The Cuckoo's Calling

with Lula Landry, then, Mrs. Bestigui? Your brother-in-law works with John?”
    “It never came up,” she said, looking bored.
    The waiter returned to take their orders. When he had left, Strike took out his notebook and pen.
    “What are you doing with those?” demanded Tansy, in a sudden panic. “I don’t want anything written down! John?” she appealed to Bristow, who turned to Strike with a flustered and apologetic expression.
    “D’you think you could just listen, Cormoran, and, ah, skip the note-taking?”
    “No problem,” said Strike easily, removing his mobile phone from his pocket and replacing the notebook and pen. “Mrs. Bestigui—”
    “You can call me Tansy,” she said, as though this concession made up for her objections to the notebook.
    “Thanks very much,” said Strike, with the merest trace of irony. “How well did you know Lula?”
    “Oh, hardly at all. She was only there for three months. It was just ‘Hi’ and ‘Nice day.’ She wasn’t interested in us, we weren’t nearly hip enough for her. It was a bore, to be honest, having her there. Paps outside the front door all the time. I had to put on makeup even to go to the gym.”
    “Isn’t there a gym in the building?” asked Strike.
    “I do Pilates with Lindsey Parr,” said Tansy, irritably. “You sound like Freddie; he was always complaining that I didn’t use the facilities at the flat.”
    “And how well did Freddie know Lula?”
    “Hardly at all, but that wasn’t for lack of trying. He had some idea about luring her into acting; he kept trying to invite her downstairs. She never came, though. And he followed her to Dickie Carbury’s house, the weekend before she died, while I was away with Ursula.”
    “I didn’t know that,” said Bristow, looking startled.
    Strike noticed Ursula’s quick smirk at her sister. He had the impression that she had been looking for an exchange of complicit glances, but Tansy did not oblige.
    “I didn’t know until later,” Tansy told Bristow. “Yah, Freddie cadged an invitation from Dickie; there was a whole group of them there: Lula, Evan Duffield, Ciara Porter, all that tabloidy, druggie, trendy gang. Freddie must have stuck out like a sore thumb. I know he’s not much older than Dickie, but he looks ancient,” she added spitefully.
    “What did your husband tell you about the weekend?”
    “Nothing. I only found out he’d been there weeks later, because Dickie let it slip. I’m sure Freddie went to try and make up to Lula, though.”
    “Do you mean,” asked Strike, “that he was interested in Lula sexually, or…?”
    “Oh yah, I’m sure he was; he’s always liked dark girls better than blondes. What he really loves, though, is getting a bit of celebrity meat into his films. He drives directors mad, trying to crowbar in celebrities, to get a bit of extra press. I’ll bet he was hoping to get her signed up for a film, and I wouldn’t be at all surprised,” Tansy added, with unexpected shrewdness, “if he had something planned around her and Deeby Macc. Imagine the press, with the fuss there was already about the two of them. Freddie’s got a genius for that stuff. He loves publicity for his films as much as he hates it for himself.”
    “Does he know Deeby Macc?”
    “Not unless they’ve met since we separated. He hadn’t met Macc before Lula died. God, he was thrilled that Macc was coming to stay in the building; he started talking about casting him the moment he heard.”
    “Casting him as what?”
    “I don’t know,” she said irritably. “Anything. Macc’s got a huge following; Freddie wasn’t going to pass that chance up. He’d probably have had a part written specially for him if he’d been interested. Oh, he would have been all over him. Telling him all about his pretend black grandmother.” Tansy’s voice was contemptuous. “That’s what he always does when he meets famous black people: tells them he’s a quarter Malay. Yeah, whatever, Freddie.”
    “Isn’t he a quarter Malay?” asked Strike.
    She gave a snide little laugh.
    “I don’t know; I never met any of Freddie’s grandparents, did I? He’s about a hundred years old. I know he’ll say anything if he thinks there’s money in it.”
    “Did anything ever come of these plans to get Lula and Macc into his films, as far as you’re aware?”
    “Well, I’m sure Lula was flattered to be asked; most of these model girls are dying to prove they can do something other than