McLevy could see little sign of weakness in Sophia save for the smallest crack when the name of Jonathen Sinclair was thrown in her face.
But was something within working against her? A truth she refused to recognise, or perhaps did not even yet know?
For instance, had she not mentioned the pool of blood in her vision being in the street, not the room, perhaps he might not have made – yes – made
Had she betrayed herself?
And if you were to believe in her world of spirits and voices and God alone knows what whirling around in the ether – how would they feel about being party to murder?
Because if she, using her ‘gift’, had split off or unearthed the beast in Magnus Bannerman, would that not perturb the spirit world?
Power misused and abused.
This was getting too deep for the inspector and he decided he’d better go to his bed no matter the hour.
That deathly figure from his dream of some time ago still worried, however. And the pain he had felt on the rooftop didn’t make him feel too cheerful either.
He patted his chest to feel the reassuring flesh and his own heart beat steadily under his fingers.
Telling no tales.
All was well.
And he would have a decent breakfast for a change this day. At the Auld Ship.
Drappit egg, his favourite, being an egg poached in gravy from the liver of a fowl. With a slab of pan bread and maybe a blood sausage on the side.
Perhaps a kidney or two? Lamb, preferably.
McLevy might need sustenance because he would catch a reasonable amount of hell from Lieutenant Roach on account of Conan Doyle’s presence at the attempted murder of one Walter Morrison.
And that’s another reason he was tired.
Because after leaving the George Hotel, he had stopped off at the lodging house, hauled Walter Morrison from his bed and got some of the truth from the terrified merchant.
At least as much as the man knew, for he claimed Gilbert to be the main protagonist, he being a good- natured type and his younger brother a grasping, treacherous fellow.
For sure greed and treachery were in the story.
A decent man betrayed and murdered.
Some might say a casualty of war, but McLevy saw it differently. Just a cold-blooded killing.
Betrayed for gain.
For the filthy lucre.
But what was the connection?
McLevy decided that, after all, he would not go to his slumbers.
If he closed his eyes, he might miss something.
38
Remember thee?
Ay, thou poor ghost, while memory holds a seat
In this distracted globe. Remember thee?
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE,
The day had been long but now Sophia had found peace, the demons no longer plagued her.
She sat before his picture, the uniform grey, the tasselled hat at a rakish angle, blond hair curling out under the rim, teeth white in a smile of life and love as he stood under the full blossom of a sweet magnolia tree.
The trip to the police station had been uneventful; she had made a formal statement as the inspector had warned would be necessary.
The body she had identified also, its face carved by death into harsh lines, the bullet holes, two, just like before, but not one to the face to smash the bones to bits and pieces. No. To the chest, hidden under the sheet, to leave the face above a death mask, eyes closed, mouth twisted, soul departed, the form that had once been Magnus Bannerman now an empty ruin for winds to blow through.
She had sat in the lieutenant’s office with a portrait of their gloomy English queen staring out at something no-one else could see and answered the questions quietly, the same, some of them, as had been asked by the inspector on their last meeting.
Most of her answers were lies but she told the truth wherever possible.
She knew nothing of the why of the crime, had rested all night at the hotel, was astonished by Bannerman’s actions, and cognised of no reason why he had ascended the rooftops to bring down murder.
Those were the lies.
She intended to leave the country as soon as possible, would give her last mesmeric demonstration at the Tanfield Hall despite the loss of her audience-conductor as she did not wish to disappoint her loyal followers, and trusted that the spirit voices would not forsake her in the hour of need.
This was the truth.
McLevy asked the questions in a dull, uninterested monotone; they were conveyed to paper by a station scribe and at the end she signed her name.
The police lieutenant, Roach, was a dry-skinned creature with eyes that seemed bloodshot but not from dissipation. He was tall and bore the imprint of someone whose expectations were confined to a limited horizon.
A photo on the wall showed him dressed in golfing apparel with a club in his hand and a ball at his feet.
The other photo was a collection of solemn-faced men in strange regalia, sitting in a row.
The inscription below announced ‘The Grand Masonic Lodge of Leith’.
The lieutenant sat at the end of the row.
A narrow life.
Between him and the inspector, a strange relationship existed. Both wore uniform, one buckled in by authority, the other bursting at the seams.
A palpable tension.
After signing and just before she left, Roach, who had been mostly silent save for formal greetings and expressions of sympathy, asked her a question that must have been annoying his mind during the whole interview.
‘If Mister Bannerman is in the world of spirits, will he not make contact with you?’
‘That is beyond my governance.’
‘Ah yes,’ Roach muttered. ‘These voices come and go, you are merely the meeting point.’
‘Like Waverley Station,’ McLevy suddenly piped up.
Roach paid no attention to this. They were all sitting at a table, which doubled as an official desk of sorts.
The lieutenant leant forward and Sophia became aware that there was a hard intelligence in his eyes. It might be a narrow mind but this was not a stupid one.
‘I must inform you, Miss Adler,’ he remarked stonily, ‘that I find no accordance with your belief, which I think to be a dangerous delusion – no matter how sincerely felt. In my opinion it appeals only to the simple-minded amongst us.’
