1 The Cuckoo's Calling

“Why not?” asked Strike.
“Tony never liked any of my children,” said Yvette Bristow. “My brother is a
very hard man. Very cold. He said dreadful things after Charlie died. Alec hit
him. It wasn’t true. It wasn’t true—what Tony said.”
Her milky gaze slid to Strike’s face, and he thought he glimpsed the woman
she must have been when she still had her looks: a little clingy, a little childish,
prettily dependent, an ultra-feminine creature, protected and petted by Sir Alec,
who strove to satisfy her every whim and wish.
“What did Tony say?”
“Horrible things about John and Charlie. Awful things. I don’t,” she said
weakly, “want to repeat them. And then he phoned Alec, when he heard that we
were adopting a little girl, and told him we ought not to do it. Alec was furious,”
she whispered. “He forbade Tony our house.”
“Did you tell Lula about all this when she visited that day?” asked Strike.
“About Tony, and the things he said after Charlie died; and when you adopted
her?”
She seemed to sense a reproach.
“I can’t remember exactly what I said to her. I had just had a very serious
operation. I was a little drowsy from all the drugs. I can’t remember precisely
what I said now…”
And then, with an abrupt change of subject:
“That boy reminded me of Charlie. Lula’s boyfriend. The very handsome boy.
What is his name?”
“Evan Duffield?”
“That’s right. He came to see me a little while ago, you know. Quite recently. I
don’t know exactly…I lose track of time. They give me so many drugs now. But
he came to see me. It was so sweet of him. He wanted to talk about Lula.”
Strike remembered Bristow’s assertion that his mother had not known who
Duffield was, and he wondered whether Lady Bristow had played this little game
with her son; making herself out to be more confused than she really was, to
stimulate his protective instincts.
“Charlie would have been handsome like that, if he’d lived. He might have
been a singer, or an actor. He loved performing, do you remember? I felt very
sorry for that boy Evan. He cried here, with me. He told me that he thought she
was meeting another man.”