Reginald Hill

“Hold on a minute!’ said Dalziel. ”ll keep. No, you keep on sniffing around here for a bit. See if you can do a bit of detecting for a change. You should be well up on the psychological stuff. Well, tell me what kind of person would tear up a place like this? And what kind of person would have a place like this to tear up?” “All right,’ said Pascoe cautiously, uncertain how serious Dalziel was.

He went back downstairs to the living-room. Behind him he heard the bed creak protestingly. Dalziel was a great believer in taking rest when and where you got the chance. Pascoe was always ready to recognize the wisdom of others. He turned the slashed cushion of the deepest armchair upside down, gathered up an armful of paper from the floor and sat down.

Something about the drawings which defaced the walls caught his attention first. Some had been done in some kind of chalk. Bright yellow. There had been no sign of it during the search. He made a mental note to look more closely.

Other drawings and pieces of writing had been done more primitively by scoring the plaster with a sharp edged object. The brass candlestick on the mantelshelf? He stood up and looked more closely. The corners of the square base were scratched and smeared with powdered plaster.

Perhaps the chalk had just run out. It had been laid on pretty thickly.

He sat down again and began looking at the papers he held. It was a disappointing task at first. The only sheets which were not out of books were typewritten lecture notes, or at least so he assumed from the subject-matter. The books from which the majority of the pages had been ripped were again mainly text-books, easily identifiable as the pages had merely been torn whole from their covers. But here and there he noticed were smaller fragments of pages, some reduced almost to confetti, and he began to fit some of these together to see why they had been given special treatment.

It wasn’t an easy task and after a few minutes he chucked the whole lot on the floor in annoyance and began to do what he ought to have done in the first place - look for book covers.

It didn’t take long to sort out the odd ones - or rather the non-biological ones, for they were not particularly odd in themselves.

Huxley’s The Doors of Perception, Leary’s Politics of Ecstasy, Professor Thorndike’s History of Magic and Experimental Science (only three volumes out of eight), Aleister Crowley’s Magic in Theory and Practice and the same writer’s translation of Eliphas Levi’s The Key of the Mysteries, Allegro’s The Sacred Mushroom and the Cross (particularly badly damaged - Pascoe could find no piece of a page larger than a postage stamp), Eros and Evil by R.E. Masters; the covers from these and a score of others on related topics Pascoe stacked in the space he cleared on the floor in front of him. He heard the stairs creak and Dalziel appeared in the doorway.

His eyebrows went up when he saw what Pascoe had been doing.

“Pornography?’ he said hopefully.

“No, sir,’ said Pascoe with a poorly muffled groan.

“No?’ said Dalziel, poking around. ‘, it’s odd, isn’t it? A bit bent.”

“I’ve read most of them myself,’ said Pascoe challengingly.

“Still, you thought it was worth picking out this lot specially,’ said Dalziel mildly. Pascoe found he didn’t have a reply.

“Anything else?’ Dalziel went on. ‘. Let’s get things moving. First thing is, where’s Fallowfield? Failing that, who did this lot? Perhaps he’ll know where Fallow field is.”

“Unless it was Fallowfield himself,’ suggested Pascoe. Dalziel looked unimpressed.

To confuse the picture, I mean, while he makes off,’ the sergeant added.

“But why make off at all? And he was a bit careless leaving those clothes lying around, wasn’t he?”

“I suppose so.”

“Still not happy?’ said Dalziel sympathetically.

“Yes. That is, well, I don’t know, sir. There’s something … “

“Perhaps it’s the fact that two people did the wrecking that bothers you,’ Dalziel went on, the sympathy oozing out now.

Oh God, thought Pascoe. I’ve missed something. I should have known as soon as he started sounding pleasant!

“You noticed the drawings, of course?”

“Why, yes. You mean some are done in chalk, others scratched?”

“Partly that. But have another look. It’s not just the instrument, it’s the style.”

Pascoe looked. It might be true, though he had reservations. One piece of graffiti looked much like another to him.

“So there were two,’ he said neutrally.

“But the question is, lad, together or apart? Anyway, we mustn’t stand around here when there’s work to be done. I’ll get these clothes back to the college. You have a go at the neighbours, though I doubt they’ll be any use.”

“They don’t seem to be in,’ said Pascoe.

Dalziel looked at him pityingly.

“Of course they’re not in. Only fools and policemen are inside on a day like this. Walk down the beach a bit, they’re probably not far. And, Sergeant … “

“Sir?”

“Don’t let all that sunburnt flesh take your mind off the job.”