She moved her head slowly from side to side. “No. My fault. You had to ask. I overreacted. Is this an official visit? Have you come about the men? The men who hurt me?”
“No. But we know who they are. They won’t get away with it.”
“Why have you come?”
“I… that’s a good question.” Banks laughed nervously and looked away, out of the window at the swaying tree-tops. “To see you, I suppose,” he said. “To bring you some grapes and some Mozart. I just happened to be in the area, you know, buying CDs.”
“What did you get?”
Banks showed her: Keith Jarrett playing Shostakovitch’s 24 preludes and fugues; Nobuko Imai playing Walton’s viola concerto. She raised her eyebrow. “Interesting.” Then she tapped the Walton. “It’s beautiful if you get it right,” she said. “But so difficult. She’s very good.”
“It says in the notes that the viola is an introvert of an instrument, a poet-philosopher. Does that describe you?”
“My teacher told me I had to be careful not to get overwhelmed by the orchestra. That tends to happen to violas, you know. But I manage to hold my own.”
“How long are they going to keep you here?”
“Who knows? Another week or so. I’d get up and go home right now but I think my leg’s broken.”
“It is. The right one.”
“Damn. The prettiest.”
Banks laughed.
“Did you catch the men who killed Robert?” she asked. “Was it the same ones?”
Banks gave her the gist of what had happened with Jameson, avoiding the more lurid details.
“So one got away?” she said.
“So far.”
“That’s not bad going.”
“Not bad,” Banks agreed. “Fifty percent success rate. It’s better than the police average.”
“Will you get a promotion out of it?”
He laughed. “I doubt it.”
“Don’t look so worried,” she said, resting her bandaged hand on his. “I’ll be all right. And don’t blame yourself… you know… for what happened to me.”
“Right. I’ll try not to.” Banks felt his eyes burn. He could see her name bracelet and the tube attached to the vein in her wrist. It made him feel squeamish, even more so than seeing Jameson’s body against the wall in the hotel room. It didn’t make sense: he could take a murder scene in his stride, but a simple intravenous drip in a hospital made him queasy.
Pamela was right. She would be fine. Her wounds would heal; her beauty would regenerate. In less than a year she would be as good as new. But would she ever recover fully inside? How would she handle being alone in the house? Would she ever again be able to hear someone walking up the garden path without that twinge of fear and panic? He didn’t know. The psyche regenerates itself, too, sometimes. We’re often a damn sight more resilient than we’d imagine.
“Will you come and see me again?” she asked. “I mean, when it’s all over and I’m home. Will you come and see me?”
“Sure I will,” said Banks, thinking guiltily of the feelings he had had for Pamela, not sure at all.
“Do you mean it?”
He looked into her almond eye and saw the black shape of fear at its center. He swallowed. “Of course I mean it,” he said. And he did. He leaned forward and brushed his lips against her good cheek. “I’d better go now.”
2
Richmond took the Yorkshire compliment, delivered in shaky harmonies by Sergeant Hatchley and an assorted cat’s choir of PCs, very well, Banks thought, especially for someone who listened to music that sounded like Zamfir on Valium.
“Speech! Speech!” Hatchley shouted.
Embarrassed, Richmond gave a sideways glance at Rachel, his fiancee, then stood up, cleared his throat and said, “Thank you. Thank you all very much. And thanks specially for the CD-ROM. You know I’m not much at giving speeches like this, but I’d just like to say it’s been a pleasure working with you all. I know you all probably think I’m a traitor, going off down south-” Here, a chorus of boos interrupted his speech. “But as soon as I’ve got that lot down there sorted out,” he went on, “I’ll be back, and you buggers had better make sure you know a hard drive from a hole in the ground. Thank you.”
He sat down again, and people went over to pat him on the back and say farewell. Everyone cheered when Susan Gay leaned forward and gave him a chaste kiss on the cheek. She blushed when Richmond responded by giving her a bear-hug.
They were in the back room of the Queen’s Arms on Saturday night, and Banks leaned against the polished bar, pint of Theakston’s in his hand, with Sandra on one side and Gristhorpe on the other. Someone had hung balloons from the ceiling. Cyril had hooked up the old jukebox for the occasion, and Gerry and the Pacemakers were singing “Ferry Across the Mersey.”
Banks knew he should have been happier to see the end of the Rothwell case, but he just couldn’t seem to get rid of a niggling feeling, like an itch he couldn’t reach. Jameson had killed Rothwell. True. Now Jameson was dead. Justice had been done, after a fashion. An eye for an eye. So forget it.
But he couldn’t. The two men who had beaten Pamela Jeffreys hadn’t been caught yet. Along with Jameson’s accomplice, that left three on the loose. Only a twenty-five percent success rate. Not satisfactory at all.
But it wasn’t just that. Somehow, it was all too neat. All too neat and ready for Martin Churchill to slip into the country one night with a new face and a clean, colossal bank account and retire quietly to Cornwall, guarding the secrets of those in power to the grave. Which might not be far off. Banks wouldn’t be surprised if someone from M16 or wherever slipped into Cornwall one night and both Mr. Churchill
Susan Gay walked over from Richmond ’s table and indicated she’d like a word. Banks excused himself from Sandra and they found a quiet corner.
“Sorry for dragging you away from the festivities, sir,” Susan said, “but I haven’t had a chance to talk to you since you got back. There’s a couple of things you might be interested in.”
“I’m listening.”
Susan told him about her talk with Tom Rothwell after the funeral, about his homosexuality and what he had seen his father do that day he followed him into Leeds. “The artist came in on Wednesday evening, sir, and we managed to get the impression in the papers on Thursday, while you were down south.”
“Any luck?”
“Well, yes and no.”
