Peter Robinson: A Dedicated Man

Banks sat in silence for a moment and enjoyed his beer as he sifted the information.

‘What about Steadman’s drinking companions?’ he asked finally. ‘What kind of people are they?’

‘He brought them all together, sir,’ Weaver answered. ‘Oh, they all knew each other well enough before he moved up here, like, but Steadman was a friendly sort, interested in everything and everyone. When he wasn’t busying himself with his books or poking around ruins and abandoned mines he was quite a socializer. There’s Jack Barker, for one – you might have heard of him?’

Banks shook his head.

‘Writer. Mystery stories.’ Weaver smiled. ‘Quite good really. Plenty of sex and violence.’ He blushed. ‘Nothing like the real thing, of course.’

‘Oh, I don’t know,’ Banks said, smiling. ‘Go on.’

‘Well, sir, he’s been here three or four years. Don’t know where he started from. Then there’s Doc Barnes, born and raised hereabouts, and Teddy Hackett, local entrepreneur. He owns the garage over there, and a couple of gift shops. That’s all, really. They’re all fortyish. Well, Doc Barnes is a bit older and Barker’s in his late thirties. An odd group, when you think about it. I’ve been in here a few times when they were together and from what I could hear they’d take the mickey out of Steadman a bit, him being an academic and all that. But not nasty like. All in good fun.’

‘No animosity? You’re certain?’

‘No, sir. Not as far as I could tell. I don’t get in here as often as I’d like. Wife and kid, you see.’ He beamed.

‘Work, too.’

‘Aye, that keeps me busy as well. But I seem to spend more time giving directions to bloody tourists and telling the time than dealing with local affairs. Whoever said “If you want to know the way, ask a policeman” ought to be shot.’

Banks laughed. ‘The locals are a fairly law-abiding lot, then?’

‘On the whole, yes. We get a few drunks now and then. Especially at the Hare and Hounds disco, as I said. But that’s mostly visitors. Then there’s the odd domestic dispute. But most of our troubles come from tourists leaving their cars all over the place and making too much noise. It’s a peaceful place, really, though there’s some as would say it’s boring.’

At this point, Sergeant Hatchley walked in and joined them. He was a bulky, fair-haired and freckle-faced man in his early thirties, and he and Banks had developed a tolerable working relationship despite some early hostilities – partly due to north-south rivalry and partly to Hatchley’s having hoped for the job Banks got.

Hatchley bought a round of drinks and they all ordered steak and kidney pies, which turned out to be very tasty. Not too much kidney, as Weaver remarked. Banks complimented the landlord and was rewarded with an ambiguous ‘Aye.’

‘Anything new?’ Banks asked the sergeant.

Hatchley lit a cigarette, lounged back in his chair, rubbed a hand like a hairy ham across his stubbly cheek, and cleared his throat.

‘Nowt much, by the look of things. Old Tavistock went looking for a stray sheep and dug up a fresh corpse. That’s about the strength of it.’

‘Was it unusual for him to go poking around by that wall? Would other people be likely to go there?’

‘If you’re thinking that anyone could expect to dump a body there and leave it undiscovered for weeks, then you’re barking up the wrong tree. Even if old Tavistock hadn’t gone out looking for his bloody sheep, someone would’ve come along soon enough – hikers, courting couples.’

Banks sipped some more beer. ‘So he wasn’t dumped there for concealment, then?’

‘Shouldn’t think so, no. Probably put there just so we’d have to leg it halfway up to Crow bloody Scar.’

Banks laughed. ‘More likely so we wouldn’t know where he was killed.’

‘Aye.’

‘Why wasn’t Steadman reported missing, sir?’ Weaver cut in. He seemed anxious to restore to the chief inspector the respect that Hatchley appeared to be denying him.

Banks told him. Then he told Hatchley to get back to the Eastvale station, find out as much as he could about Steadman’s background and collate any reports that came in.

‘What about the press?’ Hatchley asked. ‘They’re all over the place now.’

‘You can tell them we’ve found a body.’

‘Shall I tell them who it is?’

Banks sighed and gave Hatchley a long-suffering look. ‘Don’t be so bloody silly. Not until we’ve got a formal identification you can’t, no.’

‘And what will you be doing, sir?’

‘My job.’ Banks turned to Weaver. ‘You’d better get back to the station, lad. Who’s in charge?’

Weaver blushed again, his pinkness deepening to crimson. ‘I am, sir. At least, I am at the moment. Sergeant Mullins is away for two weeks. Remember I told you about him, sir?’

‘Yes, of course. How many men have you got?’

‘There’s only two of us, sir. It’s a quiet place. I called some of the lads in from Lyndgarth and Fortford to help with the search. There’s not more than half a dozen of us altogether.’

‘All right, then,’ Banks said, ‘it looks like you’re in charge. Get a request for information printed up and distributed – shops, pubs, church notice board. Then start a house-to-house enquiry up Hill Road. That body wasn’t carried all the way up there, and somebody might just have seen or heard a car. At least it’ll help us narrow down the time of death. All right?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘And don’t worry. If you need any more men, let Eastvale station know and they’ll see what they can do. I’m going to pay Michael Ramsden a visit myself, but if you ask for Sergeant Rowe, I’ll make sure he has full instructions.’

He turned to Hatchley again. ‘Before you go back, go and tell the men up in the field that they’re temporarily transferred to Helmthorpe and they’re to take their orders from Constable Weaver here. They’ll probably understand the situation already, but make it official. And check the car park for a beige Sierra.’ He gave Hatchley the number of the car and handed him the keys. ‘It’s Steadman’s car,’ he added, ‘and while it doesn’t look as if he got to use it last night, you never know. It might tell us something. Get forensic on to it right away.’

‘Yes, sir,’ Hatchley said through clenched teeth as he left. Banks could almost hear the ‘three bags full, sir’ that the sergeant probably added when he got outside.

He grinned broadly at the nonplussed young constable and said, ‘Don’t mind him; he’s probably just got a hangover. Now, off you go, Weaver. Time to get to work.’

Alone, he slipped his new pipe from his jacket pocket and stuffed it with shag. Drawing in the harsh tobacco, he coughed and shook his head. He still couldn’t get used to the damn thing; maybe mild cigarettes would be better, after all.

Excited, Sally had watched Banks drive off towards the village and followed in the same direction. She stopped to pick a campion by the hedgerow and casually admired its pinkish-purple colour, the petals like a baby’s splayed fingers. Then, thinking about what she had to tell her friends, she let it drop and hurried on her way.

She had actually seen the man, the policeman in charge, close up, and had had to stifle a giggle as he lost his footing climbing the low wall. It was obvious he wasn’t used to bounding about the northern countryside; perhaps he’d been sent up by Scotland Yard. She found his gaunt angled face under the short neat black hair attractive, despite a nose that had clearly been broken and imperfectly reset. The sharp restless eyes expressed energy and power, and the little white scar beside his right eye seemed, to Sally, a mark of exotic experience. She imagined he’d got into a fight to the death with a blood-crazed murderer. Even though he seemed too short for a policeman, his wiry body looked nimble and strong.