by Ann Cleeves
‘Where is he?’ She thought Marty might have been shipped out to an open prison before release. Sometimes it happened without warning.
‘He’s in hospital.’ The officer was from North Wales and spoke with a sibilant hiss which was mimicked by the inmates and other staff.
‘The sick bay?’ She was still thinking of it only as an administrative inconvenience. She ran through the library rota in her head, wondering if she could draft in another orderly, trying to think of a suitable candidate.’
‘No. The General.’
That brought her up short. ‘Serious then?’
‘Yeah.’
‘What’s wrong with him? He seemed fine yesterday.’
‘There was a fight. Nastier than most. We didn’t get to it in time.’ He paused. ‘Marty started it. They all say that. Some new lad was winding him up. He can kiss goodbye to his parole, if he lives that long.’
‘It’s that serious?’ What’s happening to the people I know? She thought. He can’t die. Not him too.
‘I’ve not heard how he is this morning. The Governor will know, I suppose, but you know what he’s like. He tells us nothing. It looked bad last night.’
‘It’s crazy,’ she cried. ‘Marty had so much to lose. I always guessed he had a temper, but he told me he’d learned to control it.’
‘Did anything happen yesterday to upset him?’
She thought immediately of Porteous, but what did that have to do with Marty? ‘I don’t think so.’
‘You two didn’t have a row?’
‘No. Why?’
‘He seemed wound up anyway. I had a bit of a run-in with him earlier in the evening. I mean, sometimes you could tell that he was getting tense, but he’d take a deep breath and walk away from it. But yesterday, before lights-out, he had a go at me.’ There was a silence at the end of the phone and she thought he’d finished, but he continued in a rush. ‘I’m afraid it was about you. He wanted me to give him your home phone number. He said it was urgent, vital that he talked to you. I told him if it was that urgent to give me a message and I’d pass it on. And anyway he’d see you today. He calmed down in the end, but like you said, usually he managed to hold it together, and last night he was way over the top. I couldn’t do it, Hannah. I couldn’t give an inmate your home number. Not even Marty.’
‘No,’ she said, meaning it. ‘Of course you couldn’t.’
During the day Hannah tried to find out more about Marty. He hadn’t had any close friends in the prison. He’d always worked on his own. But she thought someone might know what was behind the fight.
‘Who was the lad he went for?’
‘Don’t know, miss. He was new. Just out of reception.’
‘What did he do to wind Marty up?’
‘I didn’t see. Honest, miss. It all happened so fast.’
Apparently no one had seen. Or they weren’t telling. She thought they were scared, but perhaps she was deluding herself. Perhaps she didn’t want to believe Marty could have been such a fool.
At lunchtime she phoned the General Hospital, but the sister on ICU wasn’t giving much away either. She said Marty was ‘serious but stable’. And no, he wasn’t fit to receive visitors. She sounded disapproving. Perhaps the prison officer who would be sitting on the end of Marty’s bed was making a nuisance of himself. It wasn’t always the most house-trained member of staff they chose for escort duty.
Hannah wished she had the name and number of Marty’s girlfriend. Perhaps it would be possible to trace it through the bail hostel where she’d worked as a volunteer. But Hannah didn’t feel she had any emotional claim on Marty and she didn’t want to look as if she were interfering. In the end she shut the library early and went home. When Dave roused himself to complain she said it was a gesture of respect.
Chapter Thirty-Seven
The incident with Marty had stopped her worrying about dinner. She was glad now that she’d invited Arthur. He might know what had happened. Despite his outsider status he always seemed to understand what was going on in the prison. She took pleasure now in the preparations, set the table carefully, polished glasses, opened wine. She was coming out of the shower when the phone rang. Usually she’d have let the answerphone take it, but she thought it might be about Marty. She’d asked his wing officer to let her know if there was any news.
‘Mrs Morton?’
‘Yes?’
‘Can I speak to Rosie?’
Because she was thinking about the prison it took her a moment to place the voice: Rosie’s friend Joe.
‘She’s not here,’ Hannah said. ‘She’s at work. Sorry.’
There was an awkward pause.
‘No,’ Joe said. ‘I’ve just been to the Prom. Frank said she’d called in sick.’
Hannah’s first response was irritation. It wasn’t the first time Rosie had phoned in sick if she felt like a day’s shopping or an expedition up the coast with her mates. Then she thought that Rosie would have told her what she was up to. Not just to cover in case Frank got in touch, but because she knew Hannah would be worried after what had happened to Mel.
‘Did you see her last night?’ she demanded.
‘No. I met her the day before with the policemen, but not yesterday. My parents were out. I had to look after my sister.’
‘You weren’t at Laura’s party then?’
‘Sorry?’
‘She was at a party last night and she stayed over. She phoned to tell me. Laura’s party.’
‘I’m sorry,’ he said again. ‘I don’t know anyone called Laura.’
‘She’s not one of your friends from school?’
‘No.’
Then she lost control of her body. She still had the towel wrapped round her but she started to shiver.
As if from a distance she heard Joe on the other end of the phone. ‘Don’t worry,’ he said. ‘I don’t know everyone she does. She phoned you last night and Frank at lunchtime. She must be OK. I’ll call round and ring you back.’
She replaced the receiver and dressed quickly. The shivering didn’t stop. Feeling foolish for not having thought of it sooner, she dialled the number of Rosie’s mobile. She heard her daughter’s voice, delightfully normal, saying she couldn’t come to the phone right now, but she’d return the call as soon as she could. The doorbell rang.
It was Arthur. He was clutching a huge bunch of flowers in one hand and a bottle of red in the other. Of course, she thought, he would be a red-wine drinker. She burst into tears. He didn’t say anything then. He took her in, sat her on the sofa, poured her a glass of wine from the fridge and dumped the flowers in the sink.
‘What is it?’ he said. She saw he’d opened the red, poured a big glass for himself. ‘News from the hospital?’
‘Nothing like that.’
‘Rosie?’
She explained about Joe.
‘He’s right,’ he said. ‘Rosie must be OK if she phoned you and the pub. Perhaps she’s feeling the pressure and wants to go off on her own for a bit.’
‘No. She wouldn’t. Not without telling me.’
He sat beside her, put his arm around her shoulder. ‘Could she be at her father’s? She might feel awkward about letting you know she was there.’
‘He’s away. The Dordogne.’ With Eve, the temptress. ‘He gets back tomorrow. Rosie doesn’t have a key to their house. It’s something she complains about.’
‘Do you think you should phone the police . . .’
She sensed he was thinking of Mel and that he was going to add ‘in the circumstances’. She didn’t want to hear it and cut him off.
‘We’ll wait ten minutes. See what Joe has to say.’
As if on cue the telephone rang. She answered it in the living-room so Arthur could hear what she was saying.
‘Mrs Morton.’ The same two words but it wasn’t Joe. ‘Mrs Morton, I’ve got a message from your daughter.’
‘Where is she?’
‘Not far away.’
‘But sh
e’s safe?’
‘She is at the minute. You could say I’m looking after her. You should be grateful.’
‘Can I speak to her?’
He seemed to think about that. ‘I don’t think so. Not just yet.’
‘When is she coming home?’
There was another pause. ‘That depends on you.’
‘What do you mean? She knows she can come home. Anytime.’
‘I need something from you, Mrs Morton, before I can let her come back.’
‘Money?’ It was almost a relief. Something she could catch hold of. ‘A ransom. How much?’
‘I’m not greedy. Twenty thousand. You can manage that.’
‘Not immediately,’ she said. Her mind was racing. ‘There are savings, bonds. Some things need my husband’s signature.’
He lost his temper suddenly, shocking her. ‘Listen lady, she should be dead already. Tomorrow. Eleven. I’ll phone back then. And if you go to the police I’ll know. And I’ll kill her.’
She heard herself screaming as if it was somebody else. ‘Of course I won’t go to the police. I won’t tell anyone. I want her safe.’
The line had gone dead and she wasn’t sure he’d heard her.
Arthur took the receiver from her and dialled 1471 then held it to her ear so she could hear the number repeated.
‘Rosie’s mobile,’ she said. ‘He must have her.’ She jabbed her finger on 3 and waited for the number to connect, only to hear Rosie’s answering service say she couldn’t come to the phone right now. ‘He’s switched it off.’
They sat together on the sofa, each clasping an undrunk glass of wine, double handed, like bridesmaids each holding a posy of flowers, one white, one red.
‘I know who it is,’ Hannah said. ‘That boy.’
She hadn’t recognized the voice until he lost his temper, then the memory which was a curse, but which also served its purpose, replayed the scene in the prison library which had initially sent her back to Cranford.
‘You know him too. Thin, cropped hair, young. He’s got a tattoo of a snake running from his shoulder to his wrist. He can’t have been out for long. You took his pre-release course.’ She screwed up her eyes, saw the list of names on Arthur’s desk. ‘He’s called Hunter.’
‘Yes,’ Arthur said. ‘I remember. Are you sure it’s him?’ He kept his voice flat, but she could tell it wasn’t good news.
‘Certain.’ She set her glass on the table. ‘What was he in for?’
Arthur hesitated. ‘Assault, I think.’ He added quickly, ‘Not rape. Nothing like that. He was a smalltime dealer. Someone tried to muscle in on his patch.’ He paused again. ‘You know you must tell the police. They’ll have an address.’
‘What happened to the man he assaulted?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘Don’t lie to me, Arthur.’ The anger was wonderfully liberating. ‘You know all about these kids. That’s what you do. You tackle their offending behaviour.’ She was sneering as she used the jargon, just as the officers did when they talked about his courses.
‘Hunter stabbed him, then slashed his face. He’s got a scar.’
‘But the victim lived?’
‘Hunter isn’t a murderer, Hannah,’ Arthur said gently. ‘He didn’t kill Melanie.’
‘He was out of prison in time.’
‘What motive would he have? And he wasn’t even born when the lad in the lake died.’ He turned to her. ‘You must tell Porteous about this.’
Again she ignored the point he was making. ‘Why is he doing it? Why me? Personal revenge, perhaps. I upset him that day in the prison. Or is it Rosie? Has she done something to disturb him?’
‘I don’t know,’ he said. ‘You must tell the police. This is their area of expertise. They’ll be able to trace him.’
‘No!’ The anger returned. ‘What do the police know about why people do things? They haven’t got very far in finding Melanie’s murderer. And I can’t risk it. What if he was telling the truth? What if he knows someone who works with Porteous?’
‘He’s a kid, a smack-head. He’s not in league with the police. That’s paranoia.’
She seemed about to give in, to agree to his phoning Porteous. Certainly she presented as the old Hannah, diffident and unassuming. She straightened her skirt over her knees and clasped her hands on her lap.
‘You always wanted to play at detectives.’
‘What are you talking about?’
‘Well, now’s your chance.’
‘Hannah, what do you want me to do?’
‘Bring Rosie back.’ As if it were the most simple thing in the world. ‘You must still have access to Hunter’s file at Stavely. They won’t have cleared it yet. You can find an address for him. You worked with him. You know what he’s like. You’re a psychologist, for Christ’s sake. You’ll know what to say to him. He won’t be expecting anything to happen until eleven tomorrow. We can catch him off guard.’
‘I don’t know.’
She looked at her watch and was surprised that it still wasn’t eight o’clock. ‘If you go now to look at the file you won’t even cause a stir on the gate. They’re used to your working late.’
Still he paused.
‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘I shouldn’t have asked you. It could be dangerous. Just get the address and I’ll go myself.’
‘No.’ It came out as a wounded bellow. ‘It’s not that.’ He turned to her. ‘Sod it,’ he said. ‘Sod the Prison Service and the Home Office. I’ll do it. I bloody want to do it.’
Chapter Thirty-Eight
In the flat the boy was becoming more jumpy. Rosie thought of him only as ‘the boy’. She hadn’t asked his name. She didn’t care. The television was on. He’d switched it on as soon as it got light, but he kept the sound low and the flashing images couldn’t hold his attention. In the distance there was the scream of a police siren. He jumped to his feet and stared out of the window. Rosie saw his knuckles clenched white around the handle of his knife. He only started to relax when the noise disappeared into the distance. She couldn’t see her watch because her hands were tied behind her back, but it was starting to get dark, the second night. He wouldn’t put on a light. He didn’t want anyone to know he was using the flat.
She’d stopped being scared. Now she was only hungry and uncomfortable. The water to the flat was still connected. The toilet flushed and when she’d complained of being thirsty he’d brought her a drink in a blue plastic mug with a moulded handle. They’d had an identical set to take on picnics when she was a kid. He’d given her a biscuit too because she’d said she was starving. It was soft and stale.
‘Is this all there is?’ she’d demanded.
At that, he’d been flustered and said she’d soon be out of there. It wouldn’t hurt her to go without for a couple of days.
Yeah, she’d thought. She could live off her bum for a week. If she came out of this thinner perhaps the adventure would be worth it. That had led to a picture of a skeletal Mel. She had pushed the image from her head. Remembering Mel, dead in the cemetery, had made her panic. She needed to think straight.
It was clear to her that there’d been no forward planning in the boy’s decision to bring her to the flat. If he’d thought about it in advance, he’d have got food in. Even if he didn’t mind starving her, he’d have wanted to eat and as far as she could tell he didn’t have a stash hidden away. With the arrogance of someone who usually thrived on the challenge of exams, who found learning easy, she’d put him down as a bit dim. She’d worked out the sort of lad he was; there’d been someone like him in every class since she’d been an infant. The name for them in her school was ‘charvie’, meaning scally, loser, someone you wouldn’t be seen dead with socially. Charvies were the kids who started school without being able to tie their laces. They wet their pants and came last in spelling tests. Teachers hated them. In primary school they started fights in the playground and failed their SATs, and in high school they got involved in petty crime,
dealing in single cigarettes, then blow or smack. When they were at school, which wasn’t often.
When Hannah heard Rosie talking like that, out would come the lecture. ‘How on earth can you be so judgmental? You don’t know anything about those kids. You don’t know where they come from or what their families are like. Of course people can change if you give them a chance.’ She thought she could change her prisoners by giving them books. What planet was she on? Rosie knew this boy was a charvie, always had been, and so he was no match for her.
She sat now with her hands behind her wriggling her fingers so she wouldn’t lose the feeling in them, and she tried to work out the best thing to do. She couldn’t rely on Hannah to go to the police. Hannah would do just as the boy said. She wouldn’t take any risks. But Rosie wasn’t going to see the boy walk away with all that money – money which could see her through university, buy her a holiday somewhere seriously hot, a little car and driving lessons. Then she wondered if Mel had died because her parents had refused to pay up.
When they’d come into the flat the boy had opened the door with a key, but he hadn’t locked it behind him. It was a Yale lock with a snick, so if she got to it she’d be able to get out. Although he was thin and wiry she didn’t think he was as fit as she was. He’d been smoking since they’d got there, tiny roll-ups. He crouched over a shiny tin to make them, so no stray strands of tobacco were lost and he used both hands. So while he was making his cigarettes he couldn’t hold his knife. She wondered what he’d do when the tobacco ran out.
He hadn’t made any sexual advance towards her. Even when he’d had his arms around her pulling her to the car, when his finger was stroking her neck, she hadn’t thought he was interested. He had other obsessions. Her body wasn’t something she could bargain with. She could tell.
It was possible that he didn’t think she’d try to escape. He’d probably grown up with the same sorts of prejudice about her as she’d had about him. He’d see her as a lardy wimp who couldn’t look after herself. He even left her while he went to the toilet. It was off the hall right next to the entrance to the flat, and he left the bathroom door open, but if he’d thought she’d make a run for it, he’d have tied her legs. He just didn’t think.
