Elizabeth George - Just One Evil Act

Barbara wanted to grab Bathsheba by the throat and recite Taymullah Azhar into her face, forcing her to say the name till she was clear on the fact that he was actually a human being and not some sort of unmentionable social disease. But really, what would have been the point? Bathsheba would only have found another way to indicate her distaste for Azhar, probably choosing his ethnicity or his religion as likely areas for her aversion. Barbara also wanted to point out to her that Mr. Beaky Face didn’t look like such a prize if it came to that. At least her sister has chosen a handsome man, she wanted to sneer. But instead, she politely said, “Azhar. Your sister calls him Hari. That should be easy to remember, eh?”

“Azhar. Hari. Whatever you like. My point is that Angelina was always interested only in men who were—who are—different from her.”

“In what way?”

“In any way. Different from her makes her distinct. She’s spent her life trying to be just that: distinct. I don’t blame her for that. Our parents expected us to be close. Devoted, capable of reading each other’s mind, whatever you like. We were dressed identically and forced into each other’s company from the day we were born. ‘Celebrate your twinship’ was how my mother put it. ‘Other people would kill to have an identical twin.’”

Barbara wondered if other people would also kill because they had an identical twin. The street of Angelina’s potential murder ran in both directions, after all. If Azhar had supposedly disposed of his lover and their daughter, why could Bathsheba Ward not have done the same thing to her sister and niece? Stranger things had happened in the great city of London.

“You sound fairly unworried about her,” Barbara said. “About your niece as well.”

Bathsheba smiled with perfect insincerity. “You seem intent upon the fact that Angelina’s alive. I’m merely accepting your judgement. As to my niece, I don’t know the child. And none of us intend to get to know her.”

BOW

LONDON

Dwayne Doughty was the next final stone because, Barbara had to admit, she couldn’t take no and if there was the slightest chance that she didn’t have to take no, she was going to go for that chance like Ophelia being tossed a rope from a bridge on the off chance she was having second thoughts as she floated by. So at day’s end, she drove to Bow.

The area hadn’t improved since she’d last seen it, although there were more people along the pavements. In the Roman Road, the Roman Café and Kebab was doing a bang-up business, and the halal grocer appeared to be bagging goods as fast as housewives in chadors managed to fling them in the vicinity of the till. The money store was closing for the day, but the door that led to Dwayne Doughty’s office was still unlocked, so Barbara helped herself. She entered and at the top of the stairs, she met Doughty in conversation with an androgynous being who turned out to be Em Cass, the woman Azhar had said Doughty employed. Em Cass and Doughty exchanged what looked to Barbara like a wary glance when they clocked Barbara’s presence. They acted a wee bit like guilty lovers, which Barbara supposed they might well have been. Until Doughty made it clear that his companion was a woman by calling her Emily, Barbara reckoned he was the sort of man who liked a bit of boy flesh on the side. Turned out she was wrong on all fronts. They’d been discussing a triathlon along with the intentions of some bloke called Bryan to accompany Em with stopwatch, mineral water, and power bars. Doughty was finding this amusing. Em Cass was not.

They were leaving for the day, Doughty told Barbara. He did wish she’d rung first for an appointment. As it was, he needed to be off and so did Em.

Barbara said, “Yeah. Sorry. Should have but I was in the area and thought I’d take a chance. Just five minutes of your time?”

They both looked supremely doubtful about all of it: from being in the area to five minutes of their time. One wasn’t generally in the area of the Roman Road, and nothing they did took only five minutes unless it was to endorse a client’s cheque, which could be accomplished in far less time.

“Five minutes?” Barbara repeated. “I swear.” She brought out her chequebook. A dead moth fell out of it. Not a good sign, but Doughty overlooked this. “I’ll pay, of course.”

“This is about . . . ?”

“Same as before.”

They exchanged another look. Barbara wondered again. Private eyes were notorious for all sorts of skulduggery. They were also known for providing the fruits of their labour to various tabloids round the capital. If Doughty or his assistant had been into this game, Barbara wondered was there something they didn’t want her to know.

Doughty sighed and said, “Five minutes.” He opened the office and ushered her inside.

Barbara said, “What about . . . ?” in reference to his employee.

“Triathlon training is triathlon training,” he told her. “You’ll have to make do with me.”

“What’s she do for you exactly?” Barbara followed him into his office as Emily Cass powered down the stairs.

“Emily? This and that with the computer. Research. Phone calls. Tying loose ends. The occasional interview.”

“What about blagging?”

He looked cagey enough at this to suggest that Emily Cass had talents extending beyond those related to swimming, biking, and running marathons.

Barbara said, “Look. I’ve talked to Azhar. I know what you told him. No trace left. Completely disappeared. But no one disappears without leaving some sort of trail, and I don’t see how Angelina Upman managed to do it.”

“Nor do I,” he said frankly. “But such is the case. It happens.”

“Her alone maybe. All right. On a stretch. She takes off with no one noticing or, for that matter, no one much caring. But that’s not the situation here. Someone cares. And she’s not alone. She’s got a nine-year-old with her—and this is a kid who’s bloody close to her dad, by the way—so even if Angelina doesn’t want to be found, at some point Hadiyyah’s going to start talking about Dad and where he is and why they’re not sending him a bloody postcard.”

Doughty nodded but then he said, “Children are told all sorts of things about their parents in this kind of situation. I expect you know that.”

“Such as?”

“Such as ‘Dad and I are divorcing’ or ‘Dad’s dropped dead in his office this morning’ or anything for that matter. Point is, she’s done a successful runner, I’ve told the professor as much, and if there’s more to be done, I don’t know what it is and he’ll need someone else to do it.”

“He told me you managed the last name. Angelina’s mother. Ruth-Jane Squire.”

“Hardly a difficult feat. He probably could have managed that much himself.”

“In possession of that and other details—addresses, birthdates, and whatnot—you and I both know that a blagger can go miles: banks, credit cards, postal boxes, mobile phone records, landline records, passports, driving licences. But you still say there was no trail?”

“That’s exactly what I’m saying,” Doughty told her. “I might not like it, the professor certainly doesn’t like it, and you might not like it, but that’s how it is.”

“Who’s Bryan, then?”

“Who?”

“I heard Emily mention Bryan. Is he your blagger?”

“Miss . . . Havers, is it?”

“Excellent memory, mate.”

“Bryan is my tech expert. He did the more detailed work on the laptop from the little girl’s room.”

“And?”

“The result’s the same. The child used it. The mother did not. Which is to say there was nothing on it that could have been deemed remotely suspicious.”