Elizabeth George - This Body of Death

“No.”

“She didn’t? Or you can’t believe she did?”

He said nothing.

Barbara took out her card, wrote her mobile number on the back, and slid it across the table towards him. “I want to talk to Gina,” she said. “I want you to ring me when she gets home.”

ISABELLE HAD REMAINED AT ST. THOMAS’ HOSPITAL FOR MOST of the afternoon, excavating for information in the twisted passageways that comprised the mind of Yukio Matsumoto when she wasn’t sparring with his solicitor and making promises that she was not remotely authorised to make. The result was that, by the end of the day, she had a disjointed scenario of what had happened in Abney Park Cemetery along with two e-fits. She also had twelve voice messages on her mobile.

Hillier’s office had rung three times, which wasn’t good. Stephenson Deacon’s office had rung twice, which was just as bad. She skipped those five messages plus two from Dorothea Harriman and one from her ex-husband. That left her with messages from John Stewart, Thomas Lynley, and Barbara Havers. She listened to Lynley’s. He’d phoned twice, once about the British Museum, once about Barbara Havers. Although she took note of the fact that the sound of the inspector’s well-bred baritone was vaguely comforting, Isabelle paid scant attention to the messages. For unrelated to the fact of his messages was the additional fact that her insides felt as if they wanted to become her outsides, and while she knew very well that there was one quick way to settle both her stomach and her nerves, she did not intend to employ it.

She drove back to Victoria Street. On the way she phoned Dorothea Harriman and told her to have the team in the incident room for her return. Harriman tried to bring up the subject of AC Hillier-as Isabelle reckoned she might-but Isabelle cut her off with, “Yes, yes, I know. I’ve heard from him as well. But first things first.” She rang off before Harriman told her the obvious: that in Hillier’s head first things first meant attending to Sir David’s desires. Well, that couldn’t matter at the moment. She had to meet with her team, and that took priority.

They were assembled when she arrived. She said, “Right,” as she walked into the room, “we’ve got e-fits on two individuals who were in the cemetery and seen by Yukio Matsumoto. Dorothea’s running them through the copier, so you’ll each have one shortly.” She went over what Matsumoto had told her about that day in Abney Park Cemetery: Jemima’s actions, the two men he’d seen and where he had seen them, and Yukio’s attempt to help Jemima upon finding her wounded in the chapel annex. “Obviously, he made the wound worse when he removed the weapon,” she said. “She would have died anyway, but removing the weapon hastened things. It also got him drenched in her blood.”

“What about his hair in her hand?” It was Philip Hale who asked the question.

“He doesn’t remember her reaching up to him, but she may have done.”

“And he may be lying,” John Stewart noted.

“Having talked to him-”

“Sod talking to him.” Stewart threw a balled-up piece of paper onto his desk. “Why didn’t he phone the police? Go for help?”

“He’s a paranoid schizophrenic, John,” Isabelle said. “I don’t think we can expect rational behaviour from him.”

“But we can expect usable e-fits?”

Isabelle clocked the restless movement among those gathered in the room. Stewart’s tone was, as usual, bordering on snide. He was going to have to be sorted out eventually.

Harriman entered the room, the stack of duplicated e-fits in hand. She murmured to Isabelle that AC Hillier’s office had phoned again, apparently with the knowledge that Acting Superintendent Ardery was now in the building. Should she…?

She was in a meeting, Isabelle told her. Tell the assistant commissioner she would get to him in good time.

Dorothea looked as if that way lies madness was the response on the tip of her tongue, but she scurried off as well as she could scurry on her ridiculous high heels.

Isabelle handed out the e-fits. She’d already anticipated the reactions she was going to get once the officers looked at what Yukio Matsumoto had come up with, so she began talking to head them off. She said, “We’ve got two men. One of them our victim met in the vicinity of the chapel, in the clearing, on a stone bench where she apparently had been waiting for him. They spoke at some length. He then left her and when he left her, she was alive and unharmed. Matsumoto says that Jemima took a phone call from someone at the conclusion of her conversation with this bloke. Shortly after that she disappeared round the side of the chapel, out of Yukio’s view. It was only when man number two appeared, coming from the same direction that Jemima had herself taken, that Yukio went to see where she was. That was when he saw the annex to the chapel and discovered her body within it. Where are we with the mobile phone towers, John? If we can triangulate where that phone call came from just before she was attacked-”

“Jesus. These e-fits-”

“Hang on,” Isabelle cut in. John Stewart was the one who had spoken-no surprise there that he went his own way rather than answer her question-but she could tell from the expression on Winston Nkata’s face that he wished to speak as well. Philip Hale moved restlessly and Lynley had gone to stand by the china boards for a look at something or, perhaps, to hide his own expression, which she had no doubt was deeply concerned. As well he might be. She was concerned herself. The e-fits were nearly useless, but that was not a subject she intended to countenance. She said, “This second man is dark. Dark is consistent with three of our suspects: Frazer Chaplin, Abbott Langer, and Paolo di Fazio.”

“All with alibis,” Stewart managed to put in. He counted them off with his fingers. “Chaplin at home, confirmed by McHaggis; di Fazio inside Jubilee Market at his regular stall, confirmed by four other stall holders and no doubt seen by three hundred people; Langer walking dogs in the park, confirmed by his customers.”

“None of whom saw him, John,” Isabelle snapped. “So we’ll break the goddamn alibis. One of these blokes put a spike through a young woman’s neck, and we’re going to get him. Is that clear?”

“’Bout that spike,” Winston Nkata said.

“Hang on, Winston.” Isabelle continued her previous line of thought. “Let’s not forget what we already know about the victim’s mobile phone calls either. She’s rung Chaplin three times and Langer once on the day of her death. She’s taken one call from Gordon Jossie, another from Chaplin, and another from Jayson Druther-our cigar shop bloke-on the same day and within our window of time when she was killed. After her death, her mobile took messages from her brother, Jayson Druther again, Paolo di Fazio, and Yolanda, our psychic. But not Abbott Langer and not Frazer Chaplin, both of whom fit the description of the man seen leaving the area of the murder. Now, I want the neighbourhoods canvassed again. I want those e-fits shown at every house. Meantime, I want the CCTV films we’ve got from the area looked over once again for a Vespa motorbike, lime green, with transfers advertising DragonFly Tonics on it. And I want that to be part of the house to house as well. Philip, coordinate the house to house with the Stoke Newington station. Winston, I want you on the CCTV films. John, you’ll-”

“Bloody hell, this is stupid,” John Stewart said. “The sodding e-fits are worthless. Just look at them. Are you trying to pretend there’s a single defining characteristic…? The dark bloke looks like a villain in a television drama and the one in the cap and glasses could be a bloody woman, for all we know. D’you actually believe this slant-eye’s tale that-”