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    'It was really just to check again on what you thought Mr Westerman said before he died, Doctor,' he said.
    'Look,' said Sowden, suddenly uneasy. 'I'm not sure I should really be talking about this with you. A patient's dying words, I mean, in a sense they're, I don't know, confidential, I suppose.'
    'Like in confession?' said Ruddlesdin, swapping the grin for a parody of piety. 'Yes, I can see that. And I'm not going to quote you, Doctor. Well, probably not. But something else came up. You see, after I talked to you earlier, I did a little bit of research on the ground. Paradise Road runs past The Duke of York where Mr Westerman had been drinking, past The Towers, the old folks' holiday home, which was where he was heading, and then past nowhere at all for another three miles till you arrive at Paradise Hall Hotel. I can't afford their restaurant prices very often myself, but I have been there. Very nice. Excellent menu, top class clientele. Just the place for a pair of distinguished citizens to eat, I thought. And I was right! Mr Charlesworth and Mr Dalziel ate there tonight.
    'Mr Abbiss, the owner, was very discreet, but I got just a hint that Mr Dalziel had been a trifle the worse for wear when he left. Not that that signifies, as he was the passenger, of course. Only . . .'
    Pascoe refused to be the one who said, 'Only what?' but Sowden was less resilient.
    'Only what?' he said.
    'Only when I called in at The Towers just to get some background on the poor old chap who'd died, I got talking to a Mrs Warsop who is by way of being their bursar. Quite by chance it seems that she too was dining at Paradise Hall tonight. Now, she doesn't know Mr Dalziel from Adam, but she is acquainted with Mr Charlesworth by sight. And as she was leaving the Hall, she saw them in the car park together, getting into a car. And the strange thing is, she's quite adamant about it, that it wasn't Mr Charlesworth, but the (I quote) fat drunk one who got into the driver's seat and drove away!'

Chapter 6

    'I think I could eat one of Bellamy's veal pies.'

    Andrew Dalziel awoke to sunlight and birdsong, both of which filtered softly through grey net curtains. It was almost a month since, following his usual habit on bad mornings of hauling himself upright with the help of the hideous folk-weave drapes which were a sort of memorial to his long-fled wife, he had pulled the curtain rail right off the wall. Time had not yet effected any great healing, and now only the flimsy net and an erratic window-cleaner maintained the decencies. There was no way, however, that the net could maintain his weight, so now, belching and breaking wind, he pursued his alternative levee strategy of rolling sideways till he hit the floor, then using the bed for vertical leverage.
    Upright, he had the misfortune to glimpse himself in a long wall mirror. Clad in a string vest and purple and green checked socks, it was an image to engage the unwary eye like a basilisk. He approached closer and addressed himself.
    'Some talk of Alexander,' he said softly, 'and some of Hercules.'
    Slowly he peeled off the vest. The string had printed a pattern of pink diamonds over his torso, from broad shoulders down to broader belly. He scratched the pattern gently as a musician might run his fingers over harp strings. His head felt heavy, his tongue felt furry, his legs . . . it occurred to him that he couldn't feel his legs at all. He nodded his huge head, like a bear who sees the dogs circling and, though chained to a post, yet believes that the sport may still be his. His strength he did not doubt. Nothing was wrong with him physically that a scalding shower and an even scaldinger pot of tea had not a thousand times already set to rights. But his mind was troubled by something like the sound of a bicycle wheel whistling round in the rain.
    The shower and the tea had to be negotiated with care, but they allayed the basic physical symptoms sufficiently for him to risk a small Scotch to