James Hawkins: Missing: Presumed Dead

“Shit — what about the weapon?”

“We’ve got that alright. One of the uniformed lads marked and bagged it.”

“Thank Christ for a woolly with a brain.”

“A woolly, Guv’nor?”

“Metspeak for uniformed officer, Pat. I’m surprised you’ve never heard it before. Woolly … woollen uniform?”

Patterson sloughed off the information with a grunt then returned to the investigation in hand. “It’s a good job we got the confession.”

“Anything else I should know?”

“We haven’t told the old boy’s wife yet. She’s in a nursing home … Cancer,” he mouthed the word with due reverence. “She’s not got long by all accounts. We went to tell her last night but the matron said the shock might kill her so it’d be best if we left it ’til about ten this morning when the doctor does his rounds.” He checked his watch. “You’ll have plenty of time to get there.”

“Thank you very bloody much.”

“Tea — Sergeant Patterson.”

Bliss, still jumpy, jerked around in his chair and was disturbed to find that a diminutive grandmother figure in a blue polka dot dress had crept up behind him.

“Are you the new …” she began.

“Detective Inspector — Yes.” Bliss finished the sentence for her. A delicate hand shot out in greeting, and Bliss found himself rising in response.

“Daphne does a bit of cleaning up around here,” explained the detective sergeant.

“A lot of cleaning up, if you don’t mind,” said Daphne in a manicured voice, straight out of a 1940s Ealing Studio movie.

Bliss took the hand and was surprised at its softness — none of the bony sharpness of old age he’d expected.

“I suppose you’ve heard about the murder last night,” she said, peering deeply into his eyes, keeping his hand a few seconds longer than necessary. “Awful business — killing the old Major like that.”

“You knew him.”

“’Course I did — everyone round here knew him — well, did know him — if you take me meaning. I could tell you one or two …”

“You wanna watch our Daphne, Guv,” butted in a young detective wandering into the room and perching himself against a nearby desk. “She’ll have you here all day … Tell him about your UFO, Daph.”

“Shut up, you,” she said, bashing him playfully with a hastily rolled Daily Telegraph , forcing him to retreat from desk to desk.

Bliss smiled, amused at an elderly woman behaving like a playful adolescent.

“No respect,” she panted, returning. “Would you care for a cuppa, Sir?” she asked, looking up at him with smiling eyes, not at all embarrassed by her youthful exertion. She looks exhilarated, thought Bliss, noticing the slight blush in her cheeks, although there was no doubt that overall Daphne was fading — her skin, her hair, even her clothes, had a washed-out look, though her eyes were as sharp as her tongue. Despite the fact she was old enough to be his mother, Bliss found himself attracted by her eyes. She’s still got teenage eyes, he thought to himself, entranced by the sharp contrast between the burnt sienna pupils and almost perfect whites.

“Wouldn’t have the tea if I were you, Guv,” called Detective Dowding from across the room. “She makes it from old socks.”

“Don’t listen to him, chief inspector,” she said making eye contact, crinkling her crows feet into laughter lines.

“Inspector … Daphne,” he reminded her. “I’m only a lowly detective inspector.”

“You look like a Chief Inspector to me,” she said, then amused herself and the others by summing up her reasoning as she closely inspected him. “Distinguished, greying a bit around the edges; chiselled nose with an intriguing kink in the middle, puts me in mind of a boxer I dated once — he became a politician, ended up in the Lords — never stopped fighting.” She paused as an obviously pleasurable memory flitted across her face, then returned to Bliss. “Well-spoken, not like this crowd …”

“Bit of a beer belly,” interjected Bliss with an embarrassed laugh.

“Um,” Daphne sized up his midriff with an approving eye. “Comfortable, I’d say. Well fed — good home cooking — doting wife, I suspect — plenty of steak and kidney pies and rice puddings.”

He wasn’t going in that direction. “So what was this UFO?”

The detective constable laughed from a safe distance and put on a suitably alien voice. “It was real spooky, Guv — Ooooooh. Go on, Daph. Tell the boss.”

Indignation sharpened her tone. “I didn’t say it was a UFO. All I said was there were some strange lights in the field.”

“It was an extra-terrestrial abduction,” continued the detective, still in alien character, clearly enjoying tormenting her. “They grabbed an earthling and right now they’re dissecting his brain somewhere on another planet.” Pausing to laugh, he went on, “And the aliens made crop circles, didn’t they, Daph?”

“I didn’t say they were circles,” she shouted, “I just said the corn had been trampled, that’s all.” Then she stomped out muttering fiercely about how in her day people were taught to be polite to little old ladies.

“What’s that all about?” laughed Bliss.

“Somebody nicked a pig from the farm at the back of her place and drove it through the cornfield,” explained the sergeant. “She must have seen the bloke’s torches.”

“Pig rustling?” queried Bliss with surprise.

“Yeah, Guv. You ain’t in London now. They used to go for cattle, but too many people are scared of mad cow disease.”

“And chickens,” chimed in the detective across the room. “Then there was the sheep over …”

“Alright,” shouted the sergeant. “This ain’t All Creatures Great and Small , Dowding; we’ve got work to do. And you’d better start by getting Inspector Bliss and me some tea, seeing as how you’ve pissed Daphne off.”

“Daphne’s always pissed off, and always nosing and ferreting around in other people’s business.”

“You don’t like her ’cos she solves more crimes than you do,” laughed Patterson.

“That ain’t true.”

“What about that fraud job?”

“I could see it were a forgery.”

“Funny, you never mentioned it until Daph pointed it out.”

Ten minutes later, fully briefed on the murder, Bliss found himself in the cells being politely, though firmly, told to mind his business by a rather serious man with a gold-plated accent. A man who, in any other circumstances, would have been placed as a bank manager or gentleman farmer.

“Mr. Dauntsey, Sir,” Bliss had begun deferentially once he’d introduced himself. “I’m simply asking you to be reasonable. It must be obvious to you that we will find your father’s remains eventually. Wouldn’t it be sensible to tell me where we should look?”

Bliss sat back on the wooden bench studying the government grey walls — wondering how long it would take for the blandness to drive you crazy — awaiting a reply, realising the incongruity of the situation, realising that in past similar situations, confronted with obstinate prisoners holding back crucial bits of evidence, his language and demeanour had been entirely different.

“I’m afraid I really can’t tell you that, Inspector. I’m sure you understand,” said Dauntsey as if he were a lawyer claiming the information was privileged.

“But you’ve admitted slaughter …” he started in a rush, then paused, slowed down, and sanitised his words. “You’ve confessed to a homicide. What possible difference would it make if you were to tell us where to find the body?”

“None — probably. But, as I’ve already made perfectly clear to the superintendent and the sergeant, I cannot tell you.”