The Cuckoo's Calling

“Yeah, I was going to ask you about that,” said Strike. “Your—ready-to-wear line, is it?”

Somé looked amused.

“That’s right. That’s the stuff that isn’t made-to-measure, see? You buy it straight off the rack.”

“Right. How widely is that stuff sold?”

“It’s everywhere. When were you last in a clothes shop?” asked Somé, his wicked bulging eyes roving over Strike’s dark blue jacket. “What is that, anyway, your demob suit?”

“When you say ‘everywhere’…”

“Smart department stores, boutiques, online,” rattled off Somé. “Why?”

“One of two men caught on CCTV running away from Lula’s area that night was wearing a jacket with your logo on it.”

Somé twitched his head very slightly, a gesture of repudiation and irritation.

“Him and a million other people.”

“Didn’t you see—?”

“I didn’t look at any of that shit,” said Somé fiercely. “All the—all the coverage. I didn’t want to read about it, I didn’t want to think about it. I told them to keep it away from me,” he said, gesturing towards the stairs and his staff. “All I knew was that she was dead and Duffield was behaving like someone with something to hide. That’s all I knew. That was enough.”

“OK. Still on the subject of clothes, in the last picture of Lula, the one where she was walking into the building, she seemed to be wearing a dress and a coat…”

“Yeah, she was wearing Maribelle and Faye,” said Somé. “The dress was called Maribelle—”

“Yeah, got it,” said Strike. “But when she died, she was wearing something different.”

This seemed to surprise Somé.

“Was she?”

“Yeah. In the police pictures of the body—”

But Somé threw up his arm in an involuntary gesture of refutation, of self-protection, then got to his feet, breathing hard, and walked to the photograph wall, where Lula stared out of several pictures, smiling, wistful or serene. When the designer turned to face Strike again, the strange bulging eyes were wet.

“Fucking hell,” he said, in a low voice. “Don’t talk about her like that. ‘The body.’ Fucking hell. You’re a cold-blooded bastard, aren’t you? No fucking wonder old Jonny’s not keen on you.”

“I wasn’t trying to upset you,” said Strike calmly. “I only want to know whether you can think of any reason she’d have changed her clothes when she got home. When she fell, she was wearing trousers and a sequined top.”

“How the fuck should I know why she changed?” asked Somé, wildly. “Maybe she was cold. Maybe she was—This is fucking ridiculous. How could I know that?”

“I’m only asking,” said Strike. “I read somewhere that you’d told the press she died in one of your dresses.”

“That wasn’t me, I never announced it. Some tabloid bitch rang the office and asked for the name of that dress. One of the seamstresses told her, and they called her my spokesman. Making out I’d tried to get publicity out of it, the cunts. Fucking hell.”

“D’you think you could put me in touch with Ciara Porter and Bryony Radford?”

Somé seemed off-balance, confused.

“What? Yeah…”

But he had begun to cry in earnest; not like Bristow, with wild gulps and sobs, but silently, with tears sliding down his smooth dark cheeks and on to his T-shirt. He swallowed and closed his eyes, turned his back on Strike, rested his forehead against the wall and trembled.

Strike waited in silence until Somé had wiped his face several times and turned again towards him. He made no mention of his tears, but walked back to his chair, sat down and lit a cigarette. After two or three deep drags, he said in a practical and unemotional voice:

“If she changed her clothes, it was because she was expecting someone. Cuckoo always dressed the part. She must’ve been waiting for someone.”

“Well that’s what I thought,” said Strike. “But I’m no expert on women and their clothes.”

“No,” said Somé, with a ghost of his malicious smile, “you don’t look it. You want to speak to Ciara and Bryony?”

“It’d help.”

“They’re both doing a shoot for me on Wednesday: 1 Arlington Terrace in Islington. If you come along fivish, they’d be free to talk to you.”

“That’s good of you, thanks.”

“It isn’t good of me,” said Somé quietly. “I want to know what happened. When are you speaking to Duffield?”

“As soon as I can get hold of him.”

“He thinks he’s got away with it, the little shit. She must’ve changed because she knew he was coming, mustn’t she? Even though they’d rowed, she knew he’d follow her. But he’ll never talk to you.”

“He’ll talk to me,” said Strike easily, as he put away his notebook and checked his watch. “I’ve taken up a lot of your time. Thanks again.”

As Somé led Strike back down the spiral stairs and along the white-walled corridor, some of his swagger returned to him. By the time they shook hands in the cool tiled lobby, no trace of distress remained on show.

“Lose some weight,” he told Strike, as a parting shot, “and I’ll send you something XXL.”