Pascoe refused to be squashed.

'Perhaps he is using his head, sir. Perhaps he is, in the sporting idiom, selling us a dummy.' Dalziel flung up the window with a ripping sound from the parts where the paint had fused, and let in a solid cube of icy air which immediately expanded to fit the room. 'No one ever sold me a dummy. Point yourself at the man and bugger the ball, you can't go wrong.'

'But which man?' said Pascoe.

'No,' said Dalziel, slapping his thigh with a crack which made Pascoe wince, 'at this stage the question is, which bloody ball? Is that enigmatic enough for your scholarship, eh?'

Pascoe had grown used to jokes about his degree when a constable, but Dalziel was the only one who hung his wit on it now. The trouble is, he thought, looking at the broad slope of the back whose bulk stopped the light but not the draught, the trouble is, deep down he believes that everyone loves him. He thinks he's bloody irresistible.

'What did you make of him last night anyway?'

'Not much. That doctor of his had pumped him full of dope and was hovering around like a guardian angel when I got there.'

Dalziel snorted.

'At least you saw him. He was tucked up in bed by the time I arrived. I'd have liked a go at him while the iron was hot.'

'Yes, sir. The early bird…'

'Only if it knows what it's all about, Pascoe.' Pascoe did not let even the ghost of a smile appear on his lips. He went on speaking. 'In any case, the iron wasn't all that hot at eleven. She'd been dead at least three hours, possibly five. The room temperature seems to be a rather uncertain factor. Signs of a big fire, but the place was like an ice-box by the time we got there. That was a sharp frost that set in last night.' 'Bloody science. All it does is give us reasons for being imprecise. I can manage that without logarithms.'