‘Make up your mind!’
‘Well, he doesn’t reckon Aldermann’s interested enough in his work to be ambitious, but he thinks he needs more money. Getting on the Board would shove his income up considerably.’
‘But he must have known that he’d be competing against his immediate boss, this fellow, Eagles,’ said Dalziel. ‘Why not knock Eagles off first?’
‘Elgood had worked all that out. His theory is that what Aldermann was after initially was just Eagles’s job. He saw his chance to get Bulmer out of the way which would probably mean Eagles’s elevation, leaving a gap for Aldermann to fill. It wasn’t till after Bulmer’s death, when certain anti-Elgood elements on the Board started talking about nominating Aldermann merely in order to annoy and embarrass the Chairman, that he got the scent of a bigger prey.’
‘Bloody hell,’ said Dalziel, opening his eyes and sitting upright. ‘And Dick really believes this?’
‘That’s why he was here. Though I think the more he talked it through – which was a great deal more, I’ve cut it down by at least ninety-nine per cent – the dafter it sounded to him. But he stuck to his guns.’
‘Oh, he’d do that all right, would Dick,’ grunted Dalziel. ‘But there must’ve been something brought it on in the first place.’
‘Two things,’ said Pascoe. ‘Evidently he had some kind of row with Aldermann last Friday. He made it clear to Aldermann that even though Eagles was dead, he was still going to block his elevation to the Board. He had to go out to a meeting then, leaving Aldermann in his office. Later he returned and worked well into the evening, long enough to need his desklamp on. It’s one of those Anglepoise things. He pressed the switch and got hit by an electric shock which knocked him out of his chair. He recovered pretty quickly – he’s very fit for his age, he says, does a lot of swimming – and he put it down to a bad connection. But yesterday morning something else happened. He went to get his car out of the garage. It’s got one of those up-and-over doors. It seemed to be a bit stiff so he gave it a big heave and next thing, it came crashing down on top of him. Fortunately he’s a pretty nifty mover. He dropped flat and the door crashed on to the boot of his car. I’ve seen the dent it made and he can count himself lucky. So he crawled out a bit shaken and that’s when he rang you and started shouting murder.’
‘You’ve examined the garage door, I take it?’ said Dalziel.
‘Yes. It weighs a ton, but it just looked like the decrepitude of age to me. Still, the tech boys are taking a really close look at it, and I had someone collect the lamp from Elgood’s office too. At a glance, nothing shows. Just wires working loose and shorting. But I’ve told them to double check everything, seeing as he’s such a good friend of yours, sir.’
Dalziel ignored the gibe, looked towards his closed door and bellowed. ‘Tea! Two!’
The door rattled and even the disregarded telephone shifted uneasily on its rest and let out a plaintive ping.
‘Coffee for me,’ said Pascoe without hope.
‘Tea,’ said Dalziel. ‘Caffeine clogs the blood. That’s why all them Frog painters’ ears fell off, and God knows what else besides. Did Dick say he’d had another encounter with Aldermann on Monday? I mean, had he expressed surprise to see him still alive or anything?’
‘No. In fact, Mr Elgood seems to have kept out of the office on Monday. He went down to some cottage he owns on the coast. Presumably that’s how he keeps so fit swimming.’
‘Aye, that’s the least strenuous form of exercise that goes on down there, I gather,’ chortled Dalziel. ‘It’s stuck on the edge of a cliff that’s being eaten away by the sea. They say that every time Dick takes a new fancy woman down there, another bit gets shaken off.’
‘Too much caffeine, perhaps,’ said Pascoe. ‘Anyway, Aldermann wouldn’t need to see him to know he was still alive, would he? He’d have heard in the office if anything had happened.’
‘So you think there’s something in it, do you, Peter?’ asked Dalziel.
‘I didn’t say that,’ said Pascoe emphatically. ‘It all sounds very far-fetched to me.’
There was a perfunctory knock at the door, which opened immediately to admit a tin tray bearing two mugs and borne by a man distinguished by the elegant cut of his sober grey suit and the extreme ugliness of his asymmetrical features.
‘Either we’re overmanned or undermanned, Sergeant Wield,’ said Dalziel sarcastically. ‘Where’s that young tea-wallah?’
‘Police-Cadet Singh is receiving instructions on traffic duties at the market roundabout, sir,’ said Wield.
Cadet Shaheed Singh was the city’s first Asian police recruit, who had brought out all that was colonial in Dalziel. The boy came from a Kenyan Asian family and had been born and bred in Yorkshire, but neither bits of information affected Dalziel’s comments, which were at best geographically inaccurate, at worst criminally racist.
‘Well, it’ll make a change from rickshaws for the lad,’ he said, taking the larger of the two mugs and sipping noisily.
‘Tea,’ he diagnosed. ‘The cup that cheers.’
Pascoe took his mug and drank. It was coffee. He smiled his thanks at Sergeant Wield, winning a suspicious glance from Dalziel.
‘What’s Dick got against Aldermann, anyway?’ asked the Superintendent. ‘Why doesn’t he want him on the Board?’
‘Two reasons,’ said Pascoe. ‘First is, because it’s become a test of his authority as chairman. Aldermann’s appointment would be a serious defeat for him. Second, because he honestly doesn’t think Aldermann’s up to it. He reckons he cruises along, with only a token interest in the firm and his job.’
‘Is that right? Might be worth taking a look at this paragon,’ said Dalziel. ‘I could likely find him a slot in CID.’
Pascoe ignored this and said, ‘We can hardly just go barging in to his house, sir, and say we’re checking an allegation that he’s committed a couple of murders.’
Dalziel looked surprised, as if he could see no real objection to this way of proceeding. Sergeant Wield coughed and handed Pascoe a list of names and addresses.
‘That trouble in the multi-storey on Monday, sir,’ he offered as explanation. Dalziel looked exasperated. The ‘trouble’ referred to had been the vandalization of some parked cars by scratching their paintwork with a sharp metal instrument. It was not the kind of thing a sergeant was expected to interrupt his CID chief’s conference with.
Pascoe had more confidence in Wield. He examined the list. One of the names was underlined in red.
Mrs Daphne Aldermann. Rosemont House, nr. Garfield. VW Polo, metallic green, scratchings on bonnet.
He looked interrogatively at Wield, who said, ‘It’s his wife, sir, I checked.’
Pascoe showed the list to Dalziel who said, ‘So what?’
Pascoe said, ‘It’s an excuse to call, sir. Take a look at this Aldermann without him knowing.’
Dalziel continued to look doubtful. Wield tactfully withdrew.
‘Still,’ continued Dalziel, ‘if it’s your considered opinion that we should nose around a bit more, Peter …’
‘I didn’t necessarily mean …’
‘Sharp lad, that Wield,’ continued Dalziel. ‘Him and that darkie would make a grand pair on night patrol. The villains wouldn’t stand a chance. They’d not see one of ’em and one look at t’other would frighten the buggers to death! What else did he say when you discussed Dandy Dick with him?’
Suspecting a reproach, Pascoe said, ‘I trust his discretion