A Shred of Evidence

by Jill McGown

  “Maybe not,” said Patrick. “But I didn’t kill her. She was alive when I left, and Erica Cochrane’s told you that. It’s lucky for me Erica saw her—I told her to get out of sight.”

  “A tall order,” the inspector said. “Given where she was. Standing in front of a sheer wall.”

  Her delivery was always the same; always calm, always quiet, unlike the chief inspector, whose emotions, real or manufactured, were on display.

  “What construction do you imagine Mrs. Cochrane put on what she had just witnessed?” she asked.

  Patrick shrugged. “That it was Colin who was with her,” he said.

  “That didn’t bother you?”

  “Not really. She already thought Colin had a bit on the side. For all I know, he has.”

  Lloyd shook his head a little. “And Mrs. Cochrane would then believe that she knew who this ‘bit on the side’ was, wouldn’t she?” he asked.

  “She might as well think it was Natalie,” said Patrick. “Again—for all I know, it was.”

  Lloyd waited for him to say more, but Patrick didn’t see the need to expand on what he’d already told them.

  “That’s it, is it?” Lloyd asked. “This proof?”

  “What more proof do you need?”

  “More than that,” he said. “Mrs. Cochrane saw her husband’s car—naturally she would have thought it was her husband who was using it, and she didn’t tell us that. We therefore have no reason to believe the rest of her story—she could have found a body, couldn’t she? She could be lying to protect her husband.”

  “Not now, she couldn’t,” said Patrick. “She’s known since this afternoon that I was in the car, not Colin. Do you think she would still be keeping quiet about it if she thought I’d killed her? She found her alive, just like she told you.”

  Lloyd nodded, accepting that, and Patrick relaxed a little.

  “But there is still a little puzzle, Mr. Murray,” Lloyd went on. “You see, we can’t work out—and your account doesn’t explain—why Natalia’s shoes were sitting in the depot doorway.”

  And they had his fingerprints on them. The full story, then, the bit he had hoped not to have to recount, but that had always been a forlorn hope.

  “I parked Colin’s car at the school, and I was picking up the envelopes to put them back on the shelf, when I found Natalie’s shoes.” He looked at the disapproving Inspector Hill. “Even I couldn’t let the kid go home in bare feet,” he said.

  Lloyd was looking puzzled now, the animated eyebrows low over his eyes. “But if you went back, in what way does Mrs. Cochrane’s statement that she was alive when she saw her benefit you?” he asked. “For all we know, you went back, discovered that Natalia had failed to keep out of sight, and lost your temper with her.”

  Patrick smiled. “My temper is always exactly where I left it, Mr. Lloyd,” he said. “I don’t lose it. I went back and left her shoes—I didn’t even see Natalie, and I’ve got a witness to that fact.”

  “Couldn’t you have mentioned that earlier?” demanded Lloyd.

  “Well, to be honest, it’s not really going to be much use now,” said Patrick. “But she can clear me, once you find her, because Erica Cochrane saw Natalie alive after I left, and this girl in an Oakland School uniform saw me arrive back, with Natalie’s shoes in my hand. She watched me put them down, and she watched me leave. She knows I never even saw Natalie.”

  Lloyd sighed loudly, and scraped his chair back, getting up. “A girl in an Oakland School uniform?” he said.

  “I tried to find her, but all the kid knew was that she saw me with a pair of women’s sandals in my hand, and then Natalie was found murdered. She’s not been back to school since. All I can tell you is that her name’s Hannah.”

  “How do you know her name at all?”

  “Because I saw her tonight, and one of the other girls told me her name. But she ran away, because she’s petrified of me. I was in the staff room when I saw her, but by the time I got downstairs she had gone. Just … vanished. Her bike was lying on the ground, but she was nowhere to be seen.”

  Lloyd looked less sceptical than he had, but even more sombre. “What time was this?” he asked.

  Patrick did a calculation. “Sixish,” he said. “This Kim girl was with me, but she had gone when I went back. She probably knows where Hannah lives, but I can’t remember Kim’s other name.” He looked at the industrious inspector. “I’ve a terrible memory for names,” he said. “And faces. But you can’t write them down.”

  Lloyd made an exasperated noise. “Does this mean we have to get hold of the register in order to find Kim in order to find Hannah?” he demanded.

  “I know Kim,” said the inspector, almost absentmindedly as she went leafing backwards through her notebook. “Her name is Walters. But if I remember …”

  “Go and ask her,” said Patrick. “She’ll tell you where to find Hannah. It’s crazy—this girl thinks I’m the murderer, and she’s the only person in the world who can vouch for the fact that I’m not.”

  The inspector looked up from her notebook. “You do realize what you’re saying, don’t you, Mr. Murray?” she asked, and went back to her task.

  Patrick’s mouth opened. No, he hadn’t realized what he was saying. That hadn’t crossed his mind. No wonder Erica had been prepared to co-operate. How was he to know, for God’s sake?

  “It’s not my fault!” he said. “I told Natalie to get out of sight.”

  “Hannah,” the inspector said, not even acknowledging that Patrick had spoken. “There’s a Hannah Lewis on the list of girls we got from the drama group,” she told Lloyd. “She’s our best bet.”

  The chief inspector agreed. “Interview suspended, twenty hundred hours,” he said. “In the meantime, Mr. Murray, I’m sure you’ll understand that we must put you in one of our cells.”

  He sounded really upset about that, thought Patrick. But the worst had happened; the bleak future that he had outlined for Erica’s benefit was a virtual certainty. It had always been, really, from the moment he had discovered what had happened to Natalie. There had been moments when he had thought that he had got away with it, that’s all. They hadn’t lasted long.

  But now, unless Hannah had really vanished into thin air, she would be found, and he would at least be able to prove that whatever else he was, he was no murderer.

  “Oh, I understand all right,” he said. “And believe me, I want you to find her.”

  Tom looked up as Judy and Lloyd came in. “No joy on Mrs. Cochrane, sir,” he said. “No one’s at home. The caretaker says she left the school at about six, he thinks. She was working late.”

  “Was she, indeed?” said Lloyd. “And she’s disappeared too,” he added grimly.

  “Who else has disappeared?” asked Tom.

  Things began to fall into place as Judy told him Murray’s story. He had been wrong about Mrs. Cochrane as well, it seemed, but not that wrong. She had been stringing them along, but she hadn’t found Natalie dead. She had found her very much alive, and at it with someone she not unnaturally assumed was her husband.

  “I’ve put out a general alert for Mrs. Cochrane,” said Judy as they drove to where Hannah Lewis lived. “Meanwhile, we may have found our witness, with any luck.”

  Tom had a feeling that whatever luck they had had, and that was precious little, might well have run out. The lorry driver and his mate being able to corroborate Cochrane’s story was luck, he supposed, but he wouldn’t have taken advantage of that. He took a breath. “The DCI stopped me making a fool of myself over Cochrane,” he said. “Didn’t he?”

  She smiled. “He does have a rather unique way of doing people favours,” she said.

  “Then I’ll do him one,” said Tom, with a grin. “Something can’t be rather unique.”

  “Don’t you dare start that!” she said.

  Tom laughed. “Don’t worry,” he said. “I’m not equipped to. I had a teacher who had a thing about that.”

  As he had
gloomily predicted, they did not find their witness. What they actually found was Mrs. Lewis, who almost passed out when Tom identified himself and Judy.

  “What’s happened?” she cried. “Where’s Hannah? What’s happened to her?”

  “Nothing that we know of, Mrs. Lewis,” said Judy, her voice as reassuring as she could make it, given that they had no idea what had happened to Hannah or Mrs. Cochrane. “May we come in?”

  “Where is she?” said Mrs. Lewis again, as they walked into a pleasantly furnished, tidy sitting room. “She went to the school to meet Kim, but she’s not at Kim’s—I just rang. There’s no answer from the school. Something’s happened to her, I know it has.”

  “We don’t know that,” said Mr. Lewis.

  Tom hadn’t even noticed that he was there, but he was. Sitting on the sofa, silent until that utterance. For all Tom knew, invisible until then.

  “Try not to worry,” said Judy. “We think she may just be with a friend—she may have been mistakenly frightened of someone. We’ll find her, don’t worry. In the meantime, can you tell me what Kim said when you rang her?”

  “Kim wasn’t there—it was her mother I spoke to, and that’s what worried me.” Mrs. Lewis was on the verge of tears.

  Tom caught Judy’s eye, and looked up towards the ceiling.

  “Mrs. Lewis,” said Judy. “Has Hannah got a computer? A word processor?”

  Mrs. Lewis was startled out of the tears. “Yes,” she said.

  “Would you mind if Sergeant Finch had a look at it?” asked Judy. “It’s important.”

  Mr. Lewis gave consent, challenged by Mrs. Lewis, but Tom was already on his way to find Hannah’s bedroom. He left Judy trying to find out exactly why Kim’s mother had so alarmed Mrs. Lewis, and went up to her room.

  It didn’t take long. She hadn’t even taken the precaution of deleting the file. Presumably her parents were not into computers. Today’s letter, Tuesday’s letter, and a number of other letters. They were looking for the right girl, then, he thought. But if it was Murray she was afraid of, perhaps she hadn’t witnessed the murder after all.

  “And Kim is with her aunt at the police station?” Judy was saying.

  “That’s what Mrs. Walters said. I was just going to ring the police about Hannah when you came. Kim’s been phoning her at all hours of the day and night—she’s got Hannah into trouble, I know she has.”

  No, thought Tom. If Hannah was in trouble, she had got herself there by not coming to the police in the first place. But Judy was probably right. She would be lying low with a friend, knowing that all this was about to break about her head. He said as much in an edited version, but Mrs. Lewis dismissed the idea.

  “She would have come home,” she said.

  “I’m not so sure,” said Mr. Lewis.

  “Oh, do be quiet, George!”

  Kim Walters, it transpired when they contacted the station and DC Marshall, had been very anxious to let them know that the man who had been seeing Natalia was not Colin Cochrane.

  Judy smiled. “Better late than never,” she said as Tom headed for the Walters residence.

  The reason for this knowledge did prove Patrick Murray’s contention that he had not known until Tuesday that Natalie was only fifteen. But he had known then, and he would be charged with the offence. Tom felt a little sorry for him; Natalie had hardly been corrupted by Murray’s attentions, and in truth he would be charged with being a cad, basically. And it wasn’t every day that ungentlemanly conduct ruined your entire life.

  Kim, when they saw her, assured them that Hannah was quite safe—she was with Mrs. Cochrane.

  Erica had reversed out of Colin’s parking space, and had almost driven straight into the girl she had already frightened out of her wits when she had screamed at her to get out of her office. The headmaster had heard her. Again. And come in and told her to take a few days off if things were as bad as they seemed. And had gone on at her about the evening paper.

  She had had enough. She had finished the damn letters, left them on his desk, and gone to the car. She hadn’t been looking where she was going. She had scrambled out of the car, praying that she had done no damage.

  “Oh—please,” the girl had said. “Please—he’s coming after me.”

  Erica had tried asking who was coming after her, but had got no coherent response.

  “Please help me!” the girl had shouted, almost hysterical with fear. “Please, Mrs. Cochrane, please! Don’t leave me!”

  She had been terrified. Erica had helped her to the car.

  “Drive off,” the girl had pleaded. “Please, please, get me away!”

  Erica had driven off, looking round just in time to see Patrick Murray run round the corner of the building. Patrick? Was this girl afraid of Patrick? She had tried to take her home, but the girl was afraid even to do that, because “he” would find her.

  Erica had taken her to her own house, allowing the girl to calm down a bit before she asked her any questions. She had driven right into the garage and had let the distraught girl through into the kitchen, where Sherlock had come loping up to be fussed and fed. Erica had been in the middle of giving him his dogfood when the girl had got nervy again.

  “Mr. Murray knows where you live,” she had said. “He might have seen us—he’ll come here. I can’t stay here.”

  The girl had wanted somewhere to hide, and Erica had thought then of her own bolt-hole.

  “What’s your name?” she had asked as she had driven away from Ash Road.

  “Hannah Lewis.”

  “Do you want to tell me what all this is about?”

  No reply.

  There the conversation had ended, and now Erica was making tea while Hannah looked at her books. The books had been left in the flat when she had moved in with Colin; there were too many for the house to accommodate. She would have to think what to do with them when the flat got sold, if it ever did.

  “Why are you so afraid of Mr. Murray?” she asked, in the hope that a direct question might elicit some sort of answer. Her own feelings about Mr. Murray were in as much turmoil as the girl’s, but it was difficult to imagine him forcing his attentions on her.

  She could see Hannah in the other room, leafing through a book, but she deliberately didn’t look at her when she spoke, busying herself with her tea-making activities.

  “I saw him,” Hannah said. “On the Green. On Tuesday night.”

  “You were there?” asked Erica, sharply.

  “Yes,” Hannah said. “And I saw Mr. Murray. He had Natalie’s shoes in his hand.”

  “Her shoes?” Erica echoed. Patrick hadn’t told her that bit. “What on earth was he doing with them?”

  “Holding them,” the girl said. “Then he just put them down—and he knows I saw him.”

  Erica had made a terrible mistake on Tuesday night, but it hadn’t been her fault, it hadn’t …

  Sherry, keen to be allowed off the lead, had pulled a little as they had neared the blackness of the unlit council depot which heralded his freedom from constraint. Erica had let him lead the way, let him pull her excitedly down the path.

  She had pulled his lead tight when they reached the bottom, and she had seen the dark shape of a car parked in the depot courtyard, its engine running, the driver’s door open, lighting the empty interior. It had been facing her, its headlights dazzling her. It might have been burglars, or anything; Erica had hung on to Sherry as he strained to be allowed to go.

  Beyond the car, she had seen something moving at the embankment wall opposite the depot, which had resolved itself into two dark shapes, so intimately involved with one another that at first she had taken it to be just one. Embarrassed, she had turned to go, but Sherry had barked, wanting to go on, and he was a big dog to argue with. Erica had been pulled back into the headlights against her will, as the car door had slammed, and the engine had been raced.

  She had watched, almost mesmerized, as its tyres had squealed and spun on the concrete, the driver tr
ying to accelerate away before he’d even taken the handbrake off.

  Her puzzlement had turned to disbelief as the car shot backwards up the service road, and she had checked its number, in case she wanted to report the incident to someone. It had been Colin’s car; but it couldn’t have been, she had told herself, as the area had been plunged in darkness once more. He’d said it wasn’t going, for one thing. But she had known that she hadn’t been mistaken; Colin’s number plate had cost him a lot of money, and it wasn’t the kind you could mistake.

  Then, as her eyes had become once more accustomed to the half-light from the road above, she had seen the girl. Half naked, hopping about on one foot, still trying to get her knickers back on, for God’s sake. She had stuffed them in her pocket as Erica had approached.

  “What the hell do you think you’re doing?” Erica had demanded, grabbing hold of her arm.

  “Mind your own business,” she had said, shaking her off, and had walked away, towards the adventure playground.

  Erica had thought it was Colin who had been with her. What else could she have thought? Sherry had smelt someone he knew—that was why he had been so excited. But he had smelt Patrick, of course, whom he knew just as well.

  She poured boiling water on the teabags. “And you think he killed Natalie,” she said. “That’s why you’re afraid of him.”

  “Yes,” said Hannah.

  “You’ve got it all wrong,” Erica said brightly. “But it’s nothing we can’t sort out over a cup of tea.”

  Hannah had been on the Green that night. And she was one of those girls that had hung about the house. Not just one of them, either—she was the one who had kept coming after Colin had asked them not to.

  She loaded a tray with sugar, powdered milk, cups and saucers and the pot of tea. “No biscuits, I’m afraid,” she said, her voice still determinedly cheerful. “I don’t keep things like that here. Just books, a few sticks of furniture, and non-perishables.” She set the tray down on the coffee table.

  Hannah had called him Colin, in the office. Not Mr. Cochrane, which was the natural thing to call a teacher. Colin.