Catching sight of her, he stood frozen for a moment, his hand still raised, and the taxi he’d been trying to hail slowed ten yards away, and picked up a couple instead.
“Sarah’s pregnant, isn’t she?” said Robin.
He looked down at her, not quite as tall as Strike, but as good-looking as he’d been at seventeen, on the day he’d asked her out.
“Yeah.” He hesitated. “It was an accident.”
Was it hell, thought Robin. Sarah had always known how to get what she wanted. Robin realized at last how long a game Sarah had played: always present, giggling, flirting, prepared to settle for Matthew’s best friend to keep him close. Then, as her clutch tightened, but Matthew threatened to slip through it, there’d been the diamond earring she’d left in Robin’s bed and now, still more valuable, a pregnancy to make sure of him, before he could enter a dangerous state of singledom. Robin had a strong suspicion that this was what had lain behind the two postponements of mediation. Had a newly hormonal and insecure Sarah made scenes, frightened of Matthew coming face to face with Robin while he hadn’t yet decided whether he wanted either the baby or its mother?
“And she wants to be married before she has it?”
“Yeah,” said Matthew. “Well, so do I.”
Did the image of their own wedding flash across his mind, as it flashed across Robin’s? The church in Masham that both of them had attended since primary school, the reception in that beautiful hotel, with the swans in the lake that refused to swim together, and the disastrous reception, during which Robin had known, for a few terrifying seconds, that if Strike had asked her to leave with him, she’d have gone.
“How’re things with you?”
“Great,” said Robin.
She put up a good front. What you do, when you meet the ex, isn’t it? Pretend you think you did the right thing. No regrets.
“Well,” he said, as the traffic rolled past, “I need to…”
He began to walk away.
“Matt.”
He turned back.
“What?”
“I’ll never forget… how you were, when I really needed you. Whatever else… I’ll never forget that part.”
For a fraction of a second, his face worked slightly, like a small boy’s. Then he walked back to her, bent down, and before she knew what was happening, he’d hugged her quickly, then let go as though she was red hot.
“G’luck, Robs,” he said thickly, and walked away for good.
56
Whereas this Lady, like a sheepe astray,
Now drowned in the depth of sleepe all fearlesse lay.
Edmund Spenser
The Faerie Queene
At the precise moment Matthew turned to walk away from Robin in Holborn, Strike, who was sitting in his parked car three miles away, outside the familiar terraced house in Stoke Newington, decided to call his brother, lest Al sit in wait for him at the office all day. The detective’s anger was shot through with other, less easily identifiable feelings, of which the least painful to acknowledge was grudging admiration for Al’s persistence. Strike didn’t doubt that Al had come to the office for a last-ditch attempt to persuade Strike into some form of reconciliation with his father, preferably before or during the party to celebrate his father’s new album. Having always considered Al a fairly weak and sybaritic character, Strike had to admit he was showing guts, risking his older brother’s fury.
Strike waited until Elinor Dean had unloaded the foam and the cheap wood from her car and carried it all inside with the aid of her friend from Shifty’s gym, watched the front door close, then called Al’s number.
“Hi,” said Al, picking up after a single ring.
“Why are you in my office?” asked Strike.
“Wanted to see you, bruv. Talk face to face.”
“Well, I won’t be back there today,” lied Strike. “So I suggest you say whatever it is you’ve got to say now.”
“Bruv—”
“Who’s there with you?”
“Er—your secretary—Pat, is it?” Strike heard Al turn away from his mobile to check, and heard Pat’s caw of agreement, “and a bloke called—”
“Barclay,” said the Scot loudly, in the background.
“Right, well, go into my office for some privacy,” said Strike. He listened while Al told Pat what Strike had asked him to do, heard the familiar sound of his own office door closing, then said,
“If this is about what I think it’s about—”
“Cormoran, we didn’t want to tell you this, but Dad’s got cancer.”
Oh, for fuck’s sake.
Strike leaned forwards momentarily and rested his forehead on the steering wheel of his car, before he sat up again.
“Prostate,” Al continued. “They reckon they’ve caught it early. But we thought you should know, because this party isn’t just about celebrating the band’s anniversary, and the new album. It’s about giving him something to look forward to.”
There was a silence.
“We thought you should know,” Al repeated.
Why should I fucking know? thought Strike, eyes on the closed door of Elinor Dean’s house. He had no relationship with Rokeby. Did Al expect him to weep, to rush to Rokeby’s side, to express compassion or pity? Rokeby was a multimillionaire. Doubtless he’d enjoy the very best treatment. The memory of Joan’s lily urn bobbing away on the sea recurred as Strike said,
“OK, well, I don’t really know how to respond to that. I’m sure it’s a bugger for everyone who cares about him.”
Another long silence followed.
“We thought this might make a difference,” said Al quietly.
“To what?”
“To your attitude.”
“As long as they’ve caught it early, he’ll be fine,” said Strike bracingly. “Probably live to father another couple of kids he never sees.”
“Jesus Christ!” said Al, really angry now. “You might not give a shit, but he happens to be my dad—”
“I give a shit about people who’ve ever given a shit about me,” said Strike, “and keep your fucking voice down, those are my employees you’re airing my private business in front of.”
“That’s your priority?”
Strike thought of Charlotte who, according to the papers, remained in hospital,
