grandfather. I honestly believe that if women could learn to read an A-Z in a moving vehicle we’d have no need of men at all. Have you thought of moving out?’
The question, tacked into part of Heather’s random thought process, caught Kallie by surprise.
‘No, of course not. What do you mean?’
‘Only that with all the trouble in the street, and Paul taking off, you might prefer something in a smarter, safer area. I mean, the attacker is clearly someone who lives in the neighbourhood, and he’s still at large, isn’t he? So there’s no telling who might be at risk.’
‘You’re the one who thought this would be a good idea in the first place.’
‘Yes, but that was before everything started to go wrong.’
‘And before George left you,’ Kallie prompted. ‘Why haven’t you considered moving?’
‘Oh, I probably will once the divorce is finalized. I have a wonderful lawyer—very cute, Jewish, married at the moment but I’m working on it.’
‘Heather, you are terrible.’
‘Which reminds me, George is coming round this afternoon.’ Heather glanced at her watch. ‘I need to get back home to practise my living-in-poverty routine.’
Although Kallie had never met George, she had formed a mental image of him, so she was surprised to discover how much older than Heather he was when his black Mercedes drew up in front of their house a couple of hours later. An elegant suit could not disguise the fact that he was out of condition, sporting the kind of sclerotic complexion she associated with hill-walkers and coronary thrombosis. She tried to dismiss the image of him creeping around a Paris apartment in his dressing-gown, and concentrated on clearing the last of the paint tins from her cupboards instead.
As she worked, she thought of Heather’s parting remark—‘still at large’—and tried to avoid looking toward the basement bathroom.
The Sunday-morning downpour did little to dissuade the tourists from packing out the markets in Camden Town, but the area around Mornington Crescent Tube station remained becalmed. Rain pattered on to the hornbeams and hawthorns in Oakley Square, and the rose bushes were bowing their heads in contemplation of finer weather. With just twenty-four hours to go before Raymond Land’s deadline, the staff at the PCU were to be found at their desks, despondently clearing paperwork.
‘I don’t think Mr Bryant likes me,’ said Giles Kershaw. ‘I’ve tried to be as helpful as possible.’
‘Oh, I shouldn’t worry about it,’ May consoled the young forensic officer. ‘He’s like that with everyone: hateful until you get to know him, then merely difficult. He’ll get used to you. We never had an independent forensic expert before. Oswald Finch always handled everything, animate and inanimate. Arthur used to say he was in charge of General Debris and Criminal Fallout. He didn’t mean to bypass you. What have you got there?’
Kershaw carefully unzipped the clear plastic bag on his bench. ‘Dan Banbury’s sorting out some anomalies in the crime-scene log, so he passed me Tate’s belongings. Nothing in the room survived, but from the look of it there wasn’t much beyond a few syrup tins. I nipped over to the hostel for a quick rummage, and found the lockers on the ground floor intact. I called to get permission to open them, but some health-and-safety jobsworth refused to give me the go-ahead without Dan present, so I got one of the firemen to accidentally drop his crowbar on it.’
‘Oh, I think Arthur is soon going to like you,’ smiled May. ‘His sense of civic responsibility is tempered with a similar impatience.’
‘Then I think he might be pleased with this.’ Kershaw pulled out a set of small cloth-bound books. ‘Tate’s sole possessions, according to the clerk. Very particular about them, his “special” books, he had an arrangement to leave them permanently in his locker—said he was worried that the water would get at them. He liked to check that they were safe every time he stayed over.’
‘Have you looked at them yet?’
‘I’ve only done an external examination. I should tell Dan—after all, he’s the crime-scene manager.’
‘Don’t worry, we don’t stand on formalities around here. May I?’
The first three blue cloth-bound volumes matched, and made up a somewhat random history of English painting. The edition had been published in 1978. ‘The printing is cheap,’ May told Kershaw. ‘Poor-quality paper, and half of the colour plates are out of register.’
At the back of each volume he found a photograph of the author, presumably in his late thirties, prematurely haggard in the way of so many young men who