Death and Disclosure

by Idratherbereading29

Scotland Yard detective Paul Usher is busy: a historian and ghost-writer of a former British PM has been brutally murdered, his pretty but enigmatic girlfriend who seems to attract violent deaths in her vicinity is driving Paul crazy, lots of spies and thugs are roaming about in London, and a very dead handsome young man keeps popping up. Can Paul make sense of this chaos?

Prologue

Autumn 2003 upstate New York

The year's worst thunderstorm was raging in the town of Ithaca near Lake Cayuga. Trees were bending over, almost doubling on themselves and the sky was pitch-black.

A young man lay on the ground broken. He had no idea how the events of the last hour had come about, the last thing he remembered was leaving his office after another busy and frustrating day; his firm was definitely going to fold if he didn't manage to get another client soon. He didn't understand what was happening, even though he'd been told often that times were hard, and businesses had to cut back costs and couldn't afford to go in for the expensive buildings he designed. Well, maybe he really should take up that offer and remove his firm to Toronto after all. He hated the idea of starting again and was quite sure that his wife wouldn't take too kindly to moving either – she kept talking about getting back into teaching and wanted Cornell near.

Deep in thought he had unlocked his car, and then the nightmare had started. He had looked forward to a nice quiet evening at home, a good dinner prepared by his wife and finally some warmth and encouragement. That had not happened.

Instead he seemed to be trapped in some nightmare of horror and pain. Whoever the man was who had come after him, it was clear that he meant to kill him, though what he had done to deserve this he simply didn't know. When he had whispered his wife's name, the stranger had become even more enraged, and the pain had gotten worse. By now he was too numb with pain to even care. He closed his eyes, waiting for more injuries, his hands clawing the ground in a vain attempt at getting some hold.

The last injury had been so absurd – a bite, really?! – that he still hadn't wrapped his head around it, but after that had occurred he hadn't been able to move any longer. When he finally opened his eyes again to the sky he saw the weight of the crane come crashing down on him.

1

London. Three years later – flat of Dr Jeffrey Lynd

The burly man sat down at his desk with a sigh. He had put off work again until it was almost too late, but Sunday evening definitely called for some preparation for Monday's tutorials, even if they weren't going to be that stressful. He really should find another job. Teaching had never been right for him, and basically he had kept at it to make ends meet. Now it had become clear that it didn't even suffice to do that. He was as bored by undergraduates as they were by him – not a good starting point to get students interested in history. But they were just so …lazy and not interested in politics at all. How could you get them working about the systems of government in the past when they didn't even understand or care for the system of government that decided about their grants? Well, maybe this ghost-writing thing could get him into a different line of work, which did not include young people who kept reminding him of his failure as a parent. For that to work however, he would definitely have to be good, and that meant sorting out the problems with the archive. He made a note to call that officious idiot again after his tutorial tomorrow. Tutorial, right, better prepare that as well. He shook his head and got to work, chiding himself for not starting earlier. Even though he had probably found a way to, well, supplement his income just enough to stay out of trouble, he knew he needed to find a more permanent way to make money if he didn't want to be stuck in financial problems forever.

Concentrating still was hard. Last night's quarrel with his friend had gotten to him – he still didn't know why – and the fact that for once she had not phoned him to make up had been absolutely distracting, not to mention that he had not had a hot meal that day and was becoming decidedly grumpy. This had been the second confrontation in two weeks. Last Sunday she had become so angry about some minor thing (he couldn't even remember what it was) that she had actually thrown an onion at him. They should definitely reconsider their relationship. He shook his head: How could such a small person be so hugely infuriating? One thing he knew for sure was that the fragile innocence she projected was just a façade.

At least, he wasn't going to be alone from Wednesday onwards, he smiled, looking forward to the visitor who had announced herself. Then he bent down again over his desk and tried to concentrate on undergraduate work.

With a light click the door to his flat in the middle class neighbourhood of Maida Vale was opened, and someone entered his home.

After ten minutes the noise level in the flat changed considerably, Lynd was screaming with pain and fear at what had come down on him from God knows where. He had never imagined he could inspire this kind of rage and violence and started wishing for death to come quickly. In his last conscious moments he discovered a strength he had never known he possessed though, hoping his better nature would prevail… man's better nature would prevail… anything. He was disappointed, one more time.

Kensington, the next day

The stalker was getting worried. The two men who had gone into the house across the road had suspiciously looked like policemen.

When they came out again, she was with them. He tensed, ready to cross the road in case…

No, she got into their car with them voluntarily and was gone. He waited for another hour, stock-still in the shadow of her doorway, seething with anguish and frustration.

What had she done now?

2

She had felt watched for the longest time. As far as she could remember, the impression that somebody was out there taking care of her had been with her, even though she'd never been sure why.

Today however was a different story. Sitting in the Yard's interview room facing what was surely a two way mirror she was sure there were people behind that glass wall – watching.

She was still wondering what had made them bring her here in the first place. When she had returned from town that afternoon they had been waiting at her doorstep. She had been surprised but then remembered the note she had seen and assumed that this was about the newest break-in at the institute. Now however she wasn't sure about that anymore and she was debating if it wouldn't have been a better idea to insist on having a solicitor present only to wonder again why the hell that should be necessary at all. She was a historian, a medievalist for Christ's sake. Nobody got dragged to Scotland Yard for putting down a wrong footnote or finally managing to decipher a diploma. Only: people didn't usually see the inside of that building about some stolen computers either. There must be some misunderstanding.

The men on the other side of the mirror were indeed watching the slight woman in the other room.

Naomi Downey was small, 5' 3" probably, and quite slender. Unruly long dark hair looking almost too heavy for the small person framed a pale heart-shaped face. They knew she was 33 and in contrast to current fashion made no effort to look like a teenager. She wore little make-up, if any, and was dressed in a long light grey skirt with matching jacket, both so unobtrusively well-cut that they must have been expensive. A dark red silk blouse completed the ensemble. There must be money involved here, but they'd already guessed that from the address where they had picked her up after having just missed her at the college. No jewellery though, apart from a silver ring on her right middle finger. She wore brown high-heeled boots, apparently in an effort to appear taller. All in all the impression was that of a very fragile person.

"Do you think she's for real?" one of the policemen was asking. "Nobody can be that naïve, not in this world!"

The younger man in the room shrugged his shoulders. "You know, I'm really not sure," he said, keeping his eyes on the other room. "Maybe she actually doesn't know what's going on. She's such an egghead, and they tend to be quite literal."

"You think she's soft in the head?"

"No, just the opposite. Those people tend to get caught up in their own little worlds, and when you told her she was wanted to assist the police with their investigation, she probably took you at your word."

The barrel-shaped man was sceptic. "Ok, then let's start this whole thing so we can get it over with."

The sudden scraping of chairs turned Naomi's attention back toward the room. Both men sat down at the table, switched on the tape-recorder, gave their names and ranks and the time.

The older, Brian McNair, started the interview: "Ms. Downey, can you tell us your whereabouts on last Sunday evening between 7 and 10 o'clock?"

"Yes, of course, I was at home, reading." She looked from one to the other slightly flustered. She had not expected to have to provide an alibi. For what? And hadn't the break-in been last week? So there was something else.

"You wouldn't have happened to have company at that time?"

She raised her eyebrows. "No, not really, but I can tell you the matter."

"The matter of what?" Now McNair was interested.

"Of my reading of course. You see, once it was thought that in the twelfth century the Roman Senate …"

The younger policeman interrupted at this juncture: "Ms. Downey, did you have an argument with Jeffrey Lynd in the Swan and Eagle on Saturday evening?" They had been told the name of the victim's usual pub by his neighbour, the one who'd found him. The publican had told them about a rather intense quarrel between the victim and a woman he had with him. It had been his impression that she was his girlfriend, he had seen them there before and had described her concisely. To find her then had been a piece of cake, she was on the faculty photo in Lynd's study.

"Yes, how do you know about that?" Was there really someone watching her steps? Naomi frowned.

"Never mind. Would you mind telling us, what that was about?"

"Well, if you're really interested", she looked from face to face, both nodding, "it was about faculty policy. You see, Jeff wanted to vote for keeping on the visiting American scholar, and I was dead against it, that Clark person being so superficial and only interested in chasing undergraduates and even giving our secretary the eye… and of course academically he's a real bust. The last original thought he had must have been in the Stone Age." Oops, she really ought to think more before talking, now she'd been giving away faculty secrets again. Hopefully, the police weren't really interested in that kind of gossip. Judging from their unsatisfied expressions, she still hadn't been helping them much.

The younger detective decided to attack her head on. "Ms. Downey, would it surprise you if you found out Dr. Lynd had been found dead in his flat this morning?"

The phrasing of the question startled her. She stalled. "I don't know what you mean – dead? Jeff? Are you talking about murder?"

They certainly were. His neighbour had noticed there was something wrong when his dog wouldn't budge from the door to the flat and had called the caretaker after getting no answer. Together they had gone in, noticed the smell of dried blood at once and called the police. They'd had some trouble getting the dog to leave, but other than that it looked an ordinary crime scene, albeit a bloody one.

"Ms. Downey, Dr. Lynd's neighbour declared she saw you leaving the flat Sunday night." Brian McNair sounded all bored.

"Which neighbour?" Naomi asked back exasperatedly.

"A Mrs. McKitterick, Flat 9b, gave evidence that she saw you leave Flat 9a in a very agitated state after 9 o'clock on Sunday evening. After a long loud quarrel."

Naomi snorted impatiently and took a deep breath, obviously preparing to say something.

The younger detective leaned towards her. "Are you sure you don't want to call a solicitor?"

His colleague looked at him thinking he must have lost his mind. He hurried to intercede: "Ms. Downey, you had an argument with your boyfriend Lynd, you were seen leaving the flat of the murdered man on the night of the deed, are you sure there is nothing you want to tell us at this point?"

"Perhaps you'd like to tell me some things first," stated in a curiously flat voice, "for example how Jeff was murdered, and how – apart from that ridiculous woman – you got the idea I had anything to do with it. Unless you start telling me things, I'm going to shut up for now – and I'd like to make a phone call to my solicitor." She crossed her arms and started tapping her foot impatiently until one of the detectives handed over a mobile. Then she quickly entered a number and started a low conversation with the party at the other end – not before she had made clear her need for privacy.

Both detectives left the room – in a foul mood. This had definitely not gone the way they had planned it. It had seemed so easy at first, lovers' tiff, crime of passion.

An hour later, they felt as if they'd been hit by a bus.

By the time Naomi Downey's solicitor had finished, they were starting to wonder themselves whatever had caused them to follow that line of inquiry.

"Phew", Brian McNair sighed, "Who would have thought the little professor had that kind of clout behind her. My, my, Stanislaus Vachewsky, that guy only comes in when there is a lot of money to be made. Better start looking in other directions as well – quickly."

"We'll need to do that, I agree, but you know, Brian, I'm not totally sure we're barking up the wrong tree here," his younger colleague said thoughtfully.

"Ah, so you noticed the hesitation, too." Brian chuckled. Paul Usher certainly was a bright young thing, even if he'd only been on the force for such a short time.

Brian had not been too chuffed to be paired with the Yard's latest US re-import via Quantico. He was still wondering why the FBI hadn't wanted to keep their graduate longer than three years. But maybe one of the Yanks had seen the devious spark of anarchy in Paul's light green eyes and not been fooled by the British accent and the schoolboy looks.

Brian wondered if Paul's family connections would be enough to keep him rising in the Yard with this kind of personality. He could understand though why he had not started in what had been his father's old department, even though they probably tried recruiting him straight from university. Nobody would like to be known as the son of the former head of MI6, George Usher, who had somehow managed to keep things together and secret during the last heat of the Cold War. Big shoes to fill there, Brian thought. It seemed that Paul had even fled to the US to get out of his father's shadow and got hired by the FBI as an analyst.

There were also rumours though that he had been a bit of a loose cannon after his divorce; there was talk of drink and women. Well, from what Brian had seen so far he seemed totally committed to work, maybe even too much so.

Right now Paul had settled in his chair and was about to read the file again. He had propped up his long jeans-clad legs on an open drawer. After a hectic search he found his reading glasses in the pocket of the black jacket he wore over a dark blue shirt. He put them on and started reading. After a while he ruffled his short dark brown hair. Something did not add up here, and he hadn't needed the fancy solicitor to tell him. It just looked like too long a line of coincidences. He decided to check up a little further on their only suspect.

At the same time Brian had started to enumerate the facts of the case so far once more: Dr. Jeffrey Lynd, 50, historian, speech writer and about to become ghost writer for a former Prime Minister, had been found in his flat in Maida Vale with a number of injuries, quite a few of them deadly, consistent with either a fight or a bad fall down the spiral staircase in his post-modern flat. Suicide could definitely be ruled out, the preliminary report said. There had been no sign of a break-in or a robbery either, so Lynd must have let the assailant into his place willingly. From the injuries Brian judged that he had certainly had reason to regret that decision.

The suspect, who was known to be the victim's girlfriend – without an alibi, but with a motive – had been seen leaving the flat in an agitated manner on the evening in question. Circumstantial evidence, granted, but people had been in the dock for less.

On the other hand – as the eloquent Pole had quite succinctly pointed out – there were a few questions to consider, above all the 'how'. How could the pixie-ish Downey have hurt the burly Lynd even if a lot of anger was supposed? That idea required quite a lot of imagination. She wouldn't have been able to push him, let alone throw him down the stairs, and she certainly couldn't have beaten him up like that.

Yet again, if she had the money or the connections to make Vachewsky appear out of thin air, she might be able to hire someone to do the deed for her. Only – that assumed an amount of premeditation not entirely justified by an academic quarrel, so they would definitely have to check out what she had told them about that, or, better, get a witness to the quarrel. So far Mrs McKitterick had not come across with what exactly she had heard that night, apart from things thrown and sounds as if the furniture was being pushed around the place roughly, but both Brian and Paul were sure that she had had her ear glued to the wall. Whatever point you came at the problem, one thing became clear: More information was needed.

"Any luck so far?" Brian asked Paul. Receiving no answer, he looked up: His partner was completely absorbed, but not with the file – that had been put aside long time ago – but with his computer. Another thing Brian wasn't happy about. In his mind, Paul relied far too much on bits and bites – research he called it. On their last case he had spent long nights alone on the internet, researching. Brian wasn't absolutely sure that their surprising breakthrough didn't owe something to an activity he'd heard about – hacking. However, in the end their proof had added up in court. Still, Brian felt uncomfortable. Had the Yanks sent them back a rotten egg after all?

"Eh, partner, any luck so far?" He repeated.

Paul looked up – momentarily confused, as if he'd forgotten where he was. Then he caught himself and answered Brian's question. "What do you say, you check out a little more about Lynd, while I have another go at that Downey angle? We also need to find, if there were other women involved."

"Other women? Did you see the man?" Brian was incredulous. It wasn't as if he was an Adonis himself, but neither had Lynd matched that description. He had been quite tall though, which might have appealed to someone as small as Ms Downey, and he had been an intellectual, which certainly made him attractive.

Paul merely shrugged. "You never know, Downey isn't bad-looking, and she's quite a bit younger than him. Maybe he's got something we don't know about."

"I find it easier to believe that the faculty politics provide more of a motive."

Paul grimaced. "You might be right there as well. It looked deceptively easy, that may not necessarily be true. We also need to find out who stands to profit from his death."

"Ok, I get it, start from the beginning." Brian sighed and got up. "I'll be talking to that woman again then." He also had another idea. Maybe once the unfortunate other neighbour had calmed down again – they had had to call a doctor for him that morning – he could tell them something about the quarrel. He had sounded a much more rational person, but the sight of the battered body and his dog's reaction to that had sent him into shock, so they'd have to wait for the sedative to wear off.

Paul breathed a sigh of relief once his partner had left the office. Brian was a good detective with a lot of experience and an amazing insight into human nature and the darker side thereof. He had been working homicide for twenty years now and had to his superiors' surprise always been content with being the assistant to whoever they put in charge. He liked the excitement and the satisfaction of catching the bad guy, but he didn't want to be settled with the bureaucracy and the responsibility of the investigating detective.

Paul liked his partner, he knew he was absolutely dependable, but somehow this ham-fisted person managed to make any room feel cramped. Obviously an asset for questioning criminals who tended to want out of the room as quick as possible, even if it meant a confession.

It hadn't worked on Downey, though. She had just seemed resigned once she got their line of questioning, as if she'd been there before. This had caught Paul's attention. It was so atypical for a first time offender, as she surely must be – a lecturer in Medieval History at King's College. So he had wanted to start checking out all his usual (and unusual) resources about her. Now with Brian out, he was free to follow his course. His fingers were flying across the keyboard. He kept searching late into the night. When he finally shut down his terminal, it was becoming light outside. His eyes were raw, his throat parched, and his back felt as if he'd been chopping wood for a week. He was even more confused than he'd started out.

He left a note for Brian, stating that he'd be following his angle on the story – not a complete lie, he would start after a few hours of sleep. After he'd let himself into his empty flat, he drank two bottles of water and collapsed onto his bed fully dressed. He fell asleep with Naomi's face in front of his eyes.

3

Earlier in the evening Naomi was making pasta for Stan Vachewsky in her South Kensington house, anything to distract herself. While her friend was wolfing down the lion's share of the food, she had a glass of Pinot Grigio to calm herself down.

So it was happening again. Should she tell Stan or would he just think she was becoming paranoid? She thought about it while she listened to her friend talk, welcoming the sound in her empty house.

"I still can't imagine how they got the idea of arresting you of all people for GBH", Stan was mumbling through a mouthful of spaghetti, "Stands to reason that your way of killing someone would be far subtler, hitting them around the head with a volume of English Historical Documents would only be the last resort. Your weapon of choice would be talking them to death."

Naomi took up the barter against her will: "Yes, boring them to distraction with genealogies or the mnemonic turn on interpreting medieval sources." She decided not to tell him about the string of violent death that seemed to have been following her for the last 15 years.

Stan pushed his empty plate away. "That was great; I don't know what Nick can have been thinking leaving me alone without food for tonight." His partner had gone to a talk on Treating Diabetes and – as he had told Naomi on the phone the day before – had seen it fit to leave Stan a light salad in the fridge, stating that Stan was starting to get 'pudgy'. Apparently that had not met with approval. "Honestly, Naomi, you really needn't worry about it, you say your relationship with Jeff was okay and nobody would really kill anyone over obscure faculty politics, not unless they're of unsound mind at the time, which, I think, you've never been."

"What do I do about that ridiculous woman next door?"

"Well, if she's as daft as you say then I'm reasonably sure other people have had similar experiences with her. She also sounds as if she could be very easily influenced, so if push comes to shove we can rattle her about the exact date and that's it. As I said, don't worry!" He smiled at her affectionately.

They had met at Oxford when they were students years ago, the joke of the halls with Stan's bean-pole like stature and small Naomi belligerently taking the then still shy young man's part in most conflicts.

After Stan had told her he preferred men, Naomi had regarded him competent enough to introduce all her dates to him first – who passed muster there was in the running. Stan returned the favour. They'd lost touch for a while after university, but when Naomi returned to England two years ago, they had caught up again where they'd left off in the 90s. Theirs had never been a physical involvement, but always a good friendship, marred only by the fact that Naomi's late husband had been rather intolerant where homosexuals were concerned – but Stan held no grudges.

"Sorry, darling, early start tomorrow," he got up to leave.

"Right, where is he taking you again?"

"Walking in the Lake District, would you believe it?" Stan tried to sound as if he was suffering, but Naomi was not fooled. He was looking forward to a few days away from his desk, even if it meant physical exertion.

"At least you'll have your doctor with you", she smiled at him. Nick definitely was doing Stan good.

"Oh yes, as soon as I turn back into a child and manage to acquire some complicated disorder, I'll be perfectly treated." Nick was a highly specialised paediatrician. "Will you be alright on your own tonight?" He checked her expression. She wasn't telling him something, he knew that. He was equally sure he wouldn't get it out of her if she didn't want that.

"Yes, don't worry about me, I've been alone before."

Naomi saw him to the door. When she closed the door behind him she checked her locks several times, then stood at her study window in the dark looking out into the night. After a while she felt safer – why, she couldn't say. Again she felt watched, but couldn't say by whom, only that it was no threat.

When she was brushing her teeth that night she thought "I must be going insane, my boyfriend gets himself beaten to a pulp in his own house, and I'm not feeling a thing; I'm a suspect in a murder case, get out on a technicality, go home and stay in an empty house and still feel safe – maybe something's wrong with my mind after all. At least it's good that Jeff and I kept our break-up a secret." Their love had simply got lost along the way, in the end it had been a mere convenience, easier to simply go on seeing each other, so busy with their respective work, too busy to actually start out again in the dating jungle. Besides, there had been no one else. Good friends with a little more. It had been a good idea to have kept separate households, it made many things easier.

She already started berating herself for not calling him on Sunday after their squabble the night before. When he hadn't turned up at the college today she had just assumed that he had another one of those highly important meetings at the former Prime Minister's office.

Still, once the shock of Jeff's death had sunk in it would leave a gap and mourning – again.

The stalker retreated into the dark corner opposite her house again. He had watched her looking out of the window as if she knew he was there. Evenings he liked best: She would look out, her hair down and most of the stress of the day already gone. She looked young again, almost as young as she had been when he had first seen her. Sometimes he deluded himself into thinking that she actually was aware of his existence, even though he kept hoping she was not.

Tonight she had come back with her friend, the one she found so comforting, but the stalker knew he was a lawyer, which did not make him easier: Going out with the police and returning in the company of a lawyer could only mean trouble.

Knowing it would not help a bit, he still called his friend.

A confident voice in a very noisy place answered. "Ah, it's you. How are things at your end?" A sigh gave him the answer, and when he asked for the reason, all the stalker's troubles poured out.

"I see. Well, mon ami, you know what you should do?"

"I don't. That was my whole point. She's gotten herself into some sort of fix again, and I don't know how to get her out."

"Don't be so obtuse. You know that you won't rest until you go and get her for yourself. You told me she liked you when she met you, so go for it!"

"She had no idea who I was then. She could never love me."

An exasperated sigh from the other end. "What's not to love about you, Marcus?"

"Well… I don't know", came the ironic answer. "Maybe the fact that I'm a killer? Either way, it's no good, I would murder her…"

"My offer of help still stands…"

"Don't you dare touch her, I'll…"

"Relax, I'm miles away. OK, I think I get it, you'd rather stay out of her sight, pining for her romantically and slaughter everyone else than do what you need for your happy ending?"

No answer. "Hey! You still there?" The friend shook his head when he noticed that the line had been cut. "Suit yourself then, enjoy your martyrdom."

In a hotel room in the west of London a man was on the phone to his boss, pacing the room nervously.

"The papers were not there."

"What do you mean? He said he had found them in his letter."

"Yes, but they were not in the flat."

"What about his office?"

"No, we've already been through there last week."

"They should be in the flat then."

A sigh. "That's what I thought. But they weren't. With a little…persuasion he admitted he had hidden them somewhere."

The person at the other end did not enquire into the nature of the persuasion. "So do you know where they are now?"

"Unfortunately, no. When I tried more persuasion his heart gave out. But maybe he kept them with his girlfriend. If he'd kept them at his office I would have found them."

"Then go and get them."

4

When Paul arrived at Naomi's house the next morning, he had an odd feeling, almost as if someone was waiting for him there, checking him out and sizing him up. He checked his back carefully while he was locking his car and found he was right – out of the corner of his eye he saw a shadow move very fast and disappear into the alley between the houses opposite. He decided to do some reconnoitring once he was done interviewing Downey and rang the bell.

Naomi was glad when she opened the door and found only the younger detective on her step. He had seemed nice yesterday, not as hostile as his older colleague, plus he had the nicest light green eyes she'd ever come across. However he didn't look too friendly this morning, in fact he looked distinctly grumpy and in need of sleep.

She tried what usually worked with men in this mood: "Good morning, detective, I'm just having breakfast, would you like to join me?" She looked lovely in the morning, Paul had to admit, her curly dark hair slightly tousled in an untidy bun, her violet eyes clear and fresh. No, concentrate! Now she was moving the door ever so slightly, bringing the scent of toast and fresh-ground coffee to the door. His stomach growled.

She smiled. "That sounded like a yes. This way please." She led him to the kitchen that was part of the biggest room in the house, covering most of the ground floor at the back of the building.

When they had picked her up the day before, they hadn't gotten past the hall, so Paul was curious about the house. His first impression of the room was light: not only was the back wall facing the miniature garden almost completely made up of windows and French doors and the floor a light greyish brown wood, but the dominant colour in furniture was also white. White wooden bookshelves made up the wall opposite the windows and white shelves also framed the fireplace above which she had hung a painting – probably a Bloomsbury original from the look of it. The only spots of colour apart from the painting were provided by the two small antique pieces and the most striking feature of the room – a big square oriental carpet in blues and greens. A comfortable light coloured sofa was the only other bit of furniture in that area.

The room's other main feature was a huge cherry-wood dining table with a series of mismatched antique chairs, that took up the middle of the room. She had laid a place for her own breakfast there, but half of the table was covered with stacks of paper. Apparently she liked inviting people for dinner. This impression was confirmed by a well-equipped kitchen, which also looked as if it was not for decoration purposes only.

Naomi was at the stove. "How do you like your eggs, fried or scrambled? I don't have any bacon, I'm afraid, vegetarian, you see, but you can have mushrooms and tomatoes." She raised an enquiring eyebrow at him, one hand one the fridge door.

"Grlgwr."

"Sorry, didn't catch that." A sweet smile.

Paul cleared his throat. This was not going as he had planned it – at all. He shook his head, trying to get rid of the charm of her violet eyes. "Just a cup of coffee, please."

"Don't be ridiculous, I heard you, you must be starving. Do you think I'm going to poison you? Like that's going to clear me from suspicion of killing Jeff with my bare hands!" She held up her hands to him, small and white.

His head started swimming and his answer came with more force than he'd planned. "Can we come to the point, Ms. Downey? And, yes, since you raised the subject that was exactly what was on my mind."

She looked at him incredulously. "Do you mind if I continue breakfast while you accuse me of foul murder then? By the way, poison would be easier to hide in black coffee than in mushrooms and eggs, you know. How do you want your coffee?"

"With milk and two sugars", he growled, then started to laugh. It was hard to stay angry with her looking like a rather fierce kitten about to explode.

"Take a seat," she offered and sat down herself to start on a bowl of muesli with yoghurt and fresh fruit.

Another noise made its way from Paul's stomach – traitor! – and his bad mood came back.

"You know, Stan will dismiss anything you get from talking to me without him present as police harassment?" She said conversationally, taking a sip of coffee.

That raised Paul's hackles. "Ok, Ms Downey, you must have quite some experience with situations like these, what with so many "accidents" happening around you, don't you?"

"What do you mean?" That was a new approach. What had he found?

"Oh, come on, surely you must have noticed something, what are you, some kind of Typhoid Mary?" Paul felt as if he was watching himself from afar. Whatever was going on with him, this was not an accepted interrogation tactic as taught by Quantico.

"Are you quite sure you're not suffering from low blood sugar? You're not making sense!" Wary.

"Well, let's see, shall we?" He pulled his notebook from his pocket. "'92, you're in Oxford, two boys from your hall go mysteriously missing only to turn up… rather dead after two months." Those injuries that could be told after the long interval had been similar to Lynd's.

"So? Lots of students were in Oxford at the time, so were 90,000 other inhabitants, checked all their alibis? I had nothing to do with those jerks, didn't even have a single tutorial with them."

They had been living on the same floor with her and one of them had started chatting her up, but she hadn't liked the look of him. Besides she had just been recovering from a bout of love-sickness and was not prepared to get into trouble again at the time. When they disappeared, and later again when they were found dead the police had questioned everyone in the hall, including her. That had been her first experience with the police. She hadn't liked it.

"'94, your supervisor turns himself in as a paedophile and hangs himself in jail after going out with you for a year."

Yes, she remembered that. He had rather suddenly broken off the relationship, which had been better anyway; it had definitely been unprofessional. She had been deeply embarrassed when the police had questioned her, but she could tell them nothing about any unusual sexual preferences of the man. The accusation had been as damning as it was surprising. But why did that come up now? She was irritated. "First, he went out with lots of students, second, we'd already stopped going out together and third, do I look like a child to you?"

Paul sighed silently. Not at all, but I don't want to be thinking about that right now. He pushed on: "'96, Ithaca, you're the only girl who survives a date with the Cornell Ripper, who dies in a crash when chased by the police."

"Eh, I was not in the police car, I can assure you of that." That incident had been the strangest so far. The man had been absolutely charming, had taken her out on a date to a fancy restaurant – his usual method, as the police told her later – but then never even called her back, which definitely was not his method with his other victims. After the car chase all her friends had been joking about her guardian angel doing overtime and had told her to take it easy on the dating for a while. She had complied, deeply shaken. Stan had been livid – she could hear that on the telephone when she told him the story – telling her that that's what she got for not having her dates vetted by him first.

While she was still reminiscing Paul Usher continued. "Things quieten down for a while, you get married, only to return with a vengeance at you husband's death in 2003."

Not again. She reacted quite forcefully to this remark. "That's ludicrous! Are you mad? How am I supposed to have anything to do with that?"

Paul was all non-committed charm. "I don't know. All I'm saying is I find it pretty surprising the insurance paid up with your history of people dropping dead around you. I assume it's the insurance money you live on and not your wages as a university teacher." He looked around pointedly. King's College wages did not usually cover this kind of accommodation in South Kensington and the top of the range kitchen equipment he saw around him.

"Hey, can you rein in your wild fantasies? You should be writing fiction. I was widowed in an accident, and yes, I got a lot of money from the insurance – which was actually a good thing, being as my husband's firm was about to go bust. For your information: we both had equal policies out, so he would have profited the same had I been the one who died."

Which at the time had seemed the far more likely option: weakened and depressed from two failed pregnancies Naomi had been on the point of killing herself quite often. She had been taking lots of medications without any results, and basically it had been Robert's death that had shaken her out of her almost catatonic state and served as a springboard to restart her life.

"Yes, I was just coming to the policies. Maybe it would interest you to learn that soon after the insurance agent, who sold them to you, was found missing and – when he turned up again half a year later in the Caribbean – spouted some strange tale about how he'd won the lottery and decided to go for the good life of rum punch and beach."

Naomi looked at him pityingly raising her eyebrows. "What are you saying? I bribed an insurance agent into selling phoney policies and then climbed on top of a crane in a thunderstorm to make sure that when the weight came down it would squash my husband whom I'd somehow conveniently hypnotized in staying put under the contraption?"

Paul shrugged his shoulders. "All I'm saying is that there are a lot of coincidences happening around you, all of them connected to rather violent death." He had to admit to himself though that the insurance company's internal investigation had proved that R. Downey's death had been an unfortunate accident with which his wife could not possibly have had anything to do and that the policies had been in good faith. There had even been a memo – confidential of course – stating that the whole investigation would have made a lot more sense if it had been the wife who died.

Naomi was lost in thought. She was remembering the rainy autumn evening years ago when the insurance agent had come to their house. Robert had called him and made the arrangements, but even through the haze of the drug-induced stupor of those months she could recall how oddly nervous the little almost bald man had seemed. He had brought along not only the papers Robert had asked for but also the policy doubling the sum in case of accident. She remembered with disgust his sweaty handshake. In fact, he had seemed frightened out of his mind and she had been very reluctant to sign her name to anything this man proposed. It was really ridiculous to imagine Mr. Green enjoying himself in the Caribbean. She chuckled.

"Why? What's funny now?" Paul was all ears. She had a nice laugh.

"Nothing really, but if you'd ever met Mr. Green, the insurance agent, you would find the idea of him on the beach funny too. If you don't have any further questions though, I'd rather be leaving for work now. Just out of interest, why do you suppose I murdered Jeff?"

Paul shook his head at her. "You tell me."

"Sorry, I can't do that, my solicitor would kill me for ruining his job. Have you contacted Jeff's parents about the funeral yet?"

"No, the body's not ready to be released anyhow," Paul was trying to think of a way to prolong his stay. "Do you need a lift to anywhere?"

Naomi blinked. This man was really irritating: Aggressive and hostile one minute, then going out of his way to be friendly the next and confused like a schoolboy.

"No thanks," she was gathering her bags together to get ready to leave.

"Are you moving?" Paul eyed the two shoppers, backpack and laptop.

"No, not really. The university just doesn't give you much room to work if you're a mere lecturer, so I do most of my marking here and my research in libraries in town, hence the flight to Egypt scenario. Oh, could you catch… sorry!" The laptop had just hit Paul's shin. She flinched. Now she had gone and attacked a Scotland Yard detective.

"Don't be silly, I'll drive you to the Strand." Paul picked up part of the baggage and started moving.

It was a quiet drive to King's College, and only when Paul's stomach started growling again, did another chuckle erupt from Naomi.

"So, am I not supposed to leave town at the moment?" she asked innocently when they had almost arrived.

"Why, were you planning that?"

"Not really. Thanks." Naomi got out of the now parked car. "You ought to drive off right away, the traffic police around here are quite punctilious," she warned him with a smile and left, walking purposefully toward the building shouldering her considerable baggage without problems.

Paul frowned, then turned the car and made his way to the Yard.

In an office in another town the telephone was answered impatiently. "Have you found them?"

"No."

"Why are you calling then?"

"Bad news. We've just heard that a detective called Paul Usher is involved in the investigation. Could that be a relation of George Usher?"

"How should I know? Who is he?"

"I better check that then. Do we still have our contact inside the Yard?"

"Of course. Don't you have better things to do with your time?"

"Trust me. If he is, we have a serious problem called MI6."

"I don't understand."

"That is because you're new at the firm and you did not really pay attention to what Lynd said he had found. Think, then you'll understand the problem."

His partner did not like being talked to that way. "You're paid for solving problems, not for enumerating them."

5

When Paul arrived in his office still hungry with two packets of crisps and a mug of coffee he had charmed off the Assistant Commissioner's secretary, he found a disgruntled Brian muttering about people not doing their job properly.

Paul ignored the grumbling, offered him one of the packets and asked: "So, what have you got so far?"

"Not a lot. The other neighbour was out that night, so unfortunately there is no corroboration coming in there. I tried the pub again…"

"And?" Paul had polished off the crisps at an alarming speed, regretting not having accepted Naomi's invitation. She looked as if she was eating nothing but health food and that it was doing her good.

Brian shook his head. "It was a long shot, Saturday night is pretty noisy, even in that kind of upmarket pub, and the owner only noticed that there was a quarrel because the couple at the next table couldn't make up their mind about what wine to order and kept changing their order for food, so he had to wait."

"So he did get the gist?"

"No, what I'm saying is that he had to concentrate on the other couple, he only got the tone of the conversation."

Paul rolled his eyes. "Great. So it could have been about anything, from debating splitting up to what she told us." He balled up the crisp pack and threw it into the bin with uncanny precision.

Brian shrugged. "Right. Anyway, I went to the college again, our techs are still trying to make some headway in that paper hole of a study of his. No enemies in the faculty, apparently this guy agreed with whoever he was talking to. No national day of mourning either however. Seems like Downey was the one he was closest to. They both came to King's College at the same time. He didn't have a lot of graduate students, not a particularly inspiring teacher it turns out. Only a few undergraduate courses as he was busy writing speeches and memoirs so much. Someone mentioned something about a son, but I'll have to get back on that. Crime scene techs at his flat report nothing unusual, only a continuous interruption by the obnoxious lady next door. I think any kind of evidence coming from her will safely be discounted at court. Completely paranoid, if you ask me. Janitor said she's had her locks changed three times this year alone. Plus, she's been at him with a cock and bull story about a man looking in her window last year. Like that's likely. Also", when he saw Paul's suspicious expression "it must have been Spiderman – it's on the fourth floor."

"So we're not looking too good with our main witnesses against Downey then, are we?" Paul concluded.

"Not really, and I think we can forget about her telling us about what happened Sunday night as well, she seems to have a slight problem…", Brian mimicked the emptying of a glass. "Peter said she was five sheets to the wind this morning already. Did you find anything that could help us?" He had been surprised in the course of their cooperation by the creative way Paul thought. They certainly complemented each other and had acquired a reputation for solving cases quickly.

"No, a string of coincidences, but no probabilities. But it still smells fishy." He had definitely been surprised by what had come up when he had entered Naomi's name into the databases connected with crime last night, and he was still not happy with her reaction. He thought for a moment. "Say, a bloke like Lynd, he wouldn't do his own housekeeping, would he? Let's ask around if we can find someone who knew the flat a little better and – had a key."

"There's an idea. By the way, you could ask Downey about that. Crime tech also found some stuff at the place that wouldn't match Lynd's size."

Somehow Paul didn't want to hear that, and he tried to ignore Brian's leer. "Have they set up the incident's room yet?" he asked.

"Yep, all done, down the hall, not that we have much to set up yet. But what we've got is Dr. Sawyer's report." He handed Paul a grey folder, which the younger man skimmed quickly.

"Great reading after a meal", he said looking queasy. "I'll be over there then, if anyone's looking." What Paul really wanted was time to think. He needed an office to himself but was sceptical about getting that with the short time he had been there.

Their overly eager assistant had set up a veritable landscape of pin-boards labelled "Scene of Crime", "home and family" and "faculty". It was this last one that made Paul stop in his tracks, turn and call out to Brian in his office. "I'm at the college, see you later."

"Stop, no, you won't. I'm going to see the wife and family in Northumberland, remember?" They had found out that Lynd had been divorced for about eight years, and the discovery of some insurance policies made a visit to his family imperative. For personal reasons Paul preferred not to be dealing with these kinds of family issues and Brian had volunteered to go on the trip. "His son sounds a bit of a nutcase to me."

"Why?"

Brian chuckled. "Well, he turned himself in for stalking."

"Come again?"

"No, I put that badly. Apparently he was… seeing Downey as well and didn't want to break that off when she got involved with his father, so he stalked her."

Paul frowned. "She was dating father and son?" That didn't sound like the woman he had met.

"Chronologically, the other way around."

"Where did you get that?"

"The faculty secretary."

"Brian, would you take everything Ms Miller said about us at face value?"

"Of course not, unless she was talking about you. No, but when she said stalking, I phoned the South Kensington police station and they gave me the tale of the reformed stalker."

"I'd like to hear that one." Paul had sat down on his desk.

"Yes, well, Clive Lynd turned up there one night, raving about a dangerous man outside Downey's house threatening him. When our colleagues arrived on the scene, it turned out his father was with her. Lynd senior was very embarrassed and took his son along. No sign of an intruder."

"How old is Lynd junior?"

"Twenty-five. Dropped out of King's College a year ago, awol since."

"Great, sounds like we better find him. I'll call you as soon as I've got anything new." With what he had just seen Paul doubted very much that the family angle would get them anywhere though.

Apparently Naomi's instincts about the American scholar's qualifications had not been so wrong after all, Paul thought, driving to the Strand once more. An hour later – parking was hell, next time he would take a panda car – he dashed into the building, looking for the office of Thomas Jefferson Clark, visiting scholar from Virginia (I bet!), who had somehow made it to a vote on tenure and thus caused the squabble between the victim and his girlfriend.

After knocking on Clark's door twice Paul entered without waiting for an answer, interrupting a rather informal teaching session between a blonde and the quarterback-sized "scholar".

"What the hell…?" Clark started out only to interrupt himself by shouting "Paul. How did you get here?" He jumped up and bear-hugged Paul. The blonde, forgotten and ignored took herself off in a huff.

"This is England, remember," Paul quipped, grinning impishly from ear to ear. "Would you care to tell me how you became a scholar on …what exactly?"

Clark's grin was – if possible – even wider, his teeth a shiny contrast to his mahogany skin. "I'm a-teaching Black History from the Civil War onwards," he drawled.

"What, the firm let you go and dig up the family archive?" Paul snickered.

"No, not really, but tell me your story, and I'll tell you mine." Clark sat down and offered Paul the other chair in the tiny room. Paul shook his head: Naomi had certainly been right about the lack of space given to scholars in this building; the place felt more like a closet.

"Well, to start this the right way", he flashed his badge, "We're investigating the death of your faculty colleague Jeffrey Lynd, who was found murdered yesterday."

"So that's why he didn't show up today." Clark was stalling.

Paul shook his head at him. "Tom, it's no use. You saw our guys in his office. What are you doing here, and since when is the CIA interested in taking part in British College education?"

"Isn't it just my kind of luck to end up in the one place in all of the UK where I can be made by the one and only British cop I've ever taught and who by rights ought to be working for us?" Still stalling, odd, Paul thought. He waited.

"Have you checked this with your guys?" Clark asked cautiously.

Paul snorted. "Why the hell should I? I didn't know there was any need to get them involved."

"Ok, let me make a few phone calls and I'll get back to you. You wanna come to my place?"

"No, let's meet at a pub." Paul suggested and gave him the directions for a pub near his own flat. He was not too hopeful for the outcome of this line of questioning, sensing a lot of frustration from his American friend, but then, one never knew.

He had met Clark at Quantico where the latter had given a course on surveillance during Paul's stay. Clark had helped Paul when he was almost ready to give up on the whole policing thing after having found he was not good at shooting. He had not expected to need this skill as an analyst, but his superiors had been insistent. Paul didn't like the idea of taking another person's life, and he remembered enough discussions with his father about 'playing god or fate' to actually make him physically sick at the shooting range. When push had come to shove however, and he was about to be fired in spite of his good marks for not shooting, he had given in and asked Clark for lessons. Clark had obliged and managed to make a good shot of Paul, who still didn't like guns, but at least was now safe to be carrying one.

They had stayed in touch afterwards, linked at the time by the common experience of failed marriage. It had been – Paul recalled – a rather rowdy time with both of them more or less out of control, more like a second time at university.

After checking on the unit taking apart Lynd's office – now that he had time left on his hands, or so he convinced himself – he went down the hall and knocked on Naomi's door. He had another idea, it was a bit medieval, he had to admit, but wasn't she a medievalist after all? When she asked him in, he started smiling, noticing that her hair was still in the same untidy bun she'd started out with in the morning. She returned his smile, and for half a minute he couldn't remember why he'd come here and what he wanted – apart from looking at the lovely, frail-looking creature in front of him.

"Yes?" she encouraged.

"Ah, well, I wondered if you happened to know if Lynd did his own housekeeping and if not, if you could put us in contact with the woman who did. Also, there are some things at his flat that might belong to you – if you want to get them…?" He left the end open, having just realized that he was talking a) to a suspect b) to the victim's girlfriend and c) not to someone who'd ever be interested in him. Why should she? As far as she was concerned, he was an obnoxious policeman, probably a philistine of the first order, not able to tell apart philosophy and philology. He very much doubted she'd give him the chance to tell her otherwise.

While he was still mentally kicking himself for his presumptions, Naomi had started answering his questions and was now looking at him slightly irritated. "Are you listening at all?" she asked sternly, and he suddenly felt like a rather obtuse undergraduate again.

"Eh, yes, of course, just let me get my notebook to take down the details." Great, Inspector Plod in action.

When he'd finished writing down the name and address of Lynd's cleaning lady, he offered Naomi a lift to Lynd's flat which she accepted after checking the time. "I can drive you home after that," he offered when they were walking to his car. She accepted that too – his heart jumped – saying that quite a bit of luggage might be involved.

Naomi turned quiet when they entered Lynd's flat. She took a deep breath after seeing the bloodstains on the carpet below the stairs and quickly looked away again.

Then she swallowed hard. "Can I just walk around and pick up my things?"

Paul nodded. He was already regretting his idea. She had become deadly pale at seeing the bloodstains, and he was afraid she might faint on him. That would certainly get Vachewsky to sue the Yard.

Naomi shook herself once more. Then she briskly walked to the kitchen, got herself a box and started collecting cookbooks, pots and pans, went to the bathroom to throw away a used toothbrush and pick up a shampoo (walnut, Paul noticed), and finally went into the bedroom where she collected an armful of books.

Surprise registered in Paul's face. "Are you sure that's all?" He had been quietly following her around.

"Yes. Why?"

"Whose nightdress is it in the bed then?" He held up a lacy nothing.

"Not mine", Naomi smiled, "I think you need to find another claimant for that."

"Oh."

"Jeff's and my relationship had changed some months ago, it's quite probable that he found someone new, but he didn't tell me about her. I assume you have checked his answer-phone and his mobile?"

Paul swallowed, trying to make sense of all the new bits of information that had started coming in so fast.

"By the way", Naomi continued, "If Rosa hasn't changed her day to Monday – and you should have noticed her around yesterday, she's really hard to overlook – someone's been in here."

"Well, yes, our SOCOs have been through the flat." Paul said.

"Do they always tidy up? Someone's been through this place, and it definitely wasn't Jeff. Are you sure about no break-in?"

Things seemed to fall into place for a moment, and Paul started to nod to himself. He knew the kind of people who would make a place look tidier after searching it. "Are you finished? Then I can get you home."

"That would be nice." They needed two trips to the car, lugging all the stuff down the stairs.

"Did you only move into his kitchen?" Paul asked the second time around, carrying the box with pots and pans.

"No, but when I cook, I like the right equipment, and Jeff definitely liked to eat. Careful, you'll be really sorry if that pepper mill falls down." It was sticking out from Paul's haphazard construction at an adventurous angle.

"Why? Is it worth more than my monthly wage?" The damn thing was getting in his line of vision too.

Naomi snickered. "No, but you might be sneezing your head off if it falls and breaks."

This time the car trip wasn't as quiet as the one in the morning. Paul kept talking about nothing in particular, trying to make Naomi feel at ease with him. And she didn't seem to mind. He had decided not to touch the topic of Lynd junior just yet, better find the young man first. When they arrived at her house she said: "I would ask you in for another coffee, but I'm in a bit of a rush right now."

"Going anywhere special?" Curious. Had she got another boyfriend, too? Was she going to see Lynd's son?

"No, just my weekly Taekwondo class."

Paul stared: "What?" He just about managed to keep his chin from dropping.

He was still standing in her doorway when she rushed out again with a very large sports bag. "Sorry, did I leave something in your car?"

"You do what? Is there anything else you do at night?" Shooting? Fencing? Now he knew how she had been able to shoulder all those bags in the morning. And they had been doubting she could have dealt with Lynd! With the right kind of leverage she could probably have lobbed him over the rails herself. From the look he'd had of the body, Lynd would not have had much muscle power to resist her. He would have to check just how deadly her brand of Martial Arts could be.

Naomi seemed to be completely unaware of any implications her leisure activities could have. "I tried Karate but found I was too small to get anywhere. Sometimes I go on weekend courses for Modern Arnis, that's a Vietnamese variation with sticks, it's fun. You should try it sometimes. Why?"

Paul shook his head. "Nothing. Can I take a rain check on the coffee?"

"Yes, but I really have to run now, bye." She rushed to a small car parked at the curb and drove off at high speed.

Only after she had gone round the corner did he remember his arrangement with Clark. First however he had to deal with another aspect.

Even though he had been quite preoccupied, in the back of his policeman's mind he had noticed that by the latest in front of Naomi's house they had been shadowed. Now he carefully took his mobile out of his pocket, turned around quickly and snapped a photo of the tall man casually leaning on the opposite wall. The stranger gave no indication of having noticed this, so Paul took him not for Lynd junior but for a professional and made a mental note to ask Clark about him. He drove away quickly without turning back to be at least not too late for his date with the American, especially as he had planned on leaving his car at his house.

6

The stalker felt his control slipping.

He had calmed down the day before when Naomi had returned two hours after leaving with the police – after some time, admittedly, but today they had come back and picked her up again.

She had sounded comfortable with the tall detective though, and he had definitely become curious about Paul Usher. He looked like her type of man. The stalker balled his fists, but remembered his good intentions. He knew all her gestures, little mannerisms and quirks, which he had lovingly been watching for so many years now: She was interested in the detective. So he had followed him after he had dropped off Naomi in the early evening.

When Paul had parked his car but did not enter his flat, he had taken the time to check Paul's surroundings. He had learned quite a lot about the man from his belongings and had been extra careful about not leaving any trace of his search.

He called his friend again asking for advice on the situation of Naomi and a policeman, but only got teased for his effort.

"You better look out with your killings then, Marcus, this could get dicey."

"I'm not a complete imbecile."

"I hadn't noticed. Hey, I've been thinking about coming to London for a while. Do you think you could introduce me to her then?"

"Are you out of your mind?"

"Why? If you don't mind her boyfriend or the policeman now, why would you mind your oldest friend?" Giggling like a schoolgirl.

"Philippe!" in a sternly admonishing tone, then a sigh. "You're in Jamaica again, aren't you?"

"Right you are, man. How did you guess?" Still highly amused.

"Your manners are sadly wanting, which always happens to be the case whenever you stay in the Caribbean, as I have remarked before."

"At least one of us knows how to enjoy life. I'll talk to you soon. Don't do anything I wouldn't do!"

Marcus reacted exasperatedly. "That was exactly what I planned on doing. You know that we have very different habits, and I for one plan on remaining a gentleman."

"Bonne chance!" His friend wished with another giggle and hung up.

Marcus sighed, but could not help the smile that the talk with his friend had brought to his lips. Somehow Philippe always managed to cheer him up just a little.

After he'd gotten back to Kensington later that night though, he had found Naomi crying hard, bent over in convulsive sobs and shaking with grief.

Knowing he could not comfort her and would have to watch her suffer was torture. It took all the strength he had to stay away from her then, and he realised that it was only a question of time when he would snap and ruin all his efforts of the past years. With a new bout of self-loathing he understood that it would probably mean the end of both their lives. He struggled hard to keep his temper in check, then found a way to redirect his anger: Usher had picked her up in the morning, then he had delivered her back later. Now she was miserable. Ok, let him have it. Coolly and methodically he started plotting the murder of Paul Usher, confident of his ability to accomplish this aim.

A very quiet noise attracted his attention at that moment. Someone was trying to open Naomi's kitchen window. The stalker left his place and went to take a closer look.

7

Paul barely made it to the pub in time and found Clark already seated nursing a bottle of Budweiser.

"I see your orders are not to fraternise with the natives", he commented when he joined him with a pint of Guinness.

Clark blinked, then laughed. "Nope, and no cider either, plus bourbon only. I'm sure there is a new regulation out on that somewhere."

"That is a shame with a twelve year-old Lagavulin sitting in my flat."

"Not fair, Paul, not fair. How was your day?"

"Fine", Paul didn't see any reason yet to tell Clark about the newest developments. "By the way, do you have a tail on Downey?"

"Why would we want to do that?" Clark wrinkled his brows. "Are you telling me there's yet another firm involved here?"

So it must not have been his first Budweiser, Paul thought, having just guessed that Clark was working with the knowledge of the British service who kept him informed.

"What is your interest here?" Paul asked casually, taking a sip of beer. "If you're allowed to talk about it to a civilian that is."

"Well, there's not a lot to say really." Clark burped, "Excuse me, in effect we just wanted to be where your ghost writer kept his papers, know what he was about. As it happens, some papers seem to have disappeared, but it's nothing to worry about."

"Then you won't be worried that Lynd's ex-girl friend had the impression that somebody had been through his flat… or that someone is watching her that you don't know about…"

"Oh, c'mon, Pauly, play fair, what do you know about the Downey woman? And since when is she his ex-girl friend?"

"Let's compare some notes then!" Paul wanted to encourage Clark to share those resources he hadn't been able to tap last night. "About your second question: She stated quite clearly that she had not kept her nightdress in his flat for the past few months now. We definitely found one though. How about you share some of your knowledge? For example, what do you know about Lynd junior?"

"Who's he?"

"Lynd's son. Your faculty secretary had some rumour about Downey dating both generations, and he appears to have been stalking her."

"Must have been before we got involved." Clarke shook his head. "That doesn't sound like her, but if you like I could ask around…"

"I'd be grateful. About Downey?"

"Well, as she's a British citizen, surely you know most about her, but she spent most of her married life in up-state New York. Hubby was into architecture and construction, almost ran his firm into the ground before he ran afoul of a crane. If you ask me, she was well rid of him. Because of the huge insurance-sum involved and the short interval between the taking out of the policy and the accident the FBI had a file on the whole sad story."

"The Feds had what?" Better to at least look innocent, even if Tom was the last to believe that of Paul.

"Ah, you were already busy with the mob case then. There was some scandal on life insurance scams, so they got it into their head to become involved. Anyway, it turns out, he kept cheating on her while she was miscarrying his babies and keeping his house and guest list in shape. What came out in the internal investigation of the insurers is confidential of course, but let me tell you, it's pretty absurd." Yes, Paul had thought so too. "She left the US shortly after the funeral and took up her academic career again over here. Did you get a look at the tail?"

"I even got a photo." That was what he'd been hoping for: Clark's resources for his information. "I can mail it to you."

"Why not check out this guy right away? To tell you the truth, we were quite suspicious of her to start with, but I've since become convinced that nothing that happened after the 15th century really interests her much. The classic egghead." Paul smiled to himself, translating Clark's remarks as 'tried but was told to get lost.' He shook his head at the eternal philanderer, then told himself off for hypocrisy. Better have some more beer.

While Clark sent the photo to be checked against various databases, Paul tried to get closer to his reason for getting involved. "Just to make sure I got you right: you've been babysitting an ex-Prime Minister's ghost writer who managed to lose a few unimportant papers. That does look like a bit of an overkill, doesn't it? And why would you be doing that and not our own boys and girls?"

"Ah, Paul, you know how paranoid DC has become. For me it's a well-paid holiday with safe foreign travel and girls involved." Broad smile, knowing smirk. Wink.

You're overdoing it buddy, Paul thought, I don't want to be in your shoes, no matter how good the pay. You've just lost not only the papers you yourself were interested in but also the ghost writer who's seen them all. You have no idea who he's been talking to, and all that happened right under your nose.

"Another beer?" he asked. Do you like outer Nepal, was what he really wanted to ask Clark, whose next posting was bound to be as uncomfortable as could be imagined.

"Why not! Hey, we've got some results, thank God for different time zones. Here's your guy, definitely not Lynd junior: Marcus Trevelyan-Carter, British citizen, should be 32 by now, applied for a driver's license in Connecticut eight years ago, disappeared from our screens short time after. Entered the country again… wait, 2003 on a tourist visa. Completely innocuous, not even a speeding ticket. Pretty boy, but we have nothing on him, sorry."

As Paul had expected, the meeting lasted long into the night and when he stumbled to his bedroom at two in the morning he vowed to get his life into a more regulated rhythm as soon as possible, by tomorrow, at the latest.

Before he dropped off to sleep his mind registered a strange thing: the scent he'd smelt in Naomi's house seemed to linger on in his flat. He tried to reason this away, as Naomi had not even been close to his flat and he certainly smelt nothing like her after an evening at the pub. He decided to put off this riddle to a later, less beer-soaked hour as well.

8

The next day was cold and overcast. The weather, it seemed was trying to remind the British that it was still early March, even if some daffodils had started showing their heads among the grass in parks and by the roadside.

Naomi hadn't slept well – at some point during the night there had been an awful lot of noise outside. She had taken a long time to fall asleep at all last night. The visit to Jeff's flat had shaken her more than she had cared to admit to Paul. She had tried to play it light on the way back, but had not really succeeded in calming herself down. Even her sports class had not managed to release the tension, and in the end she had cried herself to sleep over Jeff.

Quite apart from that she felt absolutely confused: Jeff's death, the discovery of the mysterious girlfriend he hadn't told her about, her reaction to that policeman, who seemed to have so much fun infuriating her while getting all tongue-tied every time one asked an everyday question. To put it in a nutshell, she was decidedly grumpy when her phone rang at half past 8 and DI Paul Usher wanted to know if she knew some person called Carter, which she might – two a penny, she was a teacher with a lot of students – or might not do.

He hadn't sounded any better, actually. It had been a very short conversation.

After she'd found out from Jeff's older brother that the burial would not be possible for almost another week, she made herself some breakfast and tried to work. She had no tutorials that day and usually got a lot of work done.

Not today, though. Her mind kept wandering, and two hours and two essays later she gave up, tidied her desk, then her whole study and went for a run in Hyde Park to clear her head. When she got back home, there was a very irate Paul Usher on her doorstep who looked about ready to kick in her front door. Great, just the person she needed. He and his green eyes were taking up far too much room in her brain anyway. She scowled.

He didn't look too friendly either. "Where have you been?" Clipped tones.

"To the moon, planning a massacre of Martians", maybe sarcasm would help. She blew another sweaty lock of hair that had escaped the ponytail out of her face. "Do I assume correctly that you're planning to storm my house if I don't let you in voluntarily?" She unlocked the front door and went in. He followed at once.

"Why didn't you tell me there was an attempt to break into your house last night when I called this morning?" Accusing.

"Let me think", she kicked off her shoes – let him get the stench if he wanted to ambush her after running – and pointed him to the living room. "It might be for the simple reason that I DID'T KNOW MYSELF!" She was almost shouting by now.

"You're telling me you didn't notice all the brou-ha-ha last night, four panda cars, sirens wailing, neighbours shouting? Where were you?" She had probably been out. He was sure by now that there must be another man involved here. Paul closed his eyes briefly and tried not to think of her in someone's arms. Get a grip, he told himself, you only met her two days ago.

"I'm told I have a very sound sleep! I have to admit though that it did seem a bit more rowdy than usual last night." She rubbed the side of her nose in a nervous gesture. She had had the impression of someone ringing her bell at one point, but had put that down as part of her dream.

Paul continued. "One of your neighbours, it's not really clear who, phoned the police last night because someone was trying to force your kitchen window. But the perp must have gotten scared and decided to run." The window had been closed, and the police had left again when they got no reaction from inside the house.

Naomi sighed. There had been a long spell of vandalism and break-ins in Kensington the past half year, which was why she had had her doors and windows improved. Apparently that had worked. "Good, that's all cleared and settled then. Now do you mind, I'd like to take a shower…"

"Not at all, go ahead, take your time. Once you're ready, there are a few more questions I'd like to ask you." His voice had gone back to the husky baritone she had found calming the day before.

The content irritated her though, and before she had time to think she found herself holding one of her sneakers ready to throw it at Paul. She only stopped herself at the last minute, shrugged her shoulders and went upstairs to shower.

Blowing off steam literally under the shower she was debating whether to call Stan again and have that obnoxious policeman kicked out of the house, but decided against it after a while: it didn't really seem as if they were still suspecting her. Apart from that she wasn't sure if she would actually be able to reach him wherever Nick had taken him on their hiking trip. She took her time, conscientiously applied body lotion and dressed carefully.

When she came back to the living-room rosy and smelling of oranges and sandalwood she found Paul looking at her bookshelves. She noted with amusement that a pair of reading glasses disappeared in his pocket as soon as he saw her. She got some mineral water for herself and a cup of coffee for Paul and settled on the sofa. "So?" Eyebrows raised expectantly.

"Do you know what Lynd was working on?"

"He was writing something about the Suez Crisis, but I'm quite sure you wouldn't make a nuisance of yourself about that. Apart from that he had started on the former PM's memoirs. Why?"

"Did you talk about his work – not the Suez one", Paul quickly amended his question trying not to notice how her wet hair had started curling itself around her face. He really shouldn't have stayed alone for such a long time, the way he was distracted by that woman was just not fair. He cleared his throat and tried to concentrate on her answer.

"Not really, we had a rather different approach to our subject, and I wasn't really happy about this ghosting stunt. If the PM is too gaga to write himself, maybe he should leave it to professionals without all the cloak and dagger. Jeff didn't sound too happy about the whole thing once he had started either. He only took it on because of the money. He's got an ex-wife and two kids at university, you know."

"Yes, I'll come back to that in a minute." They knew about that angle, also about insurance that was to come to the kids, but so far everything seemed to check out on that front, too, Brian had told him that the ex-wife had said nothing about a missing son.

"What exactly wasn't he happy about?" Would she get that lock out of her eye or would he have to do it? Stop, concentrate!

"I didn't really get it, my field is so different, you see, but there was something about the PM not handing over all the relevant papers to the PRO or whoever is responsible for things like that. And something about confidential papers and the 30-year rule – not that I'd know why that would be relevant. Sorry, I can't help you." She eyed her watch pointedly.

Paul ignored the hint. "Aha. Can you tell me about your involvement with Clive Lynd?"

Naomi bridled. "That's private."

"There is no private in a murder investigation. How well do you know him?"

"Well enough to be able to tell you that he had nothing to do with his father's death." Defensive. Ah, so she had liked the young man.

"How can you be so sure? Especially as the young man apparently was quite… attracted to you. Jealousy is one of the oldest motives for murder known to mankind."

She had flinched at the word jealousy. "He is a very sensitive young man, he wouldn't hurt a fly. I had no idea how he felt about me, I certainly did not encourage him, he was my student after all."

Somehow Paul could believe that: she probably really had no idea about her effect on men. "But you got involved with his father?"

"He was a colleague, we both were the new people at the place, it… happens. I would never have thought Clive could become so… pig-headed – there was a rather embarrassing scene which you probably heard about." She took a deep breath. "I haven't seen Clive for over a year, I'm quite sure he has left the city."

"Hm", they would have to check the young man's whereabouts. Paul handed over a print of his snapshot. "Do you know him?"

She took a look at the photo, a crease forming between her eyebrows. Then recognition dawned, and he thought he could see a faint blush in her cheeks.

She smiled. "Oh, that's Marcus Trevelyan-Carter, he was at Oxford when I was up. Only he was much older than me. Well, six years, actually, but it seemed the world at the time. I met him at a concert and we spent a lovely evening talking. And then he ignored me, probably didn't want to be seen going out with a puny undergraduate. Almost broke my heart." She smiled again, but now Paul saw there was quite a bit of melancholy in the smile – what had the man done to make her so miserable? "Actually, I thought I'd seen him again some years ago in New York, but I could have been wrong about that. What has he done? Why are you asking questions about him?"

"He was following you yesterday, the picture was taken across the road", Paul said. He was confused now. Had she started lying to him? Again? How convenient to remember that Carter had been in the US the same time she had been there. Was he the man involved?

"You must be joking, what would he be doing following me around?" She was incredulous.

"I don't know, you tell me. What do you know about his current whereabouts?"

"Nothing!" She laughed. "The first and last time I talked to him was fifteen years ago at the concert. Do you suspect him of killing Jeff? That's ridiculous."

"I think you'll find that's my field. Why don't you leave it to the professionals? So, what do you know about him?"

Naomi blinked. "Eh – what I just told you. There was that rumour that he was doing a doctorate at Oriel, you could check their alumni records… but I'm really not sure what good that will do you."

"I'll certainly do that." Now Paul was on his feet. He didn't like her laughing at him. Was she defending that guy? What was going on here?

"Fine." She raised her eyebrows at his tone.

"Fine. Keep your windows closed!"

"I can take care of myself!" She took a step toward the French doors leading to the garden and opened it. Then she led the way out and held the front door for him. "Officer?"

"Good bye, Madam." He left before he could ruin any more.

What the hell was going on with him? He had been good for over a year now after all the chaos and heartbreak he'd left behind in DC. He really ought to pull himself together and start thinking straight.

Naomi went to her study and sat down at her desk. She got the computer going again and started drumming her fingers impatiently.

"Oh, all right", she sighed and logged into the Oxford alumni system. Ten minutes later she was confused. She had found one Marcus Trevelyan-Carter: he had been awarded a first in 1922, a PhD in 1924…and he was listed among the late students.

"Why do I always fall for the idiots? Of course he didn't want any more contact with me after sailing under a wrong name for a whole evening, probably just trying for a one-night stand anyway", which he would have got – she was honest enough to admit that to herself. He had completely bowled her over with his dark curls and intense black eyes, she had never met anyone more beautiful. That evening however he had suddenly got up and politely said good-bye and that had been it. Still, some pervert, if he kept hanging around the place now. Suddenly she was furious. "Just you wait," she said under her breath, "Just you wait!"

She left through the back door, sneaked round the house and right – there he was, standing in the shadow of the opposite block of flats' entrance. She took a deep breath and set out to walk purposefully toward him. For a second it registered on her mind that he looked exactly like he had that night in Oxford fifteen years ago, but she thought it must be a trick of the mind, she'd read all about how unreliable human memory was.

"Oy!" she shouted at him. "If you don't get your sorry carcass away from my front door within five minutes, I'll have you arrested for stalking!"

For the shortest time she felt dark, almost black eyes burning into hers from under long dark lashes. Then he focused on a point above her left shoulder and enquired: "Sorry, Miss, you must be quite mistaken, I'm waiting for a friend to come down. As soon as she's here, I will, as you so succinctly put it, remove my "sorry carcass" from your sight. Is there anything else I can be of service with?"

"Yes," she fumed, "just get lost or I'll call the police."

"By all means, be sure to call the fire brigade too while you're about it, why don't you?" He smiled at her condescendingly.

But to her great satisfaction she saw him leave, get into a car and drive away.

When she got back into her house she was still fuming. What was it with men today? However, by the time she'd made herself a pot of Earl Grey nagging doubt had started to set in: Had she just made the most ridiculous spectacle of herself? Whoever he was had certainly thought so, he had seemed quite amused. She shook her head. Had it not been for the second of his eyes meeting hers, she would even have sworn it was a different person altogether. As usual the solution to her troubled mind was work. That day the Roman townspeople's revolt of the 12th century was well and truly investigated.

Not a mile away from her house, the tall man was calling his boss again.

"Yes?" Impatient.

"We've lost a man."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean that René did not return from his attempt of breaking into the house last night. I've been looking around and tapped all our sources but he's vanished. I'm afraid there is Secret Service involvement here. Perhaps we should try to find out how much exactly they know."

"Have you got a way of doing that?"

"Well, we could ask Usher, it's his father after all…"

"I'm not sure that would get them off your back. Concentrate on the papers."

"If you think so."

"I do. Get to work!"

9

When Paul got back to Scotland Yard he found a number of surprises waiting for him.

One was that after returning from his unsuccessful mission in Northumberland Brian had put out a missing person's alert on Lynd's son.

"Why would you do that? I thought the mother had assured you everything was alright with him?" Paul wondered.

"Wishful thinking", Brian said. "While I was there she painted him in glowing colours, following in his father's footsteps, rising star on the academic stage. Then I got to talking with Lynd's elder brother, who put me right on the family situation."

"Ah?"

"It seems the young man was quite a handful to begin with, something that was not improved by his parents' divorce. Apparently he set out to make it right with his father and started studying history, but got in senior's way again." He looked up at Paul.

"He fell for Downey", Paul nodded. "Only she had no idea what was going on and started going out with his father."

"Yep. Gets even better. Clive was into drugs and might quite possibly have gotten in with a rough crowd there. His uncle who lives in London told me that they had to patch him up at a hospital ten months ago."

"What happened?"

"Lynd claimed that he had been assaulted out of the blue by some monster – sounded like a bad trip to the doctors at the hospital. The way his uncle described it, they had the feeling he was covering up for someone, seemed scared out of his mind. No one's seen him since then."

"Is he still alive?"

"He left messages for his mother and we found one on Lynd's answer phone from the day before the murder, asking for money…" He left the end open.

Paul rubbed the side of his face. "Great, that could mean that he's into the hard stuff by now, depending what he's on, he might very well be responsible for the injuries we found with Lynd. Isn't our job just wonderful?" Then he thought. "How did Lynd ever get the ghost-writing job with a son like that?"

"That's probably why they kept it that quiet", Brian said, and Paul agreed, biting down a smile: at least Clarke wasn't the only spook in London who had some explaining to do to his superiors. His bet was that quite a few heads would be rolling as soon as MI5 found out about Lynd's family troubles.

"Phew, anything else?" His partner looked as if he was about to burst if he didn't get his other news off his chest.

Indeed. Brian had spoken to Lynd's cleaning lady and she had agreed with Naomi's assessment that someone had been in the flat.

Brian was still recovering from that interview. "You have no idea what people can do to our language," he was complaining to Paul, "It took us almost ten minutes to establish that she was Lynd's housekeeper, twice as much to get her to believe me that I was police. Another ten she spent complaining about Downey. If Lynd had been starved then we would have a good witness against Downey. She was not happy with the way her ward was fed by his girlfriend."

When Paul frowned at that, he explained. "Apparently this Mrs Sz… Shö…Zl…," he struggled with the name and gave up, "sorry, she comes from Hungary, at least twelve syllables, all of them unpronounceable. Anyway, Rosa believes in lots of red meat and cream. Downey disagreed with that kind of diet for Lynd, they had words on the subject of cholesterol – apparently there's no such thing in Hungary, I have to visit that place – and doors were banged. If you ask me she also had a soft spot for this Lynd guy – I don't know what women saw in him, I really don't. However, having gotten all of this straight, we managed to agree that Downey had been right." Brian sounded exhausted. Paul chuckled.

"One thing, though," Brian continued, a wistful smile on his lips. "That woman can bake… She gave me some cake that I would murder for. I told her I had a colleague who was thinner than Lynd, and she packed up a second helping…" He pointed to a little box on Paul's desk.

Paul laughed. "You know I don't like rich cakes."

Brian shrugged. "I do, she didn't..." He already had a spoon in his hand.

"In another life you would have made a good crook", Paul told his colleague.

"There's a very fine line between the two careers I've heard", mumbled through a mouthful of Hungarian layer cake.

The second development of the day was that they could put a name to the nightdress: "Yvonne" had announced her return to London for the next day. So at least there was some movement in the right direction.

He attended the short press conference the Assistant Commissioner had pressured him into, basically stating that Lynd had been murdered and assistance was wanted of the public. Anyone who'd heard or seen something and could offer relevant information was asked to contact Scotland Yard. After consulting with their lawyers he decided not to mention the search for Lynd junior in order to avoid litigation in case the young man wasn't actually involved, but made sure that every police station in London knew they were looking for Clive Lynd.

Bogged down in paperwork Paul didn't get a chance to check on the Carter identity until he was ready to go home. When he did though, his mind did a double take. He spent a good part of the night at the computer again and finally decided that he must have been working far too much these past months and to take it up again tomorrow, maybe in paper, maybe in Somerset House or whatever stood for that nowadays.

Somehow his car found its way to Naomi's house in Tarlington Mews by itself. He convinced himself he was not obsessing, just making sure that no one was trying to break in or the like. After all – Lynd had been stalking her, probably he was trying again.

He left the car two roads down so he could arrive quietly, and sure enough, there was yet another shadow lurking in the doorway opposite Naomi's entrance. Ok, let's have the lurker explain his business. Paul released the catch on his gun and stepped forward determinedly. However, once he'd arrived there slyly the shadow had gone. Everything was dark and as quiet as London ever gets at four in the morning. Paul shook his head and made his way back to his car. He was still questioning his sanity when he got in and started the engine.

A minute later, he almost jumped out of his skin. After a soft cough from the backseat and a polite "You don't mind some fresh air, do you?" his backseat passenger swiftly moved to the front and all the windows of his car were lowered. Paul killed the engine in his surprise and the car jumped. He tried to go for his gun when his new passenger said "I wouldn't recommend that if I were you, old chap, enclosed space, ricochet and all that."

By now Paul was fairly sure he must be dreaming, so he decided to play along. He took a look at his neighbour: Quite tall, almost towering over him – not an experience he was used to at 6'1". Wavy black hair, slightly too long, high cheekbones, dark eyes under straight brows, leather jacket, torn jeans (now that did not fit with the accent or the diction), sneakers. He looked like … man, some dream he was having!

"Anything I can do for you, Sir?" he asked ironically. "Short on taxis, are we? Shall I take you to Highgate or is there any other place you'd like to go?"

"Whatever would you want to take me to Highgate for at this hour?" the stranger exclaimed in surprise, "No, but there is a matter upon which I crave some enlightenment if you don't mind too terribly, that is the sudden police interest in Ms. Downey." He raised his voice enquiringly at the end.

Paul thought he was going mad. He had some Jeeves and Wooster impersonator in his car, who was asking about police business as if he was asking the way to the nearest tube station.

"Ok, mate, maybe you'd like to answer some questions first, while we're at it, like what are you doing watching Naomi Downey's house at this hour, or how do you get a reader's pass to the London Library when you're dead?"

"That's easy, you pay the yearly fee and never return a book torn or soiled", came the suave answer from his left. "Your turn, how do you explain all this police interest in Ms. Downey on the one hand and the utter failure to protect her against intruders like the one last night on the other? By the way, how could I possibly be dead when I'm sitting right next to you?"

Paul blinked. Yes, that was the question that had him bothered too. "I'll pass on that one and come back to it in a minute. As for the first, Ms. Downey's helping the police in investigations concerning the death of Jeffrey Lynd. What do you know about last night's intruder?" Had he been the mystery caller? The alarm had been raised by a mobile phone, the caller had claimed to be a neighbour, but none of the neighbours had admitted to calling the police after nobody had been found.

"That, yes, I… eh, took care of him," the stranger replied discreetly. "So, what happened to Lynd?"

That man must be mad. Did they get all of London's wing nuts on this case? "How about I take you to the Yard and we'll talk about that there?"

"That might be quite an interesting experience, but if it's all the same to you, I'd rather decline that honour for now, and remove our little conversation back to Tarlington Mews, unless you want to leave the house unguarded again. I can try to answer some of your questions there."

"I thought I'd heard you say you took care of the guy who tried yesterday", Paul was already turning the car. "Who do you want to guard the house against now?"

"You tell me you're investigating the murder of Ms. Downey's friend – I take it, it is murder if Scotland Yard is involved. We had someone trying to illegally enter her house last night, what makes you think, they've given up?" The stranger looked at Paul as if he was slightly dim-witted.

Hm, conspiracy buff? Paul asked the pertinent question. "Who are they and what do they want? Are you talking about Clive Lynd?"

"No, he won't come here again. I'm afraid I can't answer the first question yet, but I know that Lynd senior hid something on Ms. Downey's desk which might be the connection between the two chains of events, wouldn't you agree? At least that's what I could get from yesterday's intruder's memory."

"How did you get it from his memory?" Paul asked suspiciously.

"I asked him." No more information here it seemed.

"Ok, let's go in and get whatever this is about then, shall we?" The stranger's way of speaking seemed to be contagious.

"You can't seriously be considering disturbing Ms. Downey at this hour?" the stranger objected appalled. "That would be most unseemly! It wouldn't help either, I might add, as apparently she is not aware of hiding anything of Mr. Lynd's, the skunk – excuse me – having deposited the matter in question without her knowledge. What complicates the whole affair further is that a rather unfortunate attempt at spring cleaning yesterday has since moved whatever it was to another place, and even I have not been able to find it so far. Now however, knowing the connection to Mr. Lynd I can assume it's connected to his work and will swiftly endeavour to ascertain the whereabouts of said object."

By now Paul's head was swimming. "Who are you and what makes you think I'm letting you go after you've told me you've been stalking Naomi, been through her house, and plan to do so again?"

"Sorry, old chap, my time is running out. I really need to leave now. I'll get back in touch tomorrow." With that the stranger was gone.

Paul awoke two hours later, sore from having slept in the car, his neck stiff from the cold – all the windows were open. He decided he'd need some days off soon, but before that he'd have to make sense of this mess.

First however he went home for a hot shower and a change of clothes.

This time it was another caller who reached the person at the other end.

"Do you actually want the papers back or would it be sufficient for them to disappear?"

"I want them to never reappear and to be sure about that. I thought I had made that clear."

"Just relax. They will disappear, I've found a way for that. Buyden doesn't like it though."

"He's not in charge."

"You tell him."

"I will, don't worry. Now get to work!"

10

After the shower Paul dismissed last night's encounter as a dream, induced by his long stint at researching this Carter person.

The morning was extremely unpleasant, not the least because Yvonne came to the Yard. Lynd's new girlfriend turned out to be a bottle-blonde tall stylish, and very extroverted French woman, who went into hysterics when told about Lynd's murder, couldn't be calmed down, wouldn't have them phone anyone to be with her, and kept pleading to keep her name out of the public eye for fear of her husband finding out about the affair. To make matters worse she was clinging to Paul like an octopus most of the time. Other than that she turned out to be a dead end.

The enquiry to the former Prime Minister's archive about material Lynd might have borrowed and taken home with him came to nothing. The secretary who phoned them back was extremely arrogant and made clear that the police obviously had no idea of the kind of important affairs he was concerned with or the discretion necessary to perform his duties. Dr. Lynd had had access to the papers relevant for his task, and everything had been done according to protocol.

Could he now go back to work?

"And what does that mean?" Paul asked, and it took him a while to realise that the phone had been hung up on him. Speechless at the impertinence he wrote a memo on the conversation and filed it with the rest of their evidence – a documentation of futility and failure so far, with a few dead ends thrown in.

Paul went to the pub and talked to the owner again, asking whether maybe there had been someone watching Lynd that night, but was told again that pubs tended to get crowded on that particular evening of the week, so what did the police expect?

No sign of Clive Lynd either – he seemed to have vanished from the face of the earth.

It looked as if the whole case was going cold.

At 2 PM he was just about to go to his superior and suggest that they close the file, when he screeched to a halt in the middle of the corridor, turned and raced for King's College and Tom Clark's office in a hurry.

He caught his friend on the way to a late lunch in the Senior Common Room and took hold of his elbow. "Good that I met you, Mr Clark. I'm afraid I have some more questions for you." With that he pulled him away from other chattering college people and led him outside.

"Can you tell me what all this is about, pal?" Clark was frowning.

"Absolutely, as soon as we're safely away from here."

"Aha. You gonna buy me lunch?"

"Yep!" Paul steered his car through the midday traffic towards Temple. There he parked, dashed into a newsagent for two packed sandwiches and led the way to Temple gardens.

"You call this lunch?" Clark frowned at an egg salad sandwich that had seen better days in the faraway past.

"Take mine!" Paul handed over his slightly less sorry-looking cheese and tomato. "But talk! And no nonsense this time, please!"

"Care to enlighten me on the subject?"

"You were watching Lynd at the college, so you would have someone watching him at home."

Clark looked clueless.

"Where he was murdered," Paul elaborated. "We would very much appreciate a witness who can describe the murderer."

"Ah, I see", Clark started, and Paul's mood rose only to drop again when he continued. "Sorry, can't help you there, pal, that was the job of your boys and…"

"They're not sharing?" Paul was already thinking up ways to get information out of Clark's British colleagues.

"No, that's not it – though it might be, the way they tick over here, but, the point is, there was no one there any longer."

"Come again?"

"Well, they are on a budget, same as we are, and as Lynd had already taken the bait…"

Paul rubbed his face between his hands. "Are you telling me that you had Lynd under surveillance… ok, MI whatever had him under surveillance but not on the day of his murder?"

"That about covers it."

"I don't believe it, you've been here for almost a year, and our guys disappear as soon as it gets interesting? What are you on about anyway?" He stopped. "What bait?"

"Sorry, Paul, I can't tell…" Clark started, but Paul's mind was already engaged elsewhere.

"You were setting him up for something. He got that job for the former PM not in spite of his sketchy finances and his son's bad connections but because of it. You wanted him approachable by… no, that doesn't make sense…" He looked up suddenly. "You wanted him to approach someone for money. Those papers that he found, that was the bait, right?"

Clark was shaking his head. "You are in the wrong job, Paul, but I've told you that before."

"Yes, yes, now spill!"

"All right, I'm already talking. Do you remember Francis Sutton-Barr?"

"The banker who is about to be sent to the IMF post in your place?"

"That's the one. He used to be a close friend to the PM, his economic adviser too, for a while. Well, the boys over here have been suspecting that he was… not only working for the PM at the time."

"Aha?"

"We knew that they suspected that, so when the opportunity to get him presented itself in the form of those memoirs, we suggested a scheme." Clark noticed Paul's expectant look and continued. "The idea was to plant a letter in the PM's papers that the ghost would find. We suggested using someone with money problems who would not be averse to a spot of blackmail, and it worked."

Paul nodded ironically. "Yes, brilliantly, your ghost was killed."

"Ok, well, that was not as planned, actually they said they would even grant Lynd some form of immunity." When he saw Paul's sceptical expression, he nodded. "Yeah. Anyway, he took the bait, I have him on tape trying to blackmail Sutton-Barr and setting the terms, and your guys were quite happy to do their home-movie of the exchange."

"So you're telling me that all this was over when Lynd was murdered?"

"Yes, that's why we had no surveillance on the flat anymore. Sutton-Barr actually was in talks with your lot when the murder happened."

"So, is he going to jail then?"

Clark smiled enigmatically, and Paul shook his head. "See, that is why I never wanted to do that kind of work. Now you have him working for you, don't you?"

Clark blinked innocently.

"Great. He could have someone else killing Lynd though, couldn't he?" Paul asked.

"I know", Clark answered a touch of guilt in his voice. "I didn't understand why they pulled back so quickly."

Paul sat and thought for a bit. "I guess you're not going to tell me anymore about this, are you?" When Clark shook his head, he said. "Thought so. Secrets and more secrets. Would you happen to know who else could be interested in the paper you planted?"

"Only someone connected with Sutton-Barr."

"I take it he was not working for the Salvation Army or Mother Theresa's heirs, right? Excellent."

"I can try to get something from him myself", Clark offered.

Paul scoffed. "Oh yeah, like our people would let you in on that. Well, it might interest you to know that whoever murdered Lynd was interested in more than your planted paper."

"There's more?" Clark looked surprised.

"Seems so, apparently you would not have needed to plant anything to get a reaction… or the PM had more than one dirty little secret. In other words, I'm back at square one." Paul balled up the sandwich packing furiously and propelled it toward the nearest bin. "Damn it!"

"Cheer up, Paul, I'll see what I can do."

"Thanks, Tom." Paul got the American back to his office and left deeply frustrated. His hopes of anyone pressuring Sutton-Barr into admitting anything more than they could prove were minimal at best: Everybody had what they wanted, in other words they had the man exactly where they wanted him, no need to make an enemy of him now.

Back at the Yard he tried researching Sutton-Barr himself in order to get a clue about the people behind him, but only found the whole thing a waste of time.

All in all it was after six again when Paul was finally clearing his desk and taking care of the last of the telephone messages etc. he found a mail from one of his friends.

Paul,

You asked for a photo of the Marcus Trevelyan-Carter who died in 1924. He's the son of the last Duke of Clarendon, by the way, so if you need more information on him, I'd suggest you talk to Trevor Muns, the journalist who did the feature on the whole scandal five years ago and is said to be the authority on the subject. Anyway, I've found you one photo and attached it to this mail. Why are you interested in dead aristocrats? J.

When Paul opened the attachment, he was wide awake at once. Looking at him from the picture of 1923 was the same intense face he had seen in his car the day before. Also, the same face he had on his snapshot of Naomi's stalker.

Ok, let's take this slowly, he told himself and went looking for a contact to the journalist. When he googled him though, he met with an unwelcome surprise: Muns had been killed in a car accident shortly after his feature had aired on ITV. He was mourned by lots of competitive colleagues who – Paul could read between the lines – had been wanting to tramp the dirt down on his grave. He phoned around in the hope of finding someone who could tell him about the sources he'd used for the feature, only to be told that Muns never shared anything. He called ITV to ask for a copy of the feature and was told they would send one to him as soon as they got round to it. After he hung up he realised they had probably not been taking him seriously.

Dead end – surprise!

Paul sighed and phone Joan at the British Library. He only just reached his friend.

"Hi, thanks for answering so quickly."

"No problem. How are you, Paul?"

"Fine, just busy." Paul liked the elderly lady working in the rare book collection who had been a mature student with him at St Andrew's.

"I would expect you to be, if you're trying to solve 80 year old crimes." He could hear her smile down the line.

"Come again? Crimes?"

"Well, the man you wanted me to research, he was murdered. But that happened in 1924."

"That can't be, must be a younger relative."

"Not from the right side of the sheet." Smirking.

"Now you've lost me completely."

"Well, as I wrote, he was the son of the last Duke, and as he is the mystery one…"

"The what? I didn't see that feature and the journalist can't be got hold of. Can you start at the beginning?"

"You sound grumpy. Try sleeping once in a while, why don't you? Ok, here goes: The young man – full of promise and all that – was killed in a robbery at their stately home, and his father disappeared at the same time, was never seen again. The feature however made some strange allegations, completely spurious, if you as me…"

"Hold on, you're saying this guy's dead, no scions?"

"Yes, the title reverted to the Crown after a decent interval when the father didn't turn up again."

"No close relatives then. And who is my man who's using the name?"

Joan cleared her throat. "There always was talk about the Duke being a Lady's man… And if he looked anything like his son, I can understand the ladies."

Paul shrugged his shoulders. "That must be it then, talk about strong genes. Well, he's definitely mad enough to come from that background. Thanks for your time, Joan."

"You're welcome. See me for lunch sometime, you've got my number."

"Will do. Bye." He left his office.

He tried calling Naomi on the way out, but only managed to get through to her answer-phone. Apparently she was out, which didn't make him any easier. Should he tell her about this impostor? Did she already know him? Was she having an affair with him? He dismissed that thought. No, he might be good-looking, but he was obviously mad as a hatter. Besides, it didn't look as if she was into younger men.

After running around his flat six times, having cleared away the laundry that had amassed in the last days, watered all his plants – twice – and put out all the rubbish including paper, he gave up and set out for Tarlington Mews once more. After all, there was a strangely deranged stalker hanging around there.

I really must stop obsessing like this, he thought while trying to find a parking space close to Naomi's house. Finally he found one next to an ancient car, a black and white Hispano Suiza K6 in mint condition, he noticed with longing. He wouldn't have thought there were many of those still around. What he wouldn't give for a ride in that!

He didn't have to wait long. Soon he saw Naomi, accompanied by a tall man walking toward her house.

Paul felt a stab of jealousy that he didn't want to acknowledge. He tried to justify his quick exit from the car with professional reasons: obviously it was interesting who Naomi was going out with, she was still close to the murder investigation.

However, when he saw who was politely saying good-bye to her at the door, his steps slowed. Carter again. Or at least someone remarkably like Marcus Trevelyan-Carter and using his name.

Against his initial inclination of storming toward the door and demanding an explanation – and probably making a jealous exhibition of himself at the same time – Paul waited for Carter to turn, and then waved at him. To his surprise – nothing so far had gone as planned – the man was actually walking towards him now. Paul secretly checked he was still awake and braced himself for another strange meeting.

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