‘Sometimes I feel I’m like the scorpion in that fable.’
‘Which fable?’
‘The one where the scorpion asks the turtle to give him a ride across a river to the other side. The turtle replies, “I can’t do that. You might sting me to death.”
‘The scorpion says, “Look, I’m not dumb. If you carry me across the river and I sting you, we will both die – you from my sting, and I will drown.”
‘So the turtle says, “Okay, that makes sense!”
‘They get halfway across the river and the scorpion stings the turtle. The turtle, in agony and starting to sink, turns and looks at the scorpion and says, “Why did you do that? Now we’re both going to die.”
‘The scorpion replies, “I know. I’m sorry, I couldn’t help it. It’s in my nature.”’
‘So you’re the scorpion, you think?’
She said nothing.
‘Is that what you like to think, to justify your anger?’
‘It’s not rational, I know. I should be happy that he has moved on, but I’m not.’
‘Do you want him back? Does he represent the past, something you want but can’t have back? None of us can.’
‘Maybe I’m a psycho and should be locked away,’ she said.
‘The fact that you recognize that tells me you are not. You have all this anger inside you, and it has to go somewhere, so you vent it on him, and on the woman you think is stopping him coming back to you.’
She sat, thinking, in silence.
After some moments, changing the subject, he said, ‘In our last session you were going to tell me something about the baby. Do you want to tell me now?’
She shrugged. Then she said, ‘The thing is, I’m not sure it was Roy’s.’
‘Oh?’
‘I was having an affair. With one of his colleagues.’
59
‘Eamonn Pollock’s not been flavour of the month for a long time,’ Glenn Branson said. ‘Not among the Brighton antiques fraternity. Your mate Donny Loncrane was right.’
Grace turned the car in through the entrance to the Downs Crematorium. Of Brighton’s two multi-denomination crematoriums, Roy Grace much preferred the municipal one, Woodvale, with its air of a village parish church, and its woodland setting. But the private one, the Downs, was the one chosen by most of the city’s wealthier people.
He had always considered it a courtesy to attend the funeral of murder victims whose cases he was working on, but he always had another, ulterior motive, which was to scrutinize all those attending, and any lurkers in the background who might be watching. Sometimes, sick killers turned up to observe. And the perps who had killed Aileen Mcwhirter were, unquestionably, very sick indeed.
He reversed the unmarked Ford into a space, giving himself and Glenn Branson beside him a clear view of the arriving cortege.
It wasn’t a long procession. Out of the first limousine following the hearse emerged Gavin Daly, his son Lucas and his wife Sarah. From the next a couple emerged, along with two young children. Aileen McWhirter’s granddaughter and her husband, Nicki and Matt Spiers, Grace presumed, and her great-grandchildren, Jamie and Isobel. From the one behind that emerged a number of elderly people, one of whom Grace recognized as Gavin Daly’s housekeeper; he wondered if two of the others were Aileen’s housekeeper and her gardener.
They were followed inside by a woman he knew and liked a lot, Carolyn Randall, the hardworking Area Manager of Sussex Crime-stoppers, presumably one of the charities the dead woman had supported. Next he recognized the Head of Fundraising for Brighton’s hospice, the Martlets.
Glenn Branson unclipped his seat belt, slipped his hand inside his suit jacket and took out an envelope, which he handed to Grace. ‘His mugshot. Eamonn Pollock.’
Grace shook it out of the envelope and stared at it. A morbidly obese man in his mid-sixties, with a generous thatch of short, wavy grey hair, and an unbearably self-satisfied grin, stared back at him. He was wearing a white tuxedo and holding up a glass of champagne in a mock toast to the photographer. ‘What intelligence do we have on him?’
‘He’s on a few historic Association Charts, but only one previous: for handling stolen watches and clocks – that was back in 1980. He got two years’ suspended.’
Grace’s interest was instantly piqued. ‘Watches and clocks?’
Branson nodded.
‘I think someone had better go and have a chat with him.’
‘Yeah, I wouldn’t mind a trip to Marbella – in normal circumstances.’ He shrugged and suddenly looked deeply forlorn.
Grace put his hand out and squeezed Glenn Branson’s. ‘You okay, matey?’
Branson nodded. Grace could see the tears suddenly welling in his eyes.
‘Did Ari ever say what she wanted?’
‘She didn’t want to be burned.’ Glenn Branson sniffed. ‘So I guess I have to respect that. I’ve told the funeral directors I want a plot for her at Woodingdean Cemetery. Will you come with me to the funeral?’
‘Of course. Do you have a date yet?’
The DS shook his head. ‘I’m waiting for the Coroner to release her body.’
A young couple climbed out of a small Audi, then lifted a baby out of the rear seat. Looking at his watch, Grace saw it was five minutes to go. ‘Rock’n’roll?’
‘Yep.’
As they opened their doors and climbed out into the warm sunshine, the Detective Superintendent’s phone rang.
‘Roy Grace,’ he answered.
It was the Crime Scene Manager, Dave Green, sounding excited. ‘Roy, thought you’d like to know we’ve found a tiny blood spot, down the inside of a double radiator we removed from the house.’
‘The one that Aileen McWhirter was chained to?’
‘Yes, it’s microscopic, but it looks in good enough condition to give us DNA.’
Grace thought immediately of the scab on the knuckle of the arrogant telesales man, Gareth Dupont, and what Donny Loncrane had said to him in Lewes Prison yesterday. ‘Can you get it fast-tracked?’
‘It’s en route to the lab now.’
Only a couple of years ago, DNA results took several weeks. Now, less than twenty-four hours was sometimes possible. ‘Brilliant work, Dave!’ he said.
‘Thanks, boss, but let’s see.’
‘Of course.’
He ended the call, and was about to tell Glenn Branson the news as they approached the chapel door when Branson’s phone rang.
They stopped and stood still. ‘Yeah, you’re speaking to him,’ Glenn Branson said. ‘Sorry, not a good line – can you say that again?’ He was silent for a moment; then, his face lighting up with excitement, he said, ‘Shit! Really? You’ve confirmed the IDs?’
Grace watched his friend looking more animated than he had seen him in a long while. After a couple of minutes, the DS terminated the call and turned to Roy Grace. ‘I think you’re going to like this!’
60
Returning home from the funeral at 4 p.m., the large house felt emptier than ever and unusually gloomy. Gavin Daly, drained, sat in his study, drinking a larger than usual glass of wine and smoking a cigar. He had gulped the first glass straight down. He stared out through the window.
Aileen’s family had invited him to a restaurant for a meal after the funeral, but he wanted to be alone with his thoughts. At 6 p.m. he walked along to the dining room and sat down, with the local Brighton paper the Argus in front of him, a little smashed and in need of an early supper.
And if you couldn’t drown your sorrows in one of the world’s finest wines at the age of ninety-five, then when the hell could you? he liked to tell people, particularly Betty, his housekeeper, who sometimes chided him for his drinking. But he knew she always kept a bottle of Bristol Cream sherry concealed in a kitchen cupboard – and it got replaced at very regular intervals.