Dark Room

*8*

SATURDAY, 25TH JUNE, ROMSEY ROAD POLICE STATION, WINCHESTER-12:30 P.M.

DI Maddocks and his team had put together a substantial amount of information about Jane Kingsley in the short time they'd had, but had discovered nothing about Meg Harris or her parents. "At the time of Miss Kingsley's car crash, a couple of PCs went out to talk to her parents," he told Cheever. "The stepmother, Mrs. Elizabeth Kingsley, was tipsy and offered some vitriolic comments about Leo and Meg. They were both bastards but Meg was a snake in the grass and had set out to steal Jane's boyfriends since they were at Oxford together." He looked up. "BT can't help us. At a rough estimate, Wiltshire has over five thousand families called Harris living in it. If we had the father's initial it might help, or a profession even, but you say Sir Anthony doesn't know what her father was called."

"No," said Frank Cheever with rather more cynicism than was his wont. "Despite his enthusiasm for her as an alternative daughter-in-law, he seems to know remarkably little about her."

Maddocks eyed him curiously. Well, well, well, he thought, times they are a-changing. "I've put two of our guys onto tracing Meg's next of kin through the university," he went on, "but then there's the other problem that Harris may not be her maiden name. I still say our quickest route is via the flat in Hammersmith, so Fraser and I are going up there this afternoon."

"Understood. What about Jane Kingsley?"

"Okay, after the Landy murder-" Maddocks pointed to some papers on the Superintendent's desk. "That's as much as we've managed to get hold of on the case. It seems pretty comprehensive and there's a phone number you can call for an update. I guess you missed the Kingsley connection because she was calling herself Jane Landy in those days. Anyway, within weeks of her discharge from hospital following her treatment for depression, she negotiated an extremely favorable sale of his gallery and invested the lot in a photographic studio in Pimlico. She bought it out, lock, stock, and barrel-premises, equipment, and goodwill. Until then, she'd been working part-time as a stand-in photographer when regulars didn't show." His voice took on a note of reluctant admiration. "She appears to have turned it into a success. Under the old management it was a run-of-the-mill enterprise, dealing in portraits of the local bigwigs' families, friends, and pets; under Miss Kingsley's management it's become a favored studio for promotional work-actors, pop stars, fashion models, magazines. She's earned quite a name for herself in the trade."

"Who's running it at the moment?"

Maddocks consulted his notes. "A chap called Dean Jarrett. He's been with her from the beginning. She recruited him through an ad in the newspapers, asking for samples of work with a view to employment. She had over a thousand applications, interviewed fifty, and selected one. The word among professionals is he's brilliant and devoted. I got Mandy Barry to phone through and ask whether appointments and bookings were being honored with Miss Kingsley in hospital, and the receptionist, one Angelica, was bullish and convincing about the studio's continued commitment. Loyalty to the boss was deeply felt and not feigned, according to Mandy."

Cheever nodded. "What else?"

"The house in Richmond was bought by Landy in '81 with an endowment mortgage of thirty thousand. On his death, the endowment paid off the mortgage and the house became Miss Kingsley's. She has shown no inclination to sell it. She gets on well with Colonel and Mrs. Clancey, who live next door, and is well regarded by other people in the road. She lives quietly and unostentatiously and, bar the occasional appearance of her father's Rolls Royce, does not draw attention to herself. Interestingly, nobody referred to Landy at the time of Miss Kingsley's traffic accident, although some of them must have remembered him, but they were very ready to talk about Leo Wallader. The general view is that no one liked him very much and that he behaved badly, but Richmond police were left with the impression that her neighbors were more put out about missing a wedding at Hellingdon Hall than they were about Leo's shenanigans."

"What about other boyfriends between Landy and Wallader?''

"Only what we've gleaned from the gossip columnists. There've been two or three, but nothing lasting more than six months. Mind you, Wallader didn't make six months either. She met him in February and he was dead by June. Bit of a whirlwind romance, considering the marriage was scheduled for July."

"What was the attraction?"

Maddocks shrugged. "No idea, but Colonel Clancey said it was very clear to him and his wife that Jane was having cold feet about the wedding, even if it was Leo who called it off. Claims he can't understand why she would want to top herself when he left."

"Any ideas?"

"Only the obvious, that she killed them herself or witnessed the killing and then suffered a similar breakdown to the one she'd had at the time of Landy's death. She's pretty damn weird, that's for sure. I mean, according to what we've found out, her favorite backgrounds for photographic shoots are cemeteries, derelict factories, and graffitied subway walls." He took a folded page that had been ripped out of a magazine, from his pocket. "If you're interested, that's her most famous photograph to date. It's that black supermodel standing in front of a filthy tiled wall with every obscenity you can imagine scrawled all over it."

Cheever spread the sheet on his desk and examined it. "Fascinating," he said. "She's quite an artist."

"Well, I think it sucks, sir. Why put a beautiful woman against crap like that?"

"Where would you have put her, Gareth?" asked the other man tartly. "On a bed?"

"Why not? Somewhere a bit more glamorous, anyway."

The Superintendent frowned. "It's a statement. I think it's saying that real beauty is incorruptible, never mind how profane or ugly the setting." He pinched the end of his nose. "Which is interesting, don't you think, in view of the ugliness of Landy's death? I wonder when she started using backgrounds like this in her work. There's something rather moving about the triumph of fragile human perfection over a wasteland of mindless filth."

Maddocks decided the old man was going gaga. It was only a creased fashion photograph, not the Mona Lisa.

HELLINGDON HALL, NEAR FORDINGBRIDGE, HAMPSHIRE-12:30 P.M.

Miles Kingsley shook his mother angrily, then pushed her back onto the sofa. "I don't believe it. My God, you're such a stupid cow. Why can't you keep your bloody great mouth shut? Who else have you told?" He glared across at his brother, who was skulking at the far end of the drawing room, feigning an interest in the leather-bound books his father had bought by the yard when they first moved into the Hall. "Your neck's on the line too, you little shit, so I suggest you wipe that smirk off your face before I slap it off."

"Sod off, Miles," said Fergus. "If I had any sense I'd never have listened to you in the first place." He kicked a Chippendale chair. "It was your idea, for Christ's sake. 'Foolproof,' you said. 'What can possibly go wrong?' "

"Nothing has gone wrong. You'll see. Just a little more time, and we'll be free and clear with a sodding fortune."

"That's what you said last time."

RAMSEY ROAD POLICE STATION-12:45 P.M.

Frank read the documents on his desk relating to the Landy murder, then dialed the contact number Maddocks had given him. DCI Andrews had been involved from the outset.

"The case was effectively closed at the end of '85," he said down the wire from Scotland Yard, "when Jason Phelps was put away for the Docherty murders. Remember him? Clubbed an entire family to death for twenty grand on the instructions of Docherty's nephew. They both got four life sentences. We tried to persuade Phelps to confess to the Landy killing, because it was a carbon copy of the Docherty murders, but we never got a result. There was no question he did it, though, and if we could have got him to spill the works, we'd have nailed Kingsley. He was the one we wanted."

"Tell me about the daughter," prompted Frank. "What was she like?"

"I rather took to her, as a matter of fact. She was a good kid, deeply shocked of course, and suffered a nervous breakdown afterwards. She kept saying it was all her fault but we never believed she had anything to do with it. Meredith put it to her that she was afraid her father was responsible, but she said no. A day or two later she lost her baby."

"Did she ever suggest who might have done it?"

"An unknown artist whose work Landy had rejected. She said he could be very cruel in what he said, and she was insistent that he'd told her a few days before the murder that he was being watched by some creep who'd come to the gallery. She didn't think anything of it at the time, because he treated it as a joke, but it certainly preyed on her mind afterwards. We checked it out, but there was no substance to it and we took the view that if the watcher existed at all, it was as likely to be Kingsley's contract killer as an embittered artist."

Cheever pondered for a moment. "Still, it's something of a minefield. The only contact I've had with Kingsley was years ago when he beat his future brother-in-law to a pulp to warn him off the wedding. Now you're telling me he pulped his son-in-law afterwards. Why didn't he do it before?"

"That was his daughter's argument. She claimed Kingsley had done his best to get rid of Landy three years previously by having him sacked from his job, but had long since accepted defeat on the matter. Our view was that the pregnancy changed things. She admitted that she and Landy had been going through a rocky patch but said the baby had brought them together again, and we didn't think it was coincidence that the wretched man was murdered a week after she told her parents she was expecting. We guessed Kingsley was relying on the marriage failing and when he was presented with evidence that it wasn't, he signed Landy's death warrant."

Cheever tapped one of the pieces of paper in front of him. "According to the memo you faxed through, you and Meredith believed Kingsley adored his daughter. But we're talking about something much sicker than adoration, surely? I could understand it if Landy had been treating her badly and Kingsley wanted him punished, but from what you've said, he acted out of jealous rage. There'd have to be a pretty powerful sexual motive behind actions like that."

"In a nutshell, that's what we thought it was all about. Look, the man was very highly sexed, he was visiting the Shepherd's Market prostitute every week. The second marriage was a disaster because the poor creature he settled on wasn't a patch on the first wife and took to the bottle within a couple of years. Her sons never matched up to the first wife's daughter, who, to make matters worse, is the spitting image of her dead mother. There's no evidence that Kingsley abused the child, but they lived alone together for five years before he married again, and we estimated the chances were high that he did. We had his psychological profile drawn up based on what was known of him, and it was very revealing. There was a heavy emphasis on his need to control through ruthless manipulation of people and events, and it was thought very unlikely that his daughter could have escaped unscathed."

"Did you suggest it to her?"

"Yes"-a hesitation-"more's the pity. We gave her the profile to read, and the next thing we knew, she was under the care of a psychiatrist with severe anorexia and suicidal depression. We felt rather badly about it, to be honest."

"Mind you," murmured Frank thoughtfully, "it's a typical reaction of an abused child who's suddenly forced to come to terms with a buried past."

43A SHOEBURY TERRACE, HAMMERSMITH, LONDON-3:30 P.M.

Later that afternoon, Maddocks and Fraser entered Meg Harris's flat in Hammersmith. They were met at the door by two Metropolitan policemen and a locksmith, but dispensed with the services of the latter in favor of the spare key which a stout, middle-aged neighbor produced when she saw the congregation through her window and issued forth to quiz them about what they were doing. "But Meg's in France," she said, countering their sympathetic assertion that they had reason to believe Miss Harris was dead. "I saw her off." She wrung her hands in distress. "I've been looking after her cat."

The men nodded gravely. "Can you remember when she left?" asked Maddocks.

"Oh, Lord, now you're asking me. Two weeks ago or thereabouts. The Monday, maybe."

Fraser consulted his diary. "Monday, June the thirteenth?" he asked her.

"That sounds about right, but I couldn't say for certain."

"Have you heard from her since?"

"No," she admitted, "but I wouldn't expect to." She looked put out. "I can't believe she's dead. Was it a car accident?"

DI Maddocks avoided a direct answer. "We've very few details at the moment, Mrs ... er..."

"Helms," said the woman helpfully.

"Mrs. Helms. Do you know anything about Miss Harris's boyfriend?"

"You mean Leo. He's hardly a boyfriend, too old to be a boyfriend, Meg said. She always called him her partner."

"Did he live here?"

"On and off. I think he's married and only comes to Meg when his wife's away." She caught up with Maddocks's use of the past tense. "Did?" she asked him. "Is Leo dead too?"

He nodded. "I'm afraid so, Mrs. Helms. Would you have a contact address or telephone number for Miss Harris's parents by any chance? We'd very much like to talk to them."

She shook her head. "She gave me the vet's number last year in case the cat fell ill, but that's all. As far as I remember, her family lives in Wiltshire somewhere. She used to go down there two or three times a year for a long weekend. But how awful!" She looked shocked. "You mean she's dead and her parents don't even know?"

"I'm sure we'll find something in the flat to help us." Maddocks thanked her for the key and led the way down the stone steps to the basement flat, which was marked 43A and had terracotta pots, alive with Busy Lizzies, cluttered about the doorway. He inserted the key into the lock and pondered the elusive nature of Meg's family. Even Sir Anthony Wallader, who claimed to know something about the Harrises, had no idea which part of Wiltshire they came from or what Meg's father did by way of a job. "You'll have to ask Jinx Kingsley," he told them. "She's the only one left who knows."

But, in the circumstances, the Hampshire police preferred the more tortuous route of arriving at Wiltshire via Hammersmith.

A tortoiseshell cat greeted them with undisguised pleasure as they let themselves into the narrow hallway, rubbing its sleek head and ears against their legs, purring ecstatically at the thought of food. Fraser nudged it gently with the toe of his shoe. "I hate to be the one to tell you, old son, but you're an orphan now. Mummy's dead."

"Jesus, Fraser," said Maddocks crossly, "it's a cat, for Christ's sake." He opened the door into what was obviously the living room and took stock of the off-white Chinese rug, with its embroidered floral pattern of pale blues and pinks, which covered the varnished floorboards in front of the fireplace. "A cat and an off-white rug," he murmured. "The boffins will be even more unbearable after this." He went inside, took a pen from his jacket pocket, and manipulated the buttons on the answering machine.

Hello, darling, said a light female voice. I presume you're going to phone in for your messages, so ring me as soon as you can. I read in the newspaper today that Jinx was in a car accident. I'm very worried about what to do. Should I try and phone her? I'd like to. You were such friends after all, and it seems churlish to ignore her just because ... well ... well, enough said ... no more rows, we promised. Ring me the minute you get this message and we 'II talk about it. Good-bye, darling.

Hi, Meg, where the hell are you? A man's belligerent voice. You swore on your honor you'd come into the office before you left. Damn it, it's Wednesday, there's a mound of sodding messages here and I can't make head or tail of them. Who the fuck's Bill Riley? Most of them are from him. Ring me before you ring anyone else. This is urgent.

Meg. The same man's voice. Ring me. Immediately. Damn it, I'm so angry I feel like belting you one. Do you realize Jinx has tried to kill herself? I've had your wretched parents on the phone every day asking for news. They feel bloody about this and so do I. Phone, for Christ's sake. It's Friday, seventeenth June, eight-sodding-thirty, no breakfast and I haven't slept a wink. I knew Wallader would be nothing but trouble.

It's Simon. A different, cooler man's voice. Look, Mum and Dad are going spare. You can't just bury your head in the sand and pretend nothing's wrong. I'm sure you know Jinx has tried to kill herself. It's been in all the newspapers. Mum says you're refusing to answer your messages, but at least ring me if you won't ring her. I'm going to visit Jinx, see how she's coping. One of us ought to show some interest.

Darling, it's Mummy again. Please, please ring. I really am awfully concerned about Jinx. They say she tried to commit suicide. I can't bear to think of her being so unhappy because of you and Leo. Someone should talk to her. Don't forget how ill she was after Russell was killed. Please ring. I'm so worried. I do hope you're all right. You 're usually so good about phoning.

For your information, Bill Riley is now planning to sue us. He claims we're in breach of contract. Why the hell did you agree to work with him if you weren't prepared to see it through. Message timed at nine-thirty p.m., Thursday, June twenty-third. If I don't hear from you in the next twenty-four hours, consider our partnership terminated. I'm pissed off with this, Meg, I really am.

Hello, Meg. A deeper woman's voice. It's Jinx. Look, I know this is probably politically incorrect-a low laugh-I ought to be ripping your first editions to pieces or something. But I really would like to talk to you. Things are a bit complicated this end-well, you've probably heard about it ... A pause. They say I drove my car at a concrete post-deliberately. Can you believe that? The bugger is, I've lost my memory, can't remember anything since Saturday the fourth, so everyone's jumping to the conclusion that I was upset about you and Leo. Another laugh, rather more forced this time. It's the pits, old thing, which is why I need to talk to you both. You may not believe me, but I swear to God I am not harboring grudges, so if you can bear the embarrassment, ring me on Salisbury two-two-one-four-two-zero. It's a nutters' hospital and I'm shit-scared of going round the bend here. Please ring.

The rest of the tape was blank.

Maddocks raised an eyebrow at Fraser. "Genuine?'' he asked. "Or planted for the police to hear after they found the bodies?"

"You mean hers?" Fraser shrugged. "I'd guess genuine. The pissed-off partner made his last call two days ago, so hers must have been pretty recent."

"How does that make it genuine?"

"Because she couldn't know when the bodies would be found. If it was a bluff, she'd have phoned sooner to make sure we got the message."

Maddocks was more skeptical. "Unless she's been following the newspapers." He turned to a bookcase along the wall and plucked a book at random from the shelves. "The reference to first editions was genuine. Look at this. A signed Graham Greene." He ran his finger along the spines. "Daphne du Maurier, Dorothy L. Sayers, Ruth Rendell, Colin Dexter, P. D. James, John le Carre. She's even got an Ian Fleming. I wonder who she's left them to."

"Probably her friend Jane Kingsley," said Fraser, opening a door to the right of the fireplace and disclosing a neat white kitchen with slate-gray worktops and pale gray units. He turned to the two London policemen. "Do you fancy tackling this? Chances are there'll be papers in some of these drawers. I'll take her bedroom."

He moved across the hallway to a door on the other side, clicked it open and surveyed the room. Like the rest of the flat, it was clean and meticulously tidy-so tidy, in fact, that he decided it was a spare bedroom and went to the only door he hadn't yet opened and found the bathroom. Apart from a pair of fluffy white towels that were folded with measured precision over the rail, there was nothing to indicate that the room had ever been used-no sponge, no soap, no toothpaste. He lifted the latch on the cabinet above the basin and stared thoughtfully at the meager contents. A bottle of disinfectant, a packet of Disprin, and a clean toothmug. Meg Harris was unreal, he thought. No one was this tidy, not even when they went away on holiday. And where was Leo's presence? Surely something should remain to show a man had lived there on and off. He lifted the lid of the laundry basket, but it was empty. He retreated into the hall again, where he noticed the cat's bed beneath a small radiator and wondered why Meg had bothered to keep a companion when she was clearly so house-proud that its movements had to be thoroughly restricted whenever she was absent. Tidiness appeared to be an obsession with her. Back in the bedroom, he opened the wardrobe and sorted through the few clothes hanging there. Only women's, he noted, no men's. The same was true of all the drawers. He searched for anything that might give a clue to the woman's personality, but it was like searching a hotel bedroom where a guest was staying one night. Her clothes were neatly folded away, some odds and ends of costume jewelry and makeup lay in ordered rows in her dressing table drawer, a small bowl of potpourri on the bedside table gave off a faint scent. But if there had ever been anything of a personal nature in that room, she had taken it with her.

Maddocks looked up from a book as Fraser rejoined him. "Last year's diary," he said, "but there's not a single phone number or address in it. Any luck your end?"

Fraser shook his head. "Nothing. Just a few clothes. It looks as if she took everything that mattered to her, which is odd if she was only going away for a couple of weeks. I couldn't find any suitcases."

Maddocks abandoned the diary and stared about the living room with a frown. "I don't get it. It's so damn clinical. Have you noticed there aren't any photographs about? I've been looking for an album but I can't find one. You'd think there'd be at least one photograph of her family, wouldn't you?''

"What about papers?" suggested Fraser. "House insurance, mortgage details, a will? Where are they?"

Maddocks jerked his head towards a pine bureau in the corner. "In there for what it's worth, but there's no will, just one folder with 'House Insurance' written across the front. There aren't even any letters, no indication at all who her friends were or what the family address is. It's bizarre. Most people have a few letters littered about the place." He moved across to the kitchen door. "What about you two? Have you found anything?"

The older of the two London policemen shook his head. "Tell you what, sir, it reminds me of those cottages you rent in the summer. There's cutlery and crockery here and it's all clean, but there's no food anywhere, the fridge is empty, dishwasher's empty, new plastic bag in the garbage can. Either she rented it and was about to move out or she was planning to move out and let it to somebody else." He gestured towards a pegboard on the wall. "Even her notice board's empty, but you don't do that when you're off on holiday. I'd say she's got another place somewhere."

Fraser agreed with him. "That's got to be it, Gov. It doesn't make sense otherwise. Have you ever seen a flat as devoid of personality as this one is?"

"Why did she leave her first editions behind?"

"Because the insurance policy here probably specifies and covers the collection, which would make this the most sensible place to leave them unattended. What's the betting she moved all her personal stuff before the holiday, left the cat behind because she had a neighbor who would feed it, and was planning to come back for the books, the rest of her clothes, and the cat on her return? She was moving in with Leo-it's the only logical scenario."

"Goddammit," said Maddocks ferociously, "everything points to him moving in with her. If he had a place of his own, why the hell was he shacked up in Glenavon Gardens with the Kingsley woman? Frank'll go mad over this. It's my guess the only person who knows anything is Jane Kingsley."

THE NIGHTINGALE CLINIC, SALISBURY-3:30 P.M.

Minus her bandage and dressed in black sweater and trousers, Jinx sat on a bench in the shade of a weeping beech tree and studied the comings and goings on the gravel sweep in front of the clinic. She felt herself to be comfortably anonymous behind a pair of mirrored glasses, and for the first time in several days she allowed her tired body to relax.

The memory that she had known about Leo and Meg's affair pierced her brain like a needle. My God! Leo himself had told her in the drawing room of his parents' house with Anthony and Philippa there as silent, horrified witnesses. She had screamed at them all-why had she been screaming?-and Leo had said: I'm going to marry Meg-and she had been so, so shocked. Meg and Leo ... Meg and Russell ... But when? When had Leo told her?

She wrestled with the memory, desperate to hold on to it, but like a dream, it started to fragment and fade and, in confusion, she took the bunch of flowers that was being pressed onto her lap and heard Josh Hennessey saying, "Jinxy love, are you all right?"

She had forgotten he was coming and stared up at his anxious face, smiling automatically while she knitted back the fabric of her subconscious and let the memory go. "I'm fine," she heard herself saying. "Sorry, I was miles away. How are you?" But, oh God, she'd been so angry ... she could remember her anger...

He squatted in front of her, his hands resting lightly on her knees, his eyes examining every inch of her face. "Pretty bloody depressed if I'm honest. How about you?" He seemed to be looking for a reaction and was disappointed-surprised?-when he didn't get it.

She held a thin hand to her chest where her heart was beating frantically. Something else had happened. The knowledge weighed on her like a ton weight. Something else had happened ... something so terrible that she was too frightened to search her memory for it. "I'd describe myself as being in a state of suspended animation," she said, breathing in jerky, shallow breaths. "I exist, therefore I am, but as I can't think straight it's a fairly meaningless existence." She thought how unattractive he looked, with fear and worry pinching his nose and mouth. "I suppose if you're depressed, it means you haven't got hold of Meg."

He shook his head, and she saw with dismay that there were tears in his eyes.

"I'm sorry." She fingered the flowers on her lap, then laid them beside her. "It was kind of you to bring these."

"I feel so awful about this." He lowered himself to the ground and withdrew his hands. "Couldn't you have phoned, told me you were in trouble? You know I'd have come."

"You sound like Simon," she said lightly.

He ruffled his hair and glanced away from her gaunt, bruised face and shaven head. "Simon's been on the phone almost every day. His parents are devastated, blaming each other, blaming Meg, wanting to do something to make up-well, I'm sure you can imagine how they feel. Simon tried phoning the Hall to find out where you were and got a mouthful of abuse. It's understandable, of course, but it didn't make things any easier."

"I'm sorry," she said again, "but oddly enough, Josh, it doesn't make it any easier for me, either, to have everyone blaming themselves because I drove at a brick wall."

He flicked her a quick glance but didn't say anything.

"Not that I did it deliberately," she said through gritted teeth. "That car cost me a fortune, and I can think of a hundred better ways of killing myself than writing off a perfectly good Rover."

He plucked at a blade of grass. "I spoke to Dean last night," he said uncomfortably. "The poor chap was in tears, said if I managed to get hold of you, I was to tell you business is fine but please call him the minute you feel up to it. I gave him the number here, but he's afraid to call himself in case you're too unhappy to talk to him."

It was hopeless. "I'm not unhappy," she said with a forced smile. "I feel great. I'm looking forward to going home." Why was sympathy so unbearable? "Look, let's put these flowers in my room and then go for a walk." Stupid woman! Fifty yards would see her on her knees.

"Are you sure you're up to it?" he asked, pushing himself to his feet.

"Oh, yes," she said briskly. "I keep telling you, I'm fine." She set off ahead of him so he wouldn't see her face. "Believe me, I don't intend to stay here very long. They've already said I'm mentally fit to go home, now all I need to do is prove I'm physically fit." Who the hell did she think she was kidding? "It's in here," she said, putting one groggy leg over the sill of the French windows and hauling herself towards a chair.

The flowers slipped from her fingers onto the floor. She felt Josh's arms closing about her and saw murky images floating on the swollen river of her memory.

43 SHOEBURY TERRACE-4:00 P.M.

Fraser rang the doorbell of number 43 and asked Mrs. Helms if Meg had given any indication that she intended to vacate her flat after her holiday.

"Not in so many words," said the stout woman thoughtfully, "but now you come to mention it, there was a lot of coming and going shortly before they left. I remember saying to my Henry, it wouldn't surprise me if there was a change in that direction. Then she asked me to feed Marmaduke and it rather went out of my mind, except that she was insistent the poor creature shouldn't go into any of the rooms. 'Keep him in the hall, Mrs. H,' she said, thrusting a tin of cat food at me. What's going to happen to him now? Henry won't have him anywhere near, but then he's not well, you know."

"We'll do our best to sort something out," said Fraser, "but in the meantime perhaps you could go on feeding the cat."

"I won't let him starve," she said grudgingly, "but something ought to be done before too long. That stuffy hallway's no place to keep an animal."

He agreed with her. "You wouldn't happen to know what Miss Harris did for a job, would you, Mrs. Helms?"

"Seems to me you know very little about her, Sergeant. Are you sure you've got the right person?"

He nodded. "Her job?" he prompted.

"She called herself a headhunter. Used to be with a big consultancy firm in the City, then set up on her own about five years ago." She spread her hand and made a rocking gesture with it. "But it wasn't going too well from what I could gather. People are scared to give notice because of the recession, and you can't hunt heads when there are no vacancies to fill."

"Any idea what her company is called?"

"No. We talked about Marmaduke and the milkman from time to time, but other than that"-she shrugged-"we were just neighbors. Nothing special. Nothing close. I'm sorry she's gone, though. She never gave us any trouble."

Fraser found himself dwelling on that last sentence as he walked the few yards to the DI's car. "She never gave us any trouble'' was the most depressing epitaph he had ever heard.

THE NIGHTINGALE CLINIC-4:00 P.M.

"What's the problem?" asked Alan Protheroe, reaching for Jinx's wrist and feeling for a pulse. He wondered who this man was and why he'd started so violently at the sound of the voice behind him.

"Well, look at her for God's sake," said Josh in desperation, laying her slack head on the pillow and lowering her gently onto the bed. "I think she's dying."

"No chance. Built like a tank, this one." He let the wrist go. "She's asleep." He looked at the man's pinched nostrils and frightened eyes. "You look in worse shape than she is."

"I thought she was dying." Josh leaned his hands on the side of the bed to steady himself. "Now I feel sick. Jesus, I'm not sure I can take much more of this. I haven't slept in days, not since Simon Harris phoned to say Jinx was dead."

"Why did he do that?"

"Because Betty Kingsley got rat-arsed and phoned Meg's mother. Told the poor woman her daughter was a murderer."

Alan gestured towards the terraced area beyond the windows. "Let's go and sit outside. I'm Dr. Protheroe." He took the man's arm and supported him.

"Josh Hennessey." He allowed Alan to lead him through the windows. "One minute she said she was fine, the next her eyes rolled up and-wham!" He slumped onto a wooden bench and buried his face in his hands. "I wish to hell she wouldn't keep pretending she's okay when she's not. She was the same when Russell was murdered. Kept saying, I'm fine, and then ended up in hospital."

"You've known her a long time?"

He nodded. "Twelve years. As long as I've known Meg. I'm Meg Harris's partner," he explained. "We run a recruitment consultancy." He bunched his fists angrily. "Or we did until she buggered off and left me high and dry with a bank manager baying for blood and work in progress with people I've never even heard of."

Alan could feel the stress flowing off him in waves of anger and nerves. "I see."

"Do you? I sure as hell don't. Presumably you know Meg's hijacked Jinx's fiance? I mean-have you any idea what that's doing to Meg's parents? First they get a phone call out of the blue to say Leo's jilted Jinx for her, then the next thing they hear is that Jinx has killed herself. Jesus! And on top of all that, I'm left in the bloody lurch, trying to run an office on my own while Meg's farting about in France with a prize bastard." His voice broke. "I don't know what the hell's going on." He rubbed his eyes. "I'm so fucking tired."

Alan watched him sympathetically for a moment or two. "If it makes you feel any better, I think you're worrying unnecessarily on Jinx's account. All things considered, she's doing well."

"Simon warned me she looked ill, but I wasn't expecting this." He jerked his head towards her room. "She's much worse than I thought she was going to be."

"She probably isn't, you know. Look, she took a heck of a crack on the head and she's forgotten a couple of weeks out of her life, but that's all. She's a tough lady. Give her another week or two and she'll be good as new. It's only a matter of time."

Josh stared at his hands. "You've probably never seen her with hair. She's a bit of a stunner. Very Italian-looking." He touched a hand to his shoulder. "Thick, black hair to here, and dark eyes. I've always thought it's crazy her being on the business end of the camera when she should have been in the frame." He fell silent.

"You sound fond of her."

"I am, but my timing's lousy. When I was free, she was married. When she was free, I was married." He looked away towards the trees bordering the lawn. "Then I got divorced and Leo muscled in on the act. Do you reckon she still loves him?"

"She says she doesn't."

Josh twisted his head to examine the older man's face. "Do you believe her?"

"I do, yes."

"Why?"

Alan shrugged. "She isn't angry enough with Meg." But you certainly are, he was thinking.

THE VICARAGE, LITTLETON MARY-4:00 P.M.

Charles Harris laid down his pen and folded his hands across the sermon he was writing. "This has to stop, Caroline. You're working yourself into hysterics over nothing. Meg will phone when she's ready. And let's face it," he added rather dryly, " 'when Meg is ready' are the operative words. Judging by the frequency of her calls and visits in the past, you and I could go to hell and back without her even being aware of it. She's always been far more interested in whichever man she has in tow than she's ever been in us."

Caroline looked at him with dislike. "That's what you hate, isn't it? The men."

"Don't be absurd," he snapped. There were times when he had to restrain himself from hitting her. "Must we go through this again?" he said, picking up his pen and returning to his sermon. "I do have work to do." He made a note in the margin.

"It shocked you to hear about her and Russell, didn't it?" she said spitefully.

"Yes, it did."

"Your little Meggy in the arms of a man old enough to be her father. She loved him, you know."

He kept his eyes on the page but found he couldn't write anything because his hand was shaking.

"Does it offend you to think of your daughter enjoying sex with old men when she can't even bear to be in the same house with you?"

"No," he said quietly, "what offends me is her shabbiness towards her best friend. Between us, you and I created a monster, Caroline."