The Wood Beyond

She considered this then said, ‘Assault?’

‘You threatened the TecSec boss with them wire cutters.’

‘Threatened? He must be a man of very nervous disposition. The cutters are a tool not a weapon.’

And a very clean tool too. Forensic had found no trace of blood. Surprisingly clean? Dalziel had asked hopefully. That would depend on the mind-cast of their owner, Dr Gentry, Head of the Forensic Lab, who disliked the Fat Man heartily, had replied.

‘Weapon’s a tool for killing,’ said Dalziel. ‘And you could have taken his head off if you’d made contact. Courts don’t like that sort of thing, especially not since Redcar.’

At least she didn’t pretend not to take the allusion.

‘That was terrible, and a great disservice to the movement. It wasn’t even good protest. Simply turning the poor animals loose achieves very little in terms of their wellbeing and nothing at all in terms of public support.’

‘You mean it’s the tactics you object to, not killing the odd security guard?’ said Dalziel.

‘Of course I deplore the man’s death,’ she said with some irritation. ‘It was tragic. But I cannot believe you seriously suspect my group had anything to do with it.’

‘Why not?’ said Dalziel. ‘By all accounts once you got inside the building last night, you all ran wild like a bunch of lagered-up Leeds supporters. What was that all about? Premenstrual tension?’

She was unprovoked. Very cool this one. But beneath it all there was plenty of heat. The notion had him crossing his legs.

‘A release of tension, certainly,’ she said. ‘We’d had a shock. Then suddenly I realized that we’d got where we wanted to be, inside the building. It seemed foolish not to make a gesture.’

‘A gesture?’ He articulated the word as if some passing bird had crapped in his mouth.

‘That’s right. An act which resounds with significance far beyond its mere physical limitations. You should try one some day, superintendent.’

‘At my age it happens all the time,’ he said. ‘So you took off. And headed straight for the labs. Just a bit of luck that, was it?’

‘What else could it be?’

‘Prior knowledge. Like, from being there before.’

‘Being there when?’

‘In the summer, maybe, when there was a break-in at Wanwood.’

‘Yes, I recall … ah, I see your game, Mr Dalziel. Or may I call you Andy? If I remember right, the raid on Wanwood had many of the characteristics of the raid on Redcar. Lots of mindless vandalism and the animals merely released into the countryside. And you think they could have been done by the same people. Therefore link ANIMA with the second, you link us with the first. Right?’

‘Right as a confession,’ said Dalziel.

‘Which it isn’t. Do you have dates for both these raids?’

‘Can’t remember? I get like that,’ said Dalziel. ‘June 28th. May 19th.’

She rose and went through into the living room, returning with a leather-bound diary.

‘Here we are,’ she said. ‘On June 28th I had dinner with my son, Piers.’

‘He’ll vouch for you, will he? What’s his line? Urban terrorism?’

‘In a manner of speaking. He’s Lieutenant Colonel Pitt-Evenlode MC of the Yorkshire Fusiliers. Like his number?’

‘Just tell me which bishops you were with on May 19th,’ growled Dalziel.

‘Sorry. No clergy. I went to a wedding at Scarborough, but it was a civil rather than a religious ceremony. I stayed the night there. In fact, I stayed up most of the night. There was a postnuptial party which went on until dawn. I think you’ll find I made my presence felt sufficiently to be recalled through the alcoholic haze.’

Dalziel belched. She took it as an expression of doubt.

‘Don’t you believe me? Please, feel free to check.’

‘I may just do that. And it’s nowt to do with not believing you. It’s just that I never believe my luck when folk start volunteering alibis before I’ve even asked for them.’

‘That is perhaps because most of your customers are of a lower order of intelligence in which such pre-emptive thought would indeed be suspicious. If our acquaintance is to mature, you’ll have to get used to dealing with someone whose brain is quite as good as yours. And also with someone who, unlike most of those others, is unworried by your ultimate threat of locking them away. For me to get a prison sentence would be a real publicity coup, so you must see that your threats, even if you meant to carry them through which I doubt, have little weight with me.’

She gave him a smile of great sunniness which was well worth basking in on a drab November day. He returned it gladly. She did after all have a point, and he never minded letting opponents build up a points lead. The more confident they got, the more likely they were to drop their guards and reveal a fatal weakness. Like here. Anyone who seriously doubted his willingness to carry through any threat he cared to make was wide open to a sucker punch any time he cared to throw it. But no need to rush, not with beer and crisps and pickles still on the table, and them lovely sugar loaves to leer at.

He drank and nibbled and leered, and waited to see where she would lead the conversation.

She said, ‘I cannot of course provide alibis for all of my colleagues though two of them, Meg and Donna, were in fact at the Scarborough wedding also.’

‘That ’ud be Jenkins and Linsey? The dykes?’

His reaction when he’d come across this surmise in George Headingley’s notes had been, ‘What the fuck’s that got to do with anything?’ But now he was happy to use the term as a possible irritant.

‘That’s right,’ she said, unirritated. ‘The dykes. As for the others, all I can do is vouch for their commitment to peaceful protest. Except perhaps Wendy.’

‘Walker? But she acted as peacekeeper, didn’t she?’

‘Rather out of character, I feel. What about you? I got the impression you were already acquainted.’

‘Aye. We’ve met.’

‘And did I get the impression you were surprised to find her in such company?’

‘What’re we talking here?’ he said. ‘Class or causes?’

‘Are the two really distinguishable in some people’s eyes? But what I meant was, at the peaceful protest end of the activist scene.’

Dalziel laughed and said, ‘You call what you got up to peaceful protest? I’d not like to see you if you went to war.’

‘I’ll try not to invite you then. But you’ve not answered my question.’

She was very insistent, he thought. That little exchange he’d overheard between her and Wendy Walker must have really got her going for some reason.

He said, ‘What surprised me weren’t so much Walker joining you lot as you lot taking her on board. How’d that happen?’

If he’d hoped to throw her off balance by reversing the question, he had failed. She was smiling rather slyly, an expression he found strangely exciting.