Which begged the question: Was this murder linked to the group that Lillian had described?
“Have they identified the woman?” Clio asked.
“Yes, she had ID on her. She’s a professor, called Diana Cornish. She works for the Institute of Manuscript Studies in St. Andrews.”
Clio stiffened. “What did you say?” It was a couple of weeks since she’d spoken to the butler at Lady Arden’s home, and he’d told her that it was someone from St. Andrews who’d asked about the embroidery. Sheneededto follow that up now.
As Tim repeated what he’d said, she felt as if every nerve in her body was twitching. Lillian might not have wanted her to tell anyone that she was looking into Eleanor, but she couldn’t keep everything to herself now. If she compromised a murder investigation bywithholding what she knew, she could lose her job. That couldn’t happen.
Besides, she trusted Tim. She said, “Boss, can we talk in private? I need to show you something, and I need to tell you what I did on leave.”
Anya
I scanned the timetable board at King’s Cross Station, looking for the train to Cambridge. Platform 8. In fifteen minutes.
I couldn’t believe I was going there for the first time in my life. But I’d do anything for Mum, even the one thing I swore I wouldn’t.
The train whisked me north of London into a rural landscape that flattened out as we traveled. The sky stretched wider. The horizon lengthened.
Magnus wanted me to come and look at more of his manuscripts before I went back up north. He said he kept ten of his favorites in Cambridge because he couldn’t bear to be parted from them. The rest were in Scotland, at Tracy’s castle, where he felt they were safest. “We can go today,” he said. “My driver will take us.”
Sid had messaged to ask how I was doing. He’d freak out if I told him what had happened and where I was going, and I couldn’t talk now because the train was crowded and I didn’t want to be overheard. For all I knew, Magnus could have someone watching me. If he could have me snatched off the pavement in Central London, who knew what else he was capable of?
I wrote:You wouldn’t believe how my day is going. I’ll call later.
I messaged Diana to let her know what I was doing but didn’t get a reply.
I thought about Mum. Telling her anything about today was totally out of the question; she must never know. But it would be hard because she and I had never kept secrets from each other.
As the train pulled in, my eyes were glued to the sign saying “Cambridge” as it slid past the window, proof my world had beenknocked off kilter. I walked from the station into the center. When I got there, I felt strangely at home, which was disconcerting. I knew this world of colleges and their courtyards, of clipped lawns, streets full of students and dons, and porters in their waistcoats and hats at the college gates. Even the air was marshy and close, just like Oxford’s.
I had an hour to kill before meeting my father. I went to see the site where his library would be built, drawn there like a moth to a flame.
Tall hoardings surrounded the lot. It was adjacent to Magnus’s former college. A crane was at work, hoisting up a beam. The building had risen two stories from the ground already. The hoardings were covered in signs advertising the builders and architects, with an artist’s rendering of what the library would eventually look like and an electronic countdown clock to the date it should be finished.
I’d seen pictures online already, but in person it was so much more impressive. Its sheer size and the audacity of raising such a modern building in the heart of the medieval city were breathtaking. It was remarkable that one man could do this and give it his name. It was ambition on a phenomenal scale.
My phone buzzed. Mum. My heart skipped a beat, and I debated whether to answer, because the scale of my emotional betrayal of her felt overwhelming, and I didn’t know if or how I could keep that out of my voice or my face, but I didn’t want her to worry. And I needed to know how she was.
All this will be worth it, I told myself, if it means she gets what she needs. I took a deep breath and accepted the video call.
“Hi, love,” she said. “How are you?” Her face popped up on my screen. She looked much better than I was expecting. I sat on a low wall in front of a tree so she couldn’t tell where I was.
“I’m good,” I said. “Down in London for a couple of days for work. What about you? You look great.”
In the background, on her end, I heard a strange noise.
“Is that Viv?” I asked.
“Viv is whooping! I’ve had some amazing news.”
He couldn’t have made this happen so soon, could he? “What news?”
“Somebody called from the oncology unit to say that a clinical trial in America is recruiting new patients for a trial with that drug, the one they said wasn’t available here because it was too expensive. Anyway, I’m eligible! I’m in! All expenses paid. Apparently, I’m perfect for it.”
I choked up. “That’s brilliant, Mum!”
“I know! I can’t believe it.”
