It was a week before they spoke again. Anna called him at the Yard, on the eve of the long weekend.
‘You have got the weekend off, haven’t you? You see, Tommy Athelnay’s invited us all down to Uphill for the holiday. You know, one of those pre-war long weekends. Turn up for tea on Saturday, set off home same time Monday, back in London before bedtime.’
‘Us?’ Troy said simply. ‘All?’
‘Well you and me, and the Ffitch girls, and a couple of Fitz’s friends. Chap called Tony, someone he calls Marty, and a girl called Clover. I know her – she’s part of that odd harem Fitz has at the mews house. Funny little thing. Never met Tony or Marty, or at least I don’t think I have. Tommy doesn’t go a lot on surnames – but it’ll be about a dozen in all I should think.’
Troy said nothing, so she prattled on to coax him.
‘I say Tommy’s asked us, but we’d stay with Fitz of course. He rents the south lodge off Tommy. Tommy’s lived in the north lodge ever since Uphill Park got bombed in the war.’
‘You think the prospect of prolonged exposure to Tommy would put me off, do you?’
‘I never know with you, Troy. The slightest thing can put you off. Tommy can be a bit of a bore, but you’re one of the most awkward buggers I know.’
‘And what about Fitz?’
‘What about Fitz? You’re not saying you’ve anything against Fitz?’
Troy knew Anna. He could imagine her clearly now, spluttering with incredulity. He chose his words carefully.
‘He pricks me.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘I think I mean he flirts with me. It’s a kind of flirtation. He flirts with the law.’
‘Can’t say as I’ve noticed.’
‘You wouldn’t.’
‘I mean, you’re not saying you think Fitz is a wrong ’un are you? He’s a rogue, but hardly a wrong ’un.’
‘No. I’m saying that he thinks he is. In his own mind he thinks he’s outside the law. The flirtation is in wanting also to be above the law.’
‘Now you have lost me.’
‘Why are most criminals caught?’
‘In my limited experience because they leave their fingerprints all over the shop. The average criminal seems not to be able to afford the price of a pair of gloves. Perhaps that’s what drives them to crime in the first place? And they don’t reckon with Kolankiewicz and his bag of forensic tricks. And then, they don’t much reckon with you I suppose. The relentless plod who never stops. You know “neither rain, nor snow, nor something something shall stop. . .”, and all that.’
‘I think you’ll find it’s the New York Post Office who never stop. No. Most criminals are caught because they want to be caught. Greater by far than the profit motive is the wish to be able to fling the defiant act in the face of authority.’
‘And you think that’s what Fitz is doing to you?’
‘Yes.’
‘But he’s not a criminal.’
‘No. He’s not.’
‘Then I still don’t get it.’
‘You think inviting me to sit in a cellar that reeks of pot-smoking, where men roll up reefers in the lavatory, isn’t flirtation, the flirtation I’ve just described?’
‘Did it reek of pot? I can’t say I noticed. I mean you expect the odd whiff. It wouldn’t be jazz and it wouldn’t be jazz in Notting Hill if there weren’t a dash of that sort of thing. I mean. Negroes do that sort of thing, don’t they? One sort of expects it of them, doesn’t one?’
‘I don’t.’
‘Yes – but you’re a policeman . . . oh bugger. This is rather where we came in, isn’t it?’
‘Quite. And I think by now you ought to be able to see that he associates with such people because it gives him sin by association, vicarious pleasure without the guilt, and then, to crown it all he wants me to see it. He wants me, relentless plod as you put it, to see how untouchable he is in the middle of all this vicarious pleasure, this second-hand guilt. The eyes of Nero and the hands of Pontius Pilate. That’s Paddy Fitz.’
‘He doesn’t mean any harm, you know.’ There was a bottomless sadness in her voice.
‘Convince me,’ said Troy.