by Nicci French
‘I’d like to see Frieda Klein,’ said Lola.
‘Do you have an appointment?’
‘Not exactly,’ said Lola. ‘I mean, no.’
‘Take a seat, please.’
Lola sank into the soft, off-white sofa and realized she hadn’t thought of what she would say to Frieda Klein when she met her. Perhaps they could just have a chat and she could get a few tips for her dissertation. A woman came down the stairs, her shoes clattering on the hard floor. She talked to the person at the desk, then looked round at Lola. She had dark hair and dark eyes; her fingers glittered with rings; she was dressed in a white blouse and an almost startling long skirt, striped amber and blue and red. She walked over and sat down beside Lola.
‘You look different from your picture,’ said Lola.
‘What picture?’
‘In the newspaper reports. But it’s good of you to see me.’
The woman gave a puzzled frown, and then her face relaxed into a smile. ‘You think I’m Frieda Klein?’
She was speaking in a foreign accent. Was it Spanish? Was Frieda Klein Spanish? None of the newspaper articles had said so.
‘Aren’t you?’ she asked doubtfully.
‘I’m a colleague of hers.’ There was a pause. She seemed to be waiting for Lola to speak, but Lola couldn’t think of anything at all to say, so she continued, talking in a soothing tone, ‘If you want to be seen by Dr Klein, it’s usual to get a doctor’s referral.’
There was another pause.
‘I’m not exactly a patient,’ said Lola.
‘Then who are you?’
‘I’m a student.’
‘For training and internships you make an application. You don’t just turn up.’
‘I’m not that sort of student. I just want to talk to Frieda Klein.’
‘Many people want to talk to Dr Klein.’
‘I’m doing a dissertation. I wanted to ask her some questions.’
‘What is the dissertation about?’
‘It’s about Frieda Klein.’
‘What kind of student are you?’ Suddenly her tone wasn’t so friendly.
‘I’m a criminologist. I was told she’d be an interesting subject.’
The woman stood up. ‘No,’ she said.
‘No what?’
‘Dr Klein isn’t here.’
‘Do you know when she’ll be back?’
‘She’s away.’
‘What? On holiday?’
‘That is not a concern of yours.’
‘Do you have a number for her? An email?’
‘She is a private person.’
‘Look, I’ve read about her in the newspapers. The one thing she is not is a private person.’
‘You need to leave,’ said the woman, her tone angry.
A young man joined them. He was tall and rangy, and wore loose silky trousers, a cardigan Lola wouldn’t have minded owning herself, and heavy boots. His light-brown hair was tied back in a ponytail. Lola saw he had several piercings.
‘Can I help?’
‘No. This young woman’s just on her way out.’ She glared at Lola before turning away.
‘She’s not very friendly,’ said Lola.
‘She sees it as her job to protect everyone.’
‘Are you a patient?’ asked Lola.
‘I work here.’
‘Are you a psychoanalyst? You don’t look like one.’
‘And what do psychoanalysts look like?’
‘Oh, I don’t know. Older than you. And more severe, with a beard and glasses, and …’ She looked at him dubiously. ‘Not dressed like you.’
He laughed. ‘You mean, we should all look like Freud?’
‘What’s your name?’
‘Jonah Martin. What’s yours?’
‘Lola Hayes. Do you know Frieda Klein?’
‘I’m afraid not. I only started work here last week. Of course I know of her. She’s part of the fabric of this place.’
‘Do you know how I can find her?’
He shook his head. ‘No. And if I did, I probably wouldn’t tell you.’
A minute later Lola was outside on the pavement, with no apparent way of reaching Frieda Klein. Ten minutes later, as she was making her way back to the Tube station, her phone rang. It was Hal Bradshaw.
‘Oh!’ she said, startled. ‘Have I done something wrong?’
‘Not at all.’ He gave an easy, practised laugh. ‘I was just following up on our conversation about Frieda Klein.’
‘Really? Well. That’s very kind of you.’
‘How are you doing?’
‘Not well. I’ve just been to her clinic in Swiss Cottage. She seems to have gone away and it doesn’t seem possible to contact her.’
‘Really? That’s interesting. In that case, I’ve got another suggestion. She was trained by Dr Reuben McGill. He used to be famous, or notorious. He’s always been one of Frieda Klein’s friends and he lives in Primrose Hill. You could walk there.’
‘What? Now?’
‘Yes, now. He knows her secrets. As much as anyone does. Go and see him, then ring me and let me know what happened.’
He gave her the address. Lola felt uneasy about this scheme and she was still feeling uneasy twenty minutes later when she rapped on Reuben McGill’s door. There was a shuffling sound from inside and then it opened to reveal a rumpled figure. He was in his sixties, with untidy, curly grey hair, bags under his eyes, unshaven. He wore a checked shirt and his feet were bare. Lola said she wanted to meet Reuben McGill.
‘That’s me.’
As Lola explained why she was there, his expression grew more and more suspicious. When she was finished, he gave a grunt. ‘How did you get this address?’ he said.
For reasons she didn’t quite understand, Lola was suddenly tempted to make something up. But she couldn’t think of anything, so she stuck with the truth. ‘Professor Hal Bradshaw gave it to me.’
She thought he might react blankly or with irritation. What she hadn’t expected was a wheezing laugh.
‘Hal Bradshaw,’ he said, as if the name itself was funny. Then the laugh turned into a cough. He waved her inside. With some trepidation she followed him into his front room. It was a bit of a mess in there, with books and bottles and coats everywhere. A tortoiseshell cat lay asleep in the armchair.
‘Josef,’ Reuben shouted, while still looking at her. ‘You need to come and see this.’
Lola heard the thumping sound of feet on the stairs and a man came into the room, dark-haired with brown, soulful eyes. He wore a T-shirt, paint-spattered jeans and rough boots, which looked wrong indoors.
‘She’s a student,’ said McGill. ‘And she wants to write about Frieda.’
‘Strange,’ said Josef.
‘And she was sent here by Hal Bradshaw.’
Now Josef smiled as well. Lola was confused. What was so funny about Bradshaw?
‘Can we get you a drink?’ said McGill.
‘You mean like tea?’
‘I was thinking something a little stronger.’
‘It’s a bit early in the day.’
‘I thought that’s what you students did.’
‘Not all the time.’
‘So you’re a friend of Hal Bradshaw’s?’
‘I’m not a friend. I’ve only met him once. My supervisor told me that he knew Frieda Klein. I went to see him and he pointed me towards you.’
McGill smiled again.
‘Is something funny about this?’ Lola asked.
‘Have you seen Road Runner?’ McGill asked.
‘I don’t think so,’ said Lola.
McGill looked over at Josef. ‘Have you?’
‘Road Runner?’ said Josef, thoughtfully. ‘Is a car?’
‘This is hopeless,’ said McGill. ‘It’s a cartoon. You should see it, both of you.’ He looked disconsolate. ‘Well, the roadrunner is a kind of bird and there’s a coyote that keeps trying to catch the roadrunner with more and more cunning plans and keeps f
ailing. This would make more sense if you’d seen it, but if you had, and you knew Bradshaw the way we do, you’d realize that Bradshaw is like Wile E. Coyote. And Frieda is like the roadrunner.’ There was a pause. ‘You should watch it. It’s funny. It’s probably on YouTube.’
Another pause.
‘I’m not out to get Dr Klein,’ said Lola. ‘I just want to write about her, about what she’s done.’
McGill and Josef looked at each other.
‘The point is moot,’ said McGill. ‘She’s away.’
‘I know she’s away,’ said Lola. ‘I went to her house. I’ve just been round to the Warehouse where this woman treated me like I was a criminal.’
‘Yes,’ said McGill, cheerfully. ‘Paz is a dragon.’
‘What’s the big problem? Why can’t I just phone her? If she’s away, I can email her or whatever she uses. I just want to ask her a couple of questions.’
‘Not so easy,’ said Josef, shaking his head.
‘Can you at least tell me why you won’t tell me anything?’
‘That would be telling you something,’ said McGill. ‘Look, Layla –’
‘Lola.’
‘We’ve done you the courtesy of speaking to you. I think it would be easier if you found another subject for your dissertation.’
‘But now you’ve got me all interested,’ said Lola.
As she left the house she met a young woman coming in. She had spiky black hair and kohl-rimmed eyes and was wearing clumpy boots and a black leather jacket. Lola thought she looked rather scary, but the young woman smiled at her and her face behind its make-up seemed suddenly vulnerable and sweet.
‘Hi,’ she said.
‘Hello, Chloë,’ called Josef, from inside the house.
So that was Frieda’s niece. Lola had read about her in the newspaper cuttings. She might be a good person to talk to. She turned, but as she did so, the front door closed.
Lola met Liz Barron in her newspaper office in Canary Wharf. She was on the eighteenth floor. From her desk, Lola could look across the Thames at the Millennium Dome. It was like a white spiky tortoise in the bright afternoon sun. She had to force herself to turn away and concentrate on the gleaming, smiling figure opposite her. She had shining hair and glossy lips and a look of implacable friendliness that Lola found unsettling.
‘I went through the newspaper reports on Frieda Klein,’ Lola said. ‘You seem to have written about her more than anyone else.’
‘For my sins,’ said Barron. ‘Most doctors love the attention. You can’t keep them off the TV or out of the papers. But there was a mystery about Frieda. I interviewed her, I probed her, but she was always uncomfortable in the limelight.’
‘Then why was she there?’
Barron shook her head. Her hair swung from side to side. ‘Maybe you’d need to be a psychologist to answer that question, but I did my best. I always thought there was a darkness about her, something that drew her to what she most feared. I’ve written about that. I did a long feature about women being drawn to darkness and violence.’
‘Yes. I saw it.’
‘It got a terrific response.’
Lola nodded in a noncommittal fashion. She wasn’t drawn to darkness and violence herself.
‘I wonder what will become of her,’ said Liz Barron.
‘In what way?’ Lola asked.
‘She got involved with the Hannah Docherty murders. That ended badly. Then there was the Daniel Blackstock case. I knew him. It happened under my nose. What I’m trying to say is that I think Frieda is in a bad way.’ She looked at Lola thoughtfully. ‘And you’re writing about her for your dissertation. Interesting. What did you make of her?’
‘I haven’t been able to find her.’
‘What do you mean? Don’t you have her address?’
‘There’s nobody at her house. The mail’s piled up. I went to her work. They said she’s gone away, can’t be reached, they don’t know when she’s coming back.’
‘Really?’ Liz Barron’s eyes gleamed. She picked up a pen and wrote a note on a pad in front of her. Then she looked up. ‘So what else do you want to know?’
When they had finished, Liz Barron walked Lola back to the lift. She pressed the button, then pressed it again. She gave Lola a winning smile.
‘If you find out anything interesting, you must let me know,’ she said.
‘I don’t think that will happen,’ said Lola.
Still the lift didn’t come. Barron pressed the button again. ‘I always have the illusion that if you push the button over and over again it might hurry the lift along.’
Finally it did arrive. Lola stepped inside. As the doors started to close, Barron put out her hand to block them.
‘What?’ said Lola.
‘It’s just that when people get involved with Frieda Klein …’
‘Yes?’
‘I don’t know. Just watch out, that’s all. And keep in touch.’ She withdrew her hand as the doors closed.
EIGHT
Larry Phelps was about six foot five inches tall and very spindly. He reminded Dugdale of a tree that had grown too quickly towards the light. Even when he was sitting down, he was tall, with thin wrists and sharp bones and a high forehead. He pushed his glasses back over the bridge of his bony nose and leaned forward.
‘We have a problem,’ said Dugdale. ‘We have a computer. It belonged to a murder victim. We’re interested in his browsing history. But he seems to have deleted it. Is there a way of recovering it?’ He pointed at the laptop on the desk.
Phelps flipped it open.
‘Is that something you could do? You could take it away if you wanted. I know it might take some time but the sooner we get it the better. If it’s possible.’
Phelps looked up from the computer. ‘Could you get me a coffee?’ he said. ‘Milk and two sugars.’
‘Of course.’
‘I mean, like, now.’
Dugdale flexed his jaw and went very slightly red. Any of his subordinates would have been alarmed by this but Phelps just went on looking at the screen and tapping on the keyboard. In the police, there were people who asked for coffee and people who fetched coffee, and Dugdale was in the first group. But he swallowed and stopped himself saying what he wanted to say. He left the room and walked across the office to the coffee machine and pressed the button for a white coffee and a black coffee for himself. He found two packets of sugar and made his way back to his office. Phelps was sitting with his arms folded, looking up at the ceiling.
‘Is it going to be a problem?’ said Dugdale.
‘I’ve got his full search history.’
‘I thought he’d deleted it.’
Phelps took the coffee and moved his chair away from the desk. ‘Hiding your search history by deleting it is like …’ He took a sip of coffee. ‘It’s like when me and my three-year-old daughter play hide and seek and she puts her hands over her face and thinks I can’t find her. There’s a list of URLs on the screen.’
Dugdale stepped forward.
‘Hey! Stop!’
‘What?’ asked Dugdale, startled.
‘You want to hide the information on that computer so that it can never be found? Just spill that coffee over it.’
‘All right, all right,’ said Dugdale. He carefully placed his coffee on the other side of the desk. ‘Did you see anything interesting?’
‘I thought you were looking for porn. Child porn, animal porn, some kind of porn.’
‘Isn’t there any?’
Phelps shrugged. ‘Odd bit here and there. Nothing out of the ordinary. But have a look at his recent searches.’ Larry Phelps unfolded himself from the chair. ‘I’ll leave you to it.’
When Phelps had gone, Dugdale sat down in the chair and looked at the screen. There was a window open with a list of web addresses. Weather, sport, online stores. But Phelps had mentioned searches. What had he meant? Dugdale clicked on the most recent ones and then he knew, and he read the name aloud: ‘Detective In
spector Malcolm Karlsson.’
He sat very still. What was that about? Why was this salesman searching for information about a police detective?
Dugdale knew Karlsson a bit. They’d run into each other at functions from time to time. They’d been on a training course together. There was something a bit out of the ordinary about him. He wasn’t a team player, he wasn’t a back-slapper, not one of the guys. Clever, though. He’d been involved in some high-profile cases over the years: the one where Dean Reeve abducted that little boy, for instance, or the strange affair when a dead man had been found rotting on the sofa of a madwoman. And, of course, he’d teamed up with Frieda Klein; people used to say he was smitten with her, though they would never have dared say it to his face. Dugdale ran a finger round the inside of his collar. Why was Kernan interested in him, though? He sat for a moment, scowling in concentration, then went to the door. Quarry was on the phone having a muttered conversation. Clearly something private. Dugdale stood there until Quarry noticed him and became self-conscious. He put the phone down.
‘Everything all right, Dan?’
‘Fine,’ said Quarry, abruptly.
Dugdale explained about the search history.
‘Get in touch with Karlsson, find out if he’s got any history with Kernan. I’ll phone Mrs Kernan about him. Remember her first name?’
‘Sarah,’ said Quarry.
‘Good,’ said Dugdale. ‘I’m bloody awful with names.’
When Sarah Kernan answered the phone, Dugdale dutifully asked about her state of mind, whether she was sleeping, about some counselling she’d been receiving, but then turned to the job in hand.
‘We’ve been checking your husband’s computer and one of his searches was for a senior detective called Malcolm Karlsson. We were wondering if you could throw any light on that.’