1 The Cuckoo's Calling

with Ciara, whom Kolovas-Jones had helped inside. Strike slammed the front
passenger door, forcing the two men who had leaned in to take shot after shot of
Duffield and Ciara to jump backwards out of the way.
Kolovas-Jones seemed to take an unconscionable amount of time to return to
the car; Strike felt as though the Mercedes’ interior was a test tube,
simultaneously enclosed and exposed as more and more flashes fired. Lenses
were pressed to the windows and windscreen; unfriendly faces floated in the
darkness, and black figures darted back and forth in front of the stationary car.
Beyond the explosions of light, the shadowy crowd-queue surged, curious and
excited.
“Put your foot down, for fuck’s sake!” Strike growled at Kolovas-Jones, who
revved the engine. The paparazzi blocking the road moved backwards, still taking
pictures.
“Bye-bye, you cunts,” said Evan Duffield from the backseat as the car pulled
away from the curb.
But the photographers ran alongside the vehicle, flashes erupting on either
side; and Strike’s whole body was bathed in sweat: he was suddenly back on a
yellow dirt road in the juddering Viking, with a sound like firecrackers popping
in the Afghanistan air; he had glimpsed a youth running away from the road
ahead, dragging a small boy. Without conscious thought he had bellowed
“Brake!” lunged forwards and seized Anstis, a new father of two days’ standing,
who was sitting right behind the driver; the last thing he remembered was
Anstis’s shouted protest, and the low metallic boom of him hitting the back
doors, before the Viking disintegrated with an ear-splitting bang, and the world
became a hazy blur of pain and terror.
The Mercedes had rounded the corner on to an almost deserted road; Strike
realized that he had been holding himself so tensely that his remaining calf
muscles were sore. In the wing mirror he could see two motorbikes, each being
ridden pillion, following them. Princess Diana and the Parisian underpass; the
ambulance bearing Lula Landry’s body, with cameras held high to the darkened
glass as it passed; both careered through his thoughts as the car sped through the
dark streets.
Duffield lit a cigarette. Out of the corner of his eye, Strike saw Kolovas-Jones
scowl at his passenger in the rearview mirror, though he made no protest. After a
moment or two, Ciara began whispering to Duffield. Strike thought he heard his
own name.
Five minutes later, they turned another corner and saw, ahead of them, another
small crowd of black-clad photographers, who began flashing and running
towards the car the moment it appeared. The motorbikes were pulling up right
behind them; Strike saw the four men running to catch the moment when the car