The Anna McColl Mysteries Box Set 1

by Penny Kline

  As I walked back to the car it started to rain. A group of ‘travellers’ had congregated on College Green, some on a wooden seat, some on the grass, opposite the cathedral. Their mongrel dogs ran loose, trailing pieces of rope behind them. One of the men called out as I passed: ‘Got any change for a bite to eat?’ I put my hand in my pocket half-heartedly, then shook my head and quickened my pace, glancing at my watch as I crossed the road, anxious not to be late for my appointment.

  A stream of traffic was coming towards me down Park Street. A taxi, followed by a bus, followed by a huge container truck painted in the familiar colours of a well-known supermarket. If I reached the next lamppost before the bus did then everything would be all right. Stop it. Slow down. Start thinking like a rational human being.

  Standing with my car keys in my hand I stared into the distance, expecting to see Rob Starkey lurking down a side road or behind a bus shelter. It was well over a month since his last appointment, the third in a row at which he had turned up high on drugs, giggling, showing off, talking in a baby voice. It had been a waste of time trying to help. Forget it. Ignore the stupid postcard. He wanted to provoke me, force me into some kind of a response. If I took no notice he would grow bored, stop wasting his time, and turn his attention to something else.

  Parking outside the Research Unit was restricted to those with a staff pass. I drove slowly up the road, then round the corner, searching for a gap. Needless to say Owen Hughes had given no warning that parking would be a problem. Why should he care?

  A small white car pulled out from the kerb and I eased forward, claiming the space as though it was a game of musical chairs, glaring at the driver of a car approaching in the opposite direction although he had no intention of pushing in.

  Walking back towards the Unit I rehearsed in my head what I was going to say. ‘Hallo. I’m Anna McColl. I spoke to you on the phone about the possibility of doing some research into the factors underlying hypochondria.’

  His voice had been cold, business-like. He might be anything between forty and fifty. Impatient, hard pressed, someone who liked to stick to facts, dispense with social chit-chat. Had there been a hint of Welsh in his voice? Or perhaps I had just assumed that with a name like Owen Hughes …

  The building was of dull grey stone, four storeys tall and slightly dilapidated. Inside the front door a diagram on a wooden noticeboard indicated that the Research Unit was on the first and second floors. I climbed the stairs and pushed open heavy swing doors. There was nobody in sight.

  Surely there must be an office, receptionists. I started down the corridor, glancing at the nameplates on each door, but reaching the far end without a sign of a Dr Owen Hughes.

  ‘Lost?’

  A tall fair-haired woman adjusted the pile of files and papers she was carrying under her arm and stood, blocking my way.

  ‘I’m looking for Dr Hughes.’

  She smiled. ‘Another floor up. Through the swing doors, then third on the left.’

  ‘Thanks.’

  I seemed to have spent half the afternoon going up flights of stone steps. My back ached and I had the beginnings of a headache which was almost certainly psychosomatic. No wonder I had taken a liking to Jenny Weir.

  The third door on the left was slightly ajar. When I knocked it swung open revealing a man sitting bent over a desk at the far end of an untidy narrow room. He looked up but continued writing. Then he pushed some papers aside, swung his revolving chair to face me and gestured towards another chair a few feet from his own.

  I moved a couple of heavy books and sat down.

  ‘Anna McColl,’ I said.

  He nodded. I had interrupted his work. He saw people like me every other day. It was a part of his job he would happily dispense with given half a chance.

  I searched in my bags for the notes I had prepared and he watched me, drumming his fingers on the edge of the desk. Already he had me taped. An Upper Second in Psychology from a university he almost certainly considered inferior to his own. Some hair-brained scheme for a research project. But he would hear me out. He had no choice.

  ‘I made some notes. I’m just trying to find — ’

  ‘You’re a clinical psychologist. D’you like the work?’

  ‘Yes. Well, most of it.’

  ‘Doesn’t it get you down, seeing all those depressed people?’

  ‘Not really. They’re not all depressed.’

  He glanced at me, then turned back to his desk and wrote something on a pad. He had dark blue eyes and a nose which looked as though it had been broken then straightened out. His hair was flecked with grey but he looked younger than I had expected. In his late thirties or early forties. Bad things had happened to him, not recently perhaps, but a few years back. I knew the signs.

  ‘Right then, you want to register as a research student. I’m not sure you’ll get a grant but I suppose you might persuade some charitable foundation.’

  ‘Oh, I wasn’t really expecting — ’

  ‘Hypochondria.’ He leaned down to open a drawer in his desk. ‘How do you intend to go about it?’

  ‘I haven’t worked it out exactly. It just seemed … Well, some people visit their doctor all the time — ’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘They worry about their health, even the slightest symptom, and then because they’re forever checking how they feel, of course they think they’ve got more symptoms than — ’

  ‘And there’s really nothing much the matter with them. I can’t stand doctors but that doesn’t stop me thinking I’ve got every fatal illness under the sun.’

  ‘Yes, I know. But the thing is — well, we probably don’t go and see the doctor every other week. Actually it’s quite an interesting condition. I mean, it may not be just anxiety. For some people it may be a way of getting attention.’

  ‘Oh, I’m sure it is.’

  ‘Or it may be an integral part of a relationship. The partner who’s not a hypochondriac looks after the one who is and that makes him or her feel needed.’

  I broke off, aware that he was not really listening. ‘Time for the tea trolley.’ He stood up and started moving towards the door. ‘Want a cup?’

  ‘Yes. Thanks.’

  ‘Hypochondria. More to it than meets the eye. Of course you’ll need something definite to work on. Some of these research projects have a tendency to fall apart almost before they’ve got off the ground.’

  I followed him down the corridor and for the first time I was able to see that he was fairly short, about five foot eight, with broad shoulders for his height. He wore a dark grey jacket and trousers of a different grey. One trouser leg was caught up at the back, tucked into his navy blue sock. His shoes were expensive but needed repairing.

  The tea room was cold and sparsely furnished. A semicircle of metal and canvas chairs were placed unevenly round a cheap coffee-table. On another table at the side of the room stood a large urn, a collection of plastic cups and two tins, one containing white sugar, full of lumps and tea stains, the other, dehydrated milk.

  Owen Hughes nodded in the direction of two other men, but didn’t introduce me. Then he helped himself to tea and, as an afterthought, poured a cup for me and muttered something about milk and sugar.

  We sat at one end of the semi-circle. I was not certain if we were supposed to continue discussing my research proposal or whether that was to wait until we returned to his room. He took a sip of tea, then spoke with the cup still held near his mouth.

  ‘How long have you been doing your job?’

  ‘D’you mean clinical psychology or this particular job?’

  ‘Whichever.’

  ‘I’ve been working here for nearly two years. Before that I was in London.’

  He nodded vaguely. ‘Like it, do you? No, I asked you that before. Must keep you busy, all those unhappy people. How are you going to find the time to carry out a research project?’

  ‘Oh, I think I could fit it in all right. The principal psychologist is all
in favour of it. He thinks we should do more research.’

  ‘Martin Wheeler.’

  ‘You know him?’

  ‘Know of him.’ He shuddered slightly. ‘Freezing in here, shall we take our tea back to my room?’

  The rest of the interview only took a few minutes. He suggested I put something definite on paper, a proposal which included the methods I intended to use. There would have to be questionnaires, personality tests. I wondered about in-depth case studies but he looked dubious.

  ‘Up to you. Can be interesting but it’s not clear what you can do with them.’

  I thanked him for seeing me and he smiled for the first time, probably with relief that I was just about to leave.

  ‘Goodbye then … ’ His voice trailed away, he had forgotten my name already. ‘I’ll await your proposal.’

  As he held open the door he was humming under his breath the way people do when they want to relieve the tension. He had done what was required, now he could return to his proper work.

  *

  It was twenty past four. Too late to go back to the office, but too early to go home. I took a detour and drove along Effingham Road again, pretending to be doing it for Diane Easby’s sake but aware of my morbid curiosity. I considered turning down Karen Plant’s street and waiting to see if anyone returned to the house, but even if they did I would be none the wiser. Besides it was time to stop thinking about the case. I was using it as a diversion — because my own life was in such a mess. In different circumstances I would barely have given Diane’s story a second thought.

  Putting my foot down on the accelerator I drove away, pushing the picture of Karen Plant’s cold, stiff body out of my head, replacing it with an image of my father sitting in his office in the Planning Department, occupying himself with files, agendas, reports. Keeping busy.

  Keeping going. Perhaps we were not so different after all.

  Because it was still early there were plenty of parking spaces in my road. I left the car in front of the steps up to my flat, then started walking towards the supermarket on the corner.

  It called itself a supermarket although really it was no more than a glorified corner shop. As I pushed open the door I caught my ankle on a cardboard box containing tins of a well-known brand of cat food. A woman I knew by sight smiled sympathetically.

  Two young men with shaved heads were stocking up with frozen food and cans of beer. A group of pensioners stood by the check-out, complaining about the price of eggs, but reassuring the woman on the till that it wasn’t her fault, it was the government.

  Waiting in the queue with my half-pint of semi-skim-med and bar of Turkish Delight I went over the interview with Owen Hughes. He had said nothing about whether or not he was willing to act as my supervisor. Was I supposed to assume that he would do it? Perhaps it all depended on what kind of detailed plan I came up with. Perhaps he was hoping I would lose interest and never come back.

  A screech of brakes interrupted my thoughts and I felt myself pushed to one side by other people in the shop who wanted to see what was going on.

  Outside on the pavement a small crowd had gathered by the bend in the road. I steeled myself. Not a child knocked down? Not a death. I couldn’t bear that. I hurried forward and was just in time to see a dark-haired young man being lifted to his feet and dusted down. Someone wanted to send for an ambulance. The man in the car that had hit him looked white and shaken, his anxiety turning to anger as he described how a figure had appeared from nowhere, running across the road without looking to left or right.

  I could only see the back of the young man’s head and shoulders but it was enough. He turned round, unhurt but embarrassed, then caught sight of me and started running. Several people called after him, advising him to go to Casualty, see his doctor. An old woman in a shiny raincoat asked if I knew who he was.

  I shook my head, unwilling to become involved.

  ‘Young people,’ she said, ‘always in such a hurry.’

  ‘Yes.’ Preoccupied by what I had seen I almost started home without paying for my shopping. Others in the same position began pushing their way back into the supermarket, talking in loud voices, telling the woman at the check-out what had happened. A wild young man, who looked like a gypsy, not looking where he was going, lucky not to be killed. It was amazing how easily people could embellish a story, confusing fact and speculation, anything as long as it broke the routine of the day, contributed to the general excitement.

  Chapter Seven

  Something woke me in the night. An intruder? But when I listened, holding my breath, I heard nothing except the faint crack of furniture cooling now that the central heating had switched itself off. Perhaps I had been dreaming, although no memory of a dream remained, only a general feeling of foreboding.

  I tried to concentrate on everyday happenings, plans for the weekend. But I had no plans. Before David moved out, my weekends had followed a regular pattern. Shopping on Saturday morning, going out in the afternoon for a walk in the country or by the sea, visiting friends in the evening or seeing a film. Sundays followed another familiar routine. A long lie-in, lunch at the pub, lazing about for the rest of the day.

  Now, for the first time in my life, I found myself looking forward to Monday.

  Climbing out of bed, I wrapped myself in the duvet and walked down the passage to the kitchen. The lino felt cold under my bare feet. I pulled the curtain back a little and watched dark clouds moving across the sky. The garden, neglected since the previous ground-floor tenants moved out, looked bare and dingy, but in a week or two purple and yellow crocuses would start to open out. I wondered if the new tenants were interested in gardening. Not the one in a wheelchair, although somewhere I had read about special gardens with raised beds.

  I redrew the curtain, switched on the electric kettle, and sat down at the table trying to organize the jumble of thoughts in my head. I had bought the flat a year ago, partly because it was good value for money, and partly in the hope that David would move in with me. He had, for nearly five months, and at first it had been almost perfect. A few good-natured differences of opinion about what we ate, who did the washing and cleaning, but none of that had mattered. We were happy. Talking, laughing, making love, painting the kitchen, arguing about politics, making love … Then I found out about Iris.

  He had been seeing her two or three times a week, after he left the office, when I thought he was working late. He hadn’t lied to me, well, only a little and because he didn’t want to hurt my feelings. It was just that he missed his daughter and dropping in at the house informally after work seemed a far better arrangement than taking her out at the weekend. Of course I had to agree about that.

  ‘But I wish you’d told me, David. If we can’t trust each other — ’

  ‘Nobody tells anyone everything. Oh, don’t start making trouble. Come here. Come on. You can’t be jealous of a twelve-year-old girl.’

  Then one day he had let slip that Sian was staying with her grandmother during half-term. In that case why had he been going round to the house the same as usual?

  We sat for several minutes, enduring an unpleasant silence I refused to break. Finally he looked up, sighed, and started talking in a sad, mournful voice that implied he was a victim of emotions he found it difficult to comprehend.

  ‘I can’t explain, Anna. Not in a way that would make sense to you. I suppose it’s something to do with having known Iris for such a long time. She’s familiar, knows me inside out, accepts me for what I am.’

  ‘And I don’t?’

  ‘Yes. No. It’s different with us, we’re in love with each other. Oh come on, surely a psychologist can understand.’

  At the time I had comforted myself with the knowledge that new relationships always have problems relating to previous ones. It was just a question of being patient, controlling my anxiety, and telling myself that things would change over time.

  They did, they got worse. We argued continually, and eventually, following a ro
w which almost ended in physical violence, he moved out and went to stay with a friend.

  ‘Just to give us some breathing space, Anna. We’re not doing each other any good. I moved in with you too soon. I should have taken longer to sort myself out.’

  I wanted to believe him. I had to believe him. So much had been invested in our relationship. It was the most important thing that had ever happened to me.

  David and I had met less than three months after Kit. I had known Kit ever since the first year of the Clinical Psychology course and we had lived together for two and a half years. We had got on well enough, even talked of getting married, but when we qualified and he expected me to follow him to a town in North Wales, even though I wanted a job where I could be within easy reach of my mother, I realized that part of me had known for some time that we would split up sooner or later.

  Since then we had written to each other regularly and in his last letter he had told me he was engaged to a doctor’s daughter. Kit engaged? He despised all rituals but presumably the doctor’s daughter had talked him into it. I was happy for him and wrote back wishing him all the best. I didn’t tell him about David.

  It was cold in the kitchen but if I switched on the electric fire it would be like admitting my night’s sleep was at an end. Four fifteen. I wished I had some of the tranquillizers I advised my clients against so vehemently.

  ‘They make you feel better, see.’ I could hear Diane’s deep seductive voice. Then the thought of Diane reminded me of Karen Plant and I wondered whether I should have told the police about Keith Merchant seeing a man taken ill at the football match. Only I was certain they would have checked his alibi and found it to be false. Keith was dead. It was over and done with. All that remained was for Diane to understand that her wish to prove him innocent was an understandable way of expressing the anger that helped to cover up her feelings of grief.