by Anita Waller
‘Let’s put it in this one, Nan,’ Kat said. ‘I know Leon knows about this safe, but he can’t access anything in it. It’s not even a moveable piece of furniture, so he’s completely stymied by it. The funny thing is, this was all built at his insistence. I thought it was a bit over the top, but…’
‘The joke’s on him.’ Mouse finished off the sentence.
Doris went down to the garage and retrieved the gun. She checked it was fully loaded and carried it back upstairs.
Five minutes later, the safe was locked, the dressing table put back to its original state.
Mouse hugged Kat. ‘Thank you for trusting us with this. I can’t even begin to imagine the value of all that stuff in the safe.’
Kat laughed. ‘And most of it only worn once. I think it pleased Leon to buy it more than it pleased me to wear it. He also, of course, would have seen it as an investment.’
They headed out of Kat’s bedroom and downstairs, where, after an hour of watching television, they decided enough was enough and headed back upstairs.
Kat slept soundly.
Doris read for half an hour then fell asleep, her book resting for the night on the quilt.
Martha slept, lips occasionally twitching as if trying to smile, apart from the two times she woke wanting sustenance.
Mouse hardly closed her eyes. As temporary custodian of the tiny human, it was important she stayed awake. That night convinced her she never wanted children.
Leon slept intermittently. His mind wouldn’t close down; he needed a plan that would give him access to his wife, and so far he didn’t have one.
Chapter 12
‘Come in, ladies.’ Judy Carpenter’s smile was in place, without reaching her eyes.
The officer designated to accompany Kat and Mouse remained outside, after asking Judy to ensure the door was left unlocked. He even tried it, to satisfy himself.
Kat and Mouse both accepted the offer of a drink, hoping that it would nullify any tension, make their discussions easier.
They waited until Judy had handed them their mugs of tea before speaking.
‘Thank you, Judy,’ Mouse said. ‘We’ve managed to uncover some details, but felt we should come and chat to you about what happens next. Clearly we can’t simply hand the information over, it wouldn’t be ethical. There may be reasons why this lady doesn’t want any contact with the baby she gave away, so we will make the initial approach by letter. What happens after that will depend on her reply.’
‘So you have found her?’ There was no smile, just the beginnings of a frown.
‘We have her name. We are in the process of uncovering details of where she lives.’
Kat’s eyes were glued to Judy’s face, watching for any expressive changes. She saw them. The flicker of triumph. Things were going Judy Carpenter’s way.
‘Tom never disclosed anything about his mother to you?’ Kat queried gently.
‘He never knew anything.’ Judy’s response was a shade too quick, too sharp. ‘He intended to find her, but once the cancer was diagnosed it became very debilitating, very quickly. It was the last thing on his mind to do. It’s why I’m doing it now, in honour of his memory.’
‘And you and Tom never had children? It could be a swaying factor in this lady’s decision about whether to meet with you or not.’ Kat still kept her voice solicitous, gentle.
‘No. We had no children. We didn’t want any.’ Judy’s tone was bordering on harsh.
Kat made a note on her pad. It was for show only.
They both sipped at their drink, and waited.
‘How quickly will you write to her?’
‘As soon as we have an address. We have to go through legal channels…’ Mouse said, and Kat swallowed her mouthful of tea quickly in case she choked. She rather thought that Mouse believed a legal channel to be a large body of water between Dover and Calais filled with lawyers swimming across to France.
‘I see,’ Judy said. ‘So… within a week or so we should know something?’
‘Hopefully,’ Mouse said. ‘We will contact you as soon as we hear from the birth mother, whatever she says. You have to be prepared for her not wanting to meet with you. It is her right to say no, although in these enlightened times it would be unusual for her to do that.’
They finished their drinks and, as one, stood to leave. ‘Thank you for the tea, Judy,’ Mouse said. ‘We’ll be in touch soon.’
‘It has to be about the money,’ Kat said thoughtfully, peering through the rain battering the windscreen. ‘What other possible reason could she have for tracking down Tom’s birth mother? It’s not a normal thing to do, is it? Pamela Bird, at first sight, seems to be a very wealthy woman. Maybe Judy is playing the long game, making friends with her, becoming a part of her life, inheriting eventually. It’s strange, isn’t it, but I believe it would simply take the appearance of little Henry Roy in Pamela’s life to put a stop to Judy’s hopes and dreams.’
‘You’re spot on, but Keeley doesn’t want Judy to know about her and Tom’s affair. We can’t say anything. It’s such a shame because that young man could be a very wealthy young man one day.’
Mouse steered the car onto the drive, and she and Kat jumped out and ran for the shelter of the porch. Their escorting officer waited until they were safely inside the front door before heading back to join his companion for the interminably boring surveillance of the area. Mouse clicked the car locks on, and they crept in. They could hear the strains of Ten Green Bottles as they closed the door, and headed for the lounge.
Doris was on the sofa, cradling a somewhat bemused-looking Martha; not yet able to rustle up a smile, but intent on watching the wonderful lady singing to her.
‘That’s never been a nursery rhyme,’ Mouse laughed.
‘If it was good enough for you, it’s good enough for Martha,’ Doris said. ‘This baby will be able to add and subtract by the time she is four.’
Kat watched the two of them. ‘She’ll certainly be better on a computer than her mother is.’
Kat took Mouse’s coat and went to put them up to dry in the utility room, before returning to her daughter. Doris seemed keen to hang on to her.
‘I don’t get to hold her nearly enough,’ she said. ‘And I certainly feel as though she’s part of our family.’
‘She is,’ Kat said simply. ‘She is.’
By the time they had given Doris the details of their conversation with Judy Carpenter, Martha had closed her eyes for her nap. Kat removed her from Doris’s arms and placed her in the crib.
Kat smiled down at her daughter. ‘It’s almost as though she’s been here for ever, now, isn’t it?’
They switched on the monitor and took the receiver into the kitchen with them. Kat pulled her laptop towards her. ‘I’m going to type up this report while I can still remember everything that was said. My baby brain can get a little fuzzy.’
‘And I think we need to start going through these accounts of the errant Mr Rowe, Nan,’ Mouse said. ‘Let’s see if we can’t find out where he is. Our own lives are on hold until the b–’
‘Mouse,’ Doris said, her finger raised in the air. ‘No swearing, please. Martha might hear.’
There was a humph from Mouse as she opened up her laptop. Inside her head she said, ‘Bastard, bastard, bastard.’
DI Marsden made an appearance later in the day. She didn’t stay long, having said that she was just touching base to reassure them that they were following leads of sightings.
‘And you believe these sightings?’ Kat asked.
‘Not at all,’ Tessa responded, a frown creasing her forehead. ‘He’s far too clever to be seen. But he’ll slip up. And we’ll be waiting. The fact that he’s in this country and every police force in the UK is on the alert for him leaves him with nowhere to go once he moves away from wherever it is he’s holed up.’
‘But don’t you realise what Leon is like, even after all this time?’ Kat said. ‘He will have been prepared for this happening
. Trust me, I know him. He’ll have enough food, water, warmth. Creature comforts to keep him going for a long time.’
‘And he’ll go stir crazy,’ Marsden said drily. ‘We’ve made him so well known that he can’t move out of whatever property he’s found for himself. He’s on every news item, that handsome face is so out there that someone is going to recognise him before too long.’
‘Let’s hope so. We’re just as much prisoners as he is, we can’t go anywhere.’
‘I know.’ There was sympathy in Marsden’s voice. ‘But it will come to an end, and hopefully sooner rather than later. Bibi McLoughlin won’t feel any sort of closure until this evil man is caught, either.’
‘It should be my job to go and see Bibi, offer her comfort.’ Kat’s voice was very low. ‘I can’t even do that for her. I can’t even go to my church to pray for her and everybody else touched by Leon’s actions. He will expect me to do that, and he could be waiting for me. And now there’s Martha to consider…’
‘Have patience, Kat,’ Marsden said, standing and heading towards the door. ‘And trust us. Something will break soon, and it will be Leon Rowe, not us.’
Chapter 13
Ben Charlton was a little late getting home from school. Knowing nobody would be in the house worrying about where he was, he opted for walking home instead of taking the bus. Living in such a remote location meant the bus dropped him off leaving him with a fifteen-minute stroll anyway, so he took advantage of the afternoon sunshine and walked the whole way. The roads and fields surrounding him as he walked were defined by the beautiful dry-stone walling so embedded in Derbyshire and its history.
His mind was partly on the English homework that he still hadn’t finished, and partly on his plans to go down to the river and have an hour’s fishing. He did this most days, filling in the time between his arrival home from school and his parents’ staggered homecomings from their jobs.
His dad, Ray, was a detective constable working on the Eyam murders, and prone to arriving home at odd hours. His mother, however, he could calculate to the minute; she closed her library at six every day except Friday, when it was seven.
Ben unlocked the front door and walked through to the kitchen. Quickly making a cheese and tomato sauce sandwich, he wrapped it in foil and carried it through to the utility room where he kept his fishing tackle. His basket was tidy and he stored his sandwich, two cans of Coke and the maggots removed from the tiny fridge kept specially for the wriggly creatures, before hoisting it onto his back.
It took him about ten minutes to walk down to his preferred spot on the river bank. Over two years of sitting there had seen him hollow out bits of the bank until he had a secluded place where, if necessary, he could put up his small khaki bivouac.
The sun meant such an activity wasn’t called for, so he made secure his chair, popped his drinks and sandwich into the side pockets of his chair and set up his rod and rod rest.
With his alarm set for six, he cast in.
Ben sat quietly, enjoying the moment, then stood and optimistically set up his second rod rest that he used specifically for hanging his keep net; most days he fished and most days he fondly imagined breaking his record of six fish in an hour.
The float wasn’t moving so he pulled it out and recast, then threw a few maggots in the area of the float. He balanced his rod on the rest and settled back into his chair.
It was quiet; no sounds of children running on the path above him, no parents telling them to be careful, they could fall into the water. Life was good.
The river wasn’t wide at this point, and Ben was surprised to see another angler set up on the opposite bank, about twenty-five yards upstream. He watched the older man struggle to get his seat level, but eventually he seemed settled just as Ben pulled out his first catch. It was a small tench and Ben dealt with it swiftly and efficiently, as his dad had shown him so many times, dropping it into the keep net for the next couple of hours.
He cast in again and watched idly as the man opposite caught one then dropped it straight back into the river. Ben acknowledged the catch with a lift of his hand, repeated by the stranger.
The warmth of the late afternoon sun sank into Ben, and he stared across the river and up the banking towards the derelict petrol station standing a couple of hundred yards from where he was sitting. It had been there for ever as far as Ben was concerned, a bit of an eyesore that was boarded up all the way around, and he couldn’t ever remember it being a functioning garage of any kind.
It was while he was musing along the lines of if he had some money he could buy it, do it up and spend the rest of his life fishing this stretch of the river, that he saw movement.
The tiny rear door to the property moved inwards, and at first nothing happened. Ben’s eyes were fixed on the building, his float forgotten in his surprise at anybody being inside the abandoned structure.
A minute later, a tall man stepped over the wooden base below the door, pulling his hood up to cover his head and partially obscuring his face as he did so. Nothing could have hidden the dark skin.
Ben froze. He thought he was out of the man’s line of sight, but he wasn’t sure. The angler on the opposite bank wouldn’t have seen anything; his back was to the petrol station. Ben thanked his lucky stars that fishing was a mainly silent occupation and hoped that the man on the other bank wouldn’t make any sound.
The tracksuited man had exited the tiny door, lit a cigarette and stood for five minutes or so, unmoving, taking in the warmth and the fresh air.
Ben had noticed his float bobbing up and down but chose to ignore it. He sat, motionless. He did not want the black man’s eyes to turn towards him.
Eventually the man ducked and went back inside. Ben breathed easier. He pulled in the float, released the tiny fish back into the river along with the one in the keep net, and took out his phone.
He rang his father, knowing that he would panic as soon as he saw the name Ben on his screen. Ben had never rung his dad at work before.
‘Ben?’ Ray answered immediately.
‘Dad… I think I know where Leon Rowe is.’
Ray Charlton couldn’t think straight. The panic inside his chest was immeasurable as he waited for the phone call from Ben to say he was safely back at home with all the doors and windows locked.
The team had gathered in the incident room and Ray had pinpointed on the map exactly where the tumbledown building was. His phone was in his hand, and there was an expectant murmur in the room as they all waited to hear that Ben Charlton was out of harm’s way. Until that happened, they could do very little. When his phone pinged, there was a collective whoosh of exhalation, of relief.
‘Right, troops,’ Marsden said. ‘The firearms unit will be in position in thirty minutes. The main road going by the property will be closed off here,’ she pointed with her stick, ‘and here. I want this bloody man alive, so let’s hope he doesn’t do anything stupid. But one threatening move towards anybody, and they will take him out. Ben is now safe, although we understand that when Ben left the river bank, another man was nearby. Ben says this angler can’t be seen from the garage, but that also means we can’t see him either. We have to make this man safe before we do anything, so I will take a walk by the place where Ben was, and attempt to speak to this fisherman. Once I’ve told him to go home, we’re clear to get Rowe out of the building.’
Several heads nodded as they listened to her words.
‘Let’s go. I’ll go on my own, it will look less suspicious if he can see that part of the riverbank from the building. There’s never a spare little dog around when you want one, is there?’ she said, glancing around.
The room cleared quickly, and Tessa drove her own car without taking any officers along with her. She had no idea how much Rowe could see from the garage, and knew it had to look as though she was just a casual walker.
Her hair, always worn for work loosely coiled into a bun, was released from its restraints, and she pulled it forward to hide as m
uch of her face as she could. She was aware that Leon Rowe had seen her on a couple of occasions; it would be disastrous if he recognised her. She hoped that the distance was great enough to make her unrecognisable.
She parked her car some way from the road block set up by the team, and walked down the path that followed the river. The detailed description of just where Ben’s fishing spot was had been drilled into her by his father, and she soon found it. Without stopping, she carried on walking, praying that the other angler had given up and gone home.
He hadn’t. She walked along until she was directly opposite.
‘Have you caught many?’ she called across to him.
He smiled at her across the expanse of water. ‘Four today. Put them all back though.’
‘Have you got a name?’
He looked startled. ‘I do. Do you?’
‘I do,’ she said. ‘It’s Tessa. DI Tessa Marsden, Derbyshire police. And you?’
He hesitated for a moment. ‘It’s Malcolm, Malcolm Keane.’
‘Right, Malcolm. Can you hear me? I have to speak quietly.’
He nodded. ‘I can. Is there a problem?’
‘Yes. I want you to act normally, pack everything away and leave the area. Which way will you be walking?’
‘Which way do you want me to walk?’
‘The way that I’ve come. When you reach the road, please make yourself known to one of my officers. I’m going to walk on for a couple more minutes, then reverse my journey. Please hurry.’
Malcolm nodded, immediately threw everything into his basket and dismantled his rod. Within two minutes, he had set off to walk in the direction he had seen the woman walking. He was intrigued; not scared, but he sure as hell was nosy. And he guessed it was all to do with the young lad who had been quietly fishing on the opposite bank then had suddenly packed everything away.
Malcolm’s home was in the opposite direction, but he knew he had to follow the pretty lady’s instructions. Somebody would sort him out when he reached the road.
