'He was found dead last week,' she said. 'In suspicious circumstances?' 'On a bus.' He clasped his hands behind his head. ‘The floor's yours. 'Bow was on a train to Worcester, but it was cancelled at Reading because of signalling problems. The bus was taking passengers from there to Oxford, where the trains were okay. At Oxford everyone got off, except Bow. This was because he'd died en route.' 'Natural causes?' 'So the report says. And Bow's not been on the books for a while. So not what you'd call an obvious candidate for assassination, even if he'd ever done anything important.' 'Which you're sure he hadn't.' 'You know what personnel records are like. Secure stuff's redacted, and anything more sensitive than a routine drop-and-poke is secure. But Bow's file's an open book barring some drink-related incident near the end. He did a lot of toad work. Cash for info, mostly gossip. He worked in a nightclub, so he picked up a lot.' 'Which would have been used for blackmail purposes.’ 'Of course.' 'So revenge isn't out of the question.’ 'But it was all a long time ago. And like I say, natural causes.' 'So why's Lamb interested?' River mused. 'No idea. Maybe they worked together.' She paused. 'A note says he was a talented streetwalker. That doesn't mean what it sounds like, does it?' 'Happily, no. It means he was good at shadowing people. Following them.’ 'Well, then. Maybe Lamb just heard he'd died, and got sentimental.' 'Yes, but seriously.' Catherine said, 'Bow didn't have a ticket for his journey. And he was supposed to be at work. I wonder where was he going?' 'I'd never heard of him until two minutes ago. I doubt my speculations are worth much.' ‘Mine either. But it's got Lamb off his arse, so there must be something to it.' She fell silent. To River, her gaze seemed to turn inward, as if she were looking for something she'd left at the back of her mind. And he noticed for the first time that her hair wasn't entirely grey; that in the right light, might even look blonde. But her nose was long and pinched, and she wore hats, and it all added up to a kind of greyness, so that was how you saw her when she wasn't there, and after a while became the way you saw her even when she was. A sort of witchiness that might even be sexy in the right circumstances. To break the spell, he spoke. 'Wonder what kind of something.' 'Assume the worst,' Catherine said. 'Maybe we should ask him.' Catherine said, 'I'm not sure that's such a good idea.'
Dead Lions by Mick Herron (2013)
