Career of Evil

“Is what true?” asked Strike.

“That you — that—”

Chewing vigorously, Tempest leaned towards Strike in her wheelchair, placed her hand on his forearm and swallowed.

“That you did it yourself,” she whispered, with the ghost of a wink.

Her thick thighs had subtly readjusted themselves as she lifted them off the chair, bearing their own weight, instead of hanging behind the mobile torso. Strike had been in Selly Oak Hospital with men left paraplegic and quadriplegic by the injuries they had sustained in war, seen their wasted legs, the compensations they had learned to make in the movement of their upper bodies to accommodate the dead weight below. For the first time, the reality of what Tempest was doing hit him forcibly. She did not need the wheelchair. She was entirely able-bodied.

Strangely, it was Robin’s expression that kept Strike calm and polite, because he found vicarious release in the look of distaste and fury she threw Tempest. He addressed Jason.

“You’ll need to tell me what you’ve been told before I can tell you whether it’s true or not.”

“Well,” said Jason, who had barely touched his Black Angus burger, “Kelsey said you went to the pub with her brother and you got — got drunk and told him the truth. She reckoned you walked off your base in Afghanistan with a gun and you went as far as you could in the dark, then you — shot yourself in the leg, and then you got a doctor to amputate it for you.”

Strike took a large swig of beer.

“And I did this why?”

“What?” said Jason, blinking confusedly.

“Was I trying to get invalided out of the army, or—?”

“Oh, no!” said Jason, looking strangely hurt. “No, you were” — he blushed so hard it seemed unlikely that there was enough blood left in the rest of his body — “like us. You needed it,” he whispered. “You needed to be an amputee.”

Robin suddenly found that she could not look at Strike and pretended to be contemplating a curious painting of a hand holding a single shoe. At least, she thought it showed a hand holding a shoe. It might equally have been a brown plant pot with a pink cactus growing out of it.

“The — brother — who told Kelsey all about me — did he know she wanted to take off her own leg?”

“I don’t think so, no. She said I was the only one she’d ever told.”

“So you think it was just coincidence he mentioned—?”

“People keep it quiet,” said Tempest, shoehorning herself back into the conversation at the first opportunity. “There’s a lot of shame, a lot of shame. I’m not out at work,” she said blithely, waving towards her legs. “I have to say it’s a back injury. If they knew I’m transabled they’d never understand. And don’t get me started on the prejudice from the medical profession, which is absolutely unbelievable. I’ve changed GPs twice; I wasn’t going to put up with being offered bloody psychiatric help again. No, Kelsey told us she’d never been able to tell anyone, poor little love. She had nobody to turn to. Nobody understood. That’s why she reached out to us — and to you, of course,” she told Strike, smiling with a little condescension because, unlike her, he had ignored Kelsey’s appeal. “You’re not alone, mind. Once people have successfully achieved what they’re after they tend to leave the community. We get it — we understand — but it would mean a lot if people hung around just to describe what it feels like to finally be in the body you’re meant to be in.”

Robin was worried that Strike might explode, here in this polite white space where art lovers conversed in soft voices. However, she had reckoned without the self-control that the ex — Special Investigation Branch officer had learned through long years of interrogations. His polite smile to Tempest might have been a little grim, but he merely turned again to Jason and asked:

“So you don’t think it was Kelsey’s brother’s idea for her to contact me?”

“No,” said Jason, “I think that was all her own idea.”

“So what exactly did she want from me?”

“Well, obviously,” interposed Tempest, half-laughing, “she wanted advice on how to do what you’d done!”

“Is that what you think, Jason?” asked Strike and the boy nodded.

“Yeah... she wanted to know how badly she’d have to injure her leg to get it taken off, and I think she had a sort of idea you’d introduce her to the doctor who did yours.”

“That’s the perennial problem,” said Tempest, clearly oblivious to the effect she was having on Strike, “finding reliable surgeons. They’re usually completely unsympathetic. People have died trying to do it themselves. There was a wonderful surgeon in Scotland who performed a couple of amputations on BIID sufferers, but then they stopped him. That was a good ten years ago. People go abroad, but if you can’t pay, if you can’t afford travel... you can see why Kelsey wanted to get her mitts on your contact list!”