The Woman on the Cliff
Page 26
I wonder if he’s thinking that he’s made a huge mistake, and his need for self-preservation has led him into a situation he might have avoided. I’m confused. Have Innes and I missed something? I sense that Piers is surprised at how little, not how much we know. There’s a part of the puzzle still missing, I think, with frustration and panic.
I feel a surge of anger. At the risk of provoking him, I say, “Andrew Kelso’s convinced himself that his ‘activities,’ as you call them, did no one any harm. He assured me he never hurt anyone. That’s debatable, but not in your case. You raped and murdered a young woman and for that, you deserve to be brought to justice.” I rein my emotions in then, speak more calmly. “Even so, Izzy’s more important to me than making you pay for what you did to Moira.”
Piers strides up and down the room. Weighing his options, I suppose. I sit completely still, willing myself not to glance towards the window. If Piers sees me look, he’ll know instantly that I’m expecting back-up. Will the police announce their arrival, I wonder? Piers might panic if he hears a siren or catches a glimpse of a flashing blue light through the blinds. I wonder if the Fife constabulary has much experience of hostage situations. I’ll just have to trust them to know their job.
Piers continues to pace.
“Let my daughter go, Piers. Innes and I will keep your secret. The past will stay buried.”
My thoughts race. How can Piers take a risk like that? He must know that as soon as Izzy is safe, nothing will prevent Innes and me from going straight to the police. Why should he trust us? My breath catches in my throat. The price Piers wants for Izzy’s safety is not our silence.
My gasp gets his attention. Our eyes meet. He understands that I have caught on at last.
“How will you cover up your mess this time, Piers?” I say in desperation. “You’re of no value to anyone anymore. It’ll all be on you. Explaining away three corpses in a flat you’ve been staying in won’t be easy. There’ll be no one to come along and clean up after you now.”
I don’t care if I’m repeating myself. I hardly know what I’m saying.
Piers stops pacing. “Call your boyfriend. Tell him where we are and tell him to get here fast. No police. Do as I say and Izzy lives. She’ll sleepwalk right out of here and back into her comfortable life.” He shrugs. “Motherless, but that’s the price.”
I know he’s lying. Izzy has met him. He can’t afford to take a chance and let her live. I do as he instructs. It’s good to hear Innes’s voice. It would be even better to hear some reassurance that the police have a plan. But of course, Innes can’t risk Piers overhearing.
As soon as the call ends, Piers resumes his pacing. Ten minutes later, a knock on the door makes us both jump.
“Don’t move!” Piers backs into the hallway. I suffer agonies of indecision. Do I disobey Piers, risk taking a bullet so that Innes can use the distraction to overpower him?
There’s no time to think. I watch as Piers struggles with the lock. He leans sideways so that he can watch me while he angles the gun at the door.
My whole body starts to shake. Blood pounds in my ears. Adrenalin, I realise. Urging my body to act.
The door opens inwards. In a flash, I’m out of the chair. Just before I duck, I see Piers swivel around, gun raised. A shot rings out, hits the window. Shards of glass explode across the room. I shield my face, crying out as the splinters embed themselves in my hands and fingers.
Blinking through a lattice of blood and slivers of glass, I see not Innes but Andrew Kelso standing on the threshold. He and Piers are staring, mesmerised, at the gaping window, as though it’s a portal to another dimension.
They seem to stare forever, but it’s only a split second before Andrew lunges at Piers, grabbing his wrist. The two men wrestle ineffectually for a few moments, Andrew struggling to get hold of the gun.
But Piers is the stronger of the two. He knees Andrew in the groin, and he goes down, clutching his balls, face contorted in agony. Piers silences him with a pistol whip to the head. He stands up, staggering, thrown off balance by the encounter.
He’s forgotten I’m here. No sooner does the thought flash into my mind than Piers recovers his senses. He steps over Andrew’s prone body and levels the gun at me.
This is it. This is how it was for Doug, I think bleakly, squeezing my eyes shut.
“Mum!”
Piers freezes. He swivels to see Izzy, dazed and confused, emerging from the bedroom. Adrenalin courses through me a second time. One moment there’s a dagger-sized splinter of glass at my feet, the next it’s lodged in Piers Thornton’s neck.
* * *
And now the cavalry arrives. They don’t herald their presence with blaring trumpets but nevertheless, the noise they make is enough to wake the dead. A seeming horde of uniformed officers storm through the open door in a burst of shouts and controlled chaos.
And close behind them is Innes Nevin, looking older than I’ve ever seen him — until he spots Izzy and I clinging to each other. Then his smile transforms him, briefly, into the shy young constable I first met more than a quarter of a century ago.
“That’s an arterial bleed,” someone exclaims, and yells, “Medic!”
Do I care if Piers Thornton bleeds to death? Not at this moment, but I’m somehow relieved to see two paramedics rushing to his aid.
“Come on. Come away,” Innes urges. “Let them save the murderous bastard.”
Chapter Thirty
“So, what you’re saying is that Andrew Kelso and Piers Thornton were spies for the East German secret police? The Stasi?”
Lucy’s expression of incredulity is mirrored in her husband’s face. They are having trouble taking in all that Innes has just told them. For Izzy, who grew up long after the Cold War and is only dimly aware that a wall once divided Germany, this must seem a bit surreal.
It’s two weeks since Piers Thornton was arrested and charged with abducting Izzy and threatening to kill me. The police are in the process of assessing whether there is enough evidence to charge him with the murder of Moira Mackie. Andrew Kelso is showing himself to be only too willing to talk at last. One theory is that Berger instructed Piers to kill Moira because he considered her relationship with Andrew Kelso a threat.
We’re all gathered together in Innes’s kitchen to discuss recent — and distant — events. Shona is here too, and she is as astonished as Lucy and Alec.
“I know it’s a lot to take in,” Innes says. “Lucy, your description of the man you saw talking to Moira that fateful Friday afternoon proved invaluable in unravelling the intricacies of this whole affair. The sketch Ros produced from your description enabled my colleague in Glasgow to identify Hans as Kurt Berger. Berger recruited Kelso in 1979 when he was studying at the University of Leipzig.”
“It’s hard to believe that people would do that, isn’t it?” Shona comments. “Inform on their fellow academics. Pretend to take them into their confidence and then betray them as soon as their backs are turned. And from what you’ve just told us, the Stasi singled out people who would be attracted by the excitement of it all. The glamour, even.” She shakes her head.
“In Kelso’s case, Berger’s initial lure was a promise to arrange visa permits for Kelso to visit the GDR after his exchange year was up.” Innes looks at me, “But from what Ros has told me about his personality, I’d guess he also succumbed to flattery.”
“Do you think the Stasi files on Kelso will ever be recovered? Like the ones on the people we already know about, whose files turned up after the Wall came down?” Alec asks.
“Who knows? They haven’t come to light yet. It’s more than likely they were amongst those destroyed,” Innes says. “Then again, it’s difficult to comprehend the sheer scale of the information the Stasi gathered on its own citizens at home and abroad.” He shrugs.
I think of what it must be like for ordinary citizens of the former GDR to read their files and discover that people they’d believed to be their friends and neighbours
had been secretly informing on them. It makes me shudder to think of the tentacles of this sinister repressive regime reaching out as far as our little house on North Street and contributing to the death of our friend.
I look at Innes. His eyes no longer have that blue-black gleam denoting extreme emotion, but I know that recent revelations have shaken him to the core. As all the pieces of the puzzle begin to fall into place, it is becoming clear that Piers’s confidence that he would be protected, back then, and even now, stemmed from layers of corruption going all the way to the top. Through Berger, he had access to a whole network of sympathetic comrades all over the UK. Men and women in high places who could make any trouble disappear.
My heart goes out to Innes. It strikes at the very heart of everything that he believed in when he took his oath as a police officer. As a young, inexperienced police constable, he put his trust in the integrity of the criminal justice system, and in those who sought to uphold what it stood for — from his fellow officers and his superiors, all the way to the top. Only to be betrayed.
I know he’s bitter about all this. It is something he will just have to live with. That is, knowing that people he worked for perverted the course of justice for Moira and Stuart in order to further the interests of a regime that routinely betrayed and tortured its citizens. But I am certain that in the coming months he will do his utmost to ensure that this time around, justice is served.
Now Innes looks around the room, taking in the dazed expressions. “I think we could all do with a drink,” he says. He leaves the room and returns with a bottle of scotch and five glasses and pours everyone a generous measure.
Izzy, who’s just swigged back half her scotch, interrupts. “I have left-wing leanings. You do too, Mum.”
Lucy smiles. “You’d be hard-pressed to find anyone in this room who votes Tory, Izzy. But none of us would support a regime that viciously represses its own people.”
“Just winding you up,” Izzy says, a mischievous gleam in her eye.
“Maybe you should go easy on the scotch,” I say.
“Hey, I was kidnapped by a murderer two weeks ago. My nerves need soothing.” As a joke, it’s on the dark side. Izzy seems to have recovered from her ordeal remarkably well, helped, no doubt, by the fact that she slept through most of it.
Piers had lain in wait for her outside her hall of residence and injected her with a sedative before bundling her into his car. The last and only thing she really remembers before waking up, confused, in the professor’s flat, is being surprised to see Piers Thornton so soon after meeting him in Edinburgh. Lucky for both of us that he underestimated the dosage required to keep her under.
I smile at my daughter and I don’t object when Innes tops up her drink. I pick up my scotch and swirl the liquid around in the glass, before swallowing it in one gulp. Izzy crosses the room to sit beside me. She puts her head on my shoulder, her mischievous mood gone. “How much did Aunt Elspeth know?” she asks me.
“She’s not your aunt,” I say sharply. I am aware that all eyes in the room are on me now. Elspeth’s friend. Her unfailing supporter. The one person she could always rely upon to find the good in her. I think of the first time we met, her calling to me across that packed and seemingly hostile lecture theatre. She’d offered me the lifeline of friendship at a time when I was at my lowest ebb and my gratitude had blinkered me to her true nature. But I’m no longer that person. I realise she’s been gone for a long time.
“Everything,” I say. “She knew that Piers Thornton murdered Moira, and she knew Stuart Brogan was innocent. As far as she was concerned, Piers did her a favour. With Moira dead and Annie Kelso asking for a divorce, she got what she wanted at last. The great Andrew Kelso.”
“But not for long,” Lucy said.
“No. Elspeth told me he was less of a prize than she’d imagined. But I think what he told me is closer to the truth. He saw quite quickly what Elspeth was, and wanted nothing to do with her.”
There’s an irony in that, I think, considering how long I dragged my feet over acknowledging Elspeth’s true nature. I’m grateful that neither Shona nor Lucy comments.
“As soon as she discovered I was in touch with Innes, she became suspicious, contacted Andrew and asked him if I’d approached him. That was before I’d spoken with Andrew, but of course, Annie Calder had already mentioned to him that Innes had been asking her about his alibi. Elspeth must have panicked when he told her about that. She told me that stupid story about Innes to stall me and give her time to think what to do. She also contacted Piers Thornton.”
No one speaks for a few moments. Finally, Lucy says, “Two innocent young lives sacrificed, and the man responsible walked free — for what? In the end it was all for nothing, wasn’t it?”
“Because then the Wall came down, and everything changed,” I say quietly, remembering Andrew’s words.
“What will happen to Kelso, Thornton and Elspeth?” Izzy asks. “I mean, they were sort of . . . traitors, weren’t they?”
“It will be for the court to decide what part each one of them played in Moira and Stuart Brogan’s murders,” Innes says. “As for their involvement with the Stasi, possibly nothing more than being shamed publicly for their activities, if history is anything to go by.”
Lucy, who has been nodding throughout, says, “To answer your question, Izzy, some of the people named in the late nineties were investigated by British Intelligence. Some were suspended from their posts only to be reinstated later. Many remain in post to this day as heads of university departments, researchers, politicians. Most of them still maintain that their activities were harmless and that they didn’t hurt anyone.”
A hush falls on the room.
“Tell that to all the people who were locked up or exiled from their own country as a result of information passed on by people like Kelso,” Alec says quietly.
“Tell it to their families who suffered hardship and fear when their loved ones were taken in the middle of the night,” Shona adds.
“Tell it to Stuart Brogan’s sister, and Moira’s siblings,” I say. “And to their parents, though it’s too late for any of them to hear.”
* * *
It’s late in the evening. Everyone has gone home, leaving Innes and I alone with Bronn, who is in need of a night time walk.
“Alright?” Innes asks, as he hands me my coat.
“I will be. It’s just . . . so much has happened since that day we met on the beach. So many terrible truths have come to light.”
“Maybe it’s time to look forwards, not backwards,” Innes says.
“Yes.” Our eyes meet. Neither of us has to say it aloud.
There’s a lot to look forward to. Now that we have each other.
THE END
OTHER BOOKS BY JANICE FROST
NEAL & MERRY
Book 1: DEAD SECRET
Book 2: DARK SECRET
Book 3: HER HUSBAND’S SECRET
Book 4: THEIR FATAL SECRETS
Book 5: DIRTY SECRETS
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BOOK 1 FEATURING NEAL AND MERRY
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Shocking family secrets come to light when a young woman is murdered
Amy Hill, a nineteen-year-old student, is strangled and her body dumped on open ground in the city. New police partners, DI Jim Neal and DS Ava Merry are called in to investigate this brutal crime. The last person to see Amy alive was Simon, the son of a family friend, but before he can be properly questioned he disappears.
Detectives Neal and Merry are led on a trail of shocking family secrets and crimes. Can this duo track down the murderer before anyone else dies? Stopp
ing this tragic cycle of violence will put DS Merry’s life at risk in a thrilling and heart-stopping finale.
If you like Angela Marsons, Rachel Abbott, Ruth Rendell, or Mark Billingham you will be gripped by this exciting new crime fiction writer.
BOOK 2: DARK SECRET
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Who killed Gray Mitchell?
Gray Mitchell’s body is found buried under fresh snowfall in the early hours of the morning outside Stromford Cathedral. DI Jim Neal and DS Ava Merry are called in to investigate. It seems that a number of people had motives to kill him, including Mitchell's partner.
Then another shocking act of violence occurs, also connected to the cathedral. Detectives Neal and Merry’s investigation reveals an intricate web of secrets connecting the crimes. But there is something the detectives have missed, the dark secret which can break open the case.
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