Sasha glanced at his card. 'You've done well,' she said. 'They must be proud of you.'
Perhaps they were, he thought. 'So what got you into tracing children?' he asked.
'An ad in the local newspaper,' she admitted honesdv 'I thought it sounded more interesting than my previous job.'
'Which was?' 'Office work.' 'What sort?'
'I worked for the Inland Revenue.' She laughed at his expression. 'Now you know why I wanted to leave.'
'It's not that,' he said. 'George used to be a tax inspector in London.' He laughed. 'You'll be telling me you have degrees in psychology and behavioral science next.'
'I wish I had. They'd be more useful in this game than medieval history.' She paused. 'She's an interesting person. Have you known her long?'
'Not really.' He rearranged the postman's hat so that the peak settled more comfortably on his neck. 'It just seems as if I have.' He smiled at Sasha's expression. 'That was a compliment. She has a disproportionate effect on the people she meets ... her influence on them is stronger than theirs on her.'
'Some people are like that. Louise Burton, for example.'
'Do you think so?' Jonathan asked curiously. 'To me, she has all the attributes of a loose cannon.'
Sasha shrugged. 'Then why does everyone protect her? Her brother ... Roy Trent ... possibly even Nicholas Fletcher. Why does your agent want to believe she's telling the truth? There must be something about her that attracts people. You said yourself you felt comfortable with her until you discovered your wallet was missing.'
'It's a man thing,' he answered cynically. 'Miss Brett wouldn't agree with you. She didn't like her at all.'
'But she didn't punish her the way she punished Cill,' Sasha pointed out.
George picked up the tail end of the conversation as she brought out a tray of cups and a teapot. 'Cill went back to rescue her before the rape,' she reminded Jonathan as she resumed her seat, 'which suggests she perceived Louise as more vulnerable than she was. Weakness can be a strength in certain situations, particularly if it's used to manipulate emotions.'
'It didn't work for Howard or Grace,' he said.
'No,' she agreed, 'but they weren't manipulators.'
'And Louise is?'
'She was very successful at persuading you to let her look through your briefcase ... and Andrew into feeling sorry for her.' She wagged a finger at him. 'She had a good teacher, Jon. There's no more manipulative personality than an abusive father ... and no one with less moral sense. It's an appalling role model for an impressionable child. You should know that better than anyone.'
'Are you saying I'm manipulative?'
George chuckled. 'You could write a book on it, my dear.'
Louise lit a cigarette. 'Don't tell me what to do, Roy. You're not my bloody keeper. Never have been. You all think you own me because of what happened, but you
Roy had heard it all before. Every time she was stoned or drunk the shabby family secrets poured out, contaminating her, contaminating him. He wondered sometimes if he would ever have been drawn into this suicidally symbiotic relationship if she'd told him the truth at thirteen, but he was honest enough to recognize that he would. The sort of madness that had possessed them all that fatal May in 1970 was generated by drink and self- loathing, and the problems of a skinny child who held no attraction for them wouldn't have been heeded, much less understood.
She was right about ownership. She had held their fate in her hands for thirty-plus years, and the only thing that had kept her alive was heroin. Stumbling from one fix to another, she had been a threat to no one. Clean, she was a walking time bomb. 'Take care, Lou,' he warned. 'I can't protect you forever.'
She blew a lungful of smoke in his direction. 'You're so arrogant,' she said scornfully. 'Did you never think I might be protecting you? You're the one Nick's worried about, darlin'. You know what he's like-gets a bee in his bonnet and there's no shifting it. I told you months ago he didn't like you buddying up to George, but you wouldn't listen.'
'That's crap.'
She gave an indifferent shrug. 'Why do you think he lets me come here? He doesn't trust you ... wouldn't trust Micky either if he was still alive. It's him told me to go through the wog's briefcase. He's round the bloody twist ... sees ghouls and goblins everywhere.'
It was partially true. The bits of Nick's memory that remained intact had fused into a looped tape of events that bore little resemblance to reality. Somewhere in the regions of his mad mind, it was only Grace's death he remembered.
Sasha closed her palm over her mobile's mouthpiece. 'The car's registered in the name of Priscilla Fletcher Hurst.' She frowned at George. 'Where does the Hurst come from? I thought you said her previous husband was Roy Trent.'
'Colley Hurst,' said George slowly. 'How very stupid of me. It's an old-fashioned abbreviation of Nicholas.' She sorted through her folder for the transcript she'd made of her conversations with Billy Burton. 'Her brother said her first husband was called Mike,' she said, looking at Jonathan. 'Could that have been Micky Hopkinson?'
'Wouldn't he have recognized him?'
'He said he was in prison so he never saw him.'
Jonathan hunched forward in his chair. 'What kind of a databank are you accessing?' he asked Sasha. 'Is it worth telling your colleague to feed in Nicholas Hurst-maybe Michael Hopkinson, too-and see if he comes up with
