‘He’s only Norman to Marion,’ explained Connie. ‘No one else dares call him anything other than Dom.’ She grinned. ‘It’s short for the Dominator.’
‘It’s short for what?’
‘The Dominator. Dom used to be a World Series wrestler. Had to give it up because of a back injury, but unlike most of ’em he invested the money he made wisely — in property.’
‘Good God.’
Connie gestured towards the two sofas. Jones obediently sat on the nearest one.
‘I’ll make the coffee,’ Marion offered.
Connie murmured her thanks as she sat down next to Jones. She rummaged beneath the pile of papers on the table before her and unearthed a packet of cigarettes. Jones watched in silence while she removed one and lit up. No health campaign in the world was ever going to stop Connie Pike destroying her lungs if she so wished.
‘Right then,’ said Connie calmly. ‘I expect you’d like a few answers, Sandy?’
Jones looked at her in disbelief. Upon closer examination the voluminous head of hair was almost certainly dyed red now. The roots were grey. Maybe Connie did have some personal vanity after all. Her hair was also slightly singed around the ends, and there were scratches on her hands, the only visible signs of any damage the explosion, and her miraculous escape, may have caused her.
‘I think that’s something of an understatement, Connie,’ she said.
Ten
There was one question Sandy Jones wanted the answer to which overshadowed all others.
‘So, Connie Pike, how the hell are you still alive?’ she asked.
‘Ah yes. I lay awake most of last night listening to my heart beating. Strange how comforting that sound is when you know it has no right to be beating at all. I should be dead, like Paul...’
She paused, the anguish of loss all too apparent.
‘Well, you know how we’ve always managed at RECAP to keep ourselves apart from the rules of Princeton,’ she continued eventually.
‘Don’t I just.’
‘Yes, in every way really, how the lab looked, how we worked, what we did. We were always a law unto ourselves. The toys, the cards on the wall, even the design of our equipment, and, of course, Paul’s various dogs...’
Her voice tailed off. The memories came flooding back to Jones again. For just a moment she almost half forgot the terrible tragedy which had struck in such a final and irrevocable fashion.
‘Paul’s dogs,’ she murmured. ‘Have they all been incontinent?’
‘Only at the beginning and the end of their lives. It’s just that the house-training phase went on forever with Paul. He had his own views on dog training, if you remember, and they weren’t always immediately successful. I reckon Gilda was a saint.’
Jones chuckled. Then she had a thought.
‘I wondered... did Paul have a dog with him in the lab when...’
She didn’t bother to finish. She knew.
‘I told you on the phone he had a new puppy,’ said Connie. ‘Well, she died with her master.’
‘Ah,’ said Jones.
The thought of that made her sadder than ever.
Connie looked away.
‘Anyway, I was telling you how I escaped,’ she continued. ‘You’ll remember that we always allowed smoking in the lab, even though it was against the rules. Not least because we were both smokers. And I still am, but Paul had given up, of course.’
She paused, as if she had said something profound.
Jones was puzzled.
‘Yes?’ she queried.
‘I’m sorry, I thought I told you. On the phone?’
‘Told me? Told me what?’
‘The sprinklers. Health and Safety suddenly remembered we existed and put in sprinklers. One right above my desk. Well, I was deep into something really fascinating one morning, the morning after you and I spoke on the phone, I think, and forgot all about the damned stupid things. I dropped a match in my ashtray which carried on burning for a moment. Next thing it’s raining. Place got drenched. Miraculously the computer system survived, not that it was to matter much...’
‘But obviously even I knew better than to attempt to smoke in the lab again. So, well, thankfully we were on the ground floor, with those big low windows, remember? I started the habit of climbing out of a window and walking around the quadrangle when I wanted a smoke. And that’s where I was, outside having my breakfast-time nicotine fix, when, just four days after the sprinklers had done their stuff, the lab was blown up.’
‘Jesus Christ.’
It was, thought Jones, so wonderfully simple, so ordinary, so human.
‘And so, if it was a bomb, whoever planted it still thinks that you were in the lab?’
‘It was a bomb all right, I’m sure of it.’ Connie leaned back and stretched her legs. ‘And yes, of course, whoever planted it almost certainly still thinks I was inside when the explosion happened. The university authorities too. Everybody involved believes I was there. And that I was blown to pieces, like Paul. Everybody who ever knew me — except Marion and Dom, and now you. No reason to think otherwise. Nobody knew I left the lab at all that morning. I certainly didn’t leave through the only door, did I?’
She turned her back to Jones and pulled the orange shirt down off one shoulder. There were several angry looking lacerations clearly visible on the skin of her upper back.
‘I think some fragments of glass got me, but I was extraordinarily lucky. I’d walked over to that little pond in the far corner of the quad. It’s full of some quite interesting fish now.’ She paused again. ‘Or it was, anyway. I was just standing on the path looking at the fish, when the entire place blew. The force of the blast sent me catapulting forwards, right into the scrubby bushes around the pond. Picked up a few scratches too, but I sure got off lightly.’
‘I don’t suppose you’ve been back there since, have you?’ Jones enquired conversationally.
‘Uh, yes. I went back.’
‘I see.’
It was suddenly all becoming clear.
‘And did you by any chance happen to go back there very early yesterday morning?’ Jones queried carefully. ‘And did you just happen, perhaps, to be there when I was there?’
‘Well, yes—’
‘Yes,’ Jones interrupted. ‘And so it was you, was it, who half frightened the wits out of me, thus leading to me being thrown in a police cell, given the third degree, and generally having the worst day of my entire life?’
Connie’s smile was the broadest so far. Almost up to the standard Sandy Jones remembered.
‘C’mon,’ said Connie. ‘You took off like a startled rabbit before I had a chance to make myself known to you, fell over with a great crash, attracted the attention of every policeman or security guard within a ten-mile radius I shouldn’t wonder, and nearly blew my cover completely.’
‘Well, I suppose that’s one way of looking at it,’ Jones responded wryly.
‘Sure is. What the hell were you doing there, anyway?’
‘Much the same as you I expect.’
‘Me? I just had to go and look. I needed to see what was left of the place, if there was anything that could be salvaged. Maybe see if I could spot any clues too...’
She stopped, lowered her face briefly into her hands, then looked up again at Jones.
‘Any clues? You saw the place. Modern forensics may discover something, but what the hell I thought I was going to find out just by taking a look, I have no idea. I left in such a hurry after the blast I didn’t take any real notice of anything. I realized at once that nobody inside could possibly have survived. I knew Paul must be dead, and I knew I had to get away fast or I would be too. I was quite sure straight away that the explosion was deliberate, and that Paul and I had been the targets. I told you on the phone, didn’t I, that I was already concerned about a campaign to get rid of RECAP. I hadn’t imagined anything like that explosion though. I never thought anyone would go that far. Anyway, I remembered the steam tunnels. You knew about them, didn’t you, in your time?’