“Would you now. Well, he doesn’t want that. He wants community outreach. And I’d expect you’d know that if you’d talked to him about it.”

“Yes, well,” Ulrike improvised, “there’s a hierarchy involved, as Jack’s no doubt mentioned. We like to place people where we think they’ll…well, blossom actually. Jack’s probably going to work his way up to community outreach eventually, but as for now…” She made a vague gesture.

Miss A-W said, “He’ll be in a snit about that when he hears. He’s like that. Sees himself persecuted. Well, his mum didn’t help with that any, did she. But why can’t you young people just get on with things instead of sniveling when you don’t get what you want when you want it? That’s what I’d like to know.” She cupped her hand and flicked ash into it. She rubbed this into the arm of her rocking chair. “What does this assessment leader do?”

Ulrike explained the job, and Miss A-W picked up on the most relevant part. “Young people?” she said. “Working with them to build trust? Not exactly up Jack’s street. I’d suggest you move right along to another employee if that’s what you want, but if you tell him I said that, I’ll call you a filthy liar.”

“Why?” Ulrike asked, perhaps too quickly. “What would he do if he knew we were talking?”

Miss A-W dragged in on her cigarette and let out what smoke wasn’t otherwise adhering to her doubtless blackened lungs. Ulrike did her best not to breathe in too deeply. The old lady seemed to consider what she wanted to say because she was silent for a moment before she settled on, “He can be a good enough boy when he sets his mind to it, but he generally has his mind on other things.”

“Such as?”

“Such as himself. Such as his lot in life. Just like everyone else his age.” Miss A-W gestured with her cigarette for emphasis. “Young people are whingers, and that’s the boy’s problem in a teacup, missy. To hear him talk, you’d think he’s the only child on earth who grew up without a dad. And with a loose-knickered mum, who’s flitted from man to man since the boy was born. Since before that, as a matter of fact. From the womb, Jack was probably listening to her try to recall the name of the last bloke she slept with. So how could it be a surprise to anyone that he turned out bad?”

“Bad?”

“Come now. You know what he was. He went to Colossus from borstal, for heaven’s sake. Min-that’s his mum-says it’s all to do with her never being quite sure which lover was actually his dad. She says, ‘Why can’t the lad just cope? I do.’ But that’s Min for you: blaming anyone and anything before she’d ever take a real look at herself. She chased men all her life, and Jack chased trouble. By the time he was fourteen, Min couldn’t cope with him any longer and her mum didn’t want to, so they sent him to me. Until that arson nonsense. Stupid little sod.”

“How do you get on with him?” Ulrike asked.

“We live and let live, which’s how I get on with everyone, missy.”

“What about with others?”

“What about what about?”

“His friends. Does he get on with them?”

“They’d hardly be friends if he didn’t get on with them, would they?” Miss A-W pointed out.

Ulrike smiled. “Yes. Well. D’you see them much?”

“Why d’you want to know?”

“Well, because obviously…Jack’s interactions with them indicate how he’d interact with others, you see. And that’s what we’re-”

“No, I don’t see,” Miss A-W said tartly. “If you’re his superior, you see him interacting all the time. You interact with him yourself. You don’t need my opinion on the matter.”

“Yes, but the social aspects of one’s life can reveal…” What, she thought? She couldn’t come up with an answer, so she cut to the chase. “Does he go out with friends, for instance? In the evenings. Pubbing or the like?”

Miss A-W’s sharp eyes narrowed a degree. She said carefully, “He goes out as much as the next lad.”

“Every night?”

“What on earth difference does it make?” She was sounding more and more suspicious, but Ulrike plunged on.

“And is it always the pub?”

“Are you asking if he’s a dipso, Miss…who?”

“Ellis. Ulrike Ellis. And no, it’s not about that. But he’s said he’s in the pub every night, so-”

“If that’s what he’s said, that’s where he is.”

“But you don’t believe that?”

“I don’t see how it matters. He comes and he goes. I don’t keep tabs on him. Why should I? Sometimes it’s the pub, sometimes it’s a girlfriend, sometimes it’s his mum when they’re on good terms, which happens whenever Min wants him to do something for her. But he doesn’t tell me and I don’t ask. And what I want to know is why you’re asking. Has he done something?”

“So he doesn’t always go to the pub? Can you recall any time recently when he didn’t? When he went somewhere else? Like to his mum’s? Where does she live, by the way?”

At this, Ulrike saw she’d gone too far. Miss A-W heaved herself to her feet, cigarette dangling from her lips. Ulrike thought fleetingly of the word broad as applied to women by American tough guys in old black-and-white films. That was what Miss A-W was: a broad to be reckoned with.

The old lady said, “See here, you’re prowling round for information and don’t pretend this is anything but a fishing expedition. I’m not a fool. So you can lift your tight little bum off that sofa and leave my house before I call the police and ask them to assist you in the act.”

“Miss Atkins-Ward, please. If I’ve upset you…It’s only part of the job…” Ulrike found herself floundering. She needed a delicate touch, and that was what she was lacking. She simply did not possess the Machiavellian manner that her position at Colossus occasionally required. Too honest, she told herself. Too up front with people. She had to shed that quality or at least be able to shrug it off occasionally. For God’s sake, she needed to practise lying if she was going to acquire any useful information.

She knew that Miss A-W would report her visit to Jack. Try as she might, she couldn’t see how she could avoid that happening unless she hit the old lady over the head with a table lamp and put her in hospital. She said, “If I’ve offended…used the wrong approach…I should have been more delicate with the-”

“Is there something wrong with your hearing?” Miss A-W cut in, shaking her zimmer frame for emphasis. “Are you leaving or do I have to take matters a step further?”

And she would, Ulrike saw. That was the insanity of it. One had to admire a woman like this. She’d taken on the world and succeeded, owing no one a thing.

Ulrike had no further choice but to hustle herself from the room. She did so, making noises of apology in the hope they would suffice to keep Miss A-W from phoning the police or telling Jack that his supervisor had come round checking up on him. She had little confidence in either of these possibilities actually happening. When Miss A-W threatened, she followed through with the proposed action.

Ulrike hurried out of the house and into the street. She rued her plan and her ineptitude. First Griff, now Jack. Two down and shot to smithereens. Two to go and God only knew the mess she’d make of them.

She climbed on her bike and wheeled her way into Tower Bridge Road. Enough for today, she decided. She was going home. She needed a drink.

IT WAS FADING daylight, and the overhead lights were already crisscrossing Gabriel’s Wharf when Nkata got there. The cold was keeping people indoors, so aside from the haberdasher sweeping the pavement in front of her fanciful shop, no one else hung about. Most of the shops were still open, however, and Nkata saw that Mr. Sandwich appeared to be one of these despite its posted hours: Two middle-aged white ladies in voluminous aprons seemed to be cleaning behind the counter.

In Crystal Moon, Gigi was waiting for him. She’d closed for the day, but when he knocked on the door, she appeared from the back immediately. Casting a look round, as if she expected to be spied upon, she came to the door, unlocked it, and gestured him inside conspiratorially. She relocked it behind him.