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I know you’ll say I should come out, but I’ve got to find out whether Will could be persuaded to leave. I can’t come out now, I’m too close. One more week might do it.
Please, if you can, check and see whether Lin was admitted to the local hospital, I’m worried sick about her.
Robin x
‘Yeah, she definitely needs to come out,’ said Strike. ‘Next letter, I’ll tell her to wait by the rock and we’ll pick her up. Enough’s enough.’
He was worried, not only by what Robin termed Wace’s grope – what exactly did that mean? – but by the fact she’d witnessed something that was highly incriminating of the church. This, of course, was exactly what she’d gone to Chapman Farm to do, but Strike hadn’t anticipated Robin hanging around afterwards, a dangerous witness to serious wrongdoing. While he understood why she’d admitted seeing Lin with those plants, she’d seriously compromised herself by doing so, and ought to have got out immediately that had happened. There was a board on the wall behind him showing how many people had died or disappeared in the vicinity of Papa J.
‘What?’ he said, under the impression that Barclay had just spoken to him.
‘I said, what’re ye up tae this morning?’
‘Oh,’ said Strike. ‘Sacking Littlejohn.’
He brought up a photograph on his phone, then handed it to Barclay.
‘First thing he did when he got back from Greece was go and see Patterson. About bloody time I got something for all the money I’ve been shelling out.’
‘Great,’ said Barclay. ‘Can we replace him wi’ whoever took this picture?’
‘Not unless you want this office stripped of everything sellable by Tuesday.’
‘Where ye gonnae do it?’
‘Here. He’s on his way.’
‘Can I stay an’ watch? Might be my one and only chance tae hear his voice.’
‘Thought you were on Frank Two?’
‘I am, aye,’ sighed Barclay. ‘Which means I’ll be watchin’ him watchin’ Mayo for hours. If they’re gonnae make a move, I wish they’d fuckin’ hurry up.’
‘Keen to see our client kidnapped, are you?’
‘Ye know what I mean. This could go on for months.’
‘I’ve got a feeling it’s going to hot up pretty soon.’
Barclay left. Strike heard him pass Littlejohn in the doorway with pleasure: he was looking forward to this.
‘Morning,’ said Littlejohn, appearing in the doorway Barclay had just vacated, his short salt-and-pepper hair as neat as ever, his world-weary eyes fixed on Strike. ‘Can I get a coffee before—?’
‘No,’ said Strike. ‘Come in, sit down and close the door.’
Littlejohn blinked, but did as he was bid. Now looking wary, he crossed to Robin’s chair at the partners’ desk and sat down.
‘Care to explain that?’ asked Strike, pushing his phone across the desk, face up, displaying a photograph taken the previous day of Littlejohn and Patterson outside the latter’s office in Marylebone.
The silence that ensued lasted nearly two minutes. Strike, who was inwardly debating whether Littlejohn was about to say ‘I just bumped into him’ or ‘OK, fair cop,’ allowed the silence to spool through the room undisturbed. At last, the subcontractor made a noise somewhere between a grunt and a gasp. Then, which Strike hadn’t anticipated, he began to cry.
If Strike had been asked to rank everyone he’d witnessed crying recently according to how much sympathy he felt for their distress, he’d have given Bijou last place without hesitation. Now, however, he realised there was a category of weeper he despised even more than a woman who’d played a duplicitous game that had blown up in her face: a man who’d done his best to take down another person’s business, destroy that person’s reputation, undermine an investigation into men stalking a woman, and cause that woman additional fear and alarm, all of which he’d presumably done for money, but who now seemed to expect pity for being found out.
While tempted to give the man what Strike would have considered a proper reason for crying, he judged that there might be capital to be made out of what he supposed was Littlejohn’s attempt to show contrition. Strike therefore made no comment as Littlejohn sobbed, but waited to see what came next.
‘I’m in a lot of debt,’ Littlejohn finally blurted out. ‘I got myself in trouble. Online gambling. Blackjack. I’ve got a problem.’
I’ll show you fucking problems. You wait.
