“Then you were able to see who destroyed your garden in May?” Bish asked.
Katherine stiffened. Parker’s stare was dismissive. “You think someone who cut off the heads of my wife’s flowers is responsible for the bombing?”
Bish hadn’t known that detail. “Well, it’s not everyday vandalism,” he said. “That seems more like some kind of message. Why didn’t you report it?”
“We didn’t want a fuss,” Parker said firmly.
“And we had to concentrate on Lola at the time,” Katherine added. “She was being bullied at school and not coping. We let her go on this trip because she’d been miserable all year, and her favorite teacher was a chaperone on the tour.”
“Julius McEwan?” Bish asked.
Katherine nodded. “Lola was in his history class. Some teachers can find her annoying, but he understood her spirit. Up until the day of the bombing, she was having the time of her life.” Katherine was looking at Bish, pained. “Do you think that bomb was meant for my daughter?” she asked quietly.
“I honestly don’t know.” Bish still believed that Violette could as easily have been the target. “But I’ll never forgive myself if I don’t cover every hunch.”
“If someone takes issue with my views, it’s me they should come after,” Parker said. “Not my family.”
“But that’s not how these sort of people operate,” Bish said. “They go for your nearest and dearest.”
“All I’m doing is saying the things most people are expressing around their kitchen table.”
Bish again felt Katherine eyeing him. “What are your thoughts, Chief Inspector Ortley? You seem to have some—I can tell.”
Bish’s opinion on the subject was simple. What was said in the confines of one’s home should sometimes remain there. But he didn’t believe the Parkers would appreciate the honesty.
“My thoughts these days are always on the kids,” he said, retrieving his notebook. He scribbled out his email address and tore out the page. “Can I have the security tape from the day your garden was destroyed?” he asked, handing it to Parker. “And a list of any speaking engagements you were invited to prior to the vandalism?”
“There’s no security tape,” Ian Parker said.
“It got damaged,” Katherine said.
“If that’s all, we’ll be off now,” Parker said and turned briskly to his wife. “I’ve booked us a table for morning tea in town.”
She looked surprised. “I’ve already arranged to drive up to Canterbury with Sadia for a bit of sightseeing,” she said.
“With who?”
“Sadia Bagchi. Manoshi’s mother.”
Parker’s look was one of disbelief. “Why would she want to go to a cathedral?”
“For the art and the history,” Katherine said, irritation in her voice. “Honestly, Ian, I’m going for a drive with the woman. Not converting her to Christianity.”
Bish was becoming quite a fan of Katherine Barrett-Parker.
Before he left, he went up to see Fionn. The door was shut and he heard laughter coming from inside.
“He’s got a visitor,” one of the nurses told him cheerfully. “Two mornings in a row. Go on in. I doubt he’ll mind.”
But he shook his head, glad the kid had friends coming through. “I think he’s spent enough time with us oldies around him.”
“Speak for yourself.”
He went to walk away, but stopped. What if it was Violette or Eddie in there?
“Is it a girl?” he asked the nurse.
“No. One of the lads in his form from school.”
Back home, Bish stopped at his local for a drink. He had avoided it for weeks, not wanting to explain why he wasn’t at work, so he sat at the back surrounded by TV screens. It was somber viewing. A Sky News special edition of three of the funerals taking place. White balloons hovering above Astrid Copely’s village in Devon. A transcript, read aloud, of the heartbreaking eulogy by Julius McEwan’s childhood best friend. The coffin carrying Lucia Ortez being carried up a stony outcrop in Basque Country to an eight-hundred-year-old chapel by the kids she grew up with, all of them taking their turns. Add to that Bish’s memory of Stevie’s funeral and the drowned body of the anonymous girl in the Calais morgue, and it was too much to bear.
Grazier rang for an update and Bish told him about Katherine Barrett-Parker’s vandalized garden.
“When did it happen?” Grazier asked.
“Back in May.”
“Did they report it?”
“No. And surprisingly, their own security footage for that night got damaged.”
“What are you thinking?”
“She’s hiding something,” Bish said. “Perhaps an affair. She may know whoever was responsible and wants to keep it from her husband.”
“I’ll get Elliot to look into it.”
“No, I’ll do it—”
“I need you for something else,” Grazier interrupted.
According to Grazier, Noor LeBrac had received a letter from her daughter. Although it had been intercepted in the prison mail room, a decision had been made by the acting governor of Holloway to release it to LeBrac. Apparently there was nothing in it of concern, but the Home Office wanted it regardless.
“And you want me to go in there and wrestle it from her?” Bish said. “When?”