Fuck’s sake.
“No,” said Strike. “Excuse me, need a smoke.”
He knew he’d offended them, but didn’t care, though he could imagine Joan’s disapproval as he walked away from the group by the window. What would it have hurt him, she’d have said, to entertain her friends by talking about his job? Joan had liked to show him off, the nephew who was the closest thing she’d ever have to a son, and it suddenly came back to him, after these long days of guilt, why he’d avoided coming back to the little town for so long: because he’d found himself slowly stifling under the weight of teacups and doilies and carefully curated conversations, and Joan’s suffocating pride, and the neighbors’ curiosity, and the sidelong glances at his false leg when nobody thought he could see them looking.
As he stumped down the hall, he pulled out his mobile and pressed Robin’s number without conscious thought.
“Hi,” she said, sounding mildly surprised to hear from him.
“Hi,” said Strike, pausing on the doorstep of the hotel to pull a cigarette out of the packet with his teeth. He crossed the road and lit it, looking out over the mudflats at the sea. “Just wanted to check in, and to thank you.”
“What for?”
“The flowers from the agency. They meant a lot to the family.”
“Oh,” said Robin, “I’m glad… How was the funeral?”
“It was, you know… a funeral,” said Strike, watching a seagull bobbing on the tranquil sea. “Anything new your end?”
“Well, yes, actually,” said Robin, after a fractional hesitation, “but now’s probably not the moment. I’ll tell you when you’re—”
“Now’s a great moment,” said Strike, who was yearning for normality, for something to think about that wasn’t connected to Joan, or loss, or St. Mawes.
So Robin related the story of her interview with Paul Satchwell, and Strike listened in silence.
“… and then he called me a nasty little bitch,” Robin concluded, “and left.”
“Christ almighty,” said Strike, genuinely amazed, not only that Robin had managed to draw so much information from Satchwell, but at what she’d found out.
“I’ve just been sitting here looking up records on my phone—I’m back in the Land Rover, going to head home in a bit. Blanche Doris Satchwell, died 1945, aged ten. She’s buried in a cemetery outside Leamington Spa. Satchwell called it a mercy killing. Well,” Robin corrected herself, “he called it a dream, which was his way of telling Margot, while retaining some plausible deniability, wasn’t it? It’s a traumatic memory to carry around with you from age six, though, isn’t it?”
“Certainly is,” said Strike, “and it gives him a motive of sorts, if he thought Margot might tell the authorities…”
“Exactly. And what d’you think about the Janice bit? Why didn’t she tell us she knew Satchwell?”
“Very good question,” said Strike. “Go over it again, what he said about Janice?”
“When I told him Janice was the one who said Margot was spotted in Leamington Spa, he said she was a shit-stirrer and that she was trying to implicate him somehow in Margot’s disappearance.”
“Very interesting indeed,” said Strike, frowning at the bobbing seagull, which was staring at the horizon with concentrated intent, its cruel, hooked beak pointing toward the horizon. “And what was that thing about Roy?”
“He said somebody had told him Roy was a ‘mummy’s boy’ who ‘had a stick up his arse,’” said Robin. “But he wouldn’t tell me who’d said it.”
“Doesn’t sound much like Janice, but you never know,” said Strike. “Well, you’ve done bloody well, Robin.”
“Thanks.”
“We’ll have a proper catch-up on Bamborough when I get back,” said Strike. “Well, we’ll need a catch-up on everything.”
“Great. I hope the rest of your stay’s OK,” said Robin, with that note of finality that indicated the call was about to end. Strike wanted to keep her on the line, but she evidently thought she oughtn’t monopolize his time in his last afternoon with the grieving family, and he could think of no pretext to keep her talking. They bade each other goodbye, and Strike returned his mobile to his pocket.
“Here you go, Diddy.”
Polworth had emerged from the hotel carrying a couple of fresh pints. Strike accepted his with thanks, and both turned to face the bay as they drank.
“You back up to London tomorrow, are you?” said Polworth.
“Yeah,” said Strike. “But not for long. Joan wanted us to take her ashes out on Ted’s boat and scatter them at sea.”
“Nice idea,” said Polworth.
“Listen, mate—thanks for everything.”
“Shut up,” said Polworth. “You’d do it for me.”
“You’re right,” said Strike. “I would.”
“Easy to say, you cunt,” said Polworth, without skipping a beat, “seeing as my mum’s dead and I don’t know where the fuck my dad is.”
Strike laughed.
“Well, I’m a private detective. Want me to find him for you?”
“Fuck, no,” said Polworth. “Good riddance.”
They drank their pints. There was a brief break in the cloud and the sea was suddenly a carpet of diamonds and the bobbing seagull, a paper-white piece of origami. Strike was wondering idly whether Polworth’s passionate devotion to Cornwall was a reaction against his absent Birmingham-born father when Polworth spoke up again:
“Speaking of fathers… Joan told me yours was looking for a reunion.”
“She did, did she?”
“Don’t be narked,” said Polworth. “You know what she was like. Wanted me to know you were going through a tough time. Nothing doing, I take it?”
“No,” said Strike. “Nothing doing.”
The brief silence was broken by the shrieks and yells of Polworth’s two daughters sprinting out of the hotel. Ignoring their father and Strike, they wriggled under the chain separating road from damp shingle and ran out to the water’s edge, pursued a moment later by Strike’s nephew Luke, who was holding a couple of cream buns in his hand and clearly intent on throwing them at the girls.
“OI,” bellowed Strike. “NO!”
Luke’s face fell.
“They started it,” he said, turning to show Strike a white smear down the back of his black suit jacket, newly purchased for his great-aunt’s funeral.
“And I’m finishing it,” said Strike, while
