Murder in Hampstead by Sabina Manea (read this if txt) 📕

Emilia froze, and time suddenly stood very still.

‘Come to recover the incriminating evidence, have we?’ continued the policeman. ‘You fell for it hook, line and sinker. For all your brains, you lost, Miss Poole. Or should I say, Miss Polyakova?’

Up until his last comment, there had been nothing but surprise and fear in Emilia’s eyes. As she heard her old name, the colour rose sharply in her cheeks. Out of the blue, the shapely mouth was distorted into a bloodcurdling scream as she charged with all her strength at Lucia. Before the others could intervene, Emilia slammed her into the wall and grabbed her by the neck. Lucia felt the shock of the impact as if everything around her had gone quiet. She heard her own skull crack against the hard surface – then, darkness.

Chapter 34

Lucia was conscious, even though she couldn’t feel her limbs. The pressure of her weight against a flat, moderately soft surface was the only indication that she was still alive. All she could hear was a monotonous beep. She desperately wanted to open her eyes, but they were wilfully oblivious to the signals from the brain. At last, the darkness lifted to unveil a scenery of flashing machinery and the kind face of a young woman in scrubs looking down at her. The reassuring presence smelt of soap and disinfectant.

‘You alright, sweetheart? Didn’t want to interrupt your rest. You’ve got some visitors waiting if you’re feeling up to it.’ The nurse pointed to the door.

Lucia nodded groggily.

‘Don’t tire her out, or you’ll have me to reckon with,’ the nurse half-joked.

DCI Carliss and Nina sat down by her bedside.

‘Hi, stranger. Welcome back.’ Nina smiled through uncontrollable tears.

‘What’s with the long faces?’ joked Lucia. ‘You can’t get rid of me that easily.’ She knew Nina wasn’t a crier, so it had to be serious.

‘It’s not funny, Lulu. You scared the living daylights out of us.’ Her friend leaned forward, her face pale with worry and lack of sleep. ‘The doctors couldn’t find a brain injury, but they didn’t know when you’d wake up, or what state you’d be in. We’ve been here day and night, waiting for you to come back to the land of the living.’

Lucia winced. Despite the industrial-strength painkillers, the throbbing pain in the back of her head blurred her vision. ‘You don’t know how happy I am to see you both.’

The inspector stared at her with his sad blue eyes. ‘The consultant said we should be prepared for the worst – anything from memory loss, speech difficulties, depression to even personality changes.’ His lips spread into a tentative smile. ‘You look much the same as before. Mind you, you haven’t told me off yet, so maybe you’ve had a personality change after all,’ he joked feebly.

‘What happened to Emilia?’ Lucia suddenly gasped. As she gradually came to her senses, the recent events began to unfurl in her mind.

‘I called for back-up, and she was arrested. She was completely beside herself with rage – it’s a while since I’ve seen anything like it. Uniform had to handcuff her and practically drag her kicking and screaming into the car. You can imagine the circus – apparently the whole street was out watching,’ replied the detective.

‘Apparently? You weren’t there?’

‘No, I came in the ambulance with you. We both did.’ Carliss gestured to Nina.

Lucia was taken aback and touched at the thought that he cared enough not to leave her side.

The policeman continued. ‘The DS had an easy time of it in the interview room. She confessed to both murders straightaway, not that they could get much sense out of her beyond that. Kept mumbling the same thing over and over again. I’ve jotted it down somewhere.’ He raked furiously through his coat pockets and extracted a crumpled piece of paper, clearly ripped out of his meticulously kept book. ‘“Child no longer required. Does not fit in with my new position.” Who would be callous enough to do that? Abandon a child like you’d return an unwanted pair of shoes?’

‘You’re right, and that’s why Emilia killed her almost-adoptive mother,’ Lucia said quietly. ‘The first adoption attempt failed because the Professor, or Olga Galina, or whatever you want to call her, no longer wanted the baby. A job promotion comes along and suddenly, a child turns from a desire into a burden.’

Lucia felt her concentration waning at times, but her thought processes were as sharp as ever. At the same time, she was acutely aware of her own physical frailty. She needed to speak before the medication lulled her back into senselessness.

‘I’d like to tell the whole story from the beginning, if I may, now that all the pieces finally fit together. If Emilia’s had a nervous breakdown, as I suspect she would have done, it may be a while till you get any sense out of her.’ Lucia fixed Carliss with a determined look and struggled to pull herself upright. She had pins and needles in her legs from having been sedentary for so long.

Nina rushed over and propped her up with a couple of pillows. She stroked her bedridden friend’s hair affectionately. ‘We want to hear it, Lulu. This way we can all have closure on this agonizing affair.’

Lucia proceeded in a steady, measured voice, the kind she employed when there were uncomfortable matters to present. ‘To understand why Olga Galina died, we must first understand how she lived. Inevitably, I’ve had to fill in the gaps with my own suppositions, though I believe the principal facts to be accurate as they happened. She was born of humble stock, most likely in or around Brest, on the Soviet-Polish border, in present-day Belarus. She worked her way out of poverty, left for Minsk, went to university and made a name