Free Little Knell by Catherine Aird

speared another sausage.
    â€˜Drugs cause a lot of accidents,’ went on Sloan earnestly. It wasn’t the only damage they caused, he reminded himself. That was the trouble. There was no end to the criminal consequences of drug dealing. And now all he could do was to sit back and wait to learn the consequences of a dearth of heroin. For all he knew, the absence of heroin could be worse than its presence.
    â€˜You’ll have to watch it, Seedy,’ advised his old friend. ‘You’ve got drugs on the brain these days.’
    â€˜We always knew that they were coming in through Kinnisport,’ said Sloan, ‘and now we can prove it, but that’s all. Customs and Excise pick up what they can but they can’t stop all the traffic. No way.’ He looked curiously at his old friend. ‘Harry, if you had more hard cash in small denominations than you could account for, what would you do with it?’
    â€˜Put it in the bank,’ said Inspector Harpe promptly. ‘They could count it, too.’
    â€˜No good. The banks have a legal duty to inform the regulatory authorities.’
    â€˜Pay off my mortgage, then,’ said Inspector Harpe. ‘And buy a bigger and better house.’
    Sloan shook his head.
    â€˜No good?’ said Harry.
    â€˜No. The conveyancing solicitor could rat on you – should rat on you, come to that – if you couldn’t show the dibs had been come by honestly.’
    â€˜New car? I’ve always wanted a Rolls-Royce Silver Cloud myself.’
    â€˜A man can only have so many new cars without the neighbours talking.’
    â€˜Ours even notice if we have a late night,’ conceded Harpe. ‘The stock market?’
    â€˜Your name goes on the register of shareholders.’
    â€˜Difficult.’ Harpe screwed up his face. ‘Could I take it abroad?’
    â€˜You could try,’ said Sloan. ‘A lot of drug dealers do.’
    â€˜I’d change it into francs or guilders or something. Big notes, of course.’
    â€˜Smurfing.’
    â€˜Are you having me on, Seedy?’
    â€˜No. That’s called smurfing.’
    â€˜Sounds like it’s from a kid’s comic.’
    â€˜Nothing funny about it. It goes on all the time. We’ve been watching that Bureau de Change down by the station for yonks.’
    â€˜No joy?’
    â€˜Not yet.’
    â€˜It wasn’t drugs at that crossroads.’ Harry came back to his own field. ‘It was drink. The blood alcohol was way over the limit in the driver who hit that poor fellow Barton, but he’s the one who’s in hospital still dead to the world. He was lucky not to be T-boned.’
    Detective Inspector Sloan sipped his mug of tea. ‘He doesn’t sound to have been all that lucky to me.’
    â€˜His wife says that his employers are going spare without him,’ said Harpe. ‘He’s a senior audit clerk with Pearson, Worrow and Gisby, you see…’
    â€˜The accountants?’ Sloan knew Jim Pearson for a busy man but one still with time to lend a hand with good causes.
    Harpe nodded. ‘Mrs Barton says they don’t know which way to turn, they’re so busy. Apparently, her husband’s a real workhorse and accountants need workhorses. Mind you, Seedy,’ he added with unconscious brutality, ‘all we’re doing is holding our horses. We’ve charged the guy who hit Barton with driving under the influence. Just to be going on with, mind you.’
    â€˜You can’t do a lot more with everything hanging in the balance,’ agreed Sloan, aware that Harpe’s difficulty was a procedural one. ‘At least your problem is still alive. Mine’s too dead for my liking.’
    â€˜Talking about holding our horses,’ went on Harpe, undiverted.
    â€˜Yes?’
    â€˜We had trouble over at Edsway last night with real horses.’ The faintest glimmer of what might have been a smile