Page 67 of Troubled Blood

“Where did Janice’s last patient of the day live?” asked Robin, and Strike knew that her mind was running on distances and timings.

“Gopsall Street, which is about a ten-minute drive from the practice. It would’ve been just possible for a woman in a car to have intercepted Margot on the way to the Three Kings, assuming Margot was walking very slowly, or was delayed somewhere along the route, or left the practice later than Gloria said she did. But it would’ve required luck, because as we know, some of the path Margot would’ve taken was pedestrianized.”

“And I can’t really see why you’d make arrangements with a friend to go to the cinema if you were planning to abduct someone,” said Robin.

“Nor can I,” said Strike. “But I’m not finished. When Lawson takes over the case he finds out that Janice lied to Talbot as well.”

“You’re kidding.”

“Nope. Turned out she didn’t actually have a car. Six weeks before Margot disappeared, Janice’s ancient Morris Minor gave up the ghost and she sold it for scrap. From that time onwards, she was making all her house calls by public transport and on foot. She hadn’t wanted to tell anyone at the practice that she was carless, in case they told her she couldn’t do her job. Her husband had walked out, leaving her with a kid. She was saving up to get a new car, but she knew it was going to take a while, so she pretended the Morris Minor was in the garage, or that it was easier to get the bus, if anyone asked.”

“But if that’s true—”

“It is. Lawson checked it all out, questioned the scrap yard and everything.”

“—then that surely puts her completely out of the frame for an abduction.”

“I’m inclined to agree,” said Strike. “She could’ve got a cab, of course, but the cabbie would’ve had to be in on the abduction, too. No, the interesting thing about Janice is that in spite of believing she was entirely innocent, Talbot interviewed her a total of seven times, more than any other witness or suspect.”

“Seven times?”

“Yep. He had a kind of excuse at first. She was a neighbor of Steve Douthwaite’s, Margot’s acutely stressed patient. Interviews two and three were all about Douthwaite, who Janice knew to say hello to. Douthwaite was Talbot’s preferred candidate for the Essex Butcher, so you can follow his thought processes—you would question neighbors if you thought someone might be butchering women at home. But Janice wasn’t able to tell Talbot anything about Douthwaite beyond what we already know, and Talbot still kept going back to her. After the third interview, he stopped asking her about Douthwaite and things got very strange indeed. Among other things, Talbot asked whether she’d ever been hypnotized, whether she’d be prepared to try it, asked her all about her dreams and urged her to keep a diary of them so he could read it, and also to make him a list of her most recent sexual partners.”

“He did what?”

“There’s a copy of a letter from the Commissioner in the file,” said Strike drily, “apologizing to Janice for Talbot’s behavior. All in all, you can see why they wanted him off the force as fast as possible.”

“Did his son tell you any of that?”

Strike remembered Gregory’s earnest, mild face, his assertion that Bill had been a good father and his embarrassment as the conversation turned to pentagrams.

“I doubt he knew about it. Janice doesn’t seem to have made a fuss.”

“Well,” said Robin, slowly. “She was a nurse. Maybe she could tell he was ill?”

She considered the matter for a few moments, then said,

“It’d be frightening, though, wouldn’t it? Having the investigating officer coming back to your house every five minutes, asking you to keep a dream diary?”

“It’d put the wind up most people. I’m assuming the explanation is the obvious one—but we should ask her about it.”

Strike glanced into the back and saw, as he’d hoped, a bag of food.

“Well, it is your birthday,” said Robin, her eyes still on the road.

“Fancy a biscuit?”

“Bit early for me. You carry on.”

As he leaned back to fetch the bag, Strike noticed that Robin smelled again of her old perfume.

20

And if that any ill she heard of any,

She would it eeke, and make much worse by telling,

And take great ioy to publish it to many,