The Invisible Code(46)

Lucy glanced back at her with wide innocent eyes, then picked up her pink rucksack and got up from her seat. ‘Daddy, come on,’ she commanded.

All right, Longbright thought, we’ll see what your playmate Tom has to say. She checked the number for Tom’s mother, Jennifer Penry, and called her. ‘I’m afraid you’ve missed him,’ said Mrs Penry. ‘Tom’s with his grandparents.’

‘Do you have a number for them?’ Longbright asked. ‘It’s important that I speak with Tom.’

‘I’m afraid not. At the beginning of the week they flew to Bodrum and boarded a gulet – one of those traditional Turkish boats? They’re going along the coast and will be returning from Göcek, I’m not sure when. My in-laws fancy themselves as free spirits. All very annoying. I don’t suppose there’s any way of contacting them until they stop in Rhodes, and I’m not sure when that is.’

‘Don’t you have a number for Tom’s grandparents?’

‘They don’t use mobiles. I thought we had one for the skipper but it doesn’t seem to work.’

That’s convenient, thought Longbright before checking herself. Now you’re starting to get paranoid as well. Maybe it’s catching.

‘What about the travel company who arranged the trip?’

‘I have no idea who they used. You’d have to ask them.’

‘But I can’t do that.’

‘They may call in at some point. If they do, I’ll get a contact number for them.’

As Longbright headed back towards Belsize Park Tube station, she found herself checking the glistening pavement behind her.





19



METHOD IN MADNESS



ARTHUR BRYANT STEPPED into the narthex of the baroque Wren church and slowly made his way up the nave towards the altar.

It was early on Saturday morning and the place was empty. Sunlight shone through the modern design of the stained glass, dividing the marble floor into patterns as richly coloured as Tetris blocks.

Bryant consulted the church pamphlet and read:

In 1375 Edward III issued a writ in the Tower of London confirming the Charter of the Guild of St Bride. Its first purpose was to maintain a light to burn before the statue of St Brigide the Virgin. The Guild continued until 1545, when it was swept away by Henry VIII.



He folded out another section.



St Bride’s is known as ‘the cathedral of Fleet Street’. After its devastation in the Blitz the parish rose again, as it had so many times before. Little of importance that has happened in England’s story has not been echoed here in St Bride’s. From Celts and Romans to Angles, Saxons and Normans, the church has acted as a parish pump to the world.



As the journalists’ church, it facilitated the spread of information. Was that why Amy O’Connor had chosen it, to make a point?

It was certainly not her local parish. O’Connor had lived in Spitalfields. Before that she had resided in Wiltshire from the age of seven. Banbury had been up to her apartment, but the City of London officers had already conducted a search and submitted a report, and he had not uncovered anything new.

Bryant eased himself on to a wooden chair and looked up at the great stained-glass window. The entire ground floor of the church had been searched inch by inch. If O’Connor’s death had been planned somehow, why did it occur here? O’Connor’s family might have originally come from Ireland but they were Protestant, not Catholic. Amy may have visited St Bride’s before the day of her death, but no one recalled seeing her. The question rose again: Why this particular church? A parish pump to the world. A message of some kind?

There was an answer drifting like a raincloud at the back of his brain, but every time he tried to focus on it the damned thing dissipated. The perils of age, he thought bitterly, you have to think twice as hard as you did when you were younger, and it will just keep getting worse unless you force yourself to make connections. Everything is connected. Step back and see how it all fits.

Jeff Waters had come here after talking to Sabira Kasavian. It could only be because she had told him something about the O’Connor death. That had to be the link. It was nothing to do with the little girl.

But now Oskar Kasavian’s wife was stashed away in a clinic and seeing ghosts emerging from the walls. After psychiatric evaluation she would probably be on her way to a more secure unit. She refused to co-operate with the State or the police because she was scared, but her claims made no sense.

Bryant shifted on the hard seat, his old bones aching. He was used to dealing with the aftermath of death, not the problems of the living. All right, he decided, do what you do best: approach it instinctively. What do you naturally feel about Sabira Kasavian?