House in the Avenue, Greenhill. Get an ambulance down here fast as you can. Woman in labour.”
“By God,” said Dalziel behind him. “This is one up for community policing. Don’t worry if your loved one snuffs it. Your modern caring force comes fully equipped with a replacement.”
“Better than that, Andy,” said Ellie who’d come running back from the Volvo. “Two for the price of one. They say she’s having twins.”
“Size of her, I’m surprised it’s not a football team,” said Dalziel. “What’s happening?”
“Her waters have broken. You’ve got an ambulance coming, I take it?”
The radio crackled and a voice said, “Control to Mr Pascoe. Re that ambulance for Moscow House, could be a delay. There’s been a pile-up in fog on the bypass and they’re a bit stretched.”
“So’s that poor girl,” said Ellie. “Look, if it’s going to take that long, I think we ought to get her into the house.”
Dalziel looked at Pascoe and raised his eyebrows.
Pascoe said, “Wouldn’t it make more sense to drive her direct to hospital?”
“If things happen as quickly as I think they might, she doesn’t want to be bouncing around in the back of a car,” retorted Ellie. “There’s light in there, isn’t there? And I’m sure it’s a damn sight warmer than out here. I’ll get it organized.”
She didn’t wait for an answer but returned to the Volvo.
“Shit,” said Pascoe.
“Best-laid plans, eh?” said Dalziel. “Not to worry. Thank your lucky stars it’s only a suicide, not a real crime scene.”
Again that certainty. But no time now for deep questioning. Pascoe headed for the house to reorganize his defences.
Maycock he relocated at the foot of the stairs.
No civilian goes up there,” he commanded. “And I mean no one. Anyone tries, stop ’em. Anyone persists, arrest ’em. Anyone resists arrest, cuff ’em. Is there any other way up there?”
“There’s a back stair,” said Sergeant Bonnick, coming down from the landing, followed by Inspector Ireland. “What’s going on, sir?”
Pascoe explained.
“You cover that back stair, Sergeant. Same as here. No one goes up it, OK? Paddy, how are they doing up there?”
“You know SOCO. Slow but sure,” said Ireland, for once not reacting to his sobriquet. “When they’ve finished the study, they want to know how much of the rest of the house you want done.”
“Tell them to have a look round upstairs,” said Pascoe. “Doubt if there’ll be much point down here once this mob start milling around, but let’s try to keep their movements as confined as possible.”
He went across the hall and flung open a door that led into a large bay-windowed drawing room full of bulky pieces of furniture shrouded in dust sheets.
“You reckon there’s something dodgy about this suicide, Pete?” said Ireland, curious why Pascoe should have any concern about the ground floor.
“I hope not,” said Pascoe. “But if there is, I don’t want things muddied by having the whole place turned into a maternity hospital. We’ll put Mrs Dunn and the others in here till the ambulance comes, and we’ll try to keep them in here.”
“You’ll be lucky,” said Ireland with the cynicism of a father of five, four of whom had been born at home. “Woman in labour, every female within half a mile becomes Queen of the Universe.”
“We’ll just have to do our best, but if any of them do have to come out, I want to know the reason why and I want a record kept of exactly where they go. And I mean exactly. Got that, Paddy?”
“Yes, sir,” said Ireland placatingly. “I’ve got it.”
He’s wondering why I’m being so neurotic, thought Pascoe.
Maybe I should wonder the same.
Does my sensitive nose really scent something untoward about this business, or am I merely reacting to Fat Andy’s ready acceptance of suicide and mysterious hints of preknowledge?
He heard voices in the hallway and went out. The birthing party had arrived, with Helen supported by her husband and Dalziel, Ellie and Kay Kafka in close attendance, and Cressida and Sue-Lynn bringing up the rear. The last two both looked pretty subdued. Not surprising. Husband and brother lying dead upstairs, sister and sister-in- law giving birth below. It was a situation to subdue a Tartar.
“In here,” said Pascoe.
“Couldn’t we get her to a bedroom?” said Dunn.
“Don’t be daft, we’d need a sodding crane,” said Dalziel.
And a cry of pain from Helen persuaded her husband.
Ellie said, “Is the water supply turned on?”
Pascoe looked at Ireland, who said, “Yes, ma’am.”
“Heaters too?”
“I’ll check.”
“Thank you.”
Pascoe looked at Ellie curiously. Those scenes in old movies where birth was accompanied by the boiling up of untold and unused gallons of water had always amused her greatly.
She said, “What?”
He said, “Nothing.”
There was a shriek from the lounge.
“I’d better get in there,” said Ellie.
As she went in, Dalziel came out.
“No place for a sensitive soul,” he said. “Out in the desert they say Bedouin lasses just drop their kids on the march, hardly break step. Don’t need fifty other women all running around like blue-arsed fleas. No word on that ambulance? Mebbe I should talk to the buggers.”
“I don’t think that would help,” said Pascoe sharply. “It will get here as soon as possible, and it will either be in time or it won’t, and all the shouting in the world won’t make any difference.”
“Don’t take it out on me, Pete.”
“Take what out?”
“Come on! Woman so pregnant she can hardly walk, shocked by news that her brother’s topped himself. Doctor and ambulance already at scene. And you let ’em both go! Not the best career move you ever made, lad.”
Pascoe reached forward and seized the Fat Man’s arm.
“You reckon?” he grated into his superior’s smiling face. “Well, here’s what I suggest we do during the few remaining moments of my beautiful career. Let’s find somewhere quiet where you can bring me up to speed on exactly what it is you know about this place and these people that I don’t, OK?”
“Thought you’d never ask,” said Andy Dalziel.
Dalziel and Pascoe sat side by side at the head of the staircase.
“Can’t credit you know nowt,” said Dalziel. “Where were you ten years back?”
“I don’t know. Where were you a week last Tuesday?”
“Not the same thing,” said Dalziel. “Anyone can lose a day, but I can tell you exactly where I was ten years ago.”
“Bully for you. But hang about… Ten years… March… I remember! I was on my back in bed.”
“Oh aye? Dirty weekend?”
“No. Ellie and I had been away to Marrakesh and I picked up hepatitis.”
“Like I said, dirty weekend.”
“Ha. Anyway, that accounts for me for a month or more. So, where were you that you can be so exact about?”
