The high pressure moved around a bit, bringing breezes from the north.
The nights were clear and cold and early-morning mists rolled off the hills, causing havoc on the roads. Two people were killed in a fifteen-vehicle pile-up on the M62 and a golfer was struck by lightning in Brighouse. We made ten more contacts, some by telephone. It's all right having carte blanche with expenses, but driving a hundred miles for an interview takes a big chunk out of the working day. And although Nigel was running the big show there were some jobs I had to attend to myself and some I wanted to. Arresting Peter Mark Handley was one of the latter.
Handley was forty-four years old and taught physical development at Heckley High School, the local comprehensive. When I was a pupil there it was called the Grammar School and we learned PT. Because of financial constraints there was no games mistress as such for the girls, just a reluctant succession of uninterested teachers seconded to take a lesson when they could. The net ball and hockey teams suffered, as did a group of girls who showed promise as swimmers. To prevent a further slide in the school's fortunes Handley had volunteered to take over as their coach, too.
We'd heard via an older girl who spent a week with us on a job awareness programme that he subscribed to the touchy-feely training method. We held off while the school was in session to avoid rumours spreading, but as soon as the summer holiday came we put him under observation and started interviewing specially selected pupils. Another girl, called Grace and wise beyond her years, said he would give them group talks before a match, extolling the virtues of the East German training methods. He showed them videos of the 1936 Berlin Olympics and modern ones of powerful Teutonic maidens out-sprinting, out-throwing and out-swimming their mortal competitors. Winning was all, he exhorted. Any means of achieving victory was acceptable, and "Simply the Best' became the unofficial team song.
Later, after the game, when senses were heightened and bodies pleasantly tired, he would offer a lift home to his current favourite.
Let's have a McDonald's he'd insist. In the restaurant he'd tell her more about East German training methods. They had relied heavily on the administration of huge amounts of the male hormone testosterone. It was a wonder drug for female athletes, and drastically cut down on the amount of training required to achieve international status. There could be problems, of course, if the dosage wasn't carefully controlled. He' dlaugh, and suggest that some of the women shot-putters who'd taken massive doses now left the seat upright when they came out of the toilet. What it did for their sex lives he couldn't imagine, he said, studying the girl's reaction as he broached the subject.
In the car, near the end of her street, he'd park while talking about the game to hold her attention. His arm would reach across the back of the seat and his fingers caress her hair. There were other methods, he'd say. She was special. She could make it, right to the top. The coach-and-athlete relationship was like no other. The other way, his way, was the loving way. There were no tests for it, and anyway, it wasn't against the rules. His way of administering the male hormone brought only happiness and contentment, plus improved performance. And there were no unwelcome side effects. He didn't mention pregnancy.
Grace told him to go play with himself and slammed the car door so hard the mirror fell off. He never spoke to her again but she thought the next girl he approached fell for it. Two others gave us the same story but different names of girls they thought had had affairs with him.
Three refusals, three successes, not a bad score line A female DC had a quiet word with the girls we'd been told about and two of them admitted it. The other one told her to mind her own business.
Trouble was, they were over sixteen. A schoolteacher is in loco parentis, and is not expected to seduce his charges, but it ain't illegal. We could get him sacked, but that looked like all we could do. Then one of the girls mentioned the magazines he'd shown her and that was all we needed.
The good news was that his wife had left him about a month earlier.
Whether it was related we didn't know, but she'd packed two suitcases and decamped to her mother's in Wombwell, near Barnsley. We have to tread delicately in cases like this, but with her out of the way we had a free hand to go round and put the shits up him. Thursday morning, nine a.m." me, Maggie Madison, Sparky and Annette Brown swung into the street of mock-Georgian link-detached dwellings and knocked on his door. The neighbour's sprinkler was drenching the shared lawn and a sun bed was deployed, all ready for duty. The forecast said thunder and a few big cumulus clouds were sailing overhead, but it looked unlikely.
Mrs. Handley opened the door, which wasn't in the script. I stumbled through the introductions and suggested she let us in. Her husband was in the back garden, tinkering with a lawnmower.
"Peter Mark Handley?" I asked.
"Yes. Why?" He placed a screwdriver back in its toolbox and rose to his feet. He didn't look like a PT instructor. He didn't look much like anything right then, except a man whose past has caught up with him. Mrs. Handley looked at us in disbelief and didn't even ask if we'd like a cup of tea.
"We have a warrant to search your house," I said, holding the printed side towards him.
There was a green plastic picnic table nearby, with four matching chairs around it. He reached out like a blind man, feeling for a chair. When he located one he fumbled with it and lowered himself down. "Search the house?" he repeated.
"Yes." I turned to his wife. "Would you like to accompany my officers while they conduct the search?" I said.
She ignored my question. "What are you looking for?"
"We're acting on information suggesting that your husband may be in possession of pornographic material." I nodded to the other three to get on with it and invited her to accompany them again.
"What's all this about, Peter?" she asked.
"I… I don't know, love."
"I'm not leaving you alone with my husband," she said. "I want to know what this is about." We sat down. Pornography is a vague definition.
The tabloids and most women's magazines overstep the boundaries that our parents would have laid down. I'd wanted to have a chat with him, perhaps suggest he quietly hand in his resignation and take up welding or tyre-fitting. Something that wouldn't surround him with nubile young ladies. I couldn't have done his job. I wouldn't have fallen to temptation, like him, but I'd have slowly gone blind and mad.
"We didn't expect you to be here, Mrs. Handley," I said.
"I came back last night."
"Why did you leave?"
"Is that relevant?"
"I don't know. Is it?"
"You tell me. My mother suffers from Alzheimer's, with other complications. The doctor wanted to put her in a nursing home. One for geriatrics. She has four daughters, so we decided we could look after her ourselves, staying with her for a few weeks at a time. I've just done my first stint. At a guess I'll have one more to do. I can't see her lasting much longer than that."
"I'm very sorry," I said. It wasn't much to offer, but I meant it.
"Boss." I looked round and saw Maggie standing in the doorway. I walked over to her and she whispered: "Upstairs."
"Go sit with them," I told her, and went inside.
The loft ladder was down, with Dave leaning on a rung and Annette standing nearby. "Up there," she said. It was his den. His private world, his space, his fantasy land that nobody else was allowed to enter. I couldn't stand upright, even in the middle, but there was room for a cheap desk and chair, with a TV and VCR.
Mr. Handley liked pictures of young girls. Without their clothes on.
He liked to see them posing. He liked to see them struggling. But most of all he liked to see them suffering. At a guess he downloaded stuff from the Internet and dealt in imported magazines. I looked at just enough to satisfy myself it was illegal and went outside, to the real world, where the sun still shone. President Truman was right: sunshine is the best disinfectant.
His head was in his hands. Normally I would have invited Annette to launch her career with his arrest, but I didn't. "Peter Mark Handley,"
I began, "I am arresting you for the possession of material of an obscene nature. You need not say anything…"
I was aware of Mrs. Handley rising to her feet as I droned the caution. "Oh no," she sobbed. "Oh no."
The three of them took him back while I waited for her to lock up. We rode to the station in the patrol car we'd had standing by and I seated her in reception and told her about the allegations against her husband. It wasn't enough to stop her looking at me with hatred in her eyes, as if it were all my doing. Maggie would interview her, stalling for long enough for the porn squad to lift the stuff we'd found. I trudged upstairs to my office to read the mail and wondered if it was all worthwhile.
The ten ex-chemistry students we'd contacted told us very little, so we pressed on. After another couple of blips I decided to concentrate on the female members of the course, on the doubtful grounds that they'd be more likely to remember a male colleague and, being the more sentimental gender, might possibly have retained any photographs. Also, there were only sixteen of them. Also, if they went to university in 1975 they'd be in their early forties now, which is a dangerous age. I didn't mention that last reason to Sparky.
Four of them remembered Duncan, and confirmed the dropping-out bit. One supplied us with a first-year class photograph and a lady working for the EEC in Belgium said she had some pictures taken at a party. Duncan was there and he might have been with a girl, but not one with purple hair. She wasn't sure if she still had the pictures but would be going home in about six weeks. The others were all doing quite well for themselves: one had just resumed a career as an industrial journalist after rearing three kids, and we had accountants, an advertising executive, a megabyte of computer boffins and, would you believe, several chemists among the rest. All of which was about as much use to us as dog poo on the doorstep.
"How," I said to Sparky, 'do you fancy going to university?"
"I'd a feeling this was coming," was his glum reply.
"We're getting nowhere, and we need to know who the girl with purple hair was. So far, all we've established is that Duncan dropped out.
She was probably the reason but almost certainly wasn't on the chemistry course. She's the key to his problems and ours. I'll have a word with Roper-Jones, the registrar, and maybe you could have a day or two over there, going through the records of all the other students.
For Christ's sake, surely someone can remember a girl with purple hair!"
"How many is "all the other students"?"
"There's twenty-two thousand there at present, but it would be a lot fewer in '75."
"That's a relief."
"Are you OK for tomorrow?"
"University, here I come. Wait till I tell Sophie that I've got there before her."
Sophie is Dave's daughter and my goddaughter. She'll be starting university soon, when she decides where to go. Her results were brilliant and she's spoilt for choice.
"Tell you what," I said. "Why don't you take her with you?"
"You mean… to help?"
"I don't see why not, there's nothing confidential about the records.
I'll mention it to Roper-Jones; he didn't strike me as being a job's-worth. If he doesn't agree she could always explore the campus or do some shopping."
"Great. She'd like that. Do you mind if I tell her it was my idea?"
"Why?" I demanded, suspicious.
"I'm in her bad books. Not enough time to give her driving lessons."
"Well, pay for them."
"At twenty quid a throw? I should cocoa!"
When he'd gone I rang Jacquie and arranged to see her that night. I felt ready for another steak, possibly followed by a session of aroma therapy She was telling me that too much could be dangerous for my health and I was clarifying whether she meant steak or pongy massage when my other phone rang. I said a hasty goodbye and picked it up.
"Pop up, please, Charlie, if you don't mind," Superintendent Wood said.
He had Gareth Adey, my uniformed counterpart, with him, and they both had problems. Gilbert was catching hell from the Chamber of Commerce over the number of street traders who were selling fake jeans and T-shirts, and Gareth had double-booked three teenagers who were coming in to be cautioned. I agreed to do the youths and Gareth promised a blitz on the street traders at the weekend.
The first of the cautions was a young man with low aspirations; he'd been caught shoplifting at Everything a Pound. "It says here that you are a thief," I told him, waving his case notes. He was standing in front of Adey's desk in the downstairs office, his mother on a chair to one side. He nodded his agreement.
"Do you know what I normally do?" I asked him. He didn't. "Well, I'll tell you. I chase murderers, and here I am wasting time because you stole a cheap musical box from a two-bit shop." He didn't look impressed. "Yesterday," I continued, 'we had a meeting about you. Four strangers, round a table, discussing what to do with you. How do you think that makes your mother feel, eh?" He didn't know. "Don't think you've got away with it," I told him. "The reason you are not going before a court, and possibly to a young offenders' institute, is because we decided it wasn't best for you. We decided to give you another chance because we don't want you to waste your life. What do you want to do when you leave school?" He shrugged his shoulders.
"Pardon?" I said.
"Speak to the inspector," his mother told him.
"Get a job," he mumbled.
"And what chance do you think you'd have with a criminal record?"
"Dunno."
"If you had six people apply for a job and one had a record, who would you choose?"
"One of the others."
"Right."
I told him that shoplifting cost every man, woman and child in the country about a hundred pounds a year and ranted on until I reached the point where I was boring him. He signed to accept the caution and I kicked him out. His mother apologised and swore he wouldn't be back.
Funny thing is, most of them don't come back.
The other two were much the same. I made a coffee with Adey's fixings and read the contents of his in-tray. That was much the same, too.
There was a canister of a new CS gas in his drawer that he was supposed to be appraising. I gave a bluebottle on his window a quick squirt and it keeled over. Good stuff, I thought as I closed his door behind me, tears running down my cheeks.
Fresh air, that's what I needed. I cleared my desk and went for a wander round the town centre. I have a policeman's eye for detail, the unusual, and girls' legs. The warm weather certainly brings them out.
The new mall has taken a lot of trade from the high street shops, and the place is a ghost town through the week compared to a few years ago.
The only street vendor at work was O'Keefe, at his usual place near the entrance to the market. He'd be tall if he straightened his back, with a craggy complexion eroded by years of neglect and outdoor life. He plays the Old Soldier, unable to work because of the wounds he suffered in Korea and, later, the Falklands. Soon it'll be the Gulf.
His right eye has a wedge of white where it ought to be brown and it points off to the side. O'Keefe sells jeans and football shirts.
"Anything my size, O'Keefe?" I said.
"Ello, Mr. Priest," he replied warily. "Didn't recognise you for a minute. All a bit short in the leg for you, I'd say."
"How much are the Town shirts?"
"Eighteen quid to friends. Cost you forty-two at the club shop."
"Are they any good?"
"Course they're any good. They're just the same. No middle man, that's the deal."
"And no rates, rent, electricity, National Insurance and so on. How's business?"
"Pretty fair, Mr. Priest. Pretty fair. And with you?"
"Oh, you know. It's a bit like sex. Even when it's bad, it's good. Or so I'm told."
He threw his head back and guffawed, the afternoon sun shining straight into his mouth and illuminating his teeth like a row of rotting sea de fences "You're a case, Mr. Priest," he said, wiping his chin with the back of his hand.
"Anything to tell me?" I asked.
"Aye, there is sum mat
"Go on."
"Pickpockets, Saturday morning. About five of 'em. Not from round 'ere."
"I'll send someone to have a word with you. What about burglars?
Someone is causing me a lot of grief."
"You mean, these where they ties 'em up? Old folk?"
"Mm' "Nasty jobs, them, boss. I'll let you know if I 'ear owl."
"Ask around, will you? They take orders for stuff they can buy on credit cards. Expensive stuff, like sets of alloy wheels and televisions. Washing machines, anything like that."
"Right."
"One more thing," I began. "Find another pitch at the weekend. We're having a crackdown. Spread the word if you want to earn some kudos, then ask about the burglars."
"Yeah. Right. Thanks, Mr. Priest. Thanks a lot."
It was only half past four, but I went home. I rang the office, had a shower and set the alarm clock for seven. When it rattled into life I thought it was early morning and nearly went back to work, but the jaunty tones of the Archers signature tune saved me.
The prawn cocktail was tasteless, the steak dry and the mushrooms like bits of inner tube dipped in oil. I'd have preferred a curry but Jacquie doesn't eat them she has her customers to consider. She had to be up early so I forsook the massage and dropped her off at the door.
My ansa phone was beeping when I arrived home.
"Hello, Uncle Charles," a female voice said. "If you are home before midnight could you please give me a ring." It was my favourite woman:
Dave's daughter Sophie. Apart from my mother, my previous girlfriend was the only person who had ever called me Charles. Sophie had been as besotted by her as I was and almost as devastated when she left.
Calling me by my Sunday name was an echo from the past. I sat down on the telephone seat and drummed my fingers on my knee, just for a moment wishing that things were different. But they weren't. Never would be.
Never could be. I dialled Sparky's number.
His son, Daniel, answered the phone. "Is that Mustapha?" I whispered.
He said: "If you're another one who wants to know if the coast's clear, ring the flipping coast guard I said: "There were some very handsome camels for sale at the market today."
He said: "A handsome camel has a price beyond rubies."
I said: "Beyond Ruby's what?"
Sophie's voice in the background asked: "Is that Uncle Charles?" and Daniel said: "Hang on, Charlie, Slack Gladys wants a word with you," rapidly followed by: "Owl That hurt!" He's four years younger than she is and a good foot shorter.
"Hello, Uncle Charles," she began, 'did you have a nice meal?"
"Not really. That sounded painful."
"Mmm, it did hurt my hand a bit. It was me who found her."
"Found who?"
"The girl with purple hair, of course. She's called Melissa. Melissa Youngman."
I loosened my tie and unfastened the top button of my shirt. Tonight I'd gone out smart. "You found her?" I repeated.
"Just after lunch. It was looking hopeless, so I said to myself: "What course was a weirdo most likely to be on? Let's try psychology." I rang one of the postgraduates who still lives in Leeds and she remembered her, told us that she was called Melissa Youngman and had been the first punk at the university. Brilliant, aren't I?"
I told her she was. I wanted to take her in my arms and hug her, squeeze her to pieces, ask her to marry me, but she was only eighteen and there were three miles of telephone cable between us. And I'd have caught hell from her dad.
The weather was breaking. The Saturday-morning forecast said widespread thunder, followed by a cooler spell. I breakfasted early and gathered my walking gear together. I'd have a couple of hours in the office then hotfoot it up into the Dales for the afternoon. I was taking my boots out to the car when I saw him.
The spider, that is. It was a dewy morning and he was suspended in space, halfway between the wing mirror and the outside light, welding a cross-member into position. I pretended not to notice him as I sidled down the side of the house, then I struck. "Yaaah!" I yelled and severed his web with a well-aimed karate chop. He fell to the ground, rolled expertly back on to his feet with a bewildered look on his face and fled for safety under the front tyre. He was definitely having a bad hair day. I flexed my fingers but no damage was done. Weight for weight, spider web is six times stronger than high-tensile steel.
Dave came in and told me all about it over bacon sandwiches in the canteen. They'd been getting nowhere fast until Sophie had her brain wave Jeremy in the students' office had taken her to the pub for lunch, much to Dad's disgruntlement, and she'd come back with the idea about looking for courses that might attract someone with purple hair.
Psychology had been the first guess. Dave suspected it was really Jeremy who'd thought of it, but who cares? It had saved us ploughing through several thousand records.
"I'd better buy her a present," I said. "She's saved the tax payers a few quid."
"Er, not another Alice Cooper CD, if you don't mind," Dave requested.
"Why? What's wrong with Alice Cooper?"
"She's a bit noisy, for a start!"
"She! He's a he!"
"A he? Well why do they call him Alice?"
"Er, weller because Alice is an ancient abbreviation of, er, Alexander.
Who, as you know, was a Greek. The name was popular among Greek immigrants to the States at the turn of the century and handed down through the male line."
"Really?"
"Well, either that or he's living in Wonderland."
I suggested Dave collect his boots and maybe the kids and come walking with me, but his mother-in-law's windows needed a final coat of Dulux gloss and Daniel had gone off with his pals. I didn't suggest Sophie tag along and neither did he. I bought a sandwich at the cafe across from the nick and drove to Bolton Abbey, about an hour away.
The Valley of Desolation is aptly named in winter, but in good weather it's a pussycat. I watched a succession of people crossing the Wharfe on the stepping stones, waiting for someone to come to grief on the low one in the middle. There's always one, halfway across, that's wobbly or slippery; it's a law of stepping stones. They weren't going anywhere, just crossing for the hell of it, determined to get the most from their day out. I decided not to risk it and used the bridge ten yards downstream. A rumble of thunder rolled down the valley, followed by a second of silence as every face turned towards the sky and noticed the black clouds above the trees.
In twenty minutes I'd left the tourists behind and was scrambling up the path that headed out on to the fells and towards Simon's Seat, a magnificent fifteen hundred feet above sea level. No chance of altitude sickness today. As I emerged above the tree line I saw a figure ahead of me, laden down with equipment, and shook my head in amazement at the amount of stuff some people take with them. They believe all they read about the dangers of walking on the moors.
It was a young woman. She stopped, looked around her, and decided this was the place. As I approached I saw that she'd been carrying painting equipment and I made a silent apology to her. She was struggling to set up an easel while holding her artist's pad under her arm, trying not to put it on the ground.
"Can I give you some help with your easel?" I asked with uncharacteristic boldness.
"Easel!" she gasped, red-faced. "Easel! The man said it was a deck chair I laughed and took the pad from under her arm. She was quite small, with fair hair pulled back into a short ponytail, and a mischievous smile. "Lift that bit upright," I said, pointing, 'and tighten that wing nut." She did as she was told and turned the nut the right way first time, which was a surprise.
"Well done," I said. "Now pull the middle leg back and tighten that one."
"Ah!" she exclaimed. "Now I see how it's done. You're a genius." She extended the legs and locked them in position.
"I've done it before," I told her. "Maybe you're not mechanically minded."
She tested the easel for rigidity and said: "A body will remain at rest or in motion until it is acted upon by a force. Isaac Newton said that and I agree with him. You can't be more mechanically minded than that.
Do you paint?"
"A body will remain at rest until the alarm clock goes off. I said that. I went to art school, many years ago."
"In that case," she told me, looking up into my face and smiling, "I'm not starting until you are a mere speck disappearing over that hill."
"I'm going, I'm going." I hitched my bag on to my shoulder and said:
"You've picked a nice spot."
"It's lovely, isn't it? Enjoy your walk and thanks for your help."
"Thank you."
She'd given me a new zest for life. I walked too fast, buoyed by her cheerfulness, and was soon puffing. Grouse flew up around me, clucking and whirring like clockwork toys before they dived back into the heather further away, and another roll of thunder sounded ominously near.
Big blobs of rain were staining the path by the time I reached the Rocking Stone, pock marking the dust with moon craters. I made it to the top and sheltered in a shooting hut while I donned my cagoul. Then the rain came in earnest, dark and powerful, Mother Nature showing us that the brief respite we'd had was at her whim. The path outside the hut became a stream and visibility dropped to about fifty yards, grey veils sweeping over the moor, one after another. I leaned in the doorway, dry and warm, and marvelled at it.
Five minutes later the storm had moved along, leaving a rainbow and a steady shower in its wake. I had intended to do a circular route, but I wasn't sure of the way and now the paths were sloppy with mud. I pushed my arms through the straps of my rucksack and went back the way I'd come.
It had been quite a downpour. The lazy river had become a torrent and the stepping stones were submerged. The bridge hadn't been swept away, thank goodness, but all the tourists had vanished. I soon found them.
They were in the cafe, drying off. I unhooked my bag and edged between the stools and push chairs looking for an empty place at a clean table.
I walked straight past and wouldn't have recognised her if she hadn't pulled my sleeve. Her T-shirt was now covered by a blouse in an ethnic design from one of the more mountainous areas of the world, Peru or Nepal, at a guess, and her ponytail had come undone so her hair framed her face. It suited her that way. She was tucking into a giant sausage roll and a mug of tea.
"Hello," I said, unashamedly delighted to see her again. "Did you get wet?"
"Managed to dodge most of it. And you?"
"The same." I pushed my bag under a spare chair and nodded at her plate. "That looks good. Can I get you another?"
"No, one's enough, thanks."
"Tea?"
She shook her head.
One might have been enough for her but I ordered two, with a big dollop of brown sauce. I bought a large tea, without, and two iced buns with cherries on top. "I've bought you a present," I said as I sat down beside her.
"Oh, thank you," she replied, slightly surprised, and took it from the plate I offered.
"How many paintings did you do?"
"About a half, that's all. What about you? Did you have a good walk?"
"Brilliant. Not very far, but the rain added a different dimension. I don't mind it."
"It doesn't help when you're trying to paint in watercolours," she told me.
She was a schoolteacher, which I found hard to believe she looked about Sophie's age and was called Elspeth. Her number one subjects were physics and biology but she was hoping to move into the private, that is, public, sector of education and another talent on her CV would be useful, hence the painting. She'd taught for three years at a big comprehensive in Leeds without a problem, but was beginning to think her luck might run out. I confessed to being a policeman and she wanted to know if I'd ever caught a murderer. It's easier to say no.
We were in mid-chat about the Big Bang theory when she looked at her watch and said she'd better go. She had a bus to catch.
"A bus?" I repeated. "You came on the bus?" I said it as if she'd announced that she'd arrived by sedan chair.
"Fraid so. We humble teachers have difficulties with mortgages; there's nothing left for luxuries like iced buns and motor cars."
"My heart bleeds," I said. "Where do you live? I'll give you a lift."
She said no, like any properly brought-up girl would, so I showed her my ID and aCID visiting card. "Ring Directory Enquiries," I told her, shoving my mobile across to her, 'and ask for Heckley police station.
Check the number with that."
"OK, I believe you. Thanks. I'd be very grateful for a lift."
"Uh-uh," I said, shaking my head. "Ring 192 and ask."
She did as she was told and checked the number against my card. "It's the same," she agreed.
"Right, now dial it."
She dialled, and when someone answered I took the phone from her. "Hi, Arthur," I said, holding the phone so she could hear I was engaged in a conversation. "It's Charlie. I'm expecting a call, has anyone been after me?" Nobody had. I told him where I was and about the weather and rang off. I hadn't meant to frighten her, but there's no harm in it. Psychopaths and fraudsters go to great lengths to appear legitimate. A few forged cards and a false ID would mean nothing to them. I could easily have watched her get on the bus, followed her and set the whole thing up. There are some wicked people out there.
We put her stuff in the boot and drove up the hill and through the ancient archway, heater at maximum to dry our feet. When we'd exhausted the Big Bang we talked about DNA testing. She explained the difference between meiosis and mitosis to me and I told her about the retrospective cases we'd solved. I probably said a good deal more than I ought, but she was interested and I enjoyed showing off.
On the outskirts of Leeds I said: "Usually, after a walk, I indulge in a Chinese. Would you let me treat you?"
"Ah," she replied.
"Ah?" I echoed.
"I was just thinking that going home and starting to cook was a bit of a drag. Trouble is, I had a Chinese last night. How about a pizza or something, but it's my treat. We're not completely impoverished."
"Um, I'm not a great pizza fan. Do you like spicy food?"
"Yes. Love it."
"Right, then stand by for something different."
I headed towards the city centre then picked up the Chapeltown signs.
"I spent some time here," I told her. "Got to know every eating house in the district."
We went to the Magyar Club. It started life as a big house, probably for a merchant or a surgeon. It's escaped the division into bed sits that has befallen all its neighbours and now the descendants of the local Hungarian population meet here to keep their traditions alive.
The place was empty, but later would resound to balalaika music, the stomping of boots and the clashing of vodka-filled glasses.
"Do you still do the best goulash in town?" I asked the steward when he came to see who was ringing the bell.
"We certainly do, sir," he replied, only his broad face and fair hair indicating his ancestry. "Come in."
It hadn't changed at all. We had the speciality goulash and a small glass of red wine each. Elspeth didn't know whether to believe me when I told her it was Bull's Blood.
"Phew! That was good," she proclaimed, wiping her chin with the linen napkin and settling back in her chair. "How did you find out about this place?"
"I was the local bobby for a while. You get to know people in the community."
"And can anybody come in?"
"I suppose so, but we probably wouldn't fit if it was busy. You' dgive yourself away when it was your turn to do the Cossack dancing with a vodka bottle balanced on your nose."
"Ah-ah! Are you pulling my leg?"
I shook my head. "No."
I broke a few seconds' silence by saying: "You haven't mentioned your boyfriend once since I met you. Where have you left him?"
The smile slipped from her face for the briefest interval. She sighed, and told me: "Oh, I don't have one. I seem to pick all the wrong ones.
What about you? You haven't mentioned your wife at all."
She didn't mince her words. "Similar," I replied. "She left me so long ago that I think of myself as a life-long bachelor. I'd have thought that in a big school there would be some handsome geography master wanting to whisk you away from it all."
She gave a private chuckle and said: "There is one. He took me for a drink last week. He's thirty years old and teaches maths. I wasn't too disappointed when he arrived wearing a football jersey. It was blue and green stripes and looked quite nice."
"Sounds like Stanley Accrington," I interrupted.
"Stanley Accrington! Trouble was, it said something like… I don't know… Syd's Exhausts across the front, which completely ruined it.
And if that wasn't enough, when he went to the bar I saw it had a player's name across the back. Thirty years old and he was pretending to be someone else! Can you believe it?"
"He was trying to impress you," I told her. "That was his mating plumage."
"Well he can go mate with a goalpost, that's what I say. Do you know how much those jerseys cost? It's a real racket."
"Mmm," I replied. "Forty-two quid. I bought one yesterday. A red one, with number seven, Georgie Best, across the back and Phyllosan across the front."
"Oh no!" she cried, pulling her hair. "Now you are having me on! Tell me you're having me on!"
"Actually…" I leaned across the table conspiratorially, '… you can buy them at less than half price from the street traders. Except that today, in Heckley, we had a clamp down on them. Arrested them all and confiscated their stock. Or we would have done if somebody who shall be nameless hadn't tipped them off."
"Who'd do that?"
"Don't look at me!" I protested.
"You didn't!"
I winked at her. "In CID we adopt a you-scratch-my-back-and-I'll-scratch-yours policy."
"Charlie, that's awfulV We paid the derisory bill and I took her home. She lived in a nice semi in Headingley where trees grew in the street and gardens had lawns and flower borders. I parked outside and opened the boot.
"This is where the salary goes," she told me.
"You could always take in a student," I suggested.
"No way. This is my little castle. I come home at night and lock the door with all the world and its troubles on the other side."
"I know what you mean." I lifted the easel out and she took it under her arm. The artist's pad went under the other and I hooked her bag over her head. "Can you manage?" I asked as I loaded her to the gunwales.
"I think so." She looked up into my face and said: "You made it a lovely day, Charlie. Thanks for everything."
"I've enjoyed meeting you, Elspeth," I replied. "Thank you for your company. I believe it's called serendipity."
"Yes, it is. Well, thanks again." She hitched the easel further under her arm, tightened her grip on the other stuff, and walked across the pavement towards her gate. She opened it, then turned and said: "You could come in for a coffee."
I shook my head. "No, I don't think so."
"Right. Goodbye then, Charlie."
"Bye, love."
I watched her go in, struggling with her cargo, and she gave me a wave from the front window. I pushed a cassette home and drove off. It was Gavin Bryars, not quite what I needed. I ejected it and fumbled for another, something jauntier. This time it was Dylan's Before the Flood. Just right. He was launching into "Like a Rolling Stone' as I approached Hyde Park Corner. A gang of youths ambled across in front of me, even though the lights were green. I wound my window down and turned the volume to maximum. How does it FEEL! Dylan howled into the evening gloom.
I watched a wildlife programme and listened to some more music until bedtime, helped along with a can or two. Sunday I cleaned my boots and used the washing machine. Non-colour-fast cotton, my favourite cycle.
I took the car to the garage for a shampoo and set and filled it with petrol. Inside I could smell Elspeth's perfume. I hadn't noticed it yesterday. Lunch was courtesy of Mr. Birdseye and in the afternoon I vacuumed everywhere downstairs. I wasn't expecting upstairs visitors.
In the evening I took Jacquie to a pub out in the country. We sipped our halves of lager 'neath fake beams and admired the horse brasses that were probably made in Taiwan. I told her a bit about my day at Bolton Abbey, just the geography and weather, and she described the tribulations of being in business. Apparently the popular colours this winter are going to be emerald green and russet. Outside her house, before she could invite me in for coffee, I said that I wasn't going to see her again.
She took it badly. I told her that I was wasting her time and that it would be better for both of us. I didn't love her, didn't think I ever would. She cried a little and her shoulders trembled. I put my arm around them as she dried her eyes.
"Is it because I wouldn't go to bed with you?" she asked when she felt better.
"No," I answered truthfully. "Of course not."
"I would have done, you know. When I was sure."
"In that case, you were right not to."
"Would it have made a difference?"
I shook my head. "No. It would just have delayed things, that's all.
This way we can still be friends."
Trouble is, I haven't had much practice at this sort of thing. Mostly, we drift apart. Mutual consent or something. A few women had dumped me, some badly, but this was worse. All we want from life is to be happy. All we do is make each other unhappy. Tomorrow it would be back to chasing villains. You know where you stand with them.