Inspector Morse 13 The Remorseful Day

He'd promised to be with her at 7.  30 a.  m.  on Monday 3 August.  And it

was precisely at that time that he knocked in civilized manner on the front

door of

"Collingwood', again admiring as he did so the drip-stone moulding above it.

Born in North Oxford, Mrs Bayley spoke her mind unapol- ogerically: "You look

as if you've just come straight from the abattoir, Mr Barron!"

 The builder (rather a handsome man, she thought) grinned wryly as he looked

down at overalls bespattered with scarlet paint.

"Not my choice, Mrs B.  I'm with you, all the way.  If there's a better

combination of colour than black and white and yellow, I don't know it."

Mrs B felt gratified.

"Well, I'll let you get on then.  I won't bother you no one will bother you.

It's all very quiet round here.  Would you like some coffee later?"

"Tea, if you don't mind, Mrs B.  Milk and two teaspoons of sugar, please.

About ten?  Smashing!"

From the ground-floor window she watched him as he removed the aluminium

ladders from the top of the van, stood there for a few seconds looking up at

the dormer window, then shaking out the first extension and, by means of a

rope and pulley at the bottom, elongating the ladder to its fullest extent

with a second, smaller extension.  For a few seconds he stood there, holding

the loftily assembled structure at right angles to the ground; then easing

the pointed top of the third stage most carefully, lovingly almost into place

against the casement of the dormer window some thirty feet above, before

finally fitting the bottom of the ladder on the compacted gravel of the

pathway which divided the front of the houses there from the wide stretch of

grass leading to the edge of Sheep Street, some four or five feet below.

For several minutes Mrs B stood by her front window on the ground floor,

looking out a little anxiously to observe her builder's varied skills.

Across the road, a solitary jogger in red trainers was running reasonably

briskly past the Bay Tree Hotel, his tracksuit hood over his head, as if he

were trying to work up a sweat; or just perhaps to keep his ears warm, since

there was an un seasonal nip in the air that morning.  Mrs B thought jogging

a silly and dangerous way of keeping fit, though.  She'd known the young

North Oxford don who had written the hugely popular Joys of Jogging, and who

had died aged twenty-seven, whilst on an early-morning not-s&joyful jog.

Jogging was a dangerous business.

Like climbing ladders.

And Mrs B's nerves could stand things no longer.

She would repair to the second-floor back-bedroom to continue with her

quilting as well as to quell the acute fear she felt for a man who (as she

saw it) was risking his life at every second of his working day.  But before

doing so, she knew she had the moral duty to impart a few cautionary words of

advice.  And she opened the front door just as the builder was beginning his

ascent, his left hand on a shoulder-high rung, his right hand grasping a

narrowly serrated saw, a long chisel, and a red, short-handled Stanley knife.

"You will be careful, won't you?  Please!  "

The builder nodded, successively grasping each rung (each 'round' as the

firemen say) at a point just above his shoulders as he climbed with measured

step, professionally, confidently, to the top of the triple-length ladder.

He'd always enjoyed being up high, ever since the vicar of St John the

Baptist's in Burfbrd had taken him and his fellow choir boys up to the top of

the church.  It was the first time in his young life he'd felt superior, felt

powerful, as he traversed his way along the high places there with a

strangely happy confidence, whilst the others inched their cautious way along

the narrow ledges.

It was just the same now.

Once he had reached the top rung but three, he looked up and immediately

decided he would be able to work at the top of the dormer without any

trouble.  Then he looked down, and saw that the ladders) beneath him, though

sagging slightly in the middle (that was good), seemed perfectly straight and

secure.  Funny, really!  Most people thought you were all right on heights

just so long as you didn't look up or down.  Rubbish!  The only thing to

avoid was looking laterally to left or right, when there really was the risk

(at least for him) of losing all sense of the vertical and the horizontal.

He dug his red Stanley knife into the upper lintel, then the lower sill; in

each case, as

 he twisted the blade, finding the wooden texture crumble with

ominous ease.  Not surprising though, really, for he'd noticed the date above

the door.  He secured the top of the ladder to the gutterings - his normal

practice and began work.

At the appointed hour Mrs B boiled the kettle in the second- floor front (as

her husband had called it); squeezed a Typhoo bag with the kitchen tongs; and

stirred in two heaped spoonsful of sugar.  Then, with the steaming cup and

two digestive biscuits on a circular tray, she was about to make her way

downstairs when something quite extraordinary flashed across her vision: she