'Maybe,' said Pascoe. 'But Dave Lee doesn't fit into this phone-call pattern at all.'
'So mebbe it means nothing.'
'And Pottle's reading of the Choker doesn't fit Lee either.'
'Pottle! What's he know?'
'He's been right before.'
'So had Pontius Pilate. Are you going to be all night?'
He clattered down the stairs ahead of Pascoe, but pulled up sharp at the swing-doors which opened into the main foyer of the station and peered cautiously through the central crack. When Pascoe joined him the fat man put a huge finger cautiously to his lips and motioned his subordinate to peep through.
At the desk a youngish woman in a grey dress was talking to the sergeant.
'If I am not to be allowed access to Mr and Mrs Lee wherever they are, then I insist on talking to the officer in charge of the case,' she said in a clear, angry voice.
'I'm not sure if he's in, Miss Pritchard,' said the sergeant.
'Then you'd better find out,' insisted the woman.
Reluctantly the sergeant picked up his telephone.
'Lacewing's solicitor?' whispered Pascoe. 'Aye. Come on, lad, before she starts searching the building.'
And chortling gleefully, Dalziel led the way to the rear exit.
Chapter 18
Shortly before seven P.M. Dave Lee was wheeled off to the operating theatre. Only the fact that it was Friday evening and the consultant treasured his Saturday morning golf prevented the gypsy from being put into storage overnight, or so the ward sister assured Wield. The sergeant was pleased to have the man anaesthetized so that he could relax his vigilance. He went down to the hospital canteen but changed his mind when he spotted Mrs Lee with her attendant WPC, both tucking into healthy portions of pie, peas and chips. Instead he went for a stroll outside to get the smell of medicine and illness out of his nostrils.
His perambulations took him past the entrance to C ASUALTY as an ambulance drew up. He paused and watched with professional interest the unhurried efficiency with which the attendants got the incoming patient out of the vehicle and on to the trolley. As the man was wheeled by him, the sergeant looked down. There had been considerable violence here, he saw with a small shock. One eye was closed by a huge and purple swelling, the lips were cracked and bleeding, the nose looked as if it might be broken and the open mouth through which bloody spittle bubbled revealed at least two broken teeth.
The still-functioning eye touched Wield's face in passing and for a second registered something other than pain. The reaction suddenly brought the damaged individual features into a single focus and Wield felt a second shock, stronger than the first.
It was Ron Ludlam.
He followed the trolley through the automatic doors. One of the ambulance men was talking to the girl on reception.
'Excuse me,' interrupted Wield. 'What happened to him?'
When he reinforced his question with his warrant card, the ambulance man said, 'Fell down stairs.'
'Eh?'
'That's what he says, mate. And that's what his sister says. I just bring 'em in.'
'His sister. That'd be Mrs Pickersgill, right? Where's she?'
'Coming on later, she said. It was her that rang us. She was very upset.'
'Not upset enough to come with you, though?' said Wield.
'Mebbe she had things to do, baby to feed, old mother to look after. Like I said, I just bring 'em in.'
Wield now went after the trolley which, after a bit of trial and error, he found in one of the examination cubicles.
A nurse was talking to the second ambulance man and taking down details. It struck Wield that they seemed to spend rather a lot of time taking down details but he supposed it was necessary for them to know what they were dealing with.
Again his warrant card worked and he leaned over the recumbent figure.
'Ron,' he said.
The eye flickered recognition if not welcome.
'What happened, Ron?'
The tongue moved like a blind animal in the ruined mouth. He caught the word stairs.
'Ho ho. Come on, Ron, Frankie did this, didn't he?'
There was a vigorous shaking of the head which must have caused considerable pain and Ludlam even managed to raise himself up on his elbow and say with a hard-won clarity. 'I fell down stairs.'
'All right, take it easy. Let's have a look at you.'
The doctor had arrived. Wield found himself eased out into the corridor. Not that he resisted much. If Ron in this state was determined not to put the finger on his brother-in-law, his mind must have been very firmly made up. Presumably Janey had passed on the information Wield had left wither that morning. Presumably Frankie had blown his gasket. Presumably it was fear of more of the same that was keeping Ludlam's mouth shut.
Presumably… presumably…
He didn't like the feel of it, Wield realized. If Ron had shot his mouth off in his present state, then recanted like mad when wiser counsel returned with health, that might have made sense. This way, there had to be something else, some extra pressure. Something.
He thought of ringing George Headingley and suggesting he should send a man round to see Pickersgill. It was after all the Spinks's warehouse case that was likely to be involved here.
Instead, knowing he was ripe for an excuse to get away from the hospital but unable to resist the temptation, he checked Dave Lee's status, which was alive and well but unconscious, and headed for the car park. As he drove out, a taxi came in. There was a woman alone in the back and he thought he recognized Janey Pickersgill. That cleared the ground nicely, he thought.
It took a lot of ringing at the doorbell to get any reply. Finally Pickersgill's face scowled out through a span about six inches wide.
'What do you want?' he demanded.
'You,' said Wield promptly. 'Better let me in, Frankie.'
Grudgingly he was admitted. Peckersgill was a long wiry man with a narrow face and restless eyes. He was wearing his working clothes – jeans and a white sweat shirt. Wield guessed that he had arrived home just as Janey was confronting her brother with the accusation that he'd fingered Frankie for the whisky job. Given time, she might have decided not to tell her husband, but she'd have been unable to miss lashing out at her brother first. Once Frankie picked up what was going on, he would have been unstoppable.
'I've just been talking to Ron,' said Wield. 'Oh yes. No need to look surprised. They called us right away when they heard what had happened to him.'
'Heard? Heard what?'
'That's right, Frankie. I said heard. He's been chatting away as fast as he can through the broken teeth.'
'What's he say, then?' asked Pickersgill defiantly-
For answer Wield grabbed his wrists, turned the hands over and struck the bruised and swelling knuckles together.
'You'll find it hard to hold a steering-wheel,' he said. 'Still, you probably won't have to for a while.'
'What the hell are you on about?' demanded Pickersgill. 'What's all this about Ron, anyway? I've just got home this minute. I had a bit of an accident with my hands, that's all.'
'Fell down stairs as well, did you? It doesn't matter anyway, Frankie. Assault and battery's the least of your troubles, son.'
Pickersgill tried to pull his hands away but Wield's grip was unbreakable.
'That's right, Frankie. Ron's gone all the way. You didn't think he wouldn't, did you? I mean, he's done it once, hasn't he, so why not again? So now there's just our Janey to alibi you and you know what her word's worth after last time.'
Pickersgill's reaction was not what he'd expected. Incredulity first, then simple bewilderment, then something not far off amusement.
'You're telling me he says it was me that got into Spinks's warehouse?' he said. 'You want me to believe he's got the nerve to try that? You'll have to do a lot better than that, Mr Wield!'