young Patrick's finances, but clearly I was wrong.'
'You mean the Reverend Somerton's personal account was dealt with by your firm?' said Pascoe, wanting to get this clear.
'Yes. What of it?'
'Nothing,' he said, smiling. 'Just constabulary curiosity.'
But as he shook hands and took his leave, he thought of Patrick Aldermann lunching with the pretty young schoolgirl who'd come into the office on church business, and then later in the day finding an excuse to open her father's file and seeing to his delight and speculation how much he was worth.
With such dark thoughts in his mind he drove back to the station, where he was mildly surprised to find Sergeant Wield waiting for him in the company of Police Cadet Shaheed Singh.
They came together into his office, Wield as implacably and impassively ugly as ever, and Singh with his dark, handsome face uncertain whether his presence was required for praise or for punishment.
'I think you should hear what Cadet Singh's been up to, sir,' said Wield.
Pascoe heard.
'Well, well, well,' he said.
13
MASQUERADE
Andrew Dalziel was bored. His personal opinion was that if God had wanted policemen to attend conferences, He'd have fitted chairs on their backsides, and probably tongues as well.
Saturday, the opening day of the Conference, had been all right. There'd been old friends to greet, stories to exchange, drinks to be drunk. But after a Sabbath full of lectures and seminars, Dalziel was ready to join the Lord's Day Observance Society.
On Monday morning he had set out early from his hotel with a tattered old A-Z street map and found his way to Denbigh Square. He'd noted down Penelope Highsmith's address from Pascoe's file, not with any firm intention of doing anything about it, but more intuitively, in case he should feel like doing anything about it. Woodfall House proved to be a tall old building within hearing distance of Victoria Station. He studied the names under the glass panel on the portico, then turned away and headed for the Yard.
He was late, winning a couple of reproving glances. Lunch-time saw him back in Denbigh Square, but the entrance to Woodfall House only opened once and that was to admit an old man with a dog.
The reproving glances were black looks when he returned late for the afternoon session. An address on policing racially mixed communities given by a black Captain from Miami was followed by an open discussion. Dalziel joined in vigorously, doubting whether the American experience had much relevance in the UK.
'Over here,' he said, 'we're told that what we need is more blacks in the police force. Now, mebbe that's right for us, I don't know. But if it is, we'll have to use 'em differently from you lot, won't we? I mean, your police forces seem to be jammed full of blacks from what I see on the telly, but you still leave us standing for racial violence!'
There were chuckles from the groundlings, glowers from the brass. The American said, 'Excuse me, sir, but do you have much experience of racial tension in your particular area?'
'Only when there's a London team visiting,' said Dalziel. The chucklers laughed and the glowerers mouthed his name to each other and made notes.
As soon as the session finished, Dalziel was off before he could be caught. This time he was in luck. As he arrived in Denbigh Square, a taxi pulled up outside Woodfall House and a woman got out. Dalziel recognized her instantly. Mentally he'd been adding a decade and a half to his remembered image, but this tall elegant woman in clinging cords and a light cotton jacket seemed hardly to have changed at all. Even her irrepressibly curly hair was as richly black as ever. She chatted pleasantly with the taxi-driver as she paid him, then ran lightly up the steps.
Dalziel strolled slowly by, paused as though his attention had been caught by something and looked uncertainly at the woman unlocking the street door. She, attracted by his still presence, returned his gaze queryingly.
'Penny?' said Dalziel. 'It's never Penny Highsmith is it?'
'That's right,' said the woman. 'Who the hell are you?'
'Andy Dalziel,' he said. 'You probably don't recall. When you were living up in Yorkshire, you used to come down to the rugby club some Saturday nights. Andy Dalziel. We met at the rugby club.'
'Andy Dalziel? Oh God, I remember! You were a copper, weren't you? Andy Dalziel! Crikey, you've put on a bit of weight.'
'Just a bit,' said Dalziel advancing up the steps, smiling. 'You've hardly changed a bit, though. Soon as I saw you I thought, That's Penny Highsmith or her double. How're you doing?'
He extended his hand. She took it uncertainly and he shook hers energetically.
'Well, well,' he said, it's a small world. A small world.'
'Yes,' she said. 'I suppose it is.'
She stood with the key in the door, but she showed no inclination to invite him in. He remembered her as a generous, easy-going woman, but life in London was enough to rub the fine edge off anyone's sense of hospitality.
'I'm down here for a conference at the Yard,' he explained.
'The Yard?'
'Scotland Yard.'
