Page 43 of Copper Script
“Hell.”
“Is there any chance you could tell me what’s going on?I mean, do you know who he is?”
“Yes.”
“And you’re not happy that I passed your test, because that suggests I’m right about him, and you don’t like that at all.”
“No.”
Wildsmith hesitated.Then he leaned forward, and put his hand very gently on Aaron’s knee.
“Look,” he said.“I have no idea about this, but I do know that you’re a decent man.More than decent.I am absolutely sure you’ll do the right thing if you can.”
Aaron tried to ignore the warm touch of his hand.He ought to shift his knee, shake it off.He didn’t.“I don’t know what I can do.If I have the nerve to do it.I’m— Christ.The truth is, I’m afraid.”
“This is sounding worse by the minute,” Wildsmith said.“Do I want to know?”
“Ididn’t want to know,” Aaron said, and the words rasped in his throat.“I’m sorry.You ought not be involved.I should go.”
“No, stop.Haveyou involved me?I mean, does anyone other than you know about this experiment, or my conclusions?”
“Hollis.He was on the embezzlement case, but he doesn’t know who the ringers were.”
“The...?”
“There were five suspects.We felt one in five was too good odds for guessing so I got three other people to give me their writing.I didn’t mention you.”
“And number seven was one of those ‘ringers’, because if he was one of the suspects in Hollis’s case, it wouldn’t be your problem.And...I’m going to speculate you asked people at work...Oh fuck.Number seven’s a copper?CID?”
Aaron really should not have come here.Wildsmith was too good a guesser.“This is not something to repeat.”
“On the contrary,” Wildsmith said.“It’s bloody well something for you to repeat.It’s not somethingI’mgoing to repeat because I’ve had quite enough trouble from the Met, thank you.Hollis isn’t going to tell anyone about this, is he?”
“He doesn’t know who the ringers were.”
“But number seven knows he gave you a sample of his handwriting!And if word gets around about a particularly good-looking graphological genius—”
“Hollis isn’t in CID.I only involved him because we’d already discussed you.I told everyone the samples were for my ten-year-old niece who’s obsessed with graphology.”
“Is she?”
“She’s three and I hope she stays well away from the subject.Look, I won’t involve you.I can’t: nobody else would listen to ‘A graphologist says so’.Don’t worry.”
“Iwasn’tworried, until you turned up and terrified me,” Wildsmith pointed out.“Let me get this straight.You asked your colleagues to contribute simply to make up the numbers?You didn’t suspect this man?”
“No.Or...No.”
“Really?Because if your only reason to suspect him now is a ginger beer in a moth-eaten cardigan telling you he’s a murderer on the basis of his handwriting—”
“I wouldn’t put it like that.”
“But here you are, looking sick as a dog, and I very much doubt that’s simply faith in my powers.You think I’m right about number seven.You’ve gotreasonto think I’m right.”
Aaron’s head felt slightly fuzzy with the thrum of panic, the urgent desire to squash it all away.Don’t think about it, don’t look.
If he wasn’t going to look, he should have gone back to Lisson Grove.He was here because Wildsmith’s incisive gift had cut through to a truth, and he had to face that.
He took a deep breath.“If what you say is true, a number of other things make sense.It forms a picture.A damned ugly picture, but a coherent one.”
