‘Absolutely,’ I said. ‘If this affair has taught me anything, it’s that life is more precious than I’d realized. When I thought I was dying, I was in total despair, and now that I’ve survived, I have every intention of living my life to the full. The moment has arrived to move on from Lydia.’
‘Hallelujah!’ she said, lifting her hands and eyes to the heavens. ‘And about time too.’
‘Has it been that bad?’ I asked with a smile.
‘Worse,’ she said. ‘Since she left, you’ve been about as cheerful as a fatted calf at an abattoir.’
‘Oh, thanks.’
‘It’s true,’ she said. ‘Do you realize that you sigh all the time?’
‘No.’
‘Well, you do. It’s like being around a penitent monk, but less fun.’
‘I’m sorry,’ I said. ‘Henceforth I will be happy and jolly. I promise.’
‘There’s no need to go that far. Just be your normal self.’
We laughed out loud, and we hadn’t done that together for a long time.
Faye departed just as DI Galvin arrived, this time without his sergeant sidekick.
‘Any news?’ I asked. ‘Any arrests?’
‘Sadly, no,’ replied the inspector. ‘But we have done a check on those telephone calls and, as I suspected, they were all made from public telephones. The first was made from Waterloo Station at 8.27 p.m. on the evening before you were attacked. The second was from a call box on the corner of Parliament Square at 11.32 p.m. the same evening. The other two, on the Sunday morning, were made from the only remaining phone box in High Street Harlesden.’
‘But that’s only round the corner from my flat.’
‘Indeed,’ he said. ‘And I suspect you are right in thinking they were checking up to see if you were in. Three more calls were made to your line from that number, one at 11.50 a.m., another at twelve noon and the third some ten minutes after that.’
‘I’d gone out by then.’
‘As they would have known.’
‘Is there any CCTV coverage of those public phones?’
‘We’re looking into that but I wouldn’t hold your breath. Waterloo Station or Parliament Square are our best bet — at least we can assume that the cameras will work there. Even if there are any cameras in High Street Harlesden, they will probably have been vandalized.’
Maybe Faye had a point.
‘So what else?’ I asked.
‘Have you remembered anything new about the assailants?’ he asked.
‘Not really,’ I said. ‘Sorry.’
‘Was the one that stabbed you the bigger or the smaller of the two?’
‘The smaller.’
I stared at him. ‘How did I know that?’
‘The subconscious mind often knows lots of things that the conscious mind doesn’t register until it receives a trigger. How much smaller was he?’
‘At least a couple of inches but he was stocky and made up for his lack of height with width. The other guy was taller but leaner.’
‘Taller than you?’
‘About the same. The knifeman was shorter but he was also crouching. I remember looking down at his face.’
‘Glasses? Beard? Moustache?’
‘No,’ I said. ‘He did have some stubble, as if he hadn’t shaved for a couple of days. He was also wearing a dark woollen hat, like a beanie, that covered his head and the top half of his ears.’
‘Wide face, or narrow?’
‘Neither one,’ I said. ‘Just normal.’
I was stunned that I could now remember so much after all those hours of nothing.
‘How about the other one?’
I thought hard. ‘I didn’t get to see his face properly.’
‘Did he also have a hat?’
I tried to picture in my mind the image of him tripping over the boxes in my hallway as I threw him off me.
‘I don’t know, but he was wearing trainers, you know, those ones with high ankles and lots of laces.’
‘Baseball boots?’
‘Yes. Exactly. With white laces.’
‘What colour were the boots?’
‘There was not enough light. I think they were a fairly dark colour, maybe red, with white soles. I remember seeing them as he was lying over the boxes.’
‘How about coats?’ he asked.
I tried to recall. ‘Sorry,’ I said. ‘It all happened so fast.’
‘And the knife? Can you describe that? We didn’t find it at the scene.’
‘It was like a carving knife with a long thin blade. I’ll not forget that in a hurry. It was very frightening.’
‘Overhand or underhand?’
‘Eh?’
‘When he was holding the knife, did it point up or down?’
‘Up to start with, but then he shifted it to stab at my chest above my coat.’
‘Can you remember anything else?’
I tried going over everything once again in my head. ‘No. Sorry.’
‘Here,’ he said, pulling an iPad from his bag. ‘There are literally thousands of mugshots stored on this. I’ll leave it with you. Go through them and see if any of them are your friend with the knife. I’ll come back and collect it on Friday but call me sooner if you find him.’ He gave me a business card with his number on it. ‘Otherwise we’ll try and get a videofit sorted.’
He stood up to go.
‘Can I do anything for you?’
‘How are things at my flat?’ I said. ‘It is OK?’
‘As far as I’m aware. We have forensics in there today doing a scene of crime search for dabs and DNA, although I’m not expecting much. These guys obviously came prepared but, you never know, perhaps the one you threw over the boxes spat out some saliva, or maybe a spot of phlegm was coughed up by one of them while they were waiting for you to get home.’
Nice, but at least the police were trying. Perhaps I had been a bit unfair in thinking they wouldn’t bother.
‘What about my flat key?’ I said. ‘I left it in the lock.’
‘We have that. The forensic boys took it this morning to get in and they’ll lock up again afterwards. I’ll bring it with me on Friday.’
‘Thanks.’
‘Anything else?’
‘Yes. I don’t feel particularly safe in here. I’ve asked the nurses to try and vet my visitors but you were able to walk straight in unannounced. How about if my friend with the knife comes back to finish off what he started? If those two thugs were prepared to wait all afternoon in my flat for me to get home before trying to kill me, don’t you think it’s quite likely they might just wander in to this hospital to have another go? Especially at night when it’s quiet. I’d be happier with a twenty-four-hour police guard.’
I’d be even happier still with a whole posse of guards, and a stab-proof vest.
‘I’ll have a word with hospital security.’
‘Hospital security is more concerned about people parking their cars in the ambulance bays than they are about assassins on the loose with carving knives.’
‘It’s the best I can do. I’m afraid I don’t have the manpower.’
Police budgets are set more to solve crimes than to prevent them. They would happily mobilize a hugely expensive team of detectives if I was murdered in my hospital bed, but they couldn’t afford a single man to thwart it happening in the first place. It was madness.
Third time lucky? Not if I could help it, I thought.
‘Have you spoken yet to DS Jagger at Thames Valley?’ I asked.
‘Yes,’ DI Galvin said. ‘As a matter of fact, I have.’
There was something about his tone of voice that set alarm bells ringing in my head.
‘What is it?’ I asked.
‘What is what?’
‘You have something to tell me.’ It was a statement, not a question.
‘No.’
‘I think you have. What is it?’
He lowered his voice as if that made it better. ‘Their forensics have thrown up something that may indicate that things are not as straightforward as first thought.’