He now turned the coffee machine back on. Raising his voice over the loud grinding noise, Strike said,
‘If your father did that, the risk to Will might be bigger than you realise, and I’m not just talking about his mental health. On Monday, a masked figure holding a gun tried to break into our office, possibly to get their hands on the UHC case file,’ said Strike. Shock now registered on all three Edensors’ faces. ‘The church now knows they’ve had a private investigator undercover with them for sixteen weeks. Will had direct, one-on-one contact with Robin before he escaped, which means the UHC might assume he’s now told her everything he’s feeling so guilty about.
‘Will’s also taken off with Wace’s granddaughter. Wace doesn’t seem particularly attached to either Lin or Qing, but he values his own bloodline enough to keep all the children related to him at the farm, so I doubt he’s going to be happy Qing’s disappeared. Meanwhile, if we can get word to Lin that Qing’s out, it makes it very likely she’ll want to leave. Lin grew up in the church and is likely to know a damn sight more than Will does about what goes on in there.
‘In short, Will’s got his finger in the ring pull of a large can of worms which, incidentally, also incriminates a well-known novelist, who appears to be going to Chapman Farm to sleep with young girls, and an actress who’s been pouring money into a dangerous and abusive organisation. As far as we know, the church has no idea yet where Will is, but if family members start visiting him, or if he starts visiting family lawyers, that could change. We think we were followed here this morning—’
‘We aren’t sure,’ said Robin, in response to the increasing alarm on Sir Colin’s face.
‘—by a red Vauxhall Corsa,’ said Strike, as though there’d been no interruption. ‘I’d advise you to keep an eye out for it. It’s possible the UHC is keeping tabs on us, and on you.’
There was a brief, appalled silence.
‘You’ve been to the police about this masked intruder?’ said Sir Colin.
‘Naturally,’ said Strike, ‘but they’ve got nothing so far. Whoever it was was well disguised, right down to a balaclava, and dressed all in black – and that description tallies with the only sighting of Kevin Pirbright’s shooter.’
‘Dear God,’ muttered Ed.
James, who’d refilled his own mug without offering coffee to anyone else, now advanced on the table.
‘So, Will’s potentially put all of us in danger? My wife? My kids?’
‘I wouldn’t go that far,’ said Strike.
‘Oh, wouldn’t you?’
‘They’ve never yet gone after the families of ex-members, except—’
‘Online,’ said Sir Colin. ‘Yes, I’ve seen my new Wikipedia page. Not that I care—’
‘You might not,’ said James loudly, ‘but I bloody well do! So what’s your solution to this mess?’ James threw at Strike. ‘Keep Will in hiding for a decade, while my father single-handedly funds an investigation into the whole fucking church?’
Strike deduced from this comment that Sir Colin had confided his doubts about the Daiyu line of enquiry to his elder son.
‘No,’ he began, but before he could elaborate on any course of action, Ed piped up.
‘It seems to me—’
‘Will you piss off with the bloody psychotherapy?’ spat James. ‘If they’re following and shooting people—’
‘I was going to say,’ said Ed, ‘that if this girl Lin’s prepared to give evidence against the church—’
‘She’s Wace’s daughter, she’s not going to—’
‘How the hell do you know?’
‘I know enough to know I don’t want to be beholden to her—’
‘We’ve got a duty of care—’ began Sir Colin.
‘No, we bloody don’t,’ shouted James. ‘Neither she, nor her bloody misbegotten child, are of any interest to me. That stupid little shit’s dragging Jonathan Wace’s people into our lives in place of our mother, who wouldn’t be bloody dead but for the UHC, and as far as I’m concerned, Will, this Lin and their bloody kid can go drown themselves—’
James swung his coffee mug towards the distant river, so that an arc of near-boiling black liquid hit Robin across the chest.
‘—and join his fucking prophet!’
Robin let out a shriek of pain; Strike yelled ‘Oi!’ and stood up; Ed also attempted to stand, but his weak leg gave way; Sir Colin said, ‘James!’ and while Robin was pulling scalding fabric away from her skin and looking frantically around for something to wash herself off with, Ed pushed himself back up on a second attempt and shouted at his elder brother, leaning on the table with both hands:
‘You’ve got this fucking narrative in your head – it was inoperable by the time they found it, it had been there since before Will joined the fucking church! You want to blame someone, blame me – she didn’t get herself checked because she was sitting next to me in hospital for five bloody months!’
With the two brothers yelling at each other so loudly nobody else could hear themselves speak, Robin left the table to grab some kitchen roll, which she ran under the cold tap then pressed beneath her shirt to relieve the burning on her skin.
‘Be quiet – BE QUIET!’ shouted Sir Colin, getting to his feet. ‘Miss Ellacott, I’m so sorry – are you…?’
‘I’m fine, I’m fine,’ said Robin, who, preferring not to mop hot coffee off her breasts with four men watching, turned her back on them.
James, who didn’t seem to have realised he was responsible for the large black stain across Robin’s cream shirt, began again.
‘As far as I’m concerned—’
‘Not going to apologise, then?’ snarled Strike.
‘It’s not your bloody place to tell me—’
‘You’ve just thrown boiling coffee all over my partner!’
‘What?’
‘I’m fine,’ lied Robin.
Having bathed the smarting area with cold kitchen roll, she put the wad into the bin and returned to the table, her wet shirt clinging to her. Taking her jacket off the back of her chair, she pulled it back on, silently reflecting that she’d now been injured by two Edensor sons; perhaps Ed would make it a hat trick before she left the house, and smash her round the head with his walking stick.
‘I’m sorry,’ said James, taken aback. ‘I genuinely – I didn’t mean to do that…’
‘Will didn’t mean to do what he’s done, either,’ said Robin, feeling that if she had to get scalded, the least she was owed was to be able to capitalise on it. ‘He did a really stupid, careless thing, and he knows it, but he never meant to hurt anyone.’
‘I want this girl Lin found,’ said Sir Colin in a low voice, before James could respond. ‘I don’t want to hear another word about it, James. I want her found. And after that…’
He looked at Strike.
‘I’m prepared to fund another three months of investigation into Daiyu Wace’s death. If you can prove it was suspicious, that she’s not the deity they’ve turned her into, that might help Will – but if you haven’t found out anything after three months, we’ll drop it. In the meantime, please thank your office manager for looking after Will, and… we’ll keep our eyes open for that Vauxhall Corsa.’
106
It is true that there are still dividing walls on which we stand confronting one another. But the difficulties are too great. We get into straits, and this brings us to our senses. We cannot fight, and therein lies our good fortune.