'I suppose they were. Are,' said Cap regarding him speculatively. 'But as to their meeting outside the group, you'd really have to ask Annabel. I know nothing about the social life of either of them.'
'I'd have thought in your line of business you'd have wanted to know quite a lot about your associates, Ms Marvell,' said Wield.
'Personal introduction is the principle I work on,' said Cap. 'Someone I trust introduces someone she trusts. That's step one. Then I watch and evaluate.'
'I gather someone who moved away introduced Miss Jacklin,' said Wield. 'So who introduced Wendy Walker?'
She hesitated. She's told Dalziel, Wield guessed, but doesn't know if he's told me. Who the heck is it they're making such a song and dance about? The Chief Constable's grannie? This flight of fancy put the real answer in his mind even as Cap Marvell said, 'It was Ellie Pascoe, your Mr Pascoe's wife.'
She looked as if she were thinking about adding something else but if she was, she changed her mind.
Saving it for pillow talk thought Wield churlishly.
'So what grade did you give Miss Walker?' he asked.
'Sorry?'
'You said you watched and evaluated,' said Wield.
'That's right. As I said, she was full of energy. And ideas. Never afraid of putting her point of view forward.'
'Which was different from yours?'
'Why do you say that?'
Wield could have answered that every other member of ANIMA had mentioned, with varying degrees of approval, Wendy's aggressive contribution to debate. Instead he said, 'Not much point in putting her viewpoint if all she were doing was agreeing with you. And she doesn't sound like the apple-for-the-teacher type.'
Cap smiled.
'Not unless it had a bomb in it,' she agreed. 'Yes, we often locked horns, from our first encounter almost. That's one of the things I liked about her. She didn't let anything pass unchallenged. Made you think about what you thought. I'm sorry. I'm talking about her in the past tense. I don't mean to.'
'It happens. So what were the main areas of disagreement?' asked Wield, adding reassuringly, 'It's all right. Anything you say won't be taken down and used in evidence against you.'
'I hope it may be used for me,' she replied. 'Wendy was hot for direct action; not just animal release, but active sabotage, serious damage, hitting the bastards where it hurts, I quote, which is in the pocket.'
'You mean arson? Explosions? That sort of thing.' Cap nodded.
'And people? How did she feel about harming people?'
'She said that those who inflicted suffering should be prepared to suffer themselves.'
'And you?'
She gazed at him with wide-eyed seriousness.
'I said that my first and only aim was to alleviate animal suffering and as long as I was in charge of ANIMA, this would be our sole guiding light.'
'Meaning no bombs or sabotage or attacks on individuals?'
'Meaning just that, sergeant.'
'And yet even though she disagreed so much, Wendy stayed?'
'Yes. Interesting that. I expect she was merely biding her time till she got a better offer.'
'Aren't we all?' said Edgar Wield. But he didn't mean it. iv
Last time Pascoe had been at Wanwood House the old woodland had been whole. Nothing he'd heard about the cordon sanitaire had prepared him for the swathe of muddy desolation now ripped through its heart.
He stopped the car and got out to take a closer look, venturing onto a duckboard, but starting back sharply as it threatened to sink beneath him.
'Morning, sir,' said a voice.
He turned to find a man in TecSec's green uniform watching him.
'Morning,' said Pascoe. 'My God, did we really send men to fight in this?'
'Aye, and things haven't changed so much in eighty years that the bastards wouldn't do it again if the need arose. Thank God for choppers and tactical nukes, say I.'
Pascoe looked with interest at this man who'd so easily picked up his reference. The scarred face returned his gaze unblinkingly.
'DCI Pascoe, here to see Dr Batty,' he said offering his hand.
'Yes, I know. They rang from the gate. Patten, in charge of security. When you didn't show in half a minute, I thought I'd better check.'
'In case I got bogged down?' smiled Pascoe disengaging from the handshake which threatened to become macho. 'You interested in the Great War? I noticed you picked up the reference to Passchendaele.'
'Kigg. General Kiggell, Haig's CGS,' said Patten. 'My granddad quoted it so often, I'd be ashamed not to know it. Ended up claiming he was actually there when it was said, but I doubt it. He was certainly in the battle though, if that's what you can call it.'
'Which mob?'
'Wyfies.'
'Good lord. My great-grandfather too.'
'Oh yes? Mebbe they knew each other,' said Patten indifferently. 'Dr Batty's in a staff meeting just now but shouldn't be long. Wondered if you'd fancy a coffee with me and my partner, Captain Sanderson.'
'That would be nice,' said Pascoe as they got into the car. 'Captain, you say. Military or naval?'
'Army. Same mob as me.'
'Would that be the Wyfies too? I mean the Yorkshire Fusiliers since the reorganization.'
'That's right,' said Patten.
'So you're keeping up the family tradition, Mr Patten?'
'Aye. Fourth generation of service. Not that it counted for much when they started slimming down. Loyalty's still one-way traffic, Mr Pascoe. Like it was at Passchendaele.'
'Wasn't it always so?'
'No. Time was when soldiers loved their generals. Alexander, Caesar, the old Iron Duke even, and he was a right bastard by all accounts. Not because they didn't get the lads killed, or have them lashed, or feed them weevils, but 'cos when push came to shove, the generals were on the same side as the men, often at their side, up to their knees in the same fucking mud.'
'And they weren't in the Great War?' prompted Pascoe.
'Not the way my granddad told it, and not the way the old boys at the reunions remembered it. Politicians and profiteers ran that show, and the generals, most on 'em, were in their pockets, or too damn scared or stupid to stand up and say, enough's enough. After it were over, they made Haig an earl and gave him a hundred thousand pounds. A florin a head for the lads who were dead, my granddad used to say. He was no politician, old Doug, but by Christ he made his profit.'
'But lessons were learned, weren't they?' urged Pascoe curious to see how far this ex-soldier's resentment would take him.
'Some,' admitted Patten grudgingly. 'Last lot were better by all accounts. But it's still the politicos that call the shots. Or when they need us, like the Falklands, it's all Land of Hope and Glory and thank you, Mr Atkins, but two minutes' peace and the word comes from Westminster, start sacking the sods.'
'Being made redundant and being sent over the top in the Salient aren't quite the same thing,' said Pascoe gently.
'Same kind of people not giving a fuck who gets hurt or how many,' retorted Patten. 'If they'd tried it on with the Iron Duke, he'd have sent the Guards down Whitehall with bayonets fixed. Nothing like cold steel when there's a shortage of backbone. Might still work too, if only we had someone with the guts to try it.'
Pascoe made a mental recording of all this for later retailing to Ellie as yet another example of how an apparently shared indignation could lead to such disparate ends. Patten's revulsion at the unnecessary slaughter of Passchendaele led him to advocate a military dictatorship! While his own led him to… what? Pacifism? No. He believed he would fight in a just cause. Antimilitarism then? Certainly, but not of the kneejerk variety. The country
