Stuart Pawson - Some By Fire

He smiled and shrugged, saying: "I've never been asked that before, Inspector. Is it part of your enquiry?" i' "No," I replied. "I just wondered how a person goes from school into a subject like that. It's not as if it was on the curriculum in those days is it?"

"No, I suppose you're right." He thought for a few seconds, then said:

"Girls.";

"Girls?" I repeated.

"Mmm. Girls. I'm a Freudian, Inspector. I think I went into psychology because: a) I would meet lots of girls, and b) I'd learn how to deal with them after I'd met them. Does that answer your question?"

"Did it live up to expectations?"

He bit his lower lip and nodded his head, very slowly. "I think I can safely say that it did. It bloody well did. After all," he continued, 'we're talking about Essex in the sixties. What more could a man want?

What was it that poet said? Sexual intercourse was invented in 1962, or whenever?"

"Philip Larkin," I told him. "It was 1963, after the something-something and the Beatles' first LP."

"That was it. Bloody wonderful time, it was. Did you go to university, Inspector?"

"Art college, about the same time."

"Well then, you'll know all about it, eh?"

"Can you remember any names from that period?" I asked.

He pulled his feet in, just for a moment, then relaxed again.

"Students, you mean?" he queried.

"Mm'

His right hand brushed his nose. "No, 'fraid not," he replied.

"None at all?"

He did an impression of a thinking man before shaking his head.

"I have a list of names," I told him, taking my notebook from |y jacket pocket and opening it. "I'm supposed to ask if you volunteer any, and if you can't I've to prompt you with a few. Is that OK?" "Fire away, Inspector."

"Right." I glanced down at the notebook. "Have you ever known a girl called… let me see… Melissa Youngman?"

His hand went to his mouth in a pensive gesture and he said: "No."

"Are you sure?"

"Positive."

I put a cross next to carrots on last week's shopping list. "How about Janet Wilson?"

This time there was no reaction. "No."

"Mo… Dlamini, would it be?"

He pulled his feet under the chair and said: "No."

"You never heard of any of them?"

"No." He relaxed, stretching his legs again, and said: "I'm sorry, Inspector, but it was a long time ago, and to be honest, sometimes I couldn't remember their names the next morning. Are you allowed to tell me what it's all about? It must be serious after all these years."

"Something about a fire, I believe, in an area of Leeds called Chapeltown. It's the red-light district. A witness has recently made a death-bed statement that has led us to this woman called Youngman, but we can't find her. One of my chiefs has decided I haven't enough to do already and has given me the job of looking into her background and associates. We've got to look as if we're doing something, I suppose. I'm told that she went to Essex University and one of her classmates thought she'd had an affair with a psychology lecturer. That led me to you. Believe me, Mr. Kingston, I've enough on my plate that happened last week, never mind twenty-three years ago.

I suspect that it's to do with drugs, it usually is, but nobody tells me anything." I closed my notebook and asked if there'd been much drug-taking at Essex.

It was there, he told me, for those who took the trouble to look for it. And if you were at a party the odd reefer might be passed round.

He'd dabbled, of course who hadn't? but only with pot. Nowadays he didn't know what made young people tick. He sympathised with the dilemma the police and the government were in. Legalisation wasn't the answer; that would just make a fortune for the tobacco companies.

Perhaps the new Drugs Tsar would make a difference? I stifled a smile.

We call him Twinkle, as in Twinkle, twinkle, little Tsar.

"Well," I said, 'if you've never heard of her or the others I don't think I need trouble you any longer. Thanks for your time, sir."

"Not at all," he replied. "I'm only sorry I couldn't be of more assistance."

I stood up as if to take my leave and glanced around. "Is this where you do your studying?" I asked.

"Yes. This is my little den."

I turned towards the bookcase. "May I look?"

"Of course."

They were the sort of books that are referred to by the names of the authors rather than title. Get out your Weber, Umlaut and Schnorkel rather than your The Perceived Differences Between Alternative Analytical Approaches to Clinical Investigations of Stress-Induced Syndromes in Western and Oriental Societies. They made Stone's Justices Manual sound kid's play. I let my eyes flick over them, not paying much attention, until a familiar title caught my eye.

"Read one!" I announced triumphantly, pointing to Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, which had been a cult read book in the seventies.

"Ah, the Pirsig," he said. "Did you enjoy it?"

"Mmm. Dabbled with Zen for a while afterwards. And caught up on my Plato."

"Really?"

Further along I saw some more I had read. I was definitely down among the beer-drinkers now. "And these," I told him. "The Carlos Castanedas."

"I'm impressed, Inspector," he replied. "What did you think of them?"

We had something in common. I decided to milk it for every drop. "I thought they were interesting," I told him. "Only last week I was walking in the Dales when the weather changed. I could feel it coming, long before it reached me. It was probably only a temperature drop, or the wind rustling the heather, but I thought of Castaneda and wondered about it. And I always look for a power spot before I sit down to eat my sandwiches."

"Ah! Don't we all, but we are only looking for somewhere free from sheep droppings, eh, Inspector?"

"No, I think there's more to it than that."

"You've surprised me," he said. "You're obviously a man with a great sense of the spiritual. You said you'd walked most of the hills in the Lake District, I believe?"

"Several times, over the years," I replied.

"Have you ever done any at night?"

"No, not really. Camped out near Sprinkling Tarn a couple of times in my youth. That's all."

"Well, I recommend you try it. The spirits are abroad after dark, Inspector. Late evening is a very special time. For a man with a soul it's a wonderful experience up there. Power is everywhere, believe me."

"Isn't it dangerous?"

"Only for he that cannot see."

"I'll have to try it some time. Thanks for your time, Mr. Kingston."

I walked to the door and he followed me out.

"I'll take you through the house," he said. We wandered down the path, making small talk, and entered through a back door inside a smallish porch filled with flowers I couldn't name. "Darling!" he called when we were inside.

Francesca appeared and Kingston said: "The inspector's leaving, dear. I wasn't able to help him, unfortunately." He introduced us and we shook hands.

"Perhaps you'll stay for a coffee next time, Inspector," she said.

Only if you make the offer first, I thought. We were in a passage, quite gloomy, that ran through the house. There were original watercolours of Lakes views on the walls, and in an alcove I noticed a display cabinet filled with cameras.

"Who's the photographer?" I asked, although I knew the answer.

"Oh, I used to dabble," Kingston replied.

There was a full range, from ancient folding jobs with bellows, levers and spirit levels, right up to a Nikon with a complete set of lenses.

He hadn't bothered with the latest electronic devices which did everything for you except choose the subject. Smack in the middle, with the others arranged round it, was the famous single lens reflex Hasselblad.

"I'd hardly call it dabbling," I said, 'if you used one of those."