"Cecil said you were unhappy."
"Not really. It's peculiar, what I was doing, so far outside my norm. Edward called it walking the boundaries of the mind. I had trouble adapting to the affair at first; when I was with Edward and Rosette it didn't matter at all, it was just outside, afterwards, when it seemed wrong, or stupid, or both. I was going to them more frequently, and staying longer too. But that wasn't the answer, not shutting myself away with them. Talking about it to someone who understood helped me. Cecil was the only one I could really go to. Cecil is worldly wise, or so he claims. He sympathized in a funny sort of way, and he didn't criticize. That meant a lot to me."
"Did you know Rosette was pregnant?"
Isabel's head came up, her blue eyes full of melancholy. There was no resentment in her mind, which was what he actually wanted to know. No grudge. He didn't think a gentle soul like Isabel could hold a grudge.
"Yes," Isabel said. "She never said. But I knew. I'm glad in a way, certainly now. It means there will be something of Edward left. I almost wish it was me."
"How about Kitchener, what sort of mood was he in that night?"
"Edward? Happy. Rosette and me… I… It was good that night."
"No, apart from that. His general mood that night, over the last few days. Was he preoccupied at all? Worried about something? Agitated?"
"No." She gave him a brave little smile. "You don't know Edward or you wouldn't even have asked. He pretended to be this awful old monster. But it was all a sham. Oh, he'd shout at us if we were blatantly stupid. And politicians infuriated him. Apart from that, he didn't have any worries. That was part of the attraction, I've never met anyone so carefree. He'd done so much in his lifetime, won so many battles. I don't think anything could upset him any more."
"I have to ask this, Isabeclass="underline" how do you feel about Nicholas Beswick?"
"Oh, God!" She buried her face in her hands. "Why did he have to come out and see us? He's so sweet. I didn't want to hurt him. Really. Why did any of this happen? What did we do?"
Slater patted her gently, but she shrugged him off. He shot a silent appeal at Greg.
Greg waited until she finished screwing tears from her eyes with damp knuckles.
"Were you the last to reach Kitchener's bedroom after Rosette discovered the body?" he asked, feeling a prize turd for pressing the anguished girl.
"Yes. I think so. They were all ahead of me. I don't remember much. I'm sorry."
"No matter. Before then, after Nicholas had found you and Rosette together in the corridor, did you tell Kitchener he had seen you?"
"No. God, I couldn't. I didn't know what to do about that. Even Rosette was upset. Edward had a real soft spot for Nick, he had such high hopes for him. Nick has a very high IQ and he wants to learn, I mean really wants. The whole universe is a glorious puzzle to Nick. That's the only time he ever comes out of his shell; when we're talking about the everyday things like the channels or politics he sits quietly in the corner; but say anything about Grand Unification or quantum mechanics and you can't shut him up. He's lovely like that, so animated. I'm rambling, sorry."
"Did you and Rosette discuss what to do about Nicholas seeing you?"
"Not much. It was a sort of mutual silence. I made up my mind to go and see Nick in the morning. Really I was. I would have tried to explain. He was about the one person I would have given Edward up for. I looked after I left Edward, but Nick's light was out. And anyway, it wouldn't have been right, not going in straight afterwards. That would have seemed like Edward had total priority on me. But then…"
"Nicholas Beswick's light was off at two-thirty? You're sure of that?"
"Yes."
"When did you wash that night?"
"I had a shower before I started getting our supper ready, then I had another after I left Edward."
"Were you using the Bendix at all on Thursday?"
"Yes, most of the afternoon."
"Did you access any external 'ware systems?"
"No."
The last question slid from his cybofax's little screen. He couldn't think of any more. Isabel already looked like he'd physically wrung the answers from her.
It was raining outside again, big warm drops beating incessantly on the high window.
"OK," he told Vernon. "Let's have Nicholas Beswick in."
CHAPTER EIGHT
It was raining over Peterborough again. Sheet lightning sizzled through the covering of low cloud, highlighting the new tower blocks which stood on the high ground to the west; austere monoliths looking down on the organic clutter of the smaller buildings in the city's original districts.
Julia hated flying in thunderstorms. Her Dornier tilt-fan might have every safety system in existence built in, but it seemed so insignificant compared to the power outside.
Another flash burst over the city. Glossy roof-top solar panels bounced some of the light back up at her, leaving tiny purple dazzle spots on her retinas. She had seen the Event Horizon headquarters building dead ahead, a seventeen storey cube of glass, steel, and composite panels. There was nothing elegant about it, thrown up in twenty-six frantic months so that it could accommodate the droves of head office data shufflers necessary to manage a company of Event Horizon's size, as well as Morgan's security staff. A monument to haste and functionalism. Its replacement out at Prior's Pen would be far more aesthetic; the architects had come up with a white and gold cylinder which, with its panoply of pillars and arches, resembled the Leaning Tower of Pisa. Only straight this time, of course. Event Horizon didn't build crooked.
She poured herself a chilled mineral water from the bar, and switched the bulkhead flatscreen on, flicking through the channels until she came to the Northwest Europe Broadcast Company. Jakki Coleman was on, a middle-aged woman with iron-cast gold-blonde hair, wearing a stylish mint-green satin jacket. She was sitting behind a Florentine desk in the luxurious study of some mansion.
Julia grinned gamely as she sprawled back on the white-leather settee, propping her feet up on the chair opposite.
Jakki Coleman was the queen of the gossipcasts; rock stars, channel celebrities, aristocrats, sports personalities, politicians, she shafted them all.
"Pauline Harrington, the devoutly Catholic songstress, seems to have mislaid her religious scruples," Jakki said, her French accent rich and purring. "At least for this weekend. For whom should I see but the delightful Pauline, who is at number five with "My Real Man" in this week's white soul chart, with none other than Keran Bennion, number one driver for the Porsche team."
The image cut to a picture of Pauline and Keran walking through the grounds of a country hotel, somewhere where the sun was shining. They were hand in hand, oblivious of the fountains playing in stone-lined ponds around them, in the background bushes blazed with big tangerine blooms. The recording had obviously been made with a telephoto lens, outlines were slightly fuzzy.
"Perhaps Keran's wife sent him for singing lessons," Jakki suggested smugly. "The three days they spent together should certainly have got his voice in trim."
A swarthy young male in a purple and black Versace suit walked into the office and put a sheet of paper in front of Jakki. She read it and 'Ohooed' delightedly. "Well, fancy that," she said.
The item was about a Swiss minister and her toyboy. After that was one about a music biz payola racket.
Julia took a sip of the mineral water, then noticed her boots. They were crusted with mud from the tower site. She tried rubbing at them with a tissue as Jakki stage whispered that certain pointed questions were being asked about a countess's new-born son, apparently the count was absent the night of the conception.