Robert Galbraith - The Silkworm

The previous occupant, manager of the bar downstairs, had moved on to more salubrious quarters and Strike, who had been sleeping in his office for a few months, had leapt at the chance to rent the place, grateful for such an easy solution to the problem of his homelessness. The space under the eaves was small by any standards, and especially for a man of six foot three. He scarcely had room to turn around in the shower; kitchen and living room were uneasily combined and the bedroom was almost entirely filled by the double bed. Some of Strike’s possessions remained boxed up on the landing, in spite of the landlord’s injunction against this.

His small windows looked out across rooftops, with Denmark Street far below. The constant throb of the bass from the bar below was muffled to the point that Strike’s own music often obliterated it.

Strike’s innate orderliness was manifest throughout: the bed was made, the crockery clean, everything in its place. He needed a shave and shower, but that could wait; after hanging up his overcoat, he set his alarm for nine twenty and stretched out on the bed fully clothed.

He fell asleep within seconds and within a few more—or so it seemed—he was awake again. Somebody was knocking on his door.

“I’m sorry, Cormoran, I’m really sorry—”

His assistant, a tall young woman with long strawberry-blond hair, looked apologetic as he opened the door, but at the sight of him her expression became appalled.

“Are you all right?”

“Wuzassleep. Been ’wake all night—two nights.”

“I’m really sorry,” Robin repeated, “but it’s nine forty and William Baker’s here and getting—”

“Shit,” mumbled Strike. “Can’t’ve set the alarm right—gimme five min—”

“That’s not all,” said Robin. “There’s a woman here. She hasn’t got an appointment. I’ve told her you haven’t got room for another client, but she’s refusing to leave.”

Strike yawned, rubbing his eyes.

“Five minutes. Make them tea or something.”

Six minutes later, in a clean shirt, smelling of toothpaste and deodorant but still unshaven, Strike entered the outer office where Robin was sitting at her computer.

“Well, better late than never,” said William Baker with a rigid smile. “Lucky you’ve got such a good-looking secretary, or I might have got bored and left.”

Strike saw Robin flush angrily as she turned away, ostensibly organizing the post. There had been something inherently offensive in the way that Baker had said “secretary.” Immaculate in his pinstriped suit, the company director was employing Strike to investigate two of his fellow board members.

“Morning, William,” said Strike.

“No apology?” murmured Baker, his eyes on the ceiling.

“Hello, who are you?” Strike asked, ignoring him and addressing instead the slight, middle-aged woman in an old brown overcoat who was perched on the sofa.

“Leonora Quine,” she replied, in what sounded, to Strike’s practiced ear, like a West Country accent.

“I’ve got a very busy morning ahead, Strike,” said Baker.

He walked without invitation into the inner office. When Strike did not follow, he lost a little of his suavity.

“I doubt you got away with shoddy time-keeping in the army, Mr. Strike. Come along, please.”

Strike did not seem to hear him.

“What exactly is it you were wanting me to do for you, Mrs. Quine?” he asked the shabby woman on the sofa.

“Well, it’s my husband—”

“Mr. Strike, I’ve got an appointment in just over an hour,” said William Baker, more loudly.

“—your secretary said you didn’t have no appointments but I said I’d wait.”

“Strike!” barked William Baker, calling his dog to heel.

“Robin,” snarled the exhausted Strike, losing his temper at last. “Make up Mr. Baker’s bill and give him the file; it’s up to date.”

“What?” said William Baker, thrown. He reemerged into the outer office.

“He’s sacking you,” said Leonora Quine with satisfaction.

“You haven’t finished the job,” Baker told Strike. “You said there was more—”

“Someone else can finish the job for you. Someone who doesn’t mind tossers as clients.”

The atmosphere in the office seemed to become petrified. Wooden-faced, Robin retrieved Baker’s file from the outer cabinet and handed it to Strike.

“How dare —”

“There’s a lot of good stuff in that file that’ll stand up in court,” said Strike, handing it to the director. “Well worth the money.”

“You haven’t finished—”

“He’s finished with you ,” interjected Leonora Quine.

“Will you shut up, you stupid wom—” William Baker began, then took a sudden step backwards as Strike took a half-step forwards. Nobody said anything. The ex-serviceman seemed suddenly to be filling twice as much space as he had just seconds before.

“Take a seat in my office, Mrs. Quine,” said Strike quietly.

She did as she was told.

“You think she’ll be able to afford you?” sneered a retreating William Baker, his hand now on the door handle.

“My fees are negotiable,” said Strike, “if I like the client.”

He followed Leonora Quine into his office and closed the door behind him with a snap.

…left alone to bear up all these ills…

Thomas Dekker, The Noble Spanish Soldier

“He’s a right one, isn’t he?” commented Leonora Quine as she sat down in the chair facing Strike’s desk.

“Yeah,” agreed Strike, sinking heavily into the seat opposite her. “He is.”

In spite of a barely crumpled pink-and-white complexion and the clear whites of her pale blue eyes, she looked around fifty. Fine, limp, graying hair was held off her face by two plastic combs and she was blinking at him through old-fashioned glasses with overlarge plastic frames. Her coat, though clean, had surely been bought in the eighties. It had shoulder pads and large plastic buttons.

“So you’re here about your husband, Mrs. Quine?”

“Yeah,” said Leonora. “He’s missing.”

“How long’s he been gone?” asked Strike, reaching automatically for a notebook.

“Ten days,” said Leonora.

“Have you been to the police?”

“I don’t need the police,” she said impatiently, as though she was tired of explaining this to people. “I called them once before and everyone was angry at me because he was only with a friend. Owen just goes off sometimes. He’s a writer,” she said, as though this explained everything.

“He’s disappeared before?”

“He’s emotional,” she said, her expression glum. “He’s always going off on one, but it’s been ten days and I know he’s really upset but I need him home now. There’s Orlando and I’ve got things to do and there’s—”

“Orlando?” repeated Strike, his tired mind on the Florida resort. He did not have time to go to America and Leonora Quine, in her ancient coat, certainly did not look as though she could afford a ticket for him.

“Our daughter, Orlando,” said Leonora. “She needs looking after. I’ve got a neighbor in to sit with her while I’m here.”

There was a knock on the door and Robin’s bright gold head appeared.

“Would you like coffee, Mr. Strike? You, Mrs. Quine?”

When they had given Robin their orders and she had withdrawn, Leonora said:

“It won’t take you long, because I think I know where he is, only I can’t get hold of the address and nobody’ll take my calls. It’s been ten days,” she repeated, “and we need him home.”

It seemed to Strike a great extravagance to resort to a private detective in this circumstance, especially as her appearance exhaled poverty.