A Lovely Way to Burn

Forty-Two

‘I didn’t think you’d come.’ Alexander Buchanan looked like a man who had won the lottery but was worried taxes might decimate his winnings. He stood outside her room, his face framed by the door’s small window, a mobile phone to his ear. ‘I’m sorry for the clumsy welcome, but you didn’t give us many options.’

Stevie put the phone the man had left her on speaker. She faced the window and said, ‘There’s usually an alternative to chloroforming a girl and locking her up under surveillance.’ She tried to summon the woman she had been on Shop TV: the unflappable dolly, smart but unthreatening. ‘We were both friends of Simon’s. I thought that might make us friends too.’

Buchanan grinned and shook his head, as if she were incorrigible. The strain of the days since they had first met showed on his face, but his voice remained as smooth as a late-night disc jockey’s.

‘So why turn up unannounced, armed with a tyre iron and a gun?’

‘It’s chaos out there. I needed to protect myself.’

‘Perhaps.’

‘There’s enough death in the world.’ Stevie paused, to give her words more weight. ‘Dr Ahumibe has committed suicide.’

‘John left me a message before he took care of the remaining children. He told me his plans. A great pity.’

She had hoped the news would be a weakening blow, but the chemist might have been talking about arrangements for a working lunch. She said, ‘Dr Ahumibe told me about the mistake you made with the cerebral palsy treatment, and your decision to carry on.’

The chemist shook his head. The glass in the door’s small window was strengthened with chequered wire. It gave the illusion that his skin was rippling as he moved.

‘John’s weakness for confessing got Simon and me into trouble more than once when we were boys. I hope he also told you that continuing with the treatment was the quickest way to resolve the difficulty we were having with the formula.’

‘He told me you persuaded him that it was the best way forward, but that Simon didn’t agree.’

Buchanan made a face that might have been intended to convey regret.

‘Disagreeable is the last word one would apply to Simon, and yet he often did disagree. We always managed to persuade him in the end.’

‘But not this time.’ Stevie’s legs were sore, but there was nowhere to sit except for the floor or the bed, and she wanted to be able to see Buchanan’s expression. She leant against the door, putting her face next to its small window. ‘When Simon refused to go along with the cover-up, you killed him. I’m guessing Frei died for similar reasons.’

Buchanan put his face against the window, close to hers. He lowered his voice, as if they weren’t speaking from opposite sides of wood and glass, and putting their heads together was a prelude to a confidence.

‘A neat theory, but not what happened.’

This time the chemist’s smile was like a closing door. Stevie straightened her spine and looked Buchanan in the eyes. This was not a moment for soft selling or subliminal messages, this was a do-or-die deal. She put an edge of command into her words, as persuasive as a TV mesmerist.

‘Let me out of here so we can talk properly, like human beings.’

‘William and I have to be meticulous, if we’re to avoid infection.’

‘William?’

‘My son, Simon’s godson. You met him earlier.’

Alexander Buchanan’s grin infuriated her. So many people were dead, some of them at his hands, but the chemist still had a son he could keep close. Stevie touched her throat.

‘Was it your son who attacked me outside the TV studio?’

The chemist’s smile tightened.

‘I’m sorry if William frightened you. All he wanted was to save me embarrassment by getting hold of the material on Simon’s laptop. My son is young and lacks finesse, but he wouldn’t have hurt you.’

‘Did William tell you that I managed to pull off his balaclava when he attacked me? It meant I recognised him when I saw him running away from Simon’s apartment block, just before I discovered Hope Black’s body. William mistook Hope for me and murdered her. He would have strangled me if he could.’

‘Hope’s death was an unfortunate accident.’

‘That wasn’t the impression I got.’

Colour bloomed in Alexander Buchanan’s cheeks and Stevie saw that her jibe had met its mark. There was a dreadful pleasure in baiting the chemist. She felt a surge of adrenalin, the last power of the defenceless.

He said, ‘You’re hardly the best judge of character . . .’

Stevie thought Buchanan had hung up, but then she saw the look of frustration on his face and realised that the phone signal had died. The chemist slipped his useless phone into his pocket and turned away. Stevie banged her fists against the door and shouted, ‘LET ME OUT.’ But the chemist was striding down the corridor, his back straight, footsteps swift and steady, like a man with lots to do.