“I’m sorry, Jenny, really. It’s just that I’m expecting an important call.”
“Your girlfriend?”
“The case I’m working on.”
“That one you told me about? The war thing?”
“It’s the only one I’ve got. Jimmy Riddle’s made sure my cases have been thin on the ground lately.”
“Well, I won’t take up much of your time. It just struck me that I was rather… well, emotional… on our last meeting. I want to apologize for dumping all over you, as they say in California.”
“What are friends for?”
“Anyway,” Jenny went on, “by way of an apology, I’d like to invite you to dinner. If you think you can tolerate my cooking, that is?”
“It’s bound to be better than mine.”
She laughed a little too quickly and a little too nervously. “Don’t count on it. I thought we could, you know, just talk about things over a meal and a bottle of wine. A lot’s happened to both of us this past year.”
“When?”
“How about tomorrow, sevenish?”
“Sounds fine.”
“Are you sure it won’t cause any problems?”
“Why should it?”
“I don’t know… I just…” Then her voice brightened. “That’s great. I’ll see you tomorrow about seven, then?”
“You’re on. I’ll pick up some wine.”
After he hung up, Banks sat back and thought about the invitation. Dinner with Jenny. At her place. That would be interesting. Then he thought about Annie, and that cast a shadow over him. She had basically cut him dead on the phone yesterday. After such quick and surprising intimacy, her coldness came as a shock. It was a long time since he had been given the cold shoulder by a girlfriend he had known for only a few days, and the whole thing brought back shades of adolescent gloom. Time to break out the sad songs again. Cry along with Leonard Cohen and learn how to get the best out of your suffering.
But he was anxious to hear from Annie about the East Anglia connection. She had said today at the latest, after all. He toyed with the idea of phoning her, but in the end decided against it. Whatever their personal problems, he knew she was a good enough copper to let him know the minute she got the information he’d asked for. Shortly before eleven, she did.
“I’m sorry for the delay,” she said. “What with time differences and faulty fax machines, well, I’m sure you know…”
“That’s all right. Just tell me what you’ve discovered.” Banks had already come to one or two conclusions of his own since his last talk with Annie, and he felt the tingling tremor of excitement that usually came as the pieces started to fall together; it was a feeling he hadn’t experienced in quite a while.
“First off,” Annie said, “there definitely was an American air base near Hadleigh in 1952.”
“What were they doing there?”
“Well, the US armed forces cleared out of England after the war, but a lot of them stayed on in Europe, especially Berlin and Vienna. The war hadn’t solved the Russian problem. Anyway, the Americans came back to operate from British air bases in 1948, during the Berlin blockade and airlift. The first thing they did was deploy long-range B-29 bombers from four air bases in East Anglia. All this is from my contact in Ramstein. Apparently, there were so many bases by 1951 that they had to change their organizational structure to deal with them.”
“Any familiar names?”
“Just one. Guess who ran the PX?”
“Edgar Konig.”
“The very same. You don’t sound so surprised.”
“Not really. What did you find out about him?”
“He left Rowan Woods in May 1945, with the rest of the Four Hundred Forty-Eighth and spent some time in Europe, then he returned to America. He was assigned to the base near Hadleigh in summer 1952.”
“He stayed in the air force all that time?”
“Seems that way. I suppose he had a pretty good job. Lots of perks. Tell me, why doesn’t it surprise you? Why not one of the other Americans?”
“The whiskey and the Luckies.”
“What?”
“In Vivian Elmsley’s manuscript. She said there was a bottle of whiskey smashed on the floor and an unopened carton of Lucky Strikes on the kitchen counter. It’s hardly concrete evidence of anything, but I don’t think a carton of Luckies would have stayed unopened for very long in wartime, do you?”
“Brad could have brought them.”
“Possible. But it was PX who had easiest access to the stores, PX who always supplied the goodies. The manuscript also mentioned a farewell party at Rowan Woods that night. PX must have got drunk and finally plucked up courage. He’d sneaked out of the base and brought the presents that night. One last-ditch attempt to buy what he yearned for. Gloria resisted and… Matthew only came in afterward, the poor sod. Any idea where PX was between 1945 and 1952?”
“No. I can ask Mattie to check if it’s important. You’re thinking there might have been others?”
“Possibly. Do we know anything more about him?”
“No. Mattie said she’d try to find out what she can – such as when and why he was discharged and if he’s still alive, but she doesn’t hold out a lot of hope. It’s not their official position to give out such information, but Mattie’s a mystery fan and it seems I’ve piqued her curiosity. She’s become quite an ally.”
“Good. See what you can do. Let’s see if we can link him to any other murders. How old will he be now if he’s still alive?”
“According to Mattie’s information, he’d be about seventy-five.”
“A possibility, then.”
“Could be. I’ll talk to you later.”
When Annie had hung up, Banks felt restless. Sometimes waiting was the most difficult part; that was when he smoked too much and paced up and down, bad habits from his Met days he hadn’t quite got rid of. There were a couple of things he could do in the meantime. First, he dialed Jenny Fuller’s number.
“Alan,” she said. “Don’t tell me you want to cancel?”
“No, no. It’s nothing like that. Actually, I need you to do a little favor for me.”
“Of course. If I can.”
“Didn’t you say at lunch the other day that you trained with the FBI profilers?”
“At Quantico. Yes. And you said you thought profiling was a load of bollocks.”
“Forget that for now. Do you have any contacts there? Anyone close enough to ask a personal favor?”
Jenny paused a moment. “Well, there is one fellow, yes. Why do you ask?”
Banks filled her in on the new developments, then said, “This Edgar Konig, I’d like you to ask your friend to check his record. If he’s the sort of man I think he is, the odds are that he’ll have one. DS Cabbot’s working with the military authorities, but any information they can supply us with is limited.”
“I’m sure Bill will be happy to oblige, if he can,” said Jenny. “Just let me get a pencil, then you can tell me what you want to know.”
When Banks had finished giving Jenny the details, he asked DS Hatchley to call East Anglia and find out if a US airman called Edgar Konig had ever been questioned or suspected in connection with the Brenda Hamilton murder. After that, he sat back and told himself there was no rush. Nobody was running anywhere. Even if Konig did turn out to be the killer, even if he was still alive, there was no way he could know the North Yorkshire Police were on to him after all this time.
EIGHTEEN
On Friday, the rep dropped Vivian back at her hotel a little later than she had expected. There had been a delay at the radio station when the sound technician discovered, halfway through the interview, that Vivian’s microphone was faulty. She had to do the whole thing again. It was after four o’clock when she got out of the car, and the sky looked heavy and dark, the air crackling with pre-storm tension. In the distance, she could hear hesitant rumbles of thunder and see faint lightning flashes. Even the Metropole’s facade, lovingly restored to its original orange terra cotta, looked as black as it had when she had stayed there with Charlie all those years ago.