by Lara Dearman
He picked up Amanda’s file again. Drugs, alcohol, borderline eating disorder, according to her dad. It was all self-harm really. Like those cuts on her arm. He’d read plenty about it in his time, part of the training they did to help them recognise vulnerable youngsters, those at risk of abuse from others – or themselves. They’d learnt about kids who took scissors to their arms and legs, hiding scabs behind long sleeves and trousers. Awful. He shook his head. Did people used to do these things? He didn’t think so, but then parents didn’t used to pay so much attention to their kids. His mother, for example. She’d loved him, cared for him, but there’d been no talk about feelings. She’d always been too busy to give him more than a ruffle of the hair, a kiss on the cheek before bed, a shoo out of the kitchen and into the fields to run wild until teatime. He’d been almost entirely self-sufficient by the time he’d been thirteen. It wasn’t necessarily a better way to be. Just different.
He thought of Ellen. Perhaps he’d let her down by not encouraging her to share more with him. But she had been a happy, well-balanced child. Even as a young teenager she had kept them close, confided in them. It wasn’t until she’d reached fifteen that she’d started to withdraw. By the time she’d left for Exeter University he’d barely known her. It was normal, he’d thought at the time, all part of her transition to adulthood. But perhaps it wasn’t. It was an accident, Devon and Cornwall police had said, after they’d found her. A tragic accident, nothing more. But then they asked him questions, which he hadn’t been able to answer. Was she worried about anything, stressed? Did she have a boyfriend? Friends they could talk to? How would he know? He hadn’t said that. He’d made some comment about teenage girls always being worried and stressed, that she’d mentioned a couple of people in her calls home and he’d ask his wife if she remembered the names, but that she’d only been at university a couple of months, she was settling in, finding her feet and then he’d run out of words. There were none, he realised then, that would help. They’d nodded, smiled sympathetically. Someone had given him a tissue. He hadn’t even realised he’d been crying.
He felt an all-too-familiar tightness in his chest. He had to keep his stress levels in check. He tried to let his memories of Ellen leave of their own accord. If he forced them out they only came back when he was least expecting them. He focused again on Amanda.
It was suicide. Everything was pointing to suicide and everybody on the case was convinced of it. Even her parents seemed to accept it. Young girl, depressed, troubled. It was the obvious conclusion to draw. It was the easiest and the cheapest one too.
He sighed and looked again at the pictures from the scene. Those cuts on her arm, three long vertical lines, a shorter, horizontal one underneath. It looked like some kind of tribal mark, the kind of thing you might paint on your face if you were the Indian in a game of cowboys and Indians. Not that you were allowed to play that any more. Too violent for today’s kids – and they weren’t even Indians, nowadays. Indigenous Americans or something. He sighed again. There was nothing here. Nothing to investigate. The girl took too many pills, for whatever reason, and drowned on purpose or accidently. It made little difference; the end result was the same, after all.
But something didn’t sit right. He needed a fresh perspective.
Which was why he’d agreed to meet with Jennifer Dorey.
She was an interesting one – sharp as a tack. He’d read some of her articles. Well-written, well-researched. The real deal. Presumably she was back home because of her dad, Charlie. Old school, he had been. Fished all his life. Knew the waters around here like the back of his hand. And then tripped and fell off his boat, apparently. He’d raised a couple of questions about that at the time, but in the end he’d had to accept it was an accident. They lived on a bloody island, for goodness’ sake; with all of the beauty and pleasure that brought, you had to accept there was a price to pay occasionally.
He passed Marquis’s desk on the way out.
‘Nose to the grindstone, eh, Marquis?’ The young constable jumped and his pale face blushed a deep red. He made a move to close his computer screen but Michael was too quick for him.
‘Jennifer Dorey, eh? Well there’s a coincidence. What are you emailing her about then?’ By now Marquis was an angry puce colour.
‘It’s just, well, she’s my second cousin, sir, and she was asking me about the case, Amanda Guille’s case, that is, and – and I haven’t said anything, sir. I was going to check with you first.’
‘Of course you were, Marquis. I’m actually on my way to see her right now, but feel free to send her an update from your point of view. Stick to the guidelines, obviously, don’t go giving away all of our secrets, now will you?’
She probably knows more than you do anyway, he thought. He didn’t say it though. No point disheartening the troops.
* * *
He’d arranged to meet Jenny at Bordeaux, and arrived with fifteen minutes to spare. Which was perfect, because he wanted to check a couple of things before he spoke to her. He parked up and walked down to the shoreline, which was swathed in slick brown ribbons of vraic, the islanders’ name for the local seaweed. It covered the wet, leaden sand in thick banks, lighter-coloured branches reaching up out of the piles, like emaciated arms searching for daylight. In the summer, the smell was overpowering, rotting and stale, and the flies were legion. Now, in November, the smell was bearable, almost pleasant, a sea-earth hybrid of salt and vegetation with only the odd sleepy bluebottle taking a break from the tip down the road to hover around a dead fish, scales shimmering between the seaweeds’ fronds.
Michael stood on a patch of wet-cement-like sand, which suckered around his boots, its glassy surface littered with curling sandworm trails. He surveyed the boats being tossed about in the swell. White cabins, bright hulls, red or blue. Never green – at least not dark green, not if you had any sense anyway. Green was unlucky, the colour of the land, not the sea. Superstitious lot, fishermen. Michael remembered a fishing trip with a mate, a part-time fisherman (the rest of the time he worked in insurance, only way to pay the bills). They’d been out half an hour and Michael had thought he’d heard a bell. A bell? His mate had gone deathly pale. He hadn’t heard any bell, he’d said. Probably nothing, Michael had said, probably tinnitus, I’m getting old. But his mate had turned back. A bell, he’d muttered, means death at sea. Sheila had been in a right mood that night. Michael had promised her fresh sea bass for tea.
The Blue Line Express ferry to the mainland was just visible in the distance. He wouldn’t like to be out there on that. Give him thirty minutes being bashed about on a plane over three hours on the vomit-comet any day. Jethou and Herm were shadowy hills on the horizon, Sark invisible, hidden by an ubiquitous, low-lying sea fog. He stood there until the flood stream lapped at his feet, reminding him he had a job to do.
He paced up and down the beach, from the spot where Amanda’s body was found down to the shore and back again, scattering nervous sandpipers as he went, and then over to where several small fishing boats were moored, tied to rings bolted into rocks. He tugged on a rope, seeing if he could pull one in singlehanded. It was cold and oily to the touch, the fibres rough and uncomfortable in his grip. The boat, Little Boy Blue, came towards him, slowly, but it was hard work. Surely too heavy for a slender eighteen year old? He stood for several minutes, contemplating, and then shook his head and walked back to the car, leaving the sand churned over with his footprints.
19
Jenny
Most of the beaches on the island had a kiosk; a small building with a large, open window in the front from where you could buy an ice cream or a cup of tea, a fishing net, a first-aid kit, a bucket and spade. Some of the larger ones at the busier beaches were proper cafes you could walk into and sit down, order a crab sandwich and a glass of rosé from a laminated menu. The one at Bordeaux was just a stone hut with a couple of wooden benches outside, the chalked writing on the board outside faded, the toilets at the back padlocked for the seas
on.
DCI Gilbert was sitting on a bench, his hands wrapped around a paper cup, steam billowing up into his face as he blew on it. He rose to his feet when he saw her.
‘How are you, Jenny?’ He shook her hand, firmly.
‘Well, thank you, DCI Gilbert.’
‘Michael. Please. Let me get you a drink. And a bit of cake, maybe?’
He fetched another coffee and two slices of buttered gâche, a rich, sweet bread made with dried fruit and candied peel. His hands were no steadier than the first time they’d met and crumbs sprinkled over his chin as he bit into the thick slice.
‘So, I hear you’ve been doing some research, Jenny. For a piece you’re working on, eh?’
‘Yes.’
‘Found anything interesting?’
‘Just the usual. Mostly gossip, I’m sure. We’re concentrating on the suicide angle, really. Tying it in with mental health provision on the island. That sort of thing.’
‘Hmm.’ He sipped his coffee. ‘One of my favourite spots, this. At least it was. Can’t really say that now, eh? Used to bring my daughter here when she was little. We’d look for those little pieces of sea glass, all smooth from knocking around in the sea. She called them jewels. Thought they were going to make her rich.’
‘How old is she?’
‘She died.’
‘I’m so sorry.’
He shrugged. ‘Wasn’t your fault.’ He took a picture from his wallet and handed it to Jenny. A short-haired, elfin-looking girl standing on the beach next to a tall, red-haired woman, arms around each other, thumbs up at the camera.
‘That was just before she left for university, a few months before she died.’
‘She was beautiful. And this is your wife?’
‘It was. Sheila. Divorced for, goodness, must be thirteen years now. She remarried and moved to Jersey. Left me for a crapaud, as if things weren’t bad enough!’ He used the derogatory term, meaning toad, which Guernsey people often used when referring to their neighbours in Jersey, but there was no bitterness in his laugh. ‘So, there you go. Nice, sad story for you, eh? Surprised you don’t know it already, all the questions you’ve been asking. I suppose you have some for me too?’ He tucked the photo back into his wallet and looked at her.
Perhaps she shouldn’t have written him off on first impressions. Dead girls probably weren’t his favourite subject.
She asked him about the investigation, whether or not Amanda’s family was satisfied with the results of the post-mortem and where was the police inquiry going now? He answered as she expected: official sound bites, no suspicious circumstances he said, the case would no doubt be closed very soon. He repeated nearly verbatim the official statement they had printed a few days ago. She wasn’t going to get anything here. Not without showing him what she’d been up to and she wasn’t sure she wanted to do that. Not yet. Not until she had something concrete, something more than a few dead girls who looked alike. He was still talking, about the tide.
‘That was the only thing that raised a bit of a flag with me.’
‘I’m sorry?’
‘Well, as I’m sure you noticed, Jenny, it was low tide when Amanda’s body was discovered, yet she was at least halfway up the beach.’
‘Is this something that’s being investigated?’
‘No, it’s not. General opinion is she could have been dead for anything up to a few hours before she was found. So her body could have been washed up and discovered a couple of hours later, after the tide had receded. Certainly can’t find anyone that walked past there in the hours immediately before she was found and, even if we did, it was dark, the body would have been near the water and it’s likely it wouldn’t have been seen. It’s perfectly possible the body had been there for a couple of hours.’
‘But she was soaking wet. Saturated.’
‘She was.’
‘Why are you telling me this?’
‘Well, I’m not. Not officially. Just, like I said, it’s been playing on my mind. You seem the curious type. Thought you might be interested.’ She hadn’t been expecting this. That he might want to work with her. It seemed too sophisticated a technique somehow, for the Guernsey police. It happened all the time on the mainland. The police tipped the press, the press tipped the police, journalists met coppers in bars and coffee shops. But here? She adjusted her opinion of DCI Gilbert for the second time that afternoon.
‘How do you see this working, exactly?’
‘All I’m saying, Jenny, is this investigation is going to be over. Soon. Dead bodies on the beach are bad for the island. We’re under a hell of a lot of pressure from the States to close the case. As far as most people are concerned, it’s a straightforward drowning. Amanda had been in trouble a few times over the last couple of years, as you know, and she’d had some issues with depression. I don’t have the resources to pursue this any further. Not with what I have. Which is three parts speculation to one part gut instinct. And, between you and me, my instincts are often met with irritation. I’m considered something of a pedant.’ He seemed untroubled by this, and took another sip of his coffee.
‘So, what happens now?’
‘What happen now with the case is: the Magistrates’ Court will conduct an inquest, which will most likely return a misadventure verdict, maybe even an open verdict. They won’t call it suicide without a note. That will be that.’ He paused. ‘However, seems to me you’re rather intent on sticking your nose in. Thought we might be able to make some use of each other.’ He gave her a smile, as if he knew that he’d thrown her. A permanent furrow in his brow meant that, even smiling, he seemed to be wearing half a frown. Deep lines radiated from the corners of his eyes. This was a tired man, someone who should have given up years ago by the sounds of things, and yet here he was, encouraging her to look into something the rest of the force had written off, sharing his suspicions with her, inviting her to get involved. There was nothing else for it. She reached down into her bag and pulled out her file on the dead girls and handed it to him. He raised an eyebrow.
‘My research.’
He opened the file and slowly turned the pages.
She left him sitting there reading and walked to the grassy verge at the edge of the beach. She sat and finished her coffee. Waves broke gently on the shoreline and a flock of seagulls wheeled around a fishing boat returning with its catch. Rats with wings, Charlie always called them, on account of the fact that they rifled through rubbish bags, or stood, watching, beady-eyed, as you sat on the sea wall eating your fish and chips. They were bold enough to swoop down and grab at your food, cawing in delight as they carried off a fat, greasy chip in their clutching claws. She’d always thought she hated them, but it was one of the things she had missed in London; the sight of a gull launching itself off the sea wall, its ugly, heavy body transformed in flight to a pair of simple, linear curves, elegant brushstrokes on the horizon, its strange, discordant cries filling the air.
She walked slowly back up the beach, to the spot where Amanda had been found. She stared at the bed of stones and imagined she could see an imprint, like the hollow left in a soft mattress after a long sleep. Stupid. These weren’t even the same stones Amanda had lain on. The tide would have dragged those out to sea, washed them clean, replaced them with new ones. She heard pebbles clattering as Michael made his way over to her. His face was pale, his expression determined, and there was something else there too, stress perhaps, or worry.
‘I’ll be needing a copy.’ He handed the file back to her. ‘Probably best to keep this between us for now. If you’ve really found a connection between these cases…’ His voice trailed off and he shook his head. ‘I don’t even know what to say. I’ll be in touch.’ Jenny watched him walk back to his car, and it struck her then. He hadn’t look worried. He’d looked terrified.
* * *
The demonstration was in full swing. Which was not saying much. Forty or so people gathered outside Sports Direct at the old market, some with placards with the Save
The Islander logo emblazoned across it, a smiling donkey, teeth bared, kicking up his back hooves. Guernsey people were known as donkeys, because of their stubborn nature. Presumably Deputy Tostevin was hoping to harness some of that stubbornness during this campaign. Elliot was in his element, interviewing an elderly man who was leaning heavily on his walking stick (hip replacement, he’d winked at her as he’d said it, she was trying to work out the intended implication). His name was Clive, ex-army, he’d told them proudly, been all over the world, seen it all; absolutely, positively, not a racist he’d said. In fact, he very much liked to visit multi-cultural places, but it just wasn’t right for Guernsey. Not at all, he said. And you can quote me on that. Jenny was finding it hard to concentrate, leaving most of the questioning to Elliot.
‘But I think what Deputy Tostevin is proposing is not a curb on immigration as such, just a change in the laws surrounding Right to Work documentation. Making it more difficult for non-locals to find work here?’ Elliot obviously sensed he was on to a winner with Clive and was going to get some gold star quotes. Jenny was impressed with the way he worked. People liked Elliot, they opened up to him.
‘Well, that’s how we’ll get rid of them, isn’t it? If they can’t work here they’ll go somewhere else, somewhere more suited to, you know, different religions and such?’
Elliot thanked him so much for his time and watched him as he disappeared into the rapidly dwindling crowd.
‘It’s a fucking mess, isn’t it?’ Elliot had turned to her.
‘What?’
‘This whole thing. I wanted to do a proper piece on it, you know. All the shit Tostevin’s been spouting against the facts and figures. Brian wouldn’t let me. Said this is the story.’ He gestured to the people milling about in front of them. ‘Said it was about how people feel, not whether or not there was any truth in it.’
