Waiting for Wednesday

by Nicci French

‘About being in the same line of work.’

  ‘Selling photocopiers and finding news. I can see the similarity.’’

  ‘Come on, Frieda. Don’t you get it? Being on the road.’

  ‘Being on the road,’ Frieda repeated dully. She felt suddenly and overwhelmingly tired. Her pillow looked plump and soft and welcoming.

  ‘I’m a journalist. So what do I do? I go to Copycon – that’s the company he worked for. Who’d call a company Copycon? I spoke to the area manager.’

  ‘Did you say who you were?’

  ‘You need to feel your way with these things,’ he replied vaguely. ‘Make people want to tell you stuff. And he did.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘He told me the area Lawrence Dawes covered until he retired a few months ago.’

  Frieda felt clammy and sick. She could feel beads of sweat breaking out on her forehead.

  ‘His own daughter?’ she said. ‘All those others? Is that possible?’

  ‘Everything fits, Frieda.’

  ‘Why didn’t I know?’

  ‘Why would you?’

  ‘Because – are you sure?’

  ‘I’m not sure. But I know.’

  ‘Where are you?’

  ‘Near Victoria.’

  ‘Good. We’ve got to get hold of Karlsson.’

  ‘Karlsson?’

  ‘He’s a police officer. Quite senior.’

  ‘I’m not sure we’re ready to go to the police yet, Frieda.’

  ‘We can’t wait. What if he does it again?’

  ‘They’ll need more than we’ve got. Believe me, I know them.’

  ‘So do I,’ said Frieda. ‘Karlsson will listen. I can’t explain – but he owes me. Anyway.’ She remembered the note he’d pushed through her door. ‘He’s a friend.’

  Fearby still sounded unsure. ‘Where do you want to meet?’

  ‘At the station.’ She looked at her radio clock. ‘In about forty-five minutes. Three o’clock. Is that good?’

  ‘I’ll get there as soon as I can.’

  She gave him the address and ended the call. Her tiredness had lifted. She felt glitteringly awake and alert. Only her eyes throbbed, as if the migraines she had had as a teenager had reappeared. Lawrence Dawes. She had sat in his lovely, well-tended garden. She had drunk tea with him. Shaken his hand and looked into his weathered face. Heard the pain in his voice. How had she not known? She put her head into her hands, feeling the relief of darkness.

  Then she swiftly pulled on baggy linen trousers and a soft cotton shirt, dropped her keys into her bag and left.

  Fearby was waiting for her. Approaching him, Frieda was struck by how odd he looked, with his long white hair and those eyes that glared from his creviced face. He was more crumpled than ever, as if he’d been sleeping rough. He seemed to be talking to himself and when he saw her he simply continued with the sentence.

  ‘… so I have a few of the folders in my car but of course we can collect everything else later, and there are still some notes I haven’t typed up –’

  ‘Let’s go in,’ said Frieda. She put her arm under his sharp elbow and pulled him through the revolving door.

  Karlsson was in a meeting, but when he heard that Dr Frieda Klein was downstairs he left it and bounded into Reception to meet her. She was standing very upright in the centre of the hall and her face was set in an expression of determination that he recognized from the old days. Beside her was a man who resembled a moth-eaten bird of prey. He was carrying several plastic bags bulging with folders and holding a tape recorder. Karlsson didn’t connect him to Frieda. He looked like one of the obsessive people who wandered into the station to disclose lunatic conspiracies to the indifferent duty officer behind the desk.

  ‘Come into my office,’ he said.

  ‘This is Jim Fearby. He’s a journalist. Jim, this is DCI Malcolm Karlsson.’

  Karlsson put out a hand but Fearby had none to spare. He simply nodded twice and stared fiercely into Karlsson’s face.

  ‘We need to speak to you,’ Frieda said to Karlsson.

  ‘Is this about Hal Bradshaw?’

  ‘That’s not important right now.’

  ‘Actually, it is quite important.’

  Karlsson ushered them into his room and pulled up two chairs for them. Frieda sat but Fearby put his bags on the chair, then stood behind it.

  ‘Hal Bradshaw has made it quite clear that –’

  ‘No,’ Fearby said harshly, the first word Karlsson had heard from him. ‘Listen to her.’

  ‘Mr Fearby –’

  ‘You’ll understand in a minute,’ said Frieda. ‘At least, I hope you will.’

  ‘Go on, then.’

  ‘We believe that a man called Lawrence Dawes, who lives down near Croydon, has abducted and murdered at least six young women, including his own daughter.’

  There was silence. Karlsson didn’t move. His face was expressionless.

  ‘Karlsson? Did you hear?’

  When he finally responded it was in a tone of deep dismay. ‘Frieda. What have you been doing?’

  ‘I’ve been trying to trace a missing girl,’ said Frieda, steadily.

  ‘Why don’t I know about this? Is there an ongoing murder inquiry that I’ve somehow missed?’

  ‘I told you they wouldn’t believe you,’ said Fearby.

  ‘You have to listen to me.’ Frieda fixed Karlsson with her bright gaze. ‘There’s no inquiry because no one has made the connection. Except Jim Fearby.’

  ‘But how did you get involved?’

  ‘It was something that that fake patient of Hal Bradshaw’s told me.’

  ‘The one who shafted you?’

  ‘That’s irrelevant. I don’t care about it any more. There was a detail that stood out and I couldn’t get it out of my mind. It haunted me. I had to find out what it meant.’

  Karlsson looked at Frieda and the dishevelled character with her. He felt a lurch of pity.

  ‘I know it sounds irrational,’ she continued. ‘At first I thought I was going crazy and it was just a projection of my own feelings. But I traced where the story came from. I went from the man who’d been sent to me by Hal to the other three researchers. I met Rajit, who had got the story from his girlfriend. I found her and she told me it had come from her old friend, Lila. And then I discovered that Lila had gone missing.’

  Karlsson held up his hand. ‘Why didn’t you say anything? Why didn’t you come to me, Frieda?’

  ‘I knew what everyone says: people go missing all the time and they don’t want to be found. But this felt different to me. I met Lila’s friend and then this man Lila had spent time with just before she disappeared. Nasty character. Dodgy, violent, creepy. That was where I met Jim.’

  ‘Who was also looking for Lila?’ asked Karlsson.

  ‘I was looking for Sharon.’

  ‘Sharon?’

  ‘Another missing girl.’

  ‘I see.’

  ‘And all the others, of course. But it was Sharon who led me there.’ He smiled suddenly. ‘And that was where I met Frieda.’

  Karlsson looked at Fearby. He reminded him of the drunks who sometimes slept the night in the police cells. He smelt a bit like them too: the thick reek of whisky and stale tobacco. Frieda saw his expression.

  ‘You should have heard of Jim Fearby,’ she said. ‘He was the journalist who got George Conley’s murder conviction overturned.’

  Karlsson turned to Fearby with new interest. ‘That was you?’

  ‘So you can see why I’ve mixed feelings about the police.’

  ‘Why are you here now?’

 
‘Frieda told me to come. She said you’d help.’

  ‘I said you’d listen,’ said Frieda.

  ‘We think Lila’s father is responsible.’ Fearby walked round the desk and stood beside Karlsson, who could hear him breathing heavily. ‘For his daughter and Sharon and the others.’

  ‘Lawrence Dawes,’ said Frieda.

  ‘This is the man in Croydon?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘You’re asking me to believe that the two of you have discovered that a man is responsible for several murders that the police didn’t even know had been committed?’

  ‘Yes.’ Fearby glared at Karlsson.

  ‘The girls went missing,’ Frieda said. She was trying to speak as clearly and logically as she could. ‘And because they lived in different places and no bodies were found, there was no connection made between them.’

  Karlsson sighed. ‘Why do you think this Lawrence Dawes is the killer?’

  Fearby went back to the other side of the desk and started rummaging in the bags for something. ‘The real maps are in my house, but I did this for you. So you’d see.’

  He brandished a sheet of paper on which he’d drawn, very messily, a map of the route between London and Manchester, with asterisks where the various missing women had disappeared.

  ‘It’s all right, Mr Fearby.’

  ‘You don’t believe us.’ Frieda spoke quietly.

  ‘Look. Try to see it from my point of view. Or the commissioner’s.’

  ‘No. It doesn’t matter. You don’t believe us but I still want you to help me.’

  ‘How?’

  ‘I want you to go and interview Lawrence Dawes. And search his house, every room. And the cellar. I think there’s a cellar. And his garden, too. You’ll find something.’

  ‘I can’t just send a team of police officers to take a house apart on your suspicions.’

  Frieda had been watching him attentively as he spoke. Now her expression closed; her face became a blank. ‘You owe me,’ she said.

  ‘Sorry.’

  ‘You owe me.’ She heard her voice, cool and hard. It wasn’t how she was feeling. ‘I nearly died because of you. So you owe me. I’m calling in a favour.’

  ‘I see.’

  Karlsson stood up. He was trying to hide his angry distress and turned his back on Frieda and Fearby as he put on his jacket and slid his mobile into his pocket.

  ‘You’ll do it?’ Frieda asked.

  ‘I do owe you, Frieda. And, also, you’re my friend. So I trust you as well, in spite of the apparent wildness of this. But you understand this might backfire?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘On me, I mean.’

  Frieda met his gaze. She could have wept at his expression. ‘Yes, I understand.’

  ‘All right.’

  ‘I can’t come with –’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Will you let me know?’

  He let his eyes meet hers. ‘Yes, Frieda. I’ll let you know.’

  As they left his room, a familiar figure approached them.

  ‘Oh, shit,’ Karlsson hissed.

  ‘Malcolm,’ said the commissioner. His face was red with anger. ‘A word.’

  ‘Yes? I’m on my way to see Mr Lennox. Can this wait?’

  ‘No, it cannot wait. There was a report.’ He pointed a quivering finger. ‘Her contract was terminated. There’s this scandal with Hal. You know what I think. What the flaming hell is she doing here?’

  ‘She’s been an important –’

  ‘Do you realize what this looks like?’

  Karlsson didn’t reply.

  ‘Have you paid her?’ Crawford jabbed Karlsson and, for a terrible moment, Frieda thought there might be a fight between Karlsson and his boss. She winced with the fresh knowledge of how he had risked himself for her.

  ‘Commissioner, as you must be aware, Dr Klein has been very helpful to us and –’

  ‘Have you paid her?’

  ‘No, I haven’t been paid.’ Frieda stepped forward. Her voice was cold. ‘I’m just here as a member of the public.’

  ‘What the hell are you doing, then?’

  ‘I came to see DCI Karlsson on a purely private matter. As a friend.’

  Crawford raised his eyebrows. ‘Careful, Mal,’ he said. ‘I’m paying attention.’ And he noticed Fearby. ‘Who’s that?’

  ‘This is my colleague, Jim Fearby,’ said Frieda. ‘We were both leaving.’

  ‘Don’t let me stop you.’

  At the entrance, Fearby turned to Frieda. ‘That went well, after all.’

  ‘It went terribly,’ Frieda said dully. ‘I abused my friendship with Karlsson and lied to the commissioner.’

  ‘If we achieve what we’re after,’ said Fearby, ‘none of that matters.’

  ‘And if we don’t?’

  ‘Then it doesn’t matter either.’

  As they left, they met a woman coming in – middle-aged and tall, with long brown hair and wearing a long patchwork skirt. Frieda was struck by her expression of fierce purpose.

  FIFTY-FOUR

  ‘I’d like to see Malcolm Karlsson,’ said the woman, speaking loud and fast.

  ‘I think DCI Karlsson is rather busy at the moment. Do you have –’

  ‘Or Yvette Long. Or that other one.’

  ‘Can you tell me what it’s about?’

  ‘My name is Elaine Kerrigan. It’s about the murder of Ruth Lennox. There is something I need to say.’

  Yvette sat opposite Elaine Kerrigan. She saw the hectic blotches on the woman’s normally pale cheeks and the brightness of her eyes. Her glasses, hanging round her neck on a chain, were smudged and her hair hadn’t been brushed.

  ‘You told the officer on the desk there was something you needed to say.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘About the murder of Ruth Lennox?’

  ‘That’s right. Can I have a glass of water first, please?’

  Yvette left the room and bumped into Karlsson. He looked awful and she touched him on the elbow. ‘Are you OK?’

  ‘Why wouldn’t I be?’

  ‘No reason. I’m in there –’ she jerked her head in the direction of the room ‘– with Elaine Kerrigan.’

  ‘What for?’

  ‘I don’t know. I’m just going to get her some water. She seems agitated.’

  ‘Does she indeed?’

  ‘Have you finished with Russell Lennox?’

  ‘I’m taking a break for an hour or so. It won’t do him any harm to wait and worry.’ His face grew grim. ‘There’s something I have to do.’

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘You wouldn’t understand. You’d think I’d gone mad. Sometimes I think I’ve gone mad myself.’

  There was nothing to do but wait. Fearby said he had people he needed to see while he was in London and drove off once more, leaving Frieda unsure of what to do with herself. In the end she did what she always did at times of uncertainty or distress, when dark thoughts filled her: she walked. She found herself going towards King’s Cross, weaving along minor streets to avoid the roar of traffic, then took the road that led to Camden Town, which made her think again of the house where the Lennox family used to live, in clutter and a sort of happiness, but which now stood empty. Russell was in prison; Ted, Judith and Dora were at their aunt’s house, many miles away. At least it was neat.

  She turned on to the canal. The houseboats moored by the path had pot plants and herbs on their decks. On a couple of them dogs lay in the sunshine; on one, Frieda saw a parrot in a large cage, eyeing her. Some were open to the public, selling banana bread and tie-dye scar
ves, herbal tea and recycled jewellery. People passed her on bikes; runners pounded by. Summer was coming. She could feel it in the warm air, see it in the thin brightness of the light and the sappy greenness of unfolding leaves on the trees. Soon Sandy would be back and they would have weeks together, not days.

  She thought these things but couldn’t feel them. Indeed, the clear light and the happy people seemed unreal, far off, and she belonged to a different world – one in which young women had been dragged out of their lives by a man who had a smiling, sympathetic face. He had killed his daughter, Lila, Frieda was sure of it now – and yet he had seemed genuinely grief-struck by her absence. A piece of chalked graffiti on the wall showed a huge mouth full of sharp teeth, and she shuddered, suddenly cold in spite of the warmth of the afternoon.

  She walked along the canal as far as Regent’s Park. The houses on the other side were grand here, like small castles or mock châteaux. Who would live in such places? She walked through the park swiftly, scarcely noticing the gaggles of children, the courting couples, the young man with closed eyes doing some strange slow exercises on a roll-out mattress by the ornamental gardens.

  At last, making her way through side-streets, she was at home. The phone was ringing as she opened the door and she half ran to get it, in case it was Karlsson.

  ‘Frieda? Thank God. Where the fuck –’

  ‘Reuben, I can’t talk now. I’m waiting for a call. I promise I’ll phone you as soon as I can, all right?’

  ‘Wait, did you hear about Bradshaw?’

  ‘Sorry.’

  She slammed the phone down. How long would it take for Karlsson to go to Lawrence Dawes’s house? When would he call? Now? This evening? Tomorrow?

  She made herself some toast and marmalade and ate it in the living room, listening to the phone ringing over and over and the answering machine playing messages: Chloë, plaintive; Sasha, anxious; Reuben, furious; Sandy – oh, God, Sandy. She hadn’t even told him what she was up to. She’d gone into a different world, of terror and darkness, and hadn’t even thought to confide in him. She didn’t pick up, but let him leave his message asking her, yet again, to contact him, please. Josef, drunk; Olivia, drunker.

  The day darkened and still Karlsson hadn’t called. Frieda went upstairs to her study and sat at the desk that looked out over the great sprawl of the city, now lit up and glittering under the clear sky. In the countryside, the sky tonight would be thick with stars. She picked up her pencil and opened her sketch pad, made a few indeterminate lines, like ripples. She thought of the stream at the bottom of Lawrence Dawes’s garden.