Ted had told Strike much later that he’d known if he’d stayed in his father’s house beyond the age of eighteen, murder would have been done, and it was a toss-up which of them would be killer and which the victim. National Service had saved the young man, and having no desire to return to St Mawes while his father lived, Ted, to Trevik’s disgust, had remained in the army, forgoing the sea and the rugged coastline he loved for the military police, returning only when news reached him of his father’s premature death. Ted had then married the local girl with whom he’d corresponded for seven years.
It was Ted who’d broken the pattern of hard-drinking violence that had plagued the Nancarrow men through generations. Ted’s wife had had no need to fear his fists and his surrogate children had known firmness, but never brutality. Ted had embodied the virtues, hitherto almost unknown in that family, of steadiness, sobriety and fair play, whereas Peggy, who at eighteen had seized her first chance of escaping her draconian grandmother and run away with a youth who’d come to Truro with the fair, had rechristened herself ‘Leda’ and carried chaos with her wherever she went, until her death in a squalid squat in London.
Staring at Ted and Trevik, Strike found himself wishing the strong, capable storehouse of sense he’d just lost could be here with him tonight. Ted had always had a way of putting into words things the unsettled and often angry teenage Strike had recognised as true, even if he hadn’t yet lived long enough to test Ted’s words for himself.
‘There’s no pride in having what you never worked for,’ had been one of Ted’s well-worn maxims. Strike was prepared to put in the work with Robin, but the weeks that had elapsed since he’d seen the look of shock on her face had afforded few opportunities to advance his own cause. It wasn’t only that, until the hiring of Kim, the agency had been overstretched covering its cases. Strike could also tell that Robin was finding the onslaught of press coverage about the UHC hard to handle; she seemed jumpier and more anxious than usual, yet had snapped at him when he’d mooted the idea of her taking more time off. He’d several times cut one of the subcontractors short when they’d wanted to tell Robin gleefully about a further UHC arrest, in the expectation that she’d be as happy about it as they were.
For weeks now, Strike had daily postponed the declaration he wanted to make, because he feared that dumping his feelings on Robin right now would be selfish. Then Ted’s death had forced Strike away from London, and now this this virus of Robin’s was prolonging their separation and, no doubt, affording Murphy endless opportunities to play the considerate boyfriend.
While he hadn’t yet heard any concrete indications, Strike feared that Murphy might be planning a proposal. Murphy and Robin’s relationship appeared to be as strong as ever, and both were clearly of a marrying disposition, given that each of them already had an ex-spouse. Robin was in her thirties, and might even be thinking of children. She’d seemed ambivalent on that subject the only time it had ever been mentioned between her and Strike, but that had been a while ago, before she’d met her handsome CID officer. After their last big case, and Robin’s long and traumatic spell undercover, she might well feel now was the time to take a career break. These fears added urgency to Strike’s predicament. He needed to speak up before Murphy went ring shopping, or Robin announced she’d be needing maternity leave.
‘Never let the other chap change your game plan,’ Ted had once told Strike, though they’d been speaking of boxing, rather than romance. ‘Stick to your own, and play to your strengths.’
And what were Strike’s strengths, in this particular case? Undoubtedly, the agency that he and Robin had built together, which he was almost certain meant as much to her as it did to him. Their work offered opportunities, although lately not enough of them, to spend a lot of time together. So many missed chances, thought Strike bitterly: overnight stays, shared meals and long car journeys, and he, like the stupid prick he was, had prided himself on not letting his attraction overmaster him, and what was the upshot? He was sitting here alone with the dregs of a pint and a throbbing leg, while Murphy was probably at Robin’s flat, racking up points by bringing flowers and heating up soup.
Bored by his own misery, he got to his feet again and washed his dinner things. Brooding would do no good whatsoever: what was needed was decisive action.
It seemed to Strike that the wraith of Edward Nancarrow nodded approvingly at this conclusion, so having finished the washing-up, he replaced the photographs and two hats in the shoe box and then, after a second’s deliberation, placed the old fisherman’s priest on the windowsill, the only ornament, if it could be so called, he’d ever put on display.
