Apportionment of Blame (3 page)

“Where's the seat you said someone was using?”

“Down there. Look,” and she leaned over the balustrade to point down at the edge of the paving by the base of the steps.

I looked across the scene, wondering how I could make out anything useful; wondering if there were clues somewhere waiting to be found.

But ultimately and ironically the darkness made it clear there was nothing to see.

“There's nothing we can do here tonight,” I said.

“Let's leave it till morning and see if anything can be done then.”

Joyce came up close and looked up into my eyes.

“You will try, won't you?”

“Of course I'll try. I said I would, didn't I.”

I said this with as much confidence as I could muster, which wasn't a lot at that precise moment.

“Come on. Let's get you that drink.”

Chapter 2

T
hat
night I had a dream. It was one of those weird experiences when I was watching from above as things happened to me.

I was walking up and down inside a huge factory. It was some sort of metalworks, perhaps a steelworks as there were enormous rollers with sheets which kept sliding past me. It was all very noisy and confusing. I was looking for something, but I had no idea what. Suddenly someone was trying to push me onto the rollers and I had to fight for my life to stop it happening.

It was unusual for me to have a dream so vivid and I woke suddenly, feeling disoriented as my brain tried to drag itself back up to reality from a place deep inside my subconscious.

Sitting up, it hit me. The note was meant for me. It was supposed to be me who looked under the bench, not Joyce. Something was going to happen to me, along the lines of what happened to Helen, but they got the wrong person. That is why Joyce was just dumped outside my office.

But how did they know it was Joyce? I couldn't figure that one out, so I gave up for the time being and got up, hoping that a shower and some caffeine might kick start my grey cells.

In the shower I thought some more of what had happened to Helen and who might have caused it. Could it be someone she knew? How could I find out?

Wrapped in a towel, and with water still dripping from my hair, I retrieved my mobile and called Joyce.

“Hi. I had a thought. Did Helen have a computer?”

“Yes, a laptop.”

“Great. Could you bring it with you this morning? It might just contain some useful information.”

“OK. I'll do that.”

“See you soon,” and I closed the phone and applied the towel some more to my hair.

Down in the kitchen I waited for the kettle to boil, wondering again why I was doing this. This detective thing. It was a far cry from the city job I had recently left, and that had seemed the obvious thing for me to do at the time.

I had my Economics degree and everything seemed set for a successful career. I can't say I ever enjoyed it, though. Hard, concentrated work and early mornings were never my scene. And fighting for a seat on the seven o'clock train every day wasn't my idea of fun. Some seem to like it; at least they are happy to tolerate their working lives, but not me. All that stress and aggro to achieve a shortened life expectancy. What's the point?

Looking round at colleagues, in what few idle moments I had, I used to wonder what was the appeal. What drew them into the rat race and caught them in the maelstrom of selfperpetuating financial jugglery?

It was the money, of course, and I was well paid, with a company car, private medical care and all the rest, but I wasn't happy and became increasingly frustrated as I could see no way out and had no desire to continue going my frenetic, capitalist way until burn-out in my middle to late thirties.

Then my grandfather died and left me most of the fortune he had quietly built up from his business. Everyone in the family had considered it a small business and the amount he left caused a few eyebrows to lift. The fact that he left me the money lifted a few more.

We had always been close, my Granddad and I. I got on well with my parents too, but with him there always seemed to be a special bond.

If I had a problem, he was always the one I turned to. He was the sort of person you could totally rely on, whatever happened. He never apportioned blame, just talked things through and made it possible to find a solution to almost anything.

The possibility of a private income caused me to reconsider my future, and when I began to feel the City work becoming even more monotonous and tiring, I began to look around for something else to do, preferably something more exciting and worthwhile.

With this intention, against everyone's advice and to the horror of my parents, I hung up my black umbrella, took my cell phone and signed a lease on a little upstairs room near Euston Station.

Granddad would have been great at detective work. It would have been good to have him there now, helping to sort out the conundrum that was Helen's death.

I realised the irony of the situation. He was not there to help me, but without him the business would not have been possible in the first place.

I had no idea how to run a detective agency, but figured it couldn't be too difficult. Always fascinated by detective novels, movies and TV series, I had some idea how to work things out from clues. Perhaps it might be a bit dangerous at times, but how hard could it be? Just advertise and see what happens, I'd thought. But little had, until Joyce called. Now I was suddenly being called upon to prove my worth. I wondered if I could.

After a hurried breakfast I left to meet Joyce at the station.

It was one of those mornings when the sun seemed to have given up. Thick clouds obliterated the sky and the late winter sunrise meant that even though it was mid-morning, it was hardly what you would call light.

The stygian gloom of the day reflected my mood as I picked Joyce out at the edge of the car park. She was wearing the same coat as the day before, at my suggestion, and carrying a brief case which she held up to show me. Then she came up and stood on tiptoe to kiss my cheek. That was new, and I looked questioningly at her.

“That's for looking after me yesterday.”

“I don't feel as if I did much. I certainly didn't achieve a great deal. In fact I blame myself for spreading around my business cards. It must be someone with one of my cards who organized your kidnap. That must he the connection between Essex and London.

“It was hardly a kidnap.”

“It was exactly a kidnap.”

I took her spare arm and we walked together down the ramp towards the London platform. Most regular commuters had long since left for work, but there was still quite a crowd congregating in front of the ticket office, so we bought Joyce's ticket at the machine. I had my season ticket, one of the major investments arising from my decision to work from London rather than from home. Now I had to pay for it myself. There was no longer a bank to subsidise me.

“Let's go to the end of the platform. There will be more space at the back of the train and we can talk without being overheard.”

We pushed our way past the few who ignored the warning line and stood near the platform's edge; past those sheltering behind newspapers in the narrow, covered waiting area, and down towards that part of the platform commuters rarely used.

“Greg?”

“Mm?”

“Those business cards you had printed.”

“Yes?”

“When you went out - you know - to where Helen died. Can you remember how many people you gave cards to?”

“Everyone I spoke to near the level crossing. But there weren't many. There aren't many houses.”

I couldn't hide the disappointment in my voice. The idea of the cards being the link was a good one, but perhaps it wasn't so likely after all. The chance of one out of so few cards getting into the hands of a crazy man in London, who would think nothing of taking someone by force and making serious threats, seemed decidedly remote.

“So it's not a long list,” Joyce persisted.

“No.”

I stared gloomily across at the small industrial unit that stood where once there had been sidings, in the days before Beeching's axe transformed the rail system from a comprehensive public service to a sparse and expensive luxury.

It had been a busy and important station once; a junction providing links between the London main line and rural Suffolk and Cambridgeshire. There had been sidings on both sides of the road bridge in those days, and even a turntable in the shunting yard.

The train pulled in with a whoosh of air brakes, its bright paint work showing off its modernity, together with its sliding doors, its lack of guard's van and its few toilets.

I recalled taking my bike on the old trains, the spacious guard's van making cycle storage easy and convenient. Nowadays cyclists were forced to lean their machines in the doorways of compartments, so they were often in the way and easy prey for complaining travellers. Another sign of progress -less common, less convenient, more trouble for most people.

As I had hoped, the carriage was nearly empty, and we sat together with our backs against the end wall.

“Can you remember all the people?” Joyce continued as if there had been no pause.

I thought for a moment.

“There's the house by the level crossing itself; one by the lane leading down to it; a large house on the corner of the lane; two cottages on the other side of the road, and that's about all.

“Oh, and I spoke to a man driving his tractor. I gave him a card as well.”

“So one of those people knows what happened to Helen.”

“It looks like it. And I suppose they know where to find me.”

“Know where to find us,” Joyce corrected.

“Yes. Us. But they didn't know it was us. I think they were after me.”

“And I turned up.”

“Mmm.”

I couldn't get my head round the probability of one of those people being in London to snatch Joyce.

“Do you think it's likely to be someone from there?” I asked her.

“Who else could it be?”

“I have absolutely no idea.”

I watched the fields pass by, and compared the speed of cars on the parallel main road with the train, a common habit of mine.

“That's interesting,” I suddenly realised. “It could have been anybody finding the note under that bench. How did they know it was you?”

“They didn't wait to find out. They just bundled me off.”

“But that doesn't make any sense. It might have been a complete stranger. Were they going to kidnap everyone who spotted that note?”

“I don't think the note was that visible. It's probably only because I was looking for it that I found it.”

“So they were lying in wait until someone looked for the note?”

“I think so,” she said.

“But if they were looking for me, why did they go for you? We hardly look alike.”

Joyce smiled up at me.

“You're right.”

“I mean, if they are looking for a tallish, dark, average looking bloke, why pick on a smallish, very attractive young woman?”

“Very attractive?”

“Well, you are. There's not much doubt about that.”

Joyce had a strange expression on her face and looked away from me.

“What?”

“Oh, it's just that you reminded me of what someone else once said.”

Joyce had been a successful music teacher, till she had a sudden rush of blood to the head with an ex-pupil and ran off with him in Corfu. It didn't last long, but it cost her the job, mainly because she was supposed to be in charge of a group of school children at the time.

So she had come back to Essex, with her tail between her legs, you might say, not knowing what her future held in store.

Then Helen had died.

Helen, her half sister, was not much older than her, and they were very close.

Joyce was shattered, and her parents were heartbroken.

Although, to an extent, I had lost touch with Joyce after school, I knew about Helen and we had met a few times. They were a very close family. I could imagine the effect of what had happened.

“I reckon,” I said, “that the person looking for me sent those two who took you.”

“Why?”

“Because he would know I'm male. You are fairly obviously not.”

“Whoever sent them didn't give a very good description, then.”

“Perhaps they didn't give any description. Just set the trap. Think about it.”

I turned towards her as thoughts began to coalesce.

“They placed the note under the bench in such a way that most people wouldn't notice it. Or if they did notice it, they wouldn't bother about it.