‘Blame other people.’
Macmillan grinned. ‘I think in this case we may have good cause. Have you informed the US police about your suspicions?’
‘Not yet,’ said Steven, hoping he might be able to leave it at that, but Macmillan expected more.
‘I thought I might delay until we see if Jane Lincoln comes up with anything.’
‘Can I ask why?’
‘We’re working in the dark. If the US police agree there might be something wrong with their original conclusions and instigate a full-scale murder — or should that be homicide — investigation, it will alert people we don’t want to alert and maybe scare them off.’
Macmillan accepted this but pointed out, ‘We don’t want to end up investigating an American murder; that’s way outside our remit.’
‘Agreed, but if Jane should come up with the identity of a third person present in the restaurant that night, it would probably mean more to us than it would to the local police and might even help with our inquiry if we could see a connection.’
‘Fair enough.’
‘How long is it since you last spoke to your daughter?’ Tally asked.
‘A couple of weeks,’ Steven replied, ‘I couldn’t get a word in edgeways for hearing about the wonders of Jason,’
Tally smiled. ‘You should call her,’ she said, ‘Play her at her own game, tell her how wonderful I am.’
‘Everyone knows that,’ said Steven.
‘Maximum brownie points,’ said Tally, slapping a phone into his hand. ‘Go on, call her.’
Steven was surprised when Jenny herself answered. ‘Hi nutkin, how are you? I wasn’t expecting you to pick up the phone.’
‘I’m waiting for Jason to call, Dad.’
‘Oh, I’m sorry, maybe I should call back?’
‘Don’t be silly, Dad, he can wait.’
This cheered Steven. He deliberately extended the call by asking every conceivable question he could think of about school and life in general, happy in the knowledge he would be keeping Jason waiting. Eventually, he gave in and said, ‘Well, I’d better go and let you speak to your beau.’
‘My what?’ Jenny exclaimed.
‘Sorry, it’s an old-fashioned word for boyfriend.’
‘Dad?’
‘Yes, nutkin?’
‘I love you.’
Steven felt himself choke and struggled to manage, ‘Love you too, nutkin,’ before ending the call.
Tally took the phone from him, ‘Well, my big, brave warrior,’ she said, ‘that wasn’t so hard, was it?’
Steven smiled.
Next morning, the sun shone from a clear blue sky after having been absent for several days. Steven took the opportunity to walk by the river and enjoy the warmth of its rays on his face as he thought about Jenny and how grown-up she’d sounded the night before. It made him reflect on how quickly life was passing by. In an ideal world there would be a slow-down or pause button somewhere. A rewind would be a step too far — what was gone was gone — but it would be nice to have just a little more time to cherish things that really mattered.
The beep of an incoming text message interrupted his reverie, especially when he saw it was from Jane Lincoln. It said, ‘Can we meet? Reply by text.’
Steven replied, asking where and when and was told, 3p.m. Rose’s coffee shop in Cedar Avenue. He had to look up the address and saw it was quite a long way away from the university. Was there a reason for that? he wondered.
The reason became clear when they met. Jane told Steven that she shared a flat around the corner in Cedar Crescent and had taken the afternoon off. ‘I didn’t want to meet you anywhere near the university,’ she said, ‘or even have you call me there.’
‘Okay,’ said Steven, not understanding but hoping this was about to be put right.
‘I’ve got some news.’ Jane paused when Steven’s espresso and her own latte arrived along with two pieces of chocolate cake which Jane insisted he must try. Steven could see by the smiles being exchanged that Jane was a regular.
‘I heard back from my friend... there were three people at the table in Romero’s that night.’
‘Excellent, this could be a big piece in the puzzle.’
‘There’s more.’
Steven felt the hairs on the back of his neck rise.
‘I asked her if she knew who the third person was and she said, no.’
The hairs settled.
‘But she could see what he was.’
Steven rubbed the back of his neck. ‘And what was that?’
‘A priest, a Roman Catholic priest.’
‘Well, well, well,’ murmured Steven, but feeling unsure why he’d said it or what to think about it.
‘There’s more. Thinking ahead, I asked if she could describe him and she did, not all that well — she had no reason to pay him close attention — but well enough for me to think he might have been the same priest I saw with Dorothy in the lab in the days following the fire — short, paunchy, clean-shaven, balding at the front. My friend said they all seemed very friendly and remembers that the priest left with Paul and Carrie: they went off in the direction of the lab.’
‘That could be so important,’ said Steven.
‘Could it?’ asked a troubled looking Jane. ‘If that man had anything to do with the fire and then turned up in the lab to see Dorothy, it could mean that Dorothy was involved after all.’
‘Point taken.’
‘That’s why I didn’t want to be seen talking to you or have anyone thinking it was you on the phone.’
‘You did right, but let’s not implicate Dorothy just yet... for all the reasons we spoke about before.’
Jane nodded. ‘It’s still a worry.’
Steven agreed that it was, but asked her to carry on as normal for the time being. He promised to get in touch when he had any news and she did likewise. As he got up to go, he said, ‘That was the best chocolate cake I ever tasted.’ He left two smiling women behind.
When he got back to the Home Office, Jean told him that John Macmillan had been called to a special meeting by the Home Secretary. Steven told her what Jane Lincoln had come up with and her eyes widened in surprise, ‘A priest?’ she exclaimed, ‘what do you make of that?’
‘Jane thinks there’s a good chance it was the same priest who came to see Dorothy Lindstrom at the university after the fire,’ said Steven, ‘the one I asked you to run a check on.’
‘I remember,’ said Jean.
Steven confessed that he hadn’t got around to taking a look at the file. He’d been distracted after seeing the fire department photographs.
‘Can you remember if he came up as part of the pastoral care team at Yale?’ he asked.
‘Actually, no, he didn’t. I half expected him to be one of the chaplains but he didn’t appear on the list.’
‘I know they have a department of Religious Studies,’ said Steven. ‘He could be a faculty member.’
‘I’ll check.’
‘He might even be a local priest.’
‘Dorothy’s local priest perhaps?’ Jean suggested. ‘Do we know anything about the area where she lived while she was at Yale?’
‘I could find out discreetly from Jane Lincoln, but I don’t want Dorothy to know we’re sniffing around,’ said Steven. ‘Maybe Neil Tyler might be able to help out. He was actually there at the time of the fire.’
‘Do you really think this priest was involved?’
‘Right now, he’s our prime suspect, however unlikely it sounds.’
‘In that case...’ said Jean, pausing to look through papers on her desk, ‘Time to bring in the big diggers for... Father Liam Crossan.’
John Macmillan returned from his meeting with news that Special Branch had identified the first two transfers in the chain Barrowman’s packet had taken. They were confident of coming up with the other two within the next twenty-four hours.