Page 12 of Troubled Blood

Afraid to use the shower in case he woke Ted and Joan, he peed, pulled the flush and only then remembered how noisy the old toilet was. Washing as best he could in tepid water while the cistern refilled with a noise like a cement mixer, Strike thought that if anyone slept through that, they’d have to be drugged.

Sure enough, on opening the bathroom door, he came face to face with Joan. The top of his aunt’s head barely came up to Strike’s chest. He looked down on her thinning gray hair, into once forget-me-not blue eyes now bleached with age. Her frogged and quilted red dressing gown had the ceremonial dignity of a kabuki robe.

“Morning,” Strike said, trying to sound cheerful and achieving only a fake bonhomie. “Didn’t wake you, did I?”

“No, no, I’ve been awake for a while. How was Dave?” she asked.

“Great,” said Strike heartily. “Loving his new job.”

“And Penny and the girls?”

“Yeah, they’re really happy to be back in Cornwall.”

“Oh good,” said Joan. “Dave’s mum thought Penny might not want to leave Bristol.”

“No, it’s all worked out great.”

The bedroom door behind Joan opened. Luke was standing there in his pajamas, rubbing his eyes ostentatiously.

“You woke me up,” he told Strike and Joan.

“Oh, sorry, love,” said Joan.

“Can I have Coco Pops?”

“Of course you can,” said Joan fondly.

Luke bounded downstairs, stamping on the stairs to make as much noise as possible. He was gone barely a minute before he came bounding back toward them, glee etched over his freckled face.

“Granny, Uncle Cormoran’s broken your flowers.”

You little shit.

“Yeah, sorry. The dried ones,” Strike told Joan. “I knocked them over. The vase is fine—”

“Oh, they couldn’t matter less,” said Joan, moving at once to the stairs. “I’ll fetch the carpet sweeper.”

“No,” said Strike at once, “I’ve already—”

“There are still bits all over the carpet,” Luke said. “I trod on them.”

I’ll tread on you in a minute, arsehole.

Strike and Luke followed Joan back to the sitting room, where Strike insisted on taking the carpet sweeper from Joan, a flimsy, archaic device she’d had since the seventies. As he plied it, Luke stood in the kitchen doorway watching him, smirking while shoveling Coco Pops into his mouth. By the time Strike had cleaned the carpet to Joan’s satisfaction, Jack and Adam had joined the early morning jamboree, along with a stony-faced Lucy, now fully dressed.

“Can we go to the beach today, Mum?”

“Can we swim?”

“Can I go out in the boat with Uncle Ted?”

“Sit down,” Strike told Joan. “I’ll bring you a cup of tea.”

But Lucy had already done it. She handed Joan the mug, threw Strike a filthy look, then turned back to the kitchen, answering her sons’ questions as she went.

“What’s going on?” asked Ted, shuffling into the room in pajamas, confused by this break-of-dawn activity.

He’d once been nearly as tall as Strike, who greatly resembled him. His dense, curly hair was now snow white, his deep brown face more cracked than lined, but Ted was still a strong man, though he stooped a little. However, Joan’s diagnosis seemed to have dealt him a physical blow. He seemed literally shaken, a little disorientated and unsteady.