The Drowned Man by David Whellams

name. Most people don’t stay anonymous these days. There are Nahris in the state of Bihar but nothing to lead us to this woman. I’ve blanked. Why do you think that is?”
    â€œI don’t think. It’s too early.”
    Undeterred, she continued: “Do you think she’s using a pseudonym?”
    â€œI have no idea. Let’s get going.”
    A half hour later, with Jasper and her chew toys in the back seat and Peter’s Gladstone bag in the boot of the Saab, they left the cottage. They fell into the previous night’s rhythm, Peter beginning: “You don’t manage to get a British passport without a real birth certificate. We know her mother’s name and that’s probably how London will track down her whereabouts. Info from the airlines will also tell us whether Alice booked her own travel.”
    â€œYou said you met John Carpenter?”
    â€œSpoke with him just once,” Peter said. “I was trying to bird-dog a killer through an airline passenger list from a flight bound for Manchester from Barcelona. Carpenter did a good job, figuring that the fugitive had changed passports in mid-flight, and thus arrived in Britain with a new identity.”
    â€œHow did Carpenter figure it out?” Maddy asked.
    â€œHe noted the mismatch of passenger names between the departure manifest and the arrivals processed through British customs.”
    Traffic proved lighter than expected and it was not long before several aircraft flying up from Heathrow came into view. As Maddy and Peter wound their way onto the airport access road, she channelled the conversation towards next steps.
    â€œDo you think anyone made good copies of the letters, the ones supposedly written by John Wilkes Booth? Somebody thought they were important.”
    â€œI’ll find out,” Peter said. “But I know what you’re getting at. Why would anyone kill to get hold of them?”
    â€œSuch a waste.” Maddy’s sympathy was genuine but there was girlish excitement there as well. “Alice’s flight to Montreal?”
    â€œWhat about it?”
    â€œIt would interesting if she booked only a one-way ticket.”
    Peter unloaded his gear at a drop-off stand by Departures and said goodbye to Jasper, now in the front seat, through the passenger window. Maddy leaned across, and with a mischievous look, said, “Peter, do you have a gun in your suitcase?”
    He leaned back in through the window, and Jasper tried to lick him. “Not on your life. And keep it down, my dear.”
    He tried to walk away but she called him back. She got out of the car.
    â€œPeter, about the woman. She’s the essence that we were talking about, the essence of this case. I’m certain.”
    â€œWhy’s that?”
    â€œFor one thing, she’s clever. We need to track her movements. She’ll raise your game, Peter.”
    â€œ
Our
game, dear,” he said, smiling as he strode off to Departures.
    Bartleben’s aide had booked him in first class, and so he had room to spread out. He needed it. He had trawled the airport bookstore for anything relevant to the Lincoln assassination but the closest he came was a general history of the U.S. Civil War and an epic biography of Honest Abe. The trip would take six hours or more and he had no interest in watching Air Canada’s in-flight offering, which was
Avatar
, on a tiny screen. Eight hundred pages of densely packed historical prose sat on the table beside him. He levered his seat backward, ordered coffee, and prepared to read.
    His instincts told him that Maddy had it right on at least one point: the girl was at the centre of the case. The convolutions of Alice’s self-concealment did not add up, and therefore, in his preliminary reasoning, she sat near the top of the list of suspects. Greenwell, the book dealer, headed the list. But there was no self-evident link from the girl to the Civil War letters, and he