The Silence (Dc Goodhew 4)

by Alison Bruce

  But the children had changed it all. It turned out that he never found the determination to do anything unique in life, outside raising them. They were his salvation, the meaning and direction and future all rolled into one.

  ‘I said, “No wonder they killed themselves”,’ she shouted.

  He thought: 90 per cent sour, and 10 per cent spite? He needed to revise those figures; there wasn’t even that much love between them now.

  ‘Two down, one to go, Tony.’

  Even now she could still shock him.

  ‘I never pushed them into it.’ He was shouting, but could hear his throat gagging with emotion.

  He punched her again, catching her full in the nose. He wanted to hit her hard enough so that she understood his pain. He couldn’t go back and fix everything that had brought them to this point. He now accepted that he couldn’t fix it at all.

  He hated her. God, how he hated her. He wanted to blame her for every second of the hell they were in, but he wasn’t that stupid. Whatever had driven two of their three children to suicide lay at his door, too. And that was another reason he continued raining blows down on her. For his own sanity, he wanted to destroy them both.

  Vicky didn’t seem to care. Just like his dad, she refused to acknowledge his pain, glaring in defiance and spitting hate back at him, through the blood and the bruising.

  The thought that he might kill her flashed into his head.

  I don’t care.

  What about Libby?

  Libby. Their last child.

  He crumbled then, dropping backwards into the nearest chair. Sobbing till he couldn’t catch his breath.

  Vicky stayed in the same room. She sat on the floor with her back against the opposite wall, her bloody face pressed into her blouse. She cried, but quietly, and neither of them spoke. They were like that for several minutes, then there came a loud knock at the door, the squeak of the letter box, and a clear voice: ‘Mr and Mrs Brett, this is the police. Open the door.’

  Goodhew was already most of the way to Brimley Close when he heard the report of a domestic disturbance. He responded instantly, and pulled up outside the Bretts’ house in under three minutes. By then it was silent, but that was no surprise; most domestic assaults are over quickly, although a few seconds of being punched can feel like an eternity, and it had undoubtedly gone on far, far longer than that.

  A Mrs Harper had called it in after several minutes of standing close to their party wall and weighing up whether it was ‘just one of the usual verbal spats’.

  She met Goodhew at the kerb. ‘Will you be all right by yourself?’

  He doubted she’d be able to provide much in the way of physical back-up and reassured her that he’d be fine.

  ‘They’re wicked to each other,’ she added as he opened the gate and stepped up to their front door.

  ‘Coming.’ Tony Brett answered his knock. He looked spent and, as soon as Goodhew entered the sitting room and saw Vicky Brett, he could probably guess the point of impact of most of the blows Mrs Harper had overheard.

  Maybe it was the resignation on both their faces – Tony Brett’s weariness, Vicky Brett’s lack of outrage – but the scene made Goodhew feel despair above any other emotion. Was this so typical of their daily lives that it no longer caused more than the smallest ripple? He sighed, and made Brett bring him clean towels and a bag of frozen peas. He wrapped the peas in the towel and kept them against Mrs Brett’s face while they waited for an ambulance. He read Brett his rights, too, arresting him for assault and cuffing him.

  And throughout, neither raised an eyebrow.

  Shock maybe. Maybe not.

  ‘I was already on my way here to ask you a little more about Libby – for one, why she’s returned to student accommodation rather than home. But I’m guessing this is a big part of the reason?’

  ‘It’s not going to help, is it?’ Tony Brett conceded.

  ‘I’d say that’s a slight understatement,’ Goodhew replied.

  Mrs Brett still said nothing. Even in her swollen and bloody state she seemed like the kind of person who would want to ‘keep up appearances’. That kind of attitude was so common, but so frustrating, and any minute now she’d probably suggest that no charges be pressed against her husband.

  ‘I am one of the detectives investigating the death of Libby’s housemate, Shanie Faulkner. Do either of you know whether Miss Faulkner had any connection with your two elder children?’

  They both shook their heads. Until that moment, Goodhew hadn’t been able to recognize either of them from Rosie’s inquest. Since then they had aged, shrunk and morphed, until barely resembling their former selves. The head-shakes were the same though – vacant, as though the question wasn’t really intended for them.

  ‘I spoke to the rental agency, and it appears you and Rob Stone are the official tenants of that house.’

  Tony Brett nodded. ‘They know we’ve leased it for use as student accommodation. Rob and I sorted it out between us.’ As if discussing property and money felt safer, his tone had begun to settle by the end of the first sentence. ‘Matt and Libby wanted to study elsewhere – outside out of Cambridge, I mean – but I was worried about Libby leaving home so soon.’

  Mrs Brett cut in with, ‘We, Tony, we,’ and he corrected himself.

  ‘Tell me about that house, and how did Shanie come to move in?’

  ‘Rob was happy to pay more of the rent. His wife died last year, and there was life insurance. He’s blowing the lot now. He is really screwed up.’

  Mrs Brett’s snort of cold laughter was delivered with perfect timing.

  ‘Yeah, Vicky,’ he snapped back, ‘we’re all screwed up. I’m not so thick that I don’t get the irony.’

  ‘At least he doesn’t punch the fuck out of his missus.’

  ‘Bit fucking difficult when she’s dead.’

  ‘Enough!’ Goodhew said.

  But it took more than either the assault or the frozen peas to silence Mrs Brett. ‘You liked Mandy a bit too fucking much. Bastard.’

  Tony Brett turned his face towards the furthest corner of the ceiling, then with forced calm he dragged his attention back to Goodhew. ‘I knew Mandy from school, and we became friends again through our children. That’s all. She was a lovely person and I doubt Rob will get over losing her, this side of liver disease. So both families have suffered loss. Including our children. And if Matt and Libby are helping each other through it, that’s fine by me. I can see that they aren’t about to start healing while they’re living at home.’

  Goodhew heard Mrs Brett draw breath, but thankfully she managed to keep silent this time.

  Tony Brett continued, methodically describing the advertising for, and selecting of, new housemates. ‘Only Shanie was different, she was just in the house on a short-term basis. I don’t know how it came about. Rob said it was arranged as a favour for an old friend. I didn’t ask any more. I didn’t see how another girl in the house would have any impact on Libby. I certainly didn’t feel I needed to meet her first, like I did with the lads.’

  Goodhew could hear the sirens now and knew he didn’t have many more minutes alone with the Bretts. ‘Have you heard from Libby today?’

  She shook her head. He nodded. ‘Text this morning.’

  ‘And when did this particular fight begin?’

  His turn to give a hollow laugh. ‘About twenty years ago.’

  Vicky Brett moved the bag of peas away from her face but her voice remained muffled. ‘I accused Tony of pushing them to it.’

  ‘Rosie and Nathan? Is that what you think?’

  ‘No.’ She pressed the towel back to her face for a couple of seconds, catching a bubble of blood from her left nostril just as it popped and dripped on to her upper lip. ‘I don’t think anything any more, I just lash out.’

  The ambulance arrived with a patrol car following so close to its back bumper that it looked like it was being towed. Goodhew knew PC Gardiner’s driving when he saw it. What he didn’t
need right now was assistance from a graduate of the DC Kincaide school of policing. PC Gardiner habitually drove in two modes, go and stop, and switched from the first to the second within a couple of feet. Goodhew brightened when he saw PC Yeates in the passenger seat.

  ‘A domestic turned nasty,’ Goodhew told him.

  ‘Those two are known for it.’ Yeates shrugged. ‘I’ll take it from here.’

  ‘Thanks. Can you update DI Marks after Brett has been processed?’

  Yeates seemed a little sceptical about that part of the request, but Goodhew had every intention of speaking to Rob Stone before his boss gave him a reason why he couldn’t.

  ‘And if you want Rob Stone, you’ll need to get down the Carlton Arms,’ Yeates added. ‘Third barstool on the left.’

  The paramedics moved Vicky Brett into the ambulance almost at once, as keen to get her away from her husband for her mental health as for her physical well-being, Goodhew guessed. He also guessed that whatever was occurring between Mrs Brett and her husband was a small dark window showing just a glimpse of the actual picture.

  Goodhew was about to drive away, when PC Gardiner tapped on his window.

  ‘Paramedic says the wife doesn’t want to press charges.’

  ‘And did you tell her how it doesn’t work like that any more?’

  PC Gardiner shook his head. ‘Sorry, I wasn’t sure about that.’

  The kid looked about nineteen, and nowhere near cocky enough to be Kincaide’s understudy.

  ‘It’s okay. Just go back and let Mrs Brett know that it’s no longer her decision. We’ll be sending a female officer to interview her as soon as she’s been checked over. Her injuries will serve as the evidence.’

  When he’d been a kid, Goodhew had imagined that adulthood was something that occurred overnight, sometime around the age of eighteen, like walking through a door from childhood and being given an invisible certificate that confirmed you now held all the skills necessary for the remainder of your days. He’d been at primary school when he’d begun to suspect that was a fallacy, and any last doubts had been erased just before his twelfth birthday when his grandfather’s death had first introduced him to the adult realities of funerals and divorce and loss.

  Was it any wonder that some kids didn’t make it through that door, that some family transition screwed them up beyond their ability to cope? Had Shanie, Nathan and Rosie all drifted into the uncharted waters of adulthood and then found it impossible to swim back out?

  He’d jumped to his conclusions about PC Gardiner based on two or three instances of watching his less than admirable driving skills. He didn’t like to admit to himself that he’d been too quick to judge when what PC Gardiner really needed was the kind of support and guidance he seemed to be now receiving from PC Yeates.

  One thing Goodhew knew for sure: he felt bloody old and burdened today. Twenty-seven? He felt more like fifty.

  TWENTY-FIVE

  The Carlton Arms was the kind of pub that Goodhew usually liked to visit, professionally at least. The place was essentially honest, a kind of public house equivalent of does-what-it-says-on-the-tin. The signboard outside advertised darts, pool table, live screen sport and home-cooked food.

  The punters would be mostly locals, and predominantly regulars. Any trouble was likely to be a long-brewing feud more than a random scrap. In all of that there was a rough and ready dependability with which Goodhew felt at ease. And that, in essence, was the main reason that he entered the pub without giving any thought to his own safety.

  There was a pool match underway. About a dozen men – no women – were clustered around the pool table. A handful of more serious drinkers sat at the bar. The third barstool on the left was actually occupied by the only woman in the place.

  Goodhew spoke to her first. ‘I’m looking for Rob Stone.’

  ‘Police?’

  ‘Yes. I was told I might find him here.’

  ‘Having a smoke.’ She nodded towards the sign marked Gents. ‘Back door’s that way.’

  She turned round to her pint before he had even had a chance to say thanks.

  The smoking ban had encouraged drinkers into the beer garden more than the landscaping, parasols and summer barbecues had ever done. However, apart from two guys standing in the doorway while holding their cigarettes outside it, there was just a lone figure out there tonight.

  Rob Stone. Aged forty-nine.

  There was a smouldering cigarette in his ashtray and a half-drunk pint in front of him. He stared into it as though he expected a genie to appear and grant him his deepest wish.

  Or maybe he had already drunk enough to be able to see the genie and that was the problem. Goodhew took the seat facing him and waited for Rob Stone to look across. The patio lights were bright enough to see Stone clearly and, if the picture was adjusted to eliminate beer poundage, smoker’s wrinkles and a defeated body posture, it was obvious that he had been a strikingly handsome man in his day.

  Stone glared. ‘Why are you squinting at me like that?’

  Goodhew introduced himself.

  Stone was unimpressed. ‘Worked out you were one of them.’

  ‘Why?’ Goodhew hated the idea that he could be identified as a detective so quickly. For one thing, it reduced the whole point of being plain-clothes.

  ‘Unless you’re a talent scout from the visiting pool team, who else would come in here to see me?’

  Fair point.

  There were many types of drunks, a full spectrum from volatile bingers to the prematurely aged who came complete with alcohol-induced senility. Stone’s expression seemed to suggest he used beer like a reverse telescope: it kept everything distant and slightly out of focus. Self-preservation maybe.

  ‘What d’you want, then?’ he asked.

  Goodhew explained his connection to the Shanie Faulkner case. ‘You jointly rented that house in King Street.’

  ‘My son lives there. He’s studying.’

  ‘I know. So how did Shanie Faulkner come to move in?’

  Stone blanked the question. ‘Do you know why Matt’s studying?’

  Goodhew shook his head.

  ‘If he went and got himself a job, he’d have to pay me to live at home, or else move out and cost me nothing. Instead of that I’m paying because he is studying. He thinks he’s punishing me.’ Stone pulled a face that, partly at least, included a wry smile. ‘He thinks he hates me.’

  Stone’s voice had a woolly edge to it, but the sentences themselves seemed coherent. A reverse telescope didn’t make things invisible though.

  Goodhew wanted to show interest without pushing, so he just echoed the statement back. ‘Matt hates you?’

  ‘His mother was ill with cancer, and he thinks I killed her.’

  ‘How?’

  ‘Well, he knows it was cancer that actually got her, but thinks it was my fault she contracted it. I made her unhappy, and it was that stress that caused it. Or so he’s decided.’

  ‘Is that possible?’

  ‘Medically? Yeah. Apparently there are websites and discussion forums that say so, therefore it must be true.’ Stone hadn’t touched his beer since Goodhew joined him; now he made up for it by gulping down the rest of the pint. ‘God bless the Internet, I say.’ He finished the cigarette next, with several equally intense puffs. ‘I’m getting another pint.’

  Goodhew followed him into the bar. Stone was talking now and it didn’t seem to bother him that everyone from the landlord to the opposing pool team would hear all about his family crisis.

  ‘We can go somewhere private,’ Goodhew offered.

  ‘God, no. Matt’s temper’s no secret in here, is it, Trev?’

  The landlord shook his head obligingly as he filled a pint glass with Old Speckled Hen. Goodhew caved in and ordered lemonade. With ice.

  ‘When you talk about your wife being unhappy, do you mean your marriage was unhappy?’ Goodhew kept his voice low, uncomfortable at the idea of asking questions in a public bar. He needn’t have bo
thered.

  ‘Me and Mandy?’ Stone laughed, and it sounded genuine until the last moment when it took on a hollow edge.

  He crossed his fingers and held them close to Goodhew’s face. ‘This was me and Mandy; the best woman in the world and she picked me. D’you know what gets me – wanna know?’

  Goodhew nodded.

  ‘There have been times when I’ve felt like I’m the cat with the cream, the one who’d got his life sorted. I’ve even given mates advice, feeling I’d done something that set me apart – as if a happy marriage and great kids were mine because I’d somehow earned them.’ Again the hollow laugh. ‘But life’s like a bloody credit card: if you have all the good stuff up front, it feels to me that the repayments are loaded with one hell of a lot of interest.’

  ‘So she wasn’t unhappy.’

  ‘Mandy was naturally cheerful – one of those warm people that gets huge pleasure out of small things, know what I mean? Charlotte and Matt used to be that way too. And we said we told each other everything, but I know there was one thing she held back.’

  ‘What was it?’

  Stone narrowed his eyes, as if weighing up how much of an idiot Goodhew really was. ‘If she’d told me she wouldn’t have been holding it back, would she?’

  ‘I thought someone else might have known.’

  ‘No. This was something private. A preoccupation that ate away at her sometimes. She’d get this look. I asked her plenty of times over the years but she always said, “I’m fine, don’t worry.” Just once I pushed it and she said that if she ever admitted to having a secret, she wouldn’t then be able to keep it from me. “So, Rob,” she said, “The only thing that matters is you and me are okay. And we are.” That was the end of it. The subject was completely closed.’

  ‘There’s a big difference from your wife seeming worried or withdrawn, to your son’s idea that you made her unhappy, isn’t there?’ Goodhew mused.

  ‘All I can think is that Mandy had lost her mum and aunt to breast cancer, and I wonder whether she feared it. She said not,’ he shrugged, ‘but I don’t know now. Point is, there was a lengthy period between her first visit to the doctor and her second or third hospital visit. We didn’t open up to the kids during that time. We decided to wait till we could give them something definite. Can you imagine the tension in the house for all those weeks? Unbearable. We bickered in front of the kids. Then, when they were out, we’d talk about our fears. Apart from that, I don’t understand any reason Matt would have for thinking I made her unhappy.’