Oswalde saw a sign for a service area, one mile ahead. His throat was parched and aching, and besides he needed to call base.
“She always thought the best of people. Perhaps we protected her too much. I don’t know. Do you have children?”
“No, I don’t. Would you like a cup of coffee?”
“Oh, that would be lovely.” Mrs. Fagunwa smiled at him. Oswalde signaled and pulled over to the inside lane. “Perhaps if ours hadn’t been a mixed marriage. Do you think that could have been the problem? Made her run off like that?”
Hands behind his head, Rosper leaned back in his chair, watching the videos on the TV in a corner of the Incident Room. He was enjoying himself, tapping his foot to the reggae beat. The band was on a makeshift stage out in the street, bathed in sunshine, a real carnival atmosphere. Many of the performers wore colorful African costumes, as did the crowd, packed close to the stage, clapping their hands above their heads. Rosper hummed along and tapped his foot.
Haskons came over and leaned on his shoulder. “How’s it going, Gary?”
Rosper looked up with a beaming grin. “I’m having a shanking good time, Skip.”
“Are you indeed.”
The incessant reggae beat was getting on people’s nerves; some of them complained, so Rosper turned the sound low, but kept his eyes glued to the screen as one band followed another, studying the faces of the backup singers and the women in the crowd. His perseverance paid off. Leaping to his feet, he peered closely at the screen, and just at that moment the camera obligingly moved in on one of three girl backup singers to the left of the stage.
“Yes,” Rosper breathed, and then louder, “Yes. Yes!”
It was she, no mistake, dressed in African costume, happily smiling in the sunshine, swaying and clapping, having one hell of a good time. So full of vibrant energy and youthful joy, her whole life ahead of her, a life that had less than twenty-four hours to run its course.
Standing in the busy hospital corridor, Tennison held one hand flat to her ear while she tried to concentrate on what Haskons was telling her over the phone. He was having to shout too, trying to be heard over the babble of noise as the men clustered around the TV. Not helped by the thumping reggae beat, which Rosper had turned back up.
“That’s right,” Haskons was saying. “And Bob Oswalde called in. He’s got a positive ID. Joanne… Fagunwa?” Not sure of the pronunciation. “He’s bringing Mum in now.” He shouted away from the phone, “Look, turn it down, please.”
“Brilliant,” Tennison said. “All right, thanks, Richard.”
She hung up and joined Muddyman, who was using his powers of persuasion on the Chinese female doctor, Dr. Lim, in the hope that they would be allowed in to see David Harvey. He wasn’t having much success.
“He’s a very ill man, you’ve seen that for yourself,” Dr. Lim said. “You’ve also seen how he has great difficulty breathing when lying flat. He needs complete rest.”
Tennison laid it on the line. “Dr. Lim. We have reason to believe that Mr. Harvey was involved in the murder of a seventeen-year-old girl. Now, I don’t mind what conditions you make, but we have to talk to the man.”
Dr. Lim didn’t say anything, because the discussion was at an end; the look in the eyes of the Chief Inspector told her that.
Mrs. Fagunwa was turning over Joanne’s things in interview room C3 off reception. She was bearing up well, Oswalde thought. Not a tear, not a quiver, just quietly picking things up-muddy Levi’s jeans, wrinkled Adidas sneakers-until she came to the blue sweater, and her hand shook as she held it up.
“This I recognize. My one and only attempt at knitting…”
She crumpled it in her hand, head bowed low over the table, her shoulders heaving. Oswalde did what he could to comfort her, uttering some soothing platitudes, his arm around her.
“Why her?” Mrs. Fagunwa moaned, tears dripping off the end of her nose. “Why her…?”
When she had dried her eyes, Oswalde asked if she would like a cup of tea in the cafeteria, but she said no, she’d prefer to start back. He walked her out to the car he had ordered, waiting in the parking lot.
Mrs. Fagunwa faced him. She had regained her composure, though her chin kept quivering. She said, “Thank you for your kindness. Do you think you’ll find out how it happened? You know… find the person who did it?”
“I’m sure we will,” Oswalde replied, and this wasn’t a platitude.
“I wonder, this may seem…” She hesitated. “Could I buy the clay head when your inquiries are over? It’s just… does that seem strange?” she asked anxiously, as if seeking his approval.
“No. I’ll find out for you.”
“Only there’s nothing else is there?” Mrs. Fagunwa plucked at a loose thread on her scarf, her eyes a million light-years away. “Nothing to remind me of my baby.”
Harvey was sleeping, breathing through his mouth. Tennison sat by the bed, back straight, hands clasped in her lap, watching him sleep and breathe, her eyes never leaving his face.
7
After seeing Mrs. Fagunwa off, Oswalde went back up to the Incident Room and sat at his desk. It was twenty past four. He should have been famished, having missed lunch, existing since breakfast on cups of coffee and a chocolate bar, but he wasn’t hungry. It was the hours spent with the dead girl’s mother, he reckoned, and seeing her grief, that had killed his appetite. Not good. After nearly nine years on the Force he ought to be able to shut his own emotions away, not get personally involved. You had to be cold and dispassionate or you couldn’t do the job. Doctors and nurses and paramedics and firemen had to handle it, deal unflinchingly with things that would have turned most people’s stomachs, and then go home and sleep nights. He wished he could do it too, learn the trick. Cultivate a heart like a swinging brick, as one of the tutors in training college was fond of saying.
Get your brain back on the case, Oswalde advised himself, that was the best way. He looked around. “Did the Allens have keys to Harvey’s place?” he asked of no one in particular. “I suppose they must have. Where did Tony Allen go to school?”
Lillie chucked a file over. Oswalde spent a few minutes going through it until Rosper wandered over and interrupted him.
“Have you seen this?” Rosper asked, parking himself on the corner of the desk. He was holding a video tape.
“Is that the tape of Joanne?”
“You should watch it, Bob.” Rosper made a flicking motion with his tongue. “I think I’m in love.”
Haskons had sent over a PC to relieve her. He came in and removed his helmet, holding it under his arm.
Tennison stood up and stretched. She bent over to peer closely at Harvey, his face lined and gray in the shaded light above the bed. He was out for the count, asleep or unconscious, it was hard to tell. She put on her coat, tucked in her scarf, and picked up her briefcase.
“Call me if he comes around.”
“I will.”
Mr. Dugdale taught history, which possibly explained why he had such a good memory for dates. He wasn’t bad on names either, and had no problem whatsoever with Tony Allen, as soon as Oswalde mentioned him.
“I was his adviser of year. I remember it very well.” They were walking towards Dugdale’s office, the corridor deserted except for a cleaner with a bucket and squeegee mop. Oswalde had turned up on the off chance that some of the teachers might have stayed behind to mark papers or something, and had struck lucky.
“He was a bright lad, had done very well in school, good results, going on to A levels, sights set on college.” Dugdale shook his head of shaggy, graying hair, depositing more flakes of dandruff on the collar of his tweed jacket. “Then when he came back in September he’d changed. He was surly, introverted, a loner.”
They arrived at his office and Dugdale went straight to the filing cabinet and started delving. Oswalde looked at the timetables pinned to the bulletin board, at the silver trophies gathering dust on the shelf next to the wilting potted plant, but he was taking in every word.