Elizabeth George - In Pursuit of the Proper Sinner

Matthew frowned. “He did? That's extraordinary.”

“You wouldn't know how to contact those solicitors?” Barbara asked. That hardly seemed credible.

Matthew hastened to correct her. “Obviously, I know the Chandler solicitors. I know the Chandlers themselves, if it comes down to it. Michael had four children and they're all still in London. As is his widow. But the boy didn't mention Bowers when he came to see me. He didn't mention a Neil Sitwell either. And most important, he didn't mention any music.”

“He didn't? Then why did he ask to see you?”

“He said he'd heard about the Fund. Well, he would have done, wouldn't he, since it got a lot of press when Dad died. Cole hoped for patronage. He brought me some photos of his work.”

Barbara felt as if cobwebs were filling her skull, so unprepared had she been for this information. “Are you sure?”

“Of course I'm sure. He had a portfolio with him and I thought at first he was hoping for financial support while he studied to be a set or costume designer. Because, like I said, those are the people the Fund supports: artists who're connected with the theatre in one way or another. Not artists in general. But he didn't know this. Or he misunderstood. Or he'd misread the details somewhere… I don't know.”

“Did he show you what he had in the portfolio?”

“Pictures of his work, most of it pretty awful. Gardening tools bent this way and that. I don't know much about modern art, but from what I could see, I'd say he needed to think about another profession.”

Barbara mused. When, she asked, had the visit from Terry Cole occurred?

Matthew thought for a moment and left the room to fetch his diary, which he carried back to the sitting room, open upon his palm. He hadn't recorded the visit since the Cole boy hadn't phoned for an appointment in advance. But it had been a day when Ginny-his father's widow-had been in the office and he had made note of that. Matthew gave Barbara the date. It was the very day of Terry Cole's death.

“Of course, I didn't tell him what I actually thought of his work. There would have been no point in that. And besides, he seemed so earnest about it.”

“Cole never mentioned music? A piece of sheet music? Or Michael Chandler? Or even your dad?”

“Not at all. Of course, he knew who my father was. He did say that. But that could have been merely because he was hoping to get some money off the Fund. Oiling his way with the odd compliment or two, if you know what I mean. But that was it.” Matthew sat down again, closed his diary, and took up his mug. “Sorry. I haven't helped much, have I?”

“I don't know,” Barbara replied thoughtfully.

“May I ask why you're collecting information on the boy? Has he done something…? I mean, you are the police.”

“Something's been done to him. He was murdered the same day he saw you.”

“The same …? God. That's nasty. You're on the trail of his killer?”

Barbara wondered about that. It had certainly felt like a trail. It had looked like, smelled like, and acted like a trail. But for the first time since Inspector Lynley had directed her back to the Criminal Record Information System with the order to explore Andrew Maiden's past cases for a potential connection to his daughter's death, and for the first time since she'd rejected that line of enquiry as useless to the case, she was forced to wonder if she was following a fox or a herring, cured and dyed. She couldn't have said.

So she dug her car keys out of her bag and told Matthew King-Ryder she would be in touch if she had further questions. And if he should happen to recall anything more from his time with Terry Cole… She handed over her number. Would he phone? she asked him.

Certainly, Matthew King-Ryder told her. And in case Terry Cole had unearthed the name of the Chandler solicitors without the aid of King-Ryder, he wanted the police to have the name of the firm and their telephone number. He flipped to the back of his diary, accessed a directory, and ran his finger down a page of names and numbers. Finding the one he wanted, he recited the information. Barbara took it down. She thanked the young man for his cooperation and wished him luck in his move south of the river. He saw her to the door. In the manner of all wise Londoners, he bolted it behind her.

Alone in the corridor outside his flat, Barbara considered what she'd heard, and she pondered how-and if-the information she was gathering fitted into the puzzle of Terry Coles death. Terry had talked about his big commission, she recalled. Could he have been speaking about his hopes for a grant from the King-Ryder Fund? She'd leapt to the conclusion that his visit to King-Ryder must have had to do with the Michael Chandler music in his possession. But if he'd been informed that the music was worthless to him, why would he have gone to the trouble of tracking down solicitors and turning the music over to Chandler's family? Certainly, he might have hoped for a reward from the Chandlers. But even if he'd been given one, could it possibly have matched an artistic grant from King-Ryder which would have allowed him to pursue his questionable career in sculpting? Hardly, Barbara decided. Far better to make an attempt to impress an established benefactor with his talent than to hope for the generosity of unknown people grateful to have their own property returned.

Yes. There was sense in this. And chances were that Terry Cole had shrugged off every consideration of making money from Chandler's handwritten score once he knew how necessary were the kindness and generosity of strangers to the successful fulfillment of his ambition. After speaking to Sitwell, he'd probably chucked the music out or taken it home and left it somewhere among his things. Which, of course, begged the question of why she and Nkata hadn't come across it when they'd searched the flat. But would they even have noticed a sheet of music among his gear? Especially when one considered the bombardment their senses had taken with the art of both the occupants of the flat.

Art. There was a point of connection for all the details in the case, she thought. Art. Artists. The King-Ryder Fund. Matthew had said that grants were given only to artists connected with the theatre. But what was to prevent an artist switching to the theatre just to cut in on some money? If Terry Cole had twigged to this idea, if he'd actually presented himself as a designer and not a sculptor, if indeed his big commission was in reality a fraud perpetrated against a fund that was intended as a lasting memorial to a giant of the theatre…

No. She was getting ahead of herself. She was mixing too many possibilities into the brew. She was going to give herself a headache, and she was going to turn cloudy water to mud. She needed to think, to get out in the air, to have a brisk walk in Regent's Park so she could sort out everything that was piling up in-Barbara's thoughts stopped their tumble as her gaze settled on the collection of rubbish outside King-Ryder's door. She hadn't given it any notice on the way in, but now she did. They'd talked about artists, about not knowing much about modern art. And what she saw outside King-Ryder's door intruded upon her notice because they'd had that conversation.

A canvas was among the rubbish that King-Ryder was discarding. It leaned with its face against the wall, rubbish bags piled up against it.

Barbara looked left and right. She made the decision to see what went for art-discarded or otherwise-to Matthew King-Ryder. She eased the rubbish bags away from the canvas and eased the canvas away from the wall.

“Bloody hell,” she whispered when she saw what she'd uncovered: a grotesque blonde woman, her huge mouth gaping open to display a cat defecating on her tongue.