The Hallmarked Man полностью

After years of tailing the well-heeled, Strike was familiar with the layout of most of London’s five-star hotels, so turned left at the end of the lobby. The Dorchester’s bar was decorated in gold and green with Art Deco touches, and was bestrewn with more Christmas foliage and fairy lights. He was informed by the man at the door, who emphasised Strike’s good fortune, that they could squeeze him in at the bar itself. Having ordered a double whisky, Strike had just pulled out his phone to kill time, when it rang in his hand.

‘Strike.’

‘Yeah,’ said a female voice so loud that Strike winced and held the phone away from his ear, ‘i’s Jade Semple.’ Her Estuary accent was so strong she pronounced her surname ‘Sempaw’. ‘Niall’s wife. You’ve wrote to me, on Facebook.’

‘Ah, yes,’ said Strike, ‘thanks for getting—’

‘’Ow do I know you’re ’oo you say you are?’

She was throwing her voice as though speaking to him from the bottom of a well, and Strike was reminded of Bijou Watkins, who’d been similarly loud.

‘We can switch to FaceTime if you’d like. I could screenshot my driving licence?’

He heard a male voice speak in the background, and knew he was on speakerphone.

‘Not hard to fake a driving licence,’ the man said.

‘Or we could meet face to face?’ said Strike.

The phone now seemed to change hands, because the man spoke next at full volume.

‘Who’s hired ye?’

‘I can’t disclose that, I’m afr—’

‘Newspaper,’ said the man confidently. ‘Told you, babe.’

The line went dead.

Strike immediately saved Jade Semple’s mobile number, which she’d incautiously failed to hide.

‘Nothing interesting at the coat check,’ said a voice in Strike’s ear. ‘Oh good, we’re drinking. Vodka tonic, please,’ Kim told the barman. ‘They’re all sitting down for dinner,’ she informed Strike.

Kim’s drink arrived at the same time as the man beside Strike got up off his bar stool, and she got onto it instead.

‘Whoops,’ she said, with yet another laugh, as her dress snagged on her heel, tugging it down at the back, leaving Strike with good reason to suppose she wasn’t wearing anything at all underneath it. She downed several gulps of her drink before saying,

‘God, I needed that… anyway, get this. Right after Navabi called me, I had my ex turn up at my front door. I was wearing this,’ she said, gesturing down at the dress, ‘so obviously he thought I was off meeting someone new… nice big row, obviously. He’s such a fool. We split up,’ she went on, although Strike hadn’t asked, ‘because he got made redundant and that became his entire personality, being jobless. I’m not even kidding! “Hi, I’m Ray, I don’t work.”’

She laughed again. Strike didn’t think she was drunk, but there was a slightly frenetic air about her that recalled Kenneth Ramsay, jabbering desperately in an effort to sell what wasn’t wanted. Strike had no desire whatsoever to hear about Kim’s private life, but protracted silence might provoke questions about his mood he didn’t want, so he asked,

‘What did he do?’

‘Worked for a hospital trust,’ said Kim, ‘and now it’s all “you left me when I was at my lowest”. I mean, there are other jobs, Ray. Just grow a pair and send out your bloody CV, hahaha. Oh dear God, look at her…’

Kim’s eyes were following the reflection in the mirror over the bar of a tall, willowy woman who’d clearly had a lot of cosmetic work done to her face. Strike was reminded of Charlotte’s mother, Tara, whose picture, the last time he’d seen one, had shown extensive overuse of fillers.

‘Why do they do it?’ Kim asked. ‘What’s the point? Look at her neck and her hands… you’re not fooling anyone… would you?’ she asked Strike, smirking.

‘What, have plastic surgery?’ asked Strike, knowing full well what she meant.

‘No,’ said Kim, laughing as she nudged him, ‘you know…’

All he had to do, Strike thought grimly, was get through the next couple of hours. He ordered another drink, so Kim did, too. She gabbled on and on, and though Strike paid as little attention as he could, and his responses were perfunctory, he unwillingly learned far more than he’d ever wanted to about his newest subcontractor. Ray, she told him, had been the husband of a friend also on the force (‘well, ex-friend now, obviously, hahaha’); their relationship had been the main trigger for Kim leaving the Met (‘it’s all politics, anyway, I’d had enough’); she’d also had two long, complicated affairs in her twenties, both with married policemen. Strike found it strange, to put it mildly, that she was telling him all these things unbidden, although she seemed to assume that he took her tales as sophisticated and exciting, rather than tawdry.

‘… wanted kids, which I don’t, so that was the end of that…’