Page 311 of Troubled Blood

“You’ll find Louise Tucker’s body where you find M54,” said Creed, and Strike knew Creed had thought out the clue well ahead of time, and was certain that it would have been a clue about Margot, had Strike said he’d been hired by the Tuckers. Creed needed to believe he hadn’t given Strike what he really wanted. He had to come out on top.

“Right,” said Strike. He turned to Dr. Bijral. “Shall we?”

“M54, all right, Cormoran?” called Creed.

“I heard you,” said Strike.

“Sorry not to be able to help with Dr. Bamborough!” called Creed, and Strike could hear his pleasure at the idea that he’d thwarted the detective.

Strike turned back one last time, and now he stopped pretending to be angry, and grinned, too.

“I was here for Louise, you silly fucker. I know you never met Margot Bamborough. She was murdered by a far more skillful killer than you ever were. And just so you know,” Strike added, as the nurse’s keys jangled, and Creed’s slack, fat face registered dismay, “I think you’re a fucking lunatic, and if anyone asks me, I’ll say you should be in Broadmoor till you rot.”

69

Beare ye the picture of that Ladies head?

Full liuely is the semblaunt, though the substance dead.

Edmund Spenser

The Faerie Queene

After almost an hour’s debrief with Dr. Bijral, during which the shaken psychiatrist phoned Scotland Yard, the detective left the hospital feeling as though he’d been there twice as long as he really had. The village of Crowthorne didn’t lie on Strike’s route back to London, but he was hungry, he wanted to call Robin and he felt a powerful need to place himself among ordinary people going about their lives, to expel the memory of those empty, echoing corridors, the jangle of keys and the widely dilated pupils of Dennis Creed.

He parked outside a pub, lit himself the cigarette he’d been craving for the past two and a half hours, then turned his phone back on. He’d already missed two calls from Brian Tucker, but instead of phoning the old man back, he pressed Robin’s number. She answered on the second ring.

“What happened?”

Strike told her. When he’d finished, there was a short silence.

“Say the clue again,” said Robin, who sounded tense.

“‘You’ll find her where you find M54.’”

“Not the M54? Not the motorway?”

“He could’ve meant that, but he left out the definite article.”

“The M54’s twenty-odd miles long.”

“I know.”

Reaction was setting in: Strike should have felt triumphant, but in fact he was tired and tense. His phone beeped at him and he glanced at the screen.

“That’s Brian Tucker again, trying to ring me,” he told Robin.

“What are you going to tell him?”

“The truth,” said Strike heavily, exhaling smoke out of his open window. “Dr. Bijral’s already called Scotland Yard. Trouble is, if that clue’s meaningless, or unsolvable, it leaves Tucker knowing Creed killed his daughter, but never getting the body back. This could well be Creed’s idea of the ultimate torture.”

“It’s something to have a confession, though, isn’t it?” said Robin.

“Tucker’s been convinced Creed killed her for decades. Confession without a body just keeps the wound open. Creed’ll still have the last laugh, knowing where she is and not telling… How’ve you got on in the British Library?”

“Oh. Fine,” said Robin. “I found Joanna Hammond a couple of hours ago.”

“And?” said Strike, now alert.

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