by Rob Roughley
People began to make their way from the room; Lasser went against the tide pushing towards Bannister.
‘Right, Lasser, Rachael Sinclair, do you think it’s worth following it up?’
The night before he’d rung Bannister from home and filled him in on all the details as he slouched in the chair, with a can in his hand, his eyes closing as he fought the fatigue that swept through his body.
‘I think so, I mean, Fulcom never mentioned that he knew Sinclair before she came to Claremont’s...’
‘Yes well, there seems to be a lot that man forgot to mention – right, go ahead, but don’t be all day about it, I want you at the Hall this afternoon.’
Lasser nodded a response.
On route to Claremont’s, Lasser decided to make a small detour. Pulling onto the gravel drive of Wisteria Cottage, there was no sign of Fulcom’s four by four. He made his way to the front door and rang the bell. After thirty seconds of silence, he gingerly picked his way through a flowerbed and peered in through the front window. The house, built by the Victorians, was all high ceilings and plaster coving but the front room was anything but old fashioned. A fifty-inch plasma screen hung over the ornate fireplace with a desktop computer in one corner. Sunlight pooled onto the light beech flooring, a sofa of black leather curled around the room in a semi-circle.
Stepping back onto the lawn he looked at the upstairs window, the blinds were open.
‘Excuse me, can I help you?’
He turned in surprise, an elderly woman stood behind him, all support stockings, and tweed.
Lasser patted a hand against his chest in mock shock. ‘You made me jump there.’
She flashed a set of dazzling dentures at him.
‘I’m looking for Christopher Fulcom.’ Lasser explained.
‘Oh, I am afraid he’ll be up at the school.’
Lasser smiled at her. ‘I thought as much, but I just called on the off chance.’
‘Well, to tell you the truth, I don’t think he came home last night, I mean, I live next door and I normally see his car on the drive by six at the latest.’
Lasser could hear the alarm bells clang inside his head. ‘So you haven’t seen him this morning?’
She shook her head, blue rinse, wafting in the warm breeze. ‘No, which is most unusual, though to tell you the truth Mr Holmes from that side,’ she pointed a finger at the house next door. ‘Well, he said there was a bit of a commotion yesterday,’ her voice was no more than a whisper – gossip speak.
Lasser decided to act dumb, ‘Commotion?’
She took a step towards him and then looked around as if to make sure no one was hiding in the bushes. ‘Well, he can’t be sure but he thinks it was the police who came to have a word.’
‘Really.’
‘Of course his eyes aren’t what they once were, then again neither are mine,’ she smiled and shook her head.
‘I wonder what the police wanted him for.’
‘I can’t imagine, I mean, he’s such a pleasant young man, he can’t do enough for you, which is so unusual in this day and age.’
‘Yes well, he’s always been a helpful kind of guy.’
She nodded in agreement. ‘You know, when Mrs Walmsley was moving into a care home he took pictures of her house and made an album for her, you know, so she’d be a able to look back on them and he never charged her a penny, I mean, isn’t that thoughtful?’
‘An Album?’
She crinkled her eyes at him. ‘Oh, it was wonderful, very professional; then again he seems to be able to turn his hand to anything.’
‘He’s a man of many talents.’ Lasser fished his keys from his pocket. ‘Well thanks for your help, but I’d better get going,’ he began to walk back towards the car.
‘If I see him who should I say called?’
Lasser turned. ‘Don’t worry I’ll catch up with him,’ he gave her a wave and then climbed into the car. The day before, when driving away from the house, he’d seen the glorious form of Medea Sullivan, in the mirror. Her image now replaced by the frumpy old dear in the tweed cardigan – Medea in fifty years’ time?
Twenty minutes later, he was standing in front of the woman herself; the tight bun was back, a perfect match for her tight smile.
‘It seems you spent the whole of yesterday going around causing havoc?’ she said with a frown.
Lasser slid his hands into his pockets. ‘If you mean doing my job, then guilty as charged.’
‘I shouldn’t even be in today but Mrs Wild rang in complaining about a migraine and I think you’re the one responsible for it.’
‘The Thatcher clone?’
From the look on her face, he could tell that she wasn’t impressed by his flippancy. ‘She’s worked here for almost thirty years, and if you’d explained things properly instead of coming in here like a fascist, then I’m sure you would have found her more than helpful.’
‘Somehow I doubt it.’
She tilted her head and looked at him sadly. ‘Are you always this bitter and twisted?’
‘That depends. If I’m being lied to, then the answer is yes.’
She glared at him and folded her hands on the desk. ‘So what can I do for you, Sergeant?’
‘Fulcom.’
‘He isn’t in and before you ask I don’t know where he is.’
More alarm bells started to ring. ‘What about Rachael Sinclair?’
Medea frowned. ‘I’d have to check the register.’
‘Is that a problem?’
She locked her eyes on his face. ‘No problem at all, if you’ll just give me a few seconds?’ she began to tap away at a keyboard, her eyes fixed on the screen. ‘Yes, she is in today.’
‘I’d like a word if that’s possible?’
‘What, now?’
‘Please.’
She sighed and rose from her seat. ‘I’ll see what I can do.’
‘One more thing, I was wondering if you’d sit in while I have a quick word with her.’
Medea stopped and looked at Lasser in surprise. ‘Me?’
‘Would that be a problem?’
‘Well I’m not sure, I mean, shouldn’t you have one of your colleagues present?’
‘This won’t take long and it’s not official.’
She shrugged. ‘OK then, give me ten minutes.’
He watched as she walked through the front door, yawning he went to sit on a large chesterfield positioned against one of the walls. Sunlight blasted down from the circular glass roof, last night’s beer had left a sour taste on his tongue and stretching out his legs he closed his eyes, and...
‘Sergeant, Sergeant Lasser!’
He opened them to find Medea standing in front of him, hands on hips. Rachael Sinclair stood by her side, a slight smile flickered across her face before settling back into the ‘little-girl-lost look.’
‘You were asleep?’ Medea sounded dismayed.
Lasser ran a hand across his eyes and yawned. ‘Sorry, I had a late night.’
‘I thought I could smell alcohol.’ Rachael said sotto voce.
Medea snapped her head around in shock. Rachael smiled at her sweetly.
Lasser scrambled up from the chair – if you don’t want to fuck up then wake up – he told himself and slid a hand across his head.
‘Is there somewhere quiet we could talk?’
Medea turned back to him, a frown of uncertainty on her face. ‘Follow me.’
Lasser hung back as they walked across the tiled floor, trying to get his fogged brain into gear. Medea swiped a card through the slot attached to the door and led them along the corridor past Fulcom’s office and through the next door. It was too small to be called a conference room, too big for an office. A table took up the centre of the room, with eight chairs in two neat rows of four pushed beneath, one wall was lined with filing cabinets. Rachael pulled out a chair, and slid into it, her back straight, looking prim and proper as if butter wouldn’t melt. Lasser followed suit taking the seat directly opp
osite.
Medea paused for a moment before sliding in beside the girl.
‘Right, Rachael, I’m sorry to drag you from your studies...’
‘That’s OK, this is my last week and it was only hockey practice,’ she smiled.
‘I’ve been to see the headmaster of your old school...’
‘Mr Harper, how is he?’ She leaned forward as if dying to know the answer.
‘We were talking about your time there and the reason you left.’
She crossed her legs, the hockey skirt rose, flashing some thigh. ‘I left because Claremont’s is a better school.’
‘That might be the case but that’s not the real reason is it?’ Lasser kept his eyes locked firmly on her face; this girl was playing with him.
Rachael looked perplexed; she pouted slightly, one frown line spoiling her perfect brow.
‘I’m sorry I don’t understand.’
‘According to Mr Harper you were caught selling drugs.’
Medea gasped and twisted in her seat, glaring across the desk at Lasser. ‘I certainly hope you have proof of that, Sergeant?’
‘Actually I don’t, but then I’d sooner believe a man who’s served as a teacher for over forty years with an unblemished record...’
‘That’s as may be, but you can’t simply accuse someone...’
‘And what about the accusations you made against a member of his staff.’ Lasser interrupted, not taking his eye off the teenager.
‘What accusations?’ Medea asked.
Lasser sighed. ‘Rachael?’
‘I’m sorry but I don’t understand,’ she replied.
‘So, you didn’t accuse a female member of staff of making sexual advances towards you?’
‘I never said anything like that.’
‘Though you were questioned by the police?’
Rachael smiled. ‘It was all a silly misunderstanding.’
‘Not according to her, she said you told Harper that this teacher forced you into performing a sex act upon her. Now why would they make up something like that?’
Rachael shrugged, and for the first time Lasser caught a flicker of annoyance in her eyes, not anger, or denial, a look that said you are starting to bore me.
‘The teacher then states that you followed her to the staffroom door and told her it was all some kind of joke.’
Sinclair flicked her hair from one shoulder to the other with practiced ease. ‘Summerbee was a dyke; I bet she didn’t tell you that did she?’
Medea’s mouth yawned open in shock.
Rachael shot her a look of cool contempt, any vestige of innocence vanished. ‘She used to watch all the girls when we were taking a shower, especially me. I tell you it gave me the creeps...’ She gave an exaggerated shudder, her breasts jiggling beneath the thin cotton shirt.
‘Come on, Rachael, what would a geography teacher be doing in the showers?’ Lasser asked.
For the first time a look of real anger flared in her eyes.
‘I...’
‘Did you think I wouldn’t check? Mrs Summerbee never went near those showers; it would have been professional suicide. Listen, Rachael, you are a liar, I know it and so do you. You left Hindley High because you knew you were going to be thrown out, and now imagine my surprise when I find out that another of your old teachers is working here.’
Medea leaned across the desk her cheeks flushed. ‘What are you talking about?’
‘Do you want to tell her, Rachael?’
The girl simply smiled and gave the smallest of shrugs.
‘OK then, I’ll do it,’ he looked at Medea and sighed. ‘Christopher Fulcom taught at her old school, he left under something of a cloud as well didn’t he, Rachael?’
‘If you’re asking was he fucking me? Then the answer is yes.’
Medea shot up from her seat as if it were spring loaded; her chair teetered before falling backwards, clattering against the filing cabinets. ‘I...’
‘Oh, sit down, you stupid woman,’ Rachael snapped in a bored voice.
Medea drew back her hand and Lasser lunged across the desk grabbing her forearm. ‘Don’t, Medea, it’s what she wants.’
Rachael smiled, her eyes glittering with malice. ‘Come on, Miss Perfect, don’t tell me you haven’t given him the odd blowjob while he’s been helping you with your pathetic dissertation, payment in kind I think they call it?’
‘What...!’
‘Oh, he’s told me all about it,’ she sneered. ‘I prefer to swallow but I bet you just have to spit...’
‘You disgusting...’ Medea tried to leap forward again but Lasser tightened his grip and hauled her towards the door.
‘Don’t even think of leaving this room, Rachael!’
She lifted her hand and gave them both a small wave as Lasser dragged the struggling secretary from the room.
42
Bannister glared across the desk, Mike Brewster tried to meet his gaze with a look of cold defiance.
‘Come on, Brewster, I know it was you who opened the mail.’
‘I haven’t a clue what you’re talking about.’ The reporter’s antique leather jacket creaked as he folded his arms.
‘Don’t give me that, it was your paper that ran the picture of Kelly Ramsey, the only one. Now I know you’ve been hanging around outside the house, so if you didn’t take the photographs then who did?’
Brewster fiddled with the stud in his left ear and shrugged. ‘I haven’t a clue.’
‘So, someone offered the pictures to you, is that what you’re saying?’
‘I...’
‘Bearing in mind you wrote the tagline in the paper,’ he jabbed out a finger. ‘Now, unless you start being straight, then I’ll lock you up until you decide to cooperate.’
Brewster smiled and shook his head. ‘You can’t do that, I know my rights.’
Bannister placed his elbows on the desk. ‘I’m not interested in your rights. People like you think there are no consequences for the things you do, so what if a sixteen-year-old girl is missing, what does it matter as long as it’s a good story? The family are refusing to cooperate, so why not just go through their mail.’
Bannister rose from his seat and loomed over the desk; Brewster pushed back his chair, eyes widening in surprise.
‘But I’m here to tell you that there are consequences, you little shit.’
‘I...’
‘Now, you either tell me how you came by the pictures or you’ll be shitting in a bucket until I say otherwise.’
Brewster squirmed in his seat. ‘Look, I didn’t open them I swear, they were already like that when I found them.’
‘Bollocks!’
‘It’s the truth,’ he held up his hands. ‘I’ll admit to taking the one that we printed but I did not open any envelope.’
‘Then who did?’ Bannister snarled.
Brewster looked pained. ‘I thought it must have been another reporter. I mean, you know what this industry’s like, if someone gets the story before you do, then you get your arse chewed.’ He tried a sickly smile.
Bannister fought the urge to drag him over the desk. ‘So you thought, hey-ho, someone else has broken the law, I won’t bother reporting it. I’ll simply sneak one out and print it. I mean, who gives a fuck really, eh?’
Brewster nervously licked his lips. ‘I was just doing my job, if another reporter did take one, then I didn’t want to let an opportunity like that go.’
‘But that didn’t happen, did it?’ Bannister snapped.
Brewster shook his head in confusion. ‘I can’t understand it...’
‘No, but I bet your editor loved you, a scoop like that, the only paper to get a private photograph of the girl?’
Brewster looked away without answering.
Bannister eased back in his chair. ‘Do you know why the police never talk to people like you, do you have any idea?’
‘Look, I’ve said I’m sorry, I realise...’
‘For instance, say someone has grabb
ed Kelly Ramsey and is keeping her somewhere. The first thing these people do is check the media to see what you have to say. It helps to keep them informed, it gives them information, the fact that the information is usually a load of shit is irrelevant, they absorb it as the truth.’
‘I can’t be held responsible for that!’ Brewster leaned forward in his chair, hands on the armrests as if he were about to thrust himself upright.
‘You call them a pervert, a weirdo, and they start to get angry, mention the word paedophile and they usually snap,’ he pointed a shaking finger at the reporter. ‘You used all those words in your write-up didn’t you Mr Brewster?’
Brewster could feel his own anger begin to build; people had a right to know what was going on, it was a basic human right to be kept informed. ‘So what are we expected to say, should we call them misguided is that what you’re telling me?’
‘If I had my way you wouldn’t be allowed to print anything!’ Bannister bellowed.
‘Yeah well, unless you forgot, this is the UK not South Korea.’
Bannister shook his head. ‘You don’t get it do you?’ he leaned further forward. ‘Marshall Brooks was decapitated, his arms and legs were cut from his body, and someone had set about both his eyes with a blowtorch.’
The reporter scuttled back and then shot to his feet, a look of sickly horror smeared across his suntanned face.
‘Someone read what you printed and decided to act out their own form of retribution.’
Brewster shook his head whippet quick. ‘You don’t know that!’
‘And do you know, the sad thing is, we’ll never be able to question him about Kelly or about his involvement in her disappearance.’
Despite his disgust, Bannister saw the light bulb come on behind Brewster’s eyes.
‘So he was involved?’ the reporter said as if this fact vindicated him of any wrongdoing.
Bannister yanked a drawer open and snatched out a brown envelope. ‘Does he look involved to you?’ pulling out a photograph, he slammed it down on the desk.
