It seemed like an age before Mary McDiarmuid was back from Euston station.
‘The train was late. I could hardly leave her. I took her to a café in the Hampstead Road. Actually got her to eat something. An Eccles cake and a cup of tea.’
‘Good,’ said Troy, without taking his eyes off the spread of photographs on his desk. Here a torso, there a thigh.
‘She said a lot more. I’m not sure how much of it is of any use. I could’ve taken notes, but it didn’t seem
‘It wasn’t. You did the right thing. She told you her life story, right?’
‘Right. Do they always do that?’
Troy looked up. ‘Not always, but I’ve known a lot that do. At this point they want the story to mean something.’
‘She was desperate for it to seem to real. To me at least. If she said, “Do you see?” once, she said it a thousand times. She asked me how it had all come to this. I thought better of telling her the truth. I didn’t mention the precise circumstances of Niall’s death – the buggery an a’ that – I just stated what I thought was obvious. He’d fallen in with the wrong crowd. Christ, what an understatement that was. I did start to wonder, is this what it’s like being on the Murder Squad? The problem isn’t the dead, it’s the living.’
‘It gets worse. Can you handle it?’
‘I think so.’
‘Good. Because things are going to get a lot worse before the night is over.’
‘Eh?’
Troy waved the ‘eh?’ aside, much as he’d done with Godbehere. ‘I want to put the file in order. Put it together in terms of the grotesque. Start with feet, work up to the head shots we have of those two boys, and remove anything that’s superfluous. File all the written work separately.’
‘OK. Can I ask why?’
‘It’s time.’
‘Time?’
‘Time to tackle Ted Spoon.’
‘What makes you think he’ll even see you? He’s not the sort to let coppers past the door without prior notice. Give him any notice and he’ll have his brief there, telling him not to answer a damn thing.’
Troy folded open that day’s copy of The Times, and held it out. ‘Read it aloud, Mary.’
‘ “President Eisenhower’s visit culminates this evening in a Second World War reunion dinner, given in his honour by Sir Rodyon Troy, the shadow home secretary and a wartime colleague of the President, at his Hertfordshire home Mimram House. Field Marshals Montgomery and Alexander will be among a guest list thought to total more than fifty. Also present will be Marshal of the RAF Lord Tedder, President Eisenhower’s deputy in 1944, Harold Macmillan the Prime Minister, a former political adviser at Allied HQ, Mala Caan VC, and Lord Steele, who, in 1944, led Resistance activity behind enemy lines in Normandy…”’
‘Enough. You can stop there.’
‘No, boss. I can’t. It goes on to mention the high level of security at Mimram this evening. US Secret Service, Special Branch and the Hertfordshire Constabulary.’