Still immensely suspicious, she gave monosyllabic answers at first, but slowly, gradually, she became more forthcoming. Her own history was pitiful. Early abuse, care, severe mental illness, foster homes and violent outbursts culminating, at sixteen, in homelessness. She had secured proper treatment as the indirect result of being hit by a car. Hospitalised when her bizarre behaviour had made treating her physical wounds nearly impossible, a psychiatrist had at last been called in. She was on drugs now, which, when she took them, greatly eased her symptoms. Strike found it pathetic, and touching, that the outpatient clinic where she had met Lula Landry seemed to have become, for Rochelle, the highlight of her week. She spoke with some affection of the young psychiatrist who ran the group.

‘So that’s where you met Lula?’

‘Di’n’t her brother tell ya?’

‘He was vague on the details.’

‘Yeah, she come to our group. She wuz referred.’

‘And you got talking?’

‘Yeah.’

‘You became friends?’

‘Yeah.’

‘You visited her at home? Swam in the pool?’

‘Why shou’n’t I?’

‘No reason. I’m only asking.’

She thawed very slightly.

‘I don’t like swimming. I don’t like water over m’face. I went in the jacuzzi. And we went shoppin’ an’ stuff.’

‘Did she ever talk to you about her neighbours; the other people in her building?’

‘Them Bestiguis? A bit. She din’ like them. That woman’s a bitch,’ said Rochelle, with sudden savagery.

‘What makes you say that?’

‘Have you met ’er? She look at me like I wuz dirt.’

‘What did Lula think of her?’

‘She din’ like ’er neither, nor her husband. He’s a creep.’

‘In what way?’

‘He jus’ is,’ said Rochelle, impatiently; but then, when Strike did not speak, she went on. ‘He wuz always tryin’ ter get her downstairs when his wife wuz out.’

‘Did Lula ever go?’

‘No fuckin’ chance,’ said Rochelle.

‘You and Lula talked to each other a lot, I suppose, did you?’

‘Yeah, we did, at f— Yeah, we did.’

She looked out of the window. A sudden shower of rain had caught passers-by unawares. Transparent ellipses peppered the glass beside them.

‘At first?’ said Strike. ‘Did you talk less as time went on?’

‘I’m gonna have to go soon,’ said Rochelle, grandly. ‘I got things to do.’

‘People like Lula,’ said Strike, feeling his way, ‘can be spoiled. Treat people badly. They’re used to getting their own—’

‘I ain’t no one’s servant,’ said Rochelle fiercely.

‘Maybe that’s why she liked you? Maybe she saw you as someone more equal – not a hanger-on?’

‘Yeah, igzactly,’ said Rochelle, mollified. ‘I weren’t impressed by her.’

‘You can see why she’d want you as a friend, someone more down-to-earth…’

‘Yeah.’

‘… and you had your illness in common, didn’t you? So you understood her on a level most people wouldn’t.’