Page 114 of The Impossible Fortune

Does that make her useless? No.

Nick Silver reached out to her in the first place because of who she was. What she had done. And she may never be that woman again – the mind a razor, the body a spring, the soul a granite cliff face – but she doesn’t need to be.

Because she is now part of a team. An odd team, she accepts that, as she sits on Davey Noakes’s sofa between Joyce and Paul, with Ibrahim perching on a footstool because it helps with his posture. But a team nonetheless.

Elizabeth’s grand plan had not gone as hoped. Find the key, then sit and wait. Because they had found the key, but it had immediately gone missing, straight into the hands of either Ron or Connie Johnson. She could understand Connie’s angle for taking the key, but that razor-mind of hers could still not fathom Ron’s angle.

Where were they both? Elizabeth is delighted that she saw them part company on the CCTV. That Connie hadn’t immediately killed him. Which is not to say she didn’t follow him and kill him later.

Joanna has the armchair, the alpha seat, which, historically, would be Elizabeth’s. But she’s earned it. She had found the footage of Holly and Davey, meeting at a time neither had mentioned. That has to be significant.

If Elizabeth does not have the key, Joanna’s discovery is the next best thing. Davey Noakes knows something he isn’t telling. Whether that makes him Holly’s killer or not has yet to be established, but it is certainly why they are all here at close to midnight.

There are so many questions still unanswered: who killed Holly, where is Nick Silver, why did Davey Noakes and Lord Townes both pay visits to The Compound the previous week? Perhaps it is time that she stepped up and answered a few.

Elizabeth feels her phone buzz and sees she has a message from Donna. Sorry, Donna, you’ll have to wait, we’re cracking a case here. It’s been strange. A whole case without Donna or Chris involved.

‘Well, this is jolly,’ says Davey Noakes. ‘Shall we start with some idle gossip?’

Joyce takes him at his word. ‘I was just watchingFlog I–’

But Joanna clearly wants to take the responsibility of the alpha chair seriously. ‘Why did you and Holly Lewis meet at The Compound that Thursday morning?’

That’s certainly not where Elizabeth would have started things; you need to dance around a little first. That’s where Joyce was so useful: she has a capacity for small talk that Elizabeth has always lacked. But Joanna has been very successful in her field, and perhaps in the world of hedge funds one simply came straight out and said things.

‘Straight in, then,’ says Davey.

‘It’s an easy question,’ replies Joanna.

There’s a time and a place for this sort of approach, certainly. Elizabeth remembers that a passenger had once slipped through Heathrow with a case full of enriched uranium and delivered it to a London hotel. Once they had tracked down this courier, directness was a necessity, what with the prospect of nuclear capability falling into the hands of a criminal gang, and so his interview had been fairly direct. Direct and robust. But Elizabeth’s not sure if the same principles apply here.

Davey gives Joanna a curious look. ‘This doesn’t, automatically, feel like it’s any of your business.’

Davey, it seems, agrees with Elizabeth.

‘I’ve invited you into my house,’ says Davey. ‘It’s late, and there are rather a lot of you. I’d be even more annoyed if you hadn’t brought the eye candy.’

He cocks a thumb at Ibrahim, and Ibrahim says, ‘I moisturize.’

‘I’ll say you do,’ says Davey.

Okay, Elizabeth, put your brain into gear and see how it runs.

‘Quite right,’ says Elizabeth. ‘Joanna has questions for you, which we all want the answers to, but perhaps, in the circumstances, you might have questions for us first? Forgive me, Joanna.’

Elizabeth gives a slight bow of the head to Joanna, in deference to the alpha armchair. You have to be careful with people. But Elizabeth sees no defensiveness, and no pushback, just an understanding nod in return. Joanna issmart enough to read a situation in an instant and to let somebody else take a different approach. Behind the directness and toughness, Joanna has her mother’s lightning-rod empathy. No wonder she’s so rich.

‘Thank you,’ says Davey to Elizabeth, and, just like that, the alpha seat is in the middle of the sofa, between a sleepy nurse and a university professor wearing odd socks. Elizabeth sees Ibrahim give her a little wink.

‘I don’t suppose you have the Bitcoin?’ Davey asks.

‘We do,’ says Elizabeth.

‘You cracked both codes?’

‘We did,’ Elizabeth confirms.

‘How did you manage that?’