Reginald Hill - A pinch of snuff

'You too,' said Pascoe. 'You too.'

After egg and chips in the canteen, he set out for the Shorter household. He felt more uncertain now than he had previously, recognizing that his visit was more of an act of defiance than an act of friendship. But there was the element of loyalty in it, he reassured himself. And also he felt genuinely uneasy about the way Dalziel seemed to have made up his mind about the case.

The Shorters lived on Acornboar Mount. The houses there were big enough and desirable enough to have earned the area the envious sobriquet of 'Debtors' Retreat', and an extra element of 'poshness' was inherent in the 'Private Road' sign which marked the beginning of the Mount.

Pascoe parked his car by it and proceeded on foot, not out of any sense of what was socially fitting but because he knew that like most private roads, Acornboar Mount had more craters in it than the far side of the moon. Someone else seemed to have had the same idea for there was a large motor-bike parked in the lee of the thick blackthorn hedge which shut out the proles from the lush greensward of number one.

Shorter lived at twenty-seven. Pascoe enjoyed the short walk in the growing dusk with the smells of spring staining the air.

If I'd been a dentist, I could have lived up here too, he thought. Days spent peering into other people's mouths. How vile a thing was human interdependence! No way for a constabulary sociologist to be thinking. No, he should be contemplating the degree of conscious elitism inherent in building houses like these on a hill like this; or wondering what that shiny fellow there was up to.

The shiny fellow in question he had glimpsed momentarily through a gap in a beech hedge moving with furtive speed from a holly bush to a magnolia tree. The gap may have been caused by the recent passage of a body. The shininess was certainly caused by the last glimmers of daylight sliding off the man's polished black tunic.

Pascoe remembered the motor-cycle.

He also saw as he reached the gate of the house that his fit of abstraction had brought him unawares to number twenty-seven.

The shiny man was on the move again and now Pascoe realized that his erratic motions had a purpose other than merely making the best use of cover.

He was carrying two small cylinders, aerosol cans of some kind Pascoe guessed, for from the one in his left hand he was directing a fine spray on to the lawn.

Whatever it was Pascoe did not care to risk getting a faceful of it. Carefully he slipped off his shoes, removed the laces and tied them together. Next he returned along the pavement to the gap in the hedge and fastened the length of lace from one side to the other at just below knee height.

Finally he returned to the gate, stole through it bent double, tiptoed up the drive till he was behind a hydrangea bush directly opposite the intruder, and suddenly leapt three feet into the air, flinging his arms wide and screaming, 'You're under arrest!'

It was nice to have got it out of his system. The man in the leather jerkin was impressed too.

With a startled yelp he turned and fled. Pascoe followed at his leisure till the man hit the gap in the hedge at speed. Then as his quarry went sprawling forward and the aerosol cans bounced clangingly on the pavement, Pascoe accelerated into the kill. But his ingenuity proved his downfall and the laces which had brought the pursued to earth, now by their absence upended the pursuer. One of his shoes slipped flaccidly from his foot and his first stride on to the herbaceous border drove what felt like a six-inch nail through his nylon sock.

'What the hell's going on?' demanded Shorter, not sounding much like a man recently prostrated by physical assault and nervous shock.

With a groan Pascoe pushed himself upright. He had discovered that the six-inch nail was in fact a very small thorn from a recently pruned rose-bush so instead of proudly displaying the wound, he hastily pulled on his shoe to cover it.

Distantly he could hear the fugitive's fast-receding footsteps. Pascoe knew his limitations. The race was to the swift and at the moment that didn't include him.

Briefly he explained what had happened and Shorter went out and collected the cans while Pascoe replaced his shoe laces.

'John! John! What's going on?' called a panicky female voice from the open front door.

'Nothing, dear. It's all right. Better come up to the house,' invited Shorter.

In the light of the hall, the impression of their voices was confirmed, Shorter looking fit and (plasters apart) well, his wife pale and strained.

Pascoe explained again what had taken place and Shorter banged the cans down on the telephone table. One was weed-killer, the other red paint.

'The bastard!' he said.

'I don't think he had time to use the paint, but I'm afraid you might have something nasty written on the lawn in a couple of days,' said Pascoe.

'The lousy bastard. And you've let him get away!'

There's something wrong with this picture, thought Pascoe as he met Shorter's accusing glare.

'Only temporarily,' he said. 'I saw his bike and I reckon I can remember most of the number. We'll have him in half an hour.'

He picked up the phone, but Shorter's hand went over the dial.

'No,' he said.

'What?'

'I'd rather you didn't.'

'Why on earth not?'

'It's obviously linked with this other business,' said Shorter. 'You catch him, he'll be charged and up in front of the magistrate in a couple of days. I don't want that. I'm going to beat this thing, Peter, but it may take a bit longer than that and I don't want some stupid moron shooting his mouth off in court.'

'A minute ago you were cursing me for letting him get away,' observed Pascoe.

'Yes, I was. I'm sorry. It was a stroke of luck, I see now. OK? You'll forget it?'

'No,' said Pascoe. 'I won't forget it. But I'll postpone action for a while.'

'Thanks,' said Shorter. 'Emma, give Peter a drink, will you? I'll just see if I can dilute that bloody stuff with the hose pipe.'

'You'll probably just spread it,' warned Pascoe.

'At least I'll blur the letters a bit,' said Shorter as he went out.

'He seems to be in reasonable spirits now,' said Pascoe, following the woman into the lounge. It was a cold white clinical room that made Shorter's surgery seem the epitome of Edwardian fussiness by contrast. He settled gingerly into an aluminium cage dangling from the ceiling and Emma Shorter poured him a Scotch from a pyramidal decanter into a hexagonal glass.

'He's been better since he talked to his solicitor this morning,' she said, adding as she gave him his drink, 'Inspector – may I call you Peter? – Peter, I'm sorry about the pub at lunch-time. I was overwrought.'

She remained close to him, staring fixedly into his face. She didn't exactly seem underwrought now, he thought. The silence finally became too intense for him.

'Mrs Shorter,' he said.

'Please call me Emma. I don't feel up to formalities at the moment. I'm so grateful to you for coming.'

She gave him a grateful smile and he disliked himself for seeking calculation in it. But there was no denying the reality of the strain she must be under.

'I can only stay a couple of minutes,' said Pascoe. 'I just wanted to say hello. I was a bit worried, you know.'

And not without cause, he thought. Suddenly he saw himself in the witness-box being led on to make broader and broader claims about Shorter's probity and basic decency, while Dalziel glowered at him from behind the prosecutor.

'We have a good life together, you know,' said the woman, turning away abruptly as if he'd somehow disappointed her.

'Yes, yes, I'm sure you do,' agreed Pascoe, looking round the room which, notwithstanding its lack of appeal, had obviously cost a few gold fillings.