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‘Oh,’ said Robin. ‘But we can’t approach her, can we? Not if she’s that fragile.’
Strike said nothing.
‘Strike, we can’t,’ said Robin.
‘You don’t want justice for Deirdre Doherty?’
‘Of course I do, but—’
‘If Brewster wanted to keep what she witnessed private, why draw it and post it on a public forum?’
‘I don’t know,’ said Robin distractedly. ‘People process things differently. Maybe, for her, that was a way of letting it all out.’
‘She’d have done better to let it out to the bloody police, instead of doing drawings and moaning about how miserable she feels to Prudence.’
‘That’s not fair,’ said Robin heatedly. ‘Speaking as someone who’s experienced what goes on at Chapman Farm—’
‘I don’t see you sitting on your arse feeling sorry for yourself, or deciding you’ll just draw pictures of everything you witnessed—’
‘I was only in for four months, Flora was there five years! You told me she was gay and forced to go with men – that’s five years of corrective rape. You realise that as far as we know, Flora might have had kids in there that she was forced to leave when they chucked her out?’
‘Why didn’t she go back for them?’
‘If she had the full-on mental breakdown Henry described to you, she might have believed they were in the safest place: somewhere they’d grow up with the approval of the Drowned Prophet! Everyone comes out of that place altered, even the ones who seem all right on the surface. D’you think Niamh would have ended up married to a man old enough to be her dad if her family hadn’t been smashed up by the church? She went for safety and a father figure!’
‘But you’re happy for Niamh to never to know what happened to her mother?’
‘Of course I’m not happy,’ said Robin angrily, ‘but I don’t want it on my conscience if we tip Flora Brewster into a second suicide attempt!’
Now regretting his tone, Strike said,
‘Look, I didn’t mean to—’
‘Don’t say you didn’t mean to upset me,’ said Robin through gritted teeth. ‘That’s what men always say when – I’m angry, not sad. You don’t get it. You don’t know what that place does to people. I do, and—’
Strike’s mobile rang again.
‘Shit,’ he said. ‘Abigail Glover. Better take this.’
Robin looked away at the passing traffic, arms folded. Strike answered the call and switched it to speakerphone, so Robin could listen.
‘Hi.’
‘’I,’ said Abigail. ‘I got your message, about press.’
‘Right,’ said Strike. ‘Sorry to be the bearer of bad tidings, but as I said, I don’t think there’s any immediate—’
‘I wanna ask you somefing,’ said Abigail, cutting across him.
‘Go on.’
‘Did Baz Saxon come an’ see you?’
‘Er – yeah,’ said Strike, deciding honesty was the best policy.
‘That fucker!’
‘Did he tell you himself or…?’
