by Clare Curzon
The house phone cut through her miseries. He’d heard it from the garden, mouthed at her through the window, ‘I’ll go,’ and waved her to stay put. Not that she’d any intention of moving. The calls were always for him. That’s all his replica woman could use to reach him now, since he must stay on guard-dog duty at home.
She turned on her side, straining to catch any part of his conversation in the hall. He seemed tense, listening, now and again grunting agreement or demanding clarification. There was little there for her to construct what was under discussion, or to guess who was on the other end. Just a few isolated words and one more urgent enquiry.
‘Who was it?’ she demanded when he’d rung off and came in to ask if there was anything she wanted.
‘Just Dougie, about some patients. The locum who’s supposed to come fell off her horse and can’t come for a couple of weeks. So he’s badly pushed.’
‘You want to rush back and fill the gap?’ Her voice was acid.
‘No. My place is here with you, love. They’ll simply have to manage. Still, I can’t help wondering just how.’
‘Who’s Emily?’ She had picked up the name from his conversation. The question was abrupt. She heard the suspicion in her own voice but couldn’t contain it.
‘One of my special patients.’
‘What’s special about her?’
‘She’s very frail. I like to keep in touch.’
‘Normally you see her every day?’
‘As often as I can.’
‘Is she beautiful?’
He smiled. ‘Yes, I suppose she is.’
Watchful, she didn’t miss the brief wistfulness of his eyes. I hate her, she decided. Beautiful, frail, loathsome Emily, if I had a rag doll I’d make a pin cushion of you. But he can’t see you now. I am the one he sees every day. And I won’t relinquish him.
‘She’s nearly ninety-four,’ he said, turning away, so he never saw the bitter scorn on her face at his words.
As if she’d believe anything he said! His face had given him away. Such treachery, pretending he’d never looked at any woman but herself. That last thing he’d said was a lame attempt to put her off the scent. But at least she was named now, the woman he visited every day, cared for, made love to, deceived her with. A strangled sound escaped her.
He turned, ready to give comfort, but met fury in her eyes and was rebuffed. He couldn’t take her in his arms when she was like this. He knew there had to be these moments of fierce rebellion. He’d seen it in other patients faced with finality, but here it was too close to him. He was involved and could not cope.
‘I’ll see what Edna’s left out for our lunch, shall I?’
She said nothing, screwing her fists into the cushions, and he went away.
He was clever. That was generally accepted. And this clever man had kept his affair from her until now. Surely somewhere hidden among his things there must be more evidence of his deceit? Letters, love tokens which this Emily had given him. If she mattered so much that he had to insist Dougie look in on her, surely they’d have exchanged gifts or sent notes.
Later, if she wasn’t feeling too awful, she would look through his desk and the cupboards in his dressing-room. Only she’d have to make sure he wasn’t around. She’d send him out shopping and make it sound urgent. For something special she couldn’t trust Edna to choose for her.
Oh yes, two could play at being clever.
Thirty-six hours of searching the stationery warehouse had produced no traces of Micky Kane having been there, and permission was given for normal business to resume. The computers were still with Thames Valley’s own technical experts who were trying to access connections between the boy and Allbright. Their time had been eaten into by the necessity to find two replacement computers and download current stock lists from hard disk for transfer to them.
Chief Superintendent Perry was almost apoplectic over fears of a lawsuit for malicious harassment, demanding compensation for loss of income. The public were so litigious these days. It was bound to ensue if no valid case was ever made against any employee of the company.
As a result, relations between him and Yeadings’ team were in a delicate state of balance, which Salmon’s bullish style was in hourly danger of upsetting. Nothing would persuade him that Allbright, once in his sights, should be allowed any benefit of doubt, although they’d had to release him after questioning. The investigation appeared to have stalled for lack of evidence.
It was at this point that a late sighting of Micky Kane was claimed by an anxious woman just freed from the bedside of a heavily pregnant daughter with pre-eclampsia. With the baby now successfully delivered, the relieved grandmother had been able to catch up with back issues of the local newspaper.
‘It was him all right,’ she told the duty officer. ‘And I didn’t like the look of it. If the lad hadn’t got away by scrambling over a fence I’d have felt compelled to protest.’
‘So you’re sure this boy was the one found floating in the river next morning?’
‘Oh, without any doubt. It was his clothes, see? Just like it said in the paper. He looked as though he had his dad’s trousers and jacket on. And an outsize dad at that.’
‘Was he wearing shoes?’
‘Well, of course. Or maybe boots. Big clumping things. Like I said, he went over a fence, but he hardly made it because of his bulk.’
‘If you’ll just take a seat, I’ll get someone from CID to see you.’
It was Beaumont who took the call and came straight down. He showed her into a vacant interview room. ‘Mrs Durrant? Can you give me a time for this sighting?’
It was, she was sure, about 7.30, at latest 7.35, on the Saturday evening. That was when her number 334 was due in at the bus station, and it had been right on time when she picked it up in Mardham village. It was only ten minutes’ walk to the hospital from where it dropped her off, and this was about half way, by that vacant lot behind the Odeon car park. Visiting hours had been extended for her because her daughter was so ill.
‘And the boy was running away? Can you describe the man chasing him?’
She shook her head vigorously. ‘Oh, it wasn’t a man, Sergeant. It was a woman. I suppose that’s why she didn’t go over the fence after him. She had a longish skirt on, see.’
‘A bit inconsiderate of you, Mike,’ Prof Littlejohn had boomed down the telephone. ‘This is high season for poor old pensioners going down with pneumonia. I don’t need you cluttering up my morgue with your gratuitous bodies. Still, since you ask so nicely, I’ll find a slot. How does 10.30 tomorrow suit you?’
‘Policemen can’t be choosers.’
‘Ungrateful beggar. Everyone at home doing well?’
‘Flourishing, thanks. And your lot?’
‘Ginny’s picked up a verruca at the leisure pool and for some reason thinks she should be immune. Seb’s pockets must have even larger holes in them now he’s up at Oxford. I guess that’s par for the course.’
Yeadings laughed and rang off. The pathologist, tragically widowed eight months back, was immersing himself in the twins’ activities as compensation, choosing to make a comic saga of their exaggerated misfortunes, and covering real grief with a carapace of determined cheerfulness. The daughter, kind child, had opted for a gap year before taking up her scholarship at UCL, and Yeadings guessed that there was a pact between her and Sebastian to keep their father bolstered with gossipy trivia.
Remind Nan to invite the Prof for dinner soon, he wrote on his desk pad.
‘Did you get that?’ he asked Beaumont. ‘Tomorrow, at 10.30. It could be a long session, in view of the state of the body.’
‘Disjointed data,’ was the inescapable pun. ‘I guess it’ll be me attending,’ the DS complained.
‘Meanwhile, follow up this latest thing on Micky Kane. What do you suppose he’d done, to be chased by a woman?’
‘Could she have recognized the clothes he was wearing? Maybe family or a neighbour of the man he’d pinched t
hem from? But what was he doing down by the Odeon car park?’
‘Making for the vacant lot? Coming from the cinema? How much money had been left in the clothes he made off with? This sighting was roughly three hours after he got away from the hospital. Where better to spend the time anonymously on a bitterly cold night?’
‘I’d go for that, sir. There should have been three fivers and some loose change in the man’s pockets. If Micky was desperate he wouldn’t have hesitated to use the money. And in the Odeon he could get a snack to tide him over. Anything to put off contacting Allbright again.’
‘So perhaps he didn’t. It could be someone else who raped and killed him, and we’ve been barking up the wrong tree. Get down there with a PC who’s familiar with the beat. Find out who hangs around that waste ground; if any tramps doss down there. It’s meant to be fenced off, but there could be ways of getting in. Since Micky left no fingerprints at Allbright’s house, this is possibly where he spent the intervening time.’
‘And where he got the drugs?’ Beaumont slid off the corner of his desk, patted his pockets and reached for his sheepskin. Sergeant Bird kept the beat records and would recommend a local man. It seemed a worthwhile angle to follow up.
DI Salmon thought he had a cold coming on. Sweating, he’d turned the heating down in his office, and now he couldn’t stop shivering. Also his throat felt it had been scraped with sandpaper. With two ongoing major investigations begun, this was no time to feel under the weather.
This damned female suicide. At least they’d a suitable Misper to fit that. He had stayed on last night until the body was photographed and delivered to the morgue. There he’d watched her clothes bagged and had brought them away with him. Now he expected Beaumont to list and check them against what the Judd girl had last been wearing.
Snag One was that the mother hadn’t seen her leave the house and had only the skimpiest idea of what hung in her daughter’s wardrobe. Snag Two was that Beaumont had gone off on some errand for the superintendent and wasn’t answering his mobile. That meant using Zyczynski. Better she should burrow through the unpleasant garments than himself. Women’s things, after all. Where was the wretched girl? Got in the way when there was work to be done, and now when she might have been of some use she’d gone missing.
He rang through to Yeadings’ office. ‘Is Zyczynski by any chance up with you, sir?’ he demanded.
‘Not at present, but I was thinking of sending for her. You sound as if you could do with a coffee, Walter. I’ll start the machine up.’
Slightly mollified by the use of his forename, Salmon admitted that a large mug of Yeadings’ special mocha wouldn’t go amiss. By the time he was seated with this in his shivering hands he found his nose was irrevocably blocked.
The Boss noted his pallor and snorting speech. He reached into his lower drawer for the bottle of single malt, uncapped it and waved it at his DI. ‘It’s a bit early, but it’ll help you get through the rest of the morning.’
A light tap on the door announced DS Zyczynski. Salmon opened his mouth to despatch her to listing the clothes, but was overtaken by a fit of sneezing.
‘Have a seat, Rosemary,’ Yeadings invited. ‘Your coffee’s on the windowsill. I thought we should have a meeting.’
It wasn’t time wasted. Salmon, listening intently, had to admit that the Boss had it all at his fingertips. He dealt the new death a dismissive ‘nothing we can do until we’ve an ID. Apart, of course, from a meticulous search of the college and questioning of all in the building from Sunday pm onwards. Someone there must have seen her at some point. It would help if we knew how long the body had lain there. Due to sub-zero night temperatures that won’t be easy for the professor to determine.’
He then went on to summarize progress on the Micky Kane investigation. ‘We’re badly in need of witnesses. There’s little doubt that Allbright was the enticer codenamed “Hutch”, and it’s vital that we find the computer he used to communicate with the boy. It’s possible he has got rid of it or had the hard disk replaced. He’s had time enough. And I agree with the assumption that he met Micky on the same morning he skived off school and brought him back here either by car or on the bike. But not, apparently to the house. Wherever he took the boy, he appears to have relieved him of his schoolbag and the things in it. It’s likely Micky had changed out of his uniform before they met up.
‘We have to find the alternative place Allbright took the lad, and it’s there we just might find the computer, if it still exists. So has the man access to a country cottage, or a lock-up garage, an allotment shed, or workshop: somewhere that he’s managed to keep in the dark? What were his hobbies outside the home? The search has to go on, spread wider.’
‘There’s this gap,’ Z said as Yeadings paused. ‘Four days between his leaving home and being picked up drugged and unconscious. His parents had tried to keep it low key, hoping he’d come back on his own. The Met police were informed, but it was kept out of the papers. A pity, or we’d have been on to him more quickly I’ve spoken again with the nurses who looked after him in ITU. They’d noticed no evidence of sexual assault. But then they hadn’t specifically looked for it. They’d enough to do with detoxing him and keeping him going.’
‘So you’re suggesting that up until then Allbright had been guilty of no more than abduction of a minor?’ Salmon sounded to be choking equally with indignation and catarrh.
‘It’s a possibility,’ Yeadings gave as his opinion. ‘Professor Littlejohn stated that the abuse was recent. It could have happened after he escaped from the hospital, either before or after the woman was seen chasing him. Beaumont is checking on that area now. Until we know more we can’t assume that Allbright ever caught up with him again.’
Salmon looked as if all the stuffing was knocked out of him.
Chapter Twenty-One
Alyson slept late, having been restlessly awake for over an hour from some time after two, and then visited with disjointed, disturbing dreams. Waking, she had no precise memories of them, only a vague sense of unease. She supposed that Sheena’s disappearance was connected with it.
Smelling coffee and warm yeast as she came out of the bathroom, her hair in a terry turban, she found Ramón had laid the table for breakfast and heated some flaky croissants.
‘This is pleasant,’ she said, sitting down. ‘But you mustn’t feel you need to work out of hours.’
‘I eat too,’ he said simply and took the chair opposite.
They ate in silence until something came to mind that she had meant to ask him before. ‘Ramón, that first evening you stood in for me, Sunday. Was there anyone else here, besides Sheena, when you arrived?’
He seemed to consider this. Perhaps, she thought, ‘stood in for’ was an idiom he had difficulty with, but no, he was nodding his understanding.
‘There was nobody,’ he said.
‘I see. In that case he must have left already Or else he never came.’ The only person to know would be Sheena. Except that, surely, the art valuation man would have been in touch with Fitt after his visit. She could ring his office later and set her mind at rest.
‘Emily is bright,’ Ramón volunteered. ‘Brighter, you say?’ He had a way of rolling some of his ‘r’s.
‘That’s right. Bright, brighter, brightest.’
‘We dance,’ he told her shyly. ‘Slow, with wheelchair. And she laugh.’
‘She has a great sense of fun. It’s good for her to laugh.’
‘And sometimes cry.’
Did he mean that that too was good for her, or – ? ‘Emily cries?’
He nodded. ‘Sad life, she tell me.’
It startled her. In all the months she had been here Emily had never confided that much. Or indeed spoken as much as she had done over these last few days. Ramón was bringing her out, rather as Keith had done. Perhaps it was men’s company that stimulated Emily.
It should have occurred to her before, what was missing. Although Emily never married, there had certai
nly been men in her life. Fitt had implied as much. And there had been the illegitimate child born when she was seventeen, which made her run away from home. There must have been so much in her past that no one could guess at. If now she was remembering and speaking of it, did that mean she was regaining strength, or must it be seen as an intimation of the approaching end?
‘I wish I knew more about her,’ Alyson confessed. ‘She’s my great-aunt. That’s my mother’s mother’s older sister, but none of us knew what had become of her until Mr Fitt tried to get in touch with me.’
‘Mr Fitt?’
So she explained. The solicitor had represented Emily for a very long time and knew all her family. There had been a daughter Eunice who lived in Edinburgh, had married and had the daughter Rachel, whom Ramón had met when she called. A distant cousin to herself, Rachel had mentioned an older half-brother and half-sister, Eunice being the second wife of their father.
‘I’m afraid that’s rather complicated,’ she apologized. ‘The trouble is I don’t know any of them really; and little enough about them. But I gather Mr Fitt considers that Emily’s better off at a distance from them.’
But that was only his opinion. She remembered now that Rachel had voiced criticism of the solicitor; some doubt about his management of Emily’s affairs. It was a serious thing even to hint at a professional’s dishonesty. Alyson quite liked the man; and why not, since he’d sought her out and set her up here? So did that mean she was partisan, being under an obligation to him?
