Page 35 of The Hallmarked Man
Murphy’s unexpected suggestion that they move in together had come just an hour after Robin had opened a letter from her GP, which had been lying on her doormat when she’d got home, late, after hours of surveillance. The doctor wanted her to make an appointment fora check-up after her recent hospitalisation. She hadn’t told Murphy about this. She didn’t want to go; she didn’t see what the point was. She had all the information she needed already, and she felt well, and the operation site had healed, so what could the GP do or say that was of any benefit to her? Before Strike had called, thoughts of egg freezing had been tangling themselves in her complicated feelings about house-hunting, and she had a sense, not for the first time, that she wasn’t like other women, that she wanted different things, and was prepared to bear different hardships, and she couldn’t help remembering Strike’s words:
That’d be my view in your position, but some might say that’s why I’m still single.
As Robin got out of the Land Rover on Great Queen Street an hour and a half later, a corpulent, balding passer-by said cheerfully,
‘Don’t see many of that age still on the roads!’
‘No,’ Robin agreed. ‘It’s on its last legs.’
She watched the man turn into the huge Art Deco building of pale grey stone beside which she’d parked. She’d never seen Freemasons’ Hall before. Had she thought about it, she might have expected those entering to require, if not a secret password, then at least a membership card, but a sign beside the glass doors proclaimed that there was a café inside, a museum open to the public, and guided tours.
Strike was standing on the corner ahead, collar turned up against the chilly day, vaping while staring up at the building’s front, and Robin walked towards him feeling far better for having something to think about other than her personal predicaments, and much more cheerful for seeing her work partner.
‘Impressive building,’ said Robin, when she reached him.
‘It is,’ agreed Strike.
From this angle, Freemasons’ Hall looked as though it had been constructed like a isosceles triangle, except that at the point where the two long sides converged it had been squared off, presenting a relatively narrow but very tall and grand frontage comprising columns, a square clock and a tower.
‘“Audi, vide, tace,”’ said Strike, reading an inscription high above them. ‘“See, hear, be silent.”’
‘Any chance of walking a bit?’ Robin asked, hands deep in her pockets. The Land Rover’s heating was non-existent, and the day near freezing.
‘Yeah, that’s why I wanted to meet early. Get a feel for the area.’
So they set off along Great Queen Street, with the massive stone hall to their right.
‘I think Ramsay’s keen to meet us because he’s hoping we’ll find his stolen silver,’ said Strike. ‘He’s had a hell of a run of bad luck in the last couple of years. His adult son and only child died in a jet-ski accident on holiday eighteen months ago.’
‘Oh no,’ said Robin.
‘And then his wife had a massive stroke. She’s still incapacitated. She was the one managing the shop, because Kenneth works at some financial services place up the road. I heard the whole story this morning. I think he was trying to get me as emotionally invested as possible in finding the silver.’
‘Well, if his wife needs medical care and can’t work…’
‘Not blaming him, just giving you a heads-up, because I think he’ll be most forthcoming if we pretend we’re as interested in the robbery as in the body. He told me they had a slight increase in custom after the murder, but it was mostly gawkers, rather than people wanting to buy masonic medals.’
Strike was scanning the street as they walked for CCTV cameras, and for side streets and lay-bys where silver could be divided between gang members, unobserved, but it was a populous area that would be well lit by night, and Strike doubted the felons could have counted on the absence of passers-by even then.
‘Can’t see our killers-slash-thieves making their getaway in this direction,’ said Strike. ‘No, I think the police are right: the silver went in that getaway car in Wild Street.’
Robin had an unbidden mental image of Murphy’s expression, could he have heard Strike (as Murphy would undoubtedly see it) deigning to agree with the police’s conclusions.
They turned right into Kingsway, a broader and even busier street. Canned Christmas music drifted out from a shop as they passed and both felt that undertow of sadness from which Christmas in adulthood is rarely free, Robin wishing she felt as straightforwardly happy at the prospect of her trip home as she would have done when she first moved to London, Strike suddenly visited by thoughts of Ted, Joan and the empty house in Cornwall, which had just gone up for sale.
‘The shop’s up an alleyway, to the right,’ he said. ‘Wouldn’t havesaid it’s a great location, but given the proximity to Freemasons’ Hall, they must get some masonic trade…’
He checked his watch.
‘Bit early, but we might as well head there now.’
So they turned up an unlovely lane, which had a line of plastic bins on one side.
The silver shop, which sat at the join of the red brick Connaught Rooms and the pale grey stone of Freemasons’ Hall, looked dingy and old-fashioned. Medallions and ceremonial chains lay on black velvet in the window. Somebody had draped red fairy lights around these items, in a lacklustre tribute to the season. The black awning bore silver lettering, which read:
RAMSAY SILVER
~ Masonic Insignia, Silverware and Rarities ~
