expensive when you're working to tight profit-margins.'
'Don't let my shabby appearance fool you,' said Abbiss. 'We're doing all right. And yes, of course I could put you in touch with most of my customers. Only, quite frankly, I don't believe I want to. Can you think of anything more likely to frighten my regulars away than the thought that they're under surveillance? Good lord, I had a chap in here last week, was declared bankrupt in the afternoon and celebrated with two hundred quid's worth of booze and nosh for him and his loved ones the same night!'
'The sight of your name in the paper for impeding the police might have an even more powerful deterrent effect,' said Pascoe.
Abbiss smiled and shook his head. He was, Pascoe had concluded with rueful regret, far from being the archly gay restaurateur so beloved of straight diners. That was an act for the customers. Stella Abbiss, whatever else she needed, did not need rescuing from a mismatch.
'No,' said Abbiss. 'That would be splendid free advertising, giving the world my address and telling them how loyal I was to my patrons. In any case, Inspector, I'd need legal advice, but it does seem to me at a glance that you're on a rather sticky wicket. I mean, what reason can you give for wanting these names?'
'We want to interview witnesses,' said Pascoe.
'Witnesses of what? To what? Has a crime been committed? Certainly not here. Where then? Along the road? The accident? Mr Charlesworth, I believe, says he was driving. I can certainly vouch for Mr Charlesworth's sobriety, as can my wife. In any case, I believe he took a breathalyser test.'
'You're well informed.'
'You can thank the insinuating Mr Ruddlesdin for that,' said Abbiss. 'So what can the state of Mr Dalziel's health have to do with anything? Perhaps I should consult further with Mr Ruddlesdin.'
Oh dear, thought Pascoe. Threats, and not altogether idle. He glanced at his watch. Jesus! He ought to be back at Welfare Lane by now. And he should have rung in. As far as Wield knew, he was either at Eltervale Camp or in The Duke of York.
Abbiss suddenly smiled as if scenting a weakening resolve, and said, 'Look, Inspector, surely we're on the same side in this. We all want a good press, don't we?'
On the whole, Pascoe preferred the threats. But the decision how to play this wasn't really his.
He said, 'Well, I think my colleague, Mr Headingley, will probably want to take this matter further, Mr Abbiss, but it's up to him.'
He took the spoon out of the zabaglione pan and licked it.
'Good,' he approved. 'I must come round and try it some day. But only if it's on the menu!'
'For you, sweetie,' said Abbiss, falling back into his camp role, 'on, off, it's always on. We can't have our prettier policemen going short, can we?'
Pascoe returned to the bar, waving at Stella Abbiss en route. Headingley had succumbed and was half way through a second pint while Dalziel was finishing his third. Pascoe also noticed that his portion of game pie had disappeared and had little doubt of its destination.
He said, 'I'll leave you to it, George. I've really got to get back.'
'Hey, but my car's back at The Duke of York,' said Headingley in alarm.
'That's your problem,' said Pascoe with some irritation.
Dalziel finished his pint and said, 'No problem. You finish your business here, George, while I have another pint. Then I'll drive you back to The Duke. No need to look worried – it's not the car in the smash-up. I've borrowed one from the pool while they're looking over mine.'
This information seemed to contain little for Headingley's comfort and he looked at Pascoe like a man betrayed.
Dalziel said, 'You take care now, Peter.'
His tone was light and friendly. But Pascoe somehow felt the words were even more accusatory than Headingley's gaze and he left more irritated than ever at finding added to his already large burden of problems a quite unjustified weight of guilt.
Chapter 13
'Turn up the lights. I don't want to go home in the dark.'
'Out at Paradise Hall! And what the hell were you doing at Paradise Hall?'
It was unfortunate. Sammy Ruddlesdin, thwarted in his attempt to get hold of Pascoe to question him about the Deeks case, had rung up the DCC to 'confirm some facts' about the Westerman accident. It had clearly just been a fishing expedition, but during the course of it the DCC had rather pompously suggested that he was surprised to find the Press so interested in a road accident when a particularly unpleasant murder was being investigated. If it was such an important case, Ruddlesdin had wondered, why didn't the DCC summon his head of CID back from his sudden and local holiday? Nevertheless, he continued without pausing for an answer, the Press would be extremely interested in talking to the albeit rather junior officer in charge of the Deeks case, if only someone among his minions could be found who actually knew where he was.
Wield had been inhibited in his attempts to forewarn Pascoe by the presence of the DCC three feet behind him in the caravan.
It was not Pascoe's purpose to reveal that Dalziel had been present at Paradise Hall also, but the DCC, with a nose for evasion that would have done credit to the fat man himself, asked the question direct and Pascoe was not so stupid as to offer the lie direct. He did however essay the response obscure. ‘Well, in a manner of speaking, quite unofficially of course, and only coincidentally with Mr Headingley and myself, rather as I was there coincidentally and unofficially with Mr Headingley, during my official refreshment break that is, and quite legitimately and understandably in pursuit of, or rather in order to retrieve or recover, if he had left it there, his hat.'
'His hat!'
The monosyllable made it difficult for the DCC wholly to emulate the incredulous glissando of Dame Edith Evans's a handbag! but he won the palm for volume, and Sergeant Wield, banished to the pavement for the duration of the interview, stepped back a pace from the door at which he was eavesdropping right into the unwelcoming and unwelcome arms of Constable Hector. Behind him, smiling with the contentment of a man who has enjoyed his full entitlement of lunch-break, was the red-haired Seymour.
'Where the hell have you been?' snarled Wield, adding ferocity to features already stamped with all the lineaments of fear. Seymour stopped smiling and said rather sulkily, 'On that job you said Mr Pascoe wanted done.'
'That was years ago!' growled Wield. 'I want an explanation. Come on! Speak out.'
Behind him the caravan door-handle turned.
'For Christ's sake, keep your mouth shut!' urged the Sergeant.
Seymour raised his bushy red eyebrows in surprise at this conflict of instruction. Hector merely retained his usual expression of a man not certain between steps which way his knees bent.
The DCC emerged.
'And what's this?' he said. 'A street rally?'
He stepped down and found himself having to look up at Hector despite the constable's efforts at total testudinal retraction. The sight did not improve the ACC's temper.
'And what have you been doing?' he demanded. ‘Enjoying a five course lunch at The White Rose, is that it?'
'No, sir,' protested Hector, bridling at the unjustness of the accusation. 'Looking for stones, sir.'
'Stone's, is it? Not Ward's or Tetley'sl Not John Smith's or Sam's ? Only Stone's will do you, is that it?'
Not being a man much given to either wit or beer, Hector missed the point of the joke which was, in fairness, much disguised by the violence of its delivery.
'No, sir, it was for Mr Pascoe, sir,' stuttered Hector.
'Then it's not Stone's you should be after, son,' said the DCC. 'It's your Moet et Chandon, it's your fine champagne.'
And, much to Wield's relief, the DCC, recognizing a good exit line, strode away to his car under the suspicious
