I feel a dart of shock. That’s what he’s been doing. Setting up the execution chamber.
“Now?” Demeter seems a little stunned. “Alex, I’ve only just got back. I need some time, I need a chance…”
“You’ve had plenty of time. Plenty of chances.” His voice is strained, and I can tell he’s been psyching himself up to do this. “Things have been getting worse for months. Now they’ve tipped over the edge. Demeter, you know that. Things are a shambles. And that’s why we need to talk.”
“I need to work some things out first.” Demeter closes her car door, then comes toward him on trembling legs, her eyes like shadows in her pale face. “Please, Alex. Give me till tomorrow.”
“Demeter.” He steps toward her, his face tight, avoiding her eye. “I don’t want to be doing this, you know I don’t, but I have to. Things have got out of hand and they can’t carry on. We’ll put together a story for the press; you’ll get a good package—” He stops. “We should go to the meeting room.”
“I’m not going to any meeting room.” Demeter shakes her head adamantly. “Alex, there’s another side to this. There’s stuff that doesn’t make sense. I need to show it to you.”
But Alex isn’t listening.
“All we think is, you took on a big job,” he presses on doggedly, as though reading lines. “It was too much, but it’s not your fault—”
“Stop the spiel, Alex!” Demeter yells. “Just listen to what I have to say! OK, so I went home today. I looked through some old emails, trying to…I don’t know. Work out what the hell has been going on.” She gestures to a massive bin bag I hadn’t noticed before, stuffed full of email printouts.
“What the hell?” says Alex incredulously, as some of the printouts start to flutter on the evening breeze.
“They were in my attic. I print out a lot of emails,” says Demeter defensively. “I know it’s old-fashioned, but…Anyway, so I found this.” She holds out the paper and Alex glances at it without interest.
“It’s an email.”
“Look at it!” Demeter exclaims, shaking it at him. “Actually look at it!”
Alex puts both fists to his face. “You will kill me,” he says in a muffled voice. He looks up. “OK, what?” He takes the paper, reads it, then raises his head again blankly. “It’s an email from Lindsay at Allersons. Forwarded to you from Sarah, two weeks ago. So what?”
“Read it aloud.”
For a moment, Alex looks as though he might spontaneously combust. But he starts to read: “Dear Demeter, thanks for that, and I must say, we appreciate your ongoing patience—”
“Stop there.” Demeter lifts a hand. “My ongoing patience. Do you see? My ongoing patience.”
Alex frowns blankly. “What about it?”
“Why would Allersons ‘appreciate my ongoing patience’? They say they were waiting for us to get a move on. So why would I have needed to be patient?”
“Who knows?” Alex brushes it off. “It’s a turn of phrase.”
“It’s not! It’s crucial! This email fits with my version of things, where they told me to halt on everything until further notice. I remember reading it. I replied to it! Do you realize I thought I was going mad?” She jabs at the paper. “Well, I’m not!”
“Jesus, Demeter.” Alex sounds exasperated. “We’ve been through this. Sarah’s shown us the email correspondence; none of it accords with what you’re saying—”
“Well, that’s my point!” She cuts him off, trembling.
“What? What’s your point?”
“I don’t know exactly. At least…” She sounds suddenly hesitant and less Demeter-ish. “I know it sounds far-fetched, but maybe someone hacked into my computer and…I don’t know. Messed with my emails.”
“Oh Jesus.” Alex looks as though this is all he needs.
“Alex, I know I received an email from Lindsay, telling me that Allersons wanted to pause. It said they were waiting for some research to come in.” Demeter’s voice shoots up in agitation. “I read it! I saw it!”
“OK, so show me now. Is it on your laptop?”
“No.” Demeter looks beleaguered. “It…it disappeared. I went up to London to find the printout, and I couldn’t, but I found this one instead. This email isn’t on my computer either. I know, I know it sounds crazy…but look. This is proof. Look!” She thrusts the paper at him and he reluctantly takes it. “If you give me time to go through all my old printouts…I’m sure I’ve been hacked, or something….”
“Stop saying that!” Alex looks properly upset. “Demeter, I’m an old friend and I’m telling you: Don’t go around saying things like that. You sound—” He breaks off. “Who would do it, anyway? And why?”
“I don’t know.” Demeter sounds desperate. “But it doesn’t make sense, nothing makes sense—”
“Hey,” I chip in. I’ve been gazing at the email over Alex’s shoulder and something’s caught my attention. “Look at the email address. It should be Demeter-dot-Farlowe at Cooper Clemmow-dot-com. But this has been sent to Demeter-underscore-Farlowe at Cooper Clemmow-dot-com. It’s a totally different email account.”
Even Alex is silenced. He peers closely at the email address, his brow furrowed.