by Jane Adams
Katie just ran. She could hear car horns sounding behind her and she felt a pang of guilt at having caused trouble for people who were genuinely trying to help. But the voices in her head were now screaming at her to get away.
She had to reach Mallingham.
* * *
Ray and Sarah returned briefly to the office. George was still there. He had been phoning around to find out who was heading the murder inquiry. It was a man called DI Beckett. Ray vaguely recalled him but didn’t think that they had ever met. Dave Beckett was a newcomer, after his time.
Ray went back home with Sarah rather than be alone, but even with her sleeping close beside him he could not quieten his mind. In the early hours of the morning he got out of bed and went to stand by the window, gazing out across the open fields towards the city lights. Beyond that and out of sight over the horizon he could imagine the lights of Mallingham. He saw in his mind’s eye the crime-scene tape stretched around the pathetic little pile of bricks and rubble on which young Ian Thomason had lain. But it was a face from an earlier time that filled his mind. Heavy lids drawn closed over dark brown eyes. Coarse, close-cropped hair dampened by morning dew and slender hands folded pathetically over a narrow chest. A small body covered by a rough blanket. Martha’s child.
* * *
Miles away, in Mallingham, Timothy Westerby could not sleep either. His dog, Ben, had been missing all afternoon and had not returned in the evening. They had telephoned the RSPCA and asked all the neighbours but no one had seen him. Timothy was heartbroken, convinced that the dog had been hit by a car or stolen.
The small sound of the back-gate latch fetched him out of bed and over to the window. A soft whimpering came up from the yard. Tim had the window open and was leaning out. The dog stared up at him and the whimpering became little yelps of pleasure.
Tim ran down the stairs and unlocked the back door. His parents would never see him alive again.
Chapter Nine
For Katie this was another bitterly cold morning. Rain mixed with snow had begun to fall and the sharp wind had risen. She had spent the night wandering around the town, keeping to the centre, where there was most light and people. She had tried hard to look as though she was going somewhere, but even so she had been propositioned twice and a group of drunken youths had shouted at her suggestively. She had done all she could to ignore this, though she had been badly frightened by it. It was so alien to the protected life she led with her family. Finally she had climbed over a gate into a park and sheltered in the bandstand. It was at least a little drier there, if still as cold, and she was tormented by worry about her parents and what they must be thinking. She had not slept.
At about six thirty she wandered back out of the park and into the main streets. She was cold and felt dirty and unkempt; catching sight of herself in shop windows merely confirmed this. Her hair was matted and wet, and even in the poor reflection offered by the glass she could see the dark shadows beneath her eyes.
She found a McDonald’s and cleaned herself up as best she could in their washroom before ordering some breakfast. With her face washed and her hair dried under the hand-dryer and then combed at least she felt a little more human, and with some food inside her she was more ready to face the day. She asked for directions to the bus station, but she was worried that the police would be looking for her. Emma and Bill had said they were taking her to the police station, so presumably they would have reported her missing and the local police would have been given a description. Katie knew she’d just have to chance it. There was no way she could walk to Leicester — her feet still hurt from her long walk of the day before. Her fashionable trainers had not proved up to the challenge and her heels were sore and her toes blistered.
Buses to Leicester ran almost every hour from nine o’clock. There was nothing direct to Mallingham, she was told, but it should be easy to get a direct bus from Leicester. Katie was still worried about being seen and she kept moving, wandering around the area, looking in shop windows and trying to seem as though she had somewhere to go and the right to be there, but she was relieved — profoundly relieved — when the bus arrived and she could get on board. She found a seat near the back, from where she could watch passengers getting on. It was close to the emergency exit. She thought that if the worst came to the worst she could at least get out that way. She was very tired and the bus was warm. She took off her jacket, pulled her backpack onto her knees for safekeeping and tugged the jacket over herself, knowing that as soon as the bus started to move she would be unable to resist going to sleep. Mallingham was at last in her sights and the man she saw in her dreams would be there. She knew it.
Chapter Ten
DI Dave Beckett had been drafted in from the local serious-crimes unit, but Mallingham was not new to him. He had served in Leicester as a sergeant, so he knew the area well. Around him the incident room was taking shape and the familiarity of it was somehow soothing. He had heard someone once say that habit was like the smooth groove in the brain and this was certainly his smooth groove. No matter how traumatic or difficult, he always found it comforting to have the same familiar setting around him. The noticeboards, the pinboards with their photographs, the organized routine of investigation and collation. It helped him get his mind into gear and his thoughts in order.
It was a measure of the seriousness of this case that he had been called in from the beginning, instead of the preliminary investigation being left to local officers. He’d been warned that feelings in Mallingham were running high and this murder, together with the latest disappearance, coming as it did on the back of Harrison Lee’s death, would make liaison with the public a priority and the calming of their understandable fears a difficult task for anyone to take on. When Ian Thomason had been found, one small detail had turned this from a simple murder inquiry — if they were ever simple — into something potentially more explosive. Only one member of the public — the woman who had first found the body — had been privy to this and she had failed to see the significance, being more concerned — admirably so — in keeping the scene from being contaminated by others than on close examination of a child who was so obviously dead. Beckett reflected that sometimes television could be useful. The woman had followed television crime procedure to the letter, warding people away from the scene and keeping them at a good distance from the body. Beckett knew that she had been relieved just to have something to do, to take her mind from the enormity of what had occurred, but it had stood them in good stead. The tiny marks drawn on the boy’s hands, the woman had noted but not mentioned until Beckett did, slipping it casually into the conversation as he took her statement.
‘I saw something,’ she said. ‘My kids are always drawing on themselves. I tell them not to, but that’s kids for you.’
For Beckett, and those now involved in the investigation, that little drawing was what made all the difference. The eye confined within a circle neatly and beautifully drawn in indelible ink, one in each small palm.
Someone somewhere wanted them to link this to the death of Harrison Lee. Beckett was keeping an open mind, but his superiors were deeply worried. There was just the chance that someone linked to Lee was doing this out of perverse remembrance of him. Mallingham of eleven years before had been a town paralysed by terror, its inhabitants unable to deal with the fear that the deaths of three children in nine days had caused. Those who had been on the force at the time would never forget the emotional drain, the sheer terror that every parent in the area suffered. No one wanted that again.
Beckett perched himself on the edge of his desk. He knew that the fax he held in his hand would not bring welcome news to those he had assembled for the inquiry. He had hoped that someone from the original investigation would be available to help and the obvious choice had been the person who had headed it. He might be able to bring them up to speed much faster than a simple reading of the reports. Beckett believed in personal experience, that there was no substitute for it, and that a writt
en report only ever gave part of the story.
A dozen officers had now assembled in the incident room. These would be his key personnel. Two of them had been around eleven years before, both constables at the time. One was now a detective sergeant, the other still in uniform.
‘When I spoke to you yesterday, I had hoped that the DCI Bryant as was would come on board as an adviser. And I’m afraid I’ve got some bad news for you.’ He paused and glanced around the room. These were all experienced officers, but even experienced officers had their superstitions and this news would do nothing to help allay them. ‘I’m afraid that Bryant is dead,’ he said, looking around the room again and watching them process this information.
There were shock, surprise and knowing looks from one or two of them.
‘So how did he die, sir?’ Sergeant Emma Thorn asked him.
‘Heart attack,’ Beckett said. ‘He died a few days ago, on the 18th as it happens, same day as Harrison Lee.’
Again the looks of shock and surprise.
‘It was a family celebration apparently. They had dinner and everything was fine, then Bryant seemed to become agitated about something, said he saw someone outside in the garden. He got up, went to the window and then collapsed. They tried to revive him at the scene and the paramedics did all they could, but he was dead on arrival at hospital.’
Emma Thorn was looking at him and he knew what the next question would be.
‘Who did he think he saw, sir?’ she asked.
Beckett shifted uncomfortably. ‘It was dark in the garden,’ he said, ‘but apparently Bryant thought he saw Harrison Lee.’
Chapter Eleven
The bus pulled into St Margaret’s bus station at just after eleven and Katie got out into yet more rain. Wind whipped around the bus station complex, channelled down the side streets, and whistled through the automatic doors of the waiting room. She looked around for the ticket office. She felt much more positive now, despite the shock of renewed cold after the over-heated bus. She had slept for a while and felt better for it, though she was hungry again and still damp from the earlier rain she had endured.
She asked for a ticket to Mallingham and was delighted to find that a bus left in only ten minutes’ time. Her joy turned to dismay, however, when she tried to find her purse. It had gone. She ran back to the Northampton bus, still parked on its stand, and the driver helped her to look, but the purse was nowhere to be seen and Katie was forced to the dreadful conclusion that it had been stolen while she slept. Close to tears, she thanked the driver for his help and got off the bus, wondering what to do next. She had no money, her feet hurt and it was bitterly cold. Rain mixed with snow and blown by the strong wind seemed to fly almost at right angles to the ground.
Katie went into the public toilets and examined her feet in one of the cubicles. Her heels had bled and the dried blood had stuck her socks firmly to the open cuts. Wincing, she pulled them away and padded both her heels and her blistered toes with toilet paper before easing her trainers back on. There was nothing for it. She had not come this far to turn back now, though she was sorely tempted to reverse the charges and call her mum and dad. The need to speak to them and get them to come and fetch her was so strong that she began to cry again. She wiped her eyes impatiently and turned up the collar of her jacket, wishing that she had a hood or even one of Gavin’s stupid hats. Another look at her map told her that she wanted the Nottingham road and she set off again, no longer even really certain why she was doing this, knowing only that she had come this far and had to finish her journey now.
* * *
It was almost four o’clock before Ray returned to the office. He had been to see Martha after the news of Timothy Westerby’s disappearance broke and done his best to calm her down. He had also spoken to Rowena and arranged for her to come into the office the following day. She seemed delighted at the prospect of working for them. Ray had told her all he could about what the job would entail, then left the rest to George to explain. Apart from answering telephones, he had little idea of what a secretary did, never having had need of one before.
Parking outside the office in Clarendon Park was awkward and Ray was slightly irritated to see that someone in a Ford Mondeo was in his usual spot. He parked a little way down the street and walked back, shrugging his shoulders against the damp weather. It had stopped raining but the sky was thickly grey and overcast, as if the artist who had painted it had been overly fond of impasto and lacking in subtlety. A man was standing in the Victorian tiled lobby. He was leaning against the walls and had the look of someone who’d been waiting there for quite some time. He stepped forward as Ray came through the door.
‘Ray Flowers?’
‘Yes.’ Ray eyed the other man thoughtfully. He was police. Ray could recognize the invisible badge — he still wore it himself, even though he was now retired.
‘I’m Detective Inspector Beckett,’ the man said. ‘Can you spare me some of your time?’
Ray nodded slowly. ‘I’ve been expecting you,’ he said. ‘But I hoped you wouldn’t come.’ It was final confirmation of what Martha had feared.
* * *
As Katie walked she thought about the recurring dream she’d had ever since she could remember. In fact, the dream was probably the earliest thing she could remember, and so intertwined was it with real events that she was no longer certain which part was dream and which true.
She vividly recalled the explosion. A howl of noise beginning deep beneath her feet, rumbling like thunder from below the ground and spreading upwards until it engulfed her, drowning out her screams. Before that she could remember little — there were only fragmented images. A woman bending to pick her up and holding her tightly, kissing her. Someone giving her a cup of orange and telling her to drink, and Katie protesting that she didn’t like orange juice. And then, of course, the boy. He had taken the cup away from her before she finished drinking it, leading her out of the room and downstairs into the hall. She remembered the touch of his hand, how he held her so tightly and talked to her and told her that everything was going to be all right. He had seemed so big, almost grownup, but in retrospect she realized that he was probably only thirteen or so, just much bigger than she was.
He had taken her down through the hall, into the kitchen and beyond that into a long cupboard that ran beneath a staircase. The door to the cupboard was small and cut at a funny angle at the top. The boy opened it and told her to get inside. He made it sound like a game. Katie remembered that she had felt so sleepy and that the boy had kept talking to her, telling her not to go to sleep, that she must try to stay awake. He had coaxed her into the cupboard, making a nest of cushions for her to sit in. The cushions he must have taken from sofas earlier, as she recognized the pattern. And then he disappeared for a little while, coming back with a long rug that had been in the hall. He folded it several times and then put it into the hole in front of Katie so that it was between her and the door. She could just see over it if she stood on tiptoe, but it made the cupboard very dark.
‘I’m scared,’ Katie had said.
The boy put his finger to his lips and shushed her. ‘It’s all right,’ he said. ‘We are playing hide-and-seek. You want to hide, don’t you?’
Katie remembered that she nodded. She was so sleepy now that it was too much trouble to argue. And still the boy kept talking to her, telling her not to fall asleep.
‘This is too dark,’ Katie had complained again as he began to close the door. She didn’t remember being scared, just very tired.
‘I’ll leave the door open a little bit if you promise to be quiet,’ he said. ‘But you must promise to be really, really quiet.’
Katie did not understand why but she nodded sleepily and lay down in the nest of cushions. She remembered the little shaft of light entering through the partly open door. It had looked pretty against the darkness. She seemed to remember the boy hesitating, but that might have been a part of her dream, she didn’t know. The door closed then, bu
t she must have fallen asleep soon after, because she didn’t cry and she wasn’t scared any more. The next thing was the explosion, the enormity of sound that echoed around the tiny cupboard and still filled her dreams all these years after.
* * *
It was a relief, thought Dave Beckett, to be talking to someone who had been there before and had an idea of what to expect. Briefly he outlined the incidents so far, telling Ray how the boy had been found and about the drawings on his hands. Ray said little. He sat cradling a mug of hot tea, listening intently.
‘Eye within a circle,’ he said finally. ‘It’s strange, you know, that the cult still uses the same symbol. I’d have thought they would want a change after all the lousy publicity it must have brought them.’
Beckett shrugged. ‘I don’t know anything about that,’ he said. ‘I have little time for religion of any kind.’
He took a sip of his tea. It was still extremely hot, but very welcome. He leaned back in his chair and regarded Flowers thoughtfully, taking in the scarred face and hands and the lopsided smile as Ray grinned at him, acknowledging his scrutiny and returning it. Beckett had warm brown eyes and greying hair, complete with a distinctive widow’s peak. He was, guessed Ray, mid-forties, somewhere close to his own age.
‘Look a bit odd, don’t I?’ he commented.
Beckett shrugged again. ‘The child that they rescued that night. The one they called Katie.’
‘I remember her,’ Ray said. ‘A tiny little blonde thing dressed in a Bugs Bunny night-shirt. Not a mark on her. At the time it seemed almost miraculous.’
‘She ran away from her foster home two days ago,’ Beckett told him. ‘Her foster parents think she might be headed this way. They had a phone call from a couple who picked her up on the motorway. They were going to hand her over to the police in Northampton, but she gave them the slip. They called Katie’s parents to let them know, but we’ve heard nothing from them since.’
