Good Morning, Midnight (44 page)

“And the best of luck,” said Wield. “I reckon you’ll need it.”

Pascoe switched off the phone, turned the shower on and stepped underneath.

As he towelled himself down, he heard the front door bell. Jesus, he thought. Doesn’t anyone have a long lie-in on a Saturday morning anymore? The clarinet fell silent, which suggested Rosie was taking care of things. He went back to the bedroom where he found that one person at least was set for the long lie-in. She had rolled over, throwing the duvet off her naked body and he groaned with frustrated longing as he pulled his clothes on.

He was buttoning up his shirt when the door opened and Rosie came in.

She said, “There’s a lady to see you.”

“A lady? You mean a woman,” said Pascoe, loyally adding his weight to Ellie’s attempts to purge the child of prejudice in all its forms.

Rosie thought, then said, “Yes, of course she’s a woman. But she looks like a lady and she talks like a lady.”

She turned and left with the Parthian shot, “You know I mustn’t be late.”

Behind him there was a sound as Ellie awoke.

“Was that the door bell I heard before?” she yawned.

“Yes. Rosie got it. Seems I’ve got a visitor.”

“At this time on a Saturday morning? Jesus.” Then with sudden suspicion, “It’s not that fat bastard, is it?”

“Reasonable guess,” he said. “But no. This one’s a woman. Sorry. A lady.”

“Well, if she’s here with your love-child, tell her to go and find some bulrushes,” said Ellie.

“God, you’re sexy when you yawn,” he said.

“That sounds like an argument for boring sex,” she said, sinking back on to the pillow.

On another occasion he might have read that as a hint. This morning, with Dalziel, Rosie and a lady weighing in the counterbalance, he turned and went out of the room.

As he descended the stairs he guessed that his daughter, with a sense of precedence which wouldn’t have been out of place in a Victorian society hostess, would have put her lady in the lounge rather than the kitchen.

He was right. And Rosie was right too. At least as far as she could see.

Standing by the patio window looking out into the garden was Dolly Upshott.

She looked pale, with dark shadows under her eyes. The short brown hair was even more hectic than usual. Looking at her young form clad in a Fair Isle sweater, sensible tweed skirt and flat brogues, it was still hard to believe what her presence there must surely mean was the truth.

Which with admirable directness, she now confirmed.

“Got your message,” she said. “I thought of doing a runner, but decided there was no point really. I looked you up in the phone book. I’m really sorry to be bothering you at home like this, but I thought that showing up at the cop-shop would probably remove any chance I had of keeping this thing sub rosa. I mean, I’d be straight into the torture chamber there, wouldn’t I? Tape machines, witnesses, red-hot irons, all the apparatus.”

Her attempt at humour was more revealing of her agitated state of mind than hysterical tears would have been.

He said, “Please sit down, Miss Upshott. I haven’t had any breakfast and I need at least one cup of coffee before I can function properly. Can I get you something?”

“Coffee would be nice,” she said.

He went out and ran lightly up the stairs. Ellie opened her eyes as he came into the bedroom.

“What?” she said.

“Sorry, can you take Rosie to her lesson?”

“Jesus. You mean it really is the love-child?”

“Far more serious than that,” he said. “Could even be serious enough to make me late for Fat Andy.”

“In that case, what does a little inconvenience to me matter. OK.”

“Thanks. I owe you.”

“And you’ll pay,” she called after him.

He collected a microcassette recorder from his study, went into the kitchen, made a couple of mugs of instant coffee and took them through to the lounge.

“Right, Miss Upshott,” he said.

“What do you want me to do?” she said. “I want to get everything out of the way, here, now. I heard what you said in your message about coming round to the vicarage. Please, I couldn’t bear that. I’ll do anything, but David must never hear any of this, all right?”

Though he never liked doing it, Pascoe had long ago learned the detective art of making non-binding promises, unenforceable agreements.

He smiled sympathetically and said, “Your best way to ensure that, Miss Upshott, is to tell me everything, as fully and frankly as you can.”

As he spoke he set the microcassette between them on the table.

She didn’t seem to notice it but continued to examine his face closely till he felt the sympathetic smile must resemble a cynical leer.

Finally she closed her eyes as if to compare what she saw with some inner picture.

When she opened them again after nearly a minute she said in a small childlike voice, “All right, then. I will.”

Gosh, where on earth shall I begin? I mean, you’d think that something that’s ended up where this has ended up would have a pretty definite starting point, wouldn’t you? On your mark-get set-bang! But that’s not the way life works, is it? I suppose it really began when Mother died. Or perhaps when Mother got ill. I was still living at home, you see. That was in Chester, do you know it? Sorry. Not relevant. I had a job then, in a bank, nothing exciting. After a while even all that money becomes boring, though I sometimes used to dream… but I shouldn’t be telling you that! Then Mother got ill and needed more and more looking after. The bank was very good, and arranged for me to work full-time part-time, if you see what I mean. But eventually even that was too much. I was needed at home all the time for the last six months till Mother passed on.

After that, back to the boring old bank, I thought. But David said why not come and stay with him for a while, I deserved a rest, and having his sister about the vicarage might help fend off all the lady parishioners who were determined to marry him off.

So I came to Cothersley. That was three years ago. My rest didn’t last long, I’m a busy bee by nature and very soon I was helping out with things-parish finances, timetables, fetes, that sort of thing-till eventually I found I was doing what felt like a full-time job, except of course I got nothing for it, except my keep.

I kept telling myself I had to break away, get out and find a real job again, but I can’t say the thought of going back to the bank really turned me on. David said, “Hang on, don’t rush into anything, something is sure to turn up.” And it did!

I’d got to know Pal as a neighbour and also as one of my brother’s parishioners, though really I didn’t see much of him except when I was doing the rounds with my collecting box when he was always very generous. Then one day I was in town, shopping for a birthday present for David, and I saw this little musical box in an antique shop window, and I went inside, not really registering the shop’s name, and Pal said, “Well, hello, this is nice,” like we were old friends. The box was a lovely thing, early nineteenth-century, silver with beryls and topazes, and it played a sweet little tune which Pal said was by Haydn, but its price was far more than I could afford even when he offered me a discount. Well we chatted about antiques for a while-Mother had been interested so I knew a little bit-then suddenly he asked if I’d be interested in a job. He was looking for someone to help him in the shop, someone he could rely on to take over while he was away on buying trips. Sue-Lynn, his wife, helped sometimes but he said she wasn’t really interested and if I could see my way…

I didn’t hesitate. The thought of being at least partially independent again was marvellous. I said, “Yes please. How much will you pay me?” And he laughed and said if I was going to be an antiques dealer, I’d have to learn a better haggling technique than that.

So I took the job, and it was great. I really enjoyed it and after a while I think I became pretty good at it.

That was just over eighteen months ago. The sex began three or four months later.

It wasn’t an affair. It was never an affair, not like in Brief Encounter, which was Mother’s favourite movie-in the end I knew the script by heart-no, this was certainly nothing like that. One day in the shop he touched me. Not an accidental brush. No ambiguity. A hand on my… you know. Well, I didn’t know what to do. So I touched him back. He put the closed sign up.

I suppose that was my on your mark, get set, bang!

I wasn’t inexperienced, but for a long time, what with looking after Mother then living in the vicarage, there hadn’t been much opportunity. But this was worth waiting for.

Like the job, it was great. I really enjoyed it. And after a while with Pal’s help I think I became pretty good at it.

The Dolores thing started casually. We asked each other to do various things and the Dolores get-up was one of the things he asked me to do. It was like children dressing up! Well, a bit more than that, of course, but you know what I mean. Then he asked if he could bring a friend. I got rather frightened at this, but he said I should ask myself if that wasn’t Dolly Upshott speaking, and why didn’t I check with Dolores, which was who I’d be to this friend, he need never know anything about Dolly. So I did check, and though it was still a bit scary, Dolores found the prospect rather exciting, and the actual encounter more exciting still.

I hope I’m not shocking you, but you said the franker I was, the less chance there was of David ever needing to hear any of this, and I couldn’t bear that.

Things developed. Pal said the friend would like to be by himself with me. He took a hotel room. I went to it. When he went, he left an envelope by my clothes. I opened it. There was two hundred pounds in it. I was furious and I went to Pal and had a row with him. I asked him what he thought I was. He told me that all that mattered was what I thought I was. If I wanted, he said, he’d give the money back to his friend, but if he could find a girl who left him a couple of hundred quid every time they had a fuck, he’d jump at it. I threw the money at him and said, “There you go then.” And he threw it back at me and told me angrily not to be stupid. And I said, “What’s the difference?” And he said he wouldn’t object to being paid as a stud but he had no ambitions to be a pimp. And we both started laughing.

After that, well, it became… not routine, not even regular, and not for the money either though that was nice… but whenever Dolores felt like it. Dolores was part of me, of course, but only a part, and I, me, Dolly Upshott, was completely separate from Dolores. Pal got me a phone so that his friends-there were two or three of them, no more-could contact me and leave a message, and I could get back to them if I wanted to. And sometimes I did and sometimes I didn’t. But with Pal, I always wanted to.

Sorry, I’m boring you a bit, aren’t I? It’s information you want, not analysis. Trouble is, Dolores doesn’t give a toss what you think, but Dolly would like you to understand…

Anyway, sometimes Pal took me to Moscow House. He told me how it had been put on the market after all these years and his car turning up there wouldn’t draw much attention. It was very eerie going into an old house with a lot of the furniture shrouded in dust sheets, but that only made it more exciting for Dolores. This after all was her kind of territory, though Dolly almost put in an appearance when Pal eventually told me about his father committing suicide there. He went on about it not really being suicide, insisting that his stepmother was somehow responsible. He used to get very angry when he talked about her, but I noticed that he also got very excited too, so I often deliberately brought her into the conversation.

Then he asked if I’d mind if he brought someone else along to Moscow House. I did mind. It was our place. But when he explained it wasn’t like the others, this wasn’t someone who would want to ring me up and fix to meet me in a hotel room and leave an envelope, this was personal, this was family, Dolores got interested and said, “Why not?”

That’s how I met Jason. Jase. You know him? Of course you do. He’s Pal’s brother-in-law and you must have met all the family while you’ve been investigating the case. He is gorgeous, isn’t he? And the sex! Pal once said, “For God’s sake, Jase, slow down, you make me feel like an old man!” So from that point of view it was great. But I always felt there was something else.

Then one night we were all lying there, shagged out-sorry, sounds awful, doesn’t it? But I mean it quite literally. And as well as shagged out, the two chaps were spaced out-they’d got into the habit of doing a line or two of coke, Pal’s treat. He offered me some too, but Dolores wasn’t interested. The sex was enough for her, and besides when they were like this, they’d get to talking like she wasn’t there, and it’s a bit of a giggle eavesdropping on you men when you think you’re all alone.

This time Pal started talking about Kay, that’s his stepmother. Sorry, you know that. Not his usual angry stuff but just sort of dreamily recalling how he reckoned she fancied him when he was in his teens and how there’d been a couple of occasions when they were alone together and he was sure he could have had her, only he was too nervous to try. And Jason said that he’d missed a great chance, on a scale of ten he’d give her ten plus; and Pal said, “You mean, you have had her?” Jason sort of hesitated-I think he was just enough in touch with the real world to think that maybe this wasn’t a road he wanted to go down, not with his wife’s brother-but Pal said something like, “Hey, Jase, it’s OK, buddy, you’re among friends, what anyone says here, stays here.” And Jason relaxed again and he said, oh yes, he’d certainly had Kay, but it was long before he married Helen-that’s Pal’s sister; sorry-in fact it was because of Helen he’d met Kay. She used to come to parent-teachers’ meetings at Weavers School where he taught. Jase had no reason to talk to her-the girls have a woman PE teacher-but he’d spotted this good-looking bird, as he put it, and he’d caught her eye one night and given her his come-on look, and she’d responded, and not long after the meeting ended, he was having one of the best times he’d ever had.