Chapter Forty-Two

Choosing to have the church janitor drive them to A could hear Prof Arculus saying, When the heart runs out of blood, it's like a car running out of petrol.

‘I'm sorry about your scarf,' she told the priest, really just to break the awkward silence.

‘It's an epitrachelion' – sending her a frosty look.

She narrowed her eyes, dredging up her Greek. ‘Oh right Epi-trachelion : "upon the neck". Cool.'

Half an hour later, the registrar emerged from backstage.

‘You're .?.?. Mrs Angelo-pou-los's niece right?' he asked, referring to her admission notes.

‘That's right,' she said.

The priest muttered something in Greek, probably some hellfire curse against lying harlots, but he didn't grass her up.

The news was as good as could be expected: Chrysanthi was still only semi-conscious, but out of immediate danger.

‘She's being monitored while we give her blood and IV fluids,' the doc went on, eyeing the pair of them.

‘And the arm injury?' Remembering the way the artery had kept springing leaks, she suppressed a shudder: witnessing a dramatic injury in a living person had been a radically different experience to eviscerating a dead body.

‘A vascular surgeon will be coming down to assess her. Do you have a contact number for her next of kin?'

Cassie gave it to him. Chrysanthi might not like it but she was still married to George and it felt wrong to keep him in the dark.

With the doctor gone, the old priest unfolded himself from the seat like a waking bat and left. It was a relief to see the bony old back of him, trailing stares and whispers as he trundled out of A & E on his invisible castors.

George wasn't picking up, so after leaving him a message Cassie decided to stay on: knowing Chrysanthi didn't have any other family she could hardly abandon her.

She was on her third battery-acid coffee from the machine, when the automatic doors opened to admit a blonde Valkyrie on a mission: Phyllida Flyte, the big ginger cop trailing in her wake.

Flyte's searchlight stare raked the room, her whole body tense with worry, until she caught sight of Cassie. A look of relief flooded her face and Cassie's heart did the can-can in her chest.

Ohhh, I see.

Flyte came and sat next to her, while the ginger cop stayed standing at a discreet distance.

‘The priest called us,' said Flyte, her ice-blue eyes soft.

‘He just left.'

‘Tell me what happened?'

Cassie told her as best she could, stumbling over her words: her memory of events non-linear and fragmented, like shards of a broken mirror.

‘Why would she do such a thing?' Flyte asked gently.

Cassie shook her head slowly. ‘Who knows? Grief? She just buried her daughter.'

Frowning, Flyte leaned closer and spoke in a murmur. ‘But you told me you thought it was her who murdered Bronte. And her twin brother.'

‘I don't know, Phyllida. That was just a wild theory.' In truth, since Chrysanthi's desperate act she no longer had any idea what was going on. ‘Could you take this?' – holding up the box cutter wrapped in the bloodstained epitrachelion.

‘Sure' – putting out her hand, before pulling it back. ‘Actually, DI Bacon will need to take it. Chain of custody.'

Of course , Flyte wasn't a cop anymore.

Just then the unexpected sound of ‘London Calling' filled the waiting area and they both turned to see Bacon answering his mobile phone.

The call was brief and after hanging up he met Flyte's eyes and tipped his head towards the door. He looked sombre and his meaning was crystal: We're out of here .