Life Sentence

by Judith Cutler

  By then she was alone in the cloakroom. All the other women were returning to the hall. It was Mark’s big moment, and she was letting him down! Had she had a skirt, she would have hitched it up and run; as it was, she lengthened her long stride and arrived by his side possibly before she was missed. Now all she had to do was smile and applaud like a good little woman, which was very easy. Mark was a good speaker, trenchant, witty and – mercifully – brief. Much as she deplored as uncritical sycophancy the transatlantic habit of rising to one’s feet to applaud even an after-dinner speech, she led the ovation for Mark. And why not? He was her boss, her friend and – as from about ten minutes after their checking in – her lover.

  It was hard to reverse that order the following morning as they walked through the car park. They had celebrated their coming together well but not at all wisely, and, with hardly any sleep, would have to get through the day on adrenaline and duty.

  After their usual decorous canteen breakfast – Mark was still inexplicably desperate to give as little away about their relationship as possible, and had eschewed the hotel meal on the grounds that they’d arrive at work suspiciously late – Fran smiled at her reflection in the ladies’ loo mirror. It felt wonderfully like love, and why not?

  Any moment now a thousand and one reasons why it shouldn’t be would come crowding in. But she wouldn’t let them. She’d breeze through everything the rest of the day brought, even though the first was an encounter with Henson, who might even have been hovering outside the ladies’ door, he was so eager to make his point.

  ‘I hear you’ve got young Arkwright racketing around the countryside doing your donkey-work again. I thought we’d agreed—’

  ‘I think you’ll find I cleared it with the ACC. And DC Arkwright should be in by nine or very soon after.’

  ‘Has it escaped your notice that a child is still missing and that every member of the team is expected to pull his weight?’

  ‘Not at all. How’s your trawl through the utility companies going? Your search for the workman’s shelter?’

  Afflicted with selective deafness, he turned on his heel and stalked off.

  At least the car dealers had been more cooperative. She had a pile of faxes and plentiful emails to work her way through, and took a strange pleasure in sorting out which employees had passed from one to another. But none of them worked for dealerships whose customers had had their newly-purchased cars stolen. At this point, it dawned on her that some time in the last week she’d started to re-invent the wheel. The Car Theft Unit might well have their suspicions. Unless the boss was another Henson, they would be happy to exchange information with her, especially if they could claim glory in a possible collar. As soon as Tom returned, she’d send him off to pool ideas. She glanced at her watch: he must really be enjoying his test drive to be so very late. Meanwhile, it was time for another attack on Alan Pitt’s phone. Today’s message was even more terse. ‘Please get in touch with me immediately when you get this message.’

  There was one way she could flush him out, perhaps. By using Elise herself. Poor Marjorie (or whoever she was), to have your name, your very identity, lost the moment you lost your life. What would it be like to wake up now and find everyone calling you by another name? Would you prefer it to your own? Would it make you a new woman?

  Which was another point: somewhere Elise had had a life. She’d sold one house: she must have bought another. She must have a load of furniture somewhere. What had happened to that? And what had happened to all the things that would identify her? Her handbag? It would have held her driving licence, if not her passport: people wanting a new identity would give a lot for evidence of one these days. Was another Marjorie Gray wandering the streets of some city ‘up north’ who had no right to the name?

  Where the hell was Tom? She needed legs, now – at least a set of fingers to dial phone numbers. There was no argument: she’d have to ask for more help, even when her colleagues could least spare it. She’d better talk to Mark, and though a phone call would have usually sufficed, today it had to be face to face.

  If it could have been mouth to mouth, body to body, she might have enjoyed it even more. But apart from a wonderful locked-door kiss, the door swiftly unlocked and Mark retiring to his official side of the desk, they presented to the Chief, surging in unannounced, no more than two senior officers sitting discussing a tricky case.

  ‘Tell the media Elise is regaining consciousness!’ he repeated, staring at Fran as if she had two heads. He took a chair and pulled it to her side of the desk.

  ‘I have to flush Alan Pitt out somehow,’ she said. ‘I don’t know why, but thirty-odd years in the job tell me I have to. I’d stake my pension on it.’

  ‘It’s very risky. When people find it’s untrue—’

  ‘With due respect, sir,’ Mark interrupted, ‘who the hell will care? She’s lain there like the dead for nigh on two years. People will think, “Oh, jolly good: there’s hope for me if I bang my head!” and that’ll be that.’

  ‘So you’d trust Fran’s call on this?’

  ‘Absolutely. Which reminds me, sir, how’s your wife?’

  Fran didn’t so much as blink, though she’d have given much to understand the logic behind his change of conversational gear. The Chief didn’t appear even to notice it.

  ‘Still quite poorly. Seems she’s reacting badly to some pills the doctor gave her. Everything go off well last night?’

  ‘Very well indeed,’ they said together, as one.

  ‘Mark’s speech was all you would have wanted, sir,’ Fran added, aiming for factual and probably achieving coy and knowing. ‘Meanwhile, what I really need is a couple of officers.’ She explained her fears about Elise’s documents. ‘At the very least, apart from her very expensive car, her assailant’s probably got his hands on her bank balance, which, given the price of property down there, is certainly worth having.’

  ‘And maybe… In these days of terrorism, we can’t be too sure when it comes to identity theft. Henson isn’t going to be happy – we still haven’t found that child, you know. And not a word from her kidnapper. Murderer now, more like, given the time-lapse.’

  A knock at the door heralded Carl Henson, clearly put out to see both the Chief and Fran in Mark’s room, and then further irritated by the realisation that to reach the only free chairs he would have to scramble over their legs. For a moment it seemed that he would, but he settled for standing up, perhaps aware that it made him look like a naughty schoolboy, especially as he showed no inclination at all to open the conversation.

  As if to prompt him the Chief asked, ‘How’s the Rebecca case going, Carl?’

  ‘Slowly, thank you, sir. But we have had a little breakthrough. It seems a workman’s shelter was temporarily removed from where it ought to be, placed at the edge of the market, a pretty pathetic affair by all accounts, and then moved back. Now, it could be a prank, of course, but it could be altogether more serious.’

  Fran held her breath: would he acknowledge his debt?

  ‘Chief Superintendent Harman holds the latter theory, I believe, so we’ve chosen to go with it.’

  They smiled at each other, a good professional smile that softened neither’s eyes.

  ‘But there are other crimes, Carl. And Fran’s rooting round in what we thought was a dying, if not a dead, case that has turned up all sort of leads. There may even be a terrorist link,’ the Chief added portentously. ‘So with great reluctance, she needs a couple of constables. That lad Arkwright’s up to speed on the case. I’m sure you can you spare him. And perhaps Uniform can come up with someone bright enough to work on their own initiative,’ he added, as if thinking aloud.

  ‘She’s welcome to Arkwright, and that’s a fact,’ Henson snapped. ‘Look at the time, and there’s no sign of him yet.’

  ‘Ten-twenty? He should have been back here by nine,’ Fran agreed, tutting in irritation. ‘Well, he won’t be any loss to your team, will he?’

  ‘I’ll send
him to you with a flea in his ear,’ Henson said.

  ‘That’s OK. I’ll insert any fleas myself, thanks.’

  Henson’s mobile spared him having to respond. He bowed himself out.

  ‘Thanks, guv,’ Fran smiled. ‘And the announcement about Elise?’

  ‘Will it distract attention from Rebecca?’ Mark frowned.

  ‘It shouldn’t. Only one person will be interested – Alan Pitt. Unless,’ she added thoughtfully, ‘it flushes out the assailant as well. It’s a risk I hadn’t thought of.’

  The Chief pondered. ‘We certainly can’t offer round the clock protection, and if I know the hospital they can’t either.’

  ‘What if we don’t make a media announcement?’ Mark put in. ‘What if Fran fixed it with the hospital authorities that that’s the official story but simply notified Alan Pitt? A selective lie.’

  The others nodded. ‘On the other hand, flushing out the assailant is the object of everything Fran’s been doing for the last weeks,’ the Chief said. ‘Let me think about it. Fran – get on to the hospital authorities, so they all sing from the same hymn sheet. We’ll need their permission whichever line we go for. Now, Mark, what I really came to see you about was our response to the latest HO directive.’ He looked expectantly at Fran, who took the hint with alacrity.

  Tom was glued to the computer in the outer office as she returned, but, catching her eye, grabbed his notepad and scuttled after her, looking as hangdog as if Henson had fulfilled his promise.

  A big grin was transforming his face when he observed hers. ‘I’m truly sorry, gu— ma’am,’ he said, pulling himself swiftly to an approximation of attention. ‘But I was on to something and I thought if I pursued it I’d save you a lot of time. And your phone was switched to voice-mail,’ he added, nodding to it.

  ‘And my mobile?’

  He blushed to the tips of his ears. ‘I thought perhaps you wouldn’t want to be disturbed, like. You know.’

  ‘I suppose a call when I was in with the Chief might have been a tad irritating, but you should have tried, Tom. OK, sit yourself down and tell me what you’ve found. And make it snappy, because I want you to go and talk to Car Theft.’

  ‘Again? Because that’s where I’ve been, ma’am. Can’t think why I didn’t go and chafe the fat with them before. Now, they’ve just picked up a team stealing four-by-fours to order – mind you, I’d give the bloody things away, all their pollution and consumption, plus the ladies on the school run can’t park them—’

  ‘OK, Tom – cut to the chase. I’m halfway to forgiving you, but if you don’t spill the beans soon, I’ll return you to Henson for the duration.’

  ‘Ma’am. Now, it seems they had a spate of thefts of high-powered sports cars a couple of years back, like. Porsches, Audis, Lotuses. All very efficient, usually from the owner’s drive, which you’d have thought a bit risky. But, d’you know, guv, there’s one gang specialises in stealing the wheels from cars on driveways. Alloy, of course. So the owner gets up and find his whatever it is sitting on four piles of bricks.’

  Fran coughed. ‘Lotuses?’

  ‘Sorry, guv: I do like my cars, you know. Anyway, like I was saying, all these posh cars vanished. Hundreds and thousands of pounds’ worth from driveways on Kent and Sussex. And then the thefts stopped. Just like that.’ He clicked his fingers. ‘And the last one was reported stolen two days before Elise had her accident. How’s that for a coincidence?’

  ‘How indeed? All the car thefts or just the Lotuses?’

  ‘All. Oh, I don’t mean nationwide, nothing like that. Just those down here.’

  ‘Quite.’ She interrupted what she feared would be another long explanation. ‘Tell you what, see if Interpol have reported similar spates anywhere else.’

  He looked puzzled.

  ‘You don’t think…Elise, like…I mean, it’s such a coincidence!’

  ‘You think that Elise was at the heart of an international gang of car thieves so that when she was hospitalised, the crime stopped? Elise? A woman older than me?’

  ‘Well, women’s lib and all that, ma’am.’ His face fell as he conceded, ‘Actually, there have been more thefts recently, with a similar MO.’

  ‘You mean removal from front drives?’ If only she’d had more sleep and less passion. No: just more sleep after the passion.

  ‘No, with removal vans. Actually, those horseboxes where people can sleep in the cab.’

  She rubbed her face. ‘Let me get this straight. A team of car thieves used to operate by stealing expensive cars and shoving them in horseboxes to get them away. They stopped doing it at the time of Elise’s accident, and were inactive for a while, but now they’ve resumed their activities.’

  ‘That’s what I said, guv.’ Tom looked genuinely pained.

  ‘Any theories why they might have stopped suddenly and then been resumed?’

  ‘Well, seeing as how she was hurt so badly, ma’am, you don’t suppose someone might have had a fit of conscience, like? Either that,’ he added, more prosaically, ‘or they made so much loot they could afford to have a break.’

  ‘Quite. And have our colleagues got any theories?’

  ‘They said to leave the information with them. They mentioned Interpol, too, come to think of it.’

  ‘Well, that saves you a job. Did you get anything about any Lotus dealership employees?’

  ‘Just the one. Everyone else went down-market, like. But there’s a bloke called Kevin Gregory who moved to a dealership near Canterbury. So when we did the test drive that’s where I went. Canterbury. Seems he arrived with references you’d have written for yourself, like, but after a couple of months they let him go. A waste of space, they said.’

  ‘Find him. Today. But you’ve done well, Tom. Especially the bit about horseboxes.’

  ‘Of course – the guy that found Elise saw a horsebox nearby. Parked without lights. Right?’

  ‘Right! So we may just be beginning to see light at the end of the tunnel.’

  ‘Tell you what, guv – bet it’s a train’s headlights!’

  Perhaps it was. But for the rest of the morning Fran chose to see it otherwise. Although the promised uniformed constable didn’t materialise, she had immediate success herself with her phone calls to estate agents. The chipper Draytons had been entirely correct in thinking that Burgoynes had been the estate agents responsible for selling Elise’s bungalow. In the all too predictable sing-song that estate agents’ receptionists favour, the young woman the other end confirmed that they had her solicitor’s details, and would be happy to fax them on receipt of a faxed request with an official heading. Not quite idly, Fran asked, ‘Is there anyone in the office who might remember Ms Gray?’

  ‘It was Miss Gray,’ the young woman’s voice corrected her. ‘And I remember her well. We used to call her the Invisible Woman, because she merged with the wallpaper. But – it was really strange. She could be so stubborn.’

  ‘In what way?’

  ‘Well, we kept telling her it was easier to sell a property that looked like a home, if you know what I mean. Furniture and flowers. But she stripped it. All of it. I used to see her staggering along to Oxfam or whatever with these huge bags. Day after day, she’d pass my office. Books, pictures – you could see the patches on the walls where she’d taken them down – china, glass.’

  ‘It was her own idea? There was a rumour that the purchasers wanted the house stripped.’

  ‘Hers. She removed everything. One day I stopped her and said, “Don’t forget to leave enough mugs for the removal men,” and she looked at me ever so odd, and said, “There won’t be any removal men”.’

  ‘No removal men!’ Fran slipped her voice into gossip mode, but in truth she was intrigued. It was as if Elise was systematically getting rid of her old life in the most literal way. Not to mention starting another one: the hair, the make-up, the clothes so new the price tags had scratched her skin. Surely the change of identity couldn’t be to escape the consequences of crimina
l acts?

  ‘I know: it’s really weird, isn’t it? And she took a far lower offer than we’d hoped for because she said – yes, really! – she wanted to make a quick getaway.’

  ‘You’ve been more than helpful,’ Fran told her, promising a fax within the next few minutes and eliciting a promise of an immediate response.

  Her next call was to the Draytons themselves. To her surprise they were in, though just about to dash off for their French class. She reminded them that they’d been prepared to help her.

  ‘We were wondering what could be worse than identifying a dead body!’ Mrs Drayton giggled nervously.

  ‘I think you might find identifying a live one even worse,’ Fran said quietly. ‘She’s not a pretty sight, Mrs Drayton.’ She explained.

  ‘You mean she’s not just like some grown up Sleeping Beauty!’

  ‘Alas, no. Now, would you like me to arrange for a car to collect you?’

  ‘And have every single curtain in the close twitched to within an inch of its life? No thanks, Superintendent – we’ll get there under our own steam. Some time this afternoon? Would three suit?’

  Photocopies came through to the central CID office, not to individual desks. In the past, anything for her had always been brought to her hot from the printer, but now everyone was involved in the higher profile, and indeed, more urgent case. It was time to stretch her legs and get a drink; she’d collect her fax and empty her pigeonhole at the same time.

  The fax was waiting for her: now she had the name of Elise’s solicitor and details of her bank account – a phone and Internet one. She also had an armful of what she hoped was largely redundant post, most of which she might as well deposit in the recycling box or put for shredding straight away. But there was a note that interested her. Computer-printed, it said, ‘Ask Sergeant Simpson about last evening’s phone call.’

  Intrigued, she collected a tumbler of water and looked for Simpson. She wouldn’t be in for another three or four hours yet, not if she was on the evening shift. But she didn’t take her desk home with her, and Fran leafed through the scrawls that she supposed passed for notes in Simpson’s case. Almost at the top of the pile was a name she recognised: Professor Wallace.