Child's Play

Child's Play by Reginald Hill Page A

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Authors: Reginald Hill
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that at first sight he is extremely plausible. And frankly, Dalziel, I find myself in a quandary as to how to proceed.'
Dalziel regarded him steadily.
'Me too,' he said.
'Really?'
'Aye. Shall I start calling you Thackeray if you call me Dalziel? I don't mind, but it doesn't come easy off my tongue.'
Thackeray looked bewildered, then began to smile.
'Would Eden come any easier, Superintendent?'
    'Andy,' said Dalziel. 'Now we've got things on a proper friendly basis, see if you can tell us what you want without going all round the houses.'
    'I'm not sure. Let me put it this way. My main concern as Mrs Huby's solicitor and as executor of her will is to see that her wishes are carried out.
    'Now, this man turns up and claims to be the heir. I am practically certain that he cannot be the heir, yet he has contrived to sow a seed of doubt. It would be easy for me to say to him, no, go away, you are fraudulent unto such time as you prove you are not. I could put all the obstacles of the law in his way and force him to choose between abandoning his claim or setting out on a long, tedious and extremely expensive path to a very doubtful conclusion.'
    'I'm with you,' said Dalziel. 'You don't think that's your job, right?'
    'My job is to carry out my client's wishes, and I have serious doubts as to whether that would be the nearest way to doing that.'
    'Bugger me,' said Dalziel. 'I never thought I'd hear a lawyer wanting to do what was nearest rather than what was dearest.'
    'I am full of surprises. You're probably wondering how you can help me, Dalziel - sorry; Andy.'
    'No. I'm wondering how you imagine I can help you,' said Dalziel with the easy confidence of a man who could without embarrassment reject the appeal of a molested maiden if something important, like opening time, diverted his attention. 'And while you're choosing your words, I think I saw there was mum's trifle on the menu. I'm always in a better mood for a slab of mum's trifle.'
    Meanwhile at the other table, after some preliminary indecision as to whether he should sit with his face towards Dalziel and be continually reminded of his presence, or with his back towards him and risk being stolen upon unawares, Watmough had compromised with a sideways seat and had soon lulled himself into forgetfulness with that most soothing of music, his own harmonic future.
Ogilby contented himself with reassurance and optimistic agreement throughout the brownWindsor and well into the steak and kidney pudding. He felt he'd gone quite far enough when Watmough said, 'Mid-Yorksis a good force and a clean force, and people in the know will give credit where it's due, Ike. I've carried this lot, you know that. Old Tommy Winter's been demob-happy for two years at least.'
'Everyone knows you're a great administrator, Nev,' said Ogilby.
'Not just an administrator,' retorted Watmough. 'Round here they've not forgotten the Pickford case.'
I bet they bloody haven't! thought Ogilby with an inward groan. The Pickford case had been Watmough's finest hour. It had happened a few years earlier when Watmough was Assistant Chief Constable in South Yorkshire. A seven-year-old Wakefield girl, Mary Brook, had gone missing. A friend thought she'd seen her getting into a car which might have been a blue Cortina. Four weeks later her body was found in a shallow grave on the moors. Then another girl, this time from Barnsley, went missing in similar circumstances, and at almost the same time, a third child vanished from the small mining town of Burrthorpe only ten miles away. Watmough took charge of the investigation, holding frequent press conferences in which he talked confidently of the modern age of detection and assured his listeners that the answer was already in the new police computer. It was just a matter of waiting for it to come out.
Not long after, a blue Cortina was discovered in a
lonely country lane near Doncaster. In it was Donald Pickford, a sales representative from Huddersfield, asphyxiated by

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