‘He hasn’t answered it all day,’ said the woman.
Hurried footsteps sounded behind them and all four turned to see another woman, blonde and bespectacled, jogging towards them.
‘The porter’s not there,’ she panted. ‘I can’t find him.’
‘Car,’ Strike told Robin. ‘Glove compartment. Skeleton keys. Could you go with her?’ he asked the blonde woman. ‘So she can get back in?’
The woman seemed glad to be told what to do. The two women hurried away.
‘You haven’t called the police?’ Strike asked the man.
‘We only got here ten minutes ago,’ he replied, looking thoroughly frightened. ‘We thought the porter—’
‘Call them now,’ said Strike. ‘When I open the door, nobody’s to go in, unless he’s still alive.’
‘Oh God,’ said the woman, and she covered her mouth with her hand.
The man had taken out his mobile and called 999.
‘Police, please,’ he said in a shaking voice.
Strike was now examining the note on the door without touching it. In the top corner he spotted a mark so faint it was barely visible: the faintest pink oval, as though of a latex-covered thumb.
Running footsteps and jangling keys announced the reappearance of Robin and the blonde.
‘We’re concerned about a disabled friend of ours,’ the tall thin man was telling the police. ‘He’s not answering his phone or opening his door… Yes… Stephen Hawking Building…’
Strike took the keys from Robin and after trying a couple of different ones succeeded in turning the lock. He pushed the door open.
The black woman’s scream was ear-splitting. Vikas Bhardwaj was sitting in his wheelchair facing the door, with his back to his desk and computer. His white shirt was stiff with dried brown blood, his eyes and mouth were open, his head was hanging askew, and his throat was slit.
PART FIVE
At the apex the fibres turn suddenly inwards,
into the interior of the ventricle,
forming what is called the vortex.
85
I thought my spirit and my heart were tamed
To deadness; dead the pangs that agonise.
While forensics were still busy at the crime scene, and the ambulance waited to take away Vikas Bhardwaj’s body, Strike and Robin were separated from Vikas’s friends by the police and shown into a small box of a room with one high window. It seemed a strange mix of office and cupboard, having shelves of files along one wall, a couple of chairs and a bucket and mop in the corner. Here, they gave statements to a uniformed local officer with bright red hair, who was at no pains to conceal his suspicion of the pair of them, and whose questions about Strike’s skeleton keys were aggressive.
Strike gave a lucid account of Vikas’s participation in the online game, and made deliberate mention of the fact that The Halvening had infiltrated it, in the hopes that this would expedite the arrival of people competent to deal with the case, but these details appeared only to irritate the red-headed officer further. A second officer entered the room, holding a mobile phone. The red-headed constable left the room to take the call, and after ten minutes returned to tell Strike and Robin to stay put.
They remained in their box-like room for another hour, undisturbed by anyone but the devastated porter, who brought them tepid coffee in plastic cups.
‘He was a lovely man, Dr Bhardwaj,’ said the porter. ‘One of the nicest we—’
His voice broke. After depositing the coffee on the table, he left with his hand to his eyes.
‘Poor sod,’ said Strike quietly as the door closed. ‘It’s not his fault.’
Robin, who didn’t think she’d ever forget the image of Vikas Bhardwaj’s gaping throat wound, the tendons and severed arteries clearly exposed, said,
‘What d’you think they’re keeping us for?’
‘For higher-ups to get here,’ said Strike. ‘I’m hoping we’ll see some familiar faces. That’s why I mentioned The Halvening to that ginger prick.’
The high window was showing a patch of star-strewn black sky before the door opened again and Strike saw with relief the small, neat figure of Angela Darwish.
‘We meet again,’ she said. Strike made to get up, to offer Darwish one of the two chairs, but she shook her head.
‘Thank you, no. I’ve just read your statements. So Bhardwaj was in your online game? The one The Halvening infiltrated?’
‘He wasn’t just in it, he co-created it,’ said Strike.
‘Do they know how long he’s been dead?’ Robin asked Darwish.
‘At a rough guess, twenty-four hours,’ said Darwish.
So, thought Robin, it had already been too late when she and Strike had stopped for coffee at Cambridge Services.
‘Plenty of CCTV cameras round here,’ said Strike, who’d noticed them on his way in. ‘I’d have said it’s extremely secure, unless the idiot who let us in is in the habit of holding the door open for strangers.’
‘The idiot who let you in is a doctor of theoretical physics,’ said Angela Darwish. ‘They’re interviewing him now. That’s the problem with communal buildings. They’re only as secure as the least security-conscious person living there. That said, I don’t think we’re going to have too much trouble identifying the killer. As you say, there are cameras everywhere – somebody must’ve been desperate to get rid of this poor man, to risk getting their face on that amount of film.’
‘I’ve got a feeling it’s going to be a latex mask that’s on camera,’ said Strike.
He found Darwish’s lack of reaction to this comment interesting.
‘We’ll try and keep your names out of the press,’ she said. ‘You don’t need more media exposure, not after that bomb.’
‘Appreciate it,’ said Strike.
‘Where are you staying?’
‘No idea,’ said Strike.
‘Well, let us know when you do,’ said Angela Darwish. ‘We’ll probably need to talk to you again. I’ll walk you out,’ she added. ‘Don’t worry: I’ve vouched for you to the police.’
‘Thanks,’ said Strike, flinching as he got to his feet. His right knee was throbbing again. ‘I don’t think that ginger bloke took to us much.’
‘Skeleton keys have that effect on some people,’ said Darwish with a dry smile.
As they headed towards the street through the dark garden, Robin saw parked police cars. Clusters of students stood together outside the building, horrified, no doubt, at what had happened to one of their own.
‘Well, safe travels, and don’t forget to let us know where we can find you,’ said Darwish as they reached the BMW. Raising her hand in farewell, she walked away.
‘You all right?’ said Strike once he and Robin were back in the car.
‘Fine,’ she said, which wasn’t entirely true. ‘Now what?’
‘We could stay at Nick and Ilsa’s?’ Strike suggested, without much conviction.
‘We can’t. She’s pregnant. They don’t need houseguests who’ve got The Halvening after them.’
‘Well, if you feel up to driving back to London, we could find another hotel – maybe somewhere near the office so we can access our stuff once we’re allowed back in? But if you’d rather stay here overn—’
‘No,’ said Robin, who’d had enough of Cambridge to last her a very long time, ‘I’d rather go back.’