“Are you really planning to buy that gallery?”

“No,” Neku said, dripping flat Coke onto a saucer and grinding her ink block into the liquid until it was thick enough to use. She drew a circle, because she always began everything with a circle, then began to note down everything she could remember from her conversation with Sylvia No-last-name. “I was lying…”

Charlie looked sweetly shocked.

“Unsettle people,” said Neku. “It’s one of the first rules of control. Unsettle them and they’ll answer your questions or do what you want because they’re too busy being unsettled to close down or object…My brothers taught me that.”

“You have brothers?” Charlie asked. Which was the point Neku burst into tears. And that was how Kit found them. Neku on her knees, an abandoned brush on the tiles in front of her, and a boy, all curly blond hair and bat-wing cheek bones, frozen with embarrassment as he tried and failed to comfort her.

“Meet Charlie,” said Neku through bitter sobs.

Charlie tried to shake hands.

“What did you do?”

Charlie let his hand drop. “I asked Neku about her brothers.”

“Brothers?” Kit said.

CHAPTER 34 — Monday, 25 June

Kit was the one to see Charlie out, offering his hand at the last minute, if only to tell the boy that he didn’t hold what had happened against him.

“See you some time,” said Kit.

Charlie nodded doubtfully.

When Kit got upstairs the shower was running and there Neku stayed, washing away whatever it was she needed to wash away with an hour’s worth of cold water. She came out of the room shivering and wrapped in a towel, trailing wet footprints onto the roof garden, where she spent the rest of the afternoon, plugged into her MP3 player, with a pile of Japanese police files, a notebook, and a cup of coffee Kit had got from a local café cooling on the tiles in front of her.

The first two times Kit went to see her, she looked up politely and waited, going back to her papers when she realised he was just fussing.

“You knew this woman…Mrs. Kate?” she asked, when he came out a third time, still fussing, with a bowl of takeout noodles and a fork, because he’d been unable to find wooden chopsticks. She took the noodles without comment, placing them next to the coffee.

“Kate’s mentioned in there?”

Neku nodded. “Who gave you these files?”

“Major Yamota,” said Kit. “They’re to do with the fire at Pirate Mary’s. I wasn’t allowed the ones to do with Yoshi.”

“I wondered about that,” Neku said, crossing something off her list. “Most of these are statements from the fire officer, the first policeman on the scene, the paramedic who gave you a sedative. There’s a forensic report from the Police Scientific Bureau, but there are other papers not to do with the fire.”

“They must have got in by mistake,” said Kit.

Neku’s mouth twisted. “Japanese police,” she said, “don’t make that kind of mistake. Not unless they intend to.”

“What are the papers?”

She hesitated. “A report on a murder. A list of collectors known to buy stolen ceramics. A credit check on Pirate Mary’s. One of the reports links you to a career criminal known to be making trips to Tokyo. Kathryn Robbe-Duras, nee O’Mally.”

“She never took Pat’s name,” said Kit. “And she’s retired.”

“This is the woman No Neck mentioned? The one who called you this morning?”

“Yes,” said Kit.

“She’s an old friend?”

Kit shook his head. “An enemy,” he said. “An old enemy.”

Neku nodded. It seemed she could understand that.

The buzzer sounded at midnight. Since the row of buttons beside the front door was illuminated and Sophie had already warned Kit that drunks used the courtyard to piss or worse, he ignored it. At which point the noise got louder as whoever it was began to kick the door instead.

Scrambling for his jeans, Kit reached the landing in time to hear Sophie open the door herself. “Prove it,” he heard her say, and a second later the front door shut and Sophie began stamping her way upstairs. She was swearing.

“It’s the police,” she said. “Well, one of them. A big fucker. Apparently he wants to talk to you.”

“Where is he?”

“Outside. I told him to get a warrant if he wants to come in. Unless, of course, he thinks we’re terrorists, in which case I suggested he organise back-up and a few guns…”

“And what did he say?” Kit could imagine what a Japanese policeman would have said. Actually, Kit couldn’t, because he doubted anyone in Japan would leave a police officer on the doorstep, far less be that rude to them.

“Some bollocks about Section 44. So I told him I used to be a lawyer.”

“Were you?”

Sophie shrugged. “A paralegal…It’s close enough. Do you want a witness? Because I can stay around if you need.”

“It’ll be fine,” promised Kit.

There were a dozen reasons why this was unlikely to be true. Desertion from the British Army had no statute of limitations. So the original arrest warrant was technically valid. And you didn’t go AWOL only to return to the place that issued the arrest warrant unless you were stupid, or had people like Mr. Oniji suggesting you go back to your own country for a while.

And that was before Kit even factored in Kate O’Mally, his own guilt at Yoshi’s death, or his memories of Mary.

“You certain?” Sophie asked.

“Sure,” said Kit, nodding his thanks.

“Whatever,” she said. “Call me if you need me…”

“Mr. Noover?”

“Nouveau,” said Kit, looking out into the half darkness. An officer in uniform was back-lit by lights from beyond the arch. Flicking on the hall lights, Kit saw the huge man blink.

“Come in,” said Kit.

“You don’t want to see my search warrant, sir?”

“Have you got one?”

A sour smile.

“Whatever,” said Kit. “Come in anyway.”

Without waiting to see if the officer would follow, Kit made his way towards the stairs and heard the front door click behind him. As the two of them passed the door to Sophie’s flat, her door opened slightly and then shut again.

“She didn’t like me.”

“It’s late,” said Kit. “You worried her.”

“Really, sir? Well, people who don’t like the police worry me.”

By the time they reached the top landing the officer was stopping for the occasional rest and gasping for breath. Kit found that oddly reassuring. “In here,” he said, undoing the door. “Let me get some candles…I’m waiting for the electric to come back on.”

Only a candle was already burning and Neku stood in the kitchen doorway.

“I heard noises,” she said.

A flame lit her fingers, until Kit looked again and the match went out, leaving Neku outlined in flame and a thin sodium haze that filtered between the slats of a wooden blind. It didn’t help that Neku was dressed in her black jersey and very little else.

“Go back to bed,” said Kit.

The girl gave him a look, but disappeared as ordered.

“How old is she?” asked the officer.

Kit shrugged. “I don’t know,” he said. “I’ve never asked.”

Silence followed this answer. And when Kit finished finding a saucer for the candle, it was to find the huge man staring at him.

“What?” said Kit.

“You send her to your bed and you don’t know how old she is? People like you need to be more careful.” All pretence of politeness was gone, along with the sirs the officer had been dropping into his sentences like redundant punctuation.

“She’s not going to my bed,” said Kit.

He watched the officer leave the kitchen and count off the exits leading from the tiny hall; front door, half-open bedroom door, and one other, from behind which came the flush of a lavatory. As the officer watched, that door opened and Neku stalked out, stared straight through both of them, and left the flat. A second later, an unseen door crashed shut, rather louder than was necessary.