The Silkworm(81)

Robin could only imagine how it would have felt to read her lover's depiction of her while she sat beside her dying sister's bed.

I called Pip  –  didn't I?' said Kathryn; Pippa nodded, -and told her what he'd done. I kept calling him, but he still wouldn't pick up. Well, after Angela had died I thought, Screw it. I'm coming to find you.' The brandy had given colour to Kathryn's wan cheeks. I went to their house but when I saw her  –  his wife  –  I could tell she was telling the truth. He wasn't there. So I told her to tell him Angela was dead. He'd met Angela,' said Kathryn, her face crumpling again. Pippa set down her own glass and put her arms around Kathryn's shaking shoulders, I thought he'd realise at least what he'd done to me when I was losing …  when I'd lost … '

For over a minute there were no sounds in the room but Kathryn's sobs and the distant yells of the youths in the courtyard below.

I'm sorry,' said Strike formally.

It must have been awful for you,' said Robin.

A fragile sense of comradeship bound the four of them now. They could agree on one thing, at least; that Owen Quine had behaved very badly.

It's your powers of textual analysis I'm really here for,' Strike told Kathryn when she had again dried her eyes, now swollen to slits in her face.

What d'you mean?' she asked, but Robin heard gratified pride behind the curtness.

I don't understand some of what Quine wrote in Bombyx Mori.'

It isn't hard,' she said, and again she unknowingly echoed Fancourt: It won't win prizes for subtlety, will it?'

I don't know,' said Strike. There's one very intriguing character.'

Vainglorious?' she said.

Naturally, he thought, she would jump to that conclusion. Fancourt was famous.

I was thinking of the Cutter.'

I don't want to talk about that,' she said, with a sharpness that took Robin aback. Kathryn glanced at Pippa and Robin recognised the mutual glow, poorly disguised, of a shared secret.

He pretended to be better than that,' said Kathryn. He pretended there were some things that were sacred. Then he went and … '

Nobody seems to want to interpret the Cutter for me,' said Strike.

That's because some of us have some decency,' said Kathryn.

Strike caught Robin's eye. He was urging her to take over.

Jerry Waldegrave's already told Cormoran that he's the Cutter,' she said tentatively.
 
 

 

I like Jerry Waldegrave,' said Kathryn defiantly.

You met him?' asked Robin.

Owen took me to a party, Christmas before last,' she said. Waldegrave was there. Sweet man. He'd had a few,' she said.

Drinking even then, was he?' interjected Strike.

It was a mistake; he had encouraged Robin to take over because he guessed that she seemed less frightening. His interruption made Kathryn clam up.

Anyone else interesting at the party?' Robin asked, sipping her brandy.

Michael Fancourt was there,' said Kathryn at once. People say he's arrogant, but I thought he was charming.'

Oh  –  did you speak to him?'

Owen wanted me to stay well away,' she said, but I went to the Ladies and on the way back I just told him how much I'd loved House of Hollow. Owen wouldn't have liked that,' she said with pathetic satisfaction. Always going on about Fancourt being overrated, but I think he's marvellous. Anyway, we talked for a while and then someone pulled him away, but yes,' she repeated defiantly, as though the shade of Owen Quine were in the room and could hear her praising his rival, he was charming to me. Wished me luck with my writing,' she said, sipping her brandy.

Did you tell him you were Owen's girlfriend?' asked Robin.

Yes,' said Kathryn, with a twist to her smile, and he laughed and said, "You have my commiserations." It didn't bother him. He didn't care about Owen any more, I could tell. No, I think he's a nice man and a marvellous writer. People are envious, aren't they, when you're successful?'

She poured herself more brandy. She was holding it remarkably well. Other than the flush it had brought to her face, there was no sign of tipsiness at all.

And you liked Jerry Waldegrave,' said Robin, almost absent-mindedly.

Oh, he's lovely,' said Kathryn, on a roll now, praising anyone that Quine might have attacked. Lovely man. He was very, very drunk, though. He was in a side room and people were steering clear, you know. That bitch Tassel told us to leave him to it, that he was talking gibberish.'

Why do you call her a bitch?' asked Robin.

Snobby old cow,' said Kathryn. Way she spoke to me, to everyone. But I know what it was: she was upset because Michael Fancourt was there. I said to her  –  Owen had gone off to see if Jerry was all right, he wasn't going to leave him passed out in a chair, whatever that old bitch said  –  I told her: "I've just been talking to Fancourt, he was charming." She didn't like that,' said Kathryn with satisfaction. Didn't like the idea of him being charming to me when he hates her. Owen told me she used to be in love with Fancourt and he wouldn't give her the time of day.'

She relished the gossip, however old. For that night, at least, she had been an insider.

She left soon after I told her that,' said Kathryn with satisfaction. Horrible woman.'

Michael Fancourt told me,' said Strike, and the eyes of Kathryn and Pippa were instantly riveted on him, eager to hear what the famous writer might have said, that Owen Quine and Elizabeth Tassel once had an affair.'

One moment of stupefied silence and then Kathryn Kent burst out laughing. It was unquestionably genuine: raucous, almost joyful, shrieks filled the room.

Owen and Elizabeth Tassel?'

That's what he said.'

Pippa beamed at the sight and sound of Kathryn Kent's exuberant, unexpected mirth. She rolled against the back of the sofa, trying to catch her breath; brandy slopped onto her trousers as she shook with what seemed entirely genuine amusement. Pippa caught the hysteria from her and began to laugh too.

Never,' panted Kathryn, in …  a …  million …  years … '

This would have been a long time ago,' said Strike, but her long red mane shook as she continued to roar with unfeigned laughter.

Owen and Liz …  never. Never, ever …  you don't understand,' she said, now dabbing at eyes wet with mirth. He thought she was awful. He would've told me …  Owen talked about everyone he'd slept with, he wasn't a gentleman like that, was he, Pip? I'd have known if they'd ever …  I don't know where Michael Fancourt got that from. Never,' said Kathryn Kent, with unforced merriment and total conviction.

The laughter had loosened her up.

But you don't know what the Cutter really meant?' Robin asked her, setting her empty brandy glass down on the pine coffee table with the finality of a guest about to take their leave.

I never said I didn't know,' said Kathryn, still out of breath from her protracted laughter. I do know. It was just awful, to do it to Jerry. Such a bloody hypocrite …  Owen tells me not to mention it to anyone and then he goes and puts it in Bombyx Mori … '

Robin did not need Strike's look to tell her to remain silent and let Kathryn's brandy-fuelled good humour, her enjoyment of their undivided attention and the reflected glory of knowing sensitive secrets about literary figures do their work.

All right,' she said. All right, here it is …

Owen told me as we were leaving. Jerry was very drunk that night and you know his marriage is on the rocks, has been for years …  he and Fenella had had a really terrible row the night before the party and she'd told him that their daughter might not be his. That she might be … '

Strike knew what was coming.

 …  Fancourt's,' said Kathryn, after a suitably dramatic pause. The dwarf with the big head, the baby she thought of aborting because she didn't know whose it was, d'you see? The Cutter with his cuckold's horns …

And Owen told me to keep my mouth shut. "It's not funny," he said, "Jerry loves his daughter, only good thing he's got in his life." But he talked about it all the way home. On and on about Fancourt and how much he'd hate finding out he had a daughter, because Fancourt never wanted kids …  All that bullshit about protecting Jerry! Anything to get at Michael Fancourt. Anything.'





46




Leander strived; the waves about him wound,

And pulled him to the bottom, where the ground

Was strewed with pearl …

Christopher Marlowe, Hero and Leander



Grateful for the effect of cheap brandy and to Robin's particular combination of clear-headedness and warmth, Strike parted from her with many thanks half an hour later. Robin travelled home to Matthew in a glow of gratification and excitement, looking more kindly on Strike's theory as to the killer of Owen Quine than she had done before. This was partly because nothing that Kathryn Kent had said had contradicted it, but mainly because she felt particularly warm towards her boss after the shared interrogation.

Strike returned to his attic rooms in a less elevated frame of mind. He had drunk nothing but tea and believed more strongly than ever in his theory, but all the proof he could offer was a single typewriter cassette: it would not be enough to overturn the police case against Leonora.

There were hard frosts overnight on Saturday and Sunday, but during the daytime glimmers of sunshine pierced the cloud blanket. Rain turned some of the accumulated snow in the gutters to sliding slush. Strike brooded alone between his rooms and his office, ignoring a call from Nina Lascelles and turning down an invitation to dinner at Nick and Ilsa's, pleading paperwork but actually preferring solitude without pressure to discuss the Quine case.