“You told me to.”
“Let’s try again. I’m going to count back from ten to one, and you will feel yourself sinking deeper and deeper into a state of relaxation.”
Maggie counted back and Bryant slipped into a light hypnotic state. In fact, he relaxed so much that he almost vanished into the sofa. Bryant had always been open to new ideas and beliefs. He was highly susceptible and in many ways naive, but she loved him for his refusal to become regimented in his habits and thoughts.
“You are in your office, assembling your notes and thinking about your memoirs. They are laid out in front of you on your desk. What cases are you considering for inclusion in the first volume?”
“The Palace Phantom, the Deptford Demon, the Belles of Westminster, the Battersea Cat Batterer, the Flying Dragons of Soho, the Blood Thrower of Belsize Park, the Butterfly Killer, and that strange business in the Elephant and Castle Odeon that led to the building being demolished. We called it the Fall of the House of Usherettes – ”
“Apart from the criminal cases, was there anything that would have breached the Official Secrets Act or any freedom of information rulings? Try to see yourself typing up the pages, and wondering, Should I be putting this down on paper?”
“Oh, I never think that. Put it all down, I say.”
“Didn’t you have a problem with the Ministry of Defence?”
“What kind of problem?”
“I don’t know. You came round here and told me about it.”
“When was this?”
“About seven years ago.”
“Oh, that’s right. The researchers.”
“Tell me about them.”
“They were working on a secret project down in Wiltshire. Some kind of weapon. The work had been outsourced to a private company jointly owned by US and UK executive bodies. There had been a high number of suicides over the year, research scientists, all males in their twenties, mostly Asian. None of them had shown suicidal tendencies before, and all were working on the same project.”
“What was your involvement?”
“We’d been called in by an independent think tank to look at the situation. I handled the assignment personally, as a favour. I didn’t involve John. I delivered a report, but no action was ever taken. My findings were ignored.”
“What did you find out?”
For the first time, Bryant hesitated. “I’m afraid I can’t tell you that,” he said slowly.
“How much of this did you put in your notes to Anna?”
“I’m not sure. I never include the boring bits. I probably edited it a little. Oh.”
“What?”
“I gave her the file of background material, just for fact-checking. I meant to go through it, just to make sure there wasn’t anything sensitive. But then we got involved with the Highwayman case and I didn’t get round to it.”
“How would an outsider find out what she’d read?”
“John explained it to me. If she’d grown curious enough to run searches online they would have been flagged up in the Cyber-Defence Security Department of the MoD. They could have traced the requests right back to her.”
“You think they would do that?”
“Of course. Defence of the realm. Oh, what have I done?”
“All right, you are rising back to the surface now as I count down to zero, and you will remember everything we discussed. When I reach zero you will be awake.” She brought Bryant back to full alertness.
“Don’t you see?” said Bryant, attempting to pull himself up from the couch, scrabbling for his hat and coat. “It means they knew where she kept her files. They knew she had a stomach ulcer. They knew how to get to her, and to her mother. They planted the girl in the house to look after Mrs Marquand. But they still haven’t found what they need. I wish I hadn’t come to you, Maggie. You’ve made me realize something terrible.”
“What’s that?”
“I killed her. It’s my fault Anna Marquand is dead. Defence of the realm.”
And with that, he was gone.
∨ The Memory of Blood ∧
39
Cruelty
The hunt for Gail Strong was in full swing. Renfield and Longbright were working as a team, dividing the search into quadrants. “Every home of everyone who was at the party,” Jack told the others, handing out their assignments. “Every garage, vehicle, lock-up and attic. Every private place they don’t want us to know about.”
“How are we going to get them to tell us things like that?” asked Mangeshkar.
“You’ll just have to use your charm, won’t you?” Renfield snapped. “Any sensible questions?”
“It might be worth trying offices, any place they’ve got keys to,” said Bimsley.
“Good thinking. Where’s Dan?”
“He’s over at Gail Strong’s apartment.”
“OK, Janice is going to cover the theatre. Meera, you’re always complaining about getting the crap jobs. I’m taking you off the property searches and putting you on something trickier. Go through Gail Strong’s social network sites, Twitter, Facebook, anything else she’s on, and talk to her closest friends. She might not be very likeable but she’s a smart girl; she might try to leave us a clue as to her whereabouts. See if there’s anything she’s particularly associated with apart from shopping and partying. Nicknames, passwords, emergency contacts, anything we should be watching out for.”
“But she’s got millions of online friends,” Meera complained. “It’ll take for ever.”
“That’s OK,” Renfield replied, “nobody’s going home until it’s done. We may be able to save her life.”
“It’s better than house searches,” Colin suggested cheerfully. Meera shot him a poisoned glance.
May left the briefing session and went back to the office he shared with his partner. “Why aren’t you sitting in on this?” he asked, leaning against the door jamb.
Bryant was slumped at his desk, surrounded by his beloved books. “I can’t – not while there’s this mess with Anna Marquand to sort out.”
“There’s nothing you can do right now,” said May. “I sent a beat constable from Bermondsey to keep watch on Mrs Marquand.”
“I must find that disc.”
“You don’t know where it is and besides, even if you did, you still wouldn’t know exactly who was behind her death. MoD outsourcing transfers a multitude of sins away from its centre of operations, you know that. Whoever it was will have covered their tracks by now.”
“Not if I can find the disc and let them know I have it,” said Bryant doggedly.
“I honestly don’t know how you’re going to do that, Arthur, but if I think of anything I’ll tell you. I’m going back to help them look for Gail Strong. She could still be alive. Anna’s gone. We have to prioritize.”
Gail Strong’s father hit the stratosphere when the PCU was forced to inform him that his daughter was missing, presumed kidnapped. Raymond Land locked himself in his office to field the endless unhelpful calls from officials. Gail Strong’s father had appointed various senior officers with the Met and the City of London to take immediate action and do something, anything, but nobody could tell them exactly how they might help. Whitehall was able to dam up press interest, but nobody knew how long that would last. Once the paparazzi regulars who stalked her street realized that she had disappeared, it would only be a matter of minutes before the story hit the internet.
Bryant sat at his desk and told himself to snap out of it. John was right; sometimes his partner shamed him. Arthur knew that the living took precedence over the dead. Anna could not be brought back, but perhaps Gail Strong could. He was convinced that the answer was right before him; there was something he had seen and missed, something right in front of his tired blue eyes.