Behind Dead Eyes

by Howard Linskey

  ‘High,’ offered Julie Two, ‘she never seemed like she was on something.’

  ‘So, no drugs, no boyfriend, no going out and she got on okay with her old man, even though he is a politician, which must have been a bit embarrassing for her.’

  ‘No, I think she approved of her father,’ said Julie One. ‘One of the girls teased her about him once and she said, “At least he tries to make a difference.” ’

  ‘So she’s proud of the old man,’ he conceded. ‘What do you think caused her to change then?’

  ‘I really don’t know,’ said Julie Two.

  ‘It must have been something that happened back in Newcastle,’ said Julie One. ‘I mean, she was okay when she left at Christmas, but when she came back she was a different person entirely.’

  ‘Did she dress differently after the Christmas break,’ he asked, ‘change her appearance in any way?’

  Bradshaw had met victims of rape and sexual assault who dressed down afterwards. If Sandra Jarvis had taken to wearing shapeless, sexless clothes perhaps this would be a clue as to what had happened to her.

  ‘No,’ said Julie One, looking confused, ‘why do you ask that?’

  Bradshaw ignored her question. ‘Did she ever talk to anyone,’ and when they looked blank, ‘or have a particular friend she was close to? We all need someone to confide in.’

  The two Julies exchanged glances.

  ‘You could try Megan,’ offered Julie One, ‘couldn’t he?’

  ‘He could,’ agreed Julie Two.

  ‘Yes,’ said Bradshaw, ‘I could,’ even though he didn’t have the faintest clue who Megan was.

  Freed from the need to be discreet, Helen went to her editor. ‘Who’s the best person to dish the dirt on politicians in this city?’ she asked. ‘Stuff that dates back a few years.’

  ‘That person is right here,’ replied her editor. ‘No, not me. I mean he is in this building – or at least his desk is. Brian Hilton has been our political correspondent since … oh probably about 1920.’ And he gave her that boyish grin again. ‘He actually started on the paper in the early sixties. He’s your man.’

  ‘I don’t think I’ve met him,’ Helen admitted.

  ‘Not in the office that much, comes and goes as he pleases. I should object to that but he always provides good copy and it’s on time so I cut him some slack. Brian is a bit of a grumpy bastard,’ he conceded, ‘but we’d be lost without him and his contacts.’

  ‘Won’t he mind the new girl tapping him for information?’

  ‘He might not,’ said Graham, ‘if you follow the official procedure.’

  ‘Which is?’

  ‘Wait until his working day is over, then buy him a pint,’ said her editor. ‘He likes the Crown Posada on the Quayside. You can usually set your watch by him.’

  Tom was already standing outside a pub on the Quayside but he quickly realised his walk down here had been a complete waste of time. Sandra Jarvis had worked at the Highwayman before departing for college and returned there to do shifts during the Christmas holidays. Since her personality had changed entirely following that break between college terms, there was a reasonable chance her time at the pub might have had something to do with it. He had gone over the possibilities in his mind as he made his way there: Sandra had been bullied, harassed or possibly even assaulted, she’d had a relationship that had suddenly turned sour leaving her depressed, or perhaps she had been enticed by drugs sold on the premises. None of this sounded entirely plausible to him, but then neither did her sudden disappearance.

  Any hopes Tom may have had about getting a lead from the pub were instantly dashed, for the Highwayman was no more. Despite a prime spot on the north bank of the river a short walk from the Tyne Bridge, it had ceased trading. The door was locked and boarded up, the windows already pasted over with bill stickers advertising gigs. Tom peered through a gap and saw that all of the pub’s furnishings were still there, including tables, chairs and even the beer pumps behind the bar. Whoever ran this place must have left it in a hurry.

  Realising he was going to get nowhere standing outside the abandoned pub, Tom left and arrived very early for his prearranged appointment at police headquarters. They didn’t seem to mind. A helpful junior detective handed him several thick folders. These were full of witness statements, background information on Sandra Jarvis’s life and her movements plus a large number of reported sightings of the missing girl from all over the country, many of which could probably be classed as wishful thinking or mischief making.

  He was allowed the use of a small room to examine the files in private and they even brought him a mug of tea. It had been some time since he had experienced that level of cooperation from the police and he had to admit he was glad of it. They left him to it and he began to read.

  The pub in the market place wasn’t a typical student watering hole. It was an old-school, local boozers’ pub and, when she was not attending lectures, Megan Aitken worked behind the bar there.

  Bradshaw showed her his warrant card and asked her if she had a minute. ‘No,’ she told him in a granite-hard Glaswegian accent, while eying him suspiciously, ‘I’ve lunches to get out.’ There were less than a dozen customers in the pub and none of them looked like they were there for the food.

  ‘I’m sure this strapping young man here can cope without you.’ Bradshaw stopped a rake-thin barman as he passed by and said, ‘You can manage on your own for five minutes while Megan helps me with an important police matter.’

  The youth didn’t seem to know if this was a question or an order so he simply mumbled, ‘Sure,’ while Bradshaw indicated Megan should follow him to a table in a far corner.

  When he told her why he was there, she said, ‘Well I didn’t think it was cos I hadnae paid my council tax but I’ve already had the polis asking me about Sandra, and her disappearance had bugger all to do with me.’

  ‘And we are going over old ground so we don’t miss anything.’

  ‘Good luck with that,’ Megan said sarcastically. ‘Who sent you my way.’

  ‘Some girls that knew both of you. They said you might be able to shed some light on the reasons for Sandra Jarvis’s disappearance.’

  ‘Was it Tweedledum and Tweedledee?’ Though he was poker-faced in response Bradshaw knew she was referring to the two Julies. ‘I bet it was. Why the hell would I know anything about it?’

  ‘They thought Sandra may have confided in you, since you were such good friends.’

  ‘Did they now? Well she didn’t and we weren’t that close.’

  ‘Why did they think you were then?’

  ‘No idea – except they probably thought we were bestest buddies because we were the only two girls on our course who weren’t posh and minted.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Well, I don’t see anyone else doing bar work to survive. There are girls here who spend five hundred a month just on clothes.’

  ‘That must be annoying.’

  ‘It is what it is,’ Megan said as if she didn’t care but she evidently did.

  ‘Did Sandra work here too?’

  ‘We did some shifts together at weekends during term time. She worked in a place in Newcastle during the holidays,’ she thought for a second, ‘the Pirate?’

  ‘The Highwayman.’

  ‘Aye, that was it.’

  ‘Did she like bar work?’

  ‘There are worse ways to get by but you only do it for the money. I’d rather be on this side of the bar but there you go. Sandra felt the same.’

  ‘And when you did these shifts together, when you had a drink afterwards or went for a fag break, she never told you anything about herself?’

  ‘Not really. Certainly nothing that would make me understand why she suddenly disappeared like that,’ said Megan. ‘If she disappeared.’

  ‘What do you mean by that?’

  ‘I mean, if she had just upped and left wouldn’t someone have found her by now?’

  ‘Not if she didn�
��t want to be found. You think something happened to her? Someone hurt her, maybe?’

  ‘Well it seems likely, doesn’t it?’

  ‘It’s certainly a possibility but who would want to harm Sandra?’

  ‘How should I know?’

  Bradshaw was beginning to seriously question the wisdom of interviewing Sandra’s college friends. It seemed the missing girl hadn’t bothered to open up to anyone.

  ‘I don’t suppose there’s anyone you can think of who might know something about Sandra that nobody else does.’ He was clutching at straws.

  Megan shook her head. ‘You’ll have already spoken to her room-mate,’ she said, as if that was obvious.

  ‘She had a room-mate?’ The case files hadn’t made that clear.

  ‘She shared a room in halls with Olivia Barrington but that only lasted for the first term.’

  ‘Why? Did they have a falling-out?’

  Megan shook her head. ‘Olivia wasn’t used to sharing things, was she, so she kicked up a fuss until they moved her and she got her own room.’

  ‘I see,’ said Bradshaw, ‘so where does this Olivia Barrington live now?’

  ‘The Castle.’ Megan said the words quickly and her strong Scottish accent led Bradshaw to assume he misheard her.

  ‘I’m sorry, for a second there I thought you said she lived in a castle.’

  Helen had to walk down Dean Street to get to the pub on the Quayside, a road so steep she was forced to tread carefully to avoid accidentally stumbling into a run. She almost walked past the Crown Posada at first, an ancient, Victorian watering hole with a stone façade, dark stained-glass windows and a single sign above the door to denote its presence.

  Once inside the pub, she headed for the bar while scanning the room for any sign of Brian Hilton. She spotted him soon enough. He was sitting on his own in an alcove not far from the front door. Though they hadn’t met, Hilton was one of the few journalists at her paper who merited his own photo byline and, except for a few extra lines on his face since it was taken, he looked exactly like his picture. The unfashionably long mane of silver hair was recognisable enough even in the subdued light of the Crown Posada’s wood-panelled bar. Helen ordered herself a bottle of beer and ‘a pint of whatever he’s drinking’ and she gestured towards Hilton. The barman poured her a pint of bitter and she took it over, placing it on the table in front of Hilton.

  He glanced at the pint, seemed to take a moment to register it, then looked up at the woman who’d delivered it. ‘Now then, bonny lass,’ Hilton said, ‘what are you after?’

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  While Hilton drained the remnants of his last pint and started on the next one, Helen explained she was a journalist with the same newspaper, because he clearly hadn’t recognised her. Helen wondered when and where he wrote his copy; on the back of beer mats? Perhaps he phoned it in to one of the editors, like the football correspondents when they reported on away matches. She recounted a respectful, heavily edited version of the conversation with Graham about Hilton’s in-depth knowledge of the local political scene. Next she explained her specific interest in Frank Jarvis and the fact that she was helping Tom Carney look into Sandra Jarvis’s disappearance on the councillor’s behalf.

  When she had completed this explanation, Brian Hilton nodded sagely and said quietly, ‘Well, I might be able to help you out there.’ Then she noticed he had almost finished the pint, so she got him another, even though her own drink had not been touched.

  Hilton took a sizable gulp of beer and Helen realised this conversation was likely to be expensive. ‘Frank Jarvis,’ he spoke the name like he was trying it on for size, ‘the kingmaker.’

  ‘Is that what they call him?’

  ‘Amongst other things,’ he said, ‘but that probably sums him up. If you want to know someone who can actually get things done round here who isn’t all mouth and no trousers then look no further than him.’ He drank some more. ‘There are people in politics who can get themselves elected; able campaigners who can muster up support from the grassroots of the party – and there’s only one party round here of course – those are the people who climb the ladder.’ And he counted off the stages on his fingers. ‘Town councillor, borough councillor, county councillor, MP, government minister, and that’s ultimately what they want. Most politicians will tell you, “I came into this so I can change things, so I can make a difference,” ’ another huge swig of beer and Helen waited patiently, ‘but that’s bollocks.’ Hilton thought for a moment. ‘I have seen dozens of politicians come and go and they all want to be important. They love that feeling even more than money or sex. It’s all they care about in fact,’ there was another long sip of beer then he put his pint back on the table, ‘except Jarvis.’

  Helen waited for him to elaborate and when he failed to do so she said, ‘So what does he want?’

  ‘Well, contrary to everything else I’ve just told you, pet, I have formed the impression that this guy actually does care about the city he lives in. Sure, Jarvis likes the sound of his own voice, they all do, but I don’t think he’s that bothered about people kowtowing to him.’

  ‘Is that why he never stood for parliament?’

  ‘Partly,’ he answered, ‘I think that went a long way towards it. He figured he could get more done if he stayed in the region.’

  ‘Better to be a big fish in a small pond?’ she asked.

  ‘Maybe.’ His eyes narrowed just a little.

  ‘But there was something else,’ she said, ‘wasn’t there?’

  ‘Ooh,’ Hilton said dryly, ‘very good. You should be a reporter.’

  She ignored his mocking tone and noticed his glass was two-thirds empty, ‘I’ll get us another drink,’ she said, ‘and you can tell me all about it.’

  Improbably, Olivia Barrington did live in a castle and not just any castle. She lived in the castle. Ian Bradshaw had grown up just miles from Durham city and been on countless day trips there as a child; ambling up the hill to the famous cathedral and castle, which towered high above the River Wear. All this time he had no idea it was possible to live in the actual castle but Megan Aitken assured him it was home to more than a hundred hugely privileged students.

  Bradshaw was still wondering if Megan was winding him up when he arrived at the ancient Norman castle and climbed the steps by the main door. Would this be the student equivalent of one of those tricks played on young apprentices where they were sent for ‘a long stand’ or some ‘sparks for the grinder’? However, when Bradshaw asked a male undergraduate if he knew Olivia, he struck lucky and was directed to the keep’s highest floor.

  Her room had two doors; the heavy outer one was wide open, with the inner one ajar. Bradshaw could hear the B52s on the radio. He knocked loudly enough to compete with ‘Love Shack’ and she called, ‘Come in!’ Bradshaw found Olivia working at a desk by a leaded window, which gave her a stunning view of the Romanesque cathedral opposite and the Palace Green that lay between the two ancient buildings. He wondered if she took it for granted.

  Olivia peered over the top of her glasses at Bradshaw in confusion, having presumably been expecting a friend, not a detective sergeant. Once he told her who he was she immediately stopped what she was doing, got to her feet and gave him her full attention.

  If the two Julies possessed public school accents, Olivia’s seemed to inhabit an even higher plane, as if educated for future employment at Buckingham Palace. She apologised for her unkempt appearance, explaining she was revising for exams and hadn’t even had time to ‘have a shar’ that morning, ‘let alone wash my hair’. Bradshaw found himself mentally translating her words before writing them down and was usually a beat behind her as a result. He wondered how Sandra Jarvis had found sharing a room with a girl who made the two Julies seem almost working class by comparison.

  ‘Sandra was rilly nice and it was very jolly sharing for a time but I’d simply die without my own space,’ she explained.

  Bradshaw nodded and began the
same round of questions he’d asked the other girls. The first ten minutes of his interview were routinely repetitive, with Olivia confirming Sandra had never mentioned particular problems with home, love life or academic studies. Bradshaw was already planning which pub to visit so he could grab a pint after a fruitless day, but Olivia was still talking about how rilly intense university could be. When he happened to mention it was even more pressured for Sandra because she worked in a bar as well, Olivia said, ‘Oh yah, and she worked through the holidays too,’ with the wonder of someone who has never had to work a day in her life. ‘And there was her other job as well.’

  ‘Her other job?’ asked Bradshaw as, once again, there had been no mention of this in the case files.

  ‘Yah, that did sound rather stressful.’

  ‘What other job?’

  ‘The one looking after those poor people,’ she explained, ‘who have had such dreadful lives.’

  ‘What do you remember about 1976?’ Hilton asked, when Helen returned with two more beers.

  ‘It was hot?’ she offered and he frowned.

  ‘Yeah, the heatwave,’ he said, ‘the hottest and driest summer since records began. That’s all anyone ever remembers.’ He seemed deeply disappointed by this. ‘But what else happened in 1976?’

  Helen realised she was being tested. Why would the date mean something to Brian Hilton? She would have been barely five years old, but since they were talking politics she opted for, ‘Harold Wilson resigned?’

  ‘Good lass,’ he replied, and she felt like she was back in her politics tutorials. ‘In March 1976 Harold Wilson resigned as Prime Minister, so there was an election. There was much talk at the time about the new order replacing the old and Frank Jarvis was already seen as the coming man. He was in his thirties, young for a politician but many people thought he was a dead cert to take over from the old MP who was retiring and it was one of the safest seats in the country.’

  ‘So what happened?’

  ‘The seat went to someone else.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because he turned it down. When you’re a politician, everything you say or do is fair game. You’re in the public eye, particularly at a national level. Round here it’s bad enough but we don’t jeopardise long-standing relationships with the local party by reporting every piece of gossip we’re given and there’s always the possibility we’d get sued, which can put a local paper out of business. Down there it’s different.’ She realised he was referring to London. ‘The tabloids don’t have to worry so much about staying on the good side of some new MP and they can survive a few libel cases because they sell a lot more papers than we do. Scandal is their bread and butter. A politician’s career can be over like that.’ He clicked his fingers to show how quickly it can happen. ‘We expect MPs to behave impeccably, even though we know they bloody don’t.’