A Crushing Blow (Anna McColl Mystery Book 3)

by Penny Kline

  ‘You didn’t know the murder victim, did you?’ I asked. ‘Perhaps you knew of him.’

  ‘Oh no, nothing like that. He lived in Abbot’s Leigh, off the A369. I’ve been there once but there’s no through road, you have to turn round and go back the way you’ve come.’

  ‘And before the murder Geraldine was perfectly all right? No worries, problems, psychosomatic symptoms?’

  He thought about this for a moment. ‘No, I don’t think so. The odd headache but no more than the rest of us.’

  ‘Had anything happened to her before? Something similar? A violent death, an accident?’

  ‘Yes, that’s what I was wondering. She never talks about her childhood, says she can’t remember before the age of eleven or twelve. Her father was a strange man, quiet, almost withdrawn, but with occasional outbursts of anger that seemed quite out of proportion to whatever it was had upset him. Of course, he never approved of me, thought I wasn’t nearly good enough.’

  We had reached the bridge. Sandy gave the man in the toll box a couple of coins and we started across. I never look down for more than a moment or my legs turn to jelly, but a quick glance confirmed that the tide had risen, covering most of the mud. When Sandy leaned over the parapet to watch a boat coming up the river I kept on walking, still trying to recall everything I knew about agoraphobia. The re-evocation of a fear of separation from an attachment figure in childhood? Anxiety about inter-personal relationships? Displacement: a defence against a wholly different fear?

  Sandy interrupted my thoughts. ‘I’d be happy to pay, whatever’s the going rate. More, since you’d have to come in the evening so it would be like overtime.’

  ‘I’m on holiday next week.’

  ‘Oh, I see, you’re going away.’ He sighed deeply. ‘You see the trouble is I can’t think who else to ask. You suggested the GP but he’s the kind who closes his mind to anything in the form of psychological treatment, believes drugs are the cure-all, especially for his female patients.’

  We were waiting to cross the road. I expected Sandy to turn back but as soon as there was a break in the traffic he shouted, ‘Now!’ and made a dash for the grass on the other side.

  ‘So you’ll think about it?’ he said, folding his arms across his chest. ‘Just an hour or two should do the trick, I’m sure it would.’

  ‘No, I can’t, Sandy, I’m sorry.’

  His shoulders sagged. ‘Fair enough. Right, well, I’d better go back. Geraldine likes to eat at eight o’clock sharp.’

  ‘She still does the cooking?’

  ‘Oh, yes, I help her of course but she’s fine as long as she doesn’t have to leave the house. We have a girl who does the shopping, a strange creature who seems too bright to be working as a kind of mother’s help but I dare say she’s filling in time, waiting to do a course or something.’ He smiled briefly. ‘No hard feelings? I shouldn’t have asked, I can see that now.’

  *

  Back in the flat I poured myself another glass of wine and sat looking out of the window. Janos had wanted me to go down to his basement for a cup of coffee but I had declined the offer, explaining that I was leaving for Wales first thing on Saturday so had clothes to wash and packing to sort out. His ankle was no better but while I was away Pam, who lived in the flat below mine, would take Aaron out now and again.

  A truck, piled high with lengths of scaffolding, was coming down the road. The driver stuck his head out and I watched, holding my breath, as he steered past my car with barely an inch to spare. Still, anyone mad enough to live in Cliftonwood had to get used to scratches on their paint work and scrapes on the front and back bumpers. The road was too narrow to have cars parked on both sides, but what else could people do? I thought about the immaculate Morris Minor parked in Sandy’s garden, contrasting it with my friend Chris’s considerably newer but badly beaten-up Vauxhall estate, and wondered, not for the first time, why I had agreed to go on holiday with her and Bruce. It was kind of them to ask but part of me would have preferred to stay in Bristol, go out for day trips, take the dog for walks on the Downs. And why had Chris been so keen for me to join them? Because her relationship with Bruce couldn’t take a whole week together with no one except the kids to relieve the tension?

  On the pavement opposite, the tiny woman who wore a thick tweed coat, winter and summer, was talking to Pam. I caught a few words of the conversation, something about sub-post offices closing down and what would happen to the pensioners. Then the tiny woman asked after Pam’s husband, Ernest, and agreed he was wonderfully cheerful in spite of his disability. Poor overweight Ernest, confined to a wheelchair and more or less housebound except for the rare occasions when a special bus, paid for by a local charity, took him and five others for an outing to Weston-super-Mare.

  Two teenage girls strolled up the hill, one of them carrying a transistor radio with the volume turned up full. I remembered the girl in Leigh Woods who had temporarily attached herself to me, then I thought about Geraldine Haran, housebound, like Ernest, but for entirely different reasons. Something must have been making her anxious or unhappy and the news of the murder had acted as a catalyst, causing her to withdraw into herself and escape from the outside world. Wasn’t it sometimes the case with agoraphobia that the fear, rather than being one of leaving the safety of your own home, was a terror of encountering other human beings, people who made demands, people who criticized, people who could unwittingly arouse terrifying feelings of anger and aggression, feelings that had been denied for years, perhaps since childhood?

  Chapter Four

  Maeve sat a few feet away from me, taking in the fact that it would be three weeks until her next appointment.

  ‘But coming to see you is the first thing I’ve stuck at for ages.’ She pushed back her damp hair, then lifted her arms above her head to let the air in under her lilac top. ‘Phew, I can’t stand this weather.’

  ‘I did give you plenty of warning,’ I said. ‘Besides, sometimes missing a week or two can be quite useful.’

  She sighed. ‘And when you say it’s time to stop that’ll be it, I’ll be on my own, sink or swim.’

  ‘You could make an appointment now and again, just to let me know how you’re getting on.’

  ‘Really? Could I? I handed in my notice on Friday morning, then I had to apologize to Mrs Garland and ask for my job back.’

  Maeve’s problem was an inability to make decisions. She saw it as some kind of phobia but gradually she was moving towards an understanding that the real problem was low self-esteem, particularly focused on her physical appearance. With any luck her stop-start dieting regimes could be replaced by realistic plans to improve her life. The trouble was she was using coming to see me as a way of putting off even the most minor decision. When I’m better … When you’ve cured me … During the next couple of weeks I would have to think hard about what was going to help her. No, not during my holiday. During my holiday I was going to relax, forget about the clients.

  After Maeve left I switched off the fan and flung open the window, letting in the familiar roar of traffic. Jotting down a few notes I checked all my desk drawers were safely locked, then ran downstairs to the office to make sure Heather had remembered I was going to be away for the next two weeks.

  Martin was coming out of his room, so lost in thought that I had to stick out an arm to prevent us crashing into each other. ‘Oh, Anna, it’s you.’ He yawned, rubbing the back of his neck to ease the tension.

  ‘Who else would it be, apart from Nick, and he’s seeing that probation officer in Kingswood?’

  ‘What? Oh, Kingswood,’ he said vaguely. ‘Listen, this girl’s been referred, a self-mutilator, razor cuts on the back of her arms, nothing too serious but — ’

  ‘Sounds pretty serious from her point of view.’

  ‘Yes, I knew you’d be interested, can you fit her in sometime next week?’

  ‘Martin, I’m on holiday.’

  ‘Are you? Oh God, so you are, what on earth’s the matt
er with me?’

  ‘Over-working?’

  ‘Oh, it’s not the work.’

  In a moment he was going to drag me into his room and start telling me about Sue and the kids and how Sue was always so tired and how he kept going home from work later and later …

  ‘Anyway,’ he said gloomily, ‘have a good time. By the way, did Heather find you? Phone call from your inspector.’

  When I pushed open the office door Heather was standing on a chair, fiddling with a window catch. ‘Ah, there you are.’ She was breathing hard. ‘You know we really ought to have proper locks in this place — although come to think of it there’s not much worth stealing.’ She jumped down, landing heavily, all twelve stone of her, and steadied herself on the desk. ‘Howard Fry rang.’

  ‘Yes, Martin said. You should have put him through.’

  She handed me the phone. She had a stupid grin on her face. ‘He said it was personal.’

  I punched in the number of the local station and asked to speak to DI Fry. After a short delay he came on the line.

  ‘Anna, thanks for ringing back, I wondered if we could meet some time.’

  ‘Well — yes.’

  ‘I need your advice.’

  ‘Really? What about?’ So that’s what he meant by personal. I was going to be used as an unpaid forensic psychologist.

  ‘Tell you when I see you. Would half eight be all right?’

  ‘This evening?’

  ‘That bar overlooking the Gorge?’

  ‘Yes, all right.’

  The line went dead. Heather was stuffing things into her handbag. Nail file, comb, bottle of aspirin, packet of indigestion tablets, herbal remedy for sinusitis.

  ‘Been having a clear out,’ she said. ‘My bag fell open at the supermarket checkout. I felt a right idiot.’ She looked tired, flustered, relieved it was the end of the week. ‘My girls are having a party, turning the house upside-down, and I’ll have to stay out till all hours so as not to cramp their style.’

  ‘Like Abigail's Party,’ I said. ‘They repeated it on television not long ago.’ Her face looked blank, then she slammed her hand down on my shoulder. ‘Oh, yes, I remember, the wretched mother who didn’t know what to do with herself.’

  Martin came into the office, still looking preoccupied. He stared at us for a few seconds as if he was trying to remember why he was there then put on his Head of the Psychology Service expression.

  ‘Anna, good, you need a break. Going to Wales, aren’t you, with Chris and Bruce?’

  I nodded. ‘Just for a week.’

  ‘Oh well, enjoy yourself.’ He crossed to the door, glancing briefly over his shoulder with an expression that implied it was all right for some. ‘Talk to you when you get back.’

  Heather pulled a face. ‘Poor Martin, d’you think he should see a psychologist?’

  ‘That’s not funny.’

  ‘No, of course it isn’t.’ She stuffed the last item into her bag, a leaflet I recognized at a glance, from a computer dating agency. ‘Give Inspector Fry my regards.’

  ‘It’ll be about his latest case,’ I said, ‘the murder in Leigh Woods. He likes to keep things on a personal basis otherwise the Psychology Service might start putting in charges to the CID.’

  I was buying milk from the shop at the petrol station when I saw her. She was crouching in the video hire section, with her head twisted to one side, studying the titles nearest to the ground. When she turned round she pretended not to notice me, although I knew she had.

  ‘You’re a long way from home,’ I said, and her head jerked up with mock surprise.

  ‘The bloke where I live’s got a video recorder. I said like I’d pick something out.’

  I opened my mouth to say surely there were plenty of video hire places in Southville then decided to take her explanation at face value. ‘Found one you like?’

  She held it up for me to see. Killing Time at Bloodseye Bay, with a picture of a semi-clad woman, her eyes stretched open in terror as a pair of hands closed around her throat.

  ‘Hope you enjoy it.’

  She laughed. ‘Don’t worry, we will.’

  So she wasn’t a poor lonely creature, contemplating a suicidal jump from the bridge. She shared a house with several others and came up to Clifton because she was bored and the walk filled up part of the day. It was pure coincidence that we had met for the second time in two days.

  On my way back to the flat I stopped to look in the window of the Oxfam shop. Someone had left a grey bin liner in the doorway, stuffed with old sweaters and topped with a pair of fur-lined boots.

  My imagination took over and I started concocting a horror story that began with one of the charity shop workers tipping out the contents of the bag and finding various parts of a human body. Then I thought about the body in Leigh Woods and the fact that whoever was responsible seemed to have made very little attempt to hide it. Perhaps there had been no time. Perhaps the killing had been the result of a fight and the assailant had run off, unaware that his victim was dead, or dying.

  A car was coming up the road, travelling much too fast in a built-up area. It was a black BMW, with a roof-rack, but that didn’t mean it was Sandy Haran’s. After all Clifton had never been short on Mercedes, Audis, and BMWs. As it turned the corner into Princess Victoria Street I caught a glimpse of the driver’s suntanned balding head and a dark-haired woman in the passenger seat, her head leaning to one side, just an inch or two from the driver’s shoulder. If it was Sandy the woman certainly couldn’t have been Geraldine, not unless she was wearing a wig. In any case, Geraldine was incapable of leaving the flat.

  *

  Howard Fry was waiting for me. I could see the back of his head and shoulders, the neat dark red hair and thin strip of white skin between his hair line and the top of his shirt. He had found a table in the open air and seemed to be staring across the Gorge at the house in the trees on the other side of the Suspension Bridge. As I approached he swung round as if his policeman’s ears had memorized the sound of my footsteps.

  ‘Anna, how are you?’

  I sat down opposite him, glad of the cool air coming up from the river. It was the first time I had felt comfortable all day. ‘What’s the problem? It sounded like something fairly urgent.’

  He smiled. ‘Not really, only once I’ve made up my mind I like to get on with things. I need your professional advice.’

  ‘About a case?’

  ‘No, something personal.’

  He looked away. So did I. For the second time in the same number of days I felt exploited, this time by someone who usually treated me with more respect.

  ‘Sounds interesting,’ I said, trying to sound more friendly than I felt.

  ‘I’m not sure where to begin.’ He lifted his glass, then replaced it on the table.

  ‘Not like you to be at a loss for words.’ I had no intention of making things easier for him. ‘By the way, did you find that church register you were searching for last time we met?’

  He looked up, surprised that I had remembered how he spent much of his off-duty time looking up old archives. He was tracing his family — the paternal line of course — and had reached the middle of the eighteenth century. Nice inanimate people like the murder victims whose lives he had to investigate. People who never made demands, never created awkward scenes with their unpredictable behaviour and embarrassing emotions.

  ‘No, I never found it,’ he said, frowning a little. ‘What’s up? Had a bad day?’

  ‘No. I was just thinking … ’

  He glanced through the door to the bar. ‘No crime in that, what are you having?’

  ‘Stay where you are.’ I picked up his empty glass. ‘Same again?’

  When I returned with the drinks he began at once with what sounded like a prepared speech. ‘It’s about my son. Stuart. I think I mentioned — my ex-wife, she lives in East Anglia, near Ipswich, so I don’t see Stuart very often.’

  ‘Yes, I know.’ Why did he have to talk
as though we hardly knew each other. ‘He’s nine, is that right?’

  ‘Ten in September.’

  I thought about Sandy Haran’s son, Thomas, and wondered if Stuart Fry had the same sad eyes, the same worried expression. On the face of it Howard’s son had more to contend with — but things were never that simple.

  ‘I took him on holiday in April,’ said Howard, ‘but I don’t think he enjoyed it very much, we didn’t really know what to say to each other.’

  ‘No, I can imagine it must be difficult. You keep in touch mostly by phone, do you?’

  ‘Yes, but phoning’s never very satisfactory. In fact the way things are going we’re in danger of becoming total strangers.’

  ‘How often do you see him?’

  ‘Not often enough.’ He took his jacket off the back of the chair and began searching in the pockets.

  ‘I know it sounds trite … ’ I was trying not to sound like a psychologist, but why bother? After all, it was my professional expertise that Howard wanted, nothing more. ‘But the main thing is that he knows you care about him. Perhaps if you talked to him, told him what you’ve just told me.’

  ‘He’s a bit young.’ He passed me a photo of a child about as different from Thomas Haran as it was possible to imagine. A big robust-looking boy, dressed in a Manchester United strip, with the same thick red hair as his father and the same narrow grey eyes.

  ‘He’s old enough to understand the problem,’ I said.

  ‘Yes, I suppose so. The thing is, if you don’t see kids on a day-to-day basis they grow up, change, you make silly mistakes like assuming they’re still mad on dinosaurs when really — ’

  ‘Is there something you’re both interested in? Football? Cricket? Some other sport?’