"I'm Detective Inspector James, Met CID," she said, showing her warrant card. "I'd like a word with Mr. Hart."

"He's not here." The girl showed not the least bit of interest, or apology. There was a hint of a dropped h in her accent. An authentic East End girl, and all the more trendy for it.

"Do you know when he'll be back?"

"Couldn't say."

"Can you tell me how I can contact him?"

The girl shrugged and handed her a business card from a little silver stand on her desk. "That's his mobile. But he never answers if he doesn't recognize the number, so you'll have to leave a message."

"Great. Thanks." What sort of message did you have to leave to get Caleb Hart to return your call? Gemma wondered. "Maybe you could help," she said to the receptionist with a smile. There was no harm in appealing to the girl's sense of importance. "You're Mr. Hart's personal a.s.sistant, right?" She felt sure that receptionist would not be well received. "Um-" She let the unspoken query dangle.

"Roxy."

"Roxy. Oh, that suits you." That bit of bubbly enthusiasm earned her a slight relaxing of the girl's facial muscles. "Um, Roxy," she went on brightly, "we're just trying to clear up a few details regarding an incident in Crystal Palace on Friday night. I understand that Mr. Hart booked a band at the pub there. We were hoping he might have seen something that would help us clarify the time of this, um, incident."

"I heard all about that murder," Roxy said flatly, picking at a manicured fingernail, but Gemma thought she saw a little flare of interest in her eyes. "Caleb said some policewoman came to the studio on Sat.u.r.day asking about a row the guy had with the guitarist in the band. But Caleb had already left the pub."

"Oh, that's too bad." Gemma did her best to look thoroughly disappointed. "Do you happen to know what time that was?"

"Well, it would have been before ten, because Caleb never misses his Friday night AA meeting at ten. He calls that one Alcoholic's Prime Time. Weekends are tough, you know, when you're used to going down to the pub with your mates."

"Yeah, I should think they would be," Gemma agreed. "Did he have far to go?"

"Dulwich. They meet in a community center there. Caleb organized it." There was definite pride in Roxy's voice now. Beneath the girl's brittle exterior lay a kernel of hero worship, thought Gemma. She hoped Caleb Hart deserved it.

"Thanks ever so much for your help, Roxy," she said. "And I'll just give Mr. Hart a ring later on to confirm."

She let herself out, thinking that it was the AA meeting she would be confirming before she got in touch with Hart, and that all roads seemed to lead to Dulwich.

As neither Melody nor Amanda Francis had arrived when Gemma reached the visitors' lounge at the Royal London, she went down to the bas.e.m.e.nt and searched out Rashid in his subterranean den. She always found Rashid's office a wonder-its ma.s.s of clutter and graffiti-art-covered walls seemed so at odds with the perfection of his accent-and yet it suited him.

"Gemma!" he said, looking up from a pile of papers. "Lovely to see you." When he smiled, his teeth were blindingly white against his olive skin. Today he wore a T-shirt which bore the slogan PATHOLOGY: LIVE THE DREAM, and she couldn't help grinning back at him.

"Rashid, you sound as if you've invited me for afternoon tea in the mortuary."

He pointed to a shelf behind his desk. "Kettle. Cups. Why not?"

"No, really." She shook her head. "I don't know what you've had in those. Eye of newt?"

"Gemma, I'm hurt. I put them through the instrument sterilizer every day."

"Now I really will pa.s.s." Gemma sat in the gray plastic chair-probably filched from the visitors' lounge-in front of Rashid's desk. "What have you got for us?"

He put his papers, and his teasing, aside. "I've zipped him up already, but do you want to have a look?"

"Not unless it will be useful." Gemma had never succ.u.mbed to the fascination of the postmortem.

"Well, he was developing a nice layer of fat round his organs, and some blockage in his arteries. Not good for someone so young. He certainly needed to take up squash and watch his diet, although that's a bit irrelevant now."

"Yes."

"And he was certainly strangled, and with the scarf we found round his neck. But it might not have been necessary, if you look at what I found in the tox results."

"Did he take an overdose of the Valium we found?" asked Gemma.

"Not an overdose, no, although I'd certainly say he was liberal with the prescribed dosage. But it was the combination of things that could very well have killed him without the manual a.s.sist. He was loaded with Xanax as well as the Valium, and his blood alcohol was sky high."

"Xanax? But the SOCOs didn't find any in his flat."

"No. Which means either he bought it or took it from someone, or-"

"Could someone have slipped it to him?"

"My thought exactly, unless the guy was a complete idiot who didn't realize you shouldn't mix the two drugs, and especially not with alcohol. My guess would be that it was in the gin and tonics. The bitterness of the tonic would have disguised the taste. And that the gins were doubles. Even if he'd been drinking all day, he'd have metabolized some of the alcohol, so I'd think it was administered over a fairly short time period."

"No wonder he was sick," Gemma said.

"Yes. And that might have been enough to save him, if someone hadn't throttled him."

"Were there any signs that he struggled?"

"No. There was no tissue under his nails, or any bruising to indicate that he tried to fight at the last minute. Although if he was already turned over on his stomach with his hands bound behind him, and his feet bound, there wouldn't have been a whole lot he could do."

"Did he trust whoever tied him up, or would he have been so out of it from the drugs and the alcohol that he didn't know what was happening?"

"Hard to say. He might have been slipping in and out of consciousness."

Gemma tried to visualize the scene. "Could a woman have done this?"

"The strangling, certainly. And the tying up, if he was either willing or too out of it to struggle. My question would be whether a woman could have helped him back from the pub, then got him undressed and onto the bed. He was a fairly big bloke. Fifty-fifty, I'd say."

"Thanks, Rashid. That really narrows things down," said Gemma.

"Glad to be of service," he answered with a grin.

"The barman at the Prince of Wales didn't remember serving Shaun Francis more than one drink. I wonder if any of the other staff will remember someone ordering double G and Ts? We'll have to get someone-" Gemma's phone rang.

It was Melody. "Boss, I'm upstairs, and Amanda Francis is here."

"Hang on a sec." Gemma looked at Rashid. "The sister's here for the ID. Is he ready?"

"I'll have the attendants put him in the viewing room," Rashid answered, already slipping out of the office to take care of it.

"Melody," Gemma said into the phone. "I'll be right up."

Amanda Francis viewed her brother's body in tight-lipped misery. She looked exhausted, her face still puffy and swollen, but her eyes were dry. Gemma suspected she had cried herself out.

After a full minute, she nodded, then reached out as if she might touch his face but pulled her hand back. "I've never seen anyone dead," she said. "My father-not even my mother saw him. They had my uncle make the identification. It's-weird. It's Shaun, but . . . empty. Even the wax figures at Madame Tussauds have more life in them."

"I know," said Gemma, touching her gently on the shoulder. "Are you ready to go upstairs now?" She'd left Melody to organize some tea from the hospital cafe. When Amanda nodded, Gemma signaled the mortuary attendant that they were finished, then led Amanda from the room.

As they went up in the lift, she asked, "How's your mother doing?"

"The liaison officer you sent has been good with her. He's young and good looking, and she's fawning over him. Disgusting, but at least it's off me. She asks his opinion on the arrangements every five minutes, and his patience is downright saintly."

When they reached the lounge, Melody was waiting with cardboard cups of tea. They found chairs in a quiet corner, and Amanda took her cup. Her hands trembled slightly.

"I've been to your chambers this morning," said Melody. "Everyone is asking after you."

"They've been really kind. They've sent flowers and cards, and Mr. Spencer rang me."

"I can see they think very highly of you," Melody told her. "Will you go back soon?"

Amanda shrugged. "I don't know what's appropriate. And once the liaison officer goes, I don't know how I'll manage my mother. I'll go barking mad if I stay at home with her all day." She went pale at the prospect, looking more distressed than she had at the sight of her brother's body.

"Are you Shaun's executor?" Gemma asked.

"Yes. Thank G.o.d he had enough sense not to put that on mother. From what I've seen, his affairs are a mess. Debt, and the flat is mortgaged to the hilt, so the sale of it won't begin to cover what he owed. And this time, there's no life insurance. This"-she looked at Gemma-"what happened to Shaun-it wasn't a convenient . . . accident?"

Like her father's, thought Gemma. "No. We're certain that Shaun was murdered." She caught Melody's quick glance-she hadn't had a chance to tell her Rashid's findings. "Amanda, do you know if Shaun ever used recreational drugs? Nonprescription stuff?"

"He dabbled a bit in his teens, I think, but never very seriously. Why?"

"We have to ask," Gemma said. "And was he in the habit of drinking a lot?"

"That's the lawyer's drug of choice, isn't it?" Amanda had regained a bit of her tartness. "And Shaun liked to drink. But it wasn't in his nature to get really drunk. He liked to be in control of things." She took a sip of her tea and grimaced, then frowned at Gemma. "But if you're sure Shaun was murdered, why are you asking me about drink and drugs? Do you think he was in some sort of trouble? Oh, G.o.d, if he was into something illegal and it comes out-"

"We don't know that," soothed Gemma. "We don't know why someone would have killed your brother, so we have to cover every possibility."

Melody leaned forward, cradling her cup in both hands. "Mr. Spencer at your chambers says he doesn't know of any connection Shaun might have had with the other barrister who was killed, Vincent Arnott. Is there any legal matter you might have handled that Mr. Spencer wouldn't have seen?"

"No." Amanda's eyes widened. "This Arnott. You asked me if Shaun knew him. You didn't say he'd been killed. Who was he? What happened?"

"We really can't discuss an ongoing investigation at this time," said Gemma. If it hadn't been for Shaun's death, Amanda would surely have seen the papers. Someone was bound to tell her, however, and it was better that she be prepared. "Mr. Arnott was found in circ.u.mstances similar to your brother's. We-"

"You think the same person killed them?" Amanda's voice rose. "Then why aren't you-"

"We don't know that," Gemma broke in. "We're exploring all the possibilities. But in the meantime, I'm sure you don't want the tabloids splashing the details of your brother's death all over the front pages. So, please, Amanda, don't discuss this with anyone. Not even your mother." Especially not your mother, she added to herself. Mrs. Francis would likely be shouting from the rooftops that her son was the victim of a serial killer. A quick change of subject was in order. "Amanda, did Shaun know a man called Caleb Hart?"

"No, not that I'm aware." Amanda was getting the glazed look of someone trying to follow a tennis match. "Who-"

"What about Andy Monahan?" put in Melody, her voice very tight and deliberately neutral.

"No, I don't-" Amanda frowned. "Wait. There was a kid named Andy, I think. One summer in the park. But it was years ago, and I don't think I ever knew his last name." When Gemma and Melody waited, she went on slowly. "He played the guitar. Shaun can't have been more than thirteen or fourteen that summer. I saw them a few times when I went to the park with my own friends, and I asked Shaun who he was. Blond. A pretty boy. I think Shaun was jealous." Her lips twisted. "He thought he was slumming it, my little brother, hanging out with a kid from Crystal Palace. He was a right s.h.i.t, even then."

"Did they keep in touch?" asked Gemma, watching for Melody's reaction as much as Amanda's.

"No, I don't think so. But there was some kind of trouble that autumn, after term started, at Shaun's school. I'm not even sure the two things were connected, except in my memory. No one told me what it was about-I just remember grown-ups talking in hushed voices, and Dad having meetings with the headmaster."

"The school-where was it?" asked Gemma.

"It's called Norwood College. It's an exclusive boys' prep school. In Dulwich."

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN.

Seventy-five years later, the sphinxes and statues adorning the terraces have been transformed from archaeological pastiche to real ruins, but that sense of spectacle is still apparent.

-www.sarahjyoung.com As soon as Shaun and Joe were inside the flat, Andy knew he'd made a terrible mistake. He felt stifled, as if their physical presence had sucked the air from the s.p.a.ce.

And he felt, as he watched them look round the dreary sitting room, ashamed. He did his best to keep things clean and tidy, but the furniture was old and tattered, the walls blotchy and damp stained. He knew from the other boys' clothes and accents that their homes must be very different.

"Nice place you've got here," smirked Shaun, while Joe pulled two large bottles of cheap cider from his paper bag.

Joe unscrewed the cap on one and put the other on the sitting room table. "You'll have to share. We only got two."

"I don't want any," said Andy, wondering how he could get them out again without bodily shoving them, and they were both bigger than he was. "How'd you get that stuff, anyway?"

"Told you we could get anything we wanted from the shop on the Parade." Shaun was wandering round the sitting room, peering into the kitchen. "Where's that electric guitar?" he asked. "The red one. We've seen you playing it out front."

"Not here. It was . . . borrowed." Thank G.o.d he'd left the Strat upstairs in his room, thought Andy. But what if one of them wanted to use the loo? Or Shaun just went upstairs? How would he stop him? "Hey, I changed my mind about the cider," he said, desperate for a diversion.

"All right, man." Joe handed him the open bottle and he took a swig. It was sweet and made him want to gag.

"What do you watch on this thing?" Shaun had picked up the remote for the shoddy old television. "Blue Peter? Doctor Who? Does it even have color?"

"Leave it-"

But Shaun had already put the remote down and was pulling a packet of cigarettes from the pocket of his jeans. "I've got something way better than cider."

"You can't smoke in here," protested Andy.

"Why ever not? The place reeks of smoke. Your mum will never know."

Andy knew Shaun was right, although the first thing he did when his mum had gone to work every day was empty and wash the ashtrays. "Because I don't like it, that's why."