Playing With Fire

Chapter 8

DC Winsome Jackman hated Yorkshire winters. She didn’t think much of the summers, either, but she really hated the winters. As she got out of her nice warm car in front of Patrick Aspern’s house on Sunday morning, she felt a pang of longing for home, the way she often did when the cold and damp got to her even through her thick sweater and lined raincoat. She remembered the humid heat back home, way up in Jamaica’s Cockpit Country, the lush green foliage, the insects chirping, the bright flame trees, banana leaves click-clacking overhead in the gentle breeze from the ocean, remembered how she used to walk up the steep hill home from the one-room schoolhouse in her neat uniform, laughing and joking with her friends. She missed her mother and father so much she ached for them sometimes. And her friends. Where were they all now? What were they doing?

Then she remembered the shanties, the crippling poverty and hopelessness, the way so many men treated their women as mere possessions, chattels of no real value. Winsome knew she had been lucky to get out. Her father was a police corporal at the Spring Mount station, and her mother worked at the banana-chip factory in Maroon Town, sitting out back in the shade with the other women, gossiping and slicing bananas all day. Winsome had worked for two summers at the Holiday Inn just outside Montego Bay, and she had often talked to the tourists there. Their stories of their homelands, of America, Canada and England, had excited her imagination and sharpened her will. She had envied them the money that allowed them to have luxurious holidays in the sun, and the opportunities they must have at home. These countries, she had thought, must indeed be lands of plenty.

And it wasn’t only the white folk. There were handsome black men from New York, London and Toronto, with thick gold chains hanging around their wrists and necks, their wives all dressed up in the latest fashions. What a world theirs was, with all the movies, fashions, cars and jewelry they wanted. Of course, the reality fell a long way short of her imagination, but on the whole she was happy in England; she thought she had made the right move. Apart from the winters.

She sensed, rather than saw, a number of curtains twitch as she walked up the path to ring Aspern’s doorbell. A six-footone black woman ringing your doorbell was probably a rare event in this neighborhood, she thought. Anyway, winter or not, it was nice to get away from the computer for a while, and out of the office. And she was on overtime.

A man answered her ring, and she was immediately put off by the arrogant expression on his face. She had seen looks like that before. Other than that, she thought he was probably handsome in a middle-aged English sort of way. Soft strands of sandy hair combed back, unusually good white teeth, a slim, athletic figure, loose-fitting, expensive casual clothes. But the expression ruined everything.

He arched his eyebrows. “Can I help you?” he asked, looking her up and down, the condescension dripping like treacle from his tongue. “I’m afraid there’s no surgery on Sundays.”

“That’s all right, Dr. Aspern,” Winsome said, producing her warrant card. “I’m fit as a fiddle, thank you very much. And I probably couldn’t afford you, anyway.”

He looked surprised by her accent, no doubt expecting some sort of incomprehensible patois. The Jamaican lilt was still there, of course, but more as an undertone. Winsome had been in Yorkshire for seven years, though she had only been in Eastvale for two since her transfer from Bradford, and she had unconsciously picked up much of the local idiom and accent.

Aspern examined her warrant card and handed it back to her. “So first they sent the organ-grinder, and now they send the monkey.”

“Excuse me, sir?”

“Never mind,” said Aspern. “Just a figure of speech. You’d better come in.”

Winsome got the impression that Aspern scanned the street for spies before he shut the door behind them. Was he worried what the neighbors might think? That he was having an affair with a young black woman? Drugs, more likely, Winsome guessed. He was concerned that they would think he was supplying her with drugs.

He showed her into a sitting room with cream wallpaper, a large blazing fireplace and a couple of nice landscape paintings on the wall. A recent medical journal lay open on the glass-topped coffee table beside a half-empty cup of milky tea.

“What is it this time?” he asked.

Winsome sat in one of the armchairs without being asked and crossed her long legs. Aspern perched on the sofa and finished off the tea.

“Where were you last night, sir?” Winsome asked.

“What?” Aspern’s superior expression was replaced by one of puzzlement and anger.

“I think you heard me.”

“Let’s say I just didn’t believe what I’m hearing.”

“Okay,” said Winsome, “I’ll repeat the question. Where were you last night?”

“Has he put you up to this?”

“Who?”

“You know damn well who I’m talking about. Banks. Your boss.”

“DCI Banks issues the actions, sir, and I just carry them out. I’m merely a humble DC. I’m not privy to his inner thoughts. As you so accurately put it yourself, the monkey, not the organ-grinder.” She smiled. “But I do need to know where you were last night.”

“Here, of course,” Aspern answered after a short pause. “Where the hell else do you think I’d be, with my daughter so recently deceased? Out for a night on the town?”

“I understand she was your stepdaughter?” Winsome said.

“I always thought of her as my own.”

“I’m sure you did. No blood relation, though. Probably a good thing.”

Aspern’s face darkened. “Now, look here, if Banks has been putting ideas in your head…”

“Sir?”

Aspern took a few calming breaths. “Right,” he said. “I see. I understand what you’re up to. Well, it won’t work. Last night Fran and I both stayed in and watched television, hoping for something to take our minds off what’s happened.”

“Did you succeed?”

“What do you think?”

“What did you watch?”

“A film on Channel Four. I’m sorry, but I can’t remember the title. I wasn’t really paying attention. It was set in Croatia, if that helps.”

“Is your wife here at the moment?”

“She’s resting. As you can imagine, this has been very hard on her. Anyway, she’d only corroborate my statement.”

“I’m sure she would,” said Winsome. “We’ll let her rest for now.”

“Very good of you, I’m sure.”

“But you must admit it’s not a very strong alibi, is it? It’s been my experience that wives will often stand by their husbands, no matter what horrors or atrocities they might be guilty of.”

“Well, I’m not guilty of anything,” said Aspern, getting to his feet. “So if that’s all, I’ll bid you good-bye. I don’t have to sit around and listen to your filthy insinuations.”

Winsome held her ground. “What insinuations would those be, sir?”

“You know what I’m talking about. Banks obviously briefed you on his groundless suspicions, and you’re here to do his dirty work for him. It won’t wash. I’ll be complaining to my MP about the both of you.”

“That’s your prerogative,” said Winsome. “But you have to understand that our job can be difficult at times, insensitive, even. I really am sorry for your loss, Dr. Aspern, but I still have questions to ask.”

“Look, I’ve told you what I was doing. What more do you want?”

“What clothes were you wearing?”

“Come again?”

“You seem a bit hard of hearing this morning, sir. I asked what clothes you were wearing last night.”

“I don’t see how that’s relevant to anything.”

“If you’d just tell me. Or, better still, fetch them for me.”

Aspern narrowed his eyes, then stomped out of the room. A few moments later he returned and flung a dark-blue cotton shirt and a pair of black casual trousers over the arm of the chair beside her. “Unless you want my underwear, too?” he said.

“That won’t be necessary,” said Winsome. She knew it was a farce, that he could have given her any old clothes and said he’d worn them last night, or that he could have washed and dried them in the meantime, but that wasn’t the point of the exercise. The point was to shake him up, and in that she thought she was succeeding remarkably well. “What about your jacket and overcoat?” she asked.

“What jacket and overcoat? I told you we stopped at home last night. Why would I need a jacket and overcoat?”

“Of course, sir. My mistake.” Winsome stood. “Mind if I take these?”

“Take them where? What for?”

“For forensic testing.”

“And what do you hope to find?”

“I don’t hope to find anything, sir. It’ll just help us eliminate you from our inquiries.”

“I love the language you people use. ‘Eliminate you from our inquiries.’ Talk about bureaucratese.”

“That’s a very good word for it, sir. Sometimes it does sound a bit overly formal, doesn’t it? Anyway, if you could lay your hands on some sort of a bag… Plastic would be best. Bin liner, or something like that.”

Aspern went into the kitchen and found her a white plastic kitchen bag.

“Thanks. That’ll do just fine,” Winsome said.

“Eliminate me from what inquiries?” Aspern asked.

“What do you mean, sir?”

Aspern sighed. “You said earlier that this would help eliminate me from your inquiries. I’m asking exactly what inquiries you’re talking about.”

“I’m surprised you haven’t heard,” she said. “It’s been all over the news. There was another fire last night, remarkably similar to the one in which your stepdaughter died, and not too far away.”

“And I’m a suspect?”

“I didn’t say that, sir, but we’d look pretty unprofessional if we didn’t cover every possibility, wouldn’t we?”

“I don’t care what you’d look like; this is discrimination, pure and simple.”

“Against what group? Doctors, for a change?”

“Now, look here, you fucking-”

Winsome raised a finger to her lips. “Don’t say it, Doc,” she said. “You know it’ll only get you into trouble in these politically correct times.”

Aspern ran his hand over his hair and regained his composure, and his arrogant air. “Right,” he said, nodding. “Right. Of course. I apologize.” He spread his hands. “Take whatever you like.”

“That’s all right, sir,” she said, lifting the bag of clothes. “This is all I need. I’ll be on my way now.”

“I’m sorry you’ve had such a wasted journey. It’s a long way to come for so little.”

“Oh, I wouldn’t call it wasted,” said Winsome. “Not at all.”

She felt absurdly pleased with herself as she walked down the path to her car. Curtains twitched again and Winsome smiled to herself as she hefted the bag onto the seat beside her and drove off.

Annie tracked down the ex-Mrs. Gardiner easily enough – she was now Mrs. Alice Mowbray, wife of Eric – and by mid-morning she was knocking on the door of their semi on Arboretum Crescent. The woman who answered the door looked about forty, and she had a hard-done-by air about her. The red cashmere jumper and black skirt she was wearing looked a bit Harvey Nicks, the gold necklace wasn’t cheap, either, and her blond hair definitely came from a bottle.

“Who is it, Alice?” a voice from inside the house called. “If it’s those bloody Jehovah’s Witnesses again, tell them to bugger off!”

Annie showed her warrant card and Alice stood back to let her in. “It’s the police,” she called out.

A man came out of the room on the left of the hall, a curious expression on his face. Annie put him at about the woman’s age, or maybe five years younger. It was hard to tell. He didn’t have a gray hair on his head and was, she supposed, handsome in a way, the sort of bloke who’s full of confidence and tries to pick up women in the better class of pub. Well, some women fall for the brash, sleazy charm, Annie realized.

“What do you want?” he asked. “If it’s about that speeding ticket, then-”

“It’s your wife I want to see, sir,” said Annie.

“I can’t imagine why,” said Alice, “but let’s talk in the conservatory. I know the weather’s not very good, but it’s a nice view, and we’ve got an electric heater.”

“That’ll be fine,” said Annie, aware of Eric Mowbray breathing down her neck as she followed Alice to the conservatory. Well, it wouldn’t do any harm to talk to him, too, she thought. He looked the type who would get nervous easily and blab, if there was anything to blab.

They settled in the conservatory, which was warm enough and did indeed have a magnificent view looking west into Swainsdale, the distant hills shrouded in light mist. Alice Mowbray sat down on a wicker chair and tugged her skirt over her plump knees. The skirt was at least two inches too short for someone with her thighs, Annie thought, and in conjunction with the peroxide-blond hair it gave her a definite look of mutton dressed as lamb. Her husband, black hair slicked back with a little gel, jeans too tight over the slight paunch he was already beginning to show, looked as if he didn’t mind. Unbidden, an image of the two of them disco-dancing under a whirling glittering globe, Eric waving his hands in the air and doing his best John Travolta imitation, came into her mind, and she had to hold back the laughter.

“What is it, then?” Alice Mowbray asked.

“I’m afraid I’ve got some rather bad news for you,” she said.

Alice put her hand to her necklace. “Oh?”

“It’s about your ex-husband. I don’t know if you’ve seen or heard any news this morning…?”

“Only the Sunday papers,” Alice said.

Annie knew the Jennings Field blaze had been too late to make the national Sunday papers. “Well, I’m afraid there’s been a fire at the caravan where your ex-husband was living.”

“Oh, no,” said Alice. “Is Roland hurt?”

“There was one person in the caravan at the time. As yet, we can’t be certain if he was Mr. Gardiner, but I’m afraid that person is dead, whoever he is.”

“I don’t believe it. Not Roland.”

“I’m sorry, Mrs. Mowbray, but it’s true. If it is him. Are you all right?”

Alice had turned pale, but she nodded. “Yes, I’ll be fine.” She looked at her husband. “Darling, can you fetch me a glass of water, please?”

Eric didn’t look too happy at being asked to fetch and carry in front of another woman, but there wasn’t much he could do about it without looking a complete arsehole, except his wife’s bidding.

“I’m sorry to spring such a shock on you like this,” Annie said, “but there are some questions I need to ask.”

“Of course. I understand. We’ve been apart for over two years now, but it’s not as if I don’t… well, still have some feelings for Roland. Was he… you know…?”

Annie knew all about divorced men’s feelings for their exwives at first hand, through Banks, and they could be complicated. She felt lucky that Phil had never been married. “I’m afraid the body was badly burned,” she said, “but if it’s any consolation we think he was unconscious before the fire started.”

Alice frowned. “Unconscious? But how…?”

“Sleeping pills, perhaps. But we don’t know anything for certain yet. That’s why I need to talk to you.”

Eric came back with a glass of water and a pill and handed them to Alice. “What’s this?” she asked, looking at the pill.

“Your Valium,” he said. “I just thought you might need it.”

Alice set the pill aside. “I’m fine,” she said, and sipped some water.

“He was a useless pillock,” Eric said.

“Pardon?” Annie said.

“Her ex. Roly-poly. He was a prize pillock.”

“Eric, don’t be so disrespectful.”

“Well, he was. I’m only telling the truth, Allie, and you know it. Why else are you here with me while he was off living in a poky caravan in a godforsaken field somewhere? He was a loser.”

“Mr. Mowbray,” Annie said, “I don’t think you’ve quite grasped the situation here. A man, possibly Roland Gardiner, is dead.”

“I heard you the first time round, love. And I say it doesn’t make a scrap of difference. He was a useless pillock while he was alive, and he’s a useless pillock dead.”

Annie sighed and turned back to Alice, who was glaring at her husband. “I don’t know what’s wrong with him,” she said. “He’s not usually rude like this.”

“Never mind,” said Annie, giving Eric Mowbray a dirty look. “Maybe he’s just trying to hide his grief.” Or something else, she thought. She turned back to Alice. “One problem we do have is with identification. Dental records are often useful in such cases. Could you tell me who your family dentist is? Doctor, too.”

“I don’t know if Roland ever went after he left,” said Alice, “but we went to Grunwell’s, on Market Street. Our family doctor’s Dr. Robertson, at the clinic on the Leaside Estate.”

Annie knew the place.

“We don’t know much about your ex-husband,” Annie went on. “Is there anything you can tell us that might be of any use?”

“He was just ordinary, really,” said Alice.

“You can say that again,” said Eric Mowbray.

“Shut up, Eric,” said Alice.

Annie was fast starting to think that Eric Mowbray had outstayed any usefulness she might have erroneously attributed to him in the first place. “Mr. Mowbray,” she said, “perhaps you could leave us for a while? I have some questions to ask your wife.”

Mowbray got up. “Fine with me. I’ve got work to do, anyway.”

After he’d left the conservatory, the two women let the silence stretch a few moments, then Alice said, “He’s a good sort, really, Eric. Just got a bit of a sore spot where Roland’s concerned.”

“Oh? Why’s that?”

“Because he’s my ex. Eric’s the jealous type.”

“I see,” said Annie. “Does he have any reason to be?”

“Not of Roland.”

“What does Mr. Mowbray do for a living?”

“He’s in computers. He makes very good money. Look at this conservatory. It certainly wasn’t here when me and Roland were together. Nor the Volvo. And we’re having our holidays in Florida in February. We’re going to Disney World.”

“Very nice. Do you own any other vehicles?”

“Eric used to have a Citroën, but he sold it.”

“No Jeep or Range Rover?”

“No. Why?”

“Was Roland a successful businessman?”

“I often thought he was in the wrong business,” Alice said. “He just wasn’t that much of a salesman. Didn’t have the oomph. Didn’t have an ounce of ambition in his entire being. No get-up-and-go at all. Sometimes I thought he’d have been far better off as a schoolteacher, maybe. And happier. Still, he wouldn’t have earned much money at that, either, would he?”

Money seemed to figure large in Alice Mowbray’s view of the universe, Annie gathered, and perhaps in her second husband’s, too. Jack Mellor had already hinted as much the previous night. “Did he not try to get another job?” she asked.

“It would have been a bit difficult for him, wouldn’t it?”

“Why? Lots of people get made redundant and find new jobs.”

“Redundant? That’s a good one. Where on earth did you get that idea?”

“Your husband didn’t lose his job?”

“Oh, Roland lost his job, all right, but it wasn’t through redundancy. No. He was fired. You could have knocked me over with a feather. I never thought he had it in him.”

“Had what in him?”

“He’d been on the fiddle, hadn’t he?”

“Had he?”

“Yes. Something to do with forging orders and cooking the books. Stealing from the company. I must say he didn’t have a lot to show for it, but that’s typical Roland, that is. Small-time, even as a crook. No ambition.”

“Can you tell me the name of the company he worked for?”

Alice told her. Annie wrote it down.

“Did Roland have any enemies?”

“Enemies? Roland? He was too much of a mouse to make enemies. Never offended a soul. He’d never stand in anyone’s way enough to make an enemy. No, Roland was likable enough, I’ll give him that. He had a natural charm. People liked him. Perhaps because he was so passive, so easygoing. He’d do anything for anyone.”

“This forgery business, did he have a partner?”

“Did it all by himself. As I said, you could have knocked me over with a feather.”

“How long were you married?”

“Ten years.”

“Quite late in life, then?”

Alice narrowed her eyes. “For Roland, yes. He was thirty-two when we married.”

Annie didn’t dare ask Alice how old she was. “Had he been married before?”

“Neither of us had. I must admit, he turned my head. He could be a real charmer, could Roland. Until you got to know him, of course, then you saw how empty it all was.”

“Was the divorce amicable?”

“As amicable as these things go. He didn’t have anything I wanted, despite his little business on the side, and he seemed quite willing to let me keep the house.”

“You didn’t want the caravan?”

“The caravan? I hated the bloody thing! That was typical Roland, though. Soon as we did have a bit of extra cash, off he goes and buys a bloody caravan. That was his idea of a good time: two weeks in a caravan at Primrose Valley or Flamborough Head. I ask you.”

“So there was no unsettled business between you?”

“I got on with my life, and he got on with his.”

“Mr. Mowbray, your present husband, when did he come on the scene?”

“What do you mean?”

“Did you meet him before or after you split up with Roland?”

Alice paused a few moments before answering. “Before,” she said. “But things were already over for Roland and me.”

Annie supposed that Alice needed someone to go off with, an excuse to end her marriage, and somewhere to go. Many people did. They didn’t want to stay in a relationship, but they didn’t want to go it alone, either.

“What did you do last night?”

If Alice found the question offensive, she didn’t let on. “We were out to dinner at a friend’s house.”

“Can you give me the address? Just routine, for the paperwork.”

Alice gave it to her.

“Do you think Roland might have committed suicide?”

“I don’t think he had the guts. It might have been something he’d think of, but when it came to it, he’d bottle out. And certainly not in a fire. He wasn’t exactly the most physically brave man I’ve ever met. He used to make enough fuss about going to the dentist’s, for crying out loud.”

“Can you give me a list of his friends?”

“Friends? Roland? There was no one close. I can probably come up with a few names of people who knew him, mostly from work, but I don’t think they’ll be able to tell you any more than I can.”

“Was he secretive, then?”

“I suppose so. Just quiet, though, mostly. I don’t think he really had much to talk about.”

“Do you happen to have a photograph of him? As recent as possible?”

“I might have one or two,” Alice said. “Would you excuse me for a moment?”

Annie heard her go upstairs. She also heard her husband question her as she went. Annie sat and admired the view as two sparrows fluttered in the birdbath out in the garden. She thought she could see a hawk circling over distant Tetchley Fell. A couple of minutes later, Alice came back with a handful of photographs.

“These were taken at the last office Christmas party we went to,” she said. “Three years ago.”

Annie flipped through them and picked one of the few that was actually in focus: Gardiner sitting at a table, a little flushed from the wine, raising his glass to the photographer and smiling. It was good enough for identification purposes.

“Has anyone been around asking for him since he left?” she asked.

“No. But there was a phone call.”

Annie’s ears pricked up. “When?”

“In July, I think.”

“Did the caller identify himself?”

“No. That was the funny thing. When I told him Roland no longer lived here, he just asked me if I knew where he did live.”

“What did you say?”

“I told him. I mean, I knew where Roland was. I had to, with the divorce, the solicitors and everything.”

“Did he ever call back?”

“No. That was all.”

Interesting, Annie thought. July. Around the time Roland Gardiner started being a bit more optimistic, according to Jack Mellor, and the same time Thomas McMahon got a spring in his step. What happened last summer? Annie wondered. She asked Mrs. Mowbray a few more questions about Roland’s past: where he went to school, where his parents lived, and so on; then she left. She didn’t see Eric Mowbray on her way out, and she couldn’t say it bothered her.

“One of the main problems an art forger faces,” Phil Keane explained to Banks and Annie that Sunday lunchtime at the Queen’s Arms, “is getting hold of the right period paper or canvas.”

Banks looked at him as he talked. So this was the mysterious man Annie was now seeing? She had referred to Phil merely as a friend, but Banks sensed a bit more chemistry than Platonic friendship between them. Not that they were fawning over each other, playing kissy-face or holding hands, but there was just something in the air – pheromones, most likely, and something in the way she listened as he spoke. Not so much hanging on his every word, but respectful, involved.

Banks had noticed that one or two of the women in the place had cast appraising glances when Phil walked in ten minutes late and insisted on going to the bar to buy a round of drinks. He was handsome, Banks thought, but not outrageously so, well dressed but not showy, and he talked with the easy charm and knowledge of a habitual lecturer. He did, in fact, give occasional lectures, Annie said, so it was hardly surprising that he seemed so confident, even a bit pedantic, in his delivery. What was there not to like about this man? Banks wondered. This man who was probably shagging Annie. Let it go, Banks told himself; they’d moved on ages ago, hadn’t they? And he had Michelle.

The trouble was that Michelle was far away right now, and here was Banks sitting in the Queen’s Arms with Annie and her new fancy man, desperately looking for things to dislike. In his experience, anything or anyone who seemed too good to be true was too good to be true. Well, the man was too old for her, for a start, but then so had he been too old for her, and Phil Keane was a few years younger than he.

“Anyway,” Phil went on, “not everyone can do a John Myatt and forge modern masters with emulsion paint on any old scrap of paper he finds lying around, so the typical forger tends to be careful, especially in these days of scientific testing. He has to make sure his materials, and not just his techniques, pass all the requisite requirements. Not always an easy task.”

“You were saying about the paper…?”

“Was I? Oh, yes.” Phil scratched the crease between the side of his nose and his cheek. It was a gesture Banks immediately disliked. It said, Until I was so rudely interrupted. The pontificator’s irritation at being interrupted in his digressions. He was damned glad he’d found something to dislike about the man at last, even though it wasn’t much.

“Well, until the end of the eighteenth century, all paper was made by hand, usually from rags, and after that it was slowly replaced by machine-made paper, some of it made from wood pulp.”

“What’s the difference?” Banks asked.

“Wood pulp makes far inferior paper,” Phil replied. “It’s weaker and discolors more easily.” He leaned forward and tapped the table. “But the point I’m trying to make is that if you want to forge an artist’s work, you’d damn well better make sure you use the same materials he did.”

Banks took a sip of his Theakston’s bitter. Phil was working on a half of XP, slowly, and Annie stuck with fruit juice. “Makes sense,” Banks said. “Go on. Where do you find that sort of thing?”

“Exactly the problem. There are several places he might look for the paper,” Phil went on, “and one of the best sources is an antiquarian book and print dealer. Not everything they sell is expensive, but a lot of it is old. The endpapers of old books are especially useful, for example, and books usually have a publication date to guide you as to the age of the paper you’re using.”

“What about prints?” Banks asked. “I mean, wouldn’t some old drawings be dated, too?”

“Yes, but that’s not always reliable. They could easily be copies of etchings, made posthumously, in another country, even, and until you’ve developed a very good nose for the genuine article, you wouldn’t want to slip up by believing what you read on an old print.”

“What about canvas?” Banks asked. “Aren’t most paintings done on canvas?”

Here Phil allowed himself a slight smile, which Banks pounced on as not being entirely devoid of condescension. He was starting to like the man less and less moment by moment, and he was enjoying the feeling very much.

“Quite a lot are,” said Phil, “but the same applies as to paper, except you don’t find canvas in books. You try to seek out old worthless canvases. Quite often what you find determines which artist you forge.”

“I see,” said Banks. “And you think Thomas McMahon was a forger?”

Phil glanced at Annie, a concerned expression flitting across his face.

“Phil only said that could be one possible explanation of McMahon’s odd purchases from Whitaker’s,” Annie said.

“Yes,” Phil added. “I’m not making any accusations or anything. I didn’t even know the man.”

“Wouldn’t matter if you did make accusations,” said Banks. “McMahon’s dead. He can’t sue you.”

“Even so…”

“The problem is,” Banks went on, “does any of this have anything to do with his murder, and if so, how? Shall we order lunch?”

Phil looked around. “Look, I know a cozy little place out Richmond way that serves the most tender roast lamb you’ve ever tasted in your life.” He looked at Annie. “And I hear they do a delicious vegetable curry, too. What say we head out there?”

Mark awoke the next day still very much alive, and he realized that he probably had the fleece-lined overcoat to thank for that. Even in his favorite leather jacket, he would have been too cold in the barn. He didn’t know what time it was because he didn’t have a watch, but it was daylight, and a hell of a lot warmer than it had been during the night.

He had slept surprisingly well, he thought, but exhaustion will do that for you. He must have run and walked well into the night. And it was the first real sleep he’d had since the fire. Rubbing his bleary eyes, he cast a look around at his surroundings, a half-demolished barn littered with rubble and sheep droppings. It stank of piss, too. Time to move on. He wished he could have a hot cup of tea and something to eat, some bacon and eggs, perhaps. He wouldn’t get far on the ten quid in his pocket and a bit of loose change, but at least he could buy himself a couple of small meals. It would be nice to find a proper toilet, too, somewhere he could wash his hands and face. If only he could find a café. Hardly likely in the sort of classy villages you got around this part of the world. No greasy spoons or lorry drivers’ cafés.

It was nearly one o’clock, he saw by the church clock in the first village he came to. Christ, he hadn’t realized he’d slept in that long. You could hardly call the place picturesque. This was one the tourists would drive straight through without even slowing down. There was one Tarmac main street of squat red brick houses with the red pantile roofs so common in East Yorkshire, a post office, general store and newsagent’s.

The village was dead quiet, apart from some faint pop music coming from the shabby-looking local pub, the Farmer’s Inn. There was a blackboard outside advertising bar food, and Mark noticed that he could get a ham-and-cheese sandwich for £2.99, or a roast beef lunch with Yorkshire pudding, vegetables and roast potatoes for £5.99. What should he do? Go carefully and save enough for another sandwich later, or blow nearly everything on a hearty lunch? Finally, he decided on the latter course, mostly because he was starving. He hadn’t eaten since they kicked him out of jail.

Cautiously, he walked inside. It wasn’t one of those places where all conversation stops and everyone looks at you when you walk in, as in that werewolf film he’d seen on the telly in the squat, but he still felt exposed in his ill-fitting clothes, no doubt with a twig or two stuck on the hem of his overcoat and a smear of sheep shit on his jeans. He just hoped he didn’t smell too bad.

The pub was exactly the slightly down-at-heels local you’d expect in such a village, which was probably why the food was so cheap. It smelled of last night’s beer and cigarette smoke and was mostly full of hard-looking unemployed farmhands, who wouldn’t be squeamish about a bit of sheep shit here and there. The landlord was a surly bugger, but he copied down Mark’s order and gave him a number, only turning his nose up when Mark ordered a small lemonade to drink. He didn’t want to waste his money on beer. With the change in his pocket, he now had a little over four pounds left, and that might buy him a roll and a cup of tea for dinner, if he could find anywhere serving such fare. He’d worry about tomorrow when it came.

He realized he’d have to do something about the money situation soon, and it might mean a bit of burglary. He didn’t like it, but he’d done it before, and he’d do it again if he had to. It was the one thing Crazy Nick had taught him, when he had forced Mark to come out on jobs with him. There was hardly a house he couldn’t get into. Mark would never beg, but he would thieve if necessary. At least thieving took guts, and you didn’t look like you’d just given up and sat down with your hand sticking out permanently.

Mark had one cigarette left, he realized, courtesy of the copper who had given him the clothes. He decided to smoke it after his lunch. He sat in a deserted corner by the window and looked out through the greasy glass on the empty high street. People would be eating their roasts behind their dusty net curtains, perhaps watching football or racing, as Crazy Nick did when he came back from the pub. If his team lost he used to smack Mark around. Mark’s mother, too, sometimes, though she was a tough old bird, and you could tell Crazy Nick had to be really pissed to have a go at her. As often as not, he came out the worse for wear.

The telly was on behind the bar in the pub, sound off, and Mark was just in time to catch the local news. A tart with a microphone was standing by a burned-out caravan dripping with water the fire hoses had sprayed on it. Was that what he had seen last night, when he was running from Lenny’s place? Then the screen displayed a still photograph of a man Mark had never seen before. The tart talked on for a while as the cameras lovingly panned over the scene of desolation, then the film cut to footage of the two boats. Mark felt his breath catch in his throat as he looked on his former home again, now in daylight, with men in protective clothing going over the scene.

There was another reporter by the canal side, a man, this time. His name was captioned at the bottom of the screen, but it was too small for Mark to read. He was wearing a heavy overcoat and a scarf wrapped around his neck. He talked and gestured as the others, police officers, Mark supposed, went about their work.

Next came an old picture of Tom in the next boat, the man they said was an artist. He was barely recognizable from the photograph, but it was definitely Tom.

And then came the picture that grabbed ahold of Mark’s heart and squeezed. He’d never seen it before, but it was Tina, maybe taken two or three years ago, before they met. Her blond hair was long, over her shoulders, and it seemed to glow with health. She was smiling at the camera, but Mark could tell it was a bit forced. If you didn’t know her well, though, didn’t know that telltale clenching of the jaw and shadows behind her eyes, then you’d never know. Time hung suspended. He almost felt as if she could see him, was looking right at him, and he wanted to call out to her, tell her he was sorry he had failed her, sorry he hadn’t been there for her.

When the picture vanished as quickly as it had appeared, and the program cut back to the reporter by the canal, Mark stood up so quickly he knocked his drink over and ran out into the street.

Banks bowed out of the excursion to the pub out Richmond way, allowing Annie to go with Phil, which was probably what she wanted anyway, ate a hurried roast pork lunch at the Queen’s Arms alone and returned to the station. Because it was a Sunday, things were slow, especially as far as forensics went, but a major investigation was under way, and Banks’s Major Crimes core team was hard at work.

At this point, while each fire was being investigated separately for cause and motive, every possible effort was being made to find the link between them that everyone suspected was there. When Banks dropped by the incident room, Winsome was back entering the green sheets into the HOLMES computer system; DC Gavin Rickerd was making sure everything was in its place, neatly logged and filed; DC Kevin Templeton was chewing the end of a pencil as he tried to gather information on any similar fires; and DS Hatchley was pondering over the bits and pieces he had dug up on Mark David Siddons. The phones rang from time to time, computer keyboards clacked and fax machines hummed. Everything was ticking over nicely, but just ticking over. Of course, everyone was on overtime except Banks. A DCI didn’t get paid overtime.

Banks hadn’t been back in his own office more than a couple of minutes when Stefan Nowak tapped at the door. “A moment?”

Banks looked up. “Good news, I hope?”

“I don’t know,” said Stefan, standing at the open door. “But there’s something you might like to see, if you’ve got a minute or two to spare.”

Curious, Banks followed Stefan down the corridor into the “new” part of the building, which they called the annex. It was just as old, in fact, but it used to be a hotel before Eastvale expanded from divisional HQ into Western Area Headquarters and knocked through the walls. Now it housed fingerprints, photography, scenes-of-crime and computers, among other departments.

Stefan stopped at a lab bench. “I thought you might be interested in this,” he said, pointing to a blackened cube about the size of a computer monitor. “We retrieved it from the caravan. Looks as if it was hidden in one of the cupboards.”

“What is it?” Banks asked.

“Well, it looks to me like a fire-resistant safe,” said Stefan.

“A fire-resistant safe? What on earth is a bloke living on his wits in a dilapidated caravan doing with a fire-resistant safe?”

“You tell me,” said Stefan. “I only found it and identified it.”

“Can you open it?”

“It might take a bit of brute force.”

“Any reason to treat it gently?”

“No. We’ve already checked for prints. Nothing.”

“So let’s do it.”

Stefan had already got his hands on a small crowbar – from the police garage, he told Banks – and he proceeded to wedge it in the lock area and exert pressure. Nothing happened. He looked up at Banks. “Any safecrackers down in the cells?”

“I wish,” said Banks. “Keep at it. Fire-resistant or not, the fire must have weakened the lock a bit, at least.”

Stefan kept at it. Still nothing happened. “I think we might have to dynamite it,” he said.

Banks laughed. “Let me have a go.”

Stefan handed him the crowbar and Banks shifted it to the side opposite the lock, where the deep-seated hinges were. It was hard to see exactly what he was doing because of the fire damage, but he thought he had succeeded in inserting the sharp flat end of the crowbar between the body of the safe and the hinged door. Gently at first, he worked the crowbar up and down and managed to get it in another few millimeters. Finally, the first hinge cracked and it was only a matter of time before he broke the second one, too.

“Fireproof, but not Banks-proof,” he said, pulling open the door. He reached into the dark interior. “Looks like something’s there.”

“What is it?” Stefan asked.

Banks pulled out the safe’s contents, wrapped in black plastic bin liner, and placed them on the lab bench. Both men looked down in astonishment. On the table in front of them lay some rolled-up tubes of paper and three bundles of twenty-pound notes, fastened with rubber bands, probably five hundred quid or more in each of them. Banks unfolded the tubes and saw a number of sketches of a castle, and a finished watercolor painting, about eleven by sixteen, of a view along a valley from the castle terrace.

“That’s Hornby Castle,” said Stefan.

“How do you know?”

He glanced sideways at Banks. “I’ve been there. I do a lot of walking. It’s near Kirkby Lonsdale. And this” – he pointed to the watercolor – “is the view from the castle. That’s Ingleborough, one of the Three Peaks. I’ve walked them.”

The Three Peaks walk was a popular one, but it had always seemed just that little bit too eccentric for Banks. Not to mention exhausting. You had to walk more than twenty miles in twelve hours, climbing three bloody great hills – Pen-y-Ghent, Whernside and Ingleborough – as often as not in the pouring rain.

Banks looked at the sketches and the watercolor again. They looked old. There was no signature, but it was obvious enough, even to Banks’s untrained eye, that he was looking at the work of J.M.W. Turner, or a close facsimile.

“Bloody hell,” he said, “I’d better ring Annie.”

“I don’t think your boss likes me very much,” Phil Keane said to Annie that evening. They were at her place and were just finishing a light evening meal of pasta primavera, neither being terribly hungry after their big lunch.

Annie poured them each another glass of Sainsbury’s Montepulciano D’Abruzzo. “What makes you say that?” she asked.

“Oh, I don’t know. Just a feeling. Do you think he might be jealous?”

Annie felt herself blush. She hadn’t told Phil about her and Banks. “Why would he be?”

“Maybe he’s got designs on you himself?”

“Don’t be silly.” Annie drank some wine rather too quickly and it went down the wrong way. Along with her cold, that set her coughing. Phil brought her a glass of water and watched her concernedly as she took a few seconds to get it under control.

“Okay?” he said.

“Fine. Look, Alan and I, we… well…”

Phil looked at her, interested.

“Do I have to spell it out?”

“Of course not,” Phil said. “And I’m sorry for bringing it up. You could have told me sooner, though. It’s not as if I expected you to have lived the life of a nun, you know.”

“You didn’t?”

“Well, I certainly haven’t. The life of a monk, I mean.”

“You haven’t?”

“No.”

“Anyway, it was a while ago.”

“It just surprises me, that’s all.”

“Why?”

“I don’t know,” Phil said. “I suppose because he doesn’t seem your type.”

“What is my type?”

“I don’t know. He just… what’s he like?”

“What do you mean?”

“What did you like about him?”

“Alan? Well, he’s fun to be with. Most of the time, at any rate. He loves music, likes single malt whiskey, has tolerable taste in films, apart from an unfortunate fondness for action adventure stuff – you know, James Bond, Arnold Schwarzenegger and dreadful macho stuff like that. Which is odd because he’s not really a macho kind of bloke. I mean he’s sensitive, kind, compassionate, and he’s got a good sense of humor.”

“Did you live together?”

Annie laughed. “No. I stayed in my little hovel at the center of the Harkside labyrinth, as he used to put it, and he’s got a lovely little cottage near Gratly. He’s a bit of a loner, actually, so it suits him quite well.”

“What went wrong?”

“I don’t know. It just didn’t work out. Too much baggage. Alan’s recently divorced, and his family’s still on his mind a lot. It just didn’t work out. Oh, we work well together. That’s not a problem. Except…”

“What?”

“Well, you know. Sometimes you can’t help but be aware of your history. It can make things difficult. But it’s manageable. And he’s a good boss. Gives me a lot of freedom. Respects my opinions.”

“About those fires?”

“About anything.”

“And what are your opinions?”

“I don’t have any yet. Early days.”

“You’re not comfortable talking about your work with me, I can see. I’m sorry.”

Annie reached out and squeezed his arm. “Oh, it’s all right,” she said. “To tell the truth, I was just getting used to having no one to talk to outside the station. I do have to exercise some discretion, but it’s not as if I’ve signed the Official Secrets Act or anything. Anyway, as I said, I don’t have any theories yet. Not enough evidence. All we know is that they seem to be the work of an arsonist. Which is hardly a bloody secret.” She wasn’t going to tell Phil about the Turner and the money that Banks had phoned her about just yet, not until she had talked to Banks about possibly getting Phil involved as a consultant.

“Not even the tiniest suspicion?”

“I could hardly tell you if I suspected someone, could I?”

“Then you have signed the Official Secrets Act?”

Annie laughed and topped up her glass. She felt a little tipsy, but it had been a long weekend, and she was still fighting off the remnants of her cold. “It’s like doctors and patients,” she said.

“Until your suspect is arrested?”

“Ah, then the rules change, yes. Look, you haven’t told me how long you’re staying up north this time.”

“I don’t know,” said Phil. “It’s fairly quiet at the office, but something could come up and I might get called back.”

“A suspicious Sickert, perhaps? Or a dodgy Degas?”

Phil laughed. “Something like that. Look, do you fancy a weekend in New York?”

“New York!” Annie had never been to America. She and Phil had been to Paris in September, and she’d had a hard time getting him to let her pay her own way. She didn’t think she could afford New York, and she didn’t want him to pay.

“Yes. Next weekend. Business, mostly, I’m afraid. I’ve a few gallery owners and dealers to meet with. But we could take in a Broadway show, dinner later.”

“I’m not sure I’d be able to get away next weekend.”

“The case?”

“Yes. And there’s the money…”

“Oh, don’t worry about that. It’s a business trip. On the company.”

“Both of us?”

“Of course. You’d be my security adviser.”

Annie laughed and carried their empty dishes over to the kitchen sink. “It sounds wonderful, but…”

“Tell me you’ll at least think about it.”

“I’ll think about it.” Annie sensed Phil behind her before she felt his hands on her hips and his lips nuzzle the hollow between her neck and shoulder. She wriggled and he circled his arms around, holding her to him tightly enough so she could feel his erection pressing at the base of her spine. She couldn’t help but experience a moment of fear and panic as she felt his hardness against her. Images of the rape of three years ago flashed through her mind and set her nerves on edge. But she had learned to control the emotions and, if not to enjoy sex as fully as she might, at least not to run away from it.

“Leave those dishes for now,” Phil said, loosening his grip.

Annie turned to face him, surprised to feel the panic dissipating so quickly, the warmth spreading like wetness between her legs, her knees weak. It hadn’t been like this with Alan, she thought, then felt ashamed for making the comparison. Phil put his arms around her and she smiled up at him. “Okay,” she said. “Stay the night?”

“I don’t have my toothbrush.”

Annie laughed and buried her face in the soft cotton of his shirt. “Oh, I think I’ve got an unused one in the bathroom,” she said.

“In that case…” Phil said. He let his arms fall by his side, then Annie took him by the hand and led him toward the stairs.