by Tom Bale
Then came the farewells. Alice gave Ruth a quick embrace, with Evie pressed between them. She thanked Ruth for her help but Harry detected a coolness in her tone, reflecting her awareness that it hadn’t been straightforward altruism on Ruth’s part.
Alice sat down again, desperate to feed Evie. Harry walked with Ruth across the lawn. She dismantled the gun and left the components on the path.
‘Laird’s death,’ she said. ‘Definitely an accident?’
‘Absolutely. I had nothing to do with it.’ He was trembling, he realised, light-headed with indecision.
‘I don’t mean that. Could it have been deliberate, on his part?’
Harry considered it. ‘I don’t think so. It was dark, slippery. He just misjudged the terrain, same as me.’
Ruth nodded thoughtfully. Harry felt she was waiting, as if she knew he had more to tell her.
He formed the first difficult sentence in his head and opened his mouth to say it, just as Ruth blurted out: ‘He told me about Benjamin.’
Harry gulped. ‘Did he?’
‘Turns out he viewed the whole, uh, experience very differently to the way I did. I was the bad parent, not him.’ She sniffed, harshly, and forced a smile. ‘Benjamin’s been raised by Laird’s half-sister. She’s bringing him up as her own.’
Harry couldn’t speak, so he nodded again. ‘Do you …’ He coughed. ‘Do you know where to find her?’
‘No idea. I didn’t even know he had a half-sister. Anyway, Benjamin has a new life. He won’t remember anything about me.’ She looked him in the eye. ‘I can’t disrupt that, just for my own selfishness, can I?’
Harry waited through an agonising pause, the emotion churning up his insides, before he said, ‘Will it go on torturing you, if you don’t find him?’
Ruth gave him what was possibly the saddest, bravest smile he’d ever seen.
‘I’ll try not to let it. That’s the best I can say.’
‘Good.’
‘Yes.’ The smile persisted, against all the odds. ‘Nathan’s given me a chance for closure. It would be crazy not to take it.’
Harry matched the smile, and knew that the secret had to die with Laird.
‘It would,’ he said.
Eighty-Three
After a crushing hug of farewell, and thanking her again for saving Evie’s life, Harry watched Ruth walk out of sight around the side of the house. Then he returned to Alice and made the phone call. He kept it brief, downplaying the scale of the incident, just as Ruth had suggested.
The first uniformed officers found them ten minutes later. One looked distinctly pale, having tried to administer first aid to Foster and Bridge. Soon there were paramedics out front, along with a second police car. Within an hour that had multiplied to more than a dozen vehicles, once the first officers on the scene established the number of casualties and declared this a major incident.
You’re not kidding, Harry thought to himself. After a brief conversation the officer realised he was talking to potential suspects, as well as key witnesses, so they were politely cautioned and asked to change into paper suits so their clothes could be taken away for forensic analysis.
They undressed in the garage, as it was virtually the only part of the property that wasn’t a crime scene. A couple of medical staff came to check them over. Harry’s wounded arm was given a fresh dressing, and he gratefully accepted some painkillers. One of the crew rustled up nappies and wipes for Evie. Shortly afterwards an officer brought them hot drinks and sandwiches.
Then they had to wait in separate patrol cars, presumably so they couldn’t collude. To Harry that felt downright cruel, but he consoled himself with the fact that they were, all three of them, relatively unscathed by their experiences.
As the night wore on they watched a stream of incoming personnel: uniforms and CID, ambulance crews and forensic teams, and even a couple of reporters who got lucky – for a while – before being escorted away. Helicopters buzzed overhead, searchlights roaming the trees, adding to the unreal sense of drama. Now it felt more like a movie set than the site of a genuine tragedy.
It was an interminable wait until Harry and Alice were called to sit with a pair of detectives and give their initial statements. Finally, after nearly three hours, they were allowed to sit together while someone arranged accommodation nearby. The detective explained that they weren’t being arrested at this stage, but would be kept under police guard till they’d been questioned at greater length, probably tomorrow. Harry barely listened: he was hugging Alice and holding Evie between them, the poor baby probably mystified by the tears, and the laughter, and the rain of kisses they brought down upon her.
‘When can we leave here?’ Alice had asked, and the detective shrugged.
‘A while yet. There’s someone coming to see you.’
That someone was DI Guy Thomsett. He was an affable, well-spoken man in his thirties who, it turned out, had gone to the same sixth-form college as Harry, albeit in different years. They had a couple of mutual acquaintances, and his ex-wife was a patient at Alice’s dental practice in Portslade. Small world.
After conferring with the local detectives he returned with the news that he was driving them to a hotel in Ross-on-Wye, where both he and they would be spending the night.
When they drove out they found that the whole area had been sealed off for about half a mile in each direction. An incident room had been set up in a nearby church hall, and the media were out in force. Thomsett warned that the coming days would involve not only hour after hour of meticulous questioning, but also a firestorm of publicity. Help and advice on managing the media would be available if they wanted it – Harry and Alice said they probably would – and a Family Liaison Officer would be assigned to support them. Perhaps they looked dubious, for Thomsett said, ‘Everyone reacts differently. What you’ve been through might affect you for years – or you might shrug it off in a day or two. Until you know which way it’ll go, take any assistance you can get.’
Once they were installed at the hotel, the detective arranged for someone to procure some clothes and toiletries. Then he suggested they have a stiff drink and a chat in their room, while Evie slept like a queen in the centre of a large double bed.
Neither of them declined the offer of a restorative brandy. Thomsett drained his small measure in a single gulp, then went through the current status of the investigation.
A body alleged to be that of Edward Renshaw had been found, grievously mutilated, in the boot of a Range Rover, registered to a company owned by a Mr Michael Baxter, of an address in Cheltenham.
Another man, Dean Warley, was found in the boot of a hired Mercedes, approximately a quarter of a mile from the main crime scene. Although he had sustained a head injury, Mr Warley refused medical treatment and was unwilling to offer any information as to how he had come to be there. He was found to be armed, and placed under arrest on suspicion of a number of offences.
At the house, the two men in the wrecked Mercedes were taken to hospital. The latest news was that Niall Foster had to have both legs amputated, while Darrell Bridge had succumbed to his injuries. Both men had long criminal records, and their recent activity was of great interest to several police jurisdictions.
Mark Vickery was found alive, trussed up in the bushes outside the back door. He’d required medical treatment and was now under arrest and regarded as the principal suspect.
His sister, Sian Vickery, had been found inside the house in a similar state: tied up, conscious but confused, and she too had been arrested.
A second woman, Nerys Baxter, was close to death when she was discovered, and went into cardiac arrest in the ambulance. The paramedics managed to keep her alive, but currently her chances of survival were assessed as no more than fifty–fifty.
Finally, the body of Nathan Laird – another person of interest, to the National Crime Agency among others – had been found on the treacherous slopes above the River Wye. Arrangements were still being made to recover
the body, which in all likelihood wouldn’t happen until morning.
‘So,’ said Thomsett when that was complete, ‘can either of you give me the tiniest clue as to what’s going on here?’
They told him the whole story, without embellishment, and with only a few omissions. Thomsett’s specific interest was in Renshaw – and what had happened in Brighton. Harry and Alice went through it several times, from each perspective, and kept running into one big unknown: Laird’s motive for the hunt.
‘It has to revolve around this second parcel,’ Thomsett said. ‘A flash drive or something similar.’
‘That’s what Nerys and Michael thought,’ Alice agreed. ‘Maybe they can tell you more when you interview them.’
‘Laird knew, of course,’ Harry said. ‘Hopefully Mark Vickery does, as well.’
‘My hunch is that he’ll be claiming amnesia, but we shall see. What he can’t tell us, sadly, is where this package is hidden. Only Renshaw knew that.’
The question of reprisals was debated briefly. Thomsett felt it unlikely that they needed to worry. Laird was dead. The Vickery siblings would be held in custody, and every effort would be made to ensure they ended up in prison.
‘Still wish I knew what had sparked all this mayhem,’ Thomsett said. His eyes gleamed with a hint – just the merest hint – that he suspected there was more they could divulge if they wanted to.
In particular, the lack of information about Ruth troubled him, just as it had troubled the detectives back at the house. Harry had been pressed to recall every tiny detail about the mysterious interloper: her movements over recent days, her past life, her motives. It felt disloyal, he told Alice afterwards, until he realised how little he knew that might actually help track her down. Where did she live? Did she work? Did she own a car? Was she using an alias? He could truthfully say he had no idea.
Turning the tables, he asked Thomsett about Ruth’s release from prison: had she been let out on parole, and if so wouldn’t the authorities be keeping track of her? What he got back was an embarrassed silence, and the interrogation was over.
Later that night, after they’d spoken to their families, eaten a meal and even managed to relax a little, Thomsett brought news of the police investigation in Cranstone. They had found evidence of Renshaw’s murder at Nerys’s home, but there had been no sign of Michael or his family. No answer at his home address, either. Just as they began to fear that he’d absconded, he turned himself in at Cheltenham police station with his wife – and an expensive lawyer – in tow.
‘I hope now that Nerys does pull through,’ Alice muttered to Harry, ‘if only so she can contradict Michael’s version of events.’
‘Quite.’ Wishing them goodnight, Thomsett turned to go. It struck Alice that he looked nearly as drained as they did. His own room was just along the corridor, and she noticed his shoelaces were already undone, as if he were counting the seconds till he could kick them off—
Shoelaces. Why did that … ?
‘Wait,’ she called, and something in her tone made both Thomsett and Harry turn to stare at her.
‘What?’ Harry asked.
‘I know where it is.’
Eighty-Four
They didn’t go until the next morning, by which time a lot of doubts had surfaced. Alice knew she was going to be very embarrassed if she was wrong, although Thomsett had assured her that it was worth checking. An extensive search of Nerys’s property had failed to locate anything that could account for Renshaw’s second parcel.
Neither Alice nor Harry had slept particularly well, although Evie had enjoyed a remarkably good night. On Thomsett’s advice they ate breakfast in their rooms to avoid the possibility of encountering the media. Alice thought he was exaggerating until she saw a couple of TV vans parked outside. Word had got out that vital witnesses to the incident were staying here.
They were also held up briefly by a flying visit from the Senior Investigating Officer, to whom Thomsett paid due respect. The man himself exchanged only a few words with them, and seemed to have come along merely to look them over, as if inspecting visitors from some exotic but unsavoury foreign realm.
They travelled in a marked 4x4, driven with lights and sirens for long enough to shake off any pursuing journalists. They were in Cranstone by ten o’clock on a cold, dull Sunday morning.
Alice grew tense as they turned into Mercombe Lane, her experiences here too vivid and painful to repress. Harry clutched her hand and squeezed it tight. She turned to Evie, strapped into a borrowed car seat, seeming to need visual confirmation that her daughter was unharmed before she could truly believe it.
There was a huge amount of forensic activity still evident at Beech House. The 4x4 parked next to the footpath and they climbed out, Alice carrying Evie, Harry and Thomsett and the police driver all waiting for her to take the lead.
A cold wind tugged at her hair as she traipsed across the field. It was a damp and miserable day, the horizons blurred by mist. They passed several groups of walkers, most of whom seemed to be surreptitiously observing the goings-on at Beech House.
The mist was thicker in the wood, actual tendrils of it drifting between the trees like some corny 1970s movie set: Sherlock Holmes or Hammer Horror. Compared to this, the hotel room had been the most blissful sanctuary she could imagine. Alice did her best to focus on the safe, reassuring presence of Harry, Evie, and the police, but still she had to keep pushing away the image of Michael bearing down on her. Would coming here set off the kind of psychological disturbance that Thomsett had warned might afflict them for years?
Added to the worry that she’d got it wrong was a fear that she wouldn’t be able to recall the correct place. As it was, the clearing was easy to find. She came to a halt, and tried not to feel self-conscious with everyone’s eyes upon her. Evie was grizzling, so Harry took her and started rocking her to sleep.
Alice turned in a slow circle, trying to picture where Renshaw had stood. He’d made some silly patronising comment, then nearly slipped when he put his foot on a rotten log. She remembered him kneeling down, fiddling with his shoelaces. At the time it had seemed perfectly innocuous. She wasn’t sure now what had prompted her to think otherwise.
A hunch, she thought glumly. Just a stupid hunch.
But then she saw what looked like the right place, the log half-buried in mulch. She hurried over, crouched at the right-hand end and wiped away some of the fallen leaves.
Nothing.
She straightened up, crestfallen. But Thomsett had stepped over the log, and now from the other side he pushed it with his foot. Just an inch or two, but she immediately spotted the corner of a clear plastic bag.
‘Hold on,’ he said, cautioning her not to touch it. He found a twig and used it to brush off the leaves and muck, revealing a memory stick, wrapped in a plastic freezer bag.
‘Bingo, I think,’ he said wryly. Taking no chances, he put on latex gloves and placed the package into an evidence bag.
‘Thank you,’ he said to Alice. ‘This could help a lot.’
‘I hope so. Will we ever get to know what’s on there?’
Thomsett smiled. It was a disarming smile, and Harry had already begun to tease Alice about her susceptibility to it.
‘I’d like to say that you will. But I can’t guarantee it, I’m afraid.’
Eighty-Five
The story didn’t break for another month. Even when it did, they weren’t absolutely certain of the link to that innocuous-looking USB stick.
What led them to suspect a connection was the visit, two days earlier, by DI Thomsett. This was the first contact they’d had since the exhausting round of interviews that had taken place on the Monday and Tuesday following the Wye Valley Killings – as the media had decided to call them.
At the end of that process, Harry had been informed that a number of charges were being considered, and that he would be informed when the investigation was complete. It had been four weeks of constant anxiety. Alice had done her best to
calm him, pointing out that the media had portrayed him as a hero – and the CPS would be pretty foolish to bring charges against a man who’d attacked criminals in order to find and protect his missing family.
Harry wasn’t so sure. He suspected the authorities might welcome the chance to remind the more vengeful sections of the press that mob rule and vigilante justice had to have their limits in a civilised society. In normal circumstances that would have been Harry’s view as well. Not so much if they were going to make an example of him …
Returning home had been far from easy, at first. Home is our sanctuary: it’s the place we rush back to in times of crisis. But this particular sanctuary had been invaded – violated – with far-reaching consequences. Nights were the hardest, jerking awake to every creak and groan; jumping at shadows; obsessively checking that doors were locked and alarms were set and Evie was safe.
Many times they discussed a quick sale: perhaps they should move to a rented property as a stopgap, then search carefully for a new home? Sometimes it was Harry convincing Alice that they should give it a few more days, in case it became easier to bear; at other times it was Alice persuading Harry that central Brighton was so convenient, so interesting, that moving out of town was sure to disappoint. Whatever the argument, no matter who was suffering the loss of nerve, inertia always won out.
The house over the road was a crime scene for nearly a week, invaded by police officers, forensic staff, journalists and TV camera crews. Neighbours were alternately thrilled and appalled; Clare McIntosh became the unofficial spokesperson for the street, and loved every minute of it. She ended up with far more airtime than either Harry or Alice, which was fine with them.
Then the interest waned, and number 43 was boarded up until, on the instructions of its owner, the builders moved in to renovate, prior to a sale.
