The sentence petered out. Strike stared, motionless, at the blank wall in front of him. Beyond the partition wall, Pat was laughing at something Morris had said.
“Look,” repeated Rokeby, with just a tiny hint of temper now, because he was a man used to getting his own way. “I get it, I do, but what the fuck can I do? I can’t time travel. Al’s told me what you’ve been saying, and there’s a bunch of stuff you don’t know, about your mother and all her fucking men. If you just come over, we can have a drink, we can have it all out. And,” said Rokeby, quietly insinuating, “maybe I can help you out a bit, maybe there’s something you want I can help out with, peace offering, I’m open to suggestions…”
In the outer office, Hutchins and Barclay were taking their leave, ready to get back to their separate jobs. Robin was thinking only about how much she wanted to go home. She was supposed to have the rest of the day off, but Morris was hanging around, and she was sure he was waiting because he wanted to walk with her to the Tube. Pretending to have paperwork to look at, she was rifling through a filing cabinet while Morris and Pat chatted, hoping he’d leave. She’d just opened an old file on a prolific adulterer, when Strike’s voice filled the room from the inner office. She, Pat and Morris turned their heads. Several pages of the file Robin was balancing on top of the drawer slid to the floor.
“… so GO FUCK YOURSELF!”
Before Robin could exchange looks with Morris or Pat, the dividing door between inner and outer offices opened. Strike looked alarming: white, livid, his breath coming fast. He stormed through the outer office, grabbed his coat and could be heard heading down the metal staircase outside.
Robin picked up the fallen pages.
“Shit,” said Morris, grinning. “Wouldn’t have wanted to be on the end of that call.”
“Nasty temper,” said Pat, who looked weirdly satisfied. “Knew it, the moment I laid eyes on him.”
40
Thus as they words amongst them multiply,
They fall to strokes, the frute of too much talke…
Edmund Spenser
The Faerie Queene
Robin found no polite way of avoiding walking to the Tube with Morris and in consequence was obliged to listen to two off-color jokes, and to lie about her Valentine’s plans, because she could just imagine Morris’s response if she told him Strike was coming over. Pretending that she hadn’t heard or registered Morris’s suggestion that they should get together one night to compare notes on lawyers, she parted from him at the bottom of the escalator with relief.
Tired and mildly depressed, Robin’s thoughts lingered on Morris as the Tube sped her back toward Earl’s Court. Was he so used to women responding readily to his undeniable handsomeness that he took it for granted he was eliciting a positive response? Or did the fault lie in Robin herself, who, for the sake of politeness, for the cohesion of the team, because she didn’t want to make trouble when the agency was so busy, continued to smile at his stupid jokes and chose not to say, loudly and clearly, “I don’t like you. We’re never going to date.”
She arrived home to find the flat full of the cheering and delicious smell of simmering beef and red wine. Max appeared to have gone out, but a casserole was sitting in the oven and Wolfgang was lying as close to the hot door as he could manage without burning himself, reminding Robin of fans who camped out overnight in hope of catching a glimpse of pop stars.
Instead of lying down on her bed and trying to get a few hours’ sleep before dinner, Robin, who’d been stung by Strike’s reminders that she hadn’t chased up Amanda Laws or found Paul Satchwell, made herself more coffee, opened her laptop and sat down at the small dining table. After sending Amanda Laws another email, she opened Google. When she did so, each letter of the logo turned one by one into a pastel-colored, heart-shaped candy with a slogan on it: MR. RIGHT, PUPPY LUV and BLIND DATE, and for some reason, her thoughts moved to Charlotte Campbell. It would, of course, be very difficult for a married woman to meet her lover tonight. And who, she wondered, had Strike been telling to fuck off over the phone?
Robin set to work on Satchwell, trying to emulate Strike’s success in finding C. B. Oakden. She played around with Satchwell’s three names, reversing Paul and Leonard, trying initials and deliberate misspellings, but the men who appeared in answer to her searches didn’t look promising.
Was it possible that Margot’s tight-jeaned, hairy-chested artist had turned, over the space of four decades, into classic car collector Leo Satchwell, a rotund man with a goatee who wore tinted glasses? Unlikely, Robin decided, after wasting ten minutes on Leo: judging by the photographs on his Facebook page, in which he stood alongside other enthusiasts, he was barely five feet tall. There was a Brian Satchwell in Newport, but he had a lazy eye and was five years too young, and a Colin Satchwell in Eastbourne who ran an antiques business. She was still trying to find an image of Colin when she heard the front door open. A few minutes later, Max walked into the kitchen, with a bag of shopping in his hand.
“How’s the casserole doing?” he asked.
“Great,” said Robin, who hadn’t checked it.
“Get out of the way, Wolfgang, unless you want to be burned,” said Max, as he opened the oven door. To Robin’s relief, the casserole appeared to be doing well, and Max shut the door again.
Robin closed her laptop. A feeling that it was rude to sit typing while someone else was cooking in her vicinity persisted from the days when she’d lived with a husband who’d always resented her bringing work home.
“Max, I’m really sorry about this, but my brother’s bringing another friend with him tonight.”
“That’s fine,” said Max, unpacking his shopping.
“And they might be arriving early. They aren’t expecting to eat with us—”
“They’re welcome. This casserole serves eight. I was going to freeze the rest, but we can eat the lot tonight, I don’t mind.”
“That’s really nice of you,” said Robin, “but I know you want to talk to Cormoran alone, so I could take them—”
“No, the more the merrier,” said Max, who seemed mildly cheerful at the prospect of company. “I told you, I’ve decided to give up the recluse life.”
“Oh,” said Robin. “OK, then.”
She had some misgivings about what she feared might be quite an ill-assorted group, but telling herself her tiredness was making her pessimistic, she retired to her bedroom, where she spent the rest of the afternoon trying to find a photograph of Colin Satchwell. Finally, at six o’clock, after a great deal of cross-referencing, she located a picture on the website of a local church, where he appeared to be an alderman. Portly, with a low hairline, he in no way resembled the artist she sought.
Aware that she really ought to change and go upstairs to help Max, she was on the point of closing her laptop when a new email arrived. The subject line was one word: “Creed,” and with a spurt of nervous excitement, Robin opened it.
Hi Robin,
Quick update: I’ve passed the Creed request to the two people I mentioned. My Ministry of Justice contact was a bit more hopeful than I thought he’d be. This is confidential, but another family’s been lobbying for Creed to be interviewed again. Their daughter was never found, but they’ve always believed a pendant in Creed’s house belonged to her. My contact thinks something might be achievable if the Bamborough family joined forces with the Tuckers. I don’t know whether Cormoran would be allowed to conduct the interview, though. That decision would be taken by the Broadmoor authorities, the Ministry of Justice and the Home Office and my MoJ contact thinks it more likely to be police. I’ll let you know what’s going on as soon as I hear anything else.
Best, Izzy
Robin read this email through and allowed herself a flicker of optimism, though she didn’t intend to tell Strike what she was up to just yet. With luck, they’d be allowed to talk to the police interviewer before he or she went into Broadmoor. She typed an email of thanks, then began to get ready for dinner.
Her slightly improved mood survived looking in the mirror and seeing how tired she looked, with gray shadows under her slightly bloodshot eyes, and hair that definitely needed washing. Making do with dry shampoo, Robin tied back her hair, changed into clean jeans and her favorite top, applied undereye concealer and was on the point of leaving her room when her mobile rang.
Afraid that it would be Strike canceling, she was positively relieved to see Ilsa’s name.
“Hi, Ilsa!”
“Hi, Robin. Are you with Corm?”
“No,” said Robin. Instead of leaving her bedroom, she sat back down on the bed. “Are you OK?”
Ilsa sounded odd: weak and numb.
“D’you know where Corm is?”
“No, but he should be here in ten minutes. D’you want me to give him a message?”
“No. I—d’you know whether he’s been with Nick today?”