‘No. I heard him leave by the front door. But after that I took the girls back upstairs.’
‘The girls? So they were witnesses to his visit as well?’
‘Yes, they were.’
‘But if I understand you correctly, you can’t actually say for certain that Mr Francis left the premises at all.’
‘Well, I think I would have noticed if he’d been hiding here for the last week.’
‘This short conversation you had with him,’ said DCI Capes, ‘was it … friendly, amicable?’
Rachel nodded. ‘Yes, I’d say so.’
‘You didn’t argue, at all? There was no quarrel? No … lovers’ tiff?’
‘He was not my lover.’
To emphasize this point, Rachel had raised her voice, but at the same time it cracked and broke. She sank down into an armchair and put her head in her hands. DC Pilbeam immediately leaped up from the sofa. He crouched down beside her and put a comforting hand on her knee.
‘Ms Wells, are you all right? You seem rather distressed.’
‘Oh, I’m … Not really … I don’t know, I’m fine … It’s just … It’s this house,’ she said, fighting back tears. ‘I hate it here. At night it’s dark and lonely and I start to imagine all sorts of strange things. And I get worried about the girls. So worried about them. I worry that they’re not safe.’
‘Why would they not be safe?’
‘I don’t know. There’s some … danger here. I’m convinced of it.’
‘Is that what you thought when Mr Francis called?’ said DCI Capes, from across the room. ‘That he might pose a danger to those girls?’
DC Pilbeam shot him a warning glance: he did not seem to like the slightly aggressive tone of this question. His own voice was much smoother and more reassuring.
‘Ms Wells,’ he said, ‘I’m going to tell you a little bit more about this case, and why we consider it so important.’
Rachel wiped the tears away from her eyes, and nodded.
‘The fact is that Mr Francis is not the only person to have disappeared recently in this vicinity.’
‘Oh?’
‘DCI Capes and I suspect that his disappearance is linked to five others, which have all occurred in the last few weeks. First of all, Ms Josephine Winshaw-Eaves, the newspaper columnist. Then Mr Giles Trending, the CEO of Stercus Television. Then Philip Stanmore, a director of Sunbeam Foods. Then Helke Winshaw, CEO of Winshaw Clearance plc. And also Lord Lucrum, head of the Institute for Quality Valuation. Mr Francis is the sixth person to have disappeared. One thing that all these people have in common is that they either lived, or were last seen, within a few hundred yards of this street.’
DCI Capes added: ‘But that’s not all they have in common.’
‘Indeed not,’ said DC Pilbeam, rising to his feet and beginning to pace the room. ‘But this is where the theories of my colleague and myself diverge.’
‘My junior colleague,’ said DCI Capes, ‘is a remarkable young man. He believes that in order to solve a crime, you have to look at it from the political angle. Using the word in its broadest sense, that is. I have to say that in the past, his theories have produced impressive results. So that’s the approach we intend to take in this instance.’
‘All the same,’ said DC Pilbeam, ‘as we’ve learned from past experience, we must be careful not to jump to the first and most obvious conclusion, even if it looks as if —’
‘There is no mystery, Nathan, about what these six people have in common. Just because I was the one who found out the link —’
‘What is the link?’ Rachel asked, butting in before their argument spiralled out of control.
‘It’s perfectly simple,’ said DCI Capes. ‘All six of them were present at a reception held last month at Number 11, Downing Street.’ He turned to DC Pilbeam with a challenging gleam in his eye. ‘Well? Isn’t that so?’
‘Yes. Absolutely. I don’t deny it. But I still think we should look beyond that …’
‘Beyond that!’ said Capes, in a scoffing tone. ‘To what? What else is there?’
‘There is something else,’ said Pilbeam. ‘There is the Winshaw family itself.’
‘Not them again!’ said Capes. ‘How many times do I have to point it out to you? Only two of these people are members of the Winshaw family, and one of those only by marriage.’
‘True,’ said Pilbeam. ‘But look at the other connections. Mr Trending heads the steering committee of the Winshaw Prize, established in honour of Roderick Winshaw. Mr Francis began his career as a trader at Stewards’ Bank, as a protégé of Thomas Winshaw. Lord Lucrum used to work —’
‘— with Henry Winshaw, on the committee that started dismantling the NHS,’ Rachel said.
‘Quite,’ said DC Pilbeam, so absorbed in his own reasoning that he barely noticed where this contribution had come from. ‘And Philip Stanmore’s Sunbeam Foods —’
‘— is the biggest member of the Brunwin Group, established by Dorothy Winshaw in the seventies and eighties.’
‘Exactly!’ Pilbeam turned to his colleague. ‘Don’t you see? You have to dig deeper. Have you read that book yet? The one that I lent you?’
‘Which book?’ said DCI Capes.
Pilbeam raised his eyes to the ceiling. ‘The Winshaw Legacy,’ he said, ‘by Michael Owen. Everything you need to know about the family is —’
He broke off, his attention suddenly caught by an object placed on top of the grand piano. He went over and picked it up. It was a book.
‘But … this is extraordinary,’ he said. ‘This is the very book I’m talking about. How …? What …?’
Rachel reached out and took it from him, her hands shaking.
‘I’ve been reading this,’ she said. ‘A friend of mine lent it to me the other day.’
‘I see,’ said DC Pilbeam, taking a step back, and eyeing her very differently, with a new closeness. ‘And that, I suppose, is why you are so familiar with these connections I was making?’
‘Yes,’ said Rachel. ‘I suppose it is.’
‘Interesting,’ said DC Pilbeam. ‘Very interesting.’ He was staring at her, now, so intently that she was obliged to look away and blurt out, in a strong but quavering voice:
‘I have nothing to do with Mr Francis’s disappearance. Or any of these other people. I’ve got nothing to do with any of this. I shouldn’t even be in this house. I don’t belong here.’
Her lips trembled and she fell silent. But this time it was DCI Capes, rather than his younger colleague, who took pity on her and, rising to his feet, said in a kindly voice:
‘Of course you have nothing to do with it, miss. We know that. Take no notice of him and his theories.’ He tapped his colleague on the arm. ‘Come on, Pilbeam. It’s time we were off. And listen to me, for a change: I’ve already cracked this case. Have a look at the guest list for that reception, and your suspect will be there. Number 11 is the key, I tell you. It’s as simple as that!’
*
The men were gone. The house was silent again.
Rachel went back to the sitting room, opened the Gunns’ drinks cupboard and took out the bottle of twenty-year-old Lagavulin. It seemed wasteful to use such a rare and valuable whisky simply to steady her nerves, but such considerations did not weigh with her any more. She poured herself a tumbler at least three-quarters full and sat on the piano stool, drinking it slowly and methodically. From time to time she looked at the book on the piano and wondered how it had got there. She did not remember bringing it down here, but she knew her behaviour was becoming erratic and forgetful.
She had almost finished drinking the whisky when she heard a noise in the hallway. A swift, busy rustling, as of legs upon the marble tiles. She stood up and walked slowly across the room. She stopped before reaching the doorway, listening. Then, very slowly, very carefully, she crept towards the doorway and peeped round it.