He rose and went into the back kitchen to boil the kettle once more.
The girl sat still, inhaling the steam from her cup. She might have been twelve or thirteen, he thought, glancing at her narrow shoulders from behind.
Suddenly something about her age struck him, something so obvious he couldn't understand how he'd missed it before.
'How old's Bertie?' he asked, putting a spoonful of instant coffee into his mug.
'Twenty-four. Why?'
'And Nigel's fifteen. And they're your step-brothers?'
He made a business of pouring out the water and looking for the milk. From the outer room came a laugh.
'Oh, I see. You've just noticed. Yes, Bonnie had Bertie shortly after meeting Conrad for the first time. I think she fell for his Army uniform. She likes men in uniform, you know. She was bringing Bertie up herself when she met my father. They got married. Later I appeared. Then Daddy died and who should turn up again but Conrad. This time she was wise enough, or stupid enough, to get him to the altar. And after fifteen years of intermittent marriage, here we all are. Happy Family.'
'I see,' said Dalziel.
It took you long enough,' she said, raising her voice. 'I thought everyone could see at a glance that Bertie was a bastard.'
When he rejoined her, he saw the reason for the change in tone. Bertie was standing in the doorway. Dalziel looked at his watch. It was still only seven o'clock. They really were early risers here; Bertie was fully clothed and from the look of his shoes, he had been outside.
'Don't let me interrupt,' said the fat youth, walking through the kitchen. He shot a malignant glance at Dalziel's mug as he passed but said nothing.
'Morning,' said Dalziel. 'What's it like out? Cold?'
'Why don't you try it?' said Bertie from the other room.
'Later. This restaurant was your idea, your mam says.'
Bertie returned with some coffee and looked insolently at Dalziel.
'What's it to you?' he asked.
'Nothing much,' said Dalziel. 'I was just hearing about your financial troubles. Wondering if it was worth pouring good money after bad, that's all.'
He was quite proud of that. The statement went no further than a general comment but obviously from the glance the other two exchanged it was the particular application that had been made.
Bertie's voice was definitely politer when he replied.
'I don't know what my mother's been saying, Mr Dalziel, but you mustn't get hold of the wrong end of the stick. The work's nearly finished as you can see. A token payment of a couple of thousand would get the contractors back in twenty-four hours. There's no question of long-term difficulty. Any finance house would be keen to advance money once they saw the state of the project. It's just a matter of time.'
'Oh. If that's all well, I'm glad to hear it,' said Dalziel. 'I must have mistaken Mrs Fielding. Would anyone mind if I fried myself an egg?'
He didn't wait for an answer but set about the business with the expertise of a man long used to living alone. There was some bacon in the fridge, nice thick-cut rashers which looked as if the pig had seen the light of day in the recent past. He kept his mind off the contents of the foil wrapped package which he had found here yesterday.
'Anyone else?' he called.
Ill try one,' Louisa said, joining him at the stove. 'I can't cook for toffee.'
'I bet your mam can,' said Dalziel.
'When she wants,' said the girl. She lowered her voice. 'Don't take any notice of Bertie. He thinks all big businessmen talk like that.'
'Tell lies, you mean?' said Dalziel, cracking another egg one-handed and draining it through his fingers into the pan.
'Don't worry, love,' he went on. 'I know you can't even refund the Bowls Club their money. God knows what else I don't know about! No. If I was a finance house, I wouldn't lend you your bus-fare home.'
'Up you, then,' said Louisa angrily.
'But I am not a finance house. You know what? I'm going to have mine in a sandwich. It can be messy, but what's life without risks?'
There was no need for him to be talking like this. The first hint that he might be interested in the project had been justifiable. Even then you had to pretend there was some kind of case and he was investigating it. But this was just economic prick-teasing. He tried to retrieve his position.
If a couple of thousand's all that's needed. I can't see your problem,' he said, carefully organizing his montage of egg and bacon on a slice of thick-cut bread. 'Your grandfather's got this Gumboot thing coming; how much? Fifteen thousand dollars? Won't he chip in?'
'Not bloody likely,' said Louisa, eating her egg more conventionally, albeit straight from the pan. 'He's been against the project right from the start. He's got a little bit of money from his writing, enough to pay his way in the house, and there's not much he can do with the Gumbelow money at his age. But he'd rather flush it down the loo than let Bertie get his hands on it. That's how he sees the business, you see. Always has. Bertie's balls-up. They don't get on, you may have noticed. And now Herrie thinks Conrad would still be alive if it weren't for the business.'
Is that right?' said Dalziel.
'So any knight in shining armour willing to take a small risk for a short time would be gratefully received and bounteously recompensed.'
She looked seriously at him and ran her tongue along the prongs of her fork.
Is that right?' said Dalziel again. 'Short time.'
He bit into his sandwich. The egg burst, spread, overflowed faster than his mouth could take it in and ran down his chin.
'I said it could be messy,' said Dalziel.
8
As soon as it was a reasonable working hour, Dalziel rang the garage.
Yes, they remembered talking to Mrs Fielding. Yes they hoped to send someone out for the car that day. No, they didn't think it would take long to put it right, just a drying-out job. In fact if they'd realized it was so urgent, they'd have brought it in yesterday afternoon. Of course (full of rural indignation) their breakdown truck could get through the floods if it had to.
Dalziel arranged to ring them later in the day and replaced the phone thoughtfully. At that rate, he could be on his way by tea-time. In fact it sounded as if he could have been on his way the previous day.
He was in Hereward Fielding's room and as he left the old man met him at the door.
'I was just using the phone,' Dalziel felt constrained to explain.
'There are other phones in the house,' snapped the old man. 'But feel free. Feel free. It's Liberty Hall here.'
'Are you better?' asked Dalziel.
'Better than what? I was never unwell, if that's what you mean. I've been wet before, I'll be wet again before I go. You'll see.'
'There you are, Herrie. Why on earth have you got out of bed? You are being very silly.'
It was Bonnie, looking very stern and disciplinarian.
'You must allow me to judge what is best,' said Fielding. 'I am perfectly well. In any case those Gumbelow people are likely to turn up today and I've no intention of letting a lot of damned Americans find me in bed.'
'They may not come,' said Bonnie. 'Even if they do, you could have waited till they'd rung and said definitely.'
'The phones in this house are in such constant use that it may prove impossible for them to get through,' said Fielding, glowering at Dalziel.
'Well, sit down in here. I'll put the electric fire on and get Mrs Greave to bring you some breakfast.'
'Coffee only and a slice of toast,' said Fielding. 'That woman's not to be trusted with anything else. That meal last night. Vile!'
'The sausages weren't bad,' said Dalziel.
'You had sausages? I was given some nauseating stew of a kind hitherto undescribed in prose or poetry, unless on the occasion that Dr Henry Spooner recited the opening lines of "The Burial of Sir John Moore".'
'It was chicken fricassee and it came out of a tin,' said Bonnie. 'Now go and sit down.'
She spoke in a stern schoolmistressy tone and Fielding obeyed. Dalziel felt he too might have obeyed if addressed in such a way, but her voice when she spoke to him after closing the door behind her father-in-law was humorously long-suffering.
'No wonder Herrie and Nigel got on so well! They're both at the awkward age.'
'Don't you think you ought to try to find where the boy went?' suggested Dalziel diffidently.
'I'll make some discreet enquiries round his friends,' she answered with an unworried smile. 'Boys of that age are very contrary. Any hint of a search would just make him burrow deeper. Did Herrie say you'd been telephoning?'
'Don't you think you ought to try to find where the boy went?' suggested Dalziel diffidently.
'I'll make some discreet enquiries round his friends,' she answered with an unworried smile. 'Boys of that age are very contrary. Any hint of a search would just make him burrow deeper. Did Herrie say you'd been telephoning?'
Dalziel considered.
'No. No, he didn't,' he said. 'But I have. I rang the garage.'
'What do they think?' she asked.
'They're not certain. I'm going to ring later.' The lie came easily.
'Well, you're welcome to stay as long as you need to,' said Bonnie, if you can stick us, that is.'
'I'll bear it,' said Dalziel. 'Tell you what. I'd like to go into Orburn if anyone's going that way. One or two things I'd like to get.'
'There's a shop in the village,' said the woman.
'Do they make up prescriptions?' asked Dalziel.
'No.'
'Well then. Perhaps I can phone a taxi if no one's going that way.'
'Don't be silly. I'll drive you myself. There's always some shopping to get.'
Any hopes Dalziel had of another solitary excursion with Bonnie disappeared when he met the car outside the house at the prearranged time of nine-thirty. It was an old Rover with what looked like the remnants of a nest in the radiator grille. In the front passenger seat was Tillotson and when Dalziel opened the rear door he found himself looking at Mavis Uniff.
Bonnie drove with considerable panache, passing through the flooded bottom end of the drive with an angel's wing of water arcing away on either side. Dalziel hoped the undercarriage was in better repair than the bodywork, but no harm seemed to be done. The suspension felt as if it had given its best and was now in decline, a state understandable if corners were always taken like this. The humped railway bridge where they had stood the previous night provided another interesting obstacle, but the Rover took it like a thoroughbred 'chaser which was more than Dalziel's stomach did.