She was still refusing to answer that question when she pulled into Steeles Road and slid the Mini into a parking space that was being conveniently vacated by a woman, three children, two dogs, and what appeared to be a cello with legs. She locked up and trudged in the direction of Eton Villas, gratified that she was feeling tired, because tired meant sleep and sleep meant putting an end to the voices.
She heard other voices, however, as she rounded the corner and came upon the yellow Edwardian house behind which sat her mouse-hole dwelling. These new voices were coming from the flagstone area in front of the ground floor flat. And one of these voices—belonging to a child—cried out happily when Barbara came through the gate of bright orange pickets.
“Barbara! Hullo, hullo! Dad and I are blowing bubbles. Come and see. When the light hits them just exactly right, they look like round rainbows. Did you know that, Barbara? Come and see, come and see.”
The little girl and her father were seated on the solitary wooden bench in front of their flat, she in the fast-fading light, he in the growing shadows where his cigarette glowed like a crimson firefly. He touched his daughter's head fondly and rose in the formal fashion that was his by nature. “You'll join us?” Taymullah Azhar asked Barbara.
“Oh do, do, do,” the child exclaimed. “After the bubbles, we're watching a video. The Little Mermaid. And we've got toffee apples for a treat. Well, we've only got two, but I'll share mine with you. One's too much for me to eat anyway.” She scooted off the bench and came to greet Barbara, dancing across the lawn with the bubble wand and creating a trail of round rainbows behind her.
“The Little Mermaid, is it?” Barbara said thoughtfully. “I don't know, Hadiyyah. I've never thought of myself as a Disney sort of bird. All those skinny Sloane-types being rescued by blokes in suits of armour—”
“This is a mermaid,” Hadiyyah interrupted instructively.
“Hence the title. Yeah. Right.”
“So she can't be rescued by someone in armour 'cause he'd sink to the bottom of the sea. And anyways, no one saves her at all. She saves the prince.”
“Now, there's a twist I might be able to live with.”
“You've never seen it, have you? Well, tonight you can. Do come.” Hadiyyah whirled round in a circle, surrounding herself with a hoop of bubbles. Her long, thick plaits flew about her shoulders, the silver ribbons that tied them glittering like pale dragonflies. “The little mermaid's prettier'n anything. She has auburn hair.”
“A good contrast to her scales.”
“And she wears the sweetest little shells on her chest.” Hadiyyah demonstrated with two small, dark hands cupped over two non-existent breasts.
“Ah. Strategically placed, I see,” Barbara said.
“Won't you watch it with us? Please? Like I said, we've got toffee ap-ples …” Coaxingly, she drew out the last two words.
“Hadiyyah,” her father said quietly, “an invitation once extended needn't be repeated.” And to Barbara, “Nonetheless, we'd be most happy to have you join us.”
Barbara considered the proposition. An evening with Hadiyyah and her father offered the potential for more distraction, and she liked the thought of that very much. She could sit with her little friend, comfortably lounging on enormous floor pillows, their heads in their palms and their feet in the air, swaying side by side as they kept time to the music. She could chat to her little friend's father afterwards, when Hadiyyah herself had been sent off to bed. Taymullah Azhar would expect that much. It was a habit they'd developed during the months of Barbara's enforced leave from Scotland Yard. And in the past few weeks especially, their dialogue had moved from the banalities of relative strangers being polite to the initial delicate conversational probing of two individuals who might become friends.
But in that friendship lay the rub of the matter. It called for Barbara to reveal her encounters with Hillier and Lynley. It required the truth of her demotion and her estrangement from the man she'd sought to emulate. And because Azhar's own eight-year-old daughter was the child whose life had been saved by Barbara's impetuous actions on the North Sea—actions that she'd managed to keep from Azhar in the three months since the chase had occurred—he would feel a responsibility for the fallout to her career that wasn't his to bear.
“Hadiyyah,” Taymullah Azhar said when Barbara didn't answer, “I think we've had enough bubbles for the evening. Return them to your room and wait for me there, please.”
Hadiyyah's small brow furrowed, and her eyes looked stricken. “But, Dad, the little mermaid … ?”
“We shall watch it as previously decided, Hadiyyah. Put the bubbles in your room now.”
She gave Barbara an anxious glance. “More'n half the toffee apple,” she said. “If you'd like, Barbara.”
“Hadiyyah.”
She smiled impishly and dashed into the house.