The Cuckoo's Calling

“Cyprian,” she said, offering her face for his kiss. “Yes, what a lovely surprise!”

“I thought you were going shopping, Ursula dear?” he said, his eyes on his wife as he gave Tansy a conventional peck on each cheek.

“We stopped for lunch, Cyps,” she replied, but her color was heightened, and Strike sensed an ill-defined nastiness in the air.

The older man’s pale eyes moved deliberately over Strike and came to rest on Bristow.

“I thought Tony was handling your divorce, Tansy?” he asked.

“He is,” said Tansy. “This isn’t a business lunch, Cyps. Purely social.”

He gave a wintry smile.

“Let me escort you out, then, m’dears,” he said.

With a cursory farewell to Bristow, and no word whatsoever for Strike, the two sisters permitted themselves to be shepherded out of the restaurant by Ursula’s husband. When the door had swung shut behind the threesome, Strike asked Bristow:

“What was that about?”

“That was Cyprian,” said Bristow. He seemed agitated as he fumbled with his credit card and the bill. “Cyprian May. Ursula’s husband. Senior partner at the firm. He won’t like Tansy talking to you. I wonder how he knew where we were. Probably got it out of Alison.”

“Why won’t he like her talking to me?”

“Tansy’s his sister-in-law,” said Bristow, putting on his overcoat. “He won’t want her to make a fool of herself—as he’ll see it—all over again. I’ll probably get a real bollocking for persuading her to meet you. I expect he’s phoning my uncle right now, to complain about me.”

Bristow’s hands, Strike noticed, were trembling.

The lawyer left in a taxi ordered by the maître d’. Strike headed away from Cipriani on foot, loosening his tie as he walked, and lost so deeply in thought that he was only jerked out of his reverie by a loud horn blast from a car he had not seen speeding towards him as he crossed Grosvenor Street.

With this salutary reminder that his safety would otherwise be in jeopardy, Strike headed for a patch of pale wall belonging to the Elizabeth Arden Red Door Spa, leaned up against it out of the pedestrian flow, lit up and pulled out his mobile phone. After some listening and fast-forwarding, he managed to locate that part of Tansy’s recorded testimony that dealt with those moments immediately preceding Lula Landry’s fall past her window.

…towards the bedroom, I heard shouting. She—Lula—was saying, “It’s too late, I’ve already done it,” and then a man said, “You’re a lying fucking bitch,” and then—and then he threw her over. I actually saw her fall.

He could just make out the tiny chink of Bristow’s glass hitting the table top. Strike rewound again and listened.

…saying, “It’s too late, I’ve already done it,” and then a man said, “You’re a lying fucking bitch,” and then—and then he threw her over. I actually saw her fall.

He recalled Tansy’s imitation of Landry’s flailing arms, and the horror on her frozen face as she did it. Slipping his mobile back into his pocket, he took out his notebook and began to make notes for himself.

Strike had met countless liars; he could smell them; and he knew perfectly well that Tansy was of their number. She could not have heard what she claimed to have heard from her flat; the police had therefore deduced that she could not have heard it at all. Against Strike’s expectation, however, in spite of the fact that every piece of evidence he had heard until this moment suggested that Lula Landry had committed suicide, he found himself convinced that Tansy Bestigui really believed that she had overheard an argument before Landry fell. That was the only part of her story that rang with authenticity, an authenticity that shone a garish light on the fakery with which she garnished it.

Strike pushed himself off the wall and began to walk east along Grosvenor Street, paying slightly more attention to traffic, but inwardly recalling Tansy’s expression, her tone, her mannerisms, as she spoke of Lula Landry’s final moments.

Why would she tell the truth on the essential point, but surround it with easily disproven falsehoods? Why would she lie about what she had been doing when she heard shouting from Landry’s flat? Strike remembered Adler: “A lie would have no sense unless the truth were felt as dangerous.” Tansy had come along today to make a last attempt to find someone who would believe her, and yet swallow the lies in which she insisted on swaddling her evidence.