Palmer hesitated. ‘No, I was out last night. I got back late; the snow held me up. I’m not used to driving in it.’
‘And what time was that, roughly?’
‘I suppose I left here at about seven and didn’t get back until gone midnight. It was snowing heavily by then – the roads were deserted.’
‘I see,’ said Kirby, noting down the times. ‘Can anyone verify your whereabouts?’
Palmer looked taken aback. ‘Why do you need to know?’
‘I have to ask.’
Palmer paused as though weighing up the options before speaking. ‘I was at the Vauxhall Tavern. The barman, Vihaan, will remember me.’
Kirby wrote down the barman’s name. ‘And you drove back, you said?’
‘Despite what you might think, not everyone who frequents the Tavern is high or drunk. I don’t drink, for the record. Or do drugs.’
Kirby ignored the dig and went on. ‘When you drove back, did you see anyone outside the house or on the road – either on foot or in a car?’
Palmer shook his head. ‘No one. It was a whiteout. Never seen anything like it in a city.’
He was right – Kirby had never seen snow like it in the capital. ‘Have you seen or heard anything suspicious in the last twenty-four hours?’
‘No. What’s this about?’
‘A body was found this morning in the grounds next door,’ said Kirby.
‘What?’ Palmer looked genuinely shocked. ‘A body? Jeez, that’s terrible. Was it an accident?’
‘It’s unlikely.’
‘D’you know who it is?’
‘Not at this point, no. I don’t suppose that you’ve seen anyone hanging around recently?’
Palmer shook his head. ‘No, but then again, I don’t go that way very often – past the main entrance, I mean. I usually turn left and head to the shops, or into town, that way.’
‘I believe that there used to be access to the asylum from your grounds, is that correct?’ Kirby went on.
‘There’s a door in the garden wall, but it’s been blocked off for years.’
‘Is there any other way into next door from here?’
‘Are you saying that someone got in through the garden on this side?’ Palmer looked shocked at the thought.
‘We have to explore every possibility.’ Kirby had noticed a path down the right-hand side of the house, which he assumed led to a back entrance. ‘Do you mind if I take a look in the garden?’ He glanced through the window at the snowy scene outside; he felt warmer now than he had done in the past twenty-four hours, dammit.
‘Be my guest, but I can tell you now that whoever got into the old asylum didn’t get in through here.’ Palmer got up and led Kirby through to a drawing room, which had French windows that opened straight on to the garden. He unlocked the doors with a key that he took from the top of the doorframe.
‘Does this lead directly down to the river?’ Kirby asked, stepping out on to the crisp, white snow.
‘Yes, there’s an old boathouse down there, beyond the maze.’ Palmer pointed off to the left, his breath clear and white in the cold air. ‘I wouldn’t go in, though. I don’t know if it’s safe. Everything’s a bit of a mess these days.’
Kirby walked away from the house, leaving Charles Palmer watching him from the warmth of the drawing room. He wasn’t quite sure what to make of the man. He’d been helpful and certainly knew how to make coffee, but Kirby wondered whether his hesitation over his whereabouts the previous night concealed anything more sinister than reticence. And the inheritance. I’ll probably sell. Kirby thought back to when his grandmother had died and his mother had sold the house. It was fraught with emotion. He’d got none of that from Palmer, and wondered if he had siblings or a family of his own. Just because he hung out at one of the best-known gay bars in London didn’t preclude a wife and kids tucked away in Perth.
After a few yards, Kirby stopped for a moment, the same feeling that he’d had outside Raymond Sweet’s house returning. London felt miles away, although in reality Chelsea Bridge and its traffic were only a few hundred yards to his right. A siren wailed in the distance, but the snow muffled even that, as though it were in another world running parallel to his.
As he carried on towards the boathouse through the thick, undisturbed snow, he could tell that the garden had once been beautiful. The lawn he was crossing led to a parterre on the right – its layout just visible under the snow – and a wooded area to his left. Directly ahead, he could see a statue, and beyond that a small frozen pond and a line of trees. Although the Thames was shielded, he could feel its presence beyond the treeline. He veered off to the left and found himself in a small maze, and The Shining sprung to mind for the second time that morning. Unlike the maze in the film, however, these hedges were no more than four feet high and would once have been neatly trimmed; now, they sprouted unwieldy shoots, which hung heavy with snow.
Out of the maze, he found himself on what must have been the path that Palmer had mentioned. He could feel the frozen gravel through the snow as he crunched his way forward. He could sense the river ahead of him strongly now, and smelt its familiar tang. To his left there was a high wall overgrown with ivy and topped with razor wire, and he spotted the bricked-up doorway. He went over for a closer look, but it was clear that no one had been through it in years. He gazed up at the wall, trying to imagine the elderly victim scaling it in the middle of the night; there was simply no way, unless she changed into Catwoman in the early hours. He turned and looked back at the garden. It really was magnificent; there was even what he took to be a small folly – a short, stumpy structure covered in ivy.
Heading towards the river, he made his way over to the boathouse, which was on raised stilts, and looked out over the water. In contrast to the snow, the Thames looked brown and sluggish, and yet despite this it was still a magnificent sight. A flight of steep steps led straight into the river; the tide was out and the steps were exposed right the way down to the foreshore. He moved around to the boathouse door, which he saw was fitted with a new lock. It was heavy-duty – more than you’d need to secure a lawnmower or a rowing boat. What few windows there were in the boathouse had been blacked out, and he couldn’t see anything inside. He was about to head back to the house when his mobile rang; it was Anderson.
‘What’s up?’ Kirby asked.
‘Raymond Sweet’s back. He’s waiting for us at the Lodge and doesn’t look too pleased.’
CHAPTER 7
Raymond had been waiting at the Old Lodge for over half an hour – a policeman standing guard outside – and his stress levels were escalating by the minute. He only took the odd thing from the asylum, things that no one else could possibly want. It was the more delicate acquisitions, as he liked to think of them, that he was worried about: things that should never have been left behind in the first place. Was that what this was about? Or maybe it was his drawings? He often drew little faces on the walls to help him navigate – smiley faces, sad faces, sometimes faces making a noise, depending on how the mood took him – as parts of Blackwater were so overgrown that sometimes even he had difficulty finding his way around. He spoke to them sometimes, too – little helpers, he called them. They did no harm to anyone, so it couldn’t be that, surely? Suddenly, there was a knock on the door. He got up and, despite the situation, felt a surge of pride opening the door to his house – the house that if Patrick Calder had his way would be demolished with the rest of Blackwater.