“Does he have what it takes to be a great artist?”
“To some extent. But you have to remember, there’s a big, big gap between someone like my dad and Van Gogh or Picasso. It’s all relative.”
“What about your mother?”
Again, Annie was silent a few moments. “She died,” she said at last. “When I was six. I don’t really remember her very well. I wish I could, but I can’t.”
“That’s sad. I’m sorry.”
“More wine?”
“Please.”
Annie poured.
“That oil portrait in the living room, is it your mother?”
Annie nodded.
“Your father painted it?”
“Yes.”
“It’s very good. She was a beautiful woman. You look a lot like her.”
It was almost dark outside now. Annie hadn’t put on any lights, so Banks couldn’t see her expression.
“Where did you grow up?” he asked.
“Saint Ives.”
“Nice place.”
“You know it?”
“I’ve been there on holiday a couple of times. Years ago, when I worked on the Met. It’s a bit far from here.”
“I don’t get down as often as I should. Maybe you remember it was a magnet for hippies in the sixties? It became something of an artist’s colony.”
“I remember.”
“My father lived there even before that. Over the years he’s done all kinds of odd jobs to support his art. He might have even rented you a deck chair on the beach. Now he paints local landscapes and sells them to tourists. Does some glass engraving too. He’s quite successful at it.”
“So he makes a decent living?”
“Yes. He doesn’t have to rent out the deck chairs anymore.”
“He brought you up alone?”
Annie pushed her hair back. “Well, not really. I mean, yes, in the sense that my mother was dead, but we lived in a sort of artists’ colony on an old farm just outside town, so there were always lots of other people around. My extended family, you might call them. Ray’s been living with Jasmine for nearly twenty years now.”
“It sounds like a strange setup.”
“Only to someone who hasn’t experienced it. It seemed perfectly normal to me. It was the other kids who seemed strange. The ones with mothers and fathers.”
“Did you get teased a lot at school?”
“Tormented. Some of the locals were very intolerant. Thought we were having orgies every night, doing drugs, worshiping the devil, the usual stuff. Actually, though there always seemed to be some pot around, they couldn’t have been further from the truth. There were a few wild ones – that kind of free, experimental way of life always attracts a few unstable types – but on the whole it was a pretty good environment to grow up in. Plus I got a great education in the arts – and not from school.”
“What made you join the police?”
“The village bobby took my virginity.”
“Seriously.”
Annie laughed and poured more wine. “It’s true. He did. His name was Rob. He came up to see us once, looking for someone who’d passed through, one of the occasional undesirables. He was good-looking. I was seventeen. He noticed me. It seemed a suitable act of rebellion.”
“Against your par – your father?”
“Against all of them. Oh, don’t get me wrong, I didn’t hate them or anything. It was just that I’d had enough of that lifestyle by then. There were too many people around all the time, nowhere to escape to. Too much talk and not enough done. You could never get any privacy. That’s why I value it so much now. And how many times can a grown person listen to ‘White Rabbit’?”
Banks laughed. “I feel the same way about ‘Nessun Dorma.’”
“Anyway, Rob seemed solid, dependable, more sure of himself and what he believed in.”
“Was he?”
“Yes. We went out until I went to university in Exeter. Then he turned up there a year or so later as a DC. He introduced me to some of his friends and we sort of started going out again. I suppose they found me a bit weird. After all, I didn’t throw out the baby with the bathwater. I still had a lot of my father’s values, and I was into yoga and meditation even back then, when nobody else was. I didn’t really fit in anywhere. I don’t know why, but being a detective sounded exciting. Different. When you get right down to it, most jobs are so bloody boring. I’d thought of becoming a teacher, but I changed my mind and joined the force. It was a bit impulsive, I’ll admit.”
Banks wanted to ask her why she was in a dead-end place like Harkside, but he sensed that this wasn’t the moment. At least he could ask a leading question and see if she was willing to be led. “How has it worked out?”
“It’s tough for a woman. But things are what you make them. I’m a feminist, but I’m the sort who just likes to get on with it rather than whine about what’s wrong with the system. Maybe that comes from my dad. He goes his own way. Anyway, you know all about what it’s like, about how unexciting it is most of the time. And how bloody boring it can be.”
“True enough. What happened to Rob?”
“He got killed during an armed drugs bust three years later. Poor sod. His gun jammed.”
“I’m sorry.”
Annie put her hand to her forehead, then fanned it in front of her face. “Ooh, I’m hot. Listen to me go on. I haven’t talked to anyone like this in ages.”
“I wouldn’t mind a cigarette. Would you like to stand outside with me? Cool down a bit, if it’s possible?”
“Okay.”
They went out into the backyard. It was a warm night, though there were signs of a breeze beginning to stir. Annie stood beside him. He could smell her scent. He lit up, inhaled and blew out a plume of dark smoke.
“It was like drawing teeth,” he said, “getting you to talk about your personal life.”
“I’m not used to it. I’m like you in a lot of ways.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, how much have you told me about your past?”
“What do you want to know?”
“That’s not what I mean. You just wouldn’t think of telling people about yourself, of letting someone in, would you? It’s not in your nature. You’re a loner, like me. I don’t just mean now, because you’re…”
“Because my wife left me?”
“Right. Not just because you’re physically alone or because you’re living alone. I mean in your nature, deep inside. Even when you were married. I think you’ve got a lonely, isolated nature. It colors the way you see the world, the detachment you feel. I’m not explaining it very well, am I? I think I’m the same. I can be alone in a crowded room. I’ll bet you can be, too.”
Banks thought about what Annie had said as he smoked. It was what Sandra had said when they had their final argument, what he had refused to admit was the truth. There was something in him that always stood apart, that she couldn’t reach and he wouldn’t offer. It wasn’t just the Job and its demands, but something deeper: a central core of loneliness. He had been like that even as a child. An observer. Always on the outside, even when he played with others. As Annie said, it was a part of his nature, and he didn’t think he could change it if he tried.
“Maybe you’re right,” he said. “Funny thing, though. I always thought I was a simple family man.”
“And now?”
“And now I’m not so sure I ever was.”
A cat meowed in a nearby yard. Down the street, a door opened and closed and someone turned a television on. Emmylou drifted through the open kitchen window singing about losing this sweet old world. Banks dropped his cigarette and trod on the red ember. Suddenly a chill gust of wind rustled the distant trees and passed through the yard. Annie shivered. Banks put his arm around her and moved her gently toward him. She let her head rest on his shoulder.
“Oh dear,” she said. “I don’t know if this is a good idea.”
“Why?”