Where There's Smoke

Collins let the matter drop. “The other thing I wanted to tell you is that Paul Sutherland’s been released,” he went on. “He still claims he can’t remember where he was on the night your office was broken into, but from what the officers who arrested him said, that’s pretty easy to believe. Apparently it was a while before he was sober enough to talk any sense at all. But they’ve managed to account for at least some of his movements, and it doesn’t look as though it was him.”

The car smelt of cigarettes. Kate wound down the window a little to let some air in. “I never thought it was.” The breeze was cold on her face.

“No luck with fingerprints, either, I’m afraid.” Collins’s knees pressed into the back of the seat in front. Sitting next to him, Kate felt like a little girl. “Looks as though whoever did it wore gloves. So they either knew what they were doing, or they’d got cold hands.”

“What about the matches?”

Collins turned down his mouth and shook his head. “Doesn’t prove it was Ellis, if that’s what you mean.”

“So you don’t think it was.”

“I don’t think a box of matches proves anything, one way or another. It could just have been a burglar who smoked. We’ll keep an eye on your office as well as your flat, but I wouldn’t read too much into it.”

Kate gazed out of the window. “Did you find out where he called from?” She had dialled 1471 after Ellis had phoned her. His number had been logged on the caller-return system, and she had passed it to Collins. But she could see from his expression that it had been a wasted effort.

“He used a public phone box near Oxford Circus tube station. Nobody can remember seeing him.” The Inspector sounded disgruntled by the admission. “Somebody like that’s not going to be able to keep out of sight for very long, though. He’ll turn up sooner or later.”

The sergeant pulled into the kerb. “This okay? There’s a tube station on the other side of the road.”

Kate said it was and got out. The tobacco smell seemed to follow her, caught on her clothes. Collins climbed out as well. The car sank down slightly as he eased into the front seat. As it pulled away, Kate looked to see if the road was clear to cross. Outlined against the grey clouds, the thin column of the crematorium chimney was poised like a rebuking finger.

That night she cooked herself a cheese and ham omelette, with Brussels sprouts and two slices of wholemeal bread. Sprouts weren’t her favourite vegetable, but they were rich in folic acid, which was important in pregnancy. Even though she had no appetite, there was an incentive to make an effort.

Part of her noted the irony that, now she was able to eat as much as she liked without feeling guilty or running to the gym, she wasn’t able to enjoy it.

Kate found that she had moved to an acceptance of being pregnant without really being aware of it. The thrill she had expected to feel seemed to have been subsumed in the larger emotional turmoil. At odd moments the knowledge would hit her, and there would be a vertiginous plunge that was almost terror. But even that was already growing rarer.

She forced herself to eat the omelette and helped down the final breadcrust with a glass of milk. Taking her plate and glass into the kitchen, she washed and dried them.

When she had put them away she looked at her watch. It was eight o’clock. She went back into the lounge and stared at the television until it was ten o’clock and she felt she could reasonably go to bed.

Sleep came hard. Often it was little more than a restless, half-awake state that would last until the early hours, leaving her feeling grainy and listless when it was time to get up. It was like that now. Kate groped for the clock as the insistent beep of the alarm dragged her towards consciousness. She fumbled to turn it off before realising that the noise was coming from outside her room.

She sat up. It was still dark, without even the subtle lightening that indicates dawn. Still hazy with sleep, it took her several seconds to understand what had woken her.

It was the smoke alarm. She threw back the covers and ran into the hall. The yammer of the alarm was immediately louder, and now she could smell the smoke that had triggered it. She switched on the hall light and blinked against the sudden brightness.

There was a faint grey haze in the air, but no fire.

Kate ran to the lounge. It was as she had left it, dark and quiet. The smell of smoke was fainter. She hurried out to check the kitchen, noticing that the smoke in the hallway was already thicker. As she passed the top of the stairwell a noise made her look down.

Smoke was oozing from around the door at the bottom. The foot of the stairs was in shadow, but a bright glow came from the translucent cat flap. It was bumping inwards as though blown by a wind, nudged by the heat on the other side. The plastic was already beginning to bubble.