The Running Grave полностью

Strike heaved himself up onto his feet and glanced down into the street again. The tall, fit-looking black man with green eyes had reappeared since he’d last looked, though on this occasion he was marginally better hidden than previously, in a doorway four along from the office on the other side of the street.

‘We’re still being watched,’ Strike informed Robin, ‘but only by the clown squad. He wasn’t there when I went out to Cedar Terrace this morning.’

‘You went? I thought we agreed neither of us was going to take stupid risks?’

‘I couldn’t send Shah, Barclay was still in Norwich and Midge was asleep. Anyway, it wasn’t a risk,’ said Strike, letting the blinds fall back into place. ‘There was never going to be a safer time to go and talk to Rosie Fernsby than while police are hunting the shooter. Trouble with trying to kill people you’re afraid know too much is, if you miss, you’ve not only handed them confirmation of their theory, you’ve made yourself a target. Anyway,’ Strike continued, dropping back into his chair, ‘Rosie-Bhakta was there.’

‘She was?’ said Robin, sounding excited.

‘Yeah. She’s bloody annoying, although maybe I’d’ve found her less so if I wasn’t this knackered. Says she doesn’t ever bother answering the landline because it’s only ever for her mother – predictably, given it’s her mother’s house.’

‘What did she say about the Polaroids?’

‘Exactly what we expected her to say. She was quite excited to think she might be in danger, though. I’ve persuaded her to move to a B&B at Colin Edensor’s expense.’

‘Good. Listen, I’m worried about Midge going back to Chapman Farm—’

‘She’ll want to do it. She’s constantly pissed off I don’t let her do dangerous stuff. However bloody insubordinate she can be, nobody could call her a coward.’

Robin, who’d rolled her eyes at the word ‘insubordinate’, said,

‘And what if they’ve put up cameras at the blind spot now?’

‘Unless they’re night vision cameras she’ll be OK, as long as she’s well covered and got the wire cutters. We’ve got to chance it. Without forensic evidence, we’re going to be bloody hard-pressed to prove what happened…

‘I’ve got Pat typing up a final report on Toy Boy, by the way. You’ll like this: Dev caught him in the same hotel as Bigfoot, with another Eastern European girl.’

‘No way.’

‘Yeah, so I’ve passed those photos to the client. Toy Boy’s seen his last Rolex. You and I will have to cover Hampstead while the others are working the UHC case. With luck, the clowns watching us will think we’ve lost interest in the church now we’ve been shot at.’

‘I’m worried about Sam, though. What if—?’

‘Barclay can handle himself fine,’ said Strike. ‘Stop worrying about him and Midge and concentrate on the fact that we’re trying to take down a bunch of fuckers who’re brainwashing thousands, raping people and selling kids.’

‘I am concentrating on that,’ said Robin crossly. ‘For your information, I’ve spent the last six hours combing through every other Isaac Mills in the UK.’

‘And?’

‘And there are two more Isaac Millses who’re the right age. One’s a chartered accountant, the other’s in jail.’

‘Very promising,’ said Strike. ‘Which jail?’

‘Wandsworth.’

‘Even better,’ said Strike. ‘Won’t be a long trip. What’s he in for?’

‘Manslaughter. I’m doing some more digging right now.’

‘Great.’ Strike scratched his chin, thinking. ‘If he’s the right one, you should visit him. Might require a lighter touch than I gave Reaney.’

He chose not to say that Mills was likely to fancy a visit from an attractive young woman far more than he’d want to meet a broken-nosed forty-one-year-old man.

‘This is all going to take time to arrange,’ said Robin, sounding worried.

‘Doesn’t matter. We do this properly or not at all. I’m trying to fix up a meeting with all our police contacts—’

‘I know, Ryan just called me, he got Pat’s message,’ said Robin.

Then why the fuck didn’t he call Pat? was Strike’s immediate, ungracious thought.

‘He can’t do anything until next week.’

‘Nor can Layborn,’ said Strike. ‘I might give them all a little kick up the arse, tell them my journalist contact is gagging to write a piece about the church and police apathy, and that I’m barely holding him off.’

‘Would you mind not?’ said Robin. ‘Or not unless it’s absolutely necessary?’

‘You’re the one who wants to speed things up,’ said Strike.

And nobody made you start seeing that prick Murphy.

Strength in the face of danger does not plunge ahead but bides its time, whereas weakness in the face of danger grows agitated and has not the patience to wait.

The I Ching or Book of Changes

For the next fortnight, everyone at the agency was very busy, their efforts directed almost exclusively to proving Strike’s theory about the fate of the Drowned Prophet.