On the road back, Brock said, ‘Oh well, another false trail.’
‘Yes,’ Kathy said. ‘Sorry.’
‘Not at all. It looked very promising.’
‘Poor Gavin. He must think I’m bringing down some kind of curse on him. First his car and now his marriage.’
‘Yes, you do seem to be his nemesis, don’t you? Well, I’m having a day off tomorrow. If they discover anything interesting on the security tapes they can phone me. But not during matinee hours.’
‘You’re going to see a show?’
‘Yes, Peter Pan.’
‘Really? Appropriate.’
‘How do you mean?’
‘Well, that’s what Harry’s trying to be, isn’t it?’
Brock wasn’t too impressed by that observation, and decided to change the subject. ‘I heard a rumour that you and Leon are going up north for a couple of days. Is that right?’
He noticed Kathy’s grip tighten abruptly on the steering wheel, and followed her eyes flicking down to the car clock. He felt the car give a little swerve on the road.
‘You all right?’
‘Oh… yes,’ she said. ‘I just forgot something. Doesn’t matter. What were we talking about?’
‘About you going up north.’
‘No, I don’t think so. Not this week anyway.’
Brock looked over, curious, but she said no more, her face giving away nothing of what was going on inside her head.
When she got home to the deserted flat she still couldn’t really believe that it could have happened. He hadn’t phoned. Presumably he had assumed she’d deliberately not come. Well, of course he would. What else could he think? That she’d forgotten? The idea was absurd. DS Kathy Kolla didn’t forget appointments.
She looked at the time yet again. The train would have reached Liverpool long ago. Reluctantly she tried his mobile number, but got the message that it was switched off. Then she got the number of the Adelphi Hotel and rang that. She asked reception if they had a room in the name of Desai and the woman said yes. She imagined him in the room, tired and angry with her, and her courage, or perhaps it was her stamina, failed. She rang off before she could be connected, and turned to a small pile of mail. Among the junk was a Christmas card from her aunt and uncle in Sheffield, and a separate small package containing a Christmas present from them which she didn’t open. She winced, realising that that was something else she’d forgotten. There was also her credit card statement, the size of which gave her a small shock.
On the other side of London, as far to the south of Eros as Kathy was to the north, Brock was working his way through his house, tidying stuff away and putting potentially dangerous things-the toasting fork, the carving knife, the can of rat poison-and fragile things- the sole artwork (a Schwitters tram ticket collage), the laptop, the wine glasses-out of reach of small children, and wondering as he did it if all this was really necessary. He discovered, when he finally sank below the surface of a hot bath, that he really was looking forward to being invaded.
17
B rock woke the next day with somewhat less confidence, and grew more apprehensive as the time of his guests’ arrival drew closer. It wasn’t a bad morning, with a bit of sun breaking through the clouds, but still, day showed Warren Lane in a colder and more realistic light than night, and there was no avoiding the fact that this was not Disneyland.
The party arrived on the dot of nine, as promised. It was one of the things he liked about Suzanne, her determination to stave off slack timekeeping and other symptoms of chaos. And as he helped them in, each carrying a piece of luggage, he recognised immediately that this was exactly what the children needed and responded to. They were a team, each secure in playing their part.
And he realised too that he needn’t have worried about the place not being interesting enough for them, as they followed him, wide-eyed and observant, exchanging whispered comments, up through the house, from the winding stairs and landings lined with books to the living room with its hissing gas fire and bay window projecting out over the lane and the long bench with computers, out to the kitchen with its eccentric collection of gadgets and air heavy with the smell of coffee, then upwards again to their room under the roof. He and Suzanne left them there, marvelling at the height of the beds off the floor, which grandly raised them up and gave them views out of the dormer window, over the little courtyard at the back of the house and beyond the rooftops towards the very distant prospect of Dulwich Park.
They had had an adventurous journey, Suzanne explained over the cup of coffee which Brock had ready for her. Leaving well before dawn, they had, against her better judgement, breakfasted on the road on generous helpings of sausage and eggs. Ten minutes later they had watched the sun rise in a golden blaze through the eastern mist while Miranda brought up her breakfast on the grassy verge. She had done it uncomplainingly, and Suzanne hadn’t had the heart to remind the little figure, grey and heaving, that she had warned her that precisely this would happen if she had a greasy meal while travelling in the car. After that they did the journey in hops, stopping regularly to avoid further incident.
As she explained all this, Brock was further reassured. With her competence and the kids’ resilience, everything would be fine.
‘I feel like a truant,’ Suzanne said. ‘The shop’s so busy, and I’ve just walked out and left them to it, and it feels great.’
‘Me too.’ He smiled.
‘Your case? You’re sure we’re not in the way? The children have been following all the gruesome details on TV. I’m afraid you’re going to get a request for a guided tour of the murder sites.’
Brock laughed. ‘They’ll probably enjoy Silvermeadow. There’s a volcano, you know. Erupts on the hour.’
‘Yes, I’d heard.’
‘We both need a break,’ Brock said. ‘You’re looking tired.’
‘Is that a polite way of saying haggard?’
‘Never.’
He went to her and gave her a kiss, interrupted immediately by the sound of children’s footsteps on the stairs. They assembled side by side in the doorway and the boy asked solemnly, ‘We wondered if we could visit your courtyard, Uncle David.’
‘Of course,’ Brock said, and led the way.
There wasn’t much to see: several large terracotta pots supporting the scruffy remnants of unidentifiable plants, and a wooden bench placed in the corner most likely to catch a little sun. Next to this bench stood the most impressive object in the yard, to which the children were drawn.
‘What do you think that is?’ Brock asked.
‘A bush,’ Miranda said immediately.
‘No,’ Brock said. ‘It’s a tree.’
‘A baby tree?’ she said.
‘A grown-up one. It’s about the same age as me.’
She frowned dubiously, peering more closely at the twisted roots writhing out of the moss in the shallow blue-glazed bowl, the gnarled branches, the layered foliage of pine needles.
‘Well, it looks old, but it can’t be, cos it’s only little,’ she said.
‘About ninety centimetres tall,’ Stewart suggested.
‘It’s like it’s been shrunk,’ Miranda said.
‘Like looking through the wrong end of a telescope,’ her brother offered. ‘Is it a dwarf?’
‘That’s right,’ Brock said. ‘Would you like to know how I did it?’
‘ You did it?’ Miranda said, eyes huge. ‘You made a dwarf?’
