by Ann Cleeves
‘Miranda showed me the work of the students who had received bursaries,’ Rickard said. ‘An attempt to persuade me to sign up. She should have realized that authors hate seeing good writing by newcomers. It only proves to them how pitiful their own attempts are.’
‘You recognized Joanna’s name?’ Vera had narrowed her eyes.
‘Not immediately. She’s using her maiden name again. I only knew her when she was married.’ He paused. ‘I recognized some of the details of her story.’
‘Rather gothic, I thought,’ Vera said. Ashworth was astounded. You’d have believed she dealt with books for a living. And how could she talk with such authority about a story she’d never read?
‘You’ve read it?’ Rickard too seemed astonished.
‘Don’t you think police officers can read, Mr Rickard? Just because I don’t go much for your kind of fiction, it doesn’t mean I don’t like a good story, especially when it has some basis in truth.’
They stared at each other across the table.
Vera spoke first. ‘I take it Joanna’s story did contain some element of truth? You’d know. After all, you were close to the parties concerned.’
‘I’m a friend of her ex-husband’s,’ Rickard admitted at last. ‘At least I was close to his family.’
‘I’ve heard Joanna’s version of events,’ Vera said. She seemed suddenly more cheerful. ‘Why don’t you give me yours?’
‘I knew Paul’s father very well,’ Rickard said. ‘We met at university. Oxford. Both reading English. We came from different backgrounds. Roy was a grammarschool boy and he had an eye for business even then. He spent the summer vacation working in his father’s print company. My family were landowners. Very little ready cash, but a big pile in the country. You know.’
Ashworth didn’t know at all, but Vera nodded as if she understood exactly.
Rickard continued, ‘What we had in common was a love of the English language. Roy’s passion was Dickens. I focused on the dramatists of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Shakespeare and his successors. Though, in personal reading, my taste was less grand.’ He smiled at Vera. ‘I always took pleasure in the gothic, and in detective fiction too. Sherlock Holmes, of course, then I moved on to the Golden Age stories of the Thirties.’
Ashworth was wondering what all this had to do with a murder investigation in Northumberland in the present, but Vera just nodded again as if she had all the time in the world.
‘When we graduated,’ Rickard said, ‘I retreated to the family home to write. There was just enough money that I never had to work for a living. Roy set up a publishing house. Rutherford Press. You might have heard of it. He became one of the most-established independent publishers in the country. In time Paul, his son, joined him. Paul was an ambitious man. He understood business, but he never understood books.’ Rickard paused and rubbed his left shoulder as if it was giving him pain. ‘One of the big multinationals put in a bid for Rutherford. Roy was against it, but Paul persuaded him. I found out later that Paul had been promised a lucrative post with the company, if the deal went ahead.’
‘So that was how he went to Paris,’ Vera said. ‘Taking his young bride with him.’
‘Yes, he was to head up the European operation. A poisoned chalice. I think they wanted him to fail. They’d fulfilled their commitment by giving him a leading role in the company, but they didn’t really want him.’ Rickard took a sip of water from the glass that had been put for him on the table. ‘I was living in Paris too then. I had the idea that I might write the great contemporary gothic novel, and really I couldn’t continue living in the country with my mother and her incontinent dogs. My income just about stretched to a flat in a not-very-fashionable district.’ He paused again. ‘Roy, Paul’s father, died. A heart attack. Or a broken heart.’
‘He felt that his son had betrayed him?’ Vera asked. Her voice was gentle now.
Rickard seemed surprised. ‘No, nothing like that. He was proud that Paul was so driven. But he missed the business, the meetings with authors and the excitement of new scripts arriving every day. I suggested that he should set up on his own again, but he said he didn’t have the energy. Perhaps he was already ill.’ He stared through the window, lost in thoughts of his own.
‘So you’re in Paris,’ Vera said briskly. ‘You and Paul and Joanna. Did you see a lot of them?’
‘Yes, we met up at least once a week. Paul’s idea, not mine. I’d go to their grand apartment for dinner. A way to get the quality of wine I couldn’t afford on my meagre income. And I suppose I felt a responsibility for Paul after his father died. I never married, never had children. Roy had made me Paul’s godfather. From the beginning it was clear Paul’s position in Paris was untenable. His French was appalling, and he had no knowledge of how things worked in Europe. The attitude to books and writers is still very different there. He was under considerable stress.’
‘Did you know he was beating up his wife?’ Vera’s tone was conversational.
Watching the old man’s face, Ashworth saw that his first impulse was to lie. Then Rickard thought better of it.
‘I guessed,’ he said.
‘That he kept her virtually a prisoner?’
‘If that was the case, it was a very comfortable prison. The height of luxury.’ Then Rickard saw that the flippancy wouldn’t do. ‘Paul was ill,’ he said. ‘Completely irrational. He had a sort of breakdown.’
‘And Joanna was so depressed that she attacked her husband with a knife and then attempted suicide! And, thanks to Paul’s family and friends, she was locked up in a French psychiatric hospital. If I’m not mistaken, you were one of those friends.’
‘If it wasn’t for me, she’d have found herself in a French jail!’ The retort was sharp, and Ashworth saw that Rickard regretted the outburst as soon as it was made.
‘And you expect Joanna to be grateful to you, do you?’
‘Of course not,’ Rickard said. ‘But that was a long time ago and she seems to have rebuilt her life.’
They looked at each other.
‘What about Paul?’ Vera asked, in a way that made Ashworth see that she already knew the answer. ‘Mr Paul Rutherford. What’s he up to now?’
‘He moved on from publishing,’ Rickard said. ‘Remarried, had a family.’
‘And what line of business is he in today?’
Rickard looked her straight in the face. ‘He’s an MEP.’
‘So he is.’ Vera gave a little smile. ‘And doing very well, I understand. It seems he developed an understanding of Europe after all. He’s still ambitious, though. Intending to stand for Westminster next time, so the rumours have it.’ She leaned over the desk towards Rickard. ‘I looked him up, you see, when I knew we’d be having this conversation. Now, you shouldn’t trust the Internet, but I’d say the articles I saw were right about Mr Rutherford.’ She straightened up and her voice hardened. ‘So that’s what you’re doing here, is it, Mr Rickard? Still protecting your godson’s interests? The last thing a prospective MP needs is a charge of domestic violence against him.’
‘No!’ Rickard attempted to stand up to make his point. ‘Since we spent that time together in Paris I’ve felt guilty about Joanna. I wanted to meet her, to check that things were going well for her. It was an impulse when I saw her name on the list of bursary students. An old man’s folly.’
Vera looked at him and said nothing. The silence stretched. The students had gone back to work and there was no sound from the garden. At last she spoke.
‘Things were going very well for Joanna. She’d met a man who adored her and they’d set up home in the most beautiful place in England. She’d found a way to make sense of the nightmare of her younger days, and there was a chance that the story of the abuse she’d suffered might be published. Then she was implicated in a murder. Some might consider that could be a way of getting your pal Paul off the hook. Who’s going to believe a murder suspect when she accuses a respectable MP of domestic violence? And of co
urse she wouldn’t dare, would she? Not in her position now. Last thing she’d want would be to attract the attention of the press.’
‘That’s ridiculous,’ Rickard said.
‘Aye, isn’t it? Just like something out of those gothic novels you were so fond of in your youth. All madness, conspiracy and drama.’
Rickard struggled to his feet. He was on his way to the door when Vera called him back. ‘How well did you know Tony Ferdinand?’
He turned slowly to face her. ‘I didn’t. I met him a couple of times. Nothing more.’
‘But he reviewed you, I understand.’
Rickard gave a little laugh. ‘The piece in the TLS? Unkind, perhaps but very amusing. It did me no harm.’
‘I read it,’ Vera said. ‘Rather personal, I thought. And it’s hard to believe that you were no more than acquaintances. Publishing seems a very small world.’
‘A world, Inspector, of which I wanted no part. Literary success came late to me and I never believed I deserved it.’
Chapter Sixteen
When they’d finished with Giles Rickard, Charlie was waiting for them in the main house. As Ashworth had predicted, he’d blagged coffee and a slice of homemade cake from Alex Barton and was sitting in the lobby, the front of his jacket covered in crumbs, reading a copy of the Sun.
‘That Alex seems a nice enough lad,’ Charlie said, nodding in the direction of the kitchen.
‘Eh, Charlie, man, you’d like anyone who fed you.’ Sometimes Vera despaired of Charlie. It wasn’t that he was stupid. Not really. Just unobservant, with the judgement of a gnat.
* * *
Now they were back in the chapel. They’d shut the door against the cold and Vera thought if she didn’t get some fresh air soon, she’d throw a fit. In the house there had been cooking smells coming from the kitchen and she tried to remember if there was a decent pub along this part of the coast, somewhere they could get a bar meal for lunch and maybe a pint. Though perhaps it would be simpler just to stay here. Alex Barton was a skilful chef. Her mind began to wander. She thought it was an odd existence for a young man like Barton: to be locked up in this house with a load of middle-aged arty types, the only real company a mother who seemed to pine for a more glamorous past.
She thought suddenly that Alex was a bit like Giles Rickard, who had also spent much of his adult life with his mother. Until he came to his senses: Really I couldn’t continue living in the country with my mother and her incontinent dogs.
And like me. I spent my whole life in my parent’s shadow. Hector would have liked a son to create in his own image. Someone with a passion for guns and birds of prey and breaking the law. Instead, he got a daughter with a mind of her own.
Then she realized that Charlie and Joe were staring at her and she snapped her attention back to the present.
‘So what have you got for us then, Charlie? What have you and the lovely Holly conjured up between you?’
‘I don’t know what Holly’s been up to,’ Charlie said. ‘I think she was hoping to track down Lenny Thomas’s ex, see if there was any history of domestic violence. I’ve been on the phone to an old mate of mine who’s a DS in the service in Cumbria. He remembered Mark Winterton.’
‘Did he now? And what did he come up with?’
‘Not a lot,’ Charlie said. ‘My mate described him as one of the quiet ones. Regular church-goer. You know the sort. A good enough boss and a stickler for procedure. Management loved him. He was a bit tight with his money apparently. Never first in the queue when it came to getting in a round. And you had to get him in a corner and rattle him, to get him to shell out for the tea fund.’
‘So respected, but not popular.’ Vera thought it wasn’t a bad thing to have an officer like that in the team. Someone who wasn’t going to play to the gallery.
‘Aye, though there was a lot of sympathy when his daughter died.’
‘What happened?’ Vera looked up sharply.
‘She got mixed up with the wrong crowd at uni apparently, ended up taking a heroin overdose. The coroner couldn’t decide if it was suicide or an accident.’
‘But what was the word on the street?’
‘Uh?’
‘What did your DS think had happened? Winterton’s colleagues must have had an opinion.’ She thought it would have been the talk of the station for weeks. There’d be sympathy, of course, but also malicious gossip maybe. A secret satisfaction that a God-botherer who’d given them stick over their expenses had a daughter who’d gone off the rails.
‘I don’t know,’ Charlie seemed confused. ‘My mate didn’t say.’
‘Well, ask him! If he’s based in Carlisle, it’s not that far away. An hour down the A69. Go and see him and buy him a pint.’
‘Aye, okay.’ Charlie brightened.
‘Where was the lass at university?’ Vera asked suddenly.
‘I don’t know!’ Now he was feeling got at. ‘Does it matter?’
‘It might explain what Winterton’s doing here,’ she said. ‘I mean if she was at Newcastle or Northumbria when she died. The place might provide an emotional pull for him.’ Or she might have been at St Ursula’s. That would make an interesting connection between the victim and the retired cop. She looked up at two sceptical faces. ‘Otherwise, what the hell is he doing in this place? He’s not much of a writer, so he didn’t get a bursary. But Charlie said he’s tight with his money. It doesn’t hang together.’
‘Perhaps he thought writing about his daughter’s death – putting it into a story – might help.’ Ashworth spoke for the first time. He’d had a vacant look all morning and Vera hadn’t even been sure he’d been listening. She wondered if his wife had been giving him grief again. ‘I don’t know, a way of coming to terms with the loss.’
‘Do we know what he wrote about?’ Vera was remembering Joanna’s work. All these words, she thought. All I seem to be doing on this case is sit around talking. About words written by the suspects. Again she felt the need for fresh air and a longing to escape this house. She envied Charlie his excuse for a drive to Cumbria. But she was the boss after all. She could create her own excuse.
Ashworth shook his head and Charlie looked blank.
‘What now then?’ Ashworth asked.
‘Charlie’s going to take Nina Backworth’s pills back to HQ and get them off to the lab. You and me are going out for lunch. Then if Holly has found out where Lenny Thomas’s ex-wife’s living, we’ll pay her a visit.’
‘What about this place?’ Ashworth asked.
Vera thought this place could be left to its own devices for a few hours, and really she didn’t care as long as she had a break from it. Then she had an idea. ‘Let’s get Holly over and ask her to have a chat with Mark Winterton. Two cops in the same mould, I’d say. She might get more out of him than I could. And we’ve kept her in the office for too long.’
‘What about going to Carlisle to chat to my mate?’ She could tell Charlie was pissed off because he hadn’t been invited to lunch.
‘That, Charlie, you do in your own time.’
* * *
They had lunch in the pub in Craster, sitting upstairs so there was a view over a quiet sea. Crab sandwiches and smoked salmon from the smokery over the road. The day was still cold and clear and Vera felt like a truant. She’d got Joe Ashworth to drive and had spoken to Holly on the way. Lenny’s ex-wife worked in a nursery in Cramlington and she’d be expecting them at three.
‘I felt I couldn’t breathe in the Writers’ House,’ she said. She’d gone for a glass of dry white with the sandwiches. Beer at lunchtime sometimes made her sleepy. ‘And I couldn’t think straight. This is more like it.’
‘So you’ve cracked it then, have you?’ There were times when Joe could be facetious. ‘You know who killed the letchy old goat, and why?’
‘Eh, pet, I haven’t got a clue. But at least now I feel I’ve got a chance of working it all out.’
* * *
The nursery was part of a Sure Start ce
ntre, and at first they went the wrong way and ended up with a group of pregnant women who were lying on the floor, doing breathing exercises. They reminded Vera of seals, hauled onto a beach, all round and sleek, gleaming in the sunshine. Vera had had a broody phase in her late thirties. There’d been a man then – the only man she could have contemplated living with – but he hadn’t thought the same way about her and nothing had come of it. Now she wasn’t sure she’d ever have felt the need to go through all this palaver.
Helen Thomas was in the baby room. A couple of the children were so tiny that they were lying in cots, the rest were sitting with the carers on a brightly coloured rug, surrounded by plastic toys. Ashworth, always a sucker for bairns, squatted down to make silly noises at them.
‘Don’t get any ideas, Joe,’ Vera said, only partly joking. ‘Three is enough for anyone, and they get in the way of your work.’
Lenny’s ex-wife called over to a colleague, ‘Take over here, will you, Gill. I’ll be in my office if you need me.’ Vera had been expecting their interviewee would be a nursery assistant, someone who changed nappies and wiped up sick, not this confident woman who seemed to be in charge.
The office was small, but impressively tidy. Helen Thomas nodded for them to take the two chairs and perched on the edge of the desk. On the walls there were charts and rotas, and posters about healthy eating and the importance of play.
‘How can I help you? The officer who phoned didn’t say.’
‘It’s about Lenny Thomas. You were married to him?’ Vera found it hard to imagine this neat little woman in the same bed as the man she’d met at the Writers’ House.
‘Yes.’ There was a pause. ‘Is he in some sort of trouble?’
‘Probably not. You must have seen in the press that there was a murder at the Writers’ House up the coast. Lenny was one of the witnesses.’
