Persons of Interest

by Peter Grainger

  Chapter Thirteen

  Smith had simply shown a future god-fatherly interest in how Maggie was doing but Murray’s reply had turned out to be unexpectedly gynaecological – he kept smiling and nodding supportively whilst hoping that Serena Butler, who was also present, would take over as soon as possible. As far as Smith knew, she had no offspring of her own, and here was the perfect opportunity to find out more. But on reflection, Smith thought, what they were hearing was likely to induce – awkward word here – second thoughts in even the most dewy-eyed young lady, and Butler was hardly one of those. Still, she could say something...

  Waters was on the phone to the school and it was taking longer than expected; he was asking questions and writing things down. Then Waters looked up at him briefly, and Smith knew that it was something. Serena mentioned her cousin’s pre-eclampsia and Smith could have kissed her – he excused himself and was at Waters’ desk four seconds later.

  ‘Well, she’s there and she’s not there.’

  ‘You know, until you came I never realized how much I need half an hour’s epistemology after breakfast. First of all, who is “she”?’

  ‘Tina Fellowes.’

  ‘And where is “there”?’

  ‘Lake Community College. It’s her, I got them to check the address.’

  ‘Right, come on, then. Hand over the rest.’

  Murray and Butler were still going over it – frightening what parenthood or even the prospect of it can do to a person.

  ‘She is seventeen and in year twelve – that’s the first year of the sixth form before you ask. Doing AS levels. She’s a good student with no attendance issues until now – she went off sick three weeks ago. The school has a letter from home saying that she has glandular fever. They have asked for a doctor’s certificate because she’s due to take exams soon but they haven’t received one yet.’

  ‘Three weeks – when exactly?’

  In the past, Waters would have had to call the school again at that point but now he looked down at his notebook and said, ‘She didn’t come in on Monday the 4th of May.’ Then he looked up at Smith and saw that his attention seemed to have gone somewhere else entirely, quite out of the room. The best thing to do was wait.

  After some fifteen or twenty seconds, Smith said, ‘Did you think that there was anyone else in the house when we called on Mrs F?’

  ‘No, but if she’s ill in bed... It can be pretty serious. I remember when-’

  ‘Even though I actually mentioned her daughter – I said something about being that age, and she said something about her going into the sixth form. So we were actually talking about the girl but she never said “Oh, by the way, she’s upstairs with a bad case of mononucleosis.’

  After a short pause for reflection, Waters said, ‘I’m not sure that Mrs Fellowes ever would say anything like that.’

  Smith walked back to his own desk, oblivious to Murray and Butler who were just a few feet from it, picked up his own notebook, found the page he wanted and read something intently. Then he returned to Waters’ desk, looking down into Waters’ notebook.

  Waters said, ‘And how do you even know that? I mean, mononucleosis?’

  ‘Eh? Oh – it isn’t just dentistry I do in my spare time...’

  Another pause, long enough for Waters to look down at his own book and begin to wonder what it was that was troubling Smith. The first-thing-in-the-morning noise of the office had died away, and Wilson’s team had departed for the docks. John Murray and Serena Butler, it seemed, had gone as far as they dare with tales of pre-natal terror.

  And then Smith said to no-one in particular, ‘Look – this is all a bit much, isn’t it? What exactly has the poor woman done to deserve all this?’

  Butler looked at Murray and then back at Smith before she said, ‘Maggie?’

  ‘No, of course not. Sandra Fellowes. I know it’s the end of a busy week but try to keep up. First of all her daughter gets seriously ill but the doctor won’t hand over a sick-note. Then her brother gets murdered. In between times, something else – or maybe not – happens that requires the services of Lake’s latest deadly duo. When we turn up and ask a couple of innocent enough questions, she lies about various matters. It’s no wonder she’s on the verge of a nervous breakdown. She doesn’t realise it yet but this woman needs our help.’

  He had to decide whether to speak to DI Reeve before or after the event now. If he was right and the girl had gone missing, well, teenaged girls go missing and she was seventeen, no longer a minor; in most cases, even when there was parental concern, the police would only give the matter cursory attention at this stage unless there was evidence of something more serious going on. Your uncle getting stabbed to death was quite a lot more serious, but was it connected? How could it possibly be? He was certain that he could get more out of Sandra Fellowes the second time around but Alison Reeve was likely to say that if there was a connection, then it was Huntingdon’s business, not theirs. So...before or after the event?

  ‘If you think this is something, DC, you should hand it over to Huntingdon. The killing wasn’t on our patch and we have enough going on as it is.’

  ‘I agree, absolutely.’

  Reeve looked at the two of them, but particularly at Waters, to see if he shared her own feeling of mild astonishment at that.

  Then she said, ‘But...?’

  ‘It’s just the next little bit, ma’am. As I’ve already met the woman and she was sort of talking to me-’

  ‘I think that she was sort of lying to you, wasn’t she?’

  ‘True, but that’s a part of any relationship, isn’t it, knowing when and when not to lie?’

  She glanced at Waters again – they would both need to think about that at some other time, perhaps.

  Smith continued, ‘Anyway, I’m sure she will tell me more if I just pop in there today, and then I’ll pass it all on to Huntingdon, to DI Terek. We’re developing a good working relationship and it’s benefitting inter-force cooperation; that’s why I’ve brought Chris along, so that he can see how it’s done, you see...’

  It was almost convincing.

  Reeve said, ‘These PIs – there isn’t really going to be a complaint to Superintendent Allen, is there?’

  ‘No, just a couple of wannabes. They’ll be gone in three months, I’ve never seen a more unlikely pair. She was just letting off steam, ma’am.’

  She looked down at the blank piece of paper and wondered whether she should have made some notes. It was Smith, after all. He would mention things casually, off-hand, just passing-you-in-the-corridor-style, and then forty eight hours later you could find yourself standing in a heap of rubble. Was this one of those situations? She didn’t need it to be, not with RSCU still in the building and still, as it happened, recruiting.

  Reeve nodded at him slowly, as if not actually saying the words might somehow reduce the risk, and then the pair of them were gone.

  The sun was out again and it was difficult to imagine a more beautiful May morning but today there was no drive up onto Roydon Hill. Smith had been silent at first; after five minutes or so he had said to Waters, ‘So, how would you handle this?’ and listened carefully to the answers. He seemed to be satisfied with them.

  Nevertheless, the scenario that actually greeted them when they stood at Sandra Fellowes’ half-opened front door was not one that he had considered - she took one look at them and slammed it in their faces. Without thinking, Waters put a hand on it, as if to push it open again although the catch must have dropped.

  Smith said calmly, ‘No. Go round the side and watch the back door – don’t try to enter. If anyone appears outside, identify yourself and tell them to stand still. If they don’t, then you can use your initiative. Go!’

  He did exactly as he was told. The backyard was untidy – more disused toys, bare trodden earth and evidence that there had once been a dog tied up here. One of the back bedrooms had its curtains closed, and he wondered whether the girl was up there, ill in bed
, after all. If she was, Smith was going to look foolish. Then he could hear knocking on the front door, and Smith’s voice saying something, not shouting but loud enough to be heard inside.

  A minute passed, and then two. Waters was standing in the sunshine, it was hot on his back, and somewhere very far away he could hear the sound of small children, lots of them like in a primary school playground but surely it was too early for a break. Whatever the explanation, there was a great, sad space between those shouting, laughing voices and the unhappy silence that emanated from the house in front of him.

  When the back door opened, he flinched at the rush of adrenaline but it was Smith’s face that appeared, and Smith’s voice that said, ‘Come on.’

  Sandra Fellowes sat at the kitchen table, staring down at it. Smith went to the sink with the kettle that he had picked up from the work surface, filled it and switched it on. Then he was searching around for a tea pot and cups, looking for all the world more like a home help than an investigating detective.

  He said to Waters, ‘See if there’s any milk in the fridge. I think we could all do with a cup of tea.’

  The kettle began to rattle on its base and Smith tapped it a couple of times until it quietened into a background hiss. Between them they had found all that was required to make the tea; Waters wondered whether Smith would be asking where the biscuits were at some point.

  The woman seemed to take no interest in what they were doing – she stared down and her face was shut to them. Waters looked at her more closely and realized how pale she was; he tried to picture what had happened between the front door and the back one when Smith had got into the house. How had he done so? She must have let him in but what had he said, if anything, to produce what seemed to be a state of shock?

  Smith examined one of the tea bags from the tin, and then he looked at his watch. When he spoke, even though it was not loud, his voice seemed to have been magnified by the tension that had grown in the small kitchen.

  ‘Is it alright if I call you Sandra, Sandra?’

  She didn’t move, didn’t even blink.

  ‘I’m going to take that as a yes, but if you change your mind, just let me know and we’ll get more formal. I won’t be offended.’

  Still nothing.

  ‘So I’m just going to describe the situation from my point of view. You’re not under investigation at all, and you can tell me to mind my own business as often and in as many ways as you like. It’s not an offence to lie to a policeman as long as you are not doing so with the intention of hindering an investigation – you did tell a couple the other day but I don’t think you did it for that reason. I might be wrong – it has been known – but I don’t think so.

  ‘These are the pieces I’ve got: you have been in touch by letter with your brother very recently, and you were going to see him at Littlemoor the day before yesterday. Your daughter hasn’t been to school for three weeks, even though she has some important exams, and the school have seen no medical certificate, even though they should have done so by now. When DC Waters and I first called here, your first words were “Where is she, then?” And for some reason you have engaged the services of a private detective. I don’t do jig-saws, it’s always seemed to me to be a completely pointless exercise, but before I waste any more time on this, I’d at least like to know whether any of these pieces are from the same puzzle. At the moment, Sandra, that’s the main reason why I’m standing here.’

  The kettle had boiled and Smith turned away to pour some water into the pot. He swilled it around, tipped it away and then put in the tea bags, four of them, before filling the pot. Waters looked at Sandra Fellowes. She was watching Smith as he busied himself, perhaps not quite able to believe her eyes.

  Smith picked up a tea towel from the work surface and began to wipe the insides of the three mugs he had assembled, looking out of the window and down the narrow strip of garden. When he spoke again, conversationally, he continued to look that way, and Sandra Fellowes continued to look at him. Waters realized then that that was exactly what Smith had intended – by apparently withdrawing his own attention from her, he had drawn hers to him.

  ‘The first priority, obviously, is Tina. Is she here?’

  The mention of the name brought a reaction, a half-closing of the eyes as when the dentist finds the tooth that you have been keeping quiet about.

  ‘I’m putting my cards on the table, Sandra. Now that I’m in the house, I can take a look – I don’t need a warrant.’

  Smith turned back to the room and spoke to Waters, again conversationally.

  ‘This is a Section 17. Having been allowed in, we are lawfully on the premises. We may search if we believe that an individual’s life is in danger or that serious harm has or might come to an individual. Sandra, is she upstairs?’

  There was a long pause then, during which Waters realized two things about Sandra Fellowes: that she was a tough woman who rarely cried, and that she was going to cry soon.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Has she been here at all in the last three weeks?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Do you know where she is?’

  The eyes were filling up, and it was only a matter of time. When she shook her head, the first one ran down her face.

  ‘I think this tea is probably done. Waters, play mother.’

  Smith went and sat at the table, at one of the sides adjacent to Mrs Fellowes – Waters poured out the tea, put two mugs on the table and then leaned against the work surface. In this situation, three would feel like a crowd.

  ‘OK, we’re getting somewhere. I’m now assuming that this is why you contacted Katherine Diver, and I’m also assuming that she hasn’t found out very much.’

  ‘She hasn’t found her. On Wednesday she said she had something to go on, something about a car? But I didn’t get it all - I was too messed up with you being here minutes before. I can’t have any police here, not now. You’re not helping at all, even if you think you are. It’s too dangerous!’

  Smith said, ‘Dangerous for Tina?’

  She nodded and even made a half-hearted attempt to sip at the tea. Smith was motionless, as if any movement might frighten away the shy bird of truth that he had so cautiously encouraged to approach him, but on his face was a look of intense concentration.

  ‘This is all telling me that she hasn’t just run away like a stroppy teenager, Sandra. She hasn’t, has she? You didn’t just have a row and off she went?’

  Regret has a smile all of its own and one of those briefly took possession of the woman’s face.

  ‘We did, and for the usual reason, but that’s not why she... She hasn’t run away. She was taken. I told her time and again, I warned her but they won’t listen. It was her bloody boyfriend.’

  Smith leaned back a little and caught Waters’ eye – if this was just a Romeo and Juliet story, it would receive a good deal more than the ‘Dear me’ treatment when they were back in the car.

  Smith said, ‘Your daughter has run off with her boyfriend? You don’t need to-’

  ‘No, I wish she bloody well had! It was him they took, but when she got involved they grabbed her as well. I’ve not spoken to her in three weeks, I don’t know where she is. She might be ... anywhere. When you knocked on my door that first time, I thought you’d, that...’

  ‘Alright, Sandra, there’s nothing like that that I know about. You say your daughter’s boyfriend has been kidnapped, as well as her? Is that what you mean? If it is, you can’t leave it to a private detective, can you? This is a serious business. We’d better have some details,’ and he made the writing motion in the air to Waters. ‘Let’s have your daughter’s full name, Sandra.’

  She was still hesitant, and Waters was not alone in sensing that they didn’t have the whole story yet. Eventually she said, ‘Tina Jane Fellowes.’

  ‘And her boyfriend?’

  ‘Cameron,’ spoken with a twist of bitterness.

  ‘His first name?’

  ‘That’s h
is first name. Stupid, isn’t it?’

  Waters saw the reaction as Smith straightened his back and sat a little further away from the table, his hands resting upon it, the blue eyes fixing themselves first on Sandra Fellowes, then on Waters and then again on the woman.

  ‘His surname, Sandra?’

  ‘Routh. You might have come across him already.’

  Smith didn’t answer straight away. He took a sip of the tea, and then another. Then he said, ‘Any biscuits?’ and she got up to go to one of the cupboards on the wall. Behind her back, Waters looked at Smith for some sort of reaction – he received a silent shaping of the mouth that could only mean “Ouch!” followed by a momentary grin. Someone was not going to be pleased by this revelation but apparently it wasn’t Smith.

  But when, just moments later, Smith had asked her whether this had anything at all to do with her brother’s death, the dam had burst properly. Sandra Fellowes probably did not do hysteria, ever, but she had dissolved into silent, sobbing tears. Waters had a few seconds of awkwardness, embarrassment even, and if asked at that point what they should do – if the whole thing had been set up as one of Smith’s eccentric, unofficial training exercises – he might in desperation have said, send for a female officer? But he wasn’t asked – instead, Smith first felt through his jacket pockets for a handkerchief that wasn’t there, and then he stood up, went to the kitchen sink and tore some squares off a roll of paper towel. He held them in front of Mrs Fellowes until she opened her eyes long enough to see them, and then she took the lot and buried her face in them for another minute or so. In the meantime, Smith poured himself another half a mug of tea and helped himself to another biscuit or two.

  The second of May was a Saturday. Tina had got a lift into town with her best friend – at the key points Smith interrupted and asked for details which Waters wrote down, and the friend’s name was Sophie Williams – having arranged to meet her boyfriend outside the Life Is A Beach club. The two girls saw him arrive and park his car across the road but then a lot of things happened very quickly and she, Sandra, wasn’t sure of the details because she had only heard most it from Sophie, who still got too upset to talk about it properly.