Reginald Hill - Under World

‘I don’t know. Who’s making them?’ said Watmough.

Pascoe was taken aback by this superficially disingenuous answer. Was Watmough trying to force from him an admission that he knew the content of the next article? If so, he could have it!

‘You are, sir,’ he said. ‘In the Challenger next Sunday.’

For a second Watmough looked blank. Then he smiled wanly and said, ‘This sounds like Dalziel.’ And then all trace of the smile faded and he looked very old and tired.

‘You must think me a very foolish man, Inspector, not to know what’s appearing under my name in a Sunday paper,’ he said.

‘I assume they wouldn’t print anything with no grounds at all,’ said Pascoe.

‘Grounds? If you call idle speculation, airy rumour, retailed over a glass of brandy after a lunch with Monty Boyle, grounds, then grounds there may be. It had never occurred to me that such things plus personal anecdote and even private animosity should provide the main colouring of my memoirs.’

He stood up. It was an effort. Pascoe glanced at the clock. It was just gone eleven. The chimes had not been triggered, he noticed.

‘I have got one or two other things …’ he began.

‘I’m sure. Can we make it later? I’ve got a few things to take care of myself. I’m not being evasive, I assure you. I will be delighted to cooperate fully in helping with your inquiries.’

The wan smile returned as he uttered the ritual phrase.

Pascoe let himself be ushered to the door. Dalziel wouldn’t like it, but for once he’d have to lump it.

‘Are you just helping out with South’s investigation again?’ asked Watmough at the door.

‘Rather more than that, sir.’ Pascoe explained the position.

‘So Mr Dalziel is in charge? Well, well. He’s by way of being a friend of yours, I believe?’

He couldn’t keep the note of interrogation, or perhaps rather of incredulity, out of his voice.

‘Yes, sir,’ said Pascoe simply, not having the two or three hours necessary for an in-depth analysis of the relationship.

‘Well, a man must be allowed to make his own friends,’ said Watmough. ‘As long as he is careful to make his own enemies too.’

How wise, thought Pascoe. If I found that in a Christmas cracker, I’d ask for my money back!

That was a Dalziel type joke, he realized even as it popped into his mind.

And he realized then what Watmough was saying to him.

‘This your missus?’ said Detective-Superintendent Dalziel.

‘Yes,’ said Gavin Mycroft.

‘Bonny lass,’ said Dalziel, putting the wedding photograph down. ‘Suits white. Nice room this, Mr Mycroft. Nice things. Someone’s got taste.’

‘We don’t all keep coal in the bath,’ said Mycroft.

His dark good-looking face was watchful, almost sullenly so. He was, Dalziel guessed, about thirty. He had already been interviewed about his encounter with Colin Farr in the pit the previous day. Dalziel had a copy of his statement in his hand.

‘Load of rubbish,’ he said, waving it.

‘What?’

‘A lot of the coal we get nowadays. Now, I can remember when I were a lad, a couple of bags of Shillbottle would keep you going nicely for a week in winter, burning hot and steady all the time and going down to nowt more than a fine brown ash. No clinker, or if there were, you’d put it in a box and ask the coalie next time he came if he’d changed his trade and gone into selling hardcore for road-making! Why is it things have got so bad, Mr Mycroft?’

‘I don’t know. Seems all right to me.’

‘You say so? But no! I mean, look at that mucky mark up your chimneybreast. You’d not have got that with the old Shillbottle we used to get before the war.’

He shook his head as he examined the discoloration left by the washing off of Colin Farr’s handprints above the fireplace.

Mycroft said, ‘We had an accident.’

‘An accident? No one hurt, I hope?’

‘No. It were nowt. Look, what can I do for you, mister?’

‘You can help me,’ said Dalziel with a broad beam. ‘This lad, Farr, you know him well?’

‘Well enough.’

‘And the dead man, Satterthwaite. You’d know him well enough too?’

‘Aye.’

‘But not well enough to like either of ’em? Or mebbe too well.’

‘Hold on? Why d’you say that?’

‘Well, one of ’em’s dead and the other’s suspected of killing him and you don’t seem much bothered either way.’

‘All right, so we weren’t that close. So what?’

‘Nothing. I’m glad. It makes you a good witness, unbiased. So I can look for the truth when I ask you this. When you saw Farr on his way out, did he look to you like a man who’d just bashed someone’s head in with an iron bar?’

‘I didn’t notice any blood if that’s what you mean.’

‘No, I mean his expression, his manner, how did they strike you?’

Mycroft considered.

‘Well,’ he said, ‘he were a bit quiet, that was all.’

‘Quiet?’

‘Aye. When I asked him what exactly was wrong with him, he didn’t give me a row or owt like that, just said his guts were bad and he felt too ill to work.’

‘Normally you’d have expected a bit of lip?’

‘From Farr? Too true!’

‘You in particular, or any deputy?’

‘Oh, any deputy,’ said Mycroft a little too quickly.

Dalziel scratched his slab of a cheek. Mycroft watched fascinated as if looking for the moving finger to start writing messages.

‘And he said he’d been looking for Satterthwaite?’ said the fat man finally.

‘It’s in my statement.’

‘Aye, but you don’t give his exact words.’

‘He said, “I can’t find that cunt Satterthwaite, so can you tell him I’m taking an early lowse.”’

‘Lowse?’

‘Knock-off.’

‘He didn’t like Satterthwaite? Or is cunt a term of endearment round here?’

Mycroft said. ‘I don’t think they got on too well.’

‘Worse than you and Farr?’

‘I never said we got on badly!’

‘So you didn’t. Why’d he not like Satterthwaite?’

‘I don’t know. They just rubbed each other up the wrong way, I suppose.’

‘And you didn’t see Satterthwaite any time after you spoke with Farr?’

‘No.’

‘Would you have expected to?’

‘Not necessarily. But I expected to see him in the Cage at knock-off.’

‘You usually left the pit together?’

‘Not specifically. But officials are entitled to ride ahead of the men.’

‘So normally you’re all in the first lift? I bet that’s popular,’ laughed Dalziel. ‘But it didn’t bother you that Satterthwaite wasn’t there?’

‘No. Something could easily have come up at the last minute.’

‘I know the feeling,’ said Dalziel. ‘All right, Mr Mycroft, what do you personally think could have happened?’

‘I’ve no idea,’ said Mycroft.

‘That’s funny,’ said Dalziel. ‘Me neither.’

He went to the sideboard and picked up the framed wedding photograph again.

‘Lovely lass, your missus,’ he repeated. ‘Tell you what, Mr Mycroft. I’m off next to your Welfare Club. Mebbe you could show me the way? And mebbe, just so’s I don’t break the law, you could even sign me in as a guest so I could try a pint if I happen to get thirsty.’

Mycroft took the photograph from him and said, ‘If you like.’

Outside Dalziel took in a deep draught of the cool air and asked, ‘Is it far?’

‘Not too far.’

‘Then let’s walk it, see the sights, eh?’

Ignoring the police car parked outside Mycroft’s semi, he set off down the road with the smaller man at his side. The police driver watched them till they were about fifty yards away, then started to drive slowly after them.