When they emerged from the foreign country at the back of the apartment, Kolankiewicz had taken the body and his men were dusting for fingerprints. For the first time, Troy noticed the bottle of Hine Armagnac on the small, pedestal table next to the chair in which Viktor had died, and the empty glass that stood with it.
He declined to ride back to the Yard, and walked along the river in the direction of Westminster. It might give him time to gather his thoughts before he faced Rod. The House was not sitting. Troy would call at his office; there was a fifty-fifty chance he’d be there, and if he wasn’t, he’d take the Underground up to Hampstead. Above all, he did not want to call him on the phone. He could imagine no worse way for Rod to find out Viktor was dead. He had to tell him himself. He had to tell him face to face.
“I thought you were in Cornwall with the gorgeous Anna.”
Rod was in shirtsleeves, back to window, scribbling something at his desk, a cooling September breeze wafting across the terrace from the Thames.
Troy waited till he looked up again, stacked his papers, and shoved them to one side. Rod was about to indulge in one of his big man’s sprawls of relaxation, a cat stretch, chest out, back arched, fingers locked behind his head.
Troy said, “Viktor died last night.”
The fingers never met behind the head; Rod almost slumped back to the desk, but righted himself with a jerk to stand up straight. A quick turn to the window, then a turn back to Troy, his eyes already brimming with tears.
“How?”
“It looks as though he shot himself.”
Rod turned away again, rummaged in his trouser pocket for his hanky, and honked loudly into it.
“Freddie, you say ‘looks’ . . . ?”
“A copper’s caution, Rod. Jack’s been looking into this for less than eight hours. We have nothing but the ostensible to go on. At the moment looks is everything. And, of course . . . I can’t think why Viktor should want to kill himself.”
“And you have to ask me if I can?”
“It can wait.”
Rod sat down. Troy took the chair on the other side of the desk. Rod took a bottle and two glasses out of the bottom drawer and poured brandy for both of them. It was the same mark Viktor had used as Dutch courage.
Rod sipped his in silence for a few moments, wiped each cheek with the back of his hand.
“You know, I met him that day you saw me off at St Pancras in 1940. He was in the same compartment. Don’t think I noticed him for ages. Not sure he spoke until we’d passed Derby. Inauspicious beginning. I suppose all beginnings are. Cid swears I actually asked her to dance a second time without recognizing her from the first. And that’s the woman I’m spending the rest of my life with. I knew within a couple of weeks that I’d know Viktor the rest of my life . . . or his.”
Rod downed the rest of his brandy, corked the bottle, and stood up.
“It’s a day to get pissed, but not here. Knock that back and I’ll drive us home. Sooner or later you’ll feel like asking me questions and I’ll feel like answering them.”
The drive to Hampstead was in Rod’s “blob” car.
“Viktor was scathing about this,” Troy reminded him. “The poached egg.”
“He was scathing about a lot of things,” Rod said. “If you knew Viktor, you had to learn to take the rough with the smooth.”