The Ink Black Heart, page 76
Robin left the room again.
‘I don’t think you’re stupid,’ said Strike, now closing his eyes, as if he were a child on an out-of-control bike, careering towards a wall.
‘So who was that woman, and what doesn’t she appreciate?’
Fuck, fuck, fuck. He ought to have left the flat before taking the call, but he was so tired, and his leg so sore, he hadn’t wanted to get up. He opened his eyes again and fixed them on the Raoul Dufy print on the wall. What wouldn’t he give to be sitting alone by a window overlooking the Mediterranean right now?
‘I’m having a quick drink with Robin,’ he said. ‘To talk over agency stuff. How we’re going to carry on without access to the office.’
There was a long silence, then Madeline said,
‘You’re staying with her.’
‘No I’m not,’ said Strike.
‘But it’s OK to meet Robin this evening and risk terrorists finding her—’
‘They’re already onto her,’ said Strike. ‘The bomb was addressed to both of us.’
‘Sweet,’ said Madeline coldly. ‘It’s like you’re married, isn’t it? Well, I’ll let you get on with your drink.’
The line went dead.
A swarm of angry, anxious thoughts buzzed rapidly through Strike’s brain: It’s got to end. You fuckwit. I don’t need this tonight. It was never going to work. No point calling back. Got to end it. Apologise.
Strike pushed himself off the sofa and limped to the kitchen where Robin stood with his back to her, stirring gravy.
‘Sorry,’ said Strike. ‘I was being a dick.’
‘Yes,’ said Robin coldly. ‘You were. You wouldn’t take that tone with Barclay, if he had to chat up some woman to get information.’
‘I’d say far worse than that if Barclay had had to snog some woman to get stuff out of her, believe me,’ said Strike, and when Robin turned to look at him, half annoyed, half grudgingly amused, he shrugged and said, ‘Banter, innit? It’s what we do.’
‘Hmm,’ said Robin, turning away to give the gravy another stir. ‘Well, I’d have thought you’d be pleased I got so much out of Pierce.’
‘I was pleased,’ said Strike. ‘You did bloody well. That chicken smells great.’
‘It’ll need another half an hour,’ said Robin. She hesitated, then said, ‘Who were you claiming I was room service to?’
‘Madeline,’ said Strike. He had no energy left for lying. ‘She wanted me to stay with her. I said I was going to a hotel. Just easier.’
Robin, who was very interested in this information, kept stirring the gravy, hoping to hear more but not wanting to ask for it. However, as Strike didn’t enlarge on the subject, Robin turned down the heat under the saucepan and both returned to the sitting room.
While Robin checked the game and greeted various players to make sure Buffypaws wasn’t completely inactive, Strike took out his notebook and turned to the pages in which he’d written observations on Robin’s interview with Pez.
‘You really did do great with Pierce,’ he said.
‘All right,’ said Robin with a slight eye-roll as she refilled both their glasses, ‘there’s no need to overdo it.’
‘I imagine you’ve noticed how many boxes on our Anomie profile he ticks? Knows a lot about the Beatles, doesn’t like cats—’
‘That was only ever a guess—’
‘—part-time carer for his father – he also knows a way into that cemetery without getting caught—’
‘I know that, but—’
‘—and by the sounds of it, he and Edie were working on something together and she left him in the lurch, going off with Josh and writing a smash hit with him. That’s grounds for serious resentment.’
‘She didn’t necessarily leave him in the lurch,’ said Robin. ‘She might not have thought whatever she and Pez were doing was any good. Changed her mind. They’d argued about Tim as well. Maybe it wasn’t fun working with him after that.’
‘Might not be how Pierce sees it. You don’t think he’s Anomie, do you?’ said Strike, watching for her reaction.
‘Well…’ Robin hesitated, ‘he’s got the ability to create the game, but we knew that all along. I don’t know… When I was with him, I just didn’t feel it.’
By exercising heroic self-restraint, Strike refrained from making the most obvious of the ribald comments that occurred to him.
‘I mean,’ said Robin, who thankfully hadn’t noticed any sense of strain in Strike’s expression, ‘Anomie’s vicious – sadistic. I just didn’t get that from Pez. He can definitely be crass – I told you about that thing he painted on Josh and Edie’s wall – and he was quite aggressive to the Ink Black Heart fan who turned up at our first drawing class and said she was there to “soak up the magic” or something. She was a bit annoying,’ Robin added, taking a sip of wine, ‘but there was no call for him to be that cruel. Yasmin Weatherhead seemed scared of him. I could imagine him making fat jokes. He’s that type.
‘But barring his dad being ill, which must be a big strain, he’s not doing badly in life, as far as I can see. He’s popular with women. He’s found a place to live that suits him. And he’s getting work, even if it’s not as steady as he’d like. I s’pose it’s the same objection I had to Gus Upcott. To be as good as they are in their respective fields would take hours and hours out of every day, and if there’s one thing we know for sure about Anomie, it’s that they’ve a lot of time on their hands.’
‘True,’ said Strike. ‘Well, speaking of people with a lot of time on their hands, I turned up something new myself this morning. Didn’t have time to print it out before the bomb went off, but the bottom line is: Kea Niven made some very threatening comments on Twitter on the night before the attacks, which she deleted, but which have since turned up on Reddit. She was talking about stabbing people through the heart.’
‘Oh – that’s what Cardew was trying to get her to delete?’
‘Exactly. Their little rebound fling doesn’t seem to have been the end of their acquaintance, which is interesting, as is his comment “there are better ways”. Pity we’ve ruled out Cardew, in a way, because personality-wise he seems to fit Anomie better than almost anyone, and I note Pierce thinks so too.
‘Anyway, Kea’s been up to more than making threats on Twitter,’ Strike went on, now reaching for his phone and bringing up the Tribulationem et Dolorum website. ‘Have a look at that. It’s from a couple of years ago.’
Robin took the phone and read the conversation between Arke and John that Strike had found that morning.
‘Now go and have a look at the “About the Founder” page,’ said Strike.
Robin did so, and then, with a look of dawning enlightenment, read aloud:
‘“A selection of John’s compositions can be heard at www.IJU.MakesSounds…” IJU? Not…’
‘Inigo John Upcott,’ said Strike. ‘Precisely.’
Robin stared at Strike.
‘But then—’
‘Remember Inigo’s spirited defence of Kea, when we were round at their house? Words to the effect of “Blay treated that young lady extremely badly”? I’ve got a strong suspicion that he and Kea have had a lot more contact than one online discussion about chronic fatigue.’
‘You don’t think—?’
‘She’s his “darling child”? I do, yeah.’
‘Wow,’ said Robin slowly, looking back down at the Tribulationem et Dolorum site . ‘Well, there’s no way this is coincidence. She didn’t turn up on that website without knowing who ran it.’
‘I agree. She was looking for a sneaky way to keep tabs on Josh and Edie. I don’t doubt there came a point, once she’d convinced Inigo she was there for the fascination of his personality, that they “discovered” their mutual connection to Josh and Edie and I’m sure Kea was suitably amazed at the bizarre twist of fate. On short acquaintance, I’d say Inigo’s a man with an outsize ego. I don’t think Kea would have had too hard a job convincing him she was maintaining contact because he was such a wise, talented man, rather than because she wanted to wheedle information out of him. And all of this shunts Kea right back up the Anomie suspect list, doesn’t it? We thought she had no means of knowing about the proposed Harty-to-human change, but if we’re right, she’s had a direct route into the Upcott household since 2013.’
‘D’you think she and Inigo have met in real life?’ asked Robin.
‘That’s something we’ll need to ask Upcott. They’ve clearly got each other’s phone numbers, if she’s the “darling child” he’s been reassuring and promising to help.’
‘She surely wouldn’t have—?’ began Robin, before breaking off.
‘Who knows?’ said Strike, who’d correctly guessed how the sentence would have ended. ‘Some people’ll go to any lengths to further their interests.’
Both thought immediately of Robin letting Pez Pierce thrust his tongue into her mouth.
‘I’m supposed to be taking over on Ashcroft tomorrow,’ said Robin.
‘We’ll rejig the rota,’ said Strike, picking up his phone again. ‘And we’ll do Upcott together, first thing.’
Robin suspected the suggestion they stick together was motivated by Strike’s apprehensions about The Halvening, but as she had no real complaints about spending the morning with Strike, she merely said as she got up,
‘The chicken’ll be nearly done. Keep an eye on the game. I’ll just steam some veg.’
‘“Steam”,’ repeated Strike, as though he’d never heard the word before.
‘Something wrong with steaming?’
‘No. Just never done it. I normally fry everything.’
‘Ah,’ said Robin. ‘Well, you might want to change that, if you’re worried about calories.’
She retreated to the kitchen, leaving Strike to email Pat about the rota and send texts to Midge, Dev, Barclay and Nutley. Having done this, Strike replaced his phone in his pocket, checked Drek’s Game to make sure that Anomie was still absent, then looked around the sitting room.
What would he have guessed about the occupant, if he hadn’t known who lived here? She liked reading: the books had partially overflowed the small bookcase he himself had helped put together, and he noted how many works on criminology were crammed alongside the novels. Apparently she had a fondness for Fauvist art, given that there was a second print hanging over the dining room table: Matisse’s Still Life with Geraniums. He’d have known the occupant of this flat didn’t earn the kind of money, or have the same kind of family, as Charlotte, whose flat, which Strike had briefly shared, had been full of bits of antique furniture left to her by various relatives. The blue and cream curtains Robin had hung since he’d last been here weren’t expensive, nor did they have heavy rope tiebacks or beaded fringing, while the lampshade overhead was a cheap white Chinese lantern. He’d have guessed she was habitually neat and clean, because this room bore no air of having been hastily organised for his arrival: no Hoover tracks on the carpet, no smell of Pledge in the air. He saw with some pleasure that Robin had put the philodendron he’d bought her in a blue china pot. The plant was now sitting on a corner table, looking healthy: apparently she watered plants too. After taking another pull on his e-cigarette, he heaved himself to his feet to look at the framed photographs on the mantelpiece.
He recognised Robin’s parents, beaming at what appeared to be, judging by the silver balloons behind them, a twenty-fifth anniversary celebration. Her mother Linda hadn’t often worn that smile when face to face with Strike; but then, she’d become less enamoured of him with every dangerous episode in which her daughter had been involved, working for the agency. A second picture showed a giggling toddler in a pink spotted swimsuit, standing beneath a garden sprinkler: Strike assumed this was Robin’s niece. The third picture showed the adult Robin arm in arm with her three brothers, all of whom Strike had met; the fourth, a chocolate Labrador; and the fifth a group of people sitting at a dinner table, with a spectacular view of the Matterhorn at sunset visible through the large window beside them.
Glancing behind him to make sure that Robin wasn’t going to reappear, he picked up this picture and examined it. A different toddler was sitting in a high chair at the end of the table, a plastic spoon clutched in his chubby hand. Robin was smiling at the camera from a seat about halfway down the table, and a sturdy-looking man with a neat sandy beard and eyes that Strike found fishy was sitting beside her, also beaming, with his arm along the back of Robin’s chair. Strike was still holding this picture when Robin returned, holding cutlery.
‘Matterhorn,’ he said, replacing the picture where it had stood.
‘Yes,’ said Robin. ‘It was so beautiful. Has Anomie been in?’ she asked, pointing at the iPad.
‘No,’ said Strike. ‘Let me help carry stuff through.’
Both were so tired that talk was desultory over dinner, during which Robin paused regularly to move Buffypaws in the game. Anomie didn’t appear and the only moderators present were Paperwhite and Morehouse, neither of whom chided Buffypaws for spending long periods inactive.
‘If I’m going to pass the moderator test I’ll have to find some time to revise the cartoon next week,’ Robin said as they cleared away their plates at the end of dinner.
‘I know,’ said Strike. ‘We’ll have to prioritise that.’
Strike checked whether Ormond’s arrest had been reported after washing up, but none of the news sites they visited were yet carrying the story. They retired to their respective beds shortly afterwards, and if both were aware of the intimacy of Robin handing Strike his own clean bath towel and a pile of clean bedding, and of using the same bathroom, each hid it beneath a matter-of-factness bordering on brusqueness.
Lying in his brand-new pyjamas, with the end of his stump creamed and his prosthetic leg propped up against the wall, Strike barely had time to reflect that Robin’s sofa-bed was surprisingly comfortable before falling into a deep sleep.
Getting ready for bed barely twelve feet away, Robin could hear Strike snoring even over the rap being played upstairs, which amused and slightly reassured her. She’d been savouring the pleasures of living alone since moving into Blackhorse Road, enjoying the independence and the peace, but tonight, after the bombing of the office, it was consoling to have Strike there, even if he was already fast asleep and rumbling like a tractor. Her last conscious thought before drifting off to sleep herself was of Ryan Murphy. Even though a date with him hadn’t yet happened, and might never happen, the possibility had somehow redressed an imbalance between her and Strike. She was no longer a lovesick fool committed to celibacy in the hope that Strike might one day want what he so clearly didn’t want. Soon she’d sunk into a dreamworld where she was once again on the verge of marrying Matthew, who was explaining to her in the vestibule of the church, as to a child, that if she’d only asked him he could have told her who Anomie was, and that her failure to see what was so patently obvious to everyone else proved she wasn’t fit for the job that had so nearly separated them for ever.
76
What inn is this
Where for the night
Peculiar traveller comes?
Emily Dickinson
XXXIV
When she entered the sitting room the following morning at seven, Robin found Strike already dressed, the sofa-bed returned to its usual state and Strike’s bedding neatly folded. She made both of them tea and toast, and as they consumed it at the table where they’d eaten dinner Strike said,
‘Let’s head straight for the Upcotts’ and find out what Inigo’s been sharing with Kea. Then, depending on what he tells us, we’ll go to King’s Lynn.’
‘OK,’ said Robin, though she looked unhappy.
‘What’s the matter?’
‘Just wondering what’s Katya going to say when she realises Inigo’s been in communication with Kea all this time.’
‘I’d imagine she’ll be seriously pissed off,’ said Strike, with a slight shrug. ‘Not our problem.’
‘I know, but I can’t help feeling sorry for her. I think their kids might be happier if they split up, though…’
Strike’s phone buzzed. He picked it up, read the text that had just arrived and his expression became immediately furious.
‘What’s happened?’ asked Robin.
‘Fucking Nutley!’
‘What’s he done?’
‘He’s fucking resigned, is what he’s done!’
‘What?’ said Robin. ‘Why?’
‘Because,’ said Strike, who was rapidly scrolling down through the paragraph of self-exculpation Nutley had sent, ‘his wife doesn’t want him working for us now we’ve been bombed. “I know this leaves you shorthanded and once this terrorist situation’s cleared up, I’d be happy—” Oh, would you be fucking happy, you useless piece of shit?’
‘Listen,’ said Robin, as the consequences of one fewer subcontractor passed rapidly through her mind. ‘You should do Inigo alone. I’ll take over on Ashcroft as planned and—’
‘We’re sticking together,’ said Strike. ‘It was both our names on the fucking bomb, both our pictures on the fucking news story and I’m taking these Halvening fuckers seriously, even if you aren’t.’
‘Of course I’m taking them seriously, what are you—?’
‘Then don’t suggest wandering off on your own,’ said Strike angrily, getting up from the table and, forgetting all his resolutions of the previous day, heading downstairs for a proper smoke on the street.
He knew perfectly well he’d just been unwarrantedly aggressive to Robin, but the thought merely increased his bad temper as he smoked two cigarettes back to back while texting the news of Nutley’s resignation to Barclay, Midge and Dev. He found himself completely in sympathy with Barclay, who texted back: Cowardly fucking cunt.
Having returned to Robin’s sitting room, Strike found the breakfast things cleared away and Robin ready to leave. As he’d expected, her manner was frosty again.
‘Sorry I snapped,’ said Strike before she could say anything. ‘I’m just worried.’
‘So am I, funnily enough,’ said Robin coolly, ‘but when you say “wandering off”, as though I’m some airhead who—’
