Midnight Fugue

Couldn’t even light up. Not many places you could these days. No laws to stop the bastards lighting candles though. Back in the car he guessed Fleur would be on her second or third ciggie by now, probably having a coffee from the flask. Maybe a little nip in it. No, scrub that. Not Fleur. On a job you had rules and you stuck to them. You look after the rules and the rules would look after you, she was fond of saying. And if she caught you breaking the rules–her rules–then retribution was instant and unpleasant.

Though sending him to do the tailing was breaking the rules, wasn’t it?

Maybe it meant she’d decided he wasn’t just muscle, he could think for himself.

The idea was both flattering and disturbing. It suggested a change in their relationship and he didn’t like change.

She’d laid down the terms pretty categorically in the prison visiting room as his last and longest stretch came within sight of the end. He’d served them years the hard way and he’d got respect, but at a price. Fleur was the only person he could share his horror with at the prospect of going back inside. In another sort of man this admission might have been linked to a resolve to go straight. Delay’s resolve was different.

‘I’ll top myself first,’ he said.

Fleur had given him the look that since she was nine had reversed the three years between them and made him feel like her kid brother.

‘Don’t talk stupid, Vince,’ she’d said brusquely. ‘Now, where are you going when you get out?’

He looked at her, puzzled, and said, ‘Thought I’d come home to start with…’

‘Home’s gone, Vince. I’ve got my own place now. You’re welcome to come and live with me, but there’s rules. You do things my way, in or out of the flat. Break the rules, and you’re on your own. For good. What do you say? Yes or no?’

‘Well, sounds all right, sis, but a guy’s got to have a bit of choice, know what I mean…’

‘Yes or no, Vince. That’s one of the rules. I ask yes or no, you answer yes or no.’

‘OK, keep your hair on. I mean yes.’

‘Something else. I think I can get you a job.’

‘You mean, like…a job?’ he said, horrified.

She shook her head. She knew her limitations.

‘I mean like the kind of job you’re good at,’ she said. ‘Except that what you’re not good at is not getting caught. So if you come to live with me, you come to work for me too, OK? No branching out on your own. I call the shots, OK?’

‘Is that a yes or no question, sis?’

‘It’s a yes or yes question, Vince. If you want to live with me, that is.’

‘Then yes.’

It had been a good decision. There’d been a couple of rebellious moments–like he’d said, a man’s got to have a bit of independence–but they’d all got sorted, and Fleur had one great argument to support that her way was the best way: for more than a dozen years now he’d stayed out of jail!

He put the photo back in his wallet and for want of anything better to do let his gaze focus on the open hymn book once more. Some of this stuff was dead easy, but a lot of it was like reading the instruction book for a computer.

A servant with this clause Makes drudgery divine. Who sweeps a room as for thy laws Makes that and the action fine.

What the hell was that all about?

He sighed and shifted in the chair whose wickerwork seat felt as if it was stamping its imprint on his behind. The thought took him back to his first time inside. They’d made him strip and take a shower. One of the screws had said mockingly, ‘Nice arse, Delay. You’re going to enjoy yourself here.’

It had taken half a dozen of the bastards to drag him off the man and then they’d given him a good kicking. But he’d been limping round the yard a couple of days later, an object of respect, and the screw had still been in hospital.

Happy days.

But not the kind of happy days he ever wanted to enjoy again. He was going to stay out whatever it took. And if ever Fleur’s way looked like failing, then he’d just have to do things his own way.

09.15–09.30

Normally Andy Dalziel was to diplomacy what Alexander the Great was to knots, but this time he hesitated the cutting edge and essayed a bit of gentle plucking.

‘So you and Mick, this a long-standing engagement…?’

She laughed, a pleasant sound which the old cathedral absorbed with indifference though a few human heads turned in surprise.

‘What you mean is, how long have we been at it? Or even more bluntly, were we at it while Alex was still around? Very much not. Mick stayed in touch, we became good friends, we were close, I could tell he was interested romantically, so to speak, but it wasn’t till the end of last year that I finally acknowledged that Alex was gone for good. Mick’s told me since he was starting to think I’d never get Alex out of my system. It came as a real shock to him when I finally made the break.’

Hearing himself proposing marriage must have come as a bit of a shock to Mick, too, thought Dalziel. He recalled Purdy declaring one boozy night that the only woman worth marrying was a billionairess with huge tits, no family, and an hour to live.

Still, men often change their views on marriage. He certainly had.

He went on, ‘So you left Mick a message telling him to ring you. And then…?’

‘I called my solicitor. He wasn’t all that pleased, it being Saturday. That didn’t bother me. I’m paying the louse and no doubt he’ll charge me double time.’

‘Good lass,’ said Dalziel, who loved anybody who hated lawyers. ‘What did he say?’

‘He said he wished I hadn’t told him about the photo. Because now I had, he was bound to include knowledge of it in his plea for assumption of death.’

‘Covering himself in case it later came out that Alex was alive, right?’

‘Right. I asked him what I should do. He said that all I could do was make every reasonable effort to check out the possibility that my husband was alive and living in Mid-Yorkshire. He said that on receipt of my written assurance that such an effort had been made, he would go ahead with the application.’

‘Lawyers,’ said Dalziel, ‘I’ve shit ’em. So what did you do then?’

‘I rang the Keldale Hotel.’

‘Oh aye. Why’d you do that?’

‘Because I wanted somewhere to stay when I got here and it was the obvious place. Why use the hotel’s notepaper unless it meant something?’

Mebbe because it meant nothing, thought Dalziel, nodding as if in agreement and saying, ‘And then?’

‘Then I threw some stuff in a case and drove up here,’ she said.

‘Don’t hang around, do you?’ said Dalziel admiringly.

‘You might say I’ve been hanging around for seven years,’ she said. ‘But no more. I was determined to get this thing settled one way or another.’

‘So you’d worked out a plan of action, had you?’

‘That makes it sound a bit grand,’ she said ruefully. ‘At the Keldale reception, I showed them a photo of Alex, but it didn’t ring any bells. The only other idea I had was to run a small ad in the local paper using the same photo of Alex and offering a reward to anyone supplying information. But it was too late when I got here, the newspaper office was closed.’

‘Aye, we like to keep civilized hours up here,’ said Dalziel. ‘We don’t let news happen at the weekend. So what did Mick Purdy have to say about all this? You must have got to speak with him if he’s ringing me.’

‘Yes, I did, but not till last night after I’d arrived here. When he realized where I was, he didn’t sound very happy. And when I told him what I planned to do, he sort of groaned. I wasn’t in the mood to be groaned at and I’m afraid I snapped at him. To tell the truth, I was really frustrated I couldn’t get on with things straight away.’

‘Should have thought about that afore you came rushing up here,’ said Dalziel portentously. ‘Could have saved yourself a couple of night’s rent at the Keldale, which won’t be peanuts.’

‘You know, you sound just like Mick!’ she said. ‘It ended with me saying one thing I could do on Sunday was call in at the local cop shop and check if they were any more helpful up here than down in the Met. He asked me–asked, not told–he’s a quick learner–he asked me not to do anything till he got back to me. Then he had to rush off–he was still in the middle of his op.’

‘And you sat up anxiously all night waiting for your wise fiancé to call with instructions like any good girl would,’ said Dalziel.

She smiled and said, ‘Naturally. Actually I didn’t sleep so well and I was up and out not long after seven, driving around. I know it’s stupid, but I thought I might just happen to spot Alex on the street or something.’

‘Aye, I’ve had daft buggers in the CID who thought that was how it worked,’ said Dalziel. ‘But not for long!’

He expected that to provoke a rueful smile. Instead she frowned and looked away.

‘Come on!’ he said. ‘You’re not saying you clocked him!’

She shook her head and said, ‘No. Worse than that. I thought I did. Three times. I even followed a car for half a mile, and the driver who looked like Alex turned out to be a woman!’

‘Could have had a sex change, I suppose,’ said Dalziel. ‘But I shouldn’t let it bother you, luv. Your mind can play funny tricks when you’re not quite right with yourself. Look at Blair and Bush and all them weapons of mass destruction. And I once thought I saw England win the world cup.’

That got a smile and she went on, ‘Anyway, chasing that woman driver convinced me I was acting stupidly. Then my mobile rang and it was Mick. When I told him what I’d been doing, I heard him start that groaning again, but he managed to choke it off. Then he told me about you.’

‘Let me guess,’ said Dalziel. ‘He said he had this old mucker who was top-man on the Mid-Yorkshire Force and he was just the guy to make a few discreet enquiries afore you started your public manhunt, right?’

It made some kind of sense.

She said, ‘More or less. That was about eight o’clock, He said it was probably better to contact you at home because this wasn’t really official police business. He said he was going to ring you there to put you in the picture and would let me know as soon as he’d made contact. I told him I’d wait for his call at the hotel, but soon as he rang off I stuck the address he gave me in my sat-nav and headed round to your street. I just had to be doing something, even if I thought…’

She tailed off and he said, ‘Even if you thought I’d probably be a waste of time. So, soon as Mick rang and said he’d talked to me, you were going to be ringing my bell!’

‘That’s right,’ she said. ‘Sorry. Anyway, it didn’t work out. Suddenly you shot out, jumped in your car and drove here like you were late for a funeral.’

‘How’d you know it was me?’

‘Mick described you.’

‘Oh aye. Young, slim and sexy, was it? Don’t answer that.’

Time to review the situation. He’d been weighing up the woman as she talked. A few years older than his first assessment, well into her thirties, but she knew how to use her make-up and she kept herself in good shape. Very good shape. Bright blue eyes, teeth in good nick, hair naturally blonde and elegantly arranged by someone who probably charged a tenner a snip. Clothes to match, expensive but not designer expensive, though her shoes (he knew a lot about shoes; they were Cap’s sartorial weakness and she had enough fancy footwear to kit a WAGs convention) probably cost more than he’d paid for his last suit. But then he did get very good discounts.

As for personality, she was strong. She’d come close to losing control a couple of times–and from the sound of what she’d been through, it would have been understandable if she had–but she’d managed to pull back from the brink. She was, he judged, a woman who felt that action was the better part of reaction. Heading straight up to Mid-Yorkshire in response to that weird missive, driving around the streets first thing this morning then camping outside his door, all this suggested someone who would rather do something than sit around doing nothing.

Or perhaps, rather do anything than sit around thinking about what the past had held and what the future might hold.

All in all, he liked her. Not that that signified. His life was punctuated with trouble spots that had started with women he liked.

So, decision time.

He couldn’t see what this could have to do with him professionally, but it was his day off, and having someone else’s confusions dumped in his lap had certainly diverted his mind from his own.

On the other hand, his knight-errant days were long past, he wasn’t about to rush into anything, not even for a damsel in distress as tasty as this.

He said, ‘I’ll need to brood on this a bit, luv. Tell you what, why don’t we meet up later? Have a bit of grub mebbe?’

Giving her the chance to say thanks but no thanks. If after meeting him she didn’t care to pursue the acquaintance, it was no skin off his nose.

‘OK. Where?’ she said without hesitation. So he must have made an impression. Or she were really desperate!

He said, ‘You’re at the Keldale, right? All the best folk take Sunday lunch on the terrace there. Tell them you want a table overlooking the gardens. Any problem, tell Lionel Lee, the manager, you’re meeting me.’

‘Mick said you were a man of influence,’ she said.

‘Did he now?’

For perhaps the first time since his return, he actually felt like it.

He stood up. She remained sitting.

‘You not leaving?’ he said.

‘I think I’ll sit and listen to the music for a while,’ she said.

‘Oh aye?’ Then recalling he was allegedly here because he was fond of this chase-me-round-the-houses stuff, he added, ‘You a fan of old Bach then?’

‘Very much so. Occupational hazard. I’m a music teacher by profession.’

That surprised him. His notion of music teachers involved wire-rimmed spectacles, scrubbed cheeks, and hair in a bun. Mebbe he should get out more.

‘Grand job,’ he said, overcompensating for his uncharitable thoughts. ‘Kids can’t get too much music’

‘Indeed,’ she said, smiling at him warmly. ‘It’s good to know we have music in common, Mr Dalziel. It wasn’t something I anticipated from the way Mick spoke of you. Sorry, I don’t mean to be rude…’

‘Forget to mention I was Renaissance Man, did he?’ said Dalziel. ‘Mind you, all I can recall of his tastes is he fancied himself as Rod Stewart on the karaoke.’

‘Still does. And he can’t tell a fugue from a fandango.’

She smiled again. She really was fine-looking woman. Mebbe his knight-errant days weren’t done and dusted after all. Mebbe Sir Andy of the Drooping Lance had one last tilt in him.

He began to walk away but had only gone half a dozen steps when she called after him.

‘Mr Dalziel, you didn’t say what time for lunch.’

His stomach rumbled as if in response, reminding him he’d skimped on breakfast in his rush to not be late.

‘Best make it twelvish,’ he said. ‘Folks up here stick to the old timetables, even when they’re eating at the Keldale.’

And I’d not like to get there and find the roast beef had run out, he added to himself as he turned away.

He wasn’t unhappy to be getting out of the cathedral. There was something weird and disturbing about all that space. But he had a curious fancy as he strode towards the door that he could hear little feet pattering behind him.

He glanced back and met the eager eyes of the marble dog peering over the edge of the tomb.

‘Sorry,’ he said. ‘Another time, eh? I’ll be back.’

And to his surprise he found he actually meant it.

09.31–09.40

Fleur Delay watched the fat guy come out of the cathedral.

No sign of Vince.

She guessed he’d be suffering an agony of indecision about whether to follow the man or stick with the woman. Vince didn’t do structured thinking. Rationalizing his way to a choice was like walking across hot coals.

What he might be now if she hadn’t finally decided that taking her big brother in hand was a full-time job didn’t bear thinking of. Looking back, it seemed as if she’d been training for it the whole of her life, or at least since the age of nine when their father left.

To start with there’d been a lot of self-interest here. If the family fell apart, the only route for herself was into care. Someone had to hold things together, and she didn’t need to be told that neither her mother nor her brother was up to the job. By the time she left school and got her job with The Man, she’d become expert at dealing with social workers who expressed doubts about the set-up. An hour in Fleur’s company saw them persuaded, not without relief, that she was much better qualified than they were to save her mother from the worst consequences of her own excesses while at the same time trying with diminishing success to keep her brother out of jail and making sure he had a home to return to on release.

She’d been working for Gidman for nine years when her mother finally succumbed to a cocktail of alcohol and chemicals. Not long after the funeral, the other half of her family responsibility was put on hold by a judge deciding short sharp shocks were clearly having no effect on Vince and sending him down for a ten stretch.

His behaviour inside ensured he did the full term and, as his release date approached, Fleur found herself having to work out a strategy for the future not only for her brother but herself.

During her twenty years working for The Man her reliability and ingenuity had won golden opinions and rapid advancement. But Goldie Gidman’s career horizons had widened considerably too.

Fleur’s career running The Man’s financial affairs had begun shortly before Margaret Thatcher began to run the country’s. During the Thatcher years Goldie Gidman had come to see that this brave new world of free market enterprise offered opportunities to become stinking rich that did not involve the use of a hammer. Though the implement had changed, the principle was one he was very familiar with. Human need and greed left people vulnerable. Looking west out of the East End into the City he saw a feeding frenzy that made his own localized pickings seem very Lenten fare. And so began the moves, both geographical and commercial, that were to turn him into a financial giant.

But changes of direction can be dangerous.

It was Fleur who had pointed out to him the paradox that going completely legit left him much more exposed than staying completely bent. The movement from crookedness to cleanliness meant abandoning a lot of old associates whose faces and attitudes were at odds with the new glossy picture of himself and his activities he was preparing for the world. The trick was to make sure that, as new doors opened before him, the old doors were firmly locked and double barred behind. Fortunately he’d always tidied up as he went along and those who knew enough to do him active harm were few and far between. Now once more he scrutinized them very carefully and those he had any doubts about got visited by his long-time associate and enforcer, Milton Slingsby.

No one knew more about The Man’s affairs than Fleur Delay. Her record should have made her invulnerable. But the trouble was that her professional usefulness had more or less come to an end. Her talent for manipulative accountancy had been invaluable in the days when his main financial enemies were local tax inspectors and VAT men, and she had been helpful during the early moves into legitimate areas of speculation. But as Goldie prospered, he had turned more and more to the specialized tax accountants without whom a man could sink without trace in the mazy morass of the modern markets. In their company she was like an abacus among computers, but an abacus whose database was very computer-like. While she did not believe she was in imminent danger of a visit from Sling, she knew that Goldie valued people in proportion to their usefulness, and to have dangerous knowledge but no positive function was potentially a fatal combination.

As Vince’s release date approached, she saw a way to solve both her problems.

The key was Milton Slingsby.

Sling’s great merit was total loyalty. Whatever Goldie told him to do, he did. But he was nearly ten years older than Goldie and his early years in the boxing ring, where he was renowned for blocking his opponents’ punches with his head, were starting to take their toll. With Goldie by his side telling him what to do he could function as well as ever. But now the new respectable Goldie wanted to be as far away as possible from the kind of thing he usually told Sling to do.

So Fleur brought up the subject of her brother with The Man, not as her problem, but as his opportunity. Vince, she averred, would do the heavy work. She would do the planning, guaranteeing speed, discretion, and absolutely no lines back to The Man.

To employ someone like Vince Delay directly wasn’t an option for Goldie. Such men were by their very nature likely to prove as unreliable as the unreliables they were seeing off. But the prospect of having someone as heavy as Vince under the control of someone he still trusted as implicitly as Fleur was not unattractive.

He agreed to a trial run. Three days later the designated target fell while out walking his dog and cracked his skull against a fence post with fatal results.

That had been thirteen years ago and up till now neither party had had occasion to complain about the arrangement. Rapidly the Delays’ reputation for reliability and discretion drew in offers from elsewhere, some of which Fleur accepted, though as a Gidman pensioner, she had sufficient income to permit her to be choosy. But on the increasingly rare occasions The Man put work their way, she dropped everything else and came running.

It was important to please The Man, partly for pride, principally for preservation.

Her policy of keeping Vince as ignorant of the fine detail of their jobs as possible seemed to work. As a notorious ex-con, he got pulled in from time to time when the police had nothing better to do. Silence underpinned by ignorance and bolstered by the rapid arrival of a top-class brief had kept him safe. She used these occasions to point out to The Man just how ignorant Vince was. She felt pretty certain that as long as she was around and functioning efficiently, there would be no problem.

But take her out of the picture, and she knew beyond doubt that Goldie Gidman would be running his cold eyes over her brother.

She ran her own eyes over him as finally he emerged from the cathedral and headed towards the VW.

The fat guy was already getting into his ancient Rover.

Vince slid into the passenger seat beside his sister.

‘What’s happening?’ she asked. ‘Where’s the woman?’

‘Don’t get your knickers in a twist,’ he said. ‘She’s still inside. They’re meeting up later for lunch at the hotel. Twelve o’clock. I heard them fixing it.’

The Rover was nosing its way out of the car park. She started the VW and followed it out into Holyclerk Street.

‘We not tailing Blondie any more then?’ asked Vince.

‘We’ll let the bug do that for us. If she stops anywhere, we can check it out. You keep an eye on the laptop. Now tell me exactly what you saw and heard in the cathedral.’

When he finished, she squeezed his arm and said, ‘You done well, Vince.’

He basked in the glow of pleasure that praise from Fleur always gave him.

They had left the cathedral area behind them and were approaching the main urban highway. The Rover signalled left towards the town centre. Fleur signalled right.

‘We not going to see where’s he’s heading?’ said Vince, puzzled.

‘I’m starting to have a good idea where he’s heading,’ said Fleur. ‘What I want to see is where he’s coming from.’

09.50–10.30

It was funny, thought the Fat Man. Turning up at the Station by mistake on his day off would have been disastrous, but striding in now and taking them all by surprise felt like old times.