Dialogues of the Dead

3H enjoys it. I said last time that his growing confidence is likely to be his downfall. I think that more and more he will be dropping little clues into his Dialogues. He's like a squash player who is so certain of his vast superiority that he'll start playing with the racket in his wrong hand, or boasting all his shots off the back wall. But the subconscious self-revelations which I am looking for will be much harder to find. Though it hurts me to say it, I think that from now on Mr Urquhart's skills are going to be more useful than mine.' Dalziel let out a sigh so redolent of tragic despair he could have sold it to Mrs Siddons. As if in response, his phone rang. He answered. With most people it's possible to gauge some thing of their relationship with a caller from tone of voice, vocabulary, body language, et cetera, but Pascoe had never found a way of working out whether Dalziel were speaking to the Queen or an estate agent. 'Dalziel,' he snarled. Listened. 'Aye.' Listened. 'Nay.' Listened. 'Mebbe.' Dropped the receiver on to the rest so that it bounced. Cap Marvell perhaps asking if he fancied a bout of violent sexual activity in his lunch hour? The PM offering him a peerage? The Wordman threatening his life? 'That it, gents?' said Dalziel hopefully. Pottle and Urquhart looked at each other, then the Scot said, 'Way I see it, words are the key. This is like breaking a text-based code. You can do it the long way, by sheer hard work, or you can hit lucky and find the significant text, or texts.' 'Or you can hope his growing arrogance results in a clue that someone can solve before rather than after the event,' said Pottle. 'I'll make a note of that,' said the Fat Man dismissively. 'Thanks, gents. Work to do. DC Bowler here will see you out.' Pottle and Urquhart gathered their papers together. Pascoe said effusively, 'Good of you both to come. Please don't hesitate to give me a ring if anything occurs.' At the door Urquhart said with heavy irony, 'Don't know why it is, Superintendent, but whenever I leave these meetings, I some times get to worrying just a wee bittie how much you really think I've managed to help you.' 'Nay, Mr Urquhart,' said Dalziel with a fulsome orotundity, 'I'd be real sorry to think I'd left you in any doubt about that. 'Plonker,' he added as the door closed, or maybe just a moment earlier. 'Then I don't really see why you bother to sit in on these sessions,' said Pascoe, letting his irritation show. 'Because if I weren't ready to spend time with plonkers, I'd likely be a lonely man,' said Dalziel. 'Any road, I didn't say he were a useless plonker. And if Pozzo says we ought to listen to him, them mebbe we should. He sometimes puffs out a bit of sense.' This was a roundabout concession to Pascoe, who had a good personal relationship with Pottle, and knowing it was the closest he was likely to get to an apology, the DCI put aside his irritation and said, 'So where do we go from here, sir?' The, I'm going to see Desperate Clan. That were him on the phone. You, if I remember right, have got a date with the vultures. Don't know what Wieldy here has got on. Mebbe he can find time to do a bit of police work if some bugger doesn't want him to judge a bonny baby competition.' Desperate Clan was Chief Constable Trimble. The vultures were the media. Interest in the Wordman killings had increased exponentially with each new death and this latest killing had rocketed it into an international dimension. Not only was the Hon. a peer of the realm, but one of the tabloids had worked out that there was a distant royal connection which put him at something like three hundred and thirty-seventh in line to the throne. American and European interest had exploded. One German TV company had dug up a would-be telly don whose claim that a Pyke-Strengler had been beheaded during the Civil War sparked speculation that a left-wing revolutionary movement was behind the killing. Attempts to fit the earlier killings into such a political pattern were proving ludicrous, but journalists haven't reached the depths of their profession by allowing ludicrosity to get in the way of a good story. Pascoe, who had ambiguous feelings about being regarded as the acceptable face of policing, had been elected spokesman at the forthcoming press conference. His ambiguity rose from a reluctance to accept the kind of type-casting which, while it might be good for his career, could also take it in directions he was not yet ready to go. The world of policy committees and high-level