1 The Cuckoo's Calling

“After she refused to hand over a check, and slammed the door in your face,
you went back down the stairs, and there was the door to Flat Two standing open.
Wilson and the alarm repairman were busy looking at the keypad, and Lechsinka
was somewhere in there by then—maybe vacuuming, because that would have
helped mask the noise of you creeping into the hall behind the two men.
“It wasn’t that much of a risk, really. If they’d turned and seen you, you could
have pretended you’d come in to thank Wilson for letting you up. You crossed
the hall while they were busy with the alarm fuse box, and you hid somewhere in
that big flat. There’s loads of space. Empty cupboards. Under the bed.”
Bristow was shaking his head in silent denial. Strike continued in the same
matter-of-fact tone:
“You must have heard Wilson telling Lechsinka to set the alarm to 1966.
Finally, Lechsinka, Wilson and the Securibell guy left, and you had sole
possession of the flat. Unfortunately for you, however, Lula had now left the
building, so you couldn’t go back upstairs and try and bully her into coughing
up.”
“Total fantasy,” said the lawyer. “I never set foot in Flat Two in my life. I left
Lula’s and went in to the office to pick up files—”
“From Alison, isn’t that what you said, the first time we went through your
movements that day?” asked Strike.
Patches of pink blossomed again up Bristow’s stringy neck. After a small
hesitation, he cleared his throat and said:
“I don’t remember whether—I just know that I was very quick; I wanted to get
back to my mother.”
“What effect do you think it’s going to have in court, John, when Alison takes
the stand and tells the jury how you asked her to lie for you? You played the
devastated bereaved brother in front of her, and then asked her out to dinner, and
the poor bitch was so delighted to have a chance to look like a desirable female in
front of Tony that she agreed. A couple of dates later, you persuaded her to say
she saw you at the office on the morning before Lula died. She thought you were
just overanxious and paranoid, didn’t she? She believed that you already had a
cast-iron alibi from her adored Tony, later in the day. She didn’t think it mattered
if she told a little white lie to calm you down.
“But Alison wasn’t there that day, John, to give you any files. Cyprian sent her
off to Oxford the moment she got to work, to look for Tony. You became a bit
nervous, after Rochelle’s funeral, when you realized I knew all about that, didn’t
you?”