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mumbled.
    ‘Is that what you’re thinking, Charlie?’ the DCC asked in an uncharacteristic show of intimacy. ‘That we should set a profiler loose on the files?’
    ‘Some call it profiling, sir,’ I replied, resisting the urge to call him Clarry. ‘I prefer to call it good detective work.’
    ‘But that’s the sort of thing you have in mind?’
    ‘Yes, and computerisation of all the information.’
    ‘Going back how far?’
    I shrugged my shoulders. ‘Thirty years?’
    I sensed a collective Sheest! In theory, unsolved murder inquiries never close, but it’s in our interests to conveniently forget the occasional one, and staying within budget earns more medals than pinning a forgotten murder on some old sod who is in a nursing home in the advanced stages of Alzheimer’s. I could see the cogs going round in the DCC’s head. A serial killer would be a fantastic high note to go out on, but he was already on notice, and I was talking about results in three years, not three weeks. There was nothing in it for him.
    ‘Right, Charlie,’ he concluded as the wheels ground to a standstill. ‘It looks like you’ve got yourself a job.’ He gave his famous smile, like a chimpanzee threatening a rival, and closed his file. Everybody laughed.
    ‘You walked into that,’ Les Isles told me as we strolled out into the sunshine.
    ‘I’ll never learn,’ I concurred.
    ‘Mmm. You could have a point, though.’
    ‘I’m sure I have. It’ll give Sparky something to do.’
    ‘How is the big daft so-and-so?’
    ‘Just as big. Slightly dafter.’
    ‘Mr Priest!’ Someone was calling my name.I turned to see a PC following us out of the front entrance. ‘Telephone!’ he shouted at me.
    ‘See you, Les,’ I said, turning to go back.
    Tell him he’s missed you,’ he urged.
    ‘It might be a woman,’ I replied.
    ‘Fair enough. S’long.’
    It wasn’t, of course. It was Nigel Newley, my brightest sergeant. There’s been another,’ he told me, as I leant over the front counter, the telephone cord at full stretch.
    ‘What, a burglary?’ I asked.
    ‘Yes. Old couple tied up and robbed, some time this morning.’
    ‘In Heckley?’
    That’s right.’
    ‘Who rang in this time?’
    ‘The BMW showroom on the high street, about fifteen minutes ago. An ambulance is taking them both to the General for a check-up. I’m going straight to the house, while it’s daylight.’
    ‘Have you done the necessary?’
    ‘Had a word with traffic about the videos; told the woodentops to keep off anything that might take a tyreprint; sent for Scenes of Crime. Maggie’s on her way to the hospital’
    ‘Good show. Give me the address, I’ll see you there.’
    I knew what to expect. Not the details, just theoverall picture. This was the sixth robbery of its type in as many months; three outside our parish and now three inside. Elderly couples, well off, living in comparative luxury in large, secluded houses. Two villains drive up, pull balaclavas on and threaten them with baseball bats. They tie the terrified householders into chairs and steal anything of value, loading their own vehicle and, in two of the robberies, also taking the victim’s car. They grab all their cash cards and force them into revealing the PIN numbers, threatening to come back if they don’t work. Several hours later, when well clear of the scene, they telephone someone from a callbox and suggest that the police go to such-and-such an address.
    They didn’t risk calling us themselves, choosing to ring small firms that had switchboards but wouldn’t be expected to record calls. So far, they’d been lucky. The people who received the calls had been responsible and passed the information on. It was only a matter of time before some dizzy telephonist, chosen for her off-the-switchboard talents, put it down to an ex-boyfriend taking the piss and hung her nails out to dry. Then two people would have a lingering death.
    The target this time was on Ridge Road, between