‘Look, I remember standing at the end of Petticoat Lane with my father one freezing Sunday morning. All around us were men selling chickens and canaries and skinned rabbits, and my old man – who was sober for once – lifted me up so I could look into the window of Arditti’s restaurant, and he said, “There’ll always be a pane of glass between you and these fine gentlemen. Even when you think it’s gone, it will still be there.”’ As if to illustrate the point, a cyclist passing behind them waved two fingers at the diplomatic vehicle that had just cut him up on the bridge.
‘Oh, you’ve always had a chip on your shoulder about your background. You enjoy being an outsider.’
‘I made the best of it because I never had a choice,’ Bryant pointed out. ‘Your father used to take you to the Wigmore Hall for classical concerts when you were a little boy.’
‘Because he was a musician and wanted me to appreciate the finer things in life. But he never had any money. Our family was always hard up.’
‘But your parents gave you ambition. Mine just wanted me to have a job. The fear of poverty is never far away from the working-class mind, and all the plasma TVs, PlayStations and iPhones are just talismans warding off that darkness. I think Sabira Borkowski married to free herself from the fear of poverty, and now she’s paying the price.’
‘Fine, but in her husband’s eyes the situation is worsening and we’re not helping. If you take her side, you’ll be setting us against the government.’
‘You know diplomacy has never been my strong point. I think everyone already assumes we’re against the government.’
‘Then what do you suggest we do next?’
‘We go to this address.’ Bryant held up the crumpled piece of paper he had used for wrapping up his sherbet lemons.
‘I can’t read your writing.’
‘Neither can I, but don’t worry, Janice put it in my phone. The Home Office is looking into the possibility of the spying charge. Let’s talk to a more rational enemy – the woman Sabira Kasavian assaulted in Fortnum and Mason.’
11
THE GLASS
EDGAR LANG AND his wife lived in a redbrick Edwardian house with a wrought-iron veranda overlooking a wide, calm section of the Thames at Barnes, just past Hammersmith Bridge. Anastasia Lang was not at all pleased to find a pair of detectives standing in her porch, and reluctantly invited them in. She had covered the cut on her cheek with taped cotton wool, but her left eye was now turning a lurid shade of mauve.
‘I’m fully prepared to press charges; I won’t let anybody talk me out of that,’ she said with ice in her voice. ‘Not for the physical attack, but for stealing private documents.’ She waved them into an immense glass-roofed kitchen that had been added to the rear of the already substantial house. ‘I can’t offer you anything, I’ve sent the maid home.’
‘Nice gaff,’ said Bryant, walking to the wall-sized window with his hands in his pockets. ‘A very popular look, this. Classic at the front, modern at the back. Architectural hypocrisy. Should I call you Lady Anastasia?’
‘Mrs Lang will do.’
‘We’re not here to ask you about the argument. What do you think Mrs Kasavian was doing with your husband’s property in her handbag?’
‘She must have taken it from the Pegasus offices in Great Portland Street. Edgar never keeps documents anywhere else.’
‘You have children?’
‘No, we have a dog.’
‘Do any of the directors have kids?’
‘Yes, Cathy and Emma do. I can’t see what that has to do with—’
‘Do you think Sabira was being paid to spy?’ It was Bryant’s technique to keep his witness wrong-footed.
‘She’s hardly short of money, the number of new outfits she wears. No, I don’t think she was being paid to spy. I think she did it because she’s jealous. She wishes she had my husband. Do you know how they met? My husband and Oskar were in a wine bar in the city. She started talking to Edgar first and, being a married man, he turned her down, so she went after Oskar. She was on a mission to find a successful man, operating with a fairly limited arsenal and a tight time limit on her sex appeal. Eastern European girls blow up like zeppelins when they hit thirty. Edgar said no, so she switched her attention to Oskar, who at that point had been divorced for over three years and was vulnerable to a pretty face.’
May could not imagine Kasavian ever being vulnerable. ‘You’re saying Mr Lang turned her down over four years ago, so she stole papers from his office? Doesn’t that seem a little pointless to you?’