'Was it Jed you wanted to see?' said Pontifex, sounding relieved. 'Any particular reason?'
'Just checking with everyone to see if they noticed anyone strange wandering around yesterday, sir,' Pascoe prevaricated.
'Of course. One of your chaps called. Wasn't able to help him, I'm afraid. You've seen how unreliable my eyesight is.'
Did he want an affidavit? wondered Pascoe.
He shook hands and took his leave. As he walked back to the cars, he asked Clark, 'Pontifex got any family?'
'Daughter. He's divorced. Wife got custody.'
'So he lives here alone. Does he help a lot of lads or is Jed Hardcastle unique?'
Clark shot him a disapproving glance.
'Nothing of that,' he said with distaste. 'There's never been a sniff of that.'
'I wasn't suggesting that,' protested Pascoe. Or was I? From the sound of it, that was still a stonable offense round Danby. Better warn Wieldy!
'I reckon truth is that Mr. Pontifex feels he owes the Hardcastles something,' continued Clark. 'Lot of folk would agree. I mean, mebbe if he'd not sold his land…'
'But there'd have been a compulsory purchase order, wouldn't there?' objected Pascoe.
'Lot of difference between compulsion and profit,' said Clark with Old Testament sternness.
'You think he might be to blame in some degree, then,' said Pascoe curiously.
'Well, if it were someone local like Benny Lightfoot took them lasses, it could be that finding himself sold up and moved out triggered something off in him that might else have laid buried till his dying day.'
From Old Testament sentence to modern psychobabble! Which was not to deny the possibility that there could be something in it. There'd been no such suggestion in the file, though. Fifteen years ago, offender profiling had been the job of a police artist, and even today in certain parts of Yorkshire it was an art practiced by consenting officers in private.
Pascoe asked, 'Was the Lightfoot cottage part of Pontifex's estate?'
'No. Belonged to old Mrs. Lightfoot, Benny's gran. Way it was, her husband had it as a tied cottage from Heck when Arthur Allgood were farming there. When old Lightfoot died, his son, Saul, took it over on the same tie.'
'That's Benny's father, the one who drowned?'
'You keep your lugs open,' said Clark, admiring again. 'That's right. After he died and Marion fell out with the old lady and took her kids off back to town, everyone thought Arthur would soon have her out of Neb Cottage to make way for a new man. But before he could do it, lo and behold, he snuffed it too! A hundred years ago I reckon they'd have had the old girl down for a witch.'
'But what difference did that make? The cottage would still be tied.'
'Oh, aye. But now it belonged to Chloe Allgood, Arthur's daughter, her that married Mr. Wulfstan. They wanted to hang on to Heck for a holiday place, but the rest of the farm they were happy to sell. Naturally Mr. Pontifex's agent were round there in a flash.'
'But Pontifex didn't get Neb Cottage?'
'No, he didn't. Turned out the old lady had got hold of Chloe right after her dad's funeral and talked her into selling her the cottage. No one knows where the money came from-word was that she'd had a bit of insurance on her man and put it all into a bigger insurance on her son. Well, she knew that long as Saul were alive, she'd be okay, but if owt happened to him, she'd be in trouble.'
'Bright lady,' said Pascoe.
'Oh, aye. You had to get up early in the morning to reach market before Mr. Pontifex,' said Clark, laughing. 'I gather he weren't best pleased when he found he weren't getting Neb Cottage along with the rest of the Heck holdings.'
'So what happened when Pontifex decided to sell up to the Water Board?'
'That were the finish, really. Most as owned their own places caved in and sold. Mr. Wulfstan at Heck made a fuss but it didn't get him anywhere. Only old Mrs. Lightfoot held out to the end, and they'd have had to send the bailiffs in to drag her out if she hadn't been taken ill with a stroke. It was all too much for her, they reckoned, the move and all that business about Benny. So they carried her off in an ambulance and 'dozed the cottage quick as maybe. It was a right shame, her ending her time in the dale like that. Something else on Mr. Pontifex's conscience, they reckoned.'
'People blamed him, did they?'
'Aye. For everything. The move. And the vanishings. They were linked in people's minds, you see. And in Mr. Pontifex's too. That's why he gave Ced Hardcastle Stirps End, which by all accounts had been as good as promised to Jack Allgood, who were twice the farmer Cedric ever was. And it didn't stop there. Like I say, when he saw what was happening between Jed and his father, he stepped in and gave the boy a job in his office.'
'After all those years?' said Pascoe. 'Now, that's a tender conscience.'
'Aye, in some folks it's like game. Longer it hangs, tenderer it gets.'
Pascoe smiled and said, 'Ever thought of writing for The Archers, Sergeant? They pay good money for lines like that.'
They had reached their cars and were standing in the shade of a tall yew tree. It was pleasantly cool here out of the skull-drilling rays of the relentless sun.
'So whither away, Sergeant?'
'Sir?' Puzzled.
'It's your patch. I'm sure round here the word is that fear wists not to evade as Clark wists to pursue.'
'Sir?' The monosyllable now bewildered.
'Where will we find the lad?' Pascoe spelled it out.
'He'll have gone home, won't he? Where else?' said Clark confidently. 'You all right, sir?'
Pascoe had suddenly reached out to rest his hand against the rough bark of the yew tree.
'Fine,' he said. 'Someone must have walked across my grave. That's what comes of standing under this churchyard tree.'
He moved briskly toward his car. He looked pale.
Clark said anxiously, 'You sure, sir?'
'Yes, I'm fine,' said Pascoe with some irritation. 'And there's work to do. Just lead the way to Stirps End with all the majestic instancy you can muster, Sergeant!'
Ellie Pascoe was breaking the speed limit even before she got out of her own short driveway. She knew it was stupid, and, by great effort of will, got to braking distance of thirty miles per hour by the end of the street. It was only four miles to the school, and the difference between driving like normal and driving like a lunatic was significant only in the soul.
Miss Martindale greeted her with a face as placidly reassuring as her voice on the phone had been.
'Nothing to worry about, Mrs. Pascoe,' she said. 'Miss Turner thought she seemed a little bit distant, that was how she put it. Reluctant to get on with anything, and downright snappy if pressed. We all have days like that, days when we'd rather spend time inside ourselves than face outside demands. Happens to me all the time. Then Miss Turner noticed Rosie was a bit hot and flushed. Probably only the start of a summer cold. Getting hot and then cooling off all the time makes children susceptible. No real problem, but better nipped in the bud with half an aspirin and the rest of the day in bed.'
The soothing flow of words relaxed Ellie, even though she recognized that this was what they were meant to do. Miss Martindale was a bright young woman. No; more than that; Ellie knew a lot of bright young women, but Martindale was one of the rare breed she felt her own genius rebuked by. Not that they were in competition, but on the rare occasions when they did lock horns, it was always Ellie who found herself giving ground.
She tried to explain this to Peter, who'd said, 'Whatever she's taking, I wonder if she'll give me the name of her supplier?'
Rosie was sitting on the edge of the bed in the small medical room, watched over by the school's massively maternal secretary. When she saw her mother, she said accusingly, 'I told you you shouldn't have made me go to school this morning.'
Thanks a bunch, kid, thought Ellie.
She gave her a hug, then examined her closely. Her face certainly looked a bit flushed.
