Never Coming Back

by Tim Weaver

  ‘And how are you ladies today?’

  ‘We’re good,’ Carrie said. ‘How are you, Eric?’

  Eric Schiltz, temporarily distracted, watched Annabel move around the car: she barely needed her crutches to walk now. Her gait was a little stiff still, but she had good basic movement and her weight was being transferred evenly between legs. ‘I’m fine, thank you,’ he eventually said to Carrie, and then his eyes fell on Annabel again. ‘Even better seeing your daughter like this.’ When Annabel stopped at the bottom of the drive and looked back at them both, he said, ‘Why did I give you those crutches again, Belle?’

  Annabel laughed. ‘It feels almost normal now.’

  ‘It looks almost normal too.’

  ‘Thank you, Eric,’ Carrie said to him, touching a hand to his arm.

  He nodded. ‘Come. Let’s get into the cool.’

  They headed inside, into a marble-floored foyer, where an air-conditioning unit, high up on one of the walls, hummed gently. Ahead of them, in the middle of the room, the stairs wound up and around to the second floor in a spiral; on the ground floor beyond, doorways led into a living room, kitchen and bedroom, then left into Dr Schiltz’s study.

  ‘Wow,’ Carrie said. ‘What a beautiful home you have.’

  ‘Oh, that’s very nice of you.’

  ‘How long have you lived here?’

  ‘Here, in this house? About ten years. But I’ve been in the city for almost twenty-five. A lot of people don’t like it here, especially in the summer – it can get up to one hundred and ten, one hundred and fifteen degrees in July and August.’ Schiltz gestured towards the air-conditioning unit. ‘But that’s what they invented that thing for, right?’

  He closed the front door.

  ‘Okay. Let me give you the guided tour.’

  He led them around the house, first into the living room, which – via a set of wall-to-ceiling folding doors – opened out on to a deck and a swimming pool, and then into the adjoining kitchen, open plan, finished in marble and oak. All four bedrooms – one on the ground, three upstairs – were variations on the same colour scheme, subtle pastels, with striped accessories, and then finally they all ended up back in the ground-floor foyer.

  ‘And this is my study,’ he said.

  Inside, a desk sat in front of a huge window, looking out over the foothills of the mountains. Like every other room, it was beautifully finished, although it felt less like it had been torn from the pages of a magazine, the walls lined with medical certificates and photographs, the desk home to an untidy in-tray, and a series of trophies earned out on the city’s golf courses. ‘Sorry about the mess,’ he said to them, scooping up some papers and dumping them in the top tray. He pulled a couple of chairs out from the wall. ‘Let me go and get you something to drink.’

  While the women settled in, he went through to the kitchen and poured them both some lemonade, and when he got back, Annabel was standing, using the back of the chair as an anchor and slowly rolling her hips. He’d given her some exercises to do in order to build up her core strength, but she’d recovered even faster than he’d hoped.

  ‘How’s it feeling?’ Schiltz asked.

  Annabel smiled. ‘It feels really good.’

  He sat down at his desk, and both he and Carrie watched Annabel finish up her routine. When she was done, Carrie turned to him. ‘I can’t even begin to thank you.’

  ‘Honestly, it’s not me you have to thank.’

  She nodded. ‘I know. But …’

  ‘It was my pleasure, Carrie.’

  Annabel sat down. ‘Thank you, Dr Schiltz.’

  ‘If you call me Dr Schiltz again, I’ll have to put you back on the operating table and unfix you,’ Schiltz joked, searching his in-tray for a checklist he’d printed out that morning. ‘I hope you’ll both keep me up to date with how it’s going once you get back.’

  ‘We definitely will,’ Carrie said.

  ‘When do you go?’

  ‘Thursday.’

  ‘Two more days to get a killer suntan, then.’

  The women laughed.

  ‘Sorry about this,’ Schiltz said, pulling the in-tray towards him. ‘I printed out some things I need to go through before I can give you the final sign-off, and now it’s gone missing.’ He moved from tier to tier, unable to find it. ‘Old age never comes gracefully.’

  ‘Can we help?’ Carrie asked.

  ‘No, it’s fine. I obviously went and left it somewhere this morning.’ He got up. ‘You two make yourselves at home. If I don’t return in five minutes, send a search party.’

  He headed out into the living room, looking for the paperwork, checking drawers and cabinets, before moving to the kitchen. There was nothing in either room. He circled the decking area, even though he knew he hadn’t been out to the pool that morning, then came back inside and headed upstairs. He didn’t remember taking the checklist up to his room, but inside a couple of seconds he found it there, perched on his bedside cabinet.

  ‘Old age really doesn’t come gracefully,’ he said quietly.

  Scooping up the form, he returned to the study.

  As he entered, Annabel was in a standing position again, hands gripping the back of the chair, gently lifting her legs, one after the other, like a ballet dancer. Carrie had moved too: she was behind her daughter, standing at a cabinet in the corner, where eight photographs – all in frames, each frame different – were lined up on top. She had her back to Schiltz and was leaning towards one of the photos, phone in her hand at her side.

  ‘I think I’m getting the hang of this,’ Annabel said.

  He smiled. ‘You’ll be a ballerina before you know it.’

  Carrie turned, surprise in her face, as if she hadn’t realized Schiltz was back. But there was something else too. Something he couldn’t put his finger on. Was it guilt? His eyes drifted to the photos. There was nothing worth seeing: just pictures of friends and family, taken over the course of Schiltz’s sixty-six years. He dropped the form on to the desk and moved across to where she was standing. She slipped her phone into her pocket and smiled warmly at him, and he started to wonder if he had read too much into her look.

  He took in the nearest photo: the eightieth anniversary of the golf club, him at the front with the runners-up trophy he’d won that day. He liked that photo. He looked good in it: slim and lean, not too grey, tailored suit jacket and a blue open-neck shirt.

  ‘Are you jealous of my runners-up trophy?’ he joked.

  Carrie looked embarrassed now. ‘Sorry. I was being nosy.’

  ‘It’s fine. Be as nosy as you like.’

  She nodded, her eyes returning to the photos. He watched her for a moment and saw her attention fall on a picture right at the back. ‘When was this taken?’ she asked.

  He reached for the photograph she was referring to and brought it towards them. The picture must have been over forty years old. Schiltz couldn’t remember the last time he’d looked at it.

  ‘Goodness,’ he said. ‘I’d forgotten this was even here.’

  ‘I like your fashion.’

  He smiled. ‘Pretty dashing, eh? I guess this must be the early 1970s.’

  ‘You were all friends?’

  Schiltz looked at the three men in the picture, their arms linked around each other’s shoulders. Schiltz was one of them, standing to the left. The picture had faded over time, become a little discoloured and frayed at the edges, but the frame – and the photo’s position away from the window – had helped to disguise the damage. ‘Yes,’ he said, finally. ‘Best friends.’

  ‘Are you still friends?’

  ‘Definitely. They’re like brothers to me.’ He studied the photograph for a long time, Carrie watching him, Annabel continuing her leg exercises. ‘I bought a scanner a few months back, so I could get all my old pictures on to computer before they started to get beyond repair. I’ve got so many, though, I’ve … well, kind of been putting it off.’

  ‘That’s a good idea.’

&nbs
p; ‘To put it off?’

  She smiled. ‘No, to scan them in.’

  He shrugged. ‘I don’t want to lose these memories.’

  ‘Well, maybe you can start with this one.’

  ‘Yes,’ he said, his eyes moving between him and his friends. Finally, he returned her smile and placed the photograph back on top of the cabinet. ‘Maybe I can.’

  12

  After Emily had gone, I walked through to the living room and sat down in a chair by the window. Like most of the furniture in the cottage, it had belonged to my parents, its arms marked by years of wear, the material worn thin, the pattern bleached by age. Outside, I could see Start Point lighthouse further along the coast, like a bone-white finger breaking out of the earth. Mostly, though, on this side of the house, all I could see was the garden.

  I booted up my laptop, pulled a stool towards me, then googled the Ling family’s disappearance. Nationally, it hadn’t got much coverage. One single-column story in the Daily Mail; a short in the Guardian and The Times. Both were light on details and included the same soundbite from Rocastle, probably issued through a catch-all press release. There was nothing juicy about the story a day in, just a very basic framework of events, which was probably why coverage died out pretty much as soon as it had begun. If the police had given the press the house – everything untouched, TV still on, toys on the floor, spilled bottle of milk – they’d have generated some buzz, but it was a catch-22: they didn’t want to release too much information too soon, as with any case, and the surface detail didn’t intrigue the media enough for them to start digging deeper.

  Local press coverage lasted longer, but hard information was thin on the ground, which meant either the police had kept the details locked down or – more likely – the case had quickly fizzled out. Ten and a half months down the line, with no sign of the family and no further updates for Emily, certainly suggested as much. Even so, there were a couple of things that nagged at me. The first was Rocastle, and his involvement in the case. The second was Paul Ling’s wallet, and the amount of time it had taken for it to be returned. It could have been nothing. Extra caution on the part of the police, or maybe an administrative error. But seven months seemed a long time to hold on to it.

  I turned back to the laptop.

  On-screen was a front-page story from one of the local newspapers, the family’s photo on the right, their faces clear even if the colours were washed out. Emily had given me their basic personal details, but it was good to put names to faces. At the back of the group was Paul Ling. Fifty-three. Balding. Moustache. Five or six inches taller than his wife, who was to his right, his arm around her. Carrie looked just like Emily: slim, small, dark hair, dark eyes, exactly the same smile. The only difference was that, at fifty, she was eight years older. To Paul Ling’s left, also smiling, was Annabel. Belle. She was definitely more like her mother than her father; her frame a little bigger maybe, her hair a little lighter, but neither by much. Height-wise, she was midway between Carrie and Paul – probably five-eight – and had her hair up in a ponytail, revealing a beautiful face, full of gentle sweeps. In front of her – Annabel’s hands on her shoulders – was Olivia, seventeen years younger than her sister at just eight, but much more like Paul.

  ‘Your girlfriend gone?’

  Healy stood in the doorway closest to me, which led out of the living room to the stairs. He’d showered and changed, but still smelled of booze. I didn’t bother responding.

  He came further in and collapsed on to the sofa opposite me.

  ‘Is she why you won’t speak to Liz?’

  I looked at him. ‘You don’t know what you’re talking about.’

  ‘She was an ex, though, right?’

  I didn’t reply.

  ‘Emily, I mean.’

  ‘I know who you meant, Healy.’

  ‘So was she?’

  ‘Was she what?’

  ‘An ex?’

  ‘Why do you care?’

  His gaze lingered on me. ‘You need to tell Liz.’

  I closed the laptop. Said nothing.

  ‘You owe her,’ he said.

  ‘Owe her what?’

  ‘An explanation.’

  ‘Is that her talking – or you?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ he said, leaning back. ‘I just know I chat to her, and whatever you think’s happened between you, she needs to hear it.’ He stopped. Looked at me. Slowly, something changed in his face; something softer, less severe. ‘It reminds me of …’

  ‘Of what?’

  ‘Of a place I’ve been before.’

  He meant his marriage. He meant the terrible mistakes he’d made. And he meant the aftermath, when the case he was on was falling apart, when his wife and kids told him they hated him, and when the last conversation he ever had with Leanne, his daughter, was a screaming match that ended with her storming out. Ten months later, he found her dead in a room full of so much suffering I sometimes wondered how he slept at night.

  I nodded that I understood and then watched him for a moment, half formed in the dull light of the living room. This version of Healy – this quiet rendering of him – was the one I was always trying to get at because it was the part of him I liked. He didn’t show it often but, when he did, it felt like a call for help; as if, subliminally, he wanted this part of himself to be pulled to the surface.

  ‘I’ll try and call her tomorrow,’ I said.

  He nodded. ‘I think she’d appreciate that.’

  ‘And you?’

  ‘What about me?’

  ‘You know what I mean, Healy.’

  He shrugged. ‘She’s your girlfriend, not mine.’

  And yet, even as he said it, even as he raised his defences again and began to look more familiar, something of the other Healy remained. Somewhere in his face there was a bleakness, as if the thought of me sorting things out with Liz – or, more likely, me telling her it was definitely over – had shifted things into focus. The calls would stop. She wouldn’t need Healy any more. And whatever she’d brought to his life would be gone.

  ‘I’m going out,’ he said.

  I watched him disappear into the kitchen, listened to him open and close the front door, and then opened the laptop again. The photograph of the Lings popped back into view. Close in on the four faces. Carrie. Paul. Annabel. Olivia. My eyes moved between them, one after the other, back and forth.

  Father. Mother. Daughters.

  Something seemed more obvious this time.

  Paul was Asian. As I’d been walking her back to her car, Emily had mentioned that his parents were from Hong Kong and had moved here two years before he was born. Carrie was Caucasian. Olivia was a good mix of the two: Asian in and around the eyes, the cheeks, in the soft triangle of the chin; Caucasian in the centre of her face and her bone structure. But Annabel wasn’t like that at all. She looked exactly like her mum: one hundred per cent Caucasian, with no hint of her father.

  Nothing in the cheeks. Nothing in the eyes.

  Nothing of Paul Ling at all.

  13

  Early the next day, I got up and found Healy was already awake, sitting next to the open window in a vest, smoking. Cold air escaped into the house, but the wind and rain were gone and, in the skies above the sea, narrow slivers of blue broke between clouds.

  As soon as I entered the kitchen, he nodded in the direction of the kettle. ‘Water’s just boiled,’ he said. ‘We’ve run out of coffee powder. I’ll go and get some later.’

  After making myself a mug of tea, I sat down opposite him.

  ‘Emily’s family went missing.’

  He looked at me, nodded, but didn’t say anything.

  ‘Her sister, brother-in-law, their two daughters.’

  ‘Where did they go missing from?’

  ‘From their home. She reckoned their place was like a time capsule: the TV was still on, he’d left his computer running, the younger girl’s toys were all over the floor, food still in the oven, dog still wandering aroun
d the house. Like they’d just stepped out.’

  He finished his cigarette and pulled the window shut.

  ‘You working for her?’

  ‘I said I’d do some asking around.’

  A hint of a smile on his face, one whose meaning we both got: You say that now but wait until this starts to go deeper. Before long, it’ll be just like all the other cases. And you won’t be able to let go.

  ‘Do you want to come along today?’ I asked him.

  ‘Where are you going?’

  ‘Buckfastleigh. To see the house.’

  He looked at me, left hand – wedding band still on – flat to the table; right hand clamped around a mug of tea. ‘Yeah, all right,’ he said, finally. ‘Let me get changed.’

  We took Healy’s car so I could make a couple of calls on the way. The first was to Spike, an old contact from my days as a journalist. Originally from Russia, Spike had come here on a student visa, but when that ran out he’d stayed on illegally. That wasn’t the only law he’d broken. Spike was like a skeleton key: as a hacker, he accessed names, addresses, emails and phone numbers for me, never leaving a footprint. I’d used his talent, such as it was, more than ever since my change of career, especially in the early stages of a case when I was trying to build a picture of the missing, and the life they’d left behind.

  ‘Pawn shop,’ he said when he answered.

  ‘Is that with an a-w or an o-r?’

  A moment of confusion. ‘David?’

  ‘How you doing, Spike?’

  ‘Man, how are you?’

  Spike’s accent always made me smile. It was barely recognizable as Russian now, completely Americanized except for a soft European lilt.

  ‘I’m good,’ I said. ‘It’s been a while.’

  ‘I read about you online. You okay now?’

  ‘I’m fine.’

  ‘That’s good, man, that’s good.’

  ‘Listen, I need your help on something.’

  ‘Anything.’

  We were a couple of miles from the Lings’ house, negotiating our way through the western fringes of Buckfastleigh. I had the phone on speaker so Healy was looped in. Working with someone wasn’t exactly a new experience for him, yet it had been a long time since anyone at the Met had trusted him enough to partner up. But if he was rusty, I was rustier. I’d spent my life, as a journalist and then an investigator, working alone. On the two occasions I’d tethered myself to someone, it had been Healy, and both times it had gone bad. I’d asked him to get involved here because, when he was good, he was seriously good; he offered a feel for a case you couldn’t teach. But there was a flipside, an inherent risk: that, sooner or later, he’d lose control and everything would go south. If he was involved in something else, trying to dig deeper into the body on the beach, this was a good way to keep him close and to lessen any damage.