Only the hospital could save him, and he hurried in the direction of its refuge. He wove round buses and dodged cyclists. He braked for a crocodile of tiny schoolchildren on the kerb waiting to cross the street. He thought of their own child among them-his and Helen’s: high socks, scabby knees, and miniature brogues, a cap on his head, a name tag fluttering round his neck. The teachers would have printed it for him, but he’d have been the one to decorate it any way that he liked. He’d have chosen dinosaurs because they’d taken him-he and Helen-to the Natural History Museum on a Sunday afternoon. There he’d stood beneath the bones of the T. rex with his mouth agape in wonder. “Mummy,” he would have said, “what is it? It’s tremendously big, isn’t it, Dad?” He’d have used words like that. Tremendously. He’d have named constellations, he’d have known the musculature of a horse.

A horn honked somewhere. He roused himself. The children were across the street now and on their way, heads bobbing and shoes scuffling along, three adults-fore, mid, and aft-keeping a careful eye on them.

Which was all that had been required and he’d failed: keeping a careful eye. Instead, he’d as good as provided a map to his own front door. Photographs of him. Photographs of Helen. Belgravia. How difficult could it have been? How tough a proposition even to ask a few questions in the neighbourhood?

And now he reaped the result of his hubris. There are things we don’t know, the surgeon had said.

But can’t you tell…?

There are tests for some conditions and no tests for others. All we can do is make an educated guess, a deduction based on what we know about the brain. From that we can extrapolate. We can present the facts as we know them and we can tell you how far those facts can take us. But that’s it. I’m sorry. I wish there were more…

He couldn’t. Think about it, cope with it, live with it. Anything. The horrible day after day of it. A sword piercing his heart but neither fatally, quickly, nor mercifully. Just the tip of it at first and then a bit more as days became weeks became the necessary months in which he waited for what he already knew was the very worst.

A human being can adapt to anything, yes? A human being can learn to survive because as long as the will to endure remained, the mind adjusted and it told the body to do the same.

But not to this, he thought. Not ever to this.

At the hospital, he saw that the journalists had finally dispersed. This was not a twenty-four/seven story for them. The initial incident and its relationship to the investigation of serial murders had mobilised them at first, but now they would check in only sporadically. Their focus would be on the perpetrator and the police from this point on, with passing references made to the victim and canned footage of the hospital used-a shot of a window somewhere, behind which the wounded was ostensibly languishing-should that be required by the producers. Soon even that would be considered a rehash of a twice-told tale. We need something fresh and if you haven’t got a new angle on this situation, bury it inside. Page five or six ought to do it. They had, after all, the meat of the matter: scene of the crime, press conference from the doctor, the image of himself-nice, good, a suitable reaction shot-leaving the hospital earlier in the day. They would be given the name of the press officer from the Belgravia station as well, so that was it, really. The story could just about write itself. On to other things. There were circulation figures to concern them and other breaking news to bolster those figures. This was business, merely business.

He parked. He got out of the car. He moved towards the hospital entrance and what waited for him inside: the unchanging and unchangeable situation, the family, his friends, and Helen.

Decide, Tommy darling. I trust you completely. Well…all except in the matter of ties. And that’s always been a puzzle to me because you’re generally a man of impeccable taste.

“Tommy.”

He stirred from his thoughts. His sister Judith was coming towards him. She was looking more like their mother every day: tall and lithe with close-cropped blonde hair.

He saw she was holding a folded tabloid, and he would later think it was this that set him off. Because it wasn’t the most recent edition but rather the one in which the story about him, his personal life, his wife, and his home had appeared. And suddenly what he felt was shame in such a wave that he thought he’d actually drown beneath it and the only way to struggle to the surface was to give in to the rage.

He took the tabloid from her. Judith said, “Helen’s sister had it stuffed in her bag. I hadn’t seen it yet. I actually didn’t know about it, so when Cybil and Pen mentioned-” She saw something, surely, for she came to his side and put her arm round him. She said, “It isn’t that. You mustn’t think so. If you start to believe-”

He tried to speak. His throat didn’t allow it.

“She needs you now,” Judith said.

He shook his head blindly. He turned on his heel and left the hospital, returning to his car. He heard her voice calling after him and then a moment later he heard St. James, who must have been near when he’d first seen Judith. But he couldn’t stop and speak to them now. He had to move, to go, to deal with things as they should have been dealt with from the first.

He made for the bridge. He needed speed. He needed action. It was cold and grey and damp outside, and there was clearly a rainstorm on its way, but when the first drops finally fell as he turned into Broadway, he saw them only as minor distractions, splatters on the windscreen on which was already written an unfolding drama, of which he wanted no part.

In the kiosk, the officer waved him through, his mouth opening to speak. Lynley nodded to him and drove on, descending to the carpark, where he left the Bentley and stood for a moment in the dim light, trying to breathe because it felt to him as if he’d been holding air in his lungs since he’d left the hospital, left his sister, returned the accusing tabloid to her hands.

He made for the lift. What was wanted was Tower Block, that aerie from which the sight of the trees in St. James’s Park marked the changing of the seasons. He made his way there. He saw faces emerge as if from a mist, and voices spoke, but he wasn’t able to make out the words.

When he reached AC Hillier’s office, the assistant commissioner’s secretary blocked his path to the door. Judi MacIntosh said, “Superintendent…,” in her most officious voice and then apparently read something or understood something for the first time because she altered to, “Tommy, my dear,” in a tone so rich with compassion that he could hardly bear it. “You don’t belong here. Go back to the hospital.”

“Is he in there?”

“Yes. But-”

“Then step aside please.”

“Tommy, I don’t want to have to ring for anyone.”

“Then don’t. Judi, step aside.”

“Let me at least tell him.” She made a move for her desk when any sensible woman would have simply charged into Hillier’s office ahead of him. But she did things by the book, which was her downfall because with the path unblocked, he accessed the door and let himself in, shutting it behind him.

Hillier was on the phone. He was saying, “…many so far?…Good. I want the stops pulled out…Bloody right it’s to be a special task force. No one strikes at a cop-” And then he saw Lynley. He said into the phone, “I’ll get back to you. Carry on.”

He rang off and stood. He came round the desk. “How is she?”

Lynley didn’t respond. He felt his heart slamming against his ribs.

Hillier gestured to the phone. “That was Belgravia. They’re getting volunteers-these’re men off duty, on rota, whatever-from all over town. Asking to be assigned to the case. They’ve a task force in place. It’s top priority. They went into action late yesterday afternoon.”