But if he finds you and you find him,
The rest of the world don’t matter;
For the Thousandth Man will sink or swim
With you in any water.
(RUDYARD KIPLING, The Thousandth Man)
FOR THE CHIEF Constable of Oxfordshire, a man internationally renowned for his handling of terrorist sieges, the new year dawned upon fewer problems than had been anticipated. With the much-publicized CND march from Carfax to Greenham Common badly hit by the weather, and with the First Division game between Oxford United and Everton inevitably postponed, many of the extra police drafted in for special duties in both the city and the county had not been required. There had been, it was true, a whole string of minor accidents along the A40, but no serious injuries and no serious hold-ups. Indeed, it had been a very gentle New Year’s Day; and at 6.30 p.m. the Chief Constable was just about to leave his office on the second floor of the Kidlington Police HQ when Superintendent Bell rang from the City Police HQ in St Aldates to ask whether among extra personnel available that day there happened to be any spare inspectors from the CID division.
The phone had been ringing for a good while before the sole occupant of the bachelor flat at the top of the Banbury Road in North Oxford turned down the mighty volume of the finale of Die Walküre and answered it.
‘Morse!’ he said curtly.
‘Ah, Morse!’ (The Chief Constable expected his voice to be instantly recognized, and it almost always was.) ‘I suppose you’ve just staggered out of bed all ready for another night of debauchery?’
‘A Happy New Year to you, too, sir!’
‘Looks like being a pretty good new year for the crime rate, Morse: we’ve got a murder down at the bottom of your road. I’m assuming you had nothing to do with it, of course.’
‘I’m on furlough, sir.’
‘Well, never mind! You can make up the days later in January.’
‘Or February,’ mumbled Morse.
‘Or February!’ admitted the Chief Constable.
‘Not tonight, I’m afraid, sir. I’m taking part in the final of the pub quiz round at the Friar.’
‘I’m glad to hear others have got such confidence in your brains.’
‘I’m quite good, really – apart from Sport and Pop Music.’
‘Oh, I know that, Morse!’ The Chief Constable was speaking very slowly now. ‘And I have every confidence in your brains, as well.’
Morse sighed audibly into the phone and held his peace as the Chief Constable continued: ‘We’ve got dozens of men here if you need ’em.’
‘Is Sergeant Lewis on duty?’ asked a Morse now fully resigned.
‘Lewis? Ah yes! As a matter of fact he’s on his way to pick you up now. I thought, you know, that er . . .’
‘You’re very kind, sir.’
Morse put down the phone and walked to the window where he looked down on the strangely quiet, muffled road. The Corporation lorries had gritted for a second time late that afternoon, but only a few carefully driven cars were intermittently crawling past along the icy surfaces. Lewis wouldn’t mind coming out, though. In fact, thought Morse, he’d probably be only too glad to escape the first night of the new year television.
And what of Morse himself? There was perhaps just a hint of grim delight to be observed on his features as he saw the police car pull into the gutter in a spurt of deep slush, and waved to the man who got out of it – a thick-set, slightly awkward-looking man, for whom the only blemishes on a life of unexciting virtuousness were a gluttonous partiality for egg and chips, and a passion for fast driving.
Sergeant Lewis looked up to the window of the flat, and acknowledged Morse’s gesture of recognition. And had Lewis been able to observe more closely at that moment he might have seen that in the deep shadows of Morse’s rather cold blue eyes there floated some reminiscences of an almost joyful satisfaction.