‘How do you want to do this?’ asked Nightingale.
‘You’re the expert, sir,’ I said.
‘I looked into the literature on this,’ said Nightingale, ‘and it wasn’t very helpful.’
‘There’s a literature about this?’
‘You’d be amazed, Constable, about what there’s a literature on.’
‘We have two options,’ I said. ‘One of us leads him around the crime scene, or we let him go and see where he goes.’
‘I believe we should do it in that order,’ said Nightingale.
‘You think a directed first pass will make a better control?’ I asked.
‘No,’ said Nightingale, ‘but if we let him off the lead and he runs away, that’s the end of it. I’ll take him for his walk. You stay by the church and keep an eye out.’
He didn’t say what I should keep an eye out for, but I had a shrewd idea that I knew already. Just as I’d suspected as soon as Nightingale and Toby vanished around the side of the covered market. I heard someone pssting me. I turned around and found Nicholas Wallpenny beckoning me from behind one of the pillars.
‘Over here, squire,’ hissed Nicholas. ‘Before he comes back.’ He drew me behind the pillar where, among the shadows, Nicholas seemed more solid and less worrying. ‘Do you know what manner of man you’re keeping company with?’
‘You’re a ghost,’ I said.
‘Not myself,’ said Nicholas. ‘Him with the nice suit and the silver cad-walloper.’
‘Inspector Nightingale?’ I asked. ‘He’s my governor.’
‘Well, I don’t want to tell you your business,’ said Nicholas. ‘But I’d find myself another governor if I was you. Someone less touched.’
‘Touched by what?’ I asked.
‘Just you ask him about the year of his birth,’ said Nicholas.
I heard Toby bark, and suddenly Nicholas wasn’t there any more.
‘You’re not making any friends here, Nicholas,’ I said.
Nightingale returned with Toby, and with nothing to report. I didn’t tell him about the ghost or what the ghost had said about him. I feel it’s important not to burden your senior officers with more information than they need.
I picked up Toby and held him so that his absurd doggy face was level with mine – I tried to ignore the smell of PAL Meaty Chunks in gravy.
‘Listen Toby,’ I said, ‘your master is dead, I’m not a dog person and my governor would turn you into a pair of mittens as soon as look at you. You’re looking at a one-way ticket to Battersea Dog’s Home and the big sleep. Your one chance to avoid the big kennel in the sky is to use whatever doggy supernatural senses you have to track … whatever it was murdered your owner. Do you understand?’
Toby panted and then barked once.
‘Close enough,’ I said, and put him down. He immediately trotted over to the pillar and lifted his leg.
‘I wouldn’t turn him into a pair of mittens,’ said Nightingale.
‘No?’
‘He’s a short-haired breed – they’d look terrible,’ said Nightingale. ‘Might make a good hat.’
Toby snuffled around a spot close to where his master’s body had lain. He looked up, barked once and shot off towards King Street.
‘Damn,’ I said. ‘I wasn’t expecting that.’
‘Get after him,’ said Nightingale.
I was already on my way. Detective Chief Inspectors don’t run – that’s what they have constables for. I sprinted after Toby who, like all rat-like dogs, could really shift when he wanted to. Past the Tesco’s he went, and down New Row with his little legs whirring like a low-budget cartoon. Two years running down drunks in Leicester Square had given me some speed and stamina, and I was gaining when he crossed St Martin’s Lane and into St Martin’s Court on the other side. I lost ground when I had to dodge around a crocodile of Dutch tourists leaving the No?l Coward Theatre.
‘Police,’ I yelled, ‘get out of the way!’ I didn’t yell ‘stop that dog’ – I do have some standards.
Toby whirred past the J. Sheekey Oyster Bar and the salt-beef and falafel place on the corner, and shot across the Charing Cross Road, which is one of the busiest roads in central London. I had to look both ways before crossing, but luckily Toby had stopped at a bus stop and was relieving himself against the ticket machine.
Toby gave me the smug, self-satisfied look employed by small dogs everywhere when they’ve confounded your expectations or messed on your front garden. I checked which buses used the stop – one of them was the 24: Camden Town, Chalk Farm and Hampstead.