A Walk With the Dead Read Online Free PDF Page A

a question.
    â€˜I’m sorry, love,’ Paniatowski said contritely. ‘A girl’s gone missing.’
    â€˜Like I did,’ Louisa said.
    â€˜Like you did,’ Paniatowski agreed.
    â€˜But I was back home again – safe and sound – within a couple of hours,’ Louisa pointed out.
    â€˜I know you were, but it doesn’t always work out like that,’ Paniatowski told her.
    â€˜Couldn’t somebody else deal with it?’ Louisa asked hopefully.
    â€˜No, love, it has to be me,’ Paniatowski said.
    Because nobody else would be
prepared
to deal with it after the girl had been gone for such a short time, she thought – nobody else would be willing to give up the comfort of their home on a Saturday night for what was probably a wild goose chase. But she
had
to go, because she knew exactly how Mrs Harris must be feeling – and no one should ever have to feel like that.
    And besides, she admitted reluctantly, if she’d talked to the girl at the wedding reception, this might never have happened.
    â€˜Call up some of your mates, and ask them if they’d like to come round,’ she suggested to her daughter. ‘You can take anything you want from the fridge, and if you’ve pigged out and eaten all the ice cream, I promise I won’t say a word when I get back.’
    â€˜All my friends will have made their plans for the evening by now,’ Louisa said despondently.
    Of course they would have, Paniatowski agreed silently.
    â€˜Then I’ll ring your Uncle Colin, and ask him to drop round,’ she said, with a hint of desperation in her voice.
    â€˜He’ll already be out chasing girls,’ Louisa told her.
    Paniatowski smiled. ‘You don’t miss much, do you?’ she asked.
    Because her daughter was quite right – DI Colin Beresford, after years of seemingly showing no interest in women, had suddenly, for no apparent reason, become what in Whitebridge they called ‘a bit of a lad’.
    Louisa’s eyes narrowed. ‘This isn’t an
official
investigation, is it, Mum?’ she asked.
    â€˜What makes you say that?’ Paniatowski wondered.
    â€˜I couldn’t hear what you were saying on the phone, but I could hear the
way
you said it, and it didn’t sound to me like you were talking to one of your bobbies. So my guess is that you were speaking to the mother of this girl.’
    She
really
didn’t miss much, Paniatowski thought.
    â€˜So if it’s not an official investigation, there’s no reason why I can’t tag along with you,’ Louisa added.
    â€˜That’s out of the question,’ Paniatowski said automatically.
    â€˜
Why
is it out of the question?’
    â€˜It would probably upset you.’
    â€˜Because the mother will be upset?’
    â€˜Yes.’
    â€˜Do you think I’ve never seen anybody upset before? Do you think I’ve not noticed how upset
you
are, when you’re investigating some horrible murder.’
    â€˜That’s not the same,’ Paniatowski said.
    â€˜No, not
exactly
the same,’ Louisa conceded. ‘But I really want to see how you work, Mum.’
    â€˜And why is that?’
    â€˜Because it’ll make it easier for me to accept it when you don’t come home at night.’
    â€˜I’ve offered to get a transfer if you wanted me to,’ Paniatowski said defensively.
    â€˜I
don’t
want you to get a transfer. You love your job, and I’m proud of you for doing it – I just want a better idea of what it’s like.’
    Her daughter was growing up, and the older she got, the harder it would be to shield her completely from the work she did, Paniatowski thought. So maybe it wouldn’t be such a bad idea to have her along on the edges of an investigation which, in all probability, would have a happy outcome.
    â€˜If you start to get upset, you must tell me, and we’ll leave immediately,’ she