Singing the Sadness. Reginald Hill

no. Just dropped by to see I was OK. Mr Lewis came too.’

      Just to underline, no hanky-panky.

      ‘Did he? Well, it’s his school, and welcome to it. Less I see the better. Had to come back early from Barmouth to see to your lot.’

      This came over as an accusation.

      ‘Sorry about that,’ said Joe, who sometimes wondered how he came to be apologizing so often for things which he didn’t really feel responsible for.

      ‘That’s OK,’ snuffled Williams magnanimously. ‘Just as well you were coming, way things turned out. You hungry?’

      Joe consulted his stomach and got a big yes vote. Nothing but that bowl of soup since Mirabelle’s sandwiches yesterday. It was a wonder he could still stand upright!

      He said, ‘Think I could manage a bite.’

      ‘Yes, her the nurse said you’d be hungry when you woke,’ said Williams.

      ‘Beryl, you mean?’ said Joe, moved at her foresight.

      ‘That’s the one. Fine-looking girl, that,’ said Williams, with an appreciative crinkling of his runny nose.

      Joe regarded him sharply. Was this pint-sized Sinatra imitation the local Pal Joey? he wondered as he followed him down the long west façade of the building and round the corner into a courtyard formed by the two main wings. The caretaker led him through a doorway which was probably the tradesman’s entrance in the old days. And probably the new days too, thought Joe, for didn’t places like this exist to keep the old days fresh?

      ‘Ella!’ called Willams. ‘You in there, girl? Got a hungry hero out here who needs feeding up.’

      Joe’s incipient jealousy quickly evaporated when he saw Mrs Williams. A broad-shouldered, strong-featured woman a good six inches taller than Dai, she didn’t look the kind of wife a wise husband would mess with.

      She told Dai sharply to take his germs elsewhere, then sat Joe at a well-scrubbed kitchen table and without prompting (or maybe Beryl had briefed her) she produced a mountain of scrambled eggs, mushrooms and tomatoes which filled Joe’s stomach without offending his tender throat. This was followed by soft white bread, fresh butter and home-made marmalade washed down with strong tea. And she didn’t trouble him with talk while he was eating.

      A jewel among women, he told himself.

      ‘That was the goods,’ he told her fervently as he held out his cup for a refill.

      The cup was a fine piece of Wedgwood china matching his plate, the best set, he guessed. A childhood spent observing Mirabelle in her natural habitat had taught him it wasn’t what a visitor ate that signified status, it was what they ate it off. His hostess, he noticed, was drinking her tea from a plain white breakfast cup.

      ‘More where that came from,’ she offered.

      Joe was tempted but shook his head.

      ‘Better not,’ he said. ‘Mr Lewis has asked me to eat with them tonight and if his lady is as generous with the grub as you, I’d better leave a space.’

      A knowing smile flickered across her lips but the only comment she offered on her employers’ cuisine was, ‘They’ll be wanting you to sing for your supper, I expect.’

      ‘Shan’t be doing any of that for a while,’ said Joe.

      ‘Pity. That Beryl says you always hit the notes on the head. Here, I’ve just been baking some scones, they won’t take up much space.’

      Joe felt a warm glow at this reported praise. Many choristers do good service by being able to take a note when given it, but a choir needs at least one member of each section who can actually give the notes first time.

      ‘But what I meant was, they’ll be wanting you to tell them about the fire,’ continued the woman as she put a plateful of scones and a potful of jam in front of Joe.

      ‘Expect so,’ said Joe. ‘Good folk to work for, the Lewises, are they?’

      She viewed him thoughtfully for a moment as if trying to assess his motive in asking the question. He gave her the wide-eyed smile of one who had no ulterior motive, which was easy because he hadn’t.

      ‘Williams seems settled,’ she said finally.

      ‘And you?’ asked Joe, trying a scone. It was as delicious as it looked.

      She smiled.

      ‘My gran always said, complaining loses old friends and doesn’t make new,’ she replied.

      ‘Name wasn’t Mirabelle, was it?’ said Joe. ‘Sorry. My auntie. You may have noticed her?’

      ‘Now you mention it, I think I did spot someone who reminded me of Gran.’

      They laughed together and things got even easier between them. Joe took another scone, promising himself it would be the last, and said, ‘Sorry we messed up your holiday, having to come back early for us.’

      ‘Williams been moaning? He never got on with Gran. Pay him no heed. Couple of days less in a boarding house in Barmouth is no great loss, specially when it’s run by my sister-in-law. Expects me to help in exchange for special rates, least that’s what she calls them. If that’s a holiday, give me home every time.’

      ‘Yeah, I’m not great on holidays either,’ said Joe. ‘Lot of folk are, though. Buying up country cottages for a few weekends a year. Can get up local folks’ noses, that, I’ve read.’

      ‘That what they’re saying about the fire up at Copa?’ she asked, circumnavigating his subtlety as if it wasn’t there. ‘May be something in it. Beer talk for most, but there’s always someone daft enough to take their little boys’ games further. She going to be all right, this woman?’

      ‘I hope so,’ said Joe. ‘She deserves to make it. She was very brave.’

      ‘Thought that was your line.’

      Joe thought of the injured woman’s attempts to draw herself up into the attic, the pain she must have felt.

      ‘No, she was the brave one. I just did it on the run. She had to make herself do what she did. And there’s no way I could have got her out less’n she’d helped.’

      Mrs Williams took a reflective sip of tea.

      ‘You’d just have left her then?’ she asked.

      It occurred to Joe that if the injured woman hadn’t been able to pull herself through the hole in the ceiling, the only way he could have got out was to pull her back down.

      Would he have done that?

      Could he have done that?

      ‘Man don’t know what he’ll do till he finds out,’ said Joe.

      ‘Well, what you found out is what I call brave,’ said the woman. ‘Who is she anyway, this woman?’

      ‘No one knows,’ said Joe. ‘The Haggards, who own the cottage, are here so maybe they can help. Specially if they’ve got kids, or close friends with kids. Word soon gets around; you ever in Wales, there’s this cottage only gets used in a blue moon. Kids are like that. Empty place is an invite to squat.’

      ‘You sound sort of expert,’ she said.

      ‘Watch a lot of TV,’ said Joe, thinking, this is a sharp-eyed and-eared lady. Would probably find out he was a PI, no bother, but he wasn’t going to advertise the fact. Like with a doctor, being off duty didn’t stop people parading their symptoms.

      ‘Anyway, I think you’re wrong,’ she said. ‘Anyone getting into Copa would need a key. I heard Electricity Sample charged them Haggards a fortune for making the place secure.’

      ‘Who?’

      ‘Edwin Sample. Runs a security business in Caerlindys, but everyone remembers him