“He was talking earlier,” Shirley said. “You must’ve scared him.”
“Are you going to tell us what’s going on?” Louisa said.
Now Lamb turned to her. “What’s your problem? You look like Santa shat on your sofa.”
“You let us think River was dead.”
“No, River let you think River was dead. I just didn’t spoil the joke.”
“So what’s he playing at? Whose body was it? And where?”
“Who am I, Google? I don’t know whose body it was, and what Cartwright’s playing at, my guess is Secret Agents. Why change the habit of a lifetime? As for where, it was out in the sticks, at his grandpa’s. Why do old people live in the country, do you think? Do they start in the city and just get lost?”
“So somebody’s dead, but not River?”
“How many more times?” Lamb rolled his eyes at Ho. “Women, eh?”
“Yeah, I know what you—”
“Shut up,” Louisa told him.
“So where’s River now?” asked Marcus.
“France.”
“Why?”
“That’s where the killer came from.”
“We have a killer now?”
“The body in the bathroom,” Lamb said. “I’m assuming he wasn’t a plumber.”
“And he came to kill River?”
“Let’s think that through carefully,” said Lamb. “Using our brain.”
Louisa said, “He means, whose house was it?”
“But River’s often at his grandad’s,” Marcus objected. “If I was gunna hit River, I might follow him and do it there. Out of the city, empty roads, easy getaway.”
“I’m sure we’ve all spent hours planning the best way of killing River,” Lamb said. “But our assassin came all the way from France, which sounds more like a job than a hobby. So let’s assume he was after Grandpa. Business before pleasure and all that.”
“So who killed the killer?”
“One Cartwright or other. Does it matter?” Lamb slumped heavily into the nearest chair, which was the absent River’s. “What we actually need to know is what the hell’s going on. And since young Cartwright’s not here to tell us, and old Cartwright’s lost the plot, we’re going to have to work it out ourselves.”
Louisa said, “Has he really lost it? The old man?”
“I’ve had more illuminating conversations with ducks,” Lamb assured her.
“River said he was worried about him.”
“Been confiding in you, has he, young Double-Oh Three-and-a-Half?”
“Well, he—”
“But not enough to pick up a phone and let you know he’s alive.” He shook his head sadly. “Kids today, eh? Who’d have ’em?”
Shirley said, “France is pretty big.”
“Excellent. We have a geographer. Any further insights?”
“All I meant was, River must have had more to go on than just that.”
“Yeah, well, you have a point, oddly enough. River found a train ticket in the dead man’s pocket. Plus a café receipt . . . Christ. An actual fucking clue. He must think he’s died and gone to heaven.” He looked at Louisa. “Not literally. Keep your hair on.”
“Where was the café?” she said.
“God knows. Well, him and River.” Lamb pushed his chair back, and with surprising dexterity swung first one then the other foot onto River’s desktop. Some unimportant, to Lamb, devastation ensued. “So. We have what I believe our American chums call a sit-u-a-tion. An assassin with a UK passport, but apparently based across the channel, arrives to take a pop at David Cartwright, but trips over his dick in the process. River’s gone haring off like the half-cocked idiot he is, taking the only clue with him, and the old bastard himself doesn’t know what time of day it is, let alone why anyone might want to punch his ticket. Leaving us here, now. Any bright ideas? Don’t be shy.”
“What do the Dogs say?” Marcus asked.
“The dogs say bow wow,” said Lamb. “Ask me a harder one.”
“You know what I meant.”
“They’re currently scouring Kent for a bewildered pensioner, so I imagine they’ll have their hands full. But any moment now, if they haven’t done already, they’re going to work out that it’s not River who’s dead, and alter the course of their investigation. Actually,” he said, “that might involve asking why I identified the body as River’s. So don’t be alarmed if we have unexpected company.”
“Why
“Because, bizarre as it sounds, he’s now a joe in the field. And you don’t blow a joe’s cover.” For a moment, it looked as if Lamb were about to say more, but he clamped his mouth shut instead. And then opened it again to repeat, more softly. “You don’t blow a joe’s cover.”
“You could have told
“Well, I could. But that would have involved trusting you not to do something dickheaded, like blog about it, or hire a skywriter.” He smiled kindly. “I know you think of me as a father figure, and want to do well to impress me. But if you weren’t all useless fuck-ups, you’d not be here in the first place.”
“You’re telling us now,” Shirley pointed out.
“And that’s because, like I just said, by now they’ll have established that the body isn’t River’s. So it’s become a little moot, see?” He paused. “I said ‘a little moot,’ not a little toot. Don’t go getting ideas.”
“Where’s David Cartwright now?” Louisa asked.
Lamb hesitated, then said, “He’s safe.”
“There’s something you’re not telling us.”
