Lethal White

bacteria.
“Must’ve been scary,” he said.
“Well, it wasn’t fun,” said Robin, examining her short, clean fingernails, then
checking her watch. “If you want a cigarette we should go now, he’ll be back

---

soon.”
One of the smokers they joined outside was wearing pajamas. He had
brought his drip with him, and held it tightly like a shepherd’s crook to keep
himself steady. Strike lit up and exhaled towards a clear blue sky.
“I haven’t asked about your anniversary weekend.”
“I’m sorry I couldn’t work,” said Robin quickly. “It had been booked and—”
“That’s not why I was asking.”
She hesitated.
“It wasn’t great, to be honest.”
“Ah, well. Sometimes when there’s pressure to have a good time—”
“Yes, exactly,” said Robin.
After another short pause she asked:
“Lorelei’s working today, I suppose?”
“Probably,” said Strike. “What is this, Saturday? Yeah, I suppose so.”
They stood in silence while Strike’s cigarette shrank, millimeter by
millimeter, watching visitors and arriving ambulances. There was no
awkwardness between them, but the air seemed charged, somehow, with things
wondered and unspoken. Finally Strike pressed out the stub of his cigarette in a
large open ashtray that most smokers had ignored and checked his phone.
“They boarded twenty minutes ago,” he said, reading Lucy’s last text. “They
should be here by three.”
“What happened to your mobile?” asked Robin, looking at the heavily
sellotaped screen.
“Fell on it,” said Strike. “I’ll get a new one when Chiswell pays us.”
They passed the X-ray machine being rolled out of the ward as they walked
back inside.
“Chest looks fine!” said the radiographer pushing it.
They sat by Jack’s side talking quietly for another hour, until Robin went to
buy more tea and chocolate bars from nearby vending machines, which they
consumed in the waiting room while Robin filled Strike in about everything she
had discovered about Winn’s charity.
“You’ve outdone yourself,” said Strike, halfway down his second Mars bar.
“That was excellent work, Robin.”
“You don’t mind that I told Chiswell?”
“No, you had to. We’re up against it time-wise with Mitch Patterson sniffing
round. Has this Curtis-Lacey woman accepted the invitation to the reception?”
“I’ll find out on Monday. What about Barclay? How’s he getting on with
Jimmy Knight?”
“Still nothing we can use,” Strike sighed, running a hand over the stubble

---

that was rapidly becoming a beard, “but I’m hopeful. He’s good, Barclay. He’s
like you. Got an instinct for this stuff.”
A family shuffled into the waiting room, the father sniffing and the mother
sobbing. The son, who looked barely older than six, stared at Strike’s missing leg
as though it was merely one more horrible detail in the nightmarish world he had
suddenly entered. Strike and Robin glanced at each other and left, Robin
carrying Strike’s tea as he swung along on his crutches.
Once settled beside Jack again, Strike asked, “How did Chiswell react when
you told him everything you’d got on Winn?”
“He was delighted. As a matter of fact, he offered me a job.”
“I’m always surprised that doesn’t happen more often,” said Strike,
unperturbed.
Just then, the anesthetist and surgeon converged at the foot of Jack’s bed
again.
“Well, things are looking up,” said the anesthetist. “His X-ray’s clear and his
temperature’s coming down. That’s the thing with children,” he said, smiling at
Robin. “They travel fast in both directions. We’re going to see how he manages
with a little less oxygen, but I think we’re getting on top of things.”
“Oh, thank God,” said Robin.
“He’s going to live?” said Strike.
“Oh yes, I think so,” said the surgeon, with a touch of patronage. “We know
what we’re doing in here, you know.”
“Gotta let Lucy know,” muttered Strike, trying and failing to get up, feeling
weaker at good news than he’d felt at bad. Robin fetched his crutches and helped
him into a standing position. As she watched him swinging towards the waiting
room, she sat back down, exhaled loudly and put her face briefly into her hands.
“Always worst for the mothers,” said the anesthetist kindly.
She didn’t bother to correct him.
Strike was away for twenty minutes. When he returned, he said:
“They’ve just landed. I’ve warned her how he looks, so they’re prepared.
They should be here in about an hour.”
“Great,” said Robin.
“You can head off, Robin. I didn’t mean to balls up your Saturday.”
“Oh,” said Robin, feeling oddly deflated. “OK.”
She stood up, took her jacket off the back of the chair and collected her bag.
“If you’re sure?”
“Yeah, yeah, I’ll probably try and get a kip in now we know he’s going to be
all right. I’ll walk you out.”
“There’s no need—”

---

“I want to. I can have another smoke.”
But when they reached the exit, Strike walked on with her, away from the
huddled smokers, past the ambulances and the car park that seemed to stretch for
miles, roofs glimmering like the backs of marine creatures, surfacing through a
dusty haze.
“How did you get here?” he asked, once they were away from the crowds,
beside a patch of lawn surrounded by stocks whose scent mingled with the smell
of hot tarmac.
“Bus, then cab.”
“Let me give you the cab fare—”
“Don’t be ridiculous. Seriously, no.”
“Well… thanks, Robin. It made all the difference.”
She smiled up at him.
“’S’what friends are for.”
Awkwardly, leaning on his crutches, he bent towards her. The hug was brief
and she broke away first, afraid that he was going to overbalance. The kiss that
he had meant to plant on her cheek landed on her mouth as she turned her face
towards him.
“Sorry,” he muttered.
“Don’t be silly,” she said again, blushing.
“Well, I’d better get back.”
“Yes, of course.”
He turned away.
“Let me know how he is,” she called after him, and he raised one hand in
acknowledgment.
Robin walked away without looking back. She could still feel the shape of
his mouth on hers, her skin tingling where his stubble had scratched her, but she
did not rub the sensation away.
Strike had forgotten that he had meant to have another cigarette. Whether
because he was now confident that he would be able to take his nephew to the
Imperial War Museum, or for some other reason, his exhaustion was now
stippled with a crazy light-heartedness, as though he had just taken a shot of
spirits. The dirt and heat of a London afternoon, with the smell of stocks in the
air, seemed suddenly full of beauty.
It was a glorious thing, to be given hope, when all had seemed lost.

---

27