86
Oh weary impatient patience of my lot! —
Thus with myself: how fares it, Friends, with you?
The brutal murder of Vikas Bhardwaj, who’d entered Cambridge University at the age of sixteen, whose precocious genius had seen him become a doctor of astrophysics at the age of twenty-three and who’d already won an international prize for research, made a justifiable noise in the media. Robin, who read every news story, found herself filled with what she felt to be barely justified grief for the young man she’d never met. Was it wrong, she wondered, to feel that his murder was particularly dreadful because he’d been so brilliant?
‘No,’ said Strike, at lunchtime two days later, when she put the question to him in the café of the hotel on Poland Street where both were now staying. They were waiting for the rest of the team to arrive for a long overdue face-to-face catch-up. Strike had decided that as the office had so recently been bombed, team morale had to be prioritised over a few hours’ lack of surveillance. ‘I’d happily take Oliver Peach getting run over by a train if we could have Bhardwaj back. What use is bloody Peach to anyone?’
‘You don’t think that’s a bit… eugenics-y?’ said Robin.
‘Only if I personally start shoving tossers in front of trains,’ said Strike. ‘But as I’m not going around killing people I don’t like, I don’t think there’s much wrong with admitting some people contribute more to the world than others.’
‘So you don’t subscribe to “any man’s death diminishes me”?’ said Robin.
‘I wouldn’t feel remotely diminished by the deaths of some of the bastards I’ve met,’ said Strike. ‘Did you see what Bhardwaj’s family said in The Times this morning?’
‘Yes,’ said Robin, without mentioning that the statement had reduced her to tears. In addition to pleading for help in finding his killer, Vikas’s family had spoken of their immense and lasting pride in the genius who’d never let his disability stand in his way, and for whom astrophysics had been his entire life.
‘That filled in a lot of gaps for me,’ said Strike.
‘In what way?’
‘A doctor in astrophysics seemed a very unlikely candidate for spending so much time on an online game. But then we find out he was at Cambridge at sixteen, severely disabled – I’ll bet he was lonely as hell. That game was his social life. Inside the game, he didn’t have to deal with speech and mobility issues. It must’ve been a relief to stop being the child prodigy and just be another fan, meeting other fans.’
‘And having a best friend in Anomie.’
‘Yeah,’ said Strike, ‘which is an interesting point, isn’t it? Who would Vikas Bhardwaj be most likely to buddy up with, of our remaining suspects?’
‘I’ve been wondering that myself,’ said Robin.
‘Kea’s good-looking,’ said Strike. ‘I can imagine a lonely young bloke being pretty excited about being her best mate.’
‘True,’ said Robin. ‘But then, if you didn’t know about Ashcroft’s paedophiliac inclinations, you might think he was a nice guy.’
‘And from what I heard on your recording, Pierce can be charming when he wants to be. Plus he knew Ledwell and Blay. Lived with them. That’d be a thrill for a fan.’
They sat in silence for a few seconds, both thinking, before Strike said,
‘Well, the press still haven’t cottoned on to the fact that we were there, thank Christ… Everything go all right at your flat yesterday?’
‘Yes, all good,’ said Robin.
After checking with the police that it was safe to do so, she’d returned home briefly to pick up a holdall full of clean clothes to take back to the hotel. During her hour at her flat, she watered the slightly wilted philodendron and, for one mad moment, considered taking it back to the hotel with her.
Robin suspected that the state in which she’d first entered the Z Hotel, tired after hundreds of miles of driving, and fresh from finding the corpse of Vikas Bhardwaj, might have prejudiced her against the place, but she found her room, which was decorated in shades of grey, both cramped and unpleasantly soulless. Unlike Strike, she was almost constantly holed up there because she had to revise for the moderator test Anomie would be giving her in under a week’s time.
Her partner, on the other hand, was perfectly happy. His years in the army had inured him to regular changes of residence; he preferred his spaces clean, uncluttered and utilitarian; and the cramped conditions were useful for times when he wasn’t wearing his prosthetic leg. The hotel was also ideally situated for keeping an eye on the repairs to the office and accessing all the amenities of the area he knew best.
Midge and Barclay were the first of the subcontractors to arrive for the team meeting, Midge wearing black jeans and a vest top that made Robin acutely conscious of the lack of tone in her own upper arms.
‘Everything went as planned this morning,’ were Midge’s first words to Strike.
‘What happened this morning?’ asked Robin, who’d spent every hour since 7 a.m. watching episodes of The Ink Black Heart and trying to memorise plots and important lines.
‘Paid a visit to Jago Ross’s first wife,’ said Midge. ‘Showed her those videos we’ve taken, of him knocking their kids around and forcing that little girl over that fence on her pony.’
‘And?’ said Strike.
‘She’s going to apply for sole custody,’ said Midge. ‘She promised not to call Ross or her lawyer before tonight, though.’
‘Good,’ said Strike.
‘Are you going to—?’ Robin began, but Barclay said at the same time,
‘Found anyone to replace Nutsack yet?’
‘I’m working on it,’ Strike told Barclay, although in truth he hadn’t had time to address their manpower problem since returning from Cambridge. Most of that morning had been devoted to a meeting with the office landlord who’d become understandably twitchy about renewing their lease since the bombing, and had required a good deal of placating.
‘Well, Midge and I’ve go’ news on Fingers,’ said Barclay.
‘Excellent,’ said Strike. ‘Tell us when Dev and Pat get here: they’re only a minute away.’
Robin was pleased to see that Pat looked entirely as usual when she arrived with Dev, her spry walk indicating that the door that exploded inwards on her hadn’t caused any lasting injury. Nor had Pat’s manner undergone any change: when she cast a look of disfavour at the triangular stool she was supposed to sit on, Strike got up to offer Pat the sofa, at which she growled,
‘I can manage a stool, I’m not decrepit yet,’ and sat down, pulling furiously on her e-cigarette.
When everyone had ordered food and drink, Strike said,
‘I thought we should have a face-to-face. I know it’s been tough on all of you, Robin and me taking off for a few days. Just want you to know we appreciate how much work you’ve been covering in our absence and you sticking with the agency, after what happened.’
‘Police any nearer catching the bomber?’ asked Dev.
‘We haven’t had an update yet, but it can’t be long, not with MI5 involved,’ said Strike, hoping he wasn’t being over-optimistic. ‘So, what’s the latest on Fingers?’
‘The hoosekeeper’s resigned,’ said Barclay.
‘Interesting,’ said Strike.
‘Aye. I stood next tae her at a bus stop last night while she was telling Fingers she definitely didn’t want tae come back tae work, ever, because she was scared.’