1 The Cuckoo's Calling

“They said that a neighbor had overheard an argument; so of course I thought
it was Duffield. I thought Duffield had knocked her through the window. I was
all set to tell the pigs what a cunt he is; I was ready to stand in the dock and
testify to the fucker’s character. And if this ash falls off my cigarette,” he
continued in precisely the same tone, “I will fire that little bitch.”
As though she had heard him, Trudie’s rapid footfalls grew louder and louder
until she emerged again into the room, breathing heavily and clutching a heavy
glass ashtray.
“Thank you,” said Somé, with a pointed inflection, as she placed it in front of
him and scurried back downstairs.
“Why did you think it was Duffield?” asked Strike, once he judged Trudie to
be safely out of earshot.
“Who else would Cuckoo have let in at two in the morning?”
“How well do you know him?”
“Well enough, little piss ant that he is.” Somé picked up his mint tea. “Why do
women do it? Cuckoo, too…she wasn’t stupid—actually, she was razor-sharp—
so what did she see in Evan Duffield? I’ll tell you,” he said, without pausing for
an answer. “It’s that wounded-poet crap, that soul-pain shit, that too-much-of-atortured-genius-to-wash
bollocks. Brush your teeth, you little bastard. You’re not
fucking Byron.”
He slammed his glass down and cupped his right elbow in his left hand,
steadying his forearm and continuing to draw heavily on the cigarette.
“No man would put up with the likes of Duffield. Only women. Maternal
instinct gone warped, if you ask me.”
“You think he had it in him to kill her, do you?”
“Of course I do,” said Somé dismissively. “Of course he has. All of us have
got it in us, somewhere, to kill, so why would Duffield be any exception? He’s
got the mentality of a vicious twelve-year-old. I can imagine him in one of his
rages, having a tantrum and then just—”
With his cigarette-free hand he made a violent shoving movement.
“I saw him shouting at her once. At my after-show party, last year. I got in
between them; I told him to have a go at me instead. I might be a little poof,”
Somé said, the round-cheeked face set, “but I’d back myself against that druggedup
fuck any day. He was a tit at the funeral, too.”
“Really?”