London simmered. The ziggurat-shaped tower blocks of Canary Wharf, the apex of one of which was home to Reston Rhyolitic, seemed to pulse beneath the hard-beating sun. The palm-lined streets and avenues were strips of scintillating green. A storm was brewing to the east, purple-black thunderheads boiling up on the horizon, out over the North Sea. When the rain came, it would be a welcome antidote to the heat.
“You had a wife and son,” she said.
“That’s correct.”
“Sofia and Jack.”
“Jake.” But you knew that already. You’re not the sort to slip up on details.
“They’re not with us any more.”
“Yes. So?”
“Would you mind telling me how they died?”
“I would. I don’t see that it’s any business of yours.”
“Jaguar Warrior. Everything’s my business.”
“Perhaps if I knew why you want to know…”
“Perhaps if you could just answer the fucking question.”
They held each other’s gazes. Seconds stretched.
“Well,” said Stuart, “as it happens, they volunteered for sacrifice. I say ‘they.’ Sofia did.”
“Your son had no choice?”
“How could he? He was two.”
“And why did Mrs Reston put herself and your son forward for sacrifice?”
“You’d have to ask her.”
“You don’t know?”
“Sofia was… not always a well-balanced individual. There were psychological issues. She was prone to mental disturbance, depression.”
“So to opt for sacrifice one must be mentally disturbed, is that what you’re saying?”
“No, chief inspector. I never said anything of the sort. Don’t put words in my mouth.”
“Most regard giving your life to the gods as the sanest, most rational act imaginable. Patriotic, what’s more.”
“Most do.”
“But you’re not one of them,” the policewoman said archly.
“I wouldn’t go in for it myself.” Stuart gestured around him. “Why, when I have such a good life?”
“Your wife, presumably, had a good life too. Being Mrs Stuart Reston, she couldn’t have wanted for much. A lovely home, I’d imagine. Plenty of disposable income. A respected, successful husband. A son.”
“Materially she had all she could wish for. But — perhaps you’ve heard this, Miss Vaughn — money can’t buy happiness.”
“Were you cruel to her?”
“Of course not. I resent you even suggesting it.”
“Why did you marry her?”
“What do you mean?”
“If she was unstable. Didn’t you sense that? Didn’t alarm bells start ringing before the wedding bells did?”
Stuart drew a deep breath. She was not going to rattle him, this lackey of the state. She was trying to, with her probing, her impertinence. She would not succeed.
“Sofia was a vibrant human being,” he said. “She was beautiful. When she was comfortable within her skin, when she was herself, she was a dream. She lit up a room. She had a way of drawing everyone around her to her and making them feel at home and at ease. She was also a woman of high standing, accomplished, eminently marriageable. She’d had a hundred proposals and turned them all down.”
“But then you came along, number one hundred and one, and she said yes.”
“It wasn’t easy. It was a long, drawn-out campaign. But I was persistent, and in the end she succumbed.”
“Campaign,” said Chief Inspector Vaughn. “Interesting use of military terminology.”
Stuart gave a light shrug. “A stint with the Eagles. You pick up a phrase or two along the way.”
The detective moved away from the window, closer to him. “You achieved your objective, then. Set your sights on a high-society lady and bagged her. Made a good match. And you had no reason to suspect there was anything wrong with her?”
“There was nothing wrong with Sofia,” Stuart stated adamantly. “She had her flaws, she wasn’t perfect, but then who of us is, chief inspector? You could say she was a bit tightly wound at times. At other times, perhaps not tightly wound enough. But it wasn’t until after Jake was born that the trouble really began. He was a difficult birth and an awkward baby. Sofia had a wretched time with him. He wouldn’t sleep, wouldn’t feed properly. Colicky. Sick a lot. She had help, of course. Nannies, nurses, domestic staff, the best available, the costliest. But she insisted on doing the bulk of the work herself. She felt such a depth of maternal responsibility. She loved Jake as hard as any mother loved a child.”
“Could you have done more?”
The needling was persistent, he had to give her that. And accurate.
“Maybe I could have,” he admitted. “But I couldn’t neglect my job. I had responsibilities too. I blame myself for not spotting the cracks sooner. The changes in Sofia’s behaviour. The mood swings. The long periods when she was withdrawn and uncommunicative. I just thought she was exhausted, wrung out to the last drop. Had I been a little less preoccupied with Reston Rhyolitic, maybe I could have leapt in and saved her. Saved them both.”
“Was there any warning?”
“What of?”
“That she was going to do what she did.”
“No. None. Had Sofia discussed it with me, I’d have done my damnedest to talk her out of it.”
“Why?”
“What do you mean, why?”
“Why would you try to talk her out of answering the call of the gods? If she felt a compulsion to be part of a blood rite, why would you not approve?”
“Because she was my wife and I loved her and I didn’t want to lose her. Or my son.”
“But children are especially blessed if they die under the priest’s knife. Their souls go straight to Tamoanchan, where they frolic at the feet of Quetzalcoatl all day and sleep in a dormitory next to his throne room all night. Jake could not be happier on earth than he is now, in the gods’ company.”
“Jake,” said Stuart, “belongs at my side. He would be four now, just starting school, and I would be with him every step of the way, teaching him what I know, giving him all he needs to become a man. Sofia took him from me, and herself as well, and the gods received what the gods did not deserve to have.”
Those grey eyes glinted like gunmetal. “Must make you pretty cross, that, huh? I bet you’re pissed off with your wife, but because she’s not around to be pissed off with, you resent the Empire instead.”
“That would be absurd. To transfer one’s emotions onto an abstract, unfeeling entity? What would be the point?”
“The blame’s got to go somewhere.”
“I told you, if I blame anyone, it’s myself. I could have been more on the ball. I could have been more sensitive to Sofia’s needs. A better husband.”
“Self-hatred has a way of turning outward.”
“I still don’t see what all this is about, Inspector Vaughn. What are you driving at? Why all these questions about my wife and son? Their deaths are a matter of public record. There’s no secret involved. I’ve nothing to hide. It happened while I was abroad on a business trip. Sofia chose her moment well. She was cunning, in the way that the mentally ill sometimes are. She knew if I’d got a sniff of what she was up to, I’d have moved heaven and earth to prevent it.”
“Business trip,” said the chief inspector. “Funny you should mention that.”
“Funny why?”
“Actually, you know what? I’m parched. Long day yesterday, late night last night. Could your PA whip me up a
