Lethal White

But what do you propose to do in the town, then?
Henrik Ibsen, Rosmersholm

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Six and a half miles away, Strike set his mobile down on his desk and lit a
cigarette. Robin’s interest in his story had been soothing after the interview he
had endured half an hour after Billy had fled. The two policemen who had
answered Denise’s call had seemed to relish their opportunity to make the
famous Cormoran Strike admit his fallibility, taking their time as they
ascertained that he had succeeded in finding out neither full name nor address of
the probably psychotic Billy.
The late afternoon sun hit the notebook on his desk at an angle, revealing
faint indentations. Strike dropped his cigarette into an ashtray he had stolen long
ago from a German bar, picked up the notepad and tilted it this way and that,
trying to make out the letters formed by the impressions, then reached for a
pencil and lightly shaded over them. Untidy capital letters were soon revealed,
clearly spelling the words “Charlemont Road.” Billy had pressed less hard on the
house or flat number than the street name. One of the faint indents looked like
either a 5 or an incomplete 8, but the spacing suggested more than one figure, or
possibly a letter.
Strike’s incurable predilection for getting to the root of puzzling incidents
tended to inconvenience him quite as much as other people. Hungry and tired
though he was, and despite the fact that he had sent his temp away so he could
shut up the office, he tore the paper carrying the revealed street name off the pad
and headed into the outer room, where he switched the computer back on.
There were several Charlemont Roads in the UK, but on the assumption that
Billy was unlikely to have the means to travel very far, he suspected that the one
in East Ham had to be the right one. Online records showed two Williams living
there, but both were over sixty. Remembering that Billy had been scared that
Strike might turn up at “Jimmy’s place,” he had searched for Jimmy and then
James, which turned up the details of James Farraday, 49.
Strike made a note of Farraday’s address beneath Billy’s indented scribbles,
though not at all confident that Farraday was the man he sought. For one thing,
his house number contained no fives or eights and, for another, Billy’s extreme
unkemptness suggested that whomever he lived with must take a fairly relaxed
attitude to his personal hygiene. Farraday lived with a wife and what appeared to
be two daughters.
Strike turned off the computer, but continued to stare abstractedly at the dark
screen, thinking about Billy’s story. It was the detail of the pink blanket that kept
nagging at him. It seemed such a specific, unglamorous detail for a psychotic
delusion.
Remembering that he needed to be up early in the morning for a paying job,
he pulled himself to his feet. Before leaving the office, he inserted the piece of

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paper bearing both the impressions of Billy’s handwriting and Farraday’s address
into his wallet.
London, which had recently been at the epicenter of the Queen’s Diamond
Jubilee celebrations, was preparing to host the Olympics. Union Jacks and the
London 2012 logo were everywhere—on signs, banners, bunting, keyrings,
mugs and umbrellas—while jumbles of Olympic merchandise cluttered virtually
every shop window. In Strike’s opinion, the logo resembled shards of fluorescent
glass randomly thrown together and he was equally unenamored of the official
mascots, which looked to him like a pair of cycloptic molars.
There was a tinge of excitement and nervousness about the capital, born, no
doubt, of the perennially British dread that the nation might make a fool of itself.
Complaints about non-availability of Olympics tickets were a dominant theme in
conversation, unsuccessful applicants decrying the lottery that was supposed to
have given everybody a fair and equal chance of watching events live. Strike,
who had hoped to see some boxing, had not managed to get tickets, but laughed
out loud at his old school friend Nick’s offer to take his place at the dressage,
which Nick’s wife Ilsa was overjoyed to have bagged.
Harley Street, where Strike was due to spend Friday running surveillance on
a cosmetic surgeon, remained untouched by Olympic fever. The grand Victorian
façades presented their usual implacable faces to the world, unsullied by garish
logos or flags.
Strike, who was wearing his best Italian suit for the job, took up a position
near the doorway of a building opposite and pretended to be talking on his
mobile, actually keeping watch over the entrance of the expensive consulting
rooms of two partners, one of whom was Strike’s client.
“Dodgy Doc,” as Strike had nicknamed his quarry, was taking his time living
up to his name. Possibly he had been scared out of his unethical behavior by his