The Anna McColl Mysteries Box Set 1

by Penny Kline

  Returning to the street I looked up and down, craning my neck to see beyond the parked cars. As far as I could tell the road was empty, apart from a boy on roller skates, who was coming down the road at a considerable speed and looked as though he would be quite unable to stop if a car came round the corner.

  A voice called out. ‘Watch it, Mark, you’ll kill yourself one of these days.’ And Janos came up the steps from his basement flat.

  Perhaps Luke had been to visit him. Perhaps he was there now. I called his name and he jumped.

  ‘Anna, how are you? What about our talk?’

  ‘Sorry? Oh yes, I hadn’t forgotten. You haven’t seen Luke, have you?’

  ‘Luke?’

  ‘He’s staying in my flat. Yes, I know it’s not a very good idea, but … It’s a long story, I’ll explain later. I just thought he might have been round.’

  ‘I wish he had but his memories of this house are not so good.’

  ‘Oh, I’m sure he’ll want to see you. Only he’s been ill. Well, not ill exactly.’

  ‘I understand.’ He was pushing a bag of rubbish into one of the large green bins that took up most of the space at the front of the house. ‘You look worried,’ he said. ‘Come inside.’

  ‘I’d like to, Janos, but I think I’d better try and find Luke. He can’t have gone far.’

  ‘I will come with you. No, I tell you what, you stay in the flat in case he returns and I look round a bit.’

  ‘Would you? I’m sure I’m worrying unnecessarily only he has an appointment in half an hour’s time and I’m afraid he may have — ’

  ‘Leave it to me.’

  Back in the flat I searched for any clue, however unlikely, that might tell me where Luke had gone. It was a lost cause. His clothes were still in the drawer and the zip-up bag lay on the floor by the bed. The cardboard box that Elaine had filled with the rest of his belongings had been pushed under the chair. I examined its contents, turning over a brand-new shirt, still in its cellophane packet, half a dozen paperback books — all non-fiction — and a folder containing a prospectus for the university and a leaflet about applying for accommodation. Then I lifted out the book about apes and flicked through the pages. The letter had gone.

  The bed had been left unmade. With quick automatic movements I pulled up the duvet and straightened the pillows. Was it my imagination or did the sheet feel slightly warm?

  I would have to phone Howard Fry, explain that Luke knew nothing about the witness, that he must have gone out for a walk but would be back soon. When he returned I would bring him round straight away.

  In the silence I heard a faint hum like the sound of a music centre that had been left on. But when I checked it was switched off just as I had left it. Then, out of the corner of my eye, I saw the phone lying on its side on the floor several feet away from its rest.

  As I picked it up someone came through the front door.

  ‘Luke?’

  ‘Anna.’ The voice was familiar but it didn’t belong to Luke. ‘I was passing near by and I wondered if there was anything I could do. I phoned the hospital but they said Luke had gone home.’

  Michael Jesty entered the room. He was wearing a dark blue suit, a cream shirt and a dark red tie with thin white stripes. I took in all these irrelevant details from my position on the floor by the phone.

  ‘Luke’s staying here,’ I said, standing up and attempting to look reasonably composed. ‘Just for a day or two.’

  ‘That’s very good of you. What happened to the place where he was living before?’ He was looking at a photo of my parents on the mantelpiece. ‘Nice flat you’ve got. Been here long?’

  ‘Not very. Look, there’s a bit of a problem. I said I’d take Luke round to the police station at six thirty but when I got home he wasn’t here.’

  ‘Probably gone for a walk.’

  ‘Yes, I expect so.’ I gestured towards a chair.

  ‘Thanks. He’s better, is he? I thought he’d be in hospital at least a week. When I rang up and heard he’d been discharged I wondered if he might need some help. I’m afraid you were my only contact. I tried to phone but your number was engaged.’

  ‘It had been left off the hook.’

  ‘Really? By Luke? I suppose he was afraid someone might ring while you were out.’

  He sat on the arm of a chair and gazed out of the window. Ernest was on the lawn in his wheelchair, reading the Evening Post. The sun had moved round but perhaps he preferred to be in the shade.

  ‘Your neighbour?’

  ‘From the ground-floor flat.’

  ‘He’s an invalid?’

  I nodded. Any minute now I was expecting Janos to come back with Luke. He was sure to find him, he would know all the right places to look. The shop in Queen’s Road that stayed open till late.

  The patch of grass on the way to Clifton Village where Aaron was exercised morning and evening. The seats on the opposite side of Hotwells Road where people sat for hours at a time, watching the sand boats being unloaded.

  I wanted to tell Michael about the witness but was it fair when not even Luke knew about it? On the other hand, Howard Fry had said she was unreliable. Masses of people confess to crimes they haven’t committed. Presumably people also pretend to be witnesses. That way someone listens to them, they become interesting, important.

  ‘A witness has come forward,’ I said. ‘She claims she saw Luke and Paula quarrelling.’

  For a moment I thought he had failed to understand what I was saying. He put up his hand to smooth back his hair. ‘Oh, you mean at the time of the accident.’

  ‘They’re not taking it very seriously but — ’

  ‘I’m sorry you’re having to deal with all this.’ He was worried but trying to sound as unconcerned as possible. ‘You must have quite enough to do at work without coming home to another set of problems.’ He picked a speck of dust from his trouser leg and placed it carefully in the waste-paper basket next to his chair. He was trying to stay calm, composed, but I could see the muscles in his jaw, clenching and unclenching.

  ‘This witness,’ he said, ‘who is she?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  He frowned. ‘I’ve been up in London, otherwise I could’ve collected Luke from hospital and taken him back to Portishead. Still, I doubt if he’d have stayed with either of us for long.’

  ‘So you think he’s run off?’

  ‘Not necessarily, but even if he has I don’t think you should feel responsible.’

  *

  It was after ten. Janos, Michael and I had taken turns looking for Luke but it was a token search. By now he could be anywhere in Bristol. He might even have caught the train to another part of the country. Michael had phoned his parents, not mentioning Luke’s disappearance, just wondering if Luke was there so he could talk to him. I had forced myself to phone Elaine, using the excuse that I was checking to make sure no rent money was still outstanding. Before that I had phoned Howard Fry to say Luke was out, probably visiting a friend, and to tell him I would be in touch in the morning if that was all right. He had sounded a little doubtful but accepted the explanation without pressing for more information.

  Janos had returned to his flat. He wanted to go on searching but Michael had insisted we leave it till the morning.

  ‘This is typical of Luke,’ he told me, ‘when he’s had time to cool down he’ll get in touch.’

  ‘How d’you mean cool down?’

  ‘I just meant he must be feeling fairly disorientated. This witness.’ He glanced at the carriage clock on the mantelpiece and checked it against his watch. ‘You say she claimed to have seen Luke and Paula fighting?’

  ‘Not fighting, arguing. Anyway, she didn’t know who they were. Just a tall fair-haired man and — ’

  ‘Sounds a bit vague.’

  ‘Yes, I know.’

  He forced a smile. ‘Look, I don’t know your plans for the weekend but if he hasn’t turned up by tomorrow lunchtime I’ve one or two ideas where we
could look.’

  ‘I expect the police will have started searching by then.’

  ‘Possibly, but they won’t have a clue where to begin.’ He paused, tipping back his head and staring up at the ceiling. ‘Perhaps the reason he left … Staying in your flat, it changed the nature of your relationship. It was too intimate. He felt bad about pretending to be psychotic and — ’

  ‘We discussed all that.’

  ‘I’m sure you did. All right then, maybe he was afraid now that you’d been in touch with our parents they might turn up and insist he went back to the cottage.’ This seemed unlikely. I was thinking about the letter. The bright blue ink. The smudged kiss. I blame myself entirely. You know that.

  ‘Did Luke ever tell you how he felt about Paula?’

  ‘Tell me? I never saw him. He’d cut himself off from the rest of the family, couldn’t stand the pressure.’

  ‘What pressure?’

  He shrugged. ‘My father, you’ve seen my father, and my mother’s not the happiest of people. She can’t stand the thought of growing old. I suppose she thinks she’s wasted her life.’

  ‘By not picking up on her acting career.’

  ‘That too.’ He looked at his watch. ‘Have you eaten? If not I could fetch some take-away. Indian or Chinese? One’s in Hotwells, the other’s up in Clifton Village.’ Already he was halfway through the door. ‘Luke’ll be all right, you know. He needs time on his own and if you ask me he wants to give us all a good fright.’

  From the kitchen window I watched him set off towards the steps leading up to the Village. He was shorter than Luke — and broader. Not the same build as his father or his mother but he had his mother’s colouring and the shape of her eyes. I remembered Luke’s remarks about all our characteristics, including our personality, being inherited. At the time of our discussion he had seemed in relatively good spirits. Had something happened while I was at work? Perhaps he had been round to the herb shop and Bob had questioned him about the accident, made insinuations.

  Across the road one of the tenants had flung open his window to talk to a friend down on the pavement. Rock music turned up to full volume filled the air. The monotonous beat of a drum thumped inside my head. No one was complaining, not the other tenants, not Janos. Luke would have put his hands over his ears. Luke and I were alike. Over-sensitive, easily upset. I pictured him standing by the slip-road that led up to the motorway, trying to hitch a lift to the north, anywhere, as far away as possible, in the vain hope that running away would allow him to escape from what was going on in his head.

  In a short time Michael would be back with chicken tikka or mutton roganjosh. I was so tired, too tired to eat, but I would force it down. I had made that mistake before, becoming so involved with a case that I had lost my appetite and lived off sandwiches and cups of coffee until my body finally protested.

  I found plates, forks, a couple of spoons so we could help ourselves from the tinfoil containers. Beneath the reassuring smile Michael was as worried as I was. He was trying to stay calm, positive, but the news about the witness had shaken him badly. Perhaps Luke would turn up, hiding in one of the places Michael knew about. It was a relief to have someone else around, someone who had known Luke all his life and understood how his mind worked. But supposing even now he was lying in the thick woodland above the Gorge with an empty container of capsules beside him on the grass. Or staring over the parapet of the Suspension Bridge at the dark water below …

  10

  Had I wanted Michael to stay the night? We had talked for ages, mostly about Luke, but a little about ourselves. It was a relief to have someone to talk to but he had known I was being careful not to break my rule of confidentiality. He hadn’t probed or tried to trick me into saying something I would later regret. Shortly after midnight he had stood up, cleared away the remains of our meal and announced that he was leaving. Had I felt a small twinge of disappointment? Wouldn’t I have made some scathing remark if he had assumed he could stay?

  By nine o’clock next morning I was on my way out of the flat. Last night Michael had told me he had business matters to deal with — apparently he worked most Saturday mornings and sometimes right through the weekend — but we had arranged to meet around midday. In the meantime I decided to call in at the police station, explain that Luke was still missing and try to find out more about the witness. At least as long as Luke was out of the way no one could interview him. That was the most positive way of looking at things.

  My car had been boxed in by a ridiculous jeep-like vehicle that belonged to one of the over-privileged university students and a dilapidated motor-cycle that had fallen on its side. After a series of finely judged manoeuvres I squeezed out of the gap and started up the hill. A light mist obscured the sun but it was going to be another hot stuffy day. My eyes itched and my ears felt as though they were stuffed with cotton wool. Nearby sounds seemed to come from a long way off.

  I swallowed hard, trying to clear my head, then concentrated on the traffic zooming down Constitution Hill at the kind of speed that would have made it impossible to stop had a pedestrian suddenly stepped into the road. As I turned left into Jacobs Wells Road I saw an old man struggling along with two bags of shopping and remembered that I was running out of basic foods: bread, milk, bananas. Some time during the morning I would have to visit the supermarket and fight my way through the Saturday crowds.

  Searching for a parking space off Whiteladies Road I thought I saw Carl Redfern. The same loping walk, thick grey hair. But the man who turned round was well into his fifties, with a small moustache and round, metal-framed glasses. He reminded me a little of my father.

  I turned in to the multi-storey car park above the shopping centre. Once or twice on a Saturday morning I had bumped into Doug Hargreaves buying fruit and vegetables. He and Elaine had no car but he had explained that the walk did him good and there was more choice than up where he lived. I suspected Elaine sent him off so she could have the house to herself. The arrangement probably suited them both — or was I jumping to conclusions again, speculating about other people’s lives, filling in the gaps with my own inventions?

  Inside the police station it felt cool, almost church-like. Light grey walls, dark grey lino, heavy wooden doors. I asked to speak to Inspector Fry, waited for the desk sergeant to put through a call, then made my way down the familiar corridor.

  Howard Fry was standing in the doorway. It was several months since our last meeting but I could have sworn he was dressed in exactly the same clothes as the last time I saw him. Light-coloured trousers and a dark brown jacket, striped shirt and plain green tie. The first time we met I had estimated his age at around forty. Now I decided he was nearer thirty-five. His dark red hair was cut in the same neat style, parted on the left. From his rather formal manner he might have been mistaken for a bank manager or an accountant, nothing like your average policeman — if there is such a thing.

  He seemed relaxed enough, standing there smiling, with his hand in his trouser pocket. But when he spoke I sensed a slight tension in his voice.

  ‘Anna. I was just about to phone.’

  I followed him into his office and sat down on a chair near the window.

  ‘Luke’s disappeared,’ I said. ‘I haven’t seen him since yesterday morning.’

  ‘I see. Well, thank you for coming to tell me. I’d be grateful if you could fill me in with a few details.’

  I hesitated. ‘What kind of details?’

  ‘Oh, the usual. Names, addresses. I’m presuming in this instance confidentiality won’t be a problem. Since Luke has a medical history we must at least make a token attempt to find him.’

  I didn’t know whether to be relieved or outraged.

  ‘A token attempt? But he could be in danger.’

  ‘His doctor says that’s unlikely.’

  ‘You’ve been in touch with the hospital?’

  ‘Just doing my job, Anna.’ He was watching me closely. ‘As a matter of fact the only reaso
n I’m involved is because you and Graham Whittle had a chat about the case. The witness who came forward was somewhat inarticulate, incapable of sticking to the same story. We’re not taking her evidence very seriously but we have to follow the rules.’

  ‘I don’t suppose you’ll tell me,’ I said, ‘but this witness, what’s her name?’

  ‘Rhiannon Pascoe. I’m telling you on the off-chance that you’ve come across her in your work. It occurred to me that she could probably do with some kind of psychological treatment. Rather a pathetic looking girl. Only sixteen, distinctly under-nourished and of no fixed abode.’

  ‘That doesn’t mean — ’

  ‘Of course not.’ He was sitting at his desk, turning the pages of a typewritten report.

  ‘Rhiannon,’ I said. ‘No, I don’t know a Rhiannon. She’s homeless, is she?’

  ‘Not quite. She shares a van with some of those New Age travellers. It’s all down in her statement.’

  ‘What did she say exactly — about the accident?’

  ‘That she’d seen a woman arguing with a tall fair-haired man. Shortly afterwards the woman had fallen in front of the traffic.’

  ‘Fallen?’

  ‘In her first statement she said she’d been pushed. Later she changed it to ‘could’ve been pushed’. We run across this kind of thing all the time. People read about a crime and like the idea of becoming involved. We even have an elderly man who rings up and informs on himself.’

  He had used the word ‘crime’ but that didn’t mean …

  Swivelling his chair until he faced the window, he stretched out his legs and clasped his hands behind his head. I remembered our very first meeting when I had told him about a possible intruder in my flat. Expecting him to make light of my anxiety I had been pleasantly surprised when he took my fears seriously. There had been a slight frisson between us — the kind that sometimes takes place when one person is in the role of an authority figure and the other feels in need of protection. Since then I had learned from Martin that Howard Fry was divorced with an eight-year-old son, that his wife had remarried and moved to East Anglia so he hardly ever saw the boy.