Free In the Absence of Iles by Bill James

several only the other day. With any luck you might get one of those.’
    ‘You didn’t for your case, did you?’
    ‘Sometimes they’ll slip in quite relevant questions. I’ve known it, personally been in court when it happened. I don’t deal in gossip. Your witnesses should be warned in advance that a judge might suddenly ask something totally damn sane, to all intents and purposes. It’s not just the cross-examination they have to prepare for.’
    ‘One story around was that you actually garrotted the two who got off because you were sure
they’d
previously garrotted your officer,’ Esther answered. ‘I mean, you did it individually, no hired heavies. Like tit-for-tat. They could never fix it on you – you being smart and brazen – but the tale persists. Why you’ve never gone beyond Assistant Chief? The pair
were
found garrotted, weren’t they?’
    ‘My wish to come out here and see the spot where
your
officer was found might seem to you of no purpose,’ Iles replied. ‘And it’s true I can’t altogether explain the desire adequately even to myself. I suppose I’d call it completeness. Yes, completeness. If an Out-located officer’s body is washed up on a beach, I have to see that beach. It’s something I felt required to do before meeting the family. If I refer to the pebbles they’ll know I’ve been thorough.’
    ‘They’re not fond of us, in the circumstances. They see me as responsible.’
    ‘Luckily, empathy is another core facet of mine. I find I can reach people, even people afflicted and perhaps hostile, as these may be.’
    ‘Look, Desmond, it might be best not to talk to them about the similar situation you went through, and the outcome there – the subsequent double garrotting. I don’t want them thinking I’ve sent for you to do the job on suspects in the Cormax Turton Guild, like a hit-man. This might look bad for me.’
    They climbed into the car. Iles said: ‘Empathy is not an attribute you’ll see on the usual schedule of career requirements for an ACC, but in my view it’s a nice extra. A mentioned it with gratitude after I’d listened to him and – I think I can claim – consoled him, on the telephone. He said: “Do you know the word that comes to me about your attitude during this conversation, Mr Iles?” Well, do rabbits fuck like crazy – certainly I knew.’ Esther drove. ‘But I didn’t say it. I affected ignorance because, one, for me to reply, “Oh, I expect you mean ‘empathy’, A,” would have sounded like uncharacteristic vanity; plus, two, it might have seemed I’d simply laid it on, the empathy, as if I were used to dealing with his kind of unfortunate collapse – I am, but didn’t want A to suspect and feel patronized; and, three, I considered he should have the satisfaction of producing the word himself: it seemed only proper. “Empathy,” he said. “Empathy?” I replied, apparently startled and wholly unused to the term. Then I repeated it, more ruminatively, like getting a slice of education from him in vocab: “Empathy. Hm, empathy. Well, you said it, A, not I.” “This you radiate,” he commented. “That’s very kind of you,” I remarked. “Yes, empathy, empathy, empathy,” he declared, with excellent rising volume, clarity and intensity, as he rang off.’
    ‘Like a curtain line in the theatre,’ Esther said. ‘A can always put on a brilliant show.’
    ‘Yes, they
are
inclined to be like that, shifty-by-nature undercover people, aren’t they? Changeability is a constant. But I’ve decided, after all, that I don’t need to get a different direct phone number at this stage.’
    ‘I
did undercover once.’
    ‘Absolutely,’ Iles said.

Chapter Six
    ‘Please describe to Her Honour and the jury the special duties of Detective Sergeant Dean Martlew in the period immediately before his death.’
    Richard Channing said: ‘He had successfully infiltrated a group of companies in order to carry out certain