happy and he's never been interested in anyone else.'
'Not even you?'
She blushed. 'Well, at least I know that this isn't an official question.'
'Completely unofficial and horribly nosy, I know, but I did wonder…'
'We were together once, a long time ago when we were both students.'
'And not since? Sorry…'
'My husband thought so, if that makes you feel a little less nosy. David always had a thing about Jeremy, but it was really just professional rivalry, which he liked to tart up as something else.'
Like his hair, thought Thorne.
He'd tried to pace himself and Anne had drunk far more than he had, but he was definitely starting to feel a little lightheaded.
'What do his kids do?'
James, twenty-four, and Rebecca, twenty-six, another doctor. These facts and many others filling three pages of a notebook in his desk drawer.
'Rebecca's in orthopedics. She works in Bristol.'
Thorne nodded, interested. Tell me something I don't know.
'James, well, he's done all manner of things over the last few years. He's been a bit unlucky, if I'm being kind.'
'And if you're being unkind?'
'Well, he does sponge off his dad a little. Jeremy's a bit of a soft touch. They're very close. James was in the car when the-they had the accident. He was a bit screwed up about it for a while.' She blew out a long, slow breath. 'I haven't talked about this for ages…'
Suddenly Thorne felt terrible. He wanted to hug her, but instead volunteered to make another cup of coffee. They both stood up at the same time.
'Black or…?'
'Listen, Tom, I've got to say this.' Thorne thought she was starting to sound a bit pissed. 'I don't know what you think about Jeremy, I don't know why you had to go and question him… I dread to think, actually, but whatever it is I wish you'd stop wasting your time. This is one of my oldest friends we're talking about, and I know he likes to play the hard-bitten, cynical doctor but it's just a party piece. I've heard it hundreds of times. He cares very much about his patients. He's very interested in Alison's progress…'
Alison. The one person they were supposed to talk about and hadn't.
'I meant to have a word with you about that, actually. You know we're trying to keep some things out of the papers?'
Her face darkened. 'Am I about to get told off?.' She wasn't remotely pissed.
'He seems to know a lot about the case and I just wondered if…'
She took a step towards him – not afraid of a fight.
'He knows a lot about the medical case, yes. We've spoken about Alison regularly and obviously he knows about the other attacks because that has a direct bearing on things.'
'Sorry, Anne, I didn't mean-'
'He's a colleague whose advice I value and whose discretion you can count on. I'd say take my word for it, but obviously there wouldn't be much point.'
She stared at him, his first reminder since that morning in the lecture theatre of just how scary she could look. Evidently he didn't have quite the same capacity to intimidate her. Something in his face, he had no idea what, suddenly seemed to amuse her and her expression softened.
'Well, what's it been? A few weeks? And we're already on to our second major row. It doesn't bode well, does it?'
Thorne smiled. This was highly encouraging. 'Well, I'd actually categorise the first one as more of a bollocking, if you want to be accurate.'
'Are you going to get that coffee or what?'
As he filled the mugs from the cafeteria, she shouted through to him from the living room, 'I'll stick some music on. Classical? No, let me try and guess what you're into…'
Thorne added the milk and thought, never in a million years. He shouted back, 'Just put whatever you want on… I'm easy.' As he walked back in with the coffee, he almost laughed out loud as she turned round brandishing a well-worn and wonderfully vinyl copy of Electric Ladyland.
As the taxi – a black one, he wasn't going to make that mistake again – ferried him back towards Kentish Town, the evening's conversation rattled around in his head like coins in an envelope. He could remember every word of it. Bishop had been laughing at him.
The cab drove down the Archway Road towards Suicide Bridge and he looked away as they passed Queens Wood. He pictured the fox moving swiftly and silently through the trees towards its earth. A rabbit still twitching in its jaws, trailing blood across leaves and fallen branches as the vixen carries its prey home. A litter of eager cubs tearing their supper to pieces – ripping away pale chunks of Helen Doyle's flesh while their mother stands frozen, watching for danger…
Thorne stared hard at shop fronts as they flashed past. Bed shop, bookshop, delicatessen, massage parlour. He shut his eyes. Sad, soggy men and cold, brittle women, together for a few minutes that both would try later to forget. Not a pleasant image but.., a better one. For now. He knew that Helen and Alison and the rest of it would be with him again in the morning, lurking inside his hangover, but for now he wanted to think about Anne. Their kiss on the doorstep had felt like the beginning of something and that, together with the reliably pleasant sensation of being moderately off his face, made him feel as good as he had in a long time.
He decided that, late as it was, he'd ring his dad when he got in. It was ridiculous. He was forty. But he wanted to tell him about this woman he'd met – this woman with a teenage daughter, for God's sake. Rachel had arrived back just as he was leaving. He'd said a swift hello before making a quick escape once the inevitable argument started about how late she'd got back.
He wanted to tell his dad that 'maybe', with a large dollop of 'perhaps' and a decent helping of 'forget it, never in a million years', one of them might not be spending quite so much time alone any more.
He added a two-pound tip to the six-pound fare and headed up the front path, grinning like an idiot. It was always a risky business for cabbies, wasn't it, picking up pissed punters? A healthy tip or vomit in the back of the cab? That was the gamble. Well, one had just got lucky. Thorne was humming 'All Along The Watchtower' as he put the key in the lock, and was only vaguely aware of the dark figure that emerged from the shadows and ran up the path behind him. He turned just as an animalistic grunt escaped from the mouth behind the balaclava and the arm came down. He felt instantly sick as a bulb blew inside his head.
And suddenly it was much later.
The objects in his living room were at the bottom of a swimming-pool. The stereo, the armchair, the half- empty wine bottle shimmered and wobbled in front of him. He tried desperately to focus, to get a little balance, but all his worldly goods remained upside down and stubbornly unfamiliar. He looked up. The ceiling inched towards him. He summoned every ounce of strength to roll himself over, face down on the carpet and vomit. Then he slept. A voice woke him. Hoarse and abrasive. ' You look rough, Tom. Come on, mate…'
He raised his head and the room was full of people. Madeleine, Susan and Christine sat in a line on the sofa. Their legs were neatly crossed. Secretaries waiting for a job interview. Not one of them would look at him. To one side Helen Doyle stood staring at the floor and chewing nervously at a hangnail. Huddled into the single armchair were three young girls. Their hair was neatly brushed and their white nightdresses were crisply laundered. The smallest girl, about five years old, smiled at him but her elder sister pulled her fiercely to her breast like a mother. A hand reached towards him and dragged him to his knees. His head pounded. His throat was caked in bile. He licked his lips and tasted the crusty vomit around his mouth.
'Up you come, Tom, there's a good lad. Now, eyes wide open. Nice and bright:
He squinted at the figure leaning against the mantelpiece. Francis Calvert raised a hand in greeting. 'Hello, Detective Constable.' The dirty blond hair, yellowed by cigarette smoke, was thinner now, but the smile was the same. Warm, welcoming and utterly terrifying. He had far too many teeth, all of them decayed. 'It's been ages, Tom. I'd ask how you were doing but I can see… Bit of a session, was it?'
He tried to speak but his tongue was dead and heavy. It lay in his mouth like a rotting fish.
