Free Guilty Pleasures by Judith Cutler Page B

going.’
    â€˜Not his thing, though. Impressionist painting, that’s what he knows all about.’
    â€˜And other things, I should imagine, since before he went private he was Morris’s superior officer at the Met. He’s also kindly and avuncular.’
    When Griff had taken me over as a young uneducated street urchin, I’d had no education to speak of. He’d dealt with that as best he could, but there were times when he used words I recognized but couldn’t place. This one, however, was a stranger.
    â€˜ Avuncular ?’
    â€˜From the Latin. It originally meant like a little grandfather , which was how the Romans described maternal uncles.’
    I smiled. ‘Like your deputy? If I had an uncle.’
    â€˜If indeed I had the honour of being your true grandfather. Now it just means like an uncle. Kindly, dispassionate, supportive. And, in Farfrae’s case, always happy if you can pick him out another print of the villages in his romantic past.’
    â€˜He didn’t respond to my last emails,’ I grumbled, ‘and I really needed an uncle then.’
    â€˜He has explained, loved one. When a man is trying to sort out the provenance of middle-eastern art treasures that suddenly surfaced after the Iraq war and the looting of Baghdad’s museums, then he can’t always fly to your aid. Ah, I see the problem ahead. There’s a tractor trying to turn into a field, and it’s jammed in the gate. What fun.’
    It was quite late in the day when I eventually delivered Griff to Aidan’s. Overnight case apart, he kept a selection of clothes and other necessities there, even spare pills. I knew he’d be in good hands, even if he had to wait till he was able to go out before he could eat well. Aidan’s eye-wateringly expensive kitchen was wasted on a man who could barely boil an egg. All the same, it was harder than usual to decline Aidan’s invitation to stay. My excuse was that I wanted to get home in daylight, something that made no sense at all to me but always seemed to ring bells with them.
    â€˜But you could stay till morning,’ Griff urged.
    Aidan nodded, with courtesy, if not much enthusiasm.
    â€˜Tim the Bear would be so upset if I wasn’t there at bedtime,’ I said firmly, adding, when Griff opened his mouth for one more protest, ‘and I haven’t got Farfrae’s contact details here.’
    They couldn’t argue with that. In any case, they had a diversion – a couple of plain clothes officers arrived clutching a laptop. Despite all our footage, they wanted to see if Griff could recognize anyone on their database. I left them to it.

EIGHT
    N ever having had a teddy bear when I was young, I was now the proud possessor of three. Two were very smart indeed, Steiff collectors’ bears, complete with buttons in their ears. One looked smug enough to remind me of Aidan, who’d given him to me; the other always looked a bit furtive, possibly because Morris had used him as a sort of farewell and apology mixed.
    The third bear, not collectable at all, was far more precious. He was Tim, a present from Griff. Tim had accompanied me on various travels and always gave me sound advice in the middle of the night if I couldn’t sleep. It was he who, having suggested I shove our highly-illegal pepper spray in my pocket, joined me at the supper table – we’d got a new takeaway in the village, and although I was sure their speciality, chicken tikka with salad in a huge naan bread, was crammed with cholesterol and other things I wouldn’t let Griff anywhere near, it was the best comfort food I knew. I hadn’t had any lunch, after all.
    Tim insisted I mustn’t get any on his fur, but then made it quite clear I’d put off phoning Bruce Farfrae long enough. It was true. Since the Crime Scene team had finished with the cottage, I’d given it a spring-clean. I’d also changed all the