Hays Mews, London
‘Emily, my God.’ Michael’s comment came the moment he entered their London home, seeing her standing before the sofa. ‘I’m so, so sorry.’ He rushed to her side and embraced her with all his strength.
‘I really don’t know what to say.’ Michael surrounded her with powerful, reassuring arms.
‘Neither do I.’ Emily pressed herself into his embrace, the physical consolation going further than words. When she came out of it, she sank into the sofa and Michael took a seat next to her, keeping her hand reassuringly contained in one of his own. He passed his other hand through her shoulder-length hair, still uncombed from the previous night’s unrest.
Around them, the remaining personnel from Homicide Command, together with the last huddle of forensics officers, busily concluded their work in the plush house. Michael’s family home at 46 Hays Mews had been a surprise gift to the couple after their marriage – as an incentive, Michael and Emily had both suspected, to ensure they regularly came back to England to visit. This morning it seemed cold and clinical, the forensics officers in their paper suits only adding to the awful ethos of a home that had become a crime scene.
Emily’s distress was apparent, and the tender flesh around her eyes made it clear that she had wept through most of the morning – though there were no tears now. For his part, Michael’s sudden sense of guilt was visible in his features. Of all nights to have chosen to stay over at the museum, stiffly catching a few hours’ sleep on the cot in his office in the name of a late night’s work and an early start.
‘I’ve run dry of tears,’ Emily announced, breaking the awkward silence. ‘It’s like my emotions have gone numb, Mike.’
‘You’ve been through a shock. God knows you’ll need some time, Em, to absorb it all.’
Her emotional state was hard to imagine. Emily and her cousin had been close, to a degree he had rarely witnessed in what amounted to semi-distant relatives, and though Michael had only known him since his own wedding, he had long since learned why Emily’s love for Andrew was so strong. He was affable, boyishly enthusiastic about everything and yet surprisingly deep, overwhelmingly caring. Michael had come to consider him his own family in more than just a legal sense, finding in Andrew the welcome brother he’d never had.
He knew his current shock would give way to a terrible grief. Emily’s must be . . .
He clutched her hand more firmly, the action the only replacement for words he couldn’t find.
‘Michael,’ Emily finally said, raising her head and angling to face him directly, ‘there’s something about this morning I can’t understand.’
He didn’t know how to answer. Loss, trauma . . . these were things that went beyond understanding.
‘The men who broke in and killed Andrew,’ Emily continued, ‘they were after the manuscript I had here in the house.’
‘You said so on the phone.’
‘They killed him . . . for a manuscript.’ The colour returned to Emily’s cheeks as she repeated her point, and it was a red that matched the anger in her words. ‘For a manuscript it makes no sense to kill for.’
Michael could see the emotions shifting in her expression: grief, anger, rage, sorrow, all cycling over her features with increasing intensity.
Suddenly, her gaze was sharper.
‘They called it a map,’ she said, speaking almost to herself. ‘A map. That was important to them.’
‘Maps attract interest, Em. Maybe they thought it would lead them to something.’ Michael tried to keep his voice supportive. ‘The thieves could have been anyone. Black-market dealers. Treasure hunters.’
The words triggered a memory, and Emily’s mind was suddenly filled with the memory of the childhood treasure hunts that Andrew had staged for her, tucking small toys and sweets into crooks in a woodshed or perching them on the branches of a tree, providing riddles in the style of Dr Seuss poems to lead her to her prize.
Her eyes filled with moisture, but she turned to Michael with resolve.
‘It makes no sense, Mike. The manuscript wasn’t a map.’
‘Wasn’t a map?’
‘It was text, nothing more.’ A tear broke over Emily’s right eyelid and rolled down her cheek, but she did not alter her gaze.
‘Em, I’m so sorry. That they would kill Andrew for a, a . . . mistake.’ It seemed to make the brutal act even worse.
Emily squeezed her eyes closed, the rage and grief almost too much; but beneath them was a distinct memory. The memory of one intruder questioning the manuscript, recognizing it was only text; and of the second man, dead certain it was more.
When she opened her eyes they were red, but determined.
‘No, it wasn’t a mistake.’
Michael tried to comprehend her defiance. ‘But if it wasn’t a map?’ He let the question linger.
Emily sat forward.
‘Sometimes there’s more to a document than meets the eye.’