Double Fault

by Judith Cutler

  They had. It was damage limitation time. And who was to be the little boy jamming his thumb into a great big leaky hole?

  Naturally, she suggested Wren. It was what he was paid for, after all. But he’d already left the building and of course there was no ACC in post. All fingers pointed at Fran.

  The first question, before she could even give a statement to the rightly horrified media pack, was the worst.

  ‘Is it true that the police have only identified half of the poor kids left behind that wall, and that the other half lie in some lab awaiting tests?’

  ‘Yes,’ she said flatly.

  ‘Could you explain?’

  When she didn’t respond, someone supplied the answer in another question. ‘Is it lack of manpower or lack of money?’

  She gave a horribly Wren-like answer. ‘I’m sure you’re all aware of severe constraints in the present economic climate.’

  ‘So you’re prepared to put money before suffering families?’

  She wasn’t going to put her hand up to that one. So she took a huge risk: she went into confiding mode. ‘The enquiry’s had its problems. In fact, we’ve known about this horrible crime since Friday.’ Raising her voice, she overrode the hubbub. ‘So, ladies and gentlemen, have your editors.’ She waited for the uproar to subside of its own accord. ‘We – and they – decided to throw all our resources at raising consciousness in the kidnap case. Livvie’s kidnap. We had to make a terrible, terrible decision: should we prioritize justice to the dead or try to find the living? Did we make the right one? Who knows? As far as we know, Livvie is still alive. If we find her in time, the decision may have been the right one. If not, the only thing I can – the only thing any of us can – do is apologize to the families who are all still in limbo. None of them yet knows whether to hope that their child is about to get a decent burial or that he or she isn’t among them and is still walking in God’s fresh air.’ She braced herself for a decent moral question: would all eight families wait together or would the four be told straight away? But she didn’t get it.

  ‘So you’ve all sat around doing nothing about this case all weekend?’ some idiot asked.

  ‘So I’ve had a team of officers working round the clock, many of whom weren’t scheduled to work this weekend and are giving freely of many long hours of their time,’ she retorted. ‘Thanks to them we are very close to confirming the identity of the man we believe to be the killer.’ She fed them a few geographical crumbs: after all, their provincial colleagues needed local news. ‘Naturally, as soon as we have hard information we will make a further announcement. You have my word on that.’

  She was about to draw the conference to an abrupt halt when she saw a familiar face, that of a TV reporter whose life she had once saved. Dilly could ask a really useful question if she had a chance. Fran caught her eye. Dilly nodded.

  ‘Detective Chief Superintendent, a few minutes ago you mentioned that dear little lost girl? Is there any news of Livvie?’

  What a good woman.

  ‘I wish there was. Ladies and gentlemen, every hour is now critical. However much you want – need – to cover this truly horrible story, I implore you to keep Livvie before the public eye.’ She suddenly recalled the decision to move the focus away from Kentish horses and stables. ‘As you’re aware, we’re now following leads on the continent. So any digital media cover that reaches expats in France and Spain helps us. Without your help, without their help, we may not find her in time.’ She swallowed hard, moved by her own emotion. Only then did she get to her feet. Her stagger on her weak leg was genuine, not stage-managed, though it could scarcely have happened at a better moment. Even as she limped out, she wanted to scream and shout a telling postscript: that if the government imposed even deeper financial cuts, a poorer police service would inevitably ensue. But as long as she was in the team, she had to be a team player. She zipped her mouth.

  She couldn’t face going back to her office, not with Murray still there. And she had a terrible suspicion that her emotional appeal for news about Livvie had made her mascara run. The loo again.

  As she headed that way, Ed Chatfield almost literally ran into her. He didn’t give the impression he’d noticed anything amiss; he was positively pulsing with energy.

  ‘Progress, Fran. I wanted to tell you myself. Progress. No, we’ve not got her back. Sorry if I raised your hopes. But we’re a step nearer. Ray’s on to it now.’

  Was that how you got to be a superintendent these days? You got to give the good news while someone else did the legwork? But she liked him too much to bark, and she was afraid Ray would sense a snub if anyone else took over what he saw as his territory.

  ‘Excellent. Now, I could do with a coffee, but someone’s sorting out a glitch on my computer so I can’t use my office. Can we grab something from the machine and take it to that shoebox they’ve allocated to you?’

  He looked surprised, but walked with her to the nearest dispenser, pulling a face as he looked at what emerged.

  ‘It’s not exactly top of the range. Hey, have you seen that hi-tech machine that Wren uses?’ He let her into his office and pushed forward a couple of non-matching chairs.

  She eased herself into the more upright one. ‘You’ve been favoured with admission into his nest, have you? Whoops, forget you heard that word. His sanctum, I mean.’ She felt obscurely irritated that she hadn’t known. When had this happened? Why? Was Wren trying to undermine her authority?

  ‘Only the once. When I was summoned I felt like a naughty boy called to the head’s office. Then I didn’t. He’s such a politico, that man, isn’t he? He just wanted to find out how one of his old muckers was getting on – he was dead chuffed to hear he was still just a DCI. He likes a bit of status, your guv’nor.’ He paused, looking at her sideways. ‘Talking of status, are you going after the new job?’

  ‘Depends which new job you mean,’ she said carefully. Was it something she’d want to discuss with a comparative stranger, anyway?

  ‘Running the combined Kent and Essex MIT?’

  ‘Oh,’ she asked casually, ‘is that official yet?’

  ‘Not yet. Any moment now, I’d have thought. I might just give it a go. But not if it’s yours for the asking.’

  ‘Absolutely not. And to be honest with you, Ed, it’s a job for someone younger than me: someone with five or six years of their life to devote to that and nothing else. You’d need to build a team full of resentful potential rivals; you’ve got the geography to worry about, with our dear old friend the M25 getting in the way of everything; you’ve got major cuts when you need expansion – oh, and you’ve got to factor in the new crime commissioners and their budget preferences, not to mention new chief constables.’ There: she’d just signed her resignation letter, or near enough. ‘But don’t,’ she added with a suddenly cheerful grin, a weight lifted from her shoulders, ‘let me talk you out of applying – you’re just the sort of person who should be leading it. If I had any influence, which alas, I don’t, I’d put in a good word for you.’

  ‘You mean that, don’t you, Fran? Thank you.’ He sounded more emotional than she’d expected. Poor man, thinking he was going to have to tackle an old dragon. ‘Anyway, I’m going to burst if I don’t tell you this, Fran, bad coffee or not. Your Mark did some sort of reconstruction exercise with those elderly tennis players this morning. And one of them remembered Stephen Harris making or taking a phone call.’

  She narrowed her eyes. ‘Which wasn’t disclosed at the time.’

  ‘Quite. Mysteriously he’s lost the mobile in question – yes, we’ve got that far. We’ve talked to him again. He conceded he’d maybe taken a call. Something about loft insulation, he said. But we’re nosy buggers, aren’t we, Fran – so we’re checking with his phone company. Someone’s on to it now.’

  ‘We’ve already got an account of his movements, haven’t we? All confirmed by CCTV, as I recall. Thanks for this, Ed. It’s nice to have good news for once.’

  ‘You�
�re sure it’s good?’

  She looked him in the eye. ‘You are, aren’t you? The trouble is, despite all our efforts, the story may have gone off the boil after this morning’s announcement.’

  His face was ludicrously blank. Carefully, tactfully blank. Wouldn’t even utter the words Ashford and skeletons, would he?

  ‘Oh, we know it wasn’t Kent Police’s finest moment, admitting we’d only ID’d half the poor little buggers. A total balls-up. At least we could fob them off with that stuff about Somerset and Staffordshire. A genuine mass murderer. They lapped that up. Actually, I ended up plugging the Livvie story.’

  ‘Thanks.’ His phone went. ‘Do you mind if I take this?’

  Of course she didn’t. Especially as it was very short, and the moment he cut it, he asked, ‘Do you fancy a walk to the Incident Room?’

  TWENTY

  Mark ought to have felt something, surely – exhilaration, maybe, for having helped conjure the memory of a simple phone call that might help the search for Livvie. The thrill of the chase, albeit at second hand. Instead it was as if someone had pulled an invisible plug, all his emotion draining away. What was the point of playing on? He knew better, however, than to go back into – he almost called it work! He certainly knew better than to intrude on Fran’s territory just at the moment: MIT would be going round like headless chickens, and Ray and Ed Chatfield would be too busy with the information that Alex was giving even now.

  Belatedly, when he thought it would all be official, he’d texted Fran with the news: all she’d had time for was to send a couple of XXs.

  As if equally weary, the rest of the Golden Oldies played in an increasingly desultory manner until their usual session time was up. He’d been a focus of attention, but as he’d rightly protested, all he’d done was float the idea of a reconstruction, and in any case he’d never dealt well with admiration. Now he was afraid that people were letting him score points he hadn’t entirely earned.

  He dragged himself back home, Fran’s poor car protesting at the indignity of being bounced around the track potholes, showered and then did what he’d promised himself he would do – he made an appointment with the practice nurse to have his ears syringed. Tomorrow, please? Not for another week, the receptionist declared with unnecessary fierceness: he had to undertake to put drops in his ears every single night, something he’d loathed ever since he was a child.

  Now what? He looked at his watch, but it had stopped – again. He was almost tempted to nip into Maidstone or Canterbury to buy another, but he thought of Fran’s chagrin if he did. Caffy’s too, of course – she’d feel guilty if she ever found out.

  The kitchen clock told him it was time to stare at the contents of the fridge to decide on the options for lunch. Surely by now he ought to be used to having time for such choices, and time to eat in a civilized manner without sharing a table top with half a dozen folders, the contents of which he should have mastered a week ago. It was time to stop feeling guilty about being free to relax. He’d have to have another talk with his therapist about it all.

  Meanwhile, and his heart lifted as he saw who was phoning him, here was the next best thing to a therapist – or, come to think of it, a better shrink than anyone with letters after his or her name he’d yet come across. ‘Caffy?’

  ‘Hi, Mark. Are you OK? Bored enough to share some of that food you bought during your supermarket run on Saturday? Great. I’m on my way.’ End of call. That was Caffy for you.

  A flan warming in the oven, he was still mixing salad dressing when she arrived. She washed her hands and laid the table, one of the family – and soon, of course, to be his best woman. He was aware of being under scrutiny as he tossed the salad.

  ‘Are you OK? You’re so deeply involved in this abduction case but haven’t any power: how does it feel?’

  Trust her to go for the jugular. ‘It’s weird. Very weird. But I can’t say I’d want to be back in my old job. An assistant chief constable is so remote from real people, which was why I joined the force in the first place – and I should imagine that when they finally appoint a replacement, whoever picks up the poisoned chalice will find it overflowing with budgets and redundancies. Not my thing at all.’ Nor Fran’s.

  ‘You’d need to be a Manager, with a capital M,’ she agreed, sliding easily into her next question. ‘And how is Fran, with all this business about the skeletons hitting the media? Didn’t you know? Oh, of course, your tennis morning. Well, as far as I can see, every radio news bulletin is leading with it. And presumably all the TV cameras in Kent will be zooming in ghoulishly on the same bit of Ashford.’ They exchanged a grimace.

  ‘She’ll cope. She always does. But then, she’s always had a supportive boss in the past – the old chief constable was a fully-signed up member of her fan club.’

  ‘That guy who wanted to usurp my position as best woman, and ended up offering to escort Fran up the aisle instead?’

  ‘The same. He’s off helping to organize the police force in Mali or somewhere, but he’s promised to be back in time.’ Is that what Fran would want to do, when she had to leave Kent Police? Go and sort out some unsuspecting developing country? Or would she really want to hang up her handcuffs finally and for good?

  ‘Lucky Mali,’ Caffy said dryly. ‘And Fran had you, of course. To support her when you were her boss.’

  ‘I suspect I spent as much time bollocking her as being kind.’

  ‘That’s not how she tells it – and why would a woman like Fran want a sadist as a husband?’ She fetched plates and set them on the table. ‘Now, before I forget, here’s your watch. Wow, that’s a posh one,’ she added, eyeing his wrist.

  ‘Posh but useless. It keeps stopping. Now I’ve got the other one back I’ll get this repaired. I’ll just get yours from the safe and then we’ll eat, shall we?’

  She raised a hand to stop him. ‘If you don’t mind, it can stay where it is. I can’t see myself ever wanting to wear it again, but to get rid of it seems like tempting providence. Meanwhile, I bought this classic timepiece at a garage.’ She dug it out of her bag and put it on with a theatrical flourish. ‘Ta, da!’

  ‘So things are looking good with this new young man?’ He took the flan out of the oven and put it on the table. ‘Sit and dig in while you tell me. Alistair, is it?’

  She blushed vividly. Caffy, blushing? ‘I wouldn’t tell anyone else this, especially Paula, but every time I pass an old ruin I eye it up to see if we could rescue it together. Pathetic or what? Hey, is this some of your home-made bread?’

  In other words, end of conversation about Alistair.

  ‘So the media still think we’re following up leads in France,’ Ray was saying as Ed and Fran slipped into the incident room.

  ‘Those of them that aren’t high as kites on theories about our serial killer and our failings in that regard,’ Fran cut in dourly – better it came from her than anyone else. ‘Hell’s bells, what a cock-up. Let’s see if we can do better with this one. Let’s have that good news, Ray.’

  He didn’t need any more prompting. ‘Thanks to Mark Turner,’ he said, ‘we now have information that Stephen Harris, the man with the cleanest teeth in Kent, may not be the lily-white boy all the way through. He made a phone call halfway through a tennis match. He’s since “lost” his phone, of course, but his provider’s records show exactly when and to which number he made it. And three guesses who owns the phone with that number. Right: Ross Thwaite. According to the surveillance team, he’s working on the Livingstone estate this morning, just as you’d expect. He arrived in his four by four; Snowdrop is still safe in his stable.’ He looked from Fran to Ed, and back again. ‘Are you happy to leave him there – Thwaite, I mean, not the horse – or are you ready to start talking to him now?’ If he’d had his way, Fran thought, he’d clearly have had him in for questioning, preferably under the cosh with a bit of waterboarding thrown in.

  Fran watched Ed evaluating the response of the joint team. Although she outranked him,
she knew she’d let him make the decision, and she’d back him, against vocal opposition if necessary. He was the one who spent his professional life chasing paedophiles; she was just an old Jill of all Trades.

  But he was looking to her – not for guidance, surely, but more for approval. ‘My feeling,’ he said slowly, ‘is that we let him be. Still. I know it goes against the grain, but there’s still just an outside chance that she’s OK, and he may yet lead us to her. If he goes anywhere out of the ordinary we’re tailing him. If he simply goes home and gets his supper like any normal man and puts his feet up to watch the telly, perhaps then it’s time to call on him. In fact, I’d say it is. Wouldn’t you?’ He turned to Fran.

  ‘Absolutely. Surround his cottage completely and silently. Get him. Oh, and make sure the RSPCA are on hand to look after Snowdrift.’ She smiled ironically. ‘In the meantime, as before: the man so much as sneezes and we know. Hard if he takes to the woods, of course,’ she mused.

  One of the CEOP team shook her head. ‘Not if he goes in his 4×4. Tracking device,’ she added briefly. ‘And there’s a listening device in place in the cottage. Just trying to get permission for a phone tap even as we speak.’

  ‘Excellent.’ There was nothing else to say, was there? She’d better go and check on those skeletons. And maybe – she checked her watch – pick up a sandwich.

  The media team were in overdrive, involved in damage limitation, drafting statements and making encouraging noises about interviews. Fran longed to phone Don Simpson, to see if he was up to fronting a press conference, but she restrained herself: the man was entitled to his sick leave. But she phoned anyway, just to let him give his trenchant opinion on the situation. Predictably this involved a satisfactory stream of invective directed at anyone involved in cost cutting and putting budgets before the needs of victims’ families. All highly un-PC, but if she’d wanted a polite conversation she’d have spoken to Wren, wouldn’t she?