‘No,’ Paniatowski admitted. ‘It doesn’t.’

  ‘Anyway, pimps like their girls to be young. There are plenty of spring chickens ready to be snapped up. Why would they bother with an old broiler like Betty?’

  ‘And if she did have a pimp, he’d want her to see a lot more than twelve punters a week,’ Paniatowski said.

  ‘Exactly,’ Woodend agreed. ‘Twelve punters a night would be nearer the mark. Did Betty have a phone?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Then we can rule out her puttin’ advertisements in tobacconists’ windows as a way of makin’ contact. They never include an address on the cards, only a phone number.’

  ‘Maybe she met her customers at some kind of social gathering,’ Paniatowski said.

  ‘Like what, for example?’

  ‘I don’t know. A church hall whist drive?’

  ‘Aye, you meet some rum buggers at church hall whist drives,’ Woodend said, only partly sarcastically.

  ‘Or a social club.’

  ‘It’s worth checkin’ on. In the meantime, we might get a clearer picture by talkin’ to some of her punters. I’ll need a list of as many names as you can come up with.’

  ‘That won’t be easy,’ Paniatowski warned him. ‘I might manage to squeeze a few names out of her neighbour, but there aren’t many men in Whitebridge who’ll be willing to volunteer the information that they pay for sex.’

  ‘We might be able to reach some of them through the Courier,’ Woodend suggested. ‘Get on to the Editor. Tell him I want him to put an appeal in tonight’s paper for Betty’s clients to come forward. Say he should make it plain that their confidentiality will be respected.’

  The idea seemed to trouble Paniatowski. ‘Isn’t that a bit like putting a box of matches into the hands of a pyromaniac?’ she asked.

  ‘You’re askin’ me if we can trust Bryant not to turn our appeal into a sensationalist front-page story?’

  ‘More or less.’

  ‘We can trust him. He’ll do a good job for us.’ Woodend lit up a cigarette. ‘Not that it really matters how good a job he does. I don’t expect the appeal will lead anywhere.’

  ‘You don’t think the killer was one of her punters?’ Paniatowski asked.

  ‘If he was, he’ll have taken care to ensure that neither the neighbours nor any of Betty’s other customers caught sight of him.’

  ‘Why? Because he always knew that he was going to kill to kill her?’

  ‘Because he always knew there was a possibility that he might.’ Woodend took a drag on his Capstan. ‘I don’t know what game he’s playin’, Monika, but I don’t see him havin’ anythin’ personal against Betty.’

  ‘You don’t? Why?’

  ‘Because the most important thing to him is not that he killed her, but what he did with her body afterwards. He needed a bonfire, an’ the kids built one for him. He needed a dead body, an’ Betty Stubbs was available. She was nothin’ more than a prop to him.’

  ‘Who’s he playing this game of his with?’ Paniatowski asked.

  ‘Partly with the people he expected to gather around the bonfire once the incendiary device had gone off. That particular pleasure was denied to him when those two kids found the body. But mostly I think he’s playin’ with us.He wants to show us how superior he is. He wants to demonstrate that even though he took tremendous risks, we still can’t catch him.’

  Paniatowski shuddered. ‘The problem is, he caught us with a sucker punch – and he’ll know that as well as we do.’

  ‘Exactly.’

  ‘If he’s really to convince himself that he’s superior to us, he’s going to give us a second chance – one we’ll be ready for.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And the only way he can do that is to give us another body, isn’t it?’

  ‘Looks like it,’ Woodend agreed gravely.

  Seventeen

  From her vantage point in the reception area of the Mid Lancs Courier, Elizabeth Driver was in an excellent position to observe much of the workings of the newspaper. Not that it was exactly an enthralling sight, she thought. The place could never have been mistaken for Fleet Street – and that was putting it mildly. In fact, it only a shade more impressive than the offices of the Maltham Chronicle, the provincial weekly rag on which she’d been working when Charlie Woodend – miffed that she had slightly distorted reality in order to produce a better story – had personally seen to it that she’d lost her job.

  Her musing shifted from Woodend to Dexter Bryant. The Editor might well put on a brave face in public about his changed fortunes, but a face was all it could possibly be. The simple truth was that going from the Daily Standard to the Mid Lancs Courier was the equivalent of moving out of Buckingham Palace and into a small, damp council flat.

  A young woman in a short blue dress appeared at Elizabeth Driver’s side. ‘Miss Driver?’ she asked.

  ‘That’s me.’

  ‘I’m Margaret Pearson, Mr Bryant’s secretary. If you’d care to follow me, he’ll see you now.’

  As she stood up, Elizabeth Driver gave the other woman the automatic once-over. Tall, long legs, nice breasts. She wondered whether Miss Pearson was just a secretary or whether her job also involved duties of a much more intimate nature.

  The secretary led her into the Editor’s office, she and Bryant shook hands, and then they both sat down. His appearance surprised her. She was almost certain he’d only been away from London for a little over a year, yet he looked considerably older than the last time she’d seen him. He was still rather dishy, though – in a mature sort of way!

  ‘What can I do for you, Miss Driver?’ Bryant asked.

  ‘Call me Elizabeth,’ she said. ‘Or Liz, if you prefer.’

  ‘What can I do for you, Elizabeth?’

  ‘Even though I’ve been to Whitebridge a few times before, I’m still what you might call a comparative stranger,’ Elizabeth Driver said, crossing her legs to reveal a generous expanse of thigh. ‘And that’s a problem all we reporters have to face at one time or another, isn’t it? Reporting crime in the regions is, I’m sure you’ll agree, pretty much a case of fighting the enemy on his own ground.’

  ‘Fighting the enemy on his own ground?’ Bryant repeated, as if she’d lost him already. ‘What enemy? I’m not sure I know who you mean.’

  ‘In this particular case, the enemy I’m talking about is Detective Chief Inspector Charlie Woodend.’

  ‘Is he the enemy?’ Bryant asked. ‘He struck me as a very honest, straightforward copper.’

  ‘Oh, he’s good at giving that impression to people,’ Driver admitted. ‘Very good. But it’s all a façade. Cloggin’-it Charlie is one of the most devious men you’ll ever be unfortunate enough to meet. He’d shaft his own grandmother if he thought it would help him to get what he wanted.’

  ‘You’re saying he’s a master at playing constabulary politics?’

  ‘That’s right.’

  ‘Then I’m surprised he’s still only a chief inspector.’

  ‘He’s made some mistakes in the past,’ Elizabeth Driver conceded, ‘but, like the cunning old fox he is, he’s learned from them. And that makes him even more difficult to handle.’

  The phone on the desk rang.

  ‘Excuse me a moment,’ Bryant said. He picked up the receiver. ‘Yes, Sergeant . . . yes, the appeal’s gone in . . . the paper should be on the street within the hour . . . no problem.’

  ‘Was that Monika Paniatowski?’ Elizabeth Driver asked, as Bryant placed the phone back on the cradle.

  ‘You’re so sharp you’re almost in danger of cutting yourself,’ Bryant said.

  ‘Woodend’s been bedding her ever since she became his bagman. She doesn’t like it, but he’s made it clear that sleeping with him goes with the job.’

  ‘Indeed?’ Bryant said.

  ‘But I didn’t come here to talk about Charlie Woodend’s sordid little affairs. I’ve got a proposition to make to you.’

  Bryant gave her a smile which might have been interpreted as being encouraging – but then again, might not. ‘Go on,’ he said.

  ‘The murder last night is sensational copy. It’s ages since there’s been a real Jack the Ripper-type case for our readers to sink their teeth into. And with a bit of luck it won’t stop there.’

  ‘What do you mean? It won’t stop there?’

  ‘Our maniac may well decide to strike again. And again! Handled just right, it could be one of the biggest stories of the year.’

  ‘What you say may well be true,’ Bryant replied, noncommittally. ‘But I’m still not sure why you requested this meeting.’

  Elizabeth Driver leant forward a little, partly to give their conversation a conspiratorial air, partly to afford Dexter Bryant a better view of her cleavage.

  ‘We both have our strengths and our weaknesses,’ she said, slightly huskily. ‘My weakness, as I’ve already hinted, is that I don’t have your local knowledge and contacts.’

  ‘And what’s my weakness?’ Bryant asked, the smile still hanging tenuously on his face.

  ‘Your weakness is geographical. You’ll still have to live in this dump when the case is over, which means that you may think twice about making enemies. I, on the other hand, will soon be off covering another grisly murder in another part of the country, and once I’m gone, I don’t give a damn what anybody in Whitebridge thinks about me.’

  ‘It seems to me that Mr Woodend isn’t the only one capable of shafting his own grandmother when the need arises,’ Bryant said. He stood up and held out his hand for her to shake. ‘I really don’t think I can help you, Miss Driver.’

  ‘I wouldn’t be so hasty if I were you,’ Elizabeth Driver warned. ‘This story could be your ticket back to Fleet Street.’

  She knew she’d made a mistake the moment the words were out of her mouth. Bryant tensed, and all signs of geniality disappeared from his face. He was suddenly a very powerful, frightening man, and Elizabeth Driver began to realize why the reporters who’d known him well still spoke of him with awe.

  ‘Are you suggesting I left Fleet Street under some kind of cloud, Miss Driver?’ he asked.

  ‘No, but––’

  ‘But you are suggesting that in order to get back there, I need to have some kind of dowry to buy my way in.’

  ‘I never meant––’

  ‘I’m constantly being offered jobs on national newspapers. I turn them down because, for personal reasons which are no concern of yours, I choose to live in Whitebridge.’

  ‘I wasn’t suggesting––’

  ‘I haven’t finished!’ Dexter Bryant said, in a voice which made her blood run cold. ‘You seem to think we’re colleagues – but we’re not! We might inhabit the same jungle, but we’re about as alike as the elephant and the hyena.’

  ‘If you’re trying to––’

  ‘I don’t like your kind of crime reporting, Miss Bryant. I never have. The way you present it, it’s murder as entertainment. It sticks to the facts only as long as those facts will provide your readers with the morbid fascination they seem to crave. You say I could help you with your story, and you’re undoubtedly right. I could make a big difference – but I’m not going to. Would you like to know why?’

  She didn’t want to ask, yet she heard herself doing so anyway.

  ‘I don’t like your style, Miss Driver,’ Bryant said, ‘and even more than that I don’t like your bland assumption that I’d be more than willing to be unfaithful to my wife.’

  ‘I really have no idea what you’re talking about, Mr Bryant!’ Elizabeth Driver protested.

  ‘Of course you do. You sit there, squirming in your chair and sending out signals that you’re available, but it’s all a waste of effort. I’ve had experts try to seduce me, Miss Driver – women well out of your class in all respects. And they’ve failed!’ His anger seemed to be increasing with every word he spoke. ‘My wife is older than you are, and she’s in ill health. But she’s got ten times the sex appeal you have. Or ever could have – even with lessons!’

  ‘I’ve never been so insulted in my life!’ Elizabeth Driver said, outraged.

  ‘It’s your own fault,’ Bryant told her, his anger gone and his tone now almost mild. ‘If you don’t want to be treated like a pig, Miss Driver, then stop rolling around in the shit.’

  Elizabeth Driver sat in the saloon bar of the Vines, a pub which had as its main advantage its proximity to the Mid Lancs Courier offices. The two gin and tonics she’d rapidly knocked back had calmed her down – but not a lot. She felt humiliated, not only because Dexter Bryant had spoken to her in the way he had, but also because – for reasons she still did not quite fully understand herself – she had allowed herself to just sit there and take it.

  She’d come to Whitebridge expecting to have one enemy to deal with. Now it appeared that she had acquired a second. Well, so what? She was Elizabeth Driver – a tough-as-nails reporter, a rising star of Fleet Street – and she could handle them both.

  But how exactly should she go about it?

  ‘It doesn’t matter who they are or how important they may be, every bleeder’s got a hidden weakness of some kind – a skeleton in the cupboard,’ her boss at the Daily Globe had told her on her first morning at the paper. ‘And it’s our job to find that skeleton and then rattle it to see which bones fall off.’

  She believed that. More than believed – it had become an article of faith.

  She still hadn’t found the skeleton in Charlie Woodend’s cupboard, though she’d been searching for it ever since he was transferred to Whitebridge. But that wasn’t to say that she was going to stop looking for it – not by a long chalk!

  Dexter Bryant, on the other hand, seemed a much easier nut to crack. For though his skeleton was equally well hidden for the moment, she thought she had a pretty good idea of where to start looking for it.

  She ordered a third gin and tonic and ran her argument through her mind once more. No one in their right mind would give up Fleet Street voluntarily, she reasoned. No one with a shred of self-respect or ambition would willingly accept exile in Whitebridge. Therefore, whatever he might claim, Dexter Bryant’s present situation was not of his own choosing. He had done something wrong – and exile to Whitebridge was his punishment!

  And where had he committed this blunder which had led to his downfall? In London, of course. London, her home turf – where she had contacts, where she knew how to apply pressure to get what she wanted.

  She took a slug of her fresh drink and happily contemplated a future in which both skeletons were uncovered, and she had Woodend and Bryant by the throat. She would use them like fighting cocks, setting one against the other for her own pleasure and the advancement of her career. If they co-operated, she would let them get away with a few scratches. If they didn’t, she would force them to fight it out to the death.

  Eighteen

  The landlord of the Drum and Monkey glanced across at the corner table in the public bar and – as he’d expected – saw that the pint of bitter, the half of bitter and the double vodka were occupying their customary seats.

  There was no brass plaque on that table which read, ‘Reserved between the hours of nine and eleven in the evening (especially when there’s been a murder!)’ – but there might as well have been. The regulars knew better than to sit there, non-regulars were quickly shooed away from it. It was not that Charlie Woodend had ever asked for special privileges – such a thought would never have entered his head – but it gave the landlord considerable satisfaction to know that important criminal cases were analysed, debated – and perhaps even solved – under his roof. He was not just serving drinks to these three, he told himself in his more fanciful moments – he was literally lubricating the wheels of justice.

  Woodend took a sip of his pint, then reached into the pocket of his hairy sports coat and produced a copy of that night’s Courier.

  ‘Seen this, Monika?’ he asked, waving the paper in his sergeant’s direction.

  ‘I’ve seen it,’ Paniatowski replied.

  ‘Well?’

  ‘You seem to have been right about Dexter Bryant,’ Paniatowski admitted reluctantly. ‘He’s done a good job with the appeal for witnesses.’

  Woodend beamed with pleasure. ‘By heck, but it is nice to be right about people – even if it is only once in a blue moon,’ he said. He turned to Rutter. ‘How’ve you got on this afternoon, Bob?’

  ‘We managed to extract the names of five of Betty’s clients from Mrs Ryder and the other neighbours,’ Rutter said. ‘I’ve spoken to them all.’

  ‘An’ I trust that, as an ex-grammar school boy, you were reasonably subtle and discreet about it,’ Woodend said.

  ‘I didn’t stand on their front steps and ask my questions in such a loud voice that their wives were bound to hear, if that’s what you meant,’ Rutter told him. ‘I caught them either at work or on their way home from work.’

  ‘Good,’ Woodend said. ‘An’ how did these fellers react? Did they greet you with open arms?’

  Rutter smiled. ‘Not exactly. I started out by explaining to them that it was a murder – not their morals or their private lives – that I was investigating, but I might as well have saved my breath.’

  ‘Denied it, did they?’

  ‘In the strongest possible terms. A couple of them threatened that if I did anything to blacken their hitherto spotless reputations, they’d sue the police in general and me in particular. But once they’d realized I couldn’t be intimidated into going away, they soon calmed down and admitted that while they had paid Betty for sex, it had all been a mistake, they hadn’t enjoyed it, and they’d never do it again.’

  ‘They’ll certainly never do it with Betty again,’ Woodend said. ‘Did you learn anythin’ interestin’ from these little chats of yours?’

  Rutter looked troubled. ‘Er . . . possibly . . . but before I go into that, I’d like to hear what Monika has found out.’

  ‘Any objections to doin’ things that way round, Monika?’ Woodend asked.

  ‘No, sir.’