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fit enough to come down here for a bit of close questioning?'
    'He looks in rude health to me but I'm just going to check with the doctor.'
    As Wield replaced the receiver, the door opened and a black man in a white coat came in. He was in his late twenties, with a hairline further back and a waistline further forward than they ought to be.
    'Marwood,' he said. 'You the one wanting to know if Waterson's fit to go? The answer's yes. Sooner the better.'
    This sounded like something more than a medical opinion.
    'Thank you, Doctor,' said Wield. 'Were you on when he was admitted?'
    'No, but I've seen the notes. Shock; sedation. Well, the sedation's worn off. Never lasts long with his type. Same with shock, I'd say.'
    'His type?'
    'Volatile,' said the doctor. 'At least that's one way of putting it.'
    Wield said, 'Do you know Mr Waterson, sir? I mean, not just as a patient?'
    'We've met. His wife works here.'
    'And it was through her . . . ?'
    'Staff parties, that sort of thing. He turned up a couple of times.'
    'And how did he strike you?' asked Wield.
    'Did I take to him, you mean? No way! He struck me as an opinionated little shit, and crypto-racist with it. I wasn't surprised when she left him.'
    'Left him?'
    'You didn't know?' Marwood laughed. 'If I try to operate without knowing my patient's a haemophiliac, I get struck off. But you guys just muddle through and no one gives a damn! What's he done anyway?'
    'Just helping us, sir,' said Wield, wondering how Marwood would have reacted to the scene he had interrupted minutes earlier. 'How long have they been separated?'
    'Not long. She moved into a room in our nurses' annexe. Excuse me.'
    A bleeper had started up in his pocket. He switched it off and picked up the phone.
    'Right,' he said after a moment. Replacing the receiver, he said, 'I've got to go. Listen, medically, Waterson's fit to go. But personally and off the record, I'd say the guy should be put out to pasture at the funny farm.'
    He left. Wield pondered what he had heard for a while. Clearly Marwood felt about Waterson as Dalziel felt about Swain. Such strong antipathies bred bias and clouded the judgement. Wield knew all about bias, hoped he would speak out against it if necessary. But for the moment all that he was required to do was deliver Waterson safe into Dalziel's eager hands.
    He went back to the small side ward.
    It was empty.
    Suddenly his heart felt in need of intensive care. He went out to the nurse's station. The plump sister gave him her smile.
    'Where's Mr Waterson, sister?' he asked.
    'Is he not in his bed?'
    'No. ‘He might be in the lavvy. Or perhaps he's gone to have a shower.'
    'You didn't see him? Have you been here all the time, since we talked, I mean?'
    He must have sounded accusatory.
    'Of course I haven't. I went off to fetch Dr Marwood to see you, didn't I?' she retorted.
    'Where's the lavatory? And the shower?'
    The lavatory was the nearer. It was empty. But in the shower Wield found a pair of pyjamas draped over a cubicle.
    Either Waterson was wandering around naked, or . . .
    He returned to the sister.
    'What would happen to his clothes when he was admitted?'
    'They'd be folded and put in his bedside locker,' she said.
    The locker was empty.
    'Shit,' said Wield. Only a few months earlier during the case on which Pascoe had hurt his leg, a suspect had made his escape from a hospital bed and Dalziel had rated the officer responsible a couple of points lower than PC Hector. But no reasonable person could have anticipated that a mere witness who'd volunteered a statement would do a bunk!
    Then Dalziel's features flashed upon Wield's inward eye and reason slept.
    'Oh shit,' he said again. Something made him glance down at his lapel. The tiny snowdrop had already wilted and died. He took it out and crushed it in his hand. Then with wandering steps and slow he made his way back to the telephone.
     

 
    CHAPTER THREE
     
    The Reverend Eustace Horncastle was a precise man. It was through