“Has Brittany really been phoning him?” Robin asked.
“’S’what he told me,” said Alyssa, wiping her eyes on the back of her hand. “He reckoned his ex-wife framed him, got Brittany to lie… said if ever a young blonde bird turned up she was talking shit and I wasn’t to believe anything she said.”
Robin remembered the low voice in her ear:
Do A know you, little girl?
He had thought that she was Brittany. That was why he had hung up and never called back.
“I’d better be off,” said Robin, worried about how long it would take her to get back to West Ealing. Her body ached all over. Alyssa had landed some powerful blows. “You’ll call the police, right?”
“I s’pose,” said Alyssa. Robin suspected that the idea was a novel one to Alyssa. “Yeah.”
As Robin walked away in the darkness, her fist clenched tightly around her second rape alarm, she wondered what Brittany Brockbank had found to say to her stepfather, and thought she knew: “I haven’t forgotten. Do it again and I’ll report you.” Perhaps it had been a salve to her conscience. She had been frightened that he was still doing to others what he had done to her, but could not face the consequences of a historical accusation.
I put it to you, Miss Brockbank, that your stepfather never touched you, that this story was concocted by yourself and your mother…
Robin knew how it worked. The defense barrister she had faced had been cold and sardonic, his expression vulpine.
You were coming back from the student bar, Miss Ellacott, where you had been drinking, yes?
You had made a public joke about missing the—ah—attentions of your boyfriend, yes?
When you met Mr. Trewin—
I didn’t—
When you met Mr. Trewin outside the halls of residence—
I didn’t meet—
You told Mr. Trewin you were missing—
We never talked—
I put it to you, Miss Ellacott, that you are ashamed of inviting Mr. Trewin—
I didn’t invite—
You had made a joke, Miss Ellacott, hadn’t you, in the bar, about missing the, ah, sexual attentions of—
I said I missed—
How many drinks had you had, Miss Ellacott?
Robin understood only too well why people were scared of telling, of owning up to what had been done to them, of being told that the dirty, shameful, excruciating truth was a figment of their own sick imagination. Neither Holly nor Brittany had been able to face the prospect of open court, and perhaps Alyssa and Angel would be scared away too. Yet nothing, Robin was sure, short of death or incarceration would ever stop Noel Brockbank raping little girls. Even so, she would be glad to know that Shanker had not killed him, because if he had…
“Shanker!” she shouted as a tall, tattooed figure in a shell suit passed under a streetlamp ahead.
“Couldn’t fucking find the bastard, Rob!” came Shanker’s echoing voice. He did not seem to realize that Robin had been sitting on a hard floor in terror for two whole hours, praying for his return. “He can move for a big fucker, can’t ’e?”
“The police’ll find him,” said Robin, whose knees were suddenly weak. “Alyssa’s going to call them, I think. Shanker, will you… please will you drive me home?”
55
Came the last night of sadness
And it was clear she couldn’t go on.
Blue Öyster Cult, “(Don’t Fear) The Reaper”
For twenty-four hours Strike remained in ignorance of what Robin had done. She did not answer when he phoned at lunchtime the next day, but as he was wrestling with his own dilemmas and believed her to be safe at home with her mother he neither found this strange nor troubled to call back. His injured partner was one of the few problems that he believed temporarily solved and he did not intend to encourage her in thoughts of returning to his side by confiding in her the revelation he had experienced outside the hospital.
This, however, was now his overriding preoccupation. After all, there was no longer any competition for his time or attention in the solitary, silent room where no clients called or visited. The only sound was the buzzing of a fly zooming between the open windows in the hazy sunlight, as Strike sat chain-smoking Benson & Hedges.
As he looked back over the almost three months since the severed leg had been delivered, the detective saw his mistakes only too clearly. He ought to have known the identity of the killer after visiting Kelsey Platt’s home. If he had only realized, then—if he had not allowed himself to be taken in by the killer’s misdirection, not been distracted by the competing scents of other deranged men—Lila Monkton would still have all ten fingers and Heather Smart might be safe at work in her Nottingham building society, vowing, perhaps, never again to be as drunk as she had been on her sister-in-law’s birthday jaunt to London.
Strike had not come up through the Special Investigation Branch of the Royal Military Police without learning to manage the emotional consequences of an investigation. The previous evening had been full of self-directed anger, but even as he castigated himself for not seeing what was right in front of him he had acknowledged the killer’s brazen brilliance. There had been artistry in the way that he had used Strike’s background against him, forcing Strike to second guess and question himself, undermining his trust in his own judgment.
The fact that the killer was indeed one of the men whom he had suspected from the first was cold comfort. Strike could not remember ever being in such agony of mind over an investigation as he was now. Alone in his deserted office, convinced that the conclusion he had reached had neither been given credence by the officer in whom he had confided it, nor passed on to Carver, Strike felt, however unreasonably, that if another killing occurred it would indeed be his fault.
Yet if he went near the investigation again—if he started staking out or tailing his man—Carver would almost certainly see him in court for interfering with the course of a police investigation or obstructing the police in their inquiries. He would have felt the same way himself, had he been in Carver’s shoes—except, thought Strike with a rush of pleasurable anger, that he would have listened to anyone, however infuriating, if he thought they had a shred of credible evidence. You did not solve a case as complex as this by discriminating against witnesses on the grounds that they have previously outwitted you.
Only when his stomach rumbled did Strike remember that he was supposed to be going out for dinner with Elin that night. The divorce settlement and custody arrangements had now been finalized, and Elin had announced over the phone that it was about time they enjoyed a decent dinner for a change and that she had booked Le Gavroche—“My treat.”
Alone, smoking in his office, Strike contemplated the forthcoming evening with a dispassion he was no longer able to bring to the thought of the Shacklewell Ripper. On the plus side, there would be excellent food, which was an enticing prospect given the fact that he was skint and had last night dined on baked beans on toast. He supposed that there would be sex too, in the pristine whiteness of Elin’s flat, the soon-to-be-vacated home of her disintegrating family. On the minus side—he found himself staring the bald fact in the face as he had never done before—he would have to talk to her, and talking to Elin, he had finally admitted to himself, was far from one of his favorite pastimes. He always found the conversation especially effortful when it came to his own work. Elin was interested, yet strangely unimaginative. She had none of the innate interest in and easy empathy for other people that Robin displayed. His would-be humorous word portraits of the likes of Two-Times left her perplexed rather than amused.
Then there were those two ominous words “my treat.” The increasing imbalance in their respective incomes was about to become painfully obvious. When Strike had met Elin, he had at least been in credit. If she thought that he was going to be able to return the treat with dinner at Le Gavroche on another night, she was destined to be sorely disappointed.
Strike had spent sixteen ye
ars with another woman who had been far richer than he was. Charlotte had alternately brandished money as a weapon and deplored Strike’s refusal to live beyond his means. Memories of Charlotte’s occasional fits of pique that he could not or would not fund treats on which she had set her capricious heart made his hackles rise when Elin spoke of having a decent dinner “for a change.” It had mostly been he who had footed the bills for French and Indian meals in out-of-the-way bistros and curry houses where Elin’s ex-husband had been unlikely to see them. He did not appreciate the fruits of his hard-earned cash being disparaged.
His state of mind was not entirely propitious, therefore, when he headed off to Mayfair at eight o’clock that evening, wearing his best Italian suit, thoughts of a serial killer still chasing each other around his overtired brain.
Upper Brook Street comprised grand eighteenth-century houses and the frontage of Le Gavroche, with its wrought iron canopy and ivy-covered railings, the expensive solidity and security implied by its heavy mirrored front door, was dissonant to Strike’s uneasy frame of mind. Elin arrived shortly after he had been seated in the green and red dining room, which was artfully lit so that puddles of light fell only where needed onto snow-white tablecloths, over gilt-framed oil paintings. She looked stunning in a pale blue form-fitting dress. As he rose to kiss her, Strike momentarily forgot his latent unease, his disgruntlement.
“This makes a nice change,” she said, smiling, as she sank down onto the curved, upholstered bench at their round table.
They ordered. Strike, who craved a pint of Doom Bar, drank burgundy of Elin’s choosing and wished, despite having smoked more than a pack that day, that he could have a cigarette. Meanwhile, his dinner companion launched into a barrage of property talk: she had decided against the Strata penthouse and had now looked at a property in Camberwell, which seemed promising. She showed him a picture on her phone: another columned and porticoed vision of Georgian whiteness met his tired eyes.
As Elin discussed the various pros and cons of a move to Camberwell, Strike drank in silence. He even begrudged the wine’s deliciousness, throwing it back like the cheapest plonk, trying to blunt the edges of his resentment with alcohol. It did not work: far from dissolving, his sense of alienation deepened. The comfortable Mayfair restaurant with its low lighting and its deep carpet felt like a stage set: illusory, ephemeral. What was he doing here, with this gorgeous but dull woman? Why was he pretending to be interested in her expensive lifestyle, when his business was in its death throes and he alone in London knew the identity of the Shacklewell Ripper?
Their food arrived and the deliciousness of his fillet of beef did something to assuage his resentment.
“So what have you been up to?” asked Elin, punctiliously polite as usual.
Strike now found himself presented with a stark choice. Telling her the truth about what he had been up to would necessitate an admission that he had not kept her abreast of any of the recent events that would have been deemed enough news for a decade in most people’s lives. He would be forced to reveal that the girl in the newspapers who had survived the Ripper’s latest attack was his own business partner. He would have to tell her that he had been warned off the case by a man whom he had previously humiliated over another high-profile murder. If he were making a clean breast of all that he had been up to, he ought also to add that he now knew exactly who the killer was. The prospect of relating all this bored and oppressed him. He had not once thought to call her while any of these events had unfolded, which was revealing enough in itself.
Playing for time while he took another sip of wine, Strike came to the decision that the affair had to end. He would make an excuse not to go back to Clarence Terrace with her tonight, which ought to give her early warning of his intentions; the sex had been the best part of the relationship all along. Then, next time they met, he’d tell her it was over. Not only did he feel it would be churlish to end things over a meal for which she was paying, there was a remote chance that she would walk out, leaving him with a bill that his credit card company would undoubtedly refuse to process.
“I haven’t been up to much, to be honest,” he lied.
“What about the Shackle—”
Strike’s mobile rang. He pulled it out of his jacket pocket and saw that the number had been withheld. Some sixth sense told him to answer it.
“Sorry,” he said to Elin, “I think I need to—”
“Strike,” said Carver’s unmistakable South London voice. “Did you send her to do it?”
“What?” said Strike.
“Your fucking partner. Did you send her to Brockbank?”
Strike stood up so suddenly that he hit the edge of the table. A spray of bloodied brown liquid spattered across the heavy white tablecloth, his fillet of beef slid over the edge of the plate and his wineglass toppled, splashing Elin’s pale blue dress. The waiter gaped, as did the refined couple at the next table.
“Where is she? What’s happened?” asked Strike loudly, oblivious to everything except the voice on the end of the line.
“I warned you, Strike,” said Carver, his voice crackling with rage. “I fucking warned you to stay away. You have fucked up royally this time—”
Strike lowered the mobile. A disembodied Carver bellowed into the restaurant, the “cunts” and “fucks” clearly audible to anybody standing nearby. He turned to Elin in her purple-stained dress, with her beautiful face screwed up in mingled perplexity and anger.
“I’ve got to go. I’m sorry. I’ll call you later.”
He did not stay to see how she took it; he did not care.
Limping slightly, because he had twisted his knee in his haste to get up, Strike hurried out of the restaurant, phone to his ear again. Carver was now virtually incoherent, shouting Strike down whenever he attempted to speak.
“Carver, listen,” Strike shouted as he regained Upper Brook Street, “there’s something I want to—fucking listen, will you!”
But the policeman’s obscenity-strewn soliloquy merely became louder and filthier.
“You fucking stupid fucking cunt, he’s gone to ground—I know what you were fucking up to—we’ve found it, you bastard, we found the church connection! If you ever—shut your fucking mouth, I’m talking!—if you ever come near one of my fucking investigations again…”
Strike slogged on through the warm night, his knee protesting, frustration and fury mounting with every step he took.
It took him nearly an hour to reach Robin’s flat in Hastings Road, by which time he was in full possession of the facts. Thanks to Carver, he knew that the police had been with Robin this evening and were perhaps still there, interrogating her about the intrusion into Brockbank’s house that had led to a report of child rape and the flight of their suspect. Brockbank’s photograph had been widely disseminated across the force, but he had not, as yet, been apprehended.
Strike had not warned Robin that he was coming. Turning into Hastings Road as fast as his limp would allow, he saw through the fading light that all the windows of her flat were lit. As he approached, two police officers, unmistakable even in plain clothes, emerged from the front entrance. The sound of the front door closing echoed down the quiet street. Strike moved into the shadows as the police crossed the road to their car, talking quietly to each other. Once they had pulled safely away, he proceeded to the white front door and rang the bell.
“… thought we were done,” said Matthew’s exasperated voice behind the door. Strike doubted that he knew that he could be heard, because when he opened it Robin’s fiancé was wearing an ingratiating smile that vanished the moment he realized who it was.
“What d’you want?”
“I need to talk to Robin,” said Strike.
As Matthew hesitated, with every appearance of wishing to block Strike’s entrance, Linda came out into the hall behind him.
“Oh,” she said at the sight of Strike.
He thought she looked both thinner and older than the previous time he had
met her, no doubt because her daughter had nearly got herself killed, then turned up voluntarily at a violent sexual predator’s house and got attacked all over again. Strike could feel the fury building beneath his diaphragm. If necessary, he would shout for Robin to come and meet him on the doorstep, but he had no sooner formed this resolution than she appeared behind Matthew. She too looked paler and thinner than usual. As always, he found her better-looking in the flesh than in the memory he had of her when not present. This did not make him feel any more kindly towards her.
“Oh,” she said in exactly the same colorless tone as her mother.
“I’d like a word,” said Strike.
“All right,” said Robin with a slightly defiant upwards jerk of her head that made her red-gold hair dance around her shoulders. She glanced at her mother and Matthew, then back at Strike. “D’you want to come into the kitchen, then?”
He followed her down the hall into the small kitchen where a table for two stood crammed into the corner. Robin closed the door carefully behind them. Neither sat down. Dirty dishes were piled by the sink; they had apparently been eating pasta before the police arrived to interrogate Robin. For some reason, this evidence that Robin had been behaving so prosaically in the wake of the chaos she had unleashed increased the rage now battling with Strike’s desire not to lose control.
“I told you,” he said, “not to go anywhere near Brockbank.”
“Yes,” said Robin in a flat voice that aggravated him still further. “I remember.”
Strike wondered whether Linda and Matthew were listening at the door. The small kitchen smelled strongly of garlic and tomatoes. An England Rugby calendar hung on the wall behind Robin. The thirtieth of June was circled thickly, the words HOME FOR WEDDING written beneath the date.
“But you decided to go anyway,” said Strike.
Visions of violent, cathartic action—picking up the pedal bin and throwing it through the steamy window, for instance—were rising chaotically in his mind’s eye. He stood quite still, large feet planted on the scuffed lino, staring at her white and stubborn face.