Kincaid turned to Cullen. “Right. Okay, Doug, you and I will pay a visit to Chloe Yarwood. Inspector Bell, I’d like you to stay here and look into a couple of things.” He told them about his encounter with Tony Novak. “Run a welfare check on the wife. Then see if you can get an address for him, and send somebody round to have a word.”

“Sounds like a nutter, guv,” put in Cullen. “His wife’s probably done a runner with the kid to get away from him, just like he said.”

“Probably. But we can’t afford to leave any stone unturned at this point, and I don’t like the connection with the shelter. It’s just too close for comfortable coincidence.”

Bell scribbled down the names and Laura Novak’s address in grim silence, then said, “You’ll tell Mr. Yarwood he can go, then? I’m sure he’ll appreciate your diplomatic skills.”

She directed a tight smile at them both and walked away.

“Bit hard on Inspector Bell, weren’t you, guv?” Cullen said as they crossed the river yet again and snaked through the City, heading towards Notting Hill in Kincaid’s car. “You always encourage me to say what I think.”

“I don’t encourage you to be insubordinate,” Kincaid snapped. “Inspector Bell has yet to learn the difference between offering an opinion and questioning a senior officer’s judgment.”

“So you sent her to the salt mines because she disagreed with you? Anyone could have checked up on Tony Novak.”

Kincaid took his eyes from the road long enough to give Cullen a quelling glance. “I’m beginning to think the inspector’s a bad influence on you, Dougie. You’d better watch yourself.”

Greeting this admonition with the silence it deserved, Cullen stared pointedly out the window.

Great, Kincaid thought. Now he had two sullen detectives on his hands, and he still had to account for authorizing Gemma to conduct interviews on someone else’s patch. His day seemed to be rapidly deteriorating.

And yet, aggravated as he was, he began to wonder if Cullen was biased simply because he fancied Maura Bell, or if Bell’s criticism had been justified. Would he have been harder on Yarwood if he hadn’t been worried about the fallout from higher up? It was an unpleasant thought, and to top it off, he suddenly realized he’d completely forgotten about passing Rose Kearny’s notes on to Bill Farrell.

Having navigated her way through the warren of buildings that made up Guy’s Hospital, Gemma eventually found her way to the administrative section. A young woman sat at the front desk in medical records, her long nails clicking on her computer keyboard as she typed. She looked up as Gemma entered, a slight frown creasing her brow.

“Can I help you?” she asked. “Do you have clearance to be up here?”

Gemma produced her warrant card, which she’d needed to get through the main security checkpoint, although on Winnie’s earlier visit her dog collar seemed to have worked just as well. “Hi, I’m Inspector James, Metropolitan Police. I just wanted to ask a few questions about a member of your staff, Elaine Holland.”

The young woman dropped her hands from the keyboard and appraised Gemma with frank interest. “Someone came yesterday, too, a priest. Nice lady. I’m Tasha, by the way.” Her smile revealed deep dimples in her cheeks. She was dark-skinned, with a round, friendly face emphasized by her elaborately plaited hair. Her long nails, Gemma noticed when Tasha reached across the desk to shake her hand, were lime green, each one decorated with its own unique design. “Everyone else is out at the moment – we’ve a skeleton staff on the weekends – but I work with Elaine. Isn’t it unusual to call in the police just because someone misses a day of work?”

Pulling up a chair, Gemma explained, “She’s been missing from home since yesterday morning. After twenty-four hours we begin to get concerned. I understand she didn’t call in sick yesterday?”

“No. And that’s unheard of for Miss Conscientious. You’d expect Elaine to give two weeks’ notice if she were going to take a long lunch.” There was enough satisfaction in Tasha’s voice to make Gemma suspect that Elaine hadn’t minded criticizing those who didn’t meet her standards – and that Tasha had not cared much for her officemate. Nor could she imagine, from what she knew of Elaine, that Elaine would have found this bright, outspoken girl her cup of tea.

“Did she give you any indication before yesterday that she might be planning to go somewhere, or that there was anything unusual going on in her life?”

“No. But then Elaine’s not one to sit down for a good girly gossip.”

“Has she any particular friends in the department?”

Tasha thought for a moment, idly rubbing the tip of one of her long thumbnails. “No, not really. I suppose if she were going to talk to anyone, it would be me, just because I’m the most available body. But when she does get in the mood to talk, it’s not because she’s interested in what anyone else has to say. It’s more like every so often she has an urge that needs satisfying – a sort of vocal masturbation,” Tasha added, giving Gemma a cheeky grin.

Gemma smiled back, refusing to be shocked. “What sort of things does she talk about when one of these… um… urges strikes her?”

“Oh, it’s usually some sort of rag about the disgraceful state of the government, or her glorious childhood in the Gloucestershire countryside with Mummy and Daddy. Sometimes you’d swear she’s a relic from the Great War, instead of a woman in her thirties.”

“I take it she’s not a fan of the Labour government, then?” asked Gemma, making a mental note that Elaine wasn’t likely to have volunteered for Michael Yarwood’s election campaign.

“No. And I can tell you something else,” Tasha added, “she didn’t come from Gloucestershire.”

“How do you know?” Gemma asked, interested.

“Because I was born and bred right here in Southwark, and I know a Southwark accent when I hear one. I belong to a local drama group,” Tasha confided, “and accents are my forte. I’d guess Elaine Holland’s never spent more than a month outside the Borough.”

“Where am I from, then?” Gemma asked, fairly confident that her years in the job disguised any dead giveaways from her old neighborhood.

“Is this a test?” Tasha asked, grinning. “Okay, let me think.” She closed her eyes, making a great show of concentrating. “London, obviously. Um, north of the river, but not within the sound of Bow Bells. Not posh, though… and I think North East rather than North West. I’d say Wanstead, or thereabout.”

Gemma laughed aloud. “Got it within a mile. It’s Leyton. I grew up in Leyton High Road.”

“So you’ll take my word about Elaine?”

“I will. And I’ll come see you at the Old Vic one of these days. Your talents are definitely wasted here.”

“It pays the bills. And it’s all right, really.” Tasha looked a little ashamed. “I suppose I shouldn’t have been catty about Elaine. I mean, I hope nothing’s happened to her. I just assumed she’d finally got a wild hair. Or gone off with that guy she’s been hinting about.”

Gemma nearly bolted out of her chair. “What guy?”

“I don’t know,” said Tasha, sounding less sure of herself. “She’s never really said anything. It’s just the last few months, there’s been something different… a sort of smugness whenever anyone else is blathering on about their boyfriends. She listens with this little cat-who’s-got-the-canary smile. And then… one of the other girls is getting married, and she made some comment about spinsters. I don’t think she really meant it as a dig at Elaine, not directly, but Elaine just went off. I’d never seen her like that. ‘I’ll bloody well show you,’ she shouted, and slammed out of the office.”

“When was this?”

“A couple of weeks ago. A half hour later, Elaine came back in, as calm as you please, and never said another word about it.”