west—the old wool mill a prison block in dry blood brick its staring windows now blinded by boards its clatter and chatter a distant echo through white haired heads

east—six narrow houses under one weary roof huddling against the high embankment that arrows southern trains into the city’s northern heart

few passengers ever notice Mill Street

never much of a street

in winter’s depth a cold crevassespring and autumn much the same

but occasionallyon a still summer day

with sun soaring high in a cloudless skyMill Street becomesdesert canyon overbrimming with heat

2 two mutton pasties and analmond slice

At least it gives me an excuse for sweating, thought Peter Pascoe as he scuttled towards the shelter of the first of the two cars parked across the road from Number 3.

‘You hurt your back?’ asked Detective Superintendent Andy Dalziel as his DCI slumped to the pavement beside him.

‘Sorry?’ panted Pascoe.

‘You were moving funny.’

‘I was taking precautions.’

‘Oh aye? I’d stick to the tablets. What the hell are you doing here anyway? Bank Holiday’s been cancelled, has it? Or are you just bunking off from weeding the garden?’

‘In fact I was sunbathing in it. Then Paddy Ireland rang and said there was a siege situation and you were a bit short on specialist manpower so could I help.’

‘Specialist? Didn’t know you were a marksman.’

Pascoe took a deep breath and wondered what kind of grinning God defied His own laws by allowing Dalziel’s fleshy folds, swaddled in a three-piece suit, to look so cool, while his own spare frame, clad in cotton jeans and a Leeds United T-shirt, was generating more heat than PM’s Question Time.

‘I’ve been on a Negotiator’s Course, remember?’ he

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