Page 169 of The Hallmarked Man

‘He’s lovely,’ said Robin, but in fact, to Robin, he just looked like a baby, any baby. He seemed smaller than the huge nephew whose picture she’d just been sent, but otherwise indistinguishable from most others. Yet unlike the baby pictures Robin was increasingly used to seeing from friends and family, these were all of the child alone, on a changing mat, or asleep in his cot. Of course, nobody lived with Decima to take a picture of her with her child, and the father had never even seen him.

‘I didn’t want to leave him, I’ve never done it before,’ Decima saidnervily, ‘but I had to come to town today, I needed to sort out some staffing problems. Hopefully they can get along without me for a bit longer.’

‘I like this club,’ said Robin, trying to put Decima at her ease.

‘I chose it because it’s near your office, and we can be private. My father hates it,’ Decima added.

‘I can’t see how anyone could dislike this,’ said Robin, looking around at the understated elegance of the place; the wood panelling, the fresh flowers.

‘My father doesn’t approve of any clubs except his own,’ said Decima. ‘Anyway, this is always full of media people. Theshitterati, my father calls them.’

Robin might have laughed if Decima hadn’t looked so strained.

A waiter now arrived to take drinks orders.

‘Just water, please, I’m breastfeeding,’ said Decima, which again, as far as Strike was concerned, was information the waiter didn’t need.

When the door had closed again, Decima launched immediately into speech, looking at Strike rather than Robin, her tone shakily assertive.

‘There are a couple of things I want to say, if that’s OK.’

‘Of course,’ said Strike.

‘OK, well, firstly: you seem to think that, if Rupe managed to give Dredge some money, the man wouldn’t have hurt Rupe, but Zac owed Dredge much more than two thousand pounds. Dredge still had a motive to hurt Rupe: to send a message to Zac!’

‘That’s possible,’ said Strike, ‘but we’ve found no evidence to sugg—’

‘And if Rupe had two thousand pounds, hemusthave sold the nef! He obviously got an advance payment from Ramsay Silver, pending them selling it!’

‘The owner of Ramsay Silver says he’s only ever had one nef in stock,’ said Strike.‘It was masonic, and taken the night Wright was murdered.’

‘But Ramsay would hardlyadmitto having my father’s nef, would he?’ said Decima. ‘It was stolen!’

‘Well, it’s notoriously difficult to prove a negative,’ said Strike, careful to keep his tone polite. ‘We can’t be a hundred per cent certain Kenneth Ramsay never bought your father’s nef, but I think it’s very unlikely. His shop specialises in masonic pieces and—’

‘But then, where did Rupe get two thousand pounds from?’

‘I’m not denying he might have sold the nef somewh—’

‘But it’s kind of a huge coincidence that a body turns up in Ramsay Silver thatexactlymatches Rupe, who had a big bit of silver to sell, isn’t it?’ said Decima, her voice now rising in pitch. ‘And that Rupe had a drug dealer after him, who’d made threats toliterallykill him?’

She’d said this already, of course, both in person and by email. Strike might have responded that the body no more exactly fitted Rupert Fleetwood than any of the other men whose pictures were pinned up on the corkboard in the office. He might even have pointed out that there had to be thousands of people up and down the country who had bits of silver they’d like to turn into ready cash, but that he saw no reason to suppose any of them had died in the silver vault, either. While he was trying to formulate a diplomatic response, Decima said,

‘And I wanted to say something else. I don’t believe Rupert went to Sacha Legard’s birthday party. Sacha’s either lying, or he’s made a mistake.’

‘I don’t think he can have made a mistake,’ said Strike. ‘There were a lot of witnesses. It’d be a very stupid lie to tell.’

‘But Rupe wouldneverhave gone there!’

‘Why d’you say that?’

‘Because a week before that party, Sacha was at Dino’s with some friends, and they were all talking about the party, and when Sacha looked up and realised it was Rupe serving him cocktails he looked really embarrassed, because he hadn’t told Rupe about it or given him an invitation or anything. But Rupe said to me he’d rather be dead in aditchall night than go along to Claridge’s with Sacha and his friends. And the party was on the twenty-first, which was bang in the middle of the weekend Rupe and Zac were moving out of their house, so why onearthwould Rupe have wanted to go to a party where he wasn’t wanted, when he was busy packing up and organising everything? And you said he went there to talk to Val – Val’s thelastperson he’d have wanted to see, after the business with the nef, and with Val being sofoulabout us being together!’

‘I thought it an odd thing for Rupert to do, myself,’ said Strike. ‘Apparently he spoke to your sister Cosima, as well as your broth—’

‘Cosima’s my half-sister,’ said Decima. Patches of red had appeared in her pale cheeks now, ‘and Rupehatedher, so that makes no sense, either!’

‘Why did he hate—?’