numbed by the news and in any case had no reason to believe the police wouldn't rapidly track down his connection with the dead woman. 'In the event, he overestimated their speed and efficiency, but that is a fault we must lay at the door of the investigating officers, not of my client,' said counsel for the defence blandly.
Desperately the prosecution had tried to bring the linguistic evidence forward. Gladmann had put on his best suit ('the one stained with Beluga caviare,' said Pascoe) but his hopes of fame were dashed.
The first telephone call had not been made till after the death of June McCarthy, argued defence. The first recorded telephone calls had not been made till after the death of Pauline Stanhope. To prove that any of those four voices was the same as the earlier voice would be difficult. But that was beside the case anyway. Their client was not accused of any of the subsequent killings. Indeed, although the subsequent killings had some prima facie connection in that they all involved young women, the murder of Mary Greenall or Dinwoodie must be taken as distinct and separate, unless the police had concrete proof of a connection.
The disposition of the body, suggested prosecution.
Very slight, replied defence, and explicable in terms of straightforward imitation. The Cheshire Cheese killing had been widely reported, after all.
The Judge before whom this argument had been conducted in the absence of the jury agreed with the defence. He wondered whether he should make his sternly rebuking speech about the waste of the court's time now or save it up till after the acquittal he now anticipated. In the event he never made it. After all, it was the kind of thing that the papers would quote gleefully if this fellow went out of court free and then was found in the act of strangling some other poor girl. You couldn't be too careful. Judges were not accorded the respect that was once their due, not even in obituaries.
In fact, he was surprised by how long the jury took. Five hours. Prosecution hopes had begun to rise. But then they had filed back in, twelve good men and true, and Austin Greenall had stood and regarded them neither defiantly nor fearfully, and nodded in quiet agreement as he heard the words Not Guilty.
'There he is,' said Wield suddenly.
Greenall emerged into the pale sunlight surrounded by reporters. They pressed and jostled around him but he moved steadily forward, the calm centre of their turbulence. He glanced across towards the group of policemen on the steps but did not pause. Pascoe caught the words ‘.. get back to work…' and then the slight, dapper figure passed out of earshot and, soon after, out of sight.
A reporter detached himself from the group as they passed and said, 'Any reaction, Super?'
Pascoe said quickly, 'No comment.'
The reporter said, 'How's the Choker hunt going on? Is it true you're calling in the Yard? Or is it back to the crystal ball?'
'Same thing,' grunted Dalziel. 'They'll none of 'em work without their palms being crossed with silver.'
'Can I quote that?' grinned the reporter.
'Quote what?' said Pascoe. 'Who said anything? On your bike, Beaverbrook.'
'They love it,' said Dalziel as the man moved away. 'Seeing us look stupid. Bastards.'
'We won't look so stupid if he starts up again,' said Pascoe.
'Is that likely, sir?' asked Wield.
'Pottle says that his motivation is unique in his experience. He reacted to the idea of a young girl being spoilt by marriage, with the engagement ring acting as a kind of trigger. It's quite possible, he says, that being held in custody'for so long will have effected a cure, given him time to think the thing through and come to terms with it.'
'You don't see many young girls with engagement rings in the nick,' said Dalziel.
'If he does that, perhaps it'll get to his conscience and he'll be ready to confess again,' said Wield.
'Pottle thinks not,' said Pascoe. 'He wanted to confess in the first place because of the unnecessary killings – that is, those that were motivated by simple self-preservation. It was a confession in the religious sense. He's a Catholic, remember. Pottle says I was the priest, but I turned out to be fraudulent. Real priests don't duck out of the confessional and send a curate in to finish things off. So, end of confession.'
'Fuck Pottle,' said Dalziel. ‘I’ll tell you one thing. That bugger won't pick his nose without me knowing about it from now on.'
'What?'
'Aye. Young Preece is on him now.'
'But he knows Preece,' said Pascoe.
'He'll know a lot of us before we're done,' said Dalziel. 'Day and night. ‘He’ll be after us for harassment,' protested Pascoe.
'You reckon?' Dalziel looked at Pascoe curiously. 'Bothers you, does it?'
'A lot of things bother me, sir,' said Pascoe.
'I'll tell you something, Peter,' said Dalziel seriously. 'When I started this job, there was us and them and their weapons were brutality and deceit and not-giving-a-sod and our weapon was the law. Now the law's their weapon too, or haven't you noticed? So me, I'll use whatever I can lay my hands on.'
'Even if it's something they have discarded?' wondered Pascoe.
'Dog turds, if necessary,' said Dalziel. 'I'm off. If I see them lawyers coming out, all arm in arm and friendly, I may thump their bloody wigs together.'
Pascoe and Sergeant Wield watched as the fat man stumped down the steps.
'He's not happy,' said Wield.
'I'm not happy,' said Pascoe. 'But what the hell?'
'Mr Pascoe,' said a woman's voice.
They turned. Rosetta Stanhope was standing on the step above them.
'Hello,' said Pascoe. 'I noticed you in court. You know Sergeant Wield, I think.'
'Yes,' said the woman. 'We were talking earlier.'
'I'd best be off,' said Wield. 'See you later, sir. Goodbye, Mrs Stanhope.'
They watched him go.
'Nice man,’ said the woman. 'He's been very unhappy lately, I think.'
'Has he?' said Pascoe. Somehow the states of happiness and unhappiness did not seem to relate to Wield.
'You haven't noticed? No, he wouldn't show much. He'll be happy again, eventually, I think. But you've got a lot to be happy about now, so he was telling me, Inspector. Congratulations.'
Pascoe returned the woman's warm smile and suddenly felt a surge of delight rising in him which drove out all the post-trial despondency.
'Yes,' he said. 'Thank you. Last week. It's been very worrying. Ellie, that's my wife, was ill for a long time. We thought she was going to lose it. She spent weeks in hospital. And it came a couple of weeks early.'
'It?'
'She,' said Pascoe. 'I haven't got used yet. She wasn't very heavy, but she's fine. She's OK. Perfect, I mean.'
'And your wife?'
'Fine too. She'll be all right soon. It's been very hard for her. Very hard.'
Pascoe frowned as he spoke and Rosetta Stanhope put a thin brown hand on his arm.
'Don't worry,' she said. 'It'll be all right. I feel it.'
'Yes. Well, thanks,' said Pascoe. 'And you? How are you? Look, I'm sorry. About all this, all being for nothing, I mean.'
'Don't worry,' she repeated, smiling. 'That will be all right too. I feel it. It will be as Pauline would have wanted it. I visited Dave the other day.'
'Lee? How is he? He should be out early next year if he's been behaving himself. He might even have got away with probation if it hadn't been for his record.'
'Yes, you were very gentle with him in the end. Perhaps the fat man has a bit of a conscience, eh? I explained this to Dave when he asked me to curse him.'
'Curse Mr Dalziel?' said Pascoe, amused.
'All of you, but especially Mr Dalziel,' said Rosetta Stanhope without amusement.
'But you wouldn't do it?'
