“Don’t try and break in.”

“I won’t.”

“Stay where you are.”

“I’m staying here, outside the window. I’m not going to try to enter the house. I’d just like to speak to you. It would be really helpful to know who I’m talking to.”

A pause.

“What did you say your name was?”

“DCI Simon Serrailler.”

“Who got you here?”

“Someone called us to say they had heard screams.”

“She’s fine. I told you. She’s asleep.”

“Who is asleep? Can you just tell me that?’

“She’s OK.”

“And you?”

“Not. Not OK.”

“What’s wrong?”

“Lizzie.”

“Is that Lizzie you have with you?”

“Lizzie is dead.”

“I see. Can you tell me who is with you?”

“Why?”

“I need to know if they’re all right. Is it Miss Fitzroy? Is she all right?”

“She’s all right.”

“Why won’t you tell me your name? I’m Simon, you—”

“I’m not a bloody imbecile, you told me your name once, don’t bloody talk to me like that.”

“I’m trying to get you to tell me your name, that’s all.”

“OK, OK. Max. Max, Max, Max, Max, Max, Max, Max c Shit. MAX.”

“Thanks. Max.”

“Max Jameson.”

He sounded weary for a second. Weary enough to give in? He might have had enough.

“All right, Max c is there any reason why you won’t let me inside there?”

“She’s asleep.”

“Who is?”

“She is. I don’t want to disturb her.”

“Fine. We needn’t. So long as I can make sure she’s all right—you’re both all right—we can let her sleep.”

“She’s fine. Lizzie isn’t, Lizzie’s dead, but she’s fine.”

“Tell me about Lizzie, Max.”

“Lizzie.”

He said the name as if it were strange to him. Experimentally.

“Lizzie,” he said again.

“Yes. Tell me about her. Will you?”

“She’s dead. What’s to tell? She died.”

“Max, I’m sorry.”

“Of course you’re not, you didn’t know her, how could you be?”

“Because you sound distressed.”

“Distressed.”

“Yes.”

He laughed again, a short, dry, hard little laugh. “Fuck it, you don’t know.”

“So tell me.”

But then the man’s hand reached out briefly to close the window. The curtain had scarcely parted.

Serrailler waited. The bungalow was again wrapped in the same, dreadful pall of silence. He stood for ten minutes but there was not the slightest further sound or movement.

He went to the letter box, pushed it open and called out Max Jameson’s name, asked him to reply, to come back and talk. Silence.

He went back up the path through the shrubs and fruit trees.

“Guv?”

He shook his head.

It was going to take a long time. He had assessed the situation incorrectly. He headed into the close. They had thrown a cordon round the area and, outside it, people were gathering to watch, drawn as always and as if by some magic force to a scene of potential calamity.

He spoke to the Super. Was the situation in hand? More or less. Was it likely to escalate? Hard to tell. He still had no idea why the man was holding whoever it was inside the house, or what he wanted or hoped to achieve. How dangerous was he? Hard to tell.

It was all nebulous, the most frustrating and yet, curiously, potentially the most interesting sort of situation and one which Simon was gripped by and determined to resolve. Who was this man? Who was with him? Who was Lizzie? Was Lizzie dead in there? Did “asleep” mean “dead”? He would tease the truth out, little by little, moving carefully and tactfully. He wanted to know. This was not some crude criminal act of violence, the stupid game of an idiot off his head on crack. It was not so obvious.

It was not obvious at all.

“I think it may take some time but there’s no threat beyond the bungalow, so far as I can tell. He’s isolated himself there, it’s easily surrounded and easily contained.”

“We’ll stay back out of the way then.”

“Yes. I’d like to know if there have been any sudden or violent deaths in the last few weeks with a victim called Lizzie, possibly Lizzie Jameson but I’m not certain, RTAs, suicides c And where is the Reverend Jane Fitzroy? Has she been to work? Anyone seen her?”

“Anything else?”

“Not yet.”

“Has he asked for anything?”

“No. We haven’t got that far c not sure if we will. I’m not sure of anything much but I’m going back down there now. He’s had a few minutes to think.”

How strange, Serrailler thought, this garden, half wild towards the bottom, everything flowering in the sun, birds, insects, sweet smells. How strange. In the middle of it all, there is this small silent stone bungalow and inside c

What?

“Max?” he called quietly. Then he lifted the letter box and raised his voice. “Max? Will you answer me?”

The sun shone on his back as he crouched there, warming him.

Eighteen

She had slept again. How could she have slept? To sleep you have to feel safe and she thought she had never felt less safe in her life. Perhaps, in some strange way, she trusted Max not to harm her simply because he was beside himself with grief and confusion but no longer full of rage.

He had put a blanket over her. She stretched her legs and arms to ease her cramped muscles, then turned. The curtains were still drawn but the sun was behind them, filling the room with a blotted, honey light. And the sun caught something, making it shine. Jane sat up.

There were three knives laid out neatly on the coffee table, two large kitchen knives, and one small new paring knife which she had bought a couple of days before. The sun flashed against the metal.

Max was sitting in a chair beside the window, watching her. “Don’t touch them,” he said.

She felt a lurch of sickness. She had slept, innocently, trustingly, for how long? While he had laid out three knives beside her.

“What c?” Her throat was dry with fear. “What is happening? Why have you c what are the knives doing there?”

He got up and she shrank back into the blanket but he did not come near her, only turned to lift the corner of the curtain very slightly and peer out.

It was only when he turned back that she realised she would have had time to snatch one of the knives.

“Someone was there just now,” he said, his voice normal, pleasantly conversational, “but they seem to have gone.”

“Who?”

He shrugged.

“Max, people will know I’m missing c they’ll be coming down here to look for me. I had a meeting at the hospital, I should have been to sort something out in the Dean’s office c people will c”

“It seems they already have. Don’t worry, they won’t come back.”

“Did you speak to someone?”

“Yes.”

“Who?”

He shrugged again.

“I don’t understand what you want. Please, please just tell me what this is about.”

“You know.”

“Lizzie c yes, I do know that, but I don’t see why keeping me here will help you. It can’t bring Lizzie back, you have to accept that. Whatever you do to me can’t change what has happened. I have to say this. Even if you c stab me with one of those, it won’t change what has happened.”

“No.”

“Then what are you doing?”

“Getting even with God.”

“Do you believe in God?”

“No. But you do.”

“That doesn’t make sense.”

“None of it makes sense. Death doesn’t. Lizzie being dead doesn’t.”

“So by holding me here you somehow think c what? I’m trying to get to wherever you are but it’s quite hard.”

“You never will. You can’t.”

“How do you feel?”

“What?”

“You’re angry and distressed, I know, but how else? Does your mind feel c are you thinking clearly?”

“Oh yes.”

“Because I don’t see that.”

“No.”

She fell silent. He looked grey and dishevelled, his eyes were dull. There seemed to be a weariness rather than any craziness or rage about him.

God, give me the right words.