Dead Men's s Boots

And whether it helps or not, I’m going to get you some answers. We’ve got a window – probably a few weeks, at the very least. Going on what Gary – DS Coldwood – had to say, the trial date hasn’t come down yet. The police are still looking for the murder weapon and not having much luck, so nobody’s pressing for an early hearing. If I can turn up something solid-’ That word felt a little odd, given how tenuous and formless all my speculations were. ‘Well, whatever I turn up,’ I finished lamely, ‘I’ll hand it over to you and you can decide for yourself what to do with it.

’

‘So you believe that Doug is innocent, Mister Castor?’

I grimaced. I would have preferred not to be pinned down on that score right then, because the truth was that I {uthwid didn’t have a bastard clue. ‘I believe Myriam Kale was in that hotel room,’ I said. ‘But I’d dearly love to nail down the how and the why of it, or at least get some idea of—’

‘“Why” isn’t an issue.’ Jan broke in, her voice strained and angry. ‘She killed dozens of men when she was alive.

They don’t know how many. And she’s still doing it. And we don’t need to know how she got there, either. If she’s a ghost, she can go where she likes. She doesn’t have to knock on doors, or take trains and planes and taxis. She can walk through walls, and she can be gone when the police get there. She wouldn’t even show up on cameras.’

‘And she’d have a hell of a time swinging a hammer.’

Sudden silence from the other end of the line. I waited for Jan to ask the obvious question, to which I’d have to give the obvious answer.

Your husband’s soul has run off with another woman . . . Meanwhile my gaze wandered around the square almost as if I was subconsciously looking for a way out of this conversation. A Japanese tourist a few feet away was unfolding a map of London that ended up being so big that it spilled all the way down to the ground. A big feral cat, black with dirty white splashes across its back, was watching the pigeons as they flew from one equestrian statue to the next, its tail twitching in tight arcs like a severed cable with a thousand volts pouring through it. An art student, or maybe just a hobbyist, was sketching Charles the First in pastels, a bottle of Red Stripe resting at her side as she sat cross-legged on the stones.

But it was almost as though Jan could see the chasm yawning up ahead of her and knew instinctively to veer away from it. ‘I don’t understand any of this,’ she said.