I could feel the disappointment in her voice. I wanted to cry. But I can't even do that…
S I X
'Where to, sir?'
'Muswell Hill, please.'
'No problem, sir. Where is that, please?'
Thorne sighed heavily as the simple journey from his flat in Kentish Town suddenly became an altogether trickier proposition. It was his own fault for calling a minicab. Why was he such a bloody cheapskate?
He was trying not to think about the case – this was a night off. He fooled himself for about as long as it took the cab to reach the end of his road. He would have loved to spend an evening without his curious calendar girls, but it was going to be hard, considering where he was going and who he was going to see. The subject of Jeremy Bishop might be strictly off limits with Anne Coburn. It was becoming clear that they were extremely close. Were they perhaps more than that? Thorne tried not to think about that possibility. Whatever, their relationship made things awkward in every sense, not least procedurally. Thorne hated the cliche+ of the instinctive copper as much as he hated the notion of the hardened one. But the instinctive copper was only a clich6 because, he knew, it contained a germ of truth. Hunches were nothing but trouble. If they were wrong they caused embarrassment, pain, guilt and more. But the hunches that were right were far worse. Policemen… good policemen, weren't born with these instincts. They developed them. After all, accountants were only good with numbers because they worked with them every day. Even an average copper could spot when someone was lying. A few developed a feel, a taste, a sense about people.
They were the unlucky ones.
'Here you go, sir.'
The minicab driver was thrusting a tattered A-Z at him. Christ on a bike, thought Thorne, do you want me to drive the bloody car for you?
'I don't need the A-Z. I'll give you directions. Straight up the Archway Road.'
'Right you are, sir. Which way is that?'
Thorne looked out of the window. Another warm late August evening and a T-shirted queue of eager Saturday night concert-goers was waiting to go into the Forum. As the cab drove past he strained his head to see the name of the band but only caught the word '… Maniacs'. Charming.
He now lived no more than half a mile from where he'd grown up. This had been his adolescent stamping ground. Kentish Town, Camden, Highgate. And Archway. He'd worked out of the station at Holloway for six months. He knew the road Helen Doyle had lived in. He'd drunk in the Marlborough Arms. He hoped she'd enjoyed herself that night…
Jeremy Bishop.
Yes, it had started as a strange familiarity, which he still couldn't fathom, but it had become more than that. In the few days since he'd first laid eyes on the man, his feelings had begun to bed themselves down on more solid foundations. Thorne had found out quickly why Bishop had smiled when he'd told him he was going to check out why he'd been bleeped the night that Alison had come in. He was amazed to find that the calls put out to bleep doctors were untraceable. There were no official records. The call could have been made from anywhere by all accounts. It was even possible to bleep yourself. None of the likely candidates could recall bleeping Bishop on the night that Alison Willetts came in. He'd spoken to the senior house officer, the registrar and the junior anaesthetist and their recollection of events that night was as fuzzy as Bishop had known it would be. He was certainly there when she was brought into A and E but his alibi, as far as when she was attacked and when she was dumped at the hospital, was not quite as solid as Anne Coburn had first thought.
He couldn't put any of it together yet, nowhere near, but there were other.., details.
The canvas of the area in which Helen Doyle had disappeared had started to yield results. She had been seen by at least three people after leaving the pub. One was a neighbour who knew her well. All the witnesses described seeing her talking to a man at the end of her road. She was described variously as 'looking happy', 'talking loudly' and 'seeming as if she was pissed'. The descriptions of the man varied a little but tallied in a number of areas: He was tall. He had short, graying hair and wore glasses. He was probably in his mid-to late- thirties. They thought he was Helen Doyle's new boyfriend. Her older man.
All the witnesses agreed on something else. Helen was drinking from a bottle of champagne. Now they knew how the drug was administered. So simple. So insidious. As the victims' capacity to resist had melted away they'd each felt.., what? Special? Sophisticated? Thorne sensed that the killer thought of himself in exactly those terms. The driver turned on his radio. An old song by the Eurhythmics. Thorne leaned forward quickly and told him to switch it off.
The cab turned right off the A1 towards Highgate Woods.
'It's just off the Broadway, OK?'
'Broadway…'
Thorne caught the driver's look in the mirror. Apologetic yet not really giving a toss.
'If black-cab drivers do the Knowledge, what do you lot do?'
'Sorry, mate?'
'Doesn't matter.'
He'd waited a day before talking to Frank Keable. Stepping into the DCI's office he'd been thoroughly prepared to outline his suspicions – the details that pointed towards Bishop. Ten minutes later he'd walked out feeling like he'd just left Hendon.
'I have to be honest, Tom. No, he doesn't have a rock solid alibi but…'
'Not for any of the murders, sir. I checked with-'
'But all you've got is a lot Of stuff that, well, it doesn't rule him out, and what about the description? Two of the witnesses say he's early-to mid-thirties.'
'The height's right, Frank, and Bishop looks a lot younger than he is.'
It was at that point that Thorne had become aware that it was all starting to sound unconvincing. He decided to stop before he said something that might make him look vaguely desperate. 'And he's a doctor. And I don't really… like him very much…'
The same night he'd walked into his flat and heard a woman's voice coming from the living room.
'… at the office. God, I hate these things – sorry. Anyway, please give me a call, I'm very excited about it.'
He grinned. How could a woman who probed about in people's brains be so out of her depth with an answering machine?
He found it endearing, then knew that she'd think he was being patronising. He picked up.
'Tom?'
What was she asking? 'Is that Tom?' Or 'Is it OK if I call you Tom?' Either way his answer was the same.
'Yes. Hi…'
'This is Anne Coburn – sorry, I was just waffling away. I tried to get you at the office, I hope you don't mind.'
He'd written his home number on the back of the card he'd given her. He threw his coat on to the sofa and dragged the phone over to the chair. 'No, that's fine. I've just this second walked in the door. So, what are you excited about?'
'Sorry?'
'You said you were excited. I heard it on the machine as I was coming in.'
'Oh, right. It's Alison. I think she's really starting to communicate.'
He was bending to retrieve the half-empty bottle of wine by the side of the chair but instantly sat up again. 'What?
That's fantastic.'
'Listen, I do mean starting, and I have to say there are people who aren't quite as convinced as me that the
