A dismembered corpse is discovered in the vault of a silver shop. The police initially believe it to be that of a convicted armed robber - but not everyone agrees with that theory. One of them is Decima Mullins, who calls on the help of private detective Cormoran Strike as she's certain the body in the silver vault was that of her boyfriend - the father of her newborn baby - who suddenly and mysteriously disappeared.The more Strike and his business partner Robin Ellacott delve into the case, the more labyrinthine it gets. The silver shop is no ordinary one: it's located beside Freemasons' Hall and specializes in Masonic silverware. And in addition to the armed robber and Decima's boyfriend, it becomes clear that there are other missing men who could fit the profile of the body in the vault.As the case becomes ever more complicated and dangerous, Strike faces another quandary. Robin seems increasingly committed to her boyfriend, policeman Ryan Murphy, but the impulse to declare his own feelings for her is becoming stronger than ever.A gripping, wonderfully complex novel which takes Strike and Robin's story to a new level, The Hallmarked Man is an unmissable read for any fan of this gripping series.
To Séan and Nadine Harris, who gave me back what I thought I’d lost forever.
I had dipped in life’s struggle and, out again,
Bore specks of it here, there, easy to see,
When I found my swan and the cure was plain;
The dull turned bright as I caught your white
On my bosom: you saved me—saved in vain
If you ruined yourself, and all through me!
The windscreen wipers had been working their hardest ever since the BMW had entered the county of Kent, their soporific swish and clunk aggravating Cormoran Strike’s exhaustion as he stared out through thick rain, which had turned the deserted road ahead to gleaming jet.
Shortly after he’d boarded the sleeper train from Cornwall to London the previous evening, his detective partner’s boyfriend, who Strike always referred to inside his head as ‘Ryan Fucking Murphy’, had called to say that Robin had come down with a high fever and sore throat and would therefore be unable to accompany Strike on today’s visit to their newest prospective client.
Everything about this call had annoyed Strike, and an awareness that he was being unjust – because this was the first time in six years Robin had taken a sick day, and if she had a temperature of 104 and a swollen throat it was perfectly reasonable for her to ask her boyfriend to call on her behalf – deepened rather than alleviated his grumpiness. He’d been counting on Robin driving him into Kent in her old Land Rover, and the prospect of several hours in her company had been the only point in favour of keeping this appointment. A mixture of professionalism and masochism had stopped him cancelling, so after a quick shower and change of clothes at his attic flat in Denmark Street, he’d set out for the village of Temple Ewell, in Kent.
Having to drive himself wasn’t only depressing, but also physically painful. The hamstring in the leg on which a prosthesis had replaced the calf, ankle and foot was tight and throbbing, because his sojourn in Cornwall had involved a lot of heavy lifting.
Ten days previously, he’d dashed down to Truro because his elderly uncle had suffered his second stroke. Strike’s sister, Lucy, had been helping Ted pack up for his imminent removal to a nursing home in London when, in her words, ‘his face went funny and he couldn’t answer me’. Ted had died twelve hours after Strike had arrived at the hospital, his niece and nephew holding his hands.
Strike and Lucy had then proceeded to their uncle’s home in St Mawes, which had been left to them jointly, to arrange and attend the funeral, and to make decisions about the house’s contents. Predictably, Lucy had been horrified by her brother’s suggestion that they might hire professionals to empty the place once they’d removed those sentimental items the family wanted to keep. She couldn’t bear the idea of strangers touching any of it: the old Tupperware once used for picnics on the beach, their uncle’s threadbare gardening trousers, the jar of spare buttons kept carefully by their late aunt, some of them belonging to dresses long since donated to jumble sales. Feeling guilty that Lucy had had to cope with Ted’s final lapse from consciousness alone, Strike acceded to her wishes, remaining in St Mawes to lug boxes, nearly all of which were labelled ‘Lucy’, out of the house into a rented van, to throw rubbish into a hired skip and take regular breaks in which he administered tea and comfort to his sister, whose eyes had been constantly red from dust and weeping.