Breen looked at Tozer; she looked back at him. “How can you find out if anyone’s seen her?” he asked.
She pulled out a small Letts diary and turned to a page full of phone numbers.
“I could try calling. Only, I’ve not got no change.”
This time, on the way to the police station, Breen put the siren on as Tozer weaved through the traffic, cars pulling to one side.
“She’s a good driver, isn’t she? Look at them cars bloody move,” said Carol from the back of the car. She wound down the window and stuck her head out, feeling the wind in her hair.
The station was quiet. Carol sat at Breen’s desk calling her friends. “Three guesses where I am.”
Most of them were in at this time of day but not one of them had seen Izzie for the last month.
A boy who lived in Palmers Green had a photo taken in a photobooth, but he said they couldn’t really make out Izzie clearly as there were six of them all trying to squeeze into the shot. The only girl who might have had a proper photo was away in America, visiting her parents.
The girl sat at Breen’s desk, doodling.
“Were they girlfriends? You know?”
The girl nodded. “Didn’t bother me,” she said. Breen watched Carol write her name in big rounded letters and put a heart in place of the “o.” Tozer said, “You want a lift home, then?”
“Can you put the siren on again?”
“I want you to drive me to the Ezeokes’ house after,” said Breen.
“Oh. Right. God.”
“Just a minute.”
He opened his desk drawer, pulled out the envelope Devon and Cornwall police had sent him, took out the photograph of Mrs. Sullivan’s body and examined it again.
“What’s that?” said Carol.
“Nothing,” he said.
Carol-George lived with her uncle in a terraced house in Belsize Park.
“I’m home,” she shouted loudly. “I’ve got two friends with me.”
He was in the kitchen at the table with the wireless on, a thin, silver-haired man in a gray sleeveless jumper. There were Beatles pictures stuck all around the walls.
“I’m hungry,” he said, not looking at them. “You’re late.” The whites of his eyes showed as he talked; Breen saw he was blind.
“I’ll make tea in a minute,” she said, kissing him on the forehead. “Toad in the hole and gravy.”
“Delicious,” the blind man said, smacking his lips. “Introduce me to your friends, then.”
“This is Helen. I don’t know his name.”
“Cathal,” said Breen.
“They’re not any of the ones I’ve met before, are they?”
“No, Uncle.”
She put the electric kettle on. “Come here,” she said to Tozer. “I want to show you something. Back in a minute, Uncle.”
There were bits of newspapers and magazines cut out everywhere around the house, pasted to the walls. The four Beatles getting into an airplane. A headline saying “George Says I Love You Yeah Yeah Yeah.” A picture of John next to a bulldog. An old picture of the group playing in the Cavern. “The house is like a big scrapbook,” said Tozer.
“It’s OK. He doesn’t mind,” said Carol. “I think it brightens up the place a bit. Come on. I want to show you this.”
“You look after him?”
“My auntie died a couple of years ago. I moved in then. It’s better than home. Home is rubbish. Here I get to do what I want.”
She led them up to a back room on the first floor. “This is where I bring all the fans I like,” she said shyly to Tozer.
She switched the light on.
“Oh my God,” said Tozer. “It’s incredible.”
The wall was plastered, floor to ceiling, in photographs, each overlapping the other, pasted there with glue. Thousands of faces looked out at them. It must have taken her weeks. Breen realized that each Beatle had one wall. Ringo’s wall had a small sash window in it. Paul’s wall had the door they walked in through. John’s was the wall to their left.
“Wow,” said Tozer.
“My pride and joy,” said Carol.
“It’s super,” said Tozer.
“Thanks.”
“You did all this yourself?”
Carol nodded, smiling.
There was a pile of cushions in the middle of the room, from which you could look at the walls. And there were candles stuck to the floorboards with wax around the edge. Tozer walked in and stood in the middle, looking slowly round. Breen stayed by the door with Carol.
George had the wall opposite. In the middle, a large picture of George, surrounded by flowers. Breen watched her revolving slowly in the center of the room. By the time she came round to face them, her eyes looked red.
“Are you OK?” he said.
“I’m fine,” she said.
Twenty-eight
Breen rang Mr. Ezeoke’s doorbell. After a minute or so, Mrs. Ezeoke opened the door.
“Can we come in?”
She shook her head. “My husband is away. He is at a conference.”
“When is he back?”
“Tomorrow morning.”
Breen nodded. It was late; they had stayed too long at Carol’s.
“Are you sure you are well? You don’t look well to me. Have you come to ask my husband a medical question?”
“No. It’s just something to do with the case.”
“Can I offer you a Coca-Cola?”
“If it’s no trouble.”
She opened the door and led them through into the living room. “I am bored when he is not here. I do not have many friends in London. I miss my country.”
“Will you go back there after the war?”
“My husband tells everyone that we will.” She smiled. “But he has never lived there. I have. Your hospitals are full of Nigerian doctors. They all talk about how they will go back to make the country great, but they all prefer to work here.”
The living room was the same as it had been last time, boxes still unpacked, record sleeves scattered around the floor. She returned from the kitchen carrying three glasses of Coke on a tray. “I must apologize for the mess. I had meant to tidy up, but I have not got around to it yet. Sit, please.”
She sat on the sofa; he perched on a chair; Tozer sat in a modern-looking chair that looked like it came from Habitat.
“How is your husband’s war?”
She laughed. “My husband’s war. I think that is a good name for it. He believes he alone can win it from the distance of so many thousand miles.”
“He’s a very passionate man.”
“Yes. A very passionate man. We have given all we have to the war. If it was me, I would not have given so much.”
“What do you mean?”
She smiled. “I do not like this house. I do not like our new neighbors. They are not educated people. We used to have a good house. We have sold it to raise money for the committee. He says we will get our money back when Biafra wins the war. As you say, he is a passionate man.” She was silent for a while, then said, “What did you want to ask my husband?”
“It’s an odd question.”
“I expect it is odd. You are looking for a murderer. There is nothing normal about your job.”
Breen hesitated. “I have a photograph of a woman wearing a bracelet. I think it may be African. It’s like the bracelet you’re wearing now.” He had remembered her wearing it at the party. “I was just wondering if he could tell me anything about it.”
“Why can I not help? I am more African than he is. Show it to me.”
“It isn’t that simple. The bracelet is being worn by a dead woman. She committed suicide with a shotgun.”
“So?”
“So it’s a very disturbing photograph.”
“This photograph. Is it something to do with the dead girl? The one you found by our house?”
“It’s the girl’s mother.”
“She has killed herself? My God. The girl and now the mother?”
“Yes.”
“So you found out who the poor girl was?”
“Yes.”
She held out her hand. “Show me the photograph.”