“Good news. Yes.”
He looked beyond her. She wondered if he was trying to suss out whether she'd celebrated the investigation's conclusion with a chorus line of dancing Greek boys who were still lounging somewhere within. But then she remembered her manners and said, “Oh. Come in. Coffee? I've only got instant, I'm afraid,” and she added, “this morning,” as if every other day she stood in the kitchen furiously grinding beans.
He said no, he couldn't stay long. Just a moment, in fact, because his daughter was dressing and he would be needed to plait her hair.
“Right,” Barbara said. “But you don't mind if I … ?” And she indicated the electric kettle, using her Prince of Wales mug to do so.
“No. Of course. I have interrupted your breakfast.”
“Such as it is,” Barbara admitted.
“I would have waited until a time more convenient, but I found this morning that I could no longer do so.”
“Ah.” Barbara went to the kettle and switched it on, wondering about his gravity and what it portended. While it was true that he'd been grave at their every meeting all summer, there was something added to his gravity this morning, a way of looking at her that made her wonder if she had Pop-Tart frosting on her face somewhere. “Well, have a seat if you'd like. And there're fags on the table. You're sure about the coffee?”
“Perfectly. Yes.” But he helped himself to one of her cigarettes and watched her in silence as she made her second cup of coffee. It was only when she joined him at the table—the velvet heart like an unmade declaration between them—that he spoke again. “Barbara, this is difficult for me. I am uncertain how to begin.”
She slurped her coffee and tried to look encouraging.
Azhar restlessly reached for the velvet heart. “Essex.”
“Essex,” Barbara repeated helpfully.
“Hadiyyah and I were at the seaside on Sunday. In Essex. As you know,” he reminded her.
“Yeah. Right.” Now was the moment to say Thanks for the heart, but it wouldn't come out. “Hadiyyah told me what a good time you had. She mentioned you dropped in at the Burnt House Hotel as well.”
“She dropped in,” he clarified. “That is to say that I took her there to wait with the good Mrs. Porter—you remember her I believe—”
Barbara nodded. Sitting behind her zimmer frame, Mrs. Porter had looked after Hadiyyah while her father acted as liaison between the police and a small but restless Pakistani community during the course of a murder enquiry. “Right,” she said. “I remember Mrs. Porter. Nice of you to go to see her.”
“As I said, it was Hadiyyah who visited Mrs. Porter. I myself visited the local police.”
At this, Barbara felt her defences rising. She wanted to make some sort of remark that would derail the conversation they were about to have, but she couldn't think of one quickly enough because Azhar went on.
“I spoke to Constable Fogarty,” he told her. “Constable Michael Fogarty, Barbara.”
Barbara nodded. “Yeah. Mike. Right.”
“He's the weapons officer for the Essex police.”
“Yeah. Mike. Weapons. That's right.”
“He told me what happened on the boat, Barbara. What DCI Barlow said about Hadiyyah, what she intended, and what you did.”
“Azhar—”
He rose. He walked to the day bed. Barbara grimaced to see that she'd not yet made it and the loathsome happy face T-shirt that she wore at night was still lying in a tangle with the sheets. She thought for a moment that he intended to straighten the bed—he was the most compulsively neat person she'd ever met—but he turned to face her. She could see his agitation.
“How do I thank you? What can I say that could possibly thank you for the sacrifice you have made for my child?”
“No thanks are needed.”
“This is not true. DCI Barlow—”
“Em Barlow was born with too much ambition, Azhar. That bollocksed up her judgement. It didn't mess with mine.”
“But as a result you have lost your position. You have been disgraced. Your partnership with Inspector Lynley—whom I know you esteem—has been dissolved, has it not?”
“Well, things between us aren't exactly peachy,” Barbara agreed. “But the inspector's got rules and regulations on his side so he's within his rights to be cheesed off at me.”
“But this … all this is due to what you did … to your protection of Hadiyyah when DCI Barlow wanted to leave her, when she called her a ‘Paki brat’ and was indifferent to her drowning in the sea.”