‘And you believe that this type of error is not unique to bees?’
‘Far from it. You have to consider this if you’re interviewing the patients on Ward G. Memories can be mixed up and muddled in humans, too, especially in vulnerable men and women.’
Herron thought of the patients shuffling along the corridors of Ward G, hoarding their delusions and the babble of their dreams, making and remaking their memories into something more seductive for their therapists, their consciousness somehow inhabiting a communal realm like these bees. She wondered if the psychotherapists at Deepwell occupied the same lofty perspective as Cavanagh did over his insects. Barker had kept his eye on everything and knew a lot of information about Ward G, but had decided to reveal as little as possible. She watched the bees humming with life, even under the anaesthetising effect of Cavanagh’s smoke, the mass of their bodies vibrating with a common awareness. From where did they draw this urge to share their memories? Was it the flowers gleaming in the afternoon sunlight, filling the air with their scent?
‘I’ve just one more question for you,’ she said. ‘Ever hear of a detective called Monteath?’
‘Not sure,’ he replied. A few seconds passed. ‘I remember Llewyn mentioning a detective who was a patient of his. But I can’t recall his name.’
‘If the name comes back to you, please call me immediately.’
‘Of course.’
Cavanagh puffed smoke over the bees once more and they grew more drugged in their movements, flying around with a disconcerting slowness. Some of them lay like little statues on his shoulders and arms, utterly still, or twitching as though they were busy dreaming about fantastical yellow and red flowers. One bee had tried to escape the smoke. It struggled towards a patch of nearby flowers, clumsy in flight, and then it dropped into a clump of nettles, missing its target by several yards. She wondered if Llewyn was the beekeeper, and not Barker, in this image she had constructed of Ward G; a fanatical man, hiding behind his professional persona, who had called on his drones to feed his rage for revenge.
She left Cavanagh with his bees gathered around him like a protective cloak, and ran up to the house to fetch her daughter’s missing shoe.
31
Morton had told the team he was still trying to track down Dr Llewyn, but he left no details of where he was going or when he would be back. The only clue Carla had to what he was thinking lay on a crumpled piece of paper on his desk. A series of crudely drawn circles joined by a thin spider’s web of lines with Llewyn’s name in the centre. For some reason, he seemed to be avoiding contact with Carla and the other members of the investigation team. The entire day passed without her getting the chance to share the details of her interview with Cavanagh or progress the investigation a single step further. She rang Morton’s number repeatedly but his phone went straight to an answer message.
‘Why are men so secretive?’ she asked David as they settled down with a bottle of wine that evening. It was an attempt to snag his interest so that he would listen to her. However, it failed. He just put down his glass of wine and gave her a pained, thoughtful look, like a man wondering what he was being blamed for now. ‘Why ask a question like that when I’m trying to relax before bed?’
It was the same most evenings. Sparks flew whenever she tried to start a conversation. Now, with his mother-in-law present in the house, they were forced to keep a lid on their arguments, which she reckoned was a positive but temporary improvement in their relationship.
It had been so different when Alice was a baby. She had been the centre of their lives, their sole fixed point. They had spent their evenings sitting exhausted together and drinking tea or a glass of wine, going over the minutest and dullest details of their day, the claustrophobic routine of changing nappies and feeding, the precious little moments of communication with their infant daughter that transported them with delight, even in the retelling.
Perhaps there was a note of blame in her voice when she talked about work, a hint of aggression. Was she unconsciously annoyed with him for staying, while she had to leave, and pursue her fledgling career?
‘I’m talking about Harry Morton. He’s driving me mad at the moment. I can’t help thinking he’s hiding a dangerous secret.’
David rolled his eyes and poured some more wine.
‘To be honest, it’s been more like working with an answering machine than a real person. Most of the time all I get is a blank look that says, sorry the person you are calling is not available right now.’
‘Sounds like a positive working relationship between a man and a woman to me.’
‘But we’re colleagues. How are we going to make a breakthrough if he doesn’t share his thoughts with me?’
‘Perhaps he’s depressed. Or going through some sort of mid- life crisis.’
‘That’s my point. I wouldn’t know if he was. I suspect he is because he looks so sad at times. But I get the impression his mind is working away, weighing up clues, pondering decisions. But an hour or two will go by and he won’t have uttered a single word to me.’
‘You’re beginning to sound like his wife.’
‘I’m not his wife. I’m his work partner.’
‘Talking won’t help with people like Morton. You can’t reach inside people who are naturally reticent by gabbling away.’
‘But I need to get beyond these gloomy moods of his to the truth.’
David sighed. ‘What if there’s nothing beyond the moods? What if his silence is the end? For some men, reticence is the better part of their personalities. It’s a protective thing.’
‘Protective against what?’
‘The nosiness of other people.’ He smiled but when he saw the look on her face, he said, ‘I’m only poking fun.’
He offered to get more wine, but instead she went up to the study. She moved about quietly. Mrs Herron was ensconced in the spare room and she did not want to disturb her. She closed the study door behind her and leaned against it as though the room was the only sanctuary she had left in the house. How had she ended up with another woman in her home, a woman she did not trust, who might be doing things behind her back to turn Ben and Alice against her? It was as though her family life had become a play, one in which she had been thrust into a spectator’s seat, sitting in darkness, while her husband and her mother-in-law happily got on with their dutiful roles. She gave a sigh that was like an admission of defeat. It felt as though the only way out of her domestic anxieties was, perversely, to throw herself more deeply into the investigation.
She stared at the copies she had taken of the photographs from Pochard’s house, searching for evidence of Dr Llewyn’s presence. She scrutinised the faces of the psychotherapists assembled together in the middle of the isolated forests. Were they emerging from the shadows of the trees, or about to recede into them? What were the pictures trying to tell her? There was a sense of premeditation in the settings and poses, some sort of therapeutic intent in the group shots that had bound together the fates of Chisholm and McCrea with Pochard, Sinden and now Dr Llewyn. She saw in McCrea’s pained look the ordeal of one patient’s therapy amid the rigours of a group of professionals pushing their practice to the very limits. Or was she just inventing a context? After all, it was just a set of photographs. What conclusive evidence could it provide in the murder investigation?
In one of the photographs, she managed to pick out the figure of Llewyn, standing at the side of the group, almost lost in shadow, hovering in the background. Behind him, she could make out the shape of a log cabin and a glinting body of water. Was he the mysterious intelligence operating behind the scenes and controlling the behaviour of Chisholm? She felt certain that he had been Pochard’s final visitor of the day of her murder, the one whose name had not been entered on her patients’ diary apart from the letter S, and who had left behind no trace of his identity. In the home territory of her consulting room, Pochard had been the patient not the therapist, and she had probably been sitting in the smaller of the l
eather seats, not her usual chair.
If she was on the right track, and Morton could be trusted, it would only be a short while before he hunted down Llewyn and brought him in for questioning. She paced around the study. She had to stop herself checking online for the latest news, feeling that something momentous was going to happen, realising that she was a part of something important and as yet unknown, that would make headline news tomorrow. All Morton had to do was ask Llewyn a few questions, check some details, confirm a suspicion or two, and the entire investigation would be over. She felt a cold excitement mount. She willed Morton to call with news of the final breakthrough.
The sound of it buzzing into life had never seemed so loud, its gleaming face so bright as when Morton’s name flashed up. She pressed it to her ear. His voice said something indistinct and drifted. She realised he was mumbling to someone else. She strained to listen, picturing his tall figure deep in conversation with another person. Who was it? Llewyn or a police colleague? There was a pause and then his voice grew sharper.
‘Carla, I’m coming back to the station, now,’ was all he said before the line went dead.
Before she slipped out the front door, Carla glanced back and saw the figure of Mrs Herron standing on the stairs, still as a totem pole, watching her with a frown. Normally, she found it hard to work out what mood her mother-in-law was in, but tonight, there was something insolent about the way she maintained her gaze. Up until now, she had shown no sign of having passed any judgement upon Carla and her working life. The flush in Mrs Herron’s small face and the distortion of her frown signalled the end of that phase of her residency.
32
Morton was already at the station when Herron arrived. He was in the incident room, staring at the tall windows, looking perplexed. When he noticed she was beside him, he gave a nod, but the gesture was devoid of any warmth.
‘What happened with Llewyn?’
Morton cleared his throat. ‘Dr Llewyn appears to have vanished.’
‘What?’
‘No one has seen him for the past week. One of his neighbours heard a car start in the middle of the night last Tuesday. Thinks it might have been Llewyn. His car hasn’t been spotted since.’
‘So he used his car to do a runner?’
Morton nodded. ‘It’s too much of a coincidence that he goes missing the same week a colleague is murdered and another goes missing.’
‘Should we launch a manhunt then?’
‘No. Too soon for that. There are no forensics linking Llewyn to either Pochard’s or Dunnock’s house, or the crime scene in the forest, for that matter. We have to keep making inquiries.’
‘What sort of inquiries? And with whom? Who else is there at Deepwell to speak to us?’
Morton shrugged and dug some sheets out of a drawer. She opened her mouth to ask another question, but he swivelled round in his chair and turned his back towards her.
‘I’m going to write up my notes. I think you should do the same or else go home.’
Was that all he had to share? she wondered. What was he holding back about Deepwell and his past? However, try as she might, she was unable to extract anything else from him. He confined himself to answering the questions she put to him with one-word answers, and whenever he looked at her through his long hair, it was as if she wasn’t there. A half-hour went by quickly. Whenever she caught his gaze, he looked away, as though worried she might read something in his eyes, a flicker of the past, a moment’s guilt. She tried to read his silence psychologically, but gave up.
There was something different about him, she noticed. He had tidied his hair slightly, trimmed his beard.
‘The new look suits you,’ she said.
He seemed even more at a loss for something to say. ‘Have you found him yet?’ he asked eventually.
‘Found who?’
His eyes grew impatient. ‘Your Inspector Monteath.’
‘No. Not yet.’
The tension between them did not dissolve. He stared at her again. With a completely expressionless face, he asked, ‘Want some coffee?’
‘That would be great.’
He moved to the coffee machine. She watched him push in the pods. He avoided her gaze, fiddling with the buttons of the machine. Why fool herself any longer that they were a functioning team, she thought, and that his frequent moodiness served any purpose at all?
‘If we’re stuck we should ask Bates for help,’ she suggested. ‘Perhaps get some more detectives on the case.’
‘Over my dead body,’ he grunted, and handed her a coffee.
He coughed but to her ears it sounded like a feint to keep from having to speak any more. He sat back down at his desk, read what he had written, crumpled it up and then started on a fresh sheet.
Maybe it was time to let another team take over the case completely, she thought.
‘By the way,’ said Morton, ‘I found out from Barker that Llewyn has a holiday home near Loch Lomond. Some sort of log cabin.’
Herron stared at him in surprise. ‘But that sounds like the cabin in the photographs. And Loch Lomond is where Reichmann is having his walking holiday. They must be together up there. It can’t be a coincidence.’ A note of irritation had crept into her voice. ‘Why didn’t you tell me straight away? I’ve been in this room for at least an hour. I kept trying to get a discussion on the case going. Maybe you think I’m not important enough to be told of any new clues?’
‘No, not at all. You’ve got the wrong end of the stick.’
He was quiet again, and Herron waited for a further explanation.
‘Don’t you ever get tired of saying nothing?’ she asked.
He looked at her thoughtfully, leaving her question dangling. ‘I was never much of a speaker,’ he said eventually. There was a measure of pain in his voice.
‘But these silences are more exhausting than any amount of speaking.’
He made a noise deep in his throat that might have been an expression of agreement.
Chief Inspector Bates entered the room. He told them that he wanted to run through a few things before he could draw a line under the day. He leaned back in one of the seats, and surveyed Morton closely.
‘No sign of Llewyn, I take it?’ said Bates.
‘Correct.’
‘And none of Chisholm or Dunnock?’
‘The same.’
Herron tried to swallow her exasperation at Morton’s reticence. She threw a look at Bates, but he seemed unconcerned.
‘No fresh leads?’
‘Nope.’ Morton’s lack of subtlety should have offended the DCI, but Bates seemed to be enjoying it, as though it were all part of a secret game.
‘What do you intend to do next?’
Morton shrugged and said nothing, playing his usual trick of avoiding discussion, of slipping past any questions thrown at him.
‘We’ve a special request to ask, sir,’ she said. ‘We can’t leave the investigation hanging another night without following an important new lead about Dr Llewyn’s whereabouts.’
‘You’re preparing me for bad news, Herron,’ replied the DCI, leaning further back in his seat. ‘I hope you’re not going to expose an almighty scandal at Deepwell or destroy the reputations of the fine people who work there.’
‘We need to take Reichmann and Llewyn in for questioning as soon as possible.’
‘On what grounds?’
‘Conspiracy to obstruct the police, for a start. Also aiding and abetting a murderer.’
‘What forensics do you have linking these men to any crime?’
‘None, at the moment. But Reichmann has detected the whiff of something rotten at Deepwell, and he’s circling the murder investigation. He wants to maintain the influence and reputation of the foundation at all costs. I suspect he’s been in contact with Llewyn and has been obstructing the investigation from the very start.’
Bates pulled a disbelieving face.
‘Reichmann doesn’t deny that there was something amiss on
Ward G,’ said Herron. ‘However, I think he’s trying to contain it in order to protect the reputation of the foundation.’
‘This is a murder investigation, and your prime suspect has been Chisholm from the very start. Yet you seem more interested in taking down the reputation of these psychotherapists. Llewyn’s legal team will accuse you of maliciously pursuing him and ignoring the danger posed by Chisholm.’
‘But Llewyn is the link between Chisholm and Pochard. If we track him down I’m convinced we’ll find Chisholm and hopefully Laura Dunnock.’
‘What exactly have you got on Llewyn?’
‘I’m almost sure he was the last visitor to Pochard’s house on the day she was killed. He was her supervisor, not her patient. Hence the “S” that marked his appointment time, and the absence of any notes by Pochard. It also explains why her broken nail was in the patient’s seat. We can get DNA tests that might prove he was there.’
‘Be warned, if you tarnish the reputation of highly respected individuals you can expect a very in-depth examination of you and your colleague’s work and personal motivations.’ Bates looked her up and down as he was speaking. ‘In other words, if you expose their failures, they will do their level best to expose yours.’ However, he sighed and conceded that perhaps there was a case for interviewing Llewyn and his Swiss friend since the investigation seemed to have stalled. He gave them permission to take the men in for questioning, but warned them, ‘Remember to clear up your own mess if this proves to be another red herring.’
They left the station and Herron saw Morton check the inside of his jacket, as though he had forgotten something. The gleam of a knife was revealed in his hand, and the worried look passed from his face.
His grim expression reminded her of the seriousness of their journey. She should warn David she would not be home that night until much later. She did not want him ringing her mobile, or nagging her the next day, complaining that she had flown out of the house without a word of explanation. She rang home, knowing the call would be too brief, and only add to the mood of secrecy and uncertainty associated with her work, but she had no choice in the matter. She waited on the line, but no one answered. She tried ringing several times, and still no one picked up. She was transfixed by the sight of her home number shining on her phone. How odd, she thought. Surely, David, or her mother-in-law, would have heard and answered it by now. She tried David’s mobile, but it went straight to voicemail.
The Listeners Page 21
