The Running Grave полностью

‘According to Fergus Robertson, his contact’s family shunted her off to New Zealand after her suicide attempt, but Henry Worthington-Fields says Flora’s back in the country now, though still in poor mental health. He begged me not to go near her, but I know where she’s living, because I looked her up: Strawberry Hill, a five-minute walk from Prudence and Declan’s.’

‘Oh,’ said Robin. ‘But we can’t approach her, can we? Not if she’s that fragile.’

Strike said nothing.

‘Strike, we can’t,’ said Robin.

‘You don’t want justice for Deirdre Doherty?’

‘Of course I do, but—’

‘If Brewster wanted to keep what she witnessed private, why draw it and post it on a public forum?’

‘I don’t know,’ said Robin distractedly. ‘People process things differently. Maybe, for her, that was a way of letting it all out.’

‘She’d have done better to let it out to the bloody police, instead of doing drawings and moaning about how miserable she feels to Prudence.’

‘That’s not fair,’ said Robin heatedly. ‘Speaking as someone who’s experienced what goes on at Chapman Farm—’

‘I don’t see you sitting on your arse feeling sorry for yourself, or deciding you’ll just draw pictures of everything you witnessed—’

‘I was only in for four months, Flora was there five years! You told me she was gay and forced to go with men – that’s five years of corrective rape. You realise that as far as we know, Flora might have had kids in there that she was forced to leave when they chucked her out?’

‘Why didn’t she go back for them?’

‘If she had the full-on mental breakdown Henry described to you, she might have believed they were in the safest place: somewhere they’d grow up with the approval of the Drowned Prophet! Everyone comes out of that place altered, even the ones who seem all right on the surface. D’you think Niamh would have ended up married to a man old enough to be her dad if her family hadn’t been smashed up by the church? She went for safety and a father figure!’

‘But you’re happy for Niamh to never to know what happened to her mother?’

‘Of course I’m not happy,’ said Robin angrily, ‘but I don’t want it on my conscience if we tip Flora Brewster into a second suicide attempt!’

Now regretting his tone, Strike said,

‘Look, I didn’t mean to—’

‘Don’t say you didn’t mean to upset me,’ said Robin through gritted teeth. ‘That’s what men always say when – I’m angry, not sad. You don’t get it. You don’t know what that place does to people. I do, and—’

Strike’s mobile rang again.

‘Shit,’ he said. ‘Abigail Glover. Better take this.’

Robin looked away at the passing traffic, arms folded. Strike answered the call and switched it to speakerphone, so Robin could listen.

‘Hi.’

‘’I,’ said Abigail. ‘I got your message, about press.’

‘Right,’ said Strike. ‘Sorry to be the bearer of bad tidings, but as I said, I don’t think there’s any immediate—’

‘I wanna ask you somefing,’ said Abigail, cutting across him.

‘Go on.’

‘Did Baz Saxon come an’ see you?’

‘Er – yeah,’ said Strike, deciding honesty was the best policy.

‘That fucker!’

‘Did he tell you himself or…?’

‘Fuckin’ Patrick told me! Me lodger. I’ve ’ad enough. I’ve told Patrick to get the fuck out of my flat. It’s all a fuckin’ game to them, pair of bastards,’ she added, and Strike could hear distress as well as anger now. ‘I’m sick an’ fuckin’ tired of bein’ their fuckin’ reality show!’

‘I think a new lodger’s a good move.’

‘So what did Baz tell you? ’Ow I’ll fuck anyfing that moves except ’im, was it?’

‘He certainly struck me as a man with a grievance,’ said Strike. ‘But since you’re on the line, I wondered whether you could answer a couple more questions?’

‘You don’—’

Her voice was momentarily drowned out, as two articulated lorries roared past the stationary Land Rover.

‘Sorry,’ said Strike, his voice raised. ‘I’m on the A40, I missed most of that.’

‘I said,’ she shouted, ‘you don’ wanna believe anyfing that bastard says abou’ me – except that I freatened ’im. I did freaten ’im. I’d ’ad a coupla drinks, an’ ’e was buttin’ in on me an’ Darryl, this guy from my gym, an’ I lost it.’

‘Understandable,’ said Strike, ‘but when you told Saxon the church had guns, was that to frighten him, or true?’

‘To frighten ’im,’ said Abigail. After a slight hesitation she added, ‘but I migh’ – they migh’ not’ve been real. I dunno. I couldn’t swear to it in court tha’s wha’ I saw.’

‘So you did see a gun, or guns?’

‘Yeah. Well – that’s what they looked like.’

Robin now turned her head to look at the phone in Strike’s hand.

‘Where were these guns?’ Strike asked.

‘Mazu ’ad ’em. I wen’ in ’er study one day to tell ’er sumfing an’ I saw the safe open an’ she slammed the door. It looked like two guns. She’s weird about Chapman Farm, I toldja. It’s ’er private kingdom. She usedta talk about when the police come, when the Crowthers were there. When I saw them guns, I fort, she’s not gonna be caught out again – but I dunno, they might not ’ave been real, I on’y saw ’em for a second.’