Reginald Hill - A Killing Kindness

Laughter (Dalziel’s). End of discussion.

Curiously, the one thing which seemed to confirm the superintendent’s judgement that Brenda’s death was linked with the others, he had treated most dismissively.

‘Anyone can make a phone call,’ he said. ‘And everyone’s got a Complete Shakespeare. I’ve got a Complete Shakespeare!’

Pascoe sat in his office and studied the pathologist’s reports which he knew almost off by heart. All three women had been strangled by someone using both hands. The bruising on their necks indicated this and the cartilage in the area of the voice boxes was fractured to a degree which demonstrated the violence and strength of the attack. But the pathologist was adamant that Brenda Sorby had not been quite dead when she went into the water … all over me, choking, the water, all boiling at first, and roaring, and seething … Pascoe shook the medium’s taped words out of his mind and went on with his reading.

There was a degree of lividity down the left side which was unusual for a corpse taken from the water, but it could be explained by the fact that the body seemed to have been wedged in the debris by the canal bank rather than rolling free in the current. Also (another difference from the previous cases) there was some bruising around and underneath the breasts, possibly indicating a sexual assault, though the lacerations caused by the barge propeller had made examination difficult in this area. Elsewhere there was no indication of sexual interference.

Pascoe sighed. The bloody pathologist thought he was having things difficult!

Sergeant Wield came in.

‘I just had CRO run some of those fairground people through the computer,’ he announced.

‘Including Miss Stanhope?’ said Pascoe with a grin.

Wield’s creased and pitted face had shown no response to Pascoe’s twitting about Pauline Stanhope’s interest earlier that day. Now he managed something not unlike a grimace.

‘There was a statement from her and her aunt,’ he said. ‘Like all the rest. Nothing. This was interesting, though.’

David Lee had been in the hands of the police several times. Disorderly conduct had cost him half a dozen fines. In 1974 he had been put on probation for assault on his common law wife. Assaulting a council officer in charge of an operation to move on a gypsy encampment got him three months in 1976, and this had been doubled in 1978 when he punched a police officer who was attempting to stop him from beating another common law wife.

There was also a charge of rape in 1979, dismissed by a majority verdict.

‘What made you pick on this one?’ wondered Pascoe. ‘Not because I saw him chatting up Miss Pauline, I hope?’

‘There’s half a dozen others,’ grunted Wield. ‘If you’d care to have a look.’

Pascoe thought for a moment.

‘Tell you what,’ he said. ‘If Mrs Sorby’s such an enthusiast for peering over the Great Divide, perhaps Brenda got roped in too.’

‘And might have known about the Madame Rashid connection,’ said Wield.

‘And met Dave Lee through it?’

Pascoe shook his head even as he spoke.

‘It’s stretching things a bit,’ he said. ‘Still, it’s worth checking. Fancy a trip to the fairground to have your fortune told?’

Wield shrugged.

‘I go where I’m sent,’ he said indifferently.

‘All right,’ said Pascoe. ‘It’s twelve now. Have your lunch, then with your vigour fully restored go and cross the lady’s palm with silver. Either lady, depending whether you prefer mutton or lamb.’

I must stop this nudge-nudge, wink-wink bit, he thought as Wield left. I’m getting more like Dalziel every day!

A few moments later the phone rang. It was the desk sergeant.

‘There’s a lady here wants a word with someone in CID, sir,’ he said. ‘It’s a Mrs Rosetta Stanhope.’

‘What? Oh, look, Sergeant Wield probably wants to speak with her anyway, so let him sort it out, will you? He should be on his way out any moment now.’

‘He just went past, sir. I don’t think he noticed the lady. He seemed in a bit of a hurry.’

‘The bastard!’ swore Pascoe. ‘He’s opted for lamb. All right. Wheel her in.’

Rosetta Stanhope had adapted well to her chosen environment. In her late fifties, her hair tightly permed with just the suggestion of a blue rinse, dressed in a stylishly cut grey suit with toning shoes and handbag, she could have chaired a WI meeting or opened a flower show without remark. Only a certain rather exotic stateliness of bearing and darkness of skin which even a carefully layered mask of make-up could not disguise hinted at her origins.

Her voice was quiet, a little hoarse, perhaps; the result of twisting her vocal cords to produce her spirit voices? wondered Pascoe.

‘I met your niece this morning,’ said Pascoe. ‘You haven’t seen her?’

The woman considered, then smiled.

‘You’re quite right, Mr Pascoe. I wouldn’t do Madame Rashid dressed like this. And I wouldn’t go home specially to change just to impress a policeman.’

Pascoe was impressed. She’d cut right to the source of his question. Not that you needed to be a mind-reader, but it was a good policeman’s trick.

‘So you’ve left your niece in charge of the future?’

Lucky old Wield.

‘I didn’t feel able today,’ she said. ‘I don’t put on a show. It’s got to be right.’

‘What about Pauline?’

Mrs Stanhope made an entirely un-English moue of dismissal.

‘Palmistry,’ she said. ‘It’s a craft. You learn it.’

Pascoe decided to do a bit of short-cutting himself.

‘I’m afraid you’re not going to be able to get an apology out of us, Mrs Stanhope. It wasn’t our doing. A denial perhaps, but I tried that yesterday and you saw the report. I’m sorry it upset you.’

‘I’m not upset, Inspector,’ she said. ‘Don’t heed our Pauline. She probably told you I’m not very practical? Well, I’m practical enough to let her think so. She needs to be looking after folks, that one. It probably comes of never knowing her mother.’

‘You brought her up from birth, I believe,’ said Pascoe. ‘I’m surprised she doesn’t regard you as her mother.’

‘She did when she was young, poor mite. But she had to be told. I remember she was twelve and casting her own horoscope. It wouldn’t come right. Well, it wouldn’t, would it? Bert and me had always decided to tell her. It was a relief in a way.’

‘Why so?’

‘She knew about me and my background. I’m proud of it, why not? And Bert always used to joke that he’d stolen me from the gypsies. Pauline and me, we got very close, but I could see it was a bit difficult for a young lass thinking she’d got a gypsy mother but not feeling of the blood, if you follow. It were odd, but when we told her, it seemed to bring us even closer together.’

‘And finally she joined that side of the family business?’

‘She could hardly become an engine-driver, could she, even in this age,’ said Rosetta Stanhope lightly.

‘I believe it’s possible,’ said Pascoe, suddenly picturing Thelma Lacewing wiping her brow with an oily rag on the footplate of the ‘Flying Scotsman’. ‘But tell me, Mrs Stanhope, if you’re not here to complain, threaten, or cast a gypsy’s curse, why have you come?’

She leaned forward and tapped his desk significantly. Or perhaps she was knocking on wood?

‘I was upset last night, Inspector. Not by the paper, though that irritated me. I was upset by the contact I’d made with that poor girl. I hardly slept. I just kept on getting impressions; no, not visions or words, nothing definite like that; but, like colours and feelings. I let Pauline think it was just the newspaper report that had upset me. I wanted to think things out for myself.’