Authors: Peter Robinson
But Sue knew she wouldn’t be able to concentrate on things like that. She had to be actively engaged in her search or her fears would get the better of her. At least she could walk up to
the factory and reconnoitre; that would be a positive step. It was in a part of the town that she had never seen before, and she needed to know its layout, its dark corners, its entrances and
exits. She also had to find a suitable spot to watch from. There was a chance that she might even need binoculars, though they would look a bit too suspicious if she had to use them in the
open.
But first, she realized, there was something else she must do: something she had decided on during her restless, guilty, paranoid hours awake in the night. She needed something to replace her
holdall. It wasn’t especially conspicuous, just a khaki bag with side pockets and an adjustable strap, but she had been carrying it all the time she had been staying in Whitby, whether as
Martha Browne or as Sue Bridehead. It was exactly the kind of mistake that could get her caught. Far better, she thought, to buy something else, fill the holdall full of stones and dump it in the
sea along with all her Martha Browne gear – jeans, checked shirt, quilted jacket, the lot. It would be a shame to throw away such good-quality clothing, but it would be dangerous not to.
Apart from those few moments on the front at Staithes, it was only as Martha Browne that she could be linked with Keith McLaren and Jack Grimley, so Martha Browne would have to disappear
completely.
She paid her bill, then crossed the bridge and walked up to one of the department stores on Flowergate. There she bought a smaller, dark grey shoulder bag – she wouldn’t have as much
bulky clothing to carry around – a lightweight navy-blue raincoat, and a transparent plastic rainhood. In the toilet, she transferred all the things she would need – paperweight, money,
make-up, underwear, book – into the new shoulder bag, and put the old one in the empty plastic bag bearing the store’s logo. Anyone who noticed her would think she was simply carrying
her shopping. That would do for the moment, but sometime soon she would have to go for a walk along the cliffs and get rid of the holdall permanently.
She walked back over the swing bridge, and instead of turning left onto the touristy part of Church Street, she went right and continued about half a mile along, past New Bridge, which carried
the A171 to Scarborough and beyond over the River Esk. To her right, rain pitted the grey surface of the river, and on her left she came to one of those functional, residential parts of town that
every holiday resort tucks away from public view. Consulting her map, she turned sharp left, perpendicular to the river, and walked a hundred and fifty yards or so up a lane at the southern edge of
a council estate. Finally, she turned right and found herself in the short cul-de-sac that ended at the large mesh gates of the fish-processing plant.
It was the kind of street that would look drab and uninviting whatever the weather. Terraced houses stood on both sides, set back from the road by small gardens complete with privet hedges and
wooden gates with peeling paint. The houses were pre-war, judging by the crust of grime and the white patches of saltpetre that had formed on the grey-brown brick. On the road surface, the ancient
tarmac had worn away in spots, like bald patches, to reveal the outline of old cobbles beneath. To Sue’s left, a short section of the terrace had been converted into a row of shops: grocer,
butcher, newsagent-tobacconist, video rental; and on the right, about twenty yards from the factory gates, stood a tiny cafe.
Certainly from the outside there was nothing attractive about the place. The white sign over the grimy plate-glass window was streaked reddish-brown with rusty water that had spilled over from
the eaves, and the R and the F of ROSE’S CAFE had faded to no more than mere outlines. Hanging in the window itself was a bleak, handwritten card offering TEA, COFFEE and SANDWICHES. The
location was ideal, though. From a table by the window, Sue would just about be able to see through the film of dirt, and she would have a fine view of the workers filing out of the gates down the
street. As far as she could tell, there was no other direction they could take.
She walked all the way up to the gates themselves. They stood open, and there was no guardhouse or sentry post. Obviously, national defence wasn’t at stake, and a fish-processing plant had
little to worry about from terrorists or criminal gangs. A dirt path ran a hundred yards or so through a weed- and cinder-covered stretch of waste ground to the factory itself, a long two-storey
prefab concrete building with a new red-brick extension stuck on the front for clerical staff. Inside the glass doors was what looked like a reception area, and the windows in the extension
revealed offices lit by fluorescent light. Apart from the front, the only other side of the factory that Sue could see was the one closest to the river, and it was made up entirely of numbered
loading bays. Several white vans were parked in the area and drivers in blue overalls stood around talking and smoking.
As Sue stood by the gates memorizing the layout, a loud siren sounded inside the building and a few seconds later people started to hurry out towards her. She looked at her watch: twelve
o’clock, lunch hour. Quickly, she turned back and slipped into the cafe. A bell pinged as she entered, and a wrinkled beanpole of a woman in curlers and a greasy smock glanced up at her from
behind the counter, where she had been buttering slices of thin white bread for sandwiches.
‘You must have nipped out early, love,’ the woman said cheerfully. ‘Usually takes them all of thirty seconds to get here after the buzzer goes. Them as comes, that is. Now the
Brown Cow up the road does pub lunches, there’s plenty ’as deserted poor Rose’s. Don’t hold with lunchtime drinking, myself. What’ll you have then? A nice cup of
tea?’
Was there any other kind? Sue wondered. ‘Yes, thanks, that’ll do fine,’ she said.
The woman frowned at her. ‘Just a cup of tea? You need a bit more than that, lass. Put some meat on your bones. How about one of these lovely potted-meat sandwiches? Or are you one of them
as brings her own lunch?’ Her glance had turned suspicious now.
Sue felt flustered. It was all going wrong. She was supposed to slip into the place unobtrusively and order from a bored waitress who would pay her no attention. Instead, she had gone and made
herself conspicuous just because she had run for cover when the siren went and everyone had started hurrying towards her. She was too jumpy, not very good at this kind of thing.
‘I’m on a diet,’ she offered weakly.
‘Huh!’ the woman snorted. ‘I don’t know about young ’uns today, I really don’t. No wonder you’ve all got this annexa nirvana or whatever they calls it.
Cup of tea it is, then, but don’t blame me if you start having them there dizzy spells.’ She poured the black steaming liquid from a battered old aluminium pot. ‘Milk and
sugar?’
Sue looked at the dark liquid. ‘Yes, please,’ she said.
‘New there, are you?’ the woman asked, pushing the cup and saucer along the red Formica counter.
‘Yes,’ said Sue. ‘Only started today.’
‘Been taking time off for shopping already, too, I see,’ the woman said, looking down at Sue’s carrier bag. ‘Don’t see why you’d want to shop in that place
when there’s a Marks and Sparks handy.’ She looked at the bag again. ‘Pricey that lot are. They charge for the name, you know. It’s all made in Hong Kong
anyroads.’
Would she never stop? Sue wondered, blushing and thinking frantically about what to say in reply. As it happened, she didn’t have to. The woman went on to ask an even more difficult
question: ‘Who d’you work for, old Villiers?’
‘Yes,’ said Sue, without thinking at all.
The woman smiled knowingly. ‘Well take my advice, love, and watch out for him. Wandering hands, he’s got, and as many of ’em as an octopus, so I’ve heard.’ She put
a finger to the side of her nose. The door pinged loudly behind them. ‘Hey up, here they come!’ she said, turning away from Sue at last. ‘Right, who’s first? Come on,
don’t all shout at once!’
Sue managed to weave her way through the small crowd and take the table by the window. She hoped that old Villiers and his friends were among the people who had deserted Rose’s for the
Brown Cow. If they were management, it was very unlikely that they spent their lunch hour eating potted-meat sandwiches and drinking tannic tea in a poky cafe.
Still, it was a bloody disaster. Sue had thought she could come to this place every day at about five o’clock for as long as it took without arousing much attention. After that, providing
the weather improved and the police didn’t catch up with her, if she needed to stay any longer she could buy some cheap binoculars and watch from the clump of trees just above the factory
site. But now she had been spotted and, what’s more, she had lied. If the woman found out that Sue didn’t work at the factory, she would become suspicious. After all, Rose’s Cafe
was hardly a tourist attraction. She would have to spy from the woods now, whatever the weather. The only bright spot on the horizon was the Brown Cow. If workers went there at lunchtime, perhaps
some also returned in the evening after work. It was easier to be unobtrusive in a large busy pub than in a small cafe like Rose’s.
Annoyed with herself and with the weather, Sue lit a cigarette and examined the faces of the other people in the cafe, making the best of what time she had. Calm down, she told herself. It
won’t take that long to find him if he’s here. It can’t.
KIRSTEN
‘What else did you remember?’ Sarah asked, leaning forward over the table and cupping her chin in her hands.
‘That’s just it,’ Kirsten said. ‘Nothing. It’s so frustrating. I’ve had two more sessions since then and got nowhere. Every time I pull back at the same
point.’
It was seven o’clock in the evening. Kirsten had parked the car off Dorchester Street and met Sarah at the station about an hour earlier. They had walked up to the city centre in the
lightly falling snow and now sat in a pub on Cheap Street near the Abbey. The place was busy with the after-work crowd and Christmas shoppers taking a break. Kirsten and Sarah had just managed to
squeeze in at a small table.
‘Are you going to carry on?’ Sarah asked.
Kirsten nodded. ‘I’ve got another session in the morning.’
‘So you
do
want to know?’
‘Yes.’
‘You know there’s been another one, don’t you, just before the end of term? That makes two now – three including you.’
‘Kathleen Shannon,’ Kirsten said. Aged twenty-two. She was a music student. I only wish . . .’
‘What?’
‘Nothing.’
‘Come on, Kirstie. It’s me, Sarah, remember?’
Kirsten smiled. ‘You’ll probably think I’m mad. I feel so empty sometimes and then I get so angry. I keep thinking of those two others. And there’s this block, like a
huge black lump or a thick cloud in my mind, and the whole memory’s locked in there. I don’t think it will go away, Sarah, even if the police do get him. What if they find him and they
can’t prove he did it? What if he gets off with probation or something? He might even slip away from them.’
‘Well, that’s their problem, isn’t it? You know I’m not the police’s greatest fan, but I suppose they know their job when it comes to things like this. After all,
it’s respectable middle-class girls getting killed, not prostitutes.’
‘Maybe. But I just wish
I
knew who it was. I wish I could find him myself.’
Sarah stared at her and narrowed her eyes. ‘And what would you do?’
Kirsten paused and drew a circle on the wet table with her finger. ‘I think I’d kill him.’
‘Vigilante justice?’
‘Why not?’
‘Have you ever thought that it might turn out the other way round, that he’d be the one killing you?’
‘Yes,’ Kirsten said quietly. ‘I’ve thought of that.’
‘Don’t tell me you’re feeling suicidal?’
‘No, that’s gone. Dr Henderson, Laura, helped a lot. They all say I’m making wonderful progress, and I suppose I am really, but . . .’
‘But what?’
Kirsten fumbled for a cigarette. Sarah raised her eyebrows, but said nothing. The couple beside them left and two young men took their place. Someone put a U2 song on the jukebox and Kirsten had
to speak louder to make herself heard. ‘They don’t know what it feels like to be me, do they? Living half a life, in limbo. I don’t feel that I’ll get out of it until
I’ve met him again and I know he’s dead.’
‘That’s ridiculous,’ said Sarah. ‘Besides, you wouldn’t know where to look for him any more than the police do.’
‘No, I wouldn’t. Not yet, anyway.’ She took a long deep drag on the cigarette and blew the smoke out slowly. ‘Shall we have another drink? Then you can tell me all about
the others and how Harridan’s doing.’
Sarah nodded and Kirsten made her way to the bar. She didn’t have to wait long to get served. The crowd had thinned out a bit now, as many of the after-work drinkers had gone home and the
evening regulars hadn’t arrived yet. The two lads at the next table were still there, though, talking enthusiastically about girls. Kirsten ignored the way they looked at her as she walked
back, and sat down again.
‘What about Galen?’ Sarah asked.
‘I got a Christmas card from him. He seems to be doing all right.’
‘Are you two . . .?’
Kirsten shook her head. ‘It’s not his fault, really. He tried – God, how he tried – but I put him off. I don’t think I could handle a relationship with a man right
now.’ She remembered that she had never told Sarah the full extent of her injuries and wondered whether she should do so. Not now, she decided, but perhaps sometime over the next few days.
Sarah had stuck by her; she deserved to know. Kirsten also remembered the small pile of unopened letters, most of them from Galen, that she had put away in her drawer.
As they chatted about old friends, the bookshop and the bedsit, Kirsten noticed the two lads looking at her again and talking to one another. During a lull in the conversation, the old Kinks
song on the jukebox ended and she overheard them.