Reginald Hill - Death Comes for the Fat Man

Across his mind, like a blizzard over an inland sea, raged everything that had happened since Mill Street blew up. Because he’d feared-because deep down he’d believed-that Andy Dalziel was going to die, he had ploughed forward in what to start with had seemed a simple inexorable search for certainties.

Oh what a dusty answer gets the soul…

He had made things happen, and the things he had made happen had made other things happen, so that in the end it wasn’t a simple trail that he had followed, but a track, many of whose twists and turns he had actually created. In trying to trace a line back from an effect to a cause he had himself become a cause and did not know if the place he was at now was a place that would have existed if he hadn’t started on his quest, whether he was the Red Cross Knight riding to the rescue or merely a bumbling Quixote, creating confusion rather than resolving it.

He would have liked nothing more than to pull over into a quiet lay-by, relax, and let everything that had happened, everything he knew, or thought he knew, or merely guessed at play across his mind till the surface lay still and the depths became clear.

But he just didn’t have the time.

The first cause, the death of Dalziel, was no longer a cause.

Of course he had only Wield’s secondhand account to assure him that the Fat Man had woken in his right mind. But somehow he felt certain that all was going to be well.

But how often did it happen that the starting point of a chain of action becomes irrelevant long before the end comes in sight?

No point in saying that if Dalziel had woken up the day after the explosion, he would not be here now, desperately driving like a madman toward what he fervently prayed would be nothing more than a rendezvous with a few harmless windmills.

As he got through Skipton, his car phone rang

“Yes!” he bellowed to activate the receiver.

It was Glenister. Being pissed off made her sound even more Scots than usual.

“What the hell’s going on? We’ve just heard that Youngman’s been taken. Your name was mentioned. Peter, you were warned to keep out of this stuff. Are you still playing the Lone fucking Ranger?”

Her emotion had the homeopathic effect of quelling his.

“Hi, Sandy,” he said calmly. “I was just going to ring you.”

It wasn’t a lie. As he drove along he’d found himself worrying about the consequences if something happened at Marrside and he hadn’t called his suspicions in. His conscience would find it hard to live with, his career impossible.

“Oh, good! So now I’ve saved you the bother. Fill me in!”

He said, “Let’s leave the details for later, OK? I’m on my way to Bradford. I’ve got reason to suspect a woman called Kilda Kentmore might be planning an attempt on Sheikh Ibrahim’s life. She’s five foot eight, slender, thin face, black hair. She may be armed with a sidearm, but that’s unlikely, too difficult to conceal. No, if she’s got anything, it will be a bomb, and I think it may be concealed in a camera. She’s a professional photographer, and I think she’s going to Sarhadi’s wedding reception. She won’t have been invited but he knows her, so it could be easy for her to blag her way in.”

There was a pause then Glenister said incredulously, “You’re telling me that there’s a Western suicide bomber going to Kalim Sarhadi’s wedding? Christ, Pete, these Templars are crazy but surely they’re not that crazy?”

“The others have been acting out of some half-baked notion of vigilante justice,” said Pascoe. “This one is just plain nuts. I think she wants to die. Look, it’s complicated. You need to get off the phone and alert your people. I’m pretty certain she won’t go to the mosque but she’ll head straight for the walima at the Marrside Grange Hotel, so tell your people watching the mosque to get along there straightaway. Tell them if they spot her, to approach with very great care.”

Another pause, then one stretching so long he said, “Sandy, you still there?”

Glenister said, “Peter, we’ve got no people at Marrside.”

“ What? But you said there was an observation team on-site. That’s how you knew I’d gone to see Sarhadi…oh no. Don’t tell me, this is Mill Street all over again, right? Low-scale surveillance. Don’t run up overtime over weekends and Bank Holidays. Jesus, what kind of Fred Karno outfit are you people running?”

“Pete, my bonny lad, we’re not the CIA. Those plonkers in Westminster huff and puff about national security, but when it comes to doling out the dosh, they find it more painful than passing gallstones. How close are you?”

“Ten, fifteen minutes,” said Pascoe.

“OK. I’ll get some people mobilized but you’ll definitely be first. At least you’ll recognize her. Kentmore? She related to the Kentmore your wife was on TV with?”

“Yes.”

“He mixed up with this?”

“Yes.”

“So where can we get hold of him?”

“He’s in custody. In the Mid-Yorkshire nick,” said Pascoe.

He didn’t anticipate congratulation and he didn’t get it.

“Since when, for Christ’s sake?”

“Since lunchtime.”

Again the silence, longer this time, but not ending in the expected explosion.

“Oh, Peter, Peter,” she finally breathed. “What have you been playing at?”

“I can explain, but not now, eh?”

“Of course not. After all, if you get to Marrside and find the hotel in rubble, there’s no explanation you can give which will be of any interest, is there?”

She rang off.

She was, he knew, right. If you played the Lone Ranger too long, there came a time when not even your faithful Indian companion could watch your back.

He threw back his head, yelled “Hi-yo Silver, away!” and stamped on the accelerator.

Kilda Kentmore stepped into the hotel lounge.

What she would have done if refused entry she did not know because what she planned had such an air of inevitability about it, alternatives were pointless. What did these people say? It is written. Well, they were soon going to find out that non-believers could write a fair hand too.

No sign of the Sheikh. Not a problem. Her new sense of fatalism convinced her he’d be along shortly. Meanwhile she’d get the others used to her presence.

She advanced toward the sofa-throne, smiling.

Jamila returned her smile, with added brilliance. The girl looked so happy that for a moment Kilda felt uneasy at what she was going to do to her wedding day. But only for a moment. OK, the girl’s memory of her big day was going to have a shadow over it, but at least if all went well she’d be able to share many anniversaries with her husband.

Kalim said, “Nice to see you, but what are you doing here?”

“I was in Bradford, taking some pictures. And I remembered Jamila saying it was your wedding day today, and when I passed the hotel on my way to the motorway, I thought I’d see if I could get a few shots of you arriving or leaving or something. When I realized that everyone was inside already, I should just have carried on home. Sorry.”

“No. That’s fine. Look, we’re just finishing off in here, so if you’d like to take some shots of us sitting on this silly platform, that ’ud be grand.”

Behind him, his mother viewed the newcomer narrowly, but said nothing as she continued to muster the few remaining tribute-bearing guests.

Kilda moved around the room selecting different angles and pointing her camera at the loving couple from time to time. Finally the last of the guests went into the dining room. Tottie pulled tight the drawstrings on the linen bag into which she’d been dropping all the envelopes containing checks and notes as well as the pouches of coins, flourished it triumphantly to demonstrate its weight and said, “That’s it, all gathered in except for a couple, and I’ve got them on my list. Who’s this then, Kalim?”