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  Molly shook her head. ‘I don’t know! What I mean is, the police are sure to want to talk to them, aren’t they? Just as they’ll want to talk to us. About David’s friends, about contacts who might be an enemy, all that stuff. I’m just a bit surprised they haven’t talked to the other lot yet. Their man was clobbered before ours, after all.’

  ‘Perhaps they’re trying to save money,’ Marcus said and began to scrabble in his pockets for a cigarette. ‘Wait till all the victims are in and then do the interviews in one fell swoop.’

  ‘Don’t be stupid, man,’ Bryan growled. ‘They can’t know there’ll be another coming along, can they?’

  Marcus looked up at him over the flame of the match he’d just struck. ‘Oh, dear!’ he said mildly. ‘Are my irony glands overacting again? Sorry. Though I must say, it did occur to me that this could be one of those serial bods on the prowl. Another Sutcliffe, you know.’

  Molly stared at him. ‘Jesus Christ! D’you really think so?’

  ‘I didn’t till poor old David got it. But then – I mean, dammit all, Molly, use your intelligence! Cut throats, two MPs – who knows what’s in the man’s mind? He has to be barking mad. Mad enough to be a serial killer.’

  ‘Yes,’ Sean said suddenly. ‘That was what occurred to me.’ He went scarlet as they all turned and looked at him. ‘I – er – well, it was a bit – I checked, you know? Throats cut, and something else, I think. I couldn’t get anyone to say, but something else happened. I’m sure of it. We’ll find out eventually but they’re not talking yet.’

  ‘Who aren’t?’ Colin said.

  ‘The police,’ Sean said simply. ‘I went over to the station where they’re doing the investigation – Ratcliffe Street was the nearest to where they found Diamond’s body, so I thought, that’ll be the place, and I made out I was a journalist. I just held a dictating machine in my hand. I didn’t actually tell any lies’ – he looked very earnest suddenly – ‘I just held out the machine and asked questions and they assumed … And I got the impression …’ He faltered miserably to a close.

  ‘More killings?’ Colin said. ‘Members?’

  ‘Could be.’ Marcus sounded judicious, as though he were discussing a matter that had no personal impact at all. ‘It’s an interesting idea, putting MPs in the firing line.’

  ‘You might be at the front of the queue, when whoever it is decides to get going again,’ Bryan said with a certain relish in his voice. ‘So what are you so cheerful about?’

  ‘Aha, we’re forearmed, Naith, old boy,’ Marcus grinned. ‘From here on in, I go nowhere on my own, I keep well away from geezers with knives or who look as though they might be carrying ’em – so don’t ask me out for a drink, will you? You could have God knows what stowed in those pockets of yours – and altogether I shall stay firmly in the places where the light is brightest. You’ll do the same if you’ve any sense.’

  Molly giggled, enjoying the spectacle of someone else being rude to Naith. ‘You needn’t worry, Bryan,’ she said with a sunny air. ‘He’ll only go for people with necks they can get at.’ She looked pointedly at the tight frayed shirt collar round Bryan’s neck, which was circled with tyres of thick fat. ‘It’d take the guy half a night to carve through your windpipe, so you’re safe as houses. Sean, here, now’ – looking over her shoulder winsomely at the thin young man – ‘a big Adam’s apple like his is a walking invitation, isn’t it? I think he should stick with Marcus, to be on the safe side, really I do.’

  ‘Oh, for heaven’s sake!’ Colin decided it was time to behave like a Chief Whip. He was well aware of the fact that in the House bars and dining rooms they bracketed him with Mary Bodling, calling them the Elephant and the Mouse, and he was trying hard to be bigger and stronger. (He’d foolishly said as much to Marcus Napper, who had looked at him owlishly and said, ‘Be careful, old man. You might just turn into a rat.’) Now he got to his feet and stood with his legs apart and his arms folded to increase his gravitas. ‘We’ve got better things to do than sit here making bad-taste jokes about murderers. David was a good friend of mine and it’s disgusting to hear you all being so –’

  ‘Put it down to nerves, old man,’ Marcus murmured. ‘Like medical students, you know. The only way we can handle the horror is making disgusting jokes. I was very fond of David too, but it doesn’t help to go around weeping and wailing and gnashing the old teeth, does it?’

  ‘What we have to talk about,’ Colin said, refusing even to look at Marcus, ‘is our representation on the Committee for the Right to Inheritance Bill. It’s the first step to reorganizing the Other Place and the Leader wants it done our way and done fast. David was worth his weight in gold on it: we’ll miss him dreadfully. Oh, shit!’ And he made a sharp sound, half sigh, half hiss. ‘Well, any ideas?’

  ‘I’ll take it,’ Marcus said. ‘I know a lot about it, and I know how David felt. I can carry his baton for him. Glad to do it. And I wasn’t making light of his killing, Colin, believe me. Just – I mean, Mattie phoned us that night, remember? The girls are each other’s best friends. Susan looked after Marietta from time to time. Well, you’d expect that, wouldn’t you? So …’

  Colin looked dubious and bit his lower lip, staring at Marcus. ‘Well,’ he said. ‘It’s up to Walworth Road, of course, more than it is to me. I’ll see what they say. And other names will have to be put forward. Don’t hold your breath on this one. And then he was on the Building Materials Committee as well. And the one on the Employment of Casual Labour on Building Sites.’

  ‘Richard Fallon has done a lot of good stuff in that area, I think. We could put him up. Or how about that chap who used to be with the cement people – what’s his name? Garton? D’you reckon to him at all?’

  They settled to sensible discussion at last, and were all into their arguments – because they could never meet without arguing – when the door opened and a secretary put her head round. She was alight with excitement, and almost hissed at Colin, ‘Mr Twiley, there’s a Detective Inspector Dudley and a Sergeant Urquhart from Ratcliffe Street police station here to talk to you, and I can tell you they’ve sent some other policemen along to the Chief Whip’s office for the other lot. Is it true what they’re saying happened to poor Mr Caspar-Wynette-Gondor? Did he really have his throat cut from ear to ear like Mr Diamond did? I mean, it’s very worrying, isn’t it? It could be anyone of you next, couldn’t it?’ And she held the door open as the two policemen came in.

  6

  The four policemen met as arranged, in the lobby leading to the St Stephen’s entrance of the House, to compare notes. They could have gone back to Ratcliffe Street separately, but as Gus said when Inspector Dudley pointed that out, ‘As soon as we get back we’ll get bogged down in what they’ve all been doing. And I want us all to get a proper debriefing before we do that. So, we’ll wait. In fact, we’ll have some lunch. How’s about that? See what we can get in the seat of Government.’

  In the event, they had to go out of the building to find a pub; it was made very clear to Gus when he talked to the constable on duty in the main lobby that access to the dining rooms was controlled by the Members, and not very generously at that.

  ‘You’ve got to be a guest of one of ’em, Super,’ the constable said. ‘They have to sign you in and all that, and they don’t really like doing it. But I wouldn’t bother if I was you, really I wouldn’t. It’s like school dinners without the taste.’

  ‘You’ve eaten in one of the dining rooms then?’

  ‘No, sir. Only in the staff canteen, down in the bowels, like. Now I bring sandwiches. I’ve just been told about it – often.’

  ‘Thanks for the warning,’ Gus said and stared around the lobby with its knots of people looking rather small and incongruous among all the green and red and gold pseudo-medievalism Charles Barry had inflicted on London a hundred and fifty or so years ago. Odd to think that when the first Ripper murders happened, this place had only been here forty years or so. The Ripper might even have seen it all be
ing built. And now Ripper murders might be happening again.

  He gave himself a small shake and pushed the notion away. The fact that George had made a strong case for the connection didn’t mean it was true, any more than the fact that he had felt a genuine frisson of horror when they’d found David Caspar-Wynette-Gondor’s body. The slit throat, the mutilation above the legs which had been spread wide with such an air of sexual mockery had made him feel like the most raw of rookies: sick and even frightened. Who could do such a thing? But he could not, must not think in that unprofessional way. He was a copper with a job to do. He had to find out all he could about the people involved with each victim without making any premature judgements about who might have killed them. The basic rules of detection had to be followed; conclusion-jumping was a futile exercise. He looked at his watch, chafing as he waited for Inspector Dudley and his sergeant to appear.

  ‘They won’t be long, I don’t suppose,’ Mike said soothingly. ‘I think they had more people to talk to than we did. I’ve been told they have a lot more bodies in the Whip’s office on the Government side than on the Opposition’s. What did you think of them, Guv?’

  ‘Not sure.’ Gus sat on the bench that ran right round the lobby and rested his head back against the wall, letting his gaze move across the ornate ceiling as he talked. ‘They seemed straight enough. Admitted they were as worried about the politics of the killings as the personal aspects. Didn’t seem to be hiding anything. Answered the questions easily enough. What do you think?’

  ‘I wasn’t sure about that bloke Napper. I think he knew more than he was letting on.’

  ‘Really? Why?’

  ‘Well …’ Mike hesitated. ‘He was a bit too jokey. Flip. Didn’t seem to take it seriously. Twiley was genuinely upset, I thought, as was the woman. But Napper was too offhand.’

  ‘And the others. Naith? What about him?’

  Mike looked disgusted. ‘What a slob! How do people like that get to be in Government? Looks like he hardly ever washes, for a start, and gave us barely more than a grunt when we talked to him. Not my idea of what a Member of Parliament should be.’

  ‘Did you feel the same about the young one? Burnell?’

  Mike’s face cleared. ‘Oh, aye, he was well enough. Young, you know, and a bit scared of the older ones, but a bright lad. I’d vote for him if he was a candidate. Of course he’s just a research assistant right now. But it’s my guess he’ll go further. And he’ll do well. He felt honest …’

  Gus laughed. ‘Oh, Mike, Mike, what an innocent abroad you can be in spite of all your experience! An honest politician? It can’t be!’

  Mike flushed. ‘Ye might as well say there aren’t any straight coppers, Guv,’ he said stiffly. ‘And that’s no true, as ye well know.’ Mike always got more Scottish when he was annoyed and Gus patted his knee in a cheerful manner and grinned at him.

  ‘I stand rebuked. Ah, here they are, and about time too. Have they told you their life stories, then, Roop?’

  Dudley scowled. ‘It was like pulling bloody teeth out of hens to get anything from them. They came on like villains off the estates; wouldn’t say a word if they could help it and wanted to get their legal wallahs in before they talked. I ask you. Just for preliminary enquiries!’

  ‘They say being in Government makes you paranoid,’ Gus said. ‘Look, let’s get the hell outa here. I need a beer and a sandwich. We’ll find a pub.’

  Once they were settled with lager and ham sandwiches in a dingy smoke-scented saloon bar ten minutes’ walk away, they compared notes. In spite of taking longer over his questioning, Dudley had least to report. ‘The Chief Whip, Mary Bodling – she’d put the fear of God up the Angel Gabriel, I can tell you – did most of the talking. OK. Diamond had been a Member of Parliament since the 1983 election, coming in after local government and Conservative Party business for donkey’s years. One of the pillars of the Party, to listen to her, though I got the impression she’s not so keen on his wife. We’ll go to see her as soon as she gets back. She’s been in Italy and she’s flying home today. Runs a shop in Sloane Street, by the way. Wouldn’t be caught dead in the constituency if she could help it.’

  ‘Which is?’

  ‘Hedgington South, the other side of Dorset. There’s an adult son, who lives and works in Australia, so he’s right out of the frame, like the wife.’

  Gus grinned. ‘Don’t tell me you thought this could be a nice domestic murder, Roop?’

  Dudley looked down his nose. ‘I don’t exclude anything till I have all the facts,’ he said stiffly. ‘The fact is that most murders are committed by members of the family or other close contacts and –’

  ‘Yeah, yeah, I know,’ Gus said. ‘And you’re right, of course. What about the close friends, then?’

  ‘They were vague. I got the feeling that in politics people don’t have friends as much as allies. They shift around all the time, depending on what the issues are.’

  ‘And what issues was Diamond involved in?’

  ‘Well, Brussels. He was a devout anti-European,’ Dudley replied, and then added unexpectedly, ‘He’d have got my vote on that issue.’

  ‘Really?’ Gus looked amused. ‘I didn’t have you down as a Little Englander, Roop. I didn’t think you were into politics at all, come to that.’

  ‘I’m not a Little anything and I’m not all that much interested in politics. It’s just that when some jumped-up idiots in there’ – he jerked his head in the general direction of the Houses of Parliament – ‘do things that muck up the way I live, I don’t like it. It was bad enough when they changed our money to make us fit in with Europe, instead of making Europe fit in with us, and charged us a packet for the privilege. Now they’re trying to turn us into an offshore island of some European United States. Bloody Germans!’

  Gus blinked at the illogicality. ‘Well, I see what you mean. I think. Maybe we’d better not talk about anything but the case, eh? I wouldn’t like to fall out over such things with you, me old mate. So, carry on. He was a Euro-sceptic, then. Anything else interesting? Any campaigning?’

  ‘I got the impression he was more a reactor than a bloke who started things,’ Dudley said. ‘Let me see.’ He riffled the pages of his notebook. ‘I’ve got the list here. He was a member of the committee looking at the new Bill to do with inheritance.’

  ‘Was he, by God?’ Gus said, a little startled, ‘Interesting, as you’ll see. Anything else?’

  ‘Yes.’ Dudley looked at him sharply. ‘Why the surprise?’

  ‘I’ll explain later. Go on.’

  Dudley returned to his notebook. ‘He was also involved with an investigation of some sort into building regulations. Also the NHS. There’s a Select Committee looking at the way drugs are brought in from Europe and he was very active on that. For the rest … nothing special. They were all surprised he missed the vote the night he was killed because he was usually reliable. That Mary Bodling still looked pissed off, as though she didn’t think being murdered was much of an excuse for such behaviour.’

  Gus laughed. It wasn’t often that Dudley managed to be funny, and Dudley was pleased with his reaction. For a moment he looked agreeable, which was very far from his normal expression, and that seemed to affect the whole group. Both the sergeants relaxed and Gus lifted a hand to order some more beer and another round of sandwiches.

  ‘Right,’ he said quietly when they had been served and left alone by the hovering barman who was far too interested in their conversation. ‘Let Mike give you the rundown on our chappie, David of the fancy names. Go for it, Mike.’

  Mike went for it. ‘David Caspar-Wynette-Gondor,’ he read from his notebook. ‘Aged forty. Brother of the Earl of Durleigh –’

  ‘Blimey,’ Tim said. ‘Shouldn’t he have been in the House of Lords, then?’

  Mike looked at him scornfully. ‘He’s not the Earl. His dad was, and now his brother is, so he’s the House of Lords Member, of course. I’ve got quite a bit about his family. David was the yo
ungest. There are two older brothers, twins. One of them of course is the Earl. He sits regularly in the Lords, unlike some of ’em who turn up for tea and a bun and the few quid they get for attending and then beetle off before there’s any voting. The Earl’s a true-blue Tory. Very high Tory, in fact. Goes in for the huntin’ shootin’ fishin’ bit. Strong supporter of blood sports altogether. He and our CWG were poles apart. David joined the Labour Party very young, refused to go to Oxford like his brothers, learned to be a brickie instead and worked on building sites and so forth. Active in the Union, a hunt sab at weekends – once even interfered with his brother’s hunt – he’s an MFH of course. I mean, he would be, wouldn’t he? The brother, that is. Our chap married one of his own sort though. Well, not entirely his own sort though she’d been a friend from childhood on. Not one of your landed gentry from time immemorial. His brother-in-law sits in the Lords too. He inherited his Lordship a few years ago, but his dad was the first Lord Hinckley. He made money out of engines, apparently, and was very Tory, but this Lord sits as a Lib-Dem. He likes to attend sometimes, not as often as the Earl, but oftener than some. It’s funny really. The whole political scene is like one family.’

  ‘Well, that could point to a common-or-garden sort of murder, then,’ Dudley said. ‘With everyone at everyone else’s throat.’

  Gus shook his head. ‘No it doesn’t, Roop. We asked about that. It seems they’re all on very good terms in spite of politics. David and his wife didn’t see a lot of her brother, but only because she doesn’t want to. It seems her father owned a lot of Yorkshire but he had strong views on being landed gentry. He left all the land to his son, and the big house and most of the cash on the grounds apparently that he believed a woman ought to marry her money, so he left her just a bit. She’s drunk most of it, according to the cove in that Whip’s office. David got on well enough with Hinckley, his brother-in-law, and apparently was as close as he could be to his own brothers. The three of them, according to Marcus Napper – he says he knows so much because his wife was a friend of CWG’s wife – he says the three are, or were, rather, close mates. They never let politics come between them. We’ll have to talk to the wife of course, but apparently she’s been knocked for six by losing her David. She’s been checked into a drying-out clinic over in Harrow. I’ll see if I can talk to her tomorrow, though it’ll depend on her state, of course. I’ll check with her doctor before I go. For the rest, well, there isn’t a lot. CWG was active on the Building Materials Select Committee –’