that. No, I only used my own name and that wouldn’t have meant a thing to anyone.’ There were some occasions when he was very glad about that and this was one of them.
‘I know there are people who don’t enjoy our sort of concert,’ went on the pop musician earnestly, still puzzled, ‘but blow me, not enough to want to burn a place to the ground so I can’t buy it, surely.’
‘Sure, Jas.’ Stuart Bellamy saw no point in trying to explain to the pop star that not everyone liked the decibel levels reached by the famous Kevin Cowlick events and that the Summer of Love hadn’t gone down too well with the older generation.
‘That’s just what makes Tolmie Park the perfect spot for concerts,’ explained the pop musician. ‘The isolation. Not having anyone living near enough to have a reason to complain will be a great help.’
‘I can see that,’ said Stuart Bellamy, accountant marque. For a boy from the back streets of the industrial town of Luston, Jason Burke also had a very good grasp of what constituted a viable business proposition. ‘No one would have heard a thing from Tolmie Park, it’s so far out in the country.’
‘A bit less of that “would have”, Stu, if you don’t mind,’ said Jason, demonstrating that he had a better feeling for theEnglish language than might have been thought by most of his audiences, especially after a vocal event, ‘because I still want it. Ruin or not. And not just because it’s a good place for a rave…’ he grinned and looked suddenly quite sheepish. ‘Sorry, I’ve got to say “festival”, haven’t I? Not rave.’
‘You have if you want to get it past the council’s committees,’ said Bellamy feelingly. ‘They’re mostly of an age to have Woodstock engraved on their hearts, remember.’
‘Right. Festival, it is. But I still want Tolmie Park. That understood?’ There was no mistaking the undertone of menace in his voice now.
‘Perfectly.’
‘And Stu…’
‘Yes?’
‘Go find out who started that fire.’
‘Will do.’
‘And pronto.’
‘Sure thing. And I’ll try to find out as well why they did, Jason. That matters, too, don’t forget.’ Stuart Bellamy pulled out his chair and sat down. As he did so he reminded himself of that aphorism that the familiar is not necessarily the known. If anything described his relationship with Jason Burke, that was it.
How Melanie Smithers, Berebury Council’s conservation officer, got through the cordon of tape Crosby had put up round the burnt shell of the billiard room, Detective Inspector Sloan never knew. The first he saw of that young woman was when her well-covered figure appeared at his elbow, hard-hat, steel-capped boots and all.
‘I’m afraid, miss, that whoever you are, I must ask you to leave,’ he said, putting up an arm to stop her advancing any further towards the smouldering building. ‘At once.’
‘Please, I just want to see…’
‘I must warn you, miss,’ Sloan interrupted her sternly, ‘that if you don’t go straight back to the main road, you could be at risk of prosecution for interfering with the police in the execution of their duties.’
‘And the police could be accused of interfering with me in performing mine,’ she countered unexpectedly, ‘if you don’t let me stay.’
‘And what might they be?’ he enquired, interested in spite of himself.
‘Making sure that the fire brigade doesn’t do any more damage than they need to,’ she came back swiftly. ‘Or the developers. Give either of them half a chance and they’ll be getting a structural engineer round to say that they should be knocking down what’s left of this end of the house on safety grounds even though it’s a listed building before I’ve had a chance to take photographs and do some measurements. I know what they’re like. Both of them.’
‘All the while this is a crime scene nobody’s touching anything until I say so,’ pronounced Detective Inspector Sloan, his authority