As Rose slipped up behind him, she saw a small room, drab and dingy, but neat as an army barracks. A man stood at an ironing board in trousers and cotton vest, carefully ironing a blue uniform shirt. He was thin, thinner than she’d realized, but his bare arms were well muscled. His acne-pitted cheeks were hollow, and his eyes, when he glanced at Rose, seemed curiously flat and passed over her without a sign of recognition.
She shuddered and made an effort to keep her expression pleasantly neutral.
“What can I do for you, folks?” said Braidwood. Turning off the iron, he set it on the end of the table, then slipped into his shirt, buttoning each button with careful deliberation. “I’m afraid I don’t have much to offer in the way of hospitality.”
He didn’t invite them to sit but didn’t seem to object when Farrell led the way farther into the room. Rose could see now that the walls held a collection of framed Victorian prints, many from the
“We’re from the fire brigade,” said Farrell. “We’d like to ask you a few questions about the fire on Southwark Street last Thursday night.” When Braidwood merely looked at him, Farrell went on. “A security camera recorded you looking in the open warehouse door a short time before the building burned.”
“I may have,” Braidwood answered slowly. “But is that a crime, Mr.- what did you say your name was? Farrell?”
“Most citizens would have reported an unsecured door,” countered Farrell, “especially someone in your profession.”
“My profession?” Braidwood gazed at them and Rose couldn’t tell if the flat eyes were interested or mocking. “How is it that you know my name and my job from a CCTV film?”
“We know quite a bit more than that, Mr. Braidwood,” said Rose. “You see, I saw you at last night’s fire, directing firefighters to save someone who didn’t exist – deliberately putting firefighters at risk. It seemed to me that only a person with a grudge against the fire brigade would do such a thing, so we started looking through the files for applicants who had been fairly recently rejected. We found you, and your file photo matched the CCTV film, as well as my description.
“We also found that you have an obsession with James Braidwood and with Victorian fires. You like to recreate them, and you are especially fascinated by Tooley Street, where James Braidwood died.”
Braidwood’s eyes held open dislike now, and a spark of respect. “That’s very clever of you, but it doesn’t prove anything about anything.”
“Oh, but we will,” said Farrell. “Now that we know who you are and where you are, we’ll be rechecking every bit of forensic evidence from those fires – not just the last two, but the half-dozen before that. And then we’ll be checking your work schedule and your movements against the times of the fires, we’ll be checking into your background – and we’ll be searching your premises for trace evidence connecting you to the fires. So, you see, we’re all going to be very busy together for a good while.”
“Don’t mock me,” snapped Braidwood, and for just an instant, Rose glimpsed the blazing anger that hid behind the flat, expressionless eyes. “You think you’re so clever,” he went on. “But you’re not clever enough. I’ve always been one step ahead of you.
“Do you think I’ll let you paw through my life, my things, as if I were some sort of exhibit?
“Yes, I set those fires – although Southwark Street was an unexpected gift, divine intervention, I like to think-”
“And the woman who died in the fire?”
Braidwood shrugged. “Not down to me. I didn’t know she was there until they pulled her out the next day. But it was a nice touch, I thought. I would have tried it again.” He turned to Rose. “Now, as to your firefighter, he really should have been more careful. The fire brigade is not what it used to be,” he added with a sigh.
Farrell dug his fingers into Rose’s shoulder, paralyzing her before she could react.
“I told them that,” Braidwood went on, “but they wouldn’t listen.”
Rose could feel the tension in Farrell’s fingers. He said with great sincerity, “I’m sure they’ll listen now, Mr. Braidwood.”
Braidwood showed his yellowed teeth, and the menace in the smile made Rose really afraid for the first time. “Oh, I’m sure they will. The question is, will
Reaching down behind his ironing board, he lifted a gallon can and in one fluid motion twisted off the top and sloshed the liquid all over himself. Then he swept his arm out in an arc, flinging the liquid towards them, and threw the can into the door. As the fumes hit Rose – it was acetone, dear God, acetone – she saw what Braidwood was lifting from the corner of the sofa, where it had been concealed behind a cushion. It took her brain an instant to process such a familiar thing in an unexpected circumstance, then it all clicked and she shouted with terror. It was a road flare, and she saw his hand grip the cap to twist it.
“Rose, out!” Farrell was shouting in her ear. “Out the window. It’ll blevy! Jump, God damn it! Jump!” He was pushing her and she was climbing, sliding, and then with a gasp dropping to the pavement, wrenching her ankle as she fell.
She looked up at Farrell, half out the window, hands grasping the sill, when there was a great whomp of sound and a ball of flame blew out the window and Farrell was falling, crumpling to the ground. She hobbled to him, pushing bystanders out of the way, shouting, “I’m a firefighter, let me through.” One of his legs was twisted at an odd angle, and the tops of his hands and his forehead were burned, but he was conscious and shouting, “That crazy bastard!! He’s going to burn down the whole goddamn road. Get the pumper – make it pumps two-”
“I’m calling, Bill, I’m calling,” said Rose, who had managed to fumble her phone from her pocket and make her fingers push the right buttons. “Just lie still, please, they’re on their way, and there’s an ambulance coming, too.”
“That crazy bastard,” he said again, but with less force, and she knew the shock and pain were setting in.
Looking up, Rose saw Kincaid and Martinelli running towards her, and they were lifting her, hugging her, and shouting questions over each other.
But before she answered, Rose knelt and put her arms around Martinelli’s dog, burying her face in Scully’s soft coat until she could choke back a sob.
Then she looked up once more at the fire blazing above her, and just for an instant, she thought she saw Jimmy Braidwood, dancing in the window like a human torch.
Gemma slowed the car as she passed the small rectangle of All Hallows Churchyard. Some part of her mind noted the gate’s graceful iron flowers, echoed by the stone arch beyond it, even as she searched for the street name Roberta had given them.
“Here,” said Winnie beside her, pointing, and Gemma made a sharp, screeching left turn.
Scanning the faded numbers, she quickly found the one she sought and stopped the car with an unexpected stomp on the brake. “This is it. This must be it.”
She and Winnie slid out of the car and stood staring at the house before them in dismay. Its flat front was as inhospitable as a prison, its windows opaque with years of grime. To one side, a wall the height of the ground floor sported coils of spiked wire and a frosting of broken glass.
“It looks like no one’s been here for years,” said Gemma. But as she looked more closely she saw that the sill of the door was free of accumulated rubbish and that the windowpane nearest the door had a spot about the size of a fifty-pence piece rubbed clear of grime. “No, I take that back,” she whispered. “She has been here, and recently.”
“What should we-” began Winnie, but Gemma was already striding towards the door.
She pounded the tarnished knocker against the wood, calling out, “Elaine Holland! Police! Open up!”
The house seemed to stare back at them in malevolent silence. Gemma tried the door, but the latch held fast. She pounded once more, then stepped back, her hand smarting from the effort. There was no sign of a watching eye at any of the windows.
“Can you get a warrant?” asked Winnie worriedly.
“Warrants take hours.” Gemma moved back several more paces, until she stood in the street and could survey
