A Traitor to Memory

Lynley said that he thought it unlikely, but he gave Barbara the go-ahead. They would meet later at the Yard.

It didn't take too long for Barbara to troll through two decades of legal records in St. Catherine's, since she knew what she was looking for. And what she finally found sent her to New Scotland Yard posthaste, where she got on the blower to the station that served Tower Hamlets and spent an hour tracking down and talking to the only detective who'd spent his entire career there. His memory for detail and his possession of enough notes to write his memoirs several times over provided Barbara with the vein of gold she'd been seeking.

“Oh, right,” he drawled. “That's not a name I'm likely to forget. The whole flaming lot of them've been giving us aggro 's long as they've been walking the earth.”

“But as to the one …” Barbara said.

“I can spin a tale or two about him.”

She took notes from the detective's recitation, and when she rang off, she went in search of Lynley.

She found him in his office, standing near the window, looking grave. He'd apparently been home between his early morning visit to the hospital and coming to the Yard, because he looked as he always looked: perfectly groomed, well-shaven, and suitably dressed. The only sign that things were not normal was in his posture. He'd always stood like a man with a fence pole for a spine, but now he seemed slumped, as if carrying sacks of grain on his shoulders.

“The only thing Dee told me was a coma,” Barbara said by way of hello.

Lynley recounted for her the extent of the superintendent's injuries. He concluded with, “The only blessing is that the car didn't actually run over him. The force he was hit with threw him into a pillar box, which was bad enough. But it could have been worse.”

“Were there any witnesses?”

“Just someone who saw a black vehicle tearing down Stamford Brook Road.”

“Like the car that hit Eugenie?”

“It was large,” Lynley said. “According to the witness, it could have been a taxi. He thought it was painted in two tones, black with a grey roof. Hillier claims the grey would be the street lights' reflection on black.”

“Bugger Hillier for a lark,” Barbara scoffed. “Taxis are painted all sorts of ways these days. Two tones, three tones, red and yellow, or covered tyres-to-top with advertisements. I say we should listen to what the witness says. And as we're talking about a black car once again, I expect we've got a connection, don't you?”

“With Eugenie Davies?” Lynley didn't wait for a reply. “Yes. I'd say we've got a connection.” He gestured with a notebook he'd taken up from his desk and he put on his spectacles as he walked round to sit, nodding for Barbara to do likewise. “But we've still got virtually nothing to go on, Havers. I've been reading through my notes trying to find something, and I'm not getting far. All I can come up with is a conflict among what Richard Davies, his son, and Ian Staines are saying about Eugenie's seeing Gideon. Staines claims she intended to ask Gideon for money to get him out of debt before he loses his house and everything in it, but he also says that she told him—after having made the promise to see her son—that something had come up and because of it, she wouldn't ask Gideon for the money. In the meantime, Richard Davies claims she hadn't asked to see Gideon at all, but just the opposite. He says he wanted her to try to help Gideon with a problem he's having with stage fright and that's why they were going to meet: at his suggestion. Gideon supports this claim, more or less. He says his mother never asked to see him, at least not that he was told. All he knows is that his father wanted them to meet so she could help him out with his playing.”

“She played the violin?” Barbara said. “There wasn't one at the cottage in Henley.”

“Gideon didn't mean that she was going to tutor him. He said there was actually nothing she could do to help him with his problem other than to ‘agree’ with his father.”

“What's that supposed to mean when it's dancing the polka?”

“I don't know. But I'll tell you this: He doesn't have stage fright. There's something seriously wrong with the man.”

“Like a guilty conscience? Where was he three nights ago?”

“Home. Alone. So he says.” Lynley tossed his notebook on his desk and removed his glasses. “And that doesn't even begin to address Eugenie Davies' e-mail, Barbara.” He brought her into the picture on that front, saying in conclusion, “Jete was the name tagged onto the message. Does that mean anything to you?”

“An acronym?” She considered the possible words that the four letters could begin, with just and eat coming to mind at once. She followed that thought along the family tree to its cousin, saying, “Could be Pitchley branching out from his TongueMan handle?”

“What did you get from St. Catherine's on him?” Lynley asked her.

“Gold,” she replied. “St. Catherine's confirms Pitchley's claim that he was James Pitchford twenty years ago.”