Роберт Гэлбрейт - Lethal White

‘Hi,’ said Robin, setting the platter of food down on the wrought iron table beside Andy.

‘Robin, hi!’ said Lorelei. ‘It’s such a pretty street!’

‘Yes, isn’t it?’ said Robin, as Lorelei kissed the air behind Robin’s ear.

Strike bent down, too. His stubble grazed Robin’s face, but his lips did not touch skin. He was already opening one of the six-pack of Doom Bar he had brought with him.

Robin had mentally rehearsed things to say to Strike once he was in her new house: calm, casual things that made it sound as though she had no regrets, as though there were some wonderful counterweight that he couldn’t appreciate that tipped the scales in Matthew’s favour. She also wanted to question him about the strange matter of Billy and the strangled child. However, Sarah was currently holding forth on the subject of the auction house, Christie’s, where she worked, and the whole group was listening to her.

‘Yeah, we’ve got “The Lock” coming up at auction on the third,’ she said. ‘Constable,’ she added kindly, for the benefit of anyone who did not know art as well as she did. ‘We’re expecting it to make over twenty.’

‘Thousand?’ asked Andy.

‘Million,’ said Sarah, with a patronising little snort of laughter.

Matthew laughed behind Robin and she moved automatically to let him join the circle. His expression was rapt, Robin noticed, as so often when large sums of money were under discussion. Perhaps, she thought, this is what he and Sarah talk about when they have lunch: money.

‘“Gimcrack” went for over twenty-two last year. Stubbs. Third most valuable Old Master ever sold.’

Out of the corner of her eye, Robin saw Lorelei’s scarlet-tipped hand slide into Strike’s, which had been marked across the palm with the very same knife that had forever scarred Robin’s arm.

‘Anyway, boring, boring, boring!’ said Sarah insincerely. ‘Enough work chat! Anyone got Olympics tickets? Tom – my fiancé – he’s furious. We got ping pong .’ She pulled a droll face. ‘How have you lot got on?’

Robin saw Strike and Lorelei exchange a fleeting look, and knew that they were mutually consoling each other for having to endure the tedium of the Olympics ticket conversation. Suddenly wishing that they hadn’t come, Robin backed out of the group.

An hour later, Strike was in the sitting room, discussing the England football team’s chances in the European Championships with one of Matthew’s friends from work while Lorelei danced. Robin, with whom he had not exchanged a word since they had met outside, crossed the room with a plate of food, paused to talk to a redheaded woman, then continued to offer the plate around. The way she had done her hair reminded Strike of her wedding day.

The suspicions provoked by her visit to that unknown clinic uppermost in his mind, he appraised her figure in the clinging grey dress. She certainly didn’t appear to be pregnant, and the fact that she was drinking wine seemed a further counter-indication, but they might only just have begun the process of IVF.

Directly opposite Strike, visible through the dancing bodies, stood DI Vanessa Ekwensi, whom Strike had been surprised to find at the party. She was leaning up against the wall, talking to a tall blond man who seemed, by his over-attentive attitude, to have temporarily forgotten that he was wearing a wedding ring. Vanessa glanced across the room at Strike and by a wry look signalled that she would not mind him breaking up the tête-à-tête. The football conversation was not so fascinating that he would be disappointed to leave it, and at the next convenient pause he circumnavigated the dancers to talk to Vanessa.

‘Evening.’

‘Hi,’ she said, accepting his peck on the cheek with the elegance that characterised all her gestures. ‘Cormoran, this is Owen – sorry, I didn’t catch your surname?’

It didn’t take long for Owen to lose hope of whatever he had wanted from Vanessa, whether the mere pleasure of flirting with a good-looking woman, or her phone number.

‘Didn’t realise you and Robin were this friendly,’ said Strike, as Owen walked away.

‘Yeah, we’ve been hanging out,’ said Vanessa. ‘I wrote her a note after I heard you sacked her.’

‘Oh,’ said Strike, swigging Doom Bar. ‘Right.’

‘She rang to thank me and we ended up going for a drink.’

Robin had never mentioned this to Strike, but then, as Strike knew perfectly well, he had been at pains to discourage anything but work talk since she had come back from her honeymoon.

‘Nice house,’ he commented, trying not to compare the tastefully decorated room with his combined kitchen and sitting room in the attic over the office. Matthew must be earning very good money to have afforded this, he thought. Robin’s pay rise certainly couldn’t have done it.

‘Yeah, it is,’ said Vanessa. ‘They’re renting.’

Strike watched Lorelei dance for a few moments while he pondered this interesting piece of information. An arch something in Vanessa’s tone told him that she, too, read this as a choice not entirely related to the housing market.

‘Blame sea-borne bacteria,’ said Vanessa.

‘Sorry?’ said Strike, thoroughly confused.

She threw him a sharp look, then shook her head, laughing.

‘Nothing. Forget it.’

‘Yeah, we didn’t do too badly,’ Strike heard Matthew telling the redheaded woman in a lull in the music. ‘Got tickets for the boxing.’

Of course you fucking did , thought Strike irritably, feeling in his pocket for more cigarettes.

‘Enjoy yourself?’ asked Lorelei in the taxi, at one in the morning.

‘Not particularly,’ said Strike, who was watching the headlights of oncoming cars.

He had had the impression that Robin had been avoiding him. After the relative warmth of their conversation on Thursday, he had expected – what? A conversation, a laugh? He had been curious to know how the marriage was progressing, but was not much the wiser. She and Matthew seemed amicable enough together, but the fact that they were renting was intriguing. Did it suggest, even subconsciously, a lack of investment in a joint future? An easier arrangement to untangle? And then there was Robin’s friendship with Vanessa Ekwensi, which Strike saw as another stake in the life she led independently of Matthew.

Blame sea - borne bacteria.

What the hell did that mean? Was it connected to the mysterious clinic? Was Robin ill?

After a few minutes’ silence it suddenly occurred to Strike that he ought to ask Lorelei how her evening had been.

‘I’ve had better,’ sighed Lorelei. ‘I’m afraid your Robin’s got a lot of boring friends.’

‘Yeah,’ said Strike. ‘I think that’s mainly her husband. He’s an accountant. And a bit of a tit,’ he added, enjoying saying it.

The taxi bowled on through the night, Strike remembering how Robin’s figure had looked in the grey dress.

‘Sorry?’ he said suddenly, because he had the impression that Lorelei had spoken to him.

‘I said, “What are you thinking about?”’

‘Nothing,’ lied Strike, and because it was preferable to talking, he slid an arm around her, pulled her close and kissed her.

8

… my word! Mortensgaard has risen in the world. There are lots of people who run after him now.

Henrik Ibsen, Rosmersholm

Robin texted Strike on Sunday evening to ask what he wanted her to do on Monday, because she had handed over all her jobs before taking a week’s leave. His terse response had been ‘come to office’, which she duly entered at a quarter to nine the following day, glad, no matter how matters stood between her and her partner, to be back in the shabby old rooms.