increased. The next moment he was aware that he had made some sort of mistake. The foreman was wrenching at the door of the cab and screaming blue murder.
‘Stop, for God’s sake stop,’ he shouted. ‘There’s a woman down that hole!’
‘A what?’ said the driver, and switched off the engine.
‘A fucking woman and look what you’ve been and fucking done. I told you to stop. I told you to stop pouring and you went on. You’ve been and poured twenty tons of liquid concrete on her.’
The driver climbed down from his cab and went round to the chute where the last trickles of cement were still sliding hesitantly into the hole.
‘A woman?’ he said. ‘What? Down that hole? What’s she doing down there?’
The foreman stared at him demonically. ‘Doing?’ he bellowed, ‘what do you think she’s doing? What would you be doing if you’d just had twenty tons of liquid concrete dumped on top of you? Fucking drowning, that’s what.’
The driver scratched his head. ‘Well I didn’t know she was down there. How was I to know? You should have told me.’
‘Told you?’ shrieked the foreman. ‘I told you. I told you to stop. You weren’t listening.’
‘I thought you wanted me to pour faster. I couldn’t hear what you were saying.’
‘Well, every other bugger could,’ yelled the foreman. Certainly Wilt in Room 593 could. He stared wild-eyed out of the window as the panic spread. Beside him Motor Mechanics Three had lost all interest in Shane. They clustered at the window and watched.
‘Are you quite sure?’ asked the driver.
‘Sure? Course I’m sure,’ yelled the foreman. ‘Ask Barney.’
The other workman, evidently Barney, nodded. ‘She was down there all right. I’ll vouch for that. All crumpled up she was. She had one hand up in the air and her legs was…’
‘Jesus,’ said the driver, visibly shaken. ‘What the hell are we going to do now?’
It was a question that had been bothering Wilt. Call the Police, presumably. The foreman confirmed his opinion. ‘Get the cops. Get an ambulance. Get the Fire Brigade and get a pump. For God’s sake get a pump.’
‘Pump’s no good,’ said the driver, ‘you’ll never pump that concrete out of there, not in a month of Sundays. Anyway it wouldn’t do any good. She’ll be dead by now. Crushed to death. Wouldn’t drown with twenty tons on her. Why didn’t she say something?’
‘Would it have made any difference if she had?’ asked the foreman hoarsely. ‘You’d have still gone on pouring.’
‘Well, how did she get down there in the first place?’ said the driver, to change the subject.
‘How the fuck would I know. She must have fallen…’
‘And pulled that plywood sheet over her, I suppose,’ said Barney, who clearly had a practical turn of mind. ‘She was bloody murdered.’
‘We all know that,’ squawked the foreman. ‘By Chris here. I told him to stop pouring. You heard me. Everyone for half a mile must have heard me but not Chris. Oh, no, he has to go on–’
‘She was murdered before she was put down the hole,’ said Barney. ‘That wooden cover wouldn’t have been there if she had fallen down herself.’
The foreman wiped his face with a handkerchief and looked at the square of plywood. ‘There is that to it,’ he muttered. ‘No one can say we didn’t take proper safety precautions. You’re right. She must have been murdered. Oh, my God!’
‘Sex crime, like as not,’ said Barney. ‘Raped and strangled her. That or someone’s
