flecked with puff-ball clouds. It was a sky to make even a Yorkshireman less grimly affirmative than usual that it'd rain before tea-time.
Pascoe rang the Infirmary as soon as he got up. The news that Emma Shorter was off the critical list confirmed his high spirits and he essayed a few bars of 'It was a lover and his lass' in the car on the way to work.
'Morning, sir. Lovely morning,' he said to Dalziel, who looked as if he'd been kept waiting three hours.
'It'll pee down before noon,' said Dalziel. 'You'll see.'
'Hey ding a ding a ding,' said Pascoe.
'What? You're not going screwy on me, are you, lad? I began to wonder when I heard you'd brought young Clint Heppelwhite in last night. What's it all about?'
Pascoe told him and waited for comment.
'Think it'll get your mate, Shorter, off the hook, do you?' enquired Dalziel finally.
'I thought it opened up a new possibility,' said Pascoe.
'Don't you think it was one of the first things Inspector Trumper checked out? Boy-friends; who might have been having a nibble? Nothing to show.'
'Well, there's something to show now,' said Pascoe. 'I saw it.'
'So Clint's the daddy. When he finds out, what's he do?'
'He doesn't want Brian Burkill to know for a start,' said Pascoe.
'So what's he do?'
'He looks around for someone else to blame.'
'And he picks on Shorter? Why?'
'He's read his Sunday papers. He knows that doctors and dentists are easy meat for that kind of accusation.'
'And Sandra goes along with this. Why?'
'To protect him,' said Pascoe. 'And to protect herself. It makes her more the injured innocent than being screwed in the garden shed while your mam's watching telly twenty yards away.'
'It's not a bad little plot,' said Dalziel. 'Clever in a way. You've seen more of this lad than I have. Be honest. Do you think he could think up something like this?'
'It's not that complicated,' said Pascoe defiantly.
'No, come on, Peter. Do you think he could get much further than putting her in a hot bath with a bottle of gin? Or just jumping on his bike and taking off?'
'I'm not a mind-reader!' protested Pascoe.
'Aren't you? I thought that's what they paid us for,' said Dalziel. 'Any road, we've wasted enough time on this. The Haggard business is more important. You're going to talk to Arany today, are you?'
'I thought I'd put Sergeant Wield on to him while I had another chat with Toms,' said Pascoe.
'Right. I'll drop in on God Blengdale then, see what he does with someone his own size. Hop to it, lad! There's work to be done!'
Back in his own room, Pascoe buzzed Sergeant Wield but he wasn't in which was annoying as he needed to coordinate the approaches to Blengdale, Arany and Toms. Which reminded him, he'd better check where the film director was likely to be that morning.
The phone rang before he could pick it up.
He answered it abruptly.
'Hello!'
'How busy, how important you sound,' said a woman's voice. 'If only we could learn the secret of sounding so important and busy.'
'Good morning, Ms Lacewing,' said Pascoe. 'What can I do for you?'
'I should like to see you… Peter,' she answered. She made his name sound like a verb, he thought.
'You would?'
'Yes please.'
Was it imagination or were there erotic vibrations in that please?
'Could you tell me what this is about, Ms Lacewing?' he asked.
'Honestly, it would be better if we could meet.'
'All right. Why don't you come round here at…'
'Oh no. Not there. Can't you come to me? Really, it would be so much more… convenient.'
It was unmistakable now, the sensuous undertone. And interestingly, despite his certainty that she was merely mocking him, Pascoe began to feel himself aroused.
'I could call round at the surgery, I suppose. Let me have a look at my diary.'
'Now,' she said. 'It has to be now. You understand; straight away. Please. You won't regret it.'
Pascoe sat and listened to the burr of the dialling tone for a long moment. Even that sounded sexy. He replaced the receiver, rose and went to the gents. As he washed his hands he looked at himself in the mirror. A strong face without being particularly memorable. Nose long, but not excessively; eyes blue, nicely spaced; a high forehead, well-sculpted brows, good teeth in a good mouth which took on a rather Puritanical set in repose; chin perhaps a little off centre? Well, who's perfect? L 'homme moyen sensuel, that's what he saw. A good face for a policeman.
Not the face that would inspire Ms Lacewing to offer her all at eleven o'clock in the morning.
No, she was taking the piss, but that meant she really had something to tell him, so he had better go.
Carefully he combed his almost black hair and adjusted the knot in his tie.
Then, realizing what he was doing, he pressed his face close to the mirror and said, 'Who's a cheeky boy, then?' to the surprise of the uniformed inspector who had just come through the door.
'Good of you to come,' said Ms Lacewing, very businesslike. She must have been on the watch for him for she had appeared in the entrance hall as soon as he arrived.
'I hope it's worth my while,' said Pascoe.
She grinned at him sardonically. Her hands were thrust deep into the pockets of her white coat. It was unfair, thought Pascoe. Uniform made men look all the same, but women, certain women anyway, made uniform variform.
'I'm sorry about the Mae West bit,' she said. 'It was rather childish. Will you come this way?'
She led him into her surgery.
'Next door in the office I've got Alice Andover.'
'Good God,' said Pascoe. 'Is she a patient?'
'One of MacCrystal's, but that's not why she's here. No, Alice is a sort of member of WRAG.'
Pascoe looked at her in disbelief.
'But she's seventy! And more than a bit cracked!'
'Conditions which have failed to disqualify many men from leading their countries,' said Ms Lacewing acidly. 'We picketed the Calliope Kinema Club one night. Alice watched us through her window. She was in here visiting MacCrystal the following day and she spotted me. Well, we talked. She was like a child who's been shut in a city house all her life and suddenly discovers the countryside. So I invited her to a meeting. She was a knock-out! She tended to ramble a bit, all about the old days, but at least she was now starting to see them for what they were!'
'So, you destroyed an old woman's happy memories,' said Pascoe. 'Congratulations. Where do I come in?'
'We gave her a new future,' retorted Ms Lacewing. 'To continue. Alice was adamant that she didn't want her sister to know what she was doing. Nor would she become involved with any protest aimed at that man Haggard. He was her neighbour and a friend of the family, she said. That was fine, I said. But she made me promise to let her in on any other protest I was organizing.'
'Don't tell me,' said Pascoe. 'She's put itching powder in all the jock-straps at the Rugby Club.'
Ms Lacewing looked at him curiously.
'It's interesting how many men fall back on coarseness as a defence weapon,' she mused. 'It's an attempt to reaffirm the old outmoded sexist relationship, of course.'
'Great,' said Pascoe. 'Now I know what I am, can we get back to Miss Andover.'
