Robin carried her purchase, a walking stick with a rubber handle, back to the pub. Drawing level with the Rue des Laches she looked down the lane, but Richard de Leon appeared to have retreated back into his mother’s house.
She found Strike in the back room of the Bel Air, where she handed him the stick.
‘Yes, you do need it,’ she said in exasperation, as Strike opened his mouth to remonstrate. ‘We’ve got to walk to the B&B after this. Strike, come on, I even got it in army green so nobody’ll think you’re a big girl’s blouse.’
Strike grinned, though reluctantly, because he could just imagine Murphy striding, unimpeded, over the island, possibly with his bloody gym bag and water bottle.
‘Should’ve brought one with me,’ he admitted. ‘Thanks. I’ve ordered you a pizza, it was all they had.’
‘Great,’ said Robin. ‘I’ve just run into Richard de Leon again, by the way. He wasn’t threatening,’ she added, forestalling Strike’s question. ‘He didn’t say anything at all, just spotted me and turned back the way he’d come.’
‘Strange,’ said Strike, as a group of people settled at a neighbouring table. He took a sip of his zero-alcohol beer, then said, in a lower voice, ‘I was going to tell you this before I fell asleep on the plane. That Scottish Gateshead I thought might be Niall Semple’s dead best mate’s sister? I think I’ve found a few traces of her online over the weekend. She’s started and abandoned two different Twitter accounts and a Facebook page over the last seven years. See for yourself.’
Robin flicked through the pictures on Strike’s phone. Rena Liddell’s posts were often cryptic and occasionally garbled. She seemed fond of random pictures of clouds, doorways and blurry shots of the backs of passers-by, but not of selfies. Her profile picture on all three accounts was a cartoon picture of a purple and blue bat.
‘Zubat,’ said Robin.
‘What?’ said Strike.
‘Her avi, it’s a Pokémon called Zubat. My brother Jon was mad about Pokémon when he was a kid. But she’s calling herself @Mirbat, not @Zubat.’
‘That’s one of the things that made me almost certain it was her.’
‘You like Pokémon?’ said Robin, laughing as she looked up.
‘No,’ said Strike, ‘Mirbat’s a coastal town in Oman. There was a battle there in 1972: nine SAS guys versus two hundred and fifty Communist rebels. The SAS won.’
‘Nine against two hundred and fifty?’
‘Best of the best,’ said Strike, just as he had in Ironbridge. ‘Wouldn’t be surprised if Rena heard about the battle from her brother, hence the name.’
Robin scrolled down through Rena’s chaotic and garbled output. A preoccupation with Muslims and the danger Rena felt they posed to the UK were very evident throughout her posts. A few of her tweets had been reported and taken down. Judging by those that remained, Robin suspected they’d been extremely Islamophobic.
‘I think we’re talking serious mental illness, addiction or both,’ said Strike. ‘She posts in spurts, with hiatuses for months, but she’s been writing less and becoming more incoherent lately. However, if you look back to 2015, she managed to say something when she might’ve been on the right meds…’
Robin scrolled backwards and saw:
there telling me my brother\s dead I don’t think hes really dead. don’t believe it.
‘’Course,’ said Strike, ‘if Richard de Leon’s telling the truth and he hasn’t heard from Danny since June the eighteenth last year, Rena Liddell becomes irrelev—’
Strike’s mobile rang in Robin’s hand.
‘Wardle,’ she said, handing it back.
‘I’ll take it outside,’ said Strike, with a glance at the group at the next table.
The walking stick, Strike had to grudgingly admit, was helpful and enabled him to get out into the courtyard more speedily than he would have done without it.
‘What’s up?’ he asked Wardle.
‘Hi,’ said the policeman. ‘Nothing urgent. I just wanted to ask… were you serious about a job at the agency?’
‘Yeah, of course. We probably couldn’t match the salary you’re on, though.’
‘Yeah, I know,’ said Wardle. ‘I’m thinking about it. Like I said, with Mum dying, I can still see Liam right.’
‘We could use you as soon as you want to work,’ said Strike, although it occurred to him as he said it that he hadn’t yet discussed this with his detective partner. Absent-mindedly turning to face the high street, he saw Richard de Leon exit the Rue des Laches, glance around, spot Strike watching him, and beat a hasty retreat back down the track from which he’d just emerged.
Meanwhile, in the pub, a barman had just arrived at Robin’s table with two pizzas.
‘On holiday?’ he asked, as he set them down.
‘Not really,’ said Robin. ‘We’re looking for a man called Danny de Leon.’
‘Danny?’ said the barman cheerfully. ‘He’s up at Helen Platt’s, just seen him. Clos de Camille, on Rue de La Seigneurie. He’s doing her garden.’
84
What so false as truth is,
False to thee?
Where the serpent’s tooth is
Shun the tree…
Pizzas eaten, Strike and Robin emerged half an hour later from the Bel Air and set off up the Avenue beneath a sky still threatening rain, and following the verbal directions given to them by the helpful barman. As they passed the small, low-built shops that were either empty or closed, Strike said,
‘What would you say are the chances our friend Richard was trying to sneak off up the road to warn his brother we’re after him?’
‘High to very high,’ said Robin.
‘Why didn’t he just phone him?’
‘Maybe he has,’ said Robin. ‘Or maybe he waited for you to go back into the pub so he could dash up there. He might be waiting for us at Helen Platt’s. Hope he hasn’t brought his log.’
Strike laughed, but didn’t quip back, because even with the stick he was finding the Avenue harder going than he would have done had it been tarmacked, and didn’t want to look or sound like a man struggling with the terrain, not when Murphy would probably be vaulting gates if he was here, the limber fucker.
‘I don’t understand why this place is British,’ said Robin, as they turned right into Rue de la Seigneurie. ‘All the place names are French and we’re nearer France than Britain.’
‘I don’t think it is British, strictly speaking,’ said Strike, still trying determinedly not to wince or pant. ‘The Seigneur used to hold the island for the British monarch, or something. All goes back to William the Conqueror.’
They passed a church and graveyard and the local police station, both old, low buildings of stone, and after a further five minutes found themselves passing attractive houses. Ahead, in the distance to the left, they could see the tower of what Strike knew from maps was the Seigneurie, the large stone building where the current Seigneur lived.
‘That’s it,’ said Robin suddenly, pointing at a house painted light pink. ‘Clos de Camille.’
It was rather better maintained than the de Leon family residence, the camellia tree for which it was named standing proudly beside the front door. However, nobody answered when Robin rang the doorbell.
‘Maybe Richard has called to warn him,’ she said, rejoining Strike in the street.
A painted side gate stood open, through which they could see into a long and well-tended garden.