The arrest of Sebastian Vane did not go as smoothly as Clara had hoped. He surrendered himself at the Harrow Street Station at nine o'clock the following morning, accompanied by a solicitor from one of the capital's most expensive firms, and he wore the expression of a man who had been inconvenienced rather than accused. The navy-blue suit was immaculate, the silver hair perfectly combed, the handshake he offered the custody sergeant dry and cool.
"I wish to cooperate fully with the investigation," he said, in the tone of someone bestowing a favour. "The Ethics Committee has nothing to hide."
Clara watched the booking process from behind the observation glass. Sebastian Vane submitted to fingerprinting with the fastidious distaste of a man handling something unpleasant, and when he was shown to an interview room, he sat with his back to the wall and his hands folded on the table, waiting.
She let him wait for two hours. It was a tactic she had learned early in her career: the powerful were unaccustomed to being kept waiting, and the discomfort of idleness sometimes loosened the tongue more effectively than any question. She used the time to review the files Corin Thorne had preserved, spreading the documents across her desk in a chronological map of the conspiracy.
The Locke Inquiry had begun with a single anonymous complaint, filed three years earlier, alleging that Locke & Calder had facilitated improper payments to influence the Fairfax redistricting process. Helena Sinclair had not been the original complainant—Clara noted that detail with interest—but she had become the inquiry's most valuable source, feeding documents to the Ethics Committee through her contact, Sebastian Vane. The contact had begun productively: Vane had opened a file, requested additional evidence, and assured Helena that the Committee was taking the matter seriously. But at some point, the correspondence had shifted. Vane had begun to delay, to request more documentation, to suggest that the evidence was insufficient. And then, two weeks before Helena's death, he had stopped responding to her messages entirely.
Clara found the final email Helena had sent him, preserved in Corin's copies. It read: "I know what you're doing. I know who you're protecting. If I don't hear from you by Friday, I will take everything I have to the press. You have until then to decide whose side you're on."
Friday had come and gone. The following Tuesday, Helena had been found in the canal.
At eleven o'clock, Clara entered the interview room. Sebastian Vane looked up with an expression of polite inquiry. His solicitor, a woman with a razor-cut bob and a diamond wedding ring, opened a leather-bound notebook and prepared to take notes.
"Interview commencing at eleven-oh-three," Clara said for the recording. "Present are Detective Inspector Clara Vance, Mr. Sebastian Vane, and his legal representative. Mr. Vane, you have been arrested on suspicion of obstruction of justice, destruction of evidence, and conspiracy to pervert the course of justice. You are not obliged to say anything, but anything you do say may be given in evidence."
"Noted," Sebastian said. "And I wish to state, for the record, that I deny all of these accusations in the strongest possible terms."
"Let's start with the Locke Inquiry. You were the lead investigator for the Ethics Committee's investigation into Locke & Calder's role in the Fairfax redistricting. Is that correct?"
"It is."
"And you received evidence from Helena Sinclair, over a period of approximately eighteen months, documenting payments from a consortium of developers to a political action committee that supported Edmund Fairfax's campaign."
Sebastian's expression did not flicker. "Ms. Sinclair provided material that she believed was relevant. I reviewed it thoroughly. In my professional assessment, the evidence did not meet the threshold required to bring formal disciplinary proceedings against Locke & Calder."
"What threshold was that?"
"Clear and convincing evidence of professional misconduct. The documents Ms. Sinclair provided were suggestive, but they did not establish a direct causal link between the payments and the redistricting decisions. There were alternative explanations for every transaction she flagged."
Clara opened a folder and withdrew a printed email. "This is a message you sent to Helena Sinclair eight months before her death. You wrote: 'The evidence you have provided is compelling. I believe we have grounds to proceed to a formal hearing.' Eight months later, you closed the file. What changed?"
For the first time, Sebastian's composure wavered. He glanced at his solicitor, who gave an almost imperceptible shake of her head. "I reassessed the evidence in light of additional information. I cannot disclose the nature of that information, as it pertains to confidential Committee proceedings."
"Mr. Vane, your former colleague Corin Thorne has provided us with copies of the complete Locke Inquiry file. The file you claimed had been destroyed. It includes a recorded conversation between Helena Sinclair and a developer named Aldous Thwaites, in which Thwaites explicitly admits that the Fairfax map was drawn to benefit his consortium and that payments were made through Locke & Calder to secure Edmund Fairfax's cooperation. Did you listen to that recording?"
The silence stretched. Sebastian's solicitor leaned over and whispered something in his ear. He nodded, and when he spoke, his voice was measured. "I have no recollection of such a recording."
"Then let me refresh your memory." Clara produced the digital recorder from Corin's box and placed it on the table. "This is a copy of the recording, preserved by your former colleague before you ordered the original erased. Would you like me to play it?"
Sebastian's face tightened. "That recording, if it exists, was obtained without the consent of the parties involved. It would be inadmissible in any legal proceeding."
"This isn't a court, Mr. Vane. This is a murder investigation. A woman is dead, and you suppressed evidence that might have explained why she was killed. I want to know who told you to close the Locke Inquiry."
"I was not 'told' to close it. I made an independent professional judgment."
"Then you won't mind explaining why you met with Isadora Locke on at least six occasions during the inquiry, none of which were recorded in the official file."
The name landed like a slap. Sebastian's hands, which had been resting calmly on the table, tightened fractionally. "I met with many individuals during the course of the inquiry. That is standard procedure."
"Standard procedure to meet with the subject of an investigation, off the books, and then close the file without action? That's an interesting definition of procedure."
Sebastian's solicitor interjected. "My client has answered your questions. Unless you have specific evidence of wrongdoing, I must ask you to either charge him or release him."
Clara ignored her. She leaned forward, her eyes fixed on Sebastian. "Helena Sinclair was killed because she was about to expose a conspiracy that reached from Edmund Fairfax's office to Locke & Calder to the Ethics Committee itself. She was going to go to the press. She gave you a deadline. And then she was dead. Where were you on the night she died, Mr. Vane? The truth, this time."
Sebastian met her gaze. The mask of politeness was still in place, but beneath it, Clara could see something colder—the calculation of a man who had spent a lifetime managing risks and was now confronting one he could not control.
"I was at a dinner for the Veridia Law Society," he said. "I arrived at seven and left after midnight. There are photographs. Witnesses. The reservation list. My alibi is ironclad."
"And yet Helena Sinclair had fibres from a navy-blue bespoke suit under her fingernails when she died. A suit very much like the one you're wearing now."
"Coincidence. As I told you before, there are thousands of such suits in this city."
"Were any of them at the Law Society dinner?"
The question caught him off guard. He blinked. "I don't understand."
"The person who killed Helena wore a navy-blue suit. You wore a navy-blue suit to the dinner. But you're right—so might a hundred other men. What I'm asking is whether anyone at that dinner might have left early, or arrived late, or slipped out during the speeches. Someone you knew. Someone you might have asked to deliver a message to Helena on your behalf."
Sebastian's solicitor stood. "This interview is becoming speculative. I'm advising my client to say nothing further."
"That's fine," Clara said, rising. "I have enough to hold Mr. Vane while we verify his alibi. And while we track down Isadora Locke, who fled the country after being warned that the Locke Inquiry was about to become public. Warned by a woman in lavender, who visited her the night Edmund Fairfax died. A woman who, I suspect, was trying to undo some of the damage your client had done."
She left the interview room and walked to the observation room, where the Chief Constable was waiting. He was a heavy man with a tired face, and he had been following the Fairfax case with the anxious attention of someone who could feel his career teetering on its outcome.
"The Vane arrest is going to make waves," he said. "His firm represents half the judiciary."
"I know. But the evidence is solid. He suppressed a corruption investigation. He destroyed evidence. And he may be connected to Helena Sinclair's murder, even if he didn't strike the blow himself."
"Then find who did." The Chief Constable rubbed his eyes. "And find Isadora Locke. If she's a witness, I want her in protective custody before Vane's people get to her."
Clara spent the rest of the day chasing alibis. The Veridia Law Society dinner had been held at the Gilded Acacia—the same venue where Edmund Fairfax had collapsed—and its guest list read like a directory of the capital's legal elite. She cross-referenced the names against the membership of the Daughters of Themis, the personnel of Locke & Calder, and the associates of Sebastian Vane. One name appeared on all three lists: Rosamund Thorne, the solicitor who had been the fourth surviving member of the Daughters.
Rosamund Thorne practised corporate law in the capital, specialising in real estate transactions. Her firm, Thorne & Calder, was an offshoot of Locke & Calder—she had been a junior partner there before branching out on her own. And she had attended the Law Society dinner on the night of Helena's death. She had been seated at the same table as Sebastian Vane.
Clara pulled Rosamund's file. She was fifty-two, divorced, childless, with a career that had followed the arc of a woman who had chosen professional success over personal attachments. Her photograph showed a sharp-featured woman with dark hair swept back from a high forehead, her expression cool and appraising. She wore a tailored jacket in a shade that might, in certain lights, be described as lavender.
Clara called the station's forensic unit. "The fibres under Helena Sinclair's fingernails—you said they were from a bespoke suit. Can you trace the tailor?"
"Already done. The fabric is from a limited run by a mill in the eastern provinces. Only twelve suits were made from that bolt. Eight of them went to clients in the capital. We're tracking them now."
"Add Rosamund Thorne to your list. She's a solicitor. She may have ordered bespoke suiting."
She hung up and stared at Rosamund's photograph. Another brilliant woman, another Grenville graduate, another member of the Daughters of Themis. But unlike Margaret, who had been erased by marriage, or Helena, who had been silenced by violence, or Genevieve, who had retreated into seclusion, Rosamund had thrived within the system. She had built a career on the very kind of corporate work that the Daughters had once sworn to challenge.
Was she the one who had betrayed them? The one who had warned Sebastian Vane? The one who had met Helena on the night of her death?
The answer, Clara suspected, lay with Isadora Locke. Somewhere, in whatever refuge she had fled to, Edmund's mistress held the final pieces of the puzzle. And Clara needed to find her before the woman in lavender did.
She reached for the phone to call the international liaison office, and the night gathered dark beyond her window.
No comments yet. Be the first to comment!