let it settle and closed his fingers around hers. 'There's a lot you can achieve without going to war every time, you know. You could still be a real asset to the service.'
They parted amicably with a handshake and pecks on the cheek. Simon climbed into a waiting taxi and gave a friendly wave as he departed. As an exercise in washing his hands of a troublesome coroner, it couldn't have left a smaller stain on his conscience.
Jenny retraced her steps across the city oblivious to the passing showers. Simon hadn't spelled it out in terms, but he had told her that despite all the high-blown academic theory there were situations in which the law came a distant second to politics, and this was one of them. The government had read the public mood and quietly agreed to smooth the way for the Decency Bill. It was a near-perfect manoeuvre: a private bill claiming massive support, striking a death blow to permissiveness that previous administrations could only have dreamed of. And Eva's short and tragic life neatly told the story: slain by a monster she helped to create, saved by a faith that redeemed her. Nothing must be allowed to sully her memory.
Jenny found herself asking what Alec McAvoy would have said. From wherever he was, he answered her loud and clear: Would that oily wee bastard from the Ministry have come all the way from London if he'd nothing to hide? Who're you kidding, woman?
A news bulletin blaring out of the open door of a builder's van told her it was three o'clock, a thought which brought her back to her appointment later that afternoon at Weston police station. Turning the corner from Whiteladies Road, she pulled out her phone and tried to reach Steve.
He answered with the impatient tone of a man who didn't appreciate a personal call intruding at the office. 'Hi, Jenny. Look, I'm just going in to meet clients.'
'When can I talk to you?'
'I can't say - it could be a few hours.'
'Your detective came to see me. He wants me to go to Weston police station this evening to give a statement.'
'My detective?'
'Sorry. It's not what I meant—'
'I really can't talk now. I'll call you when I'm done.'
He rang off.
'Screw you, too,' Jenny said out loud to herself.
Alison emerged from the kitchenette in a pair of spiky heels that Jenny didn't recall her wearing earlier in the day.
'There you are, Mrs Cooper,' she said, sounding a little flustered. 'I've had a consultant surgeon from the Vale on the line who's just lost a twelve-year-old girl to peritonitis. He sounded in a dreadful state.' She handed Jenny a note bearing his name and direct line. 'And you had another call from Father Starr. He doesn't give up, does he? He's like some sort of incubus.'
'What did he say?'
'Do you think he'd tell me?' She sat in her swivel chair and turned to her computer with exaggerated primness.
The consultant's voice was weak with exhaustion. The fight to save the dead girl had lasted nearly two hours. She was from a strict Muslim family who had left it far too late to bring her to A & E for fear of her being examined by a male doctor. A ruptured appendix had caused septicaemia and multiple organ failure. Jenny did her best to reassure him that her inquest was likely to be a formality, but she could hear the fear in his voice. Successful litigation would push his insurance premiums through the ceiling and kill his private practice. No more house in the country, no more private school fees. She feared he might break down and weep: there was no one quite as pathetic in adversity as a professional man used to nothing but praise.
There was nothing brittle about Father Starr's voice as he answered the communal telephone in the Jesuit house, nor any trace of surprise that she had responded so obediently.
'It's absolutely essential that we talk, Mrs Cooper, as soon as possible. Are you free now?'
'I could be. I don't have long.'
'I'll come straight to your office.'
'That wouldn't be appropriate.'
'Because—?'
Because I don't want anyone to know, she said to herself. Because I'm confused. Because I don't know if you're mad, obsessed or the one person I should be listening to.
'I have to drive out of town. I'll be passing through Clifton.'
'No.' He lowered his voice. 'But I can be on the Downs side of the suspension bridge in fifteen minutes.'
The heavy clouds had blown over