Authors: Michael Robotham
‘She’s a ballbreaker.’
‘Tell me about it. Hey, mon, your daddy makes me laugh. He’s hilarious. You should put him on TV.’
Yeah, terrific, I want to say – a comedian who shits his pants – he’d be funnier than Jimmy Carr.
The orderly opens the side gate and tells me to take it easy. I’m almost at my car when I catch sight of someone standing in the garden. The psychologist’s daughter is holding something open in her hands … a sketchbook. I remember where I’ve seen it before.
Further down the slope, beyond the wall, a man leans against a Range Rover, watching her. It’s not the psychologist. This one looks like a copper, a detective maybe. At that moment a car alarm shatters the evening quiet in a nearby street. My sphincter tightens instinctively.
The girl is moving up the path. I cut across the lawn. She doesn’t see me until the last moment.
‘Can I help you?’ I ask.
She jumps. Startled. ‘I’ve been looking for this house.’
‘Hoping to buy, are you?’
She half laughs. ‘No, I’ve been trying to find the house in this sketch. I definitely think this is the place. It has the same roofline and look at that weathervane – it’s shaped like a hedgehog.’
I look at the open page.
‘Did you draw this?’
‘Me? No, I’m hopeless at drawing.’
‘It looks more like a dog than a hedgehog,’ I say.
‘No, this is definitely the place,’ she replies, reaching into her pocket and pulling out two Polaroid photographs. ‘See?’
‘Mmmm, you might be right.’
‘What is this place?’ she asks.
‘A nursing home.’
‘Do you work here?’
I contemplate lying, but the truth works better. ‘I’m visiting someone. Why is the sketch so important?’
She shrugs.
‘You’re not going to tell me.’
‘I’m not supposed to.’
I glance at the man watching her from the road. ‘Is he following you?’
‘No, he’s my minder.’
‘Are you someone important?’
I get a proper laugh this time. ‘No.’ She looks up at the house and a thought seems to occur to her. She turns the page of the sketchbook and comes to another half-finished drawing. ‘Maybe this is someone who lives at the nursing home.’
I look at the drawing. My father’s eyes are staring out at me. Harper managed to capture the blankness of them.
‘He could be any old man,’ I say.
‘I think he looks quite unique,’ she says. ‘Maybe I should ask.’
‘Visiting hours have finished. And I don’t think you’re allowed to visit residents here unless you’re friends or family.’
She frowns.
‘What’s your name?’ I ask.
‘Charlie.’
‘Well, I’d love to help you, Charlie, but the sketch isn’t very clear. Do you have any other photographs of the old man?’
‘I don’t know. Maybe. I have a whole bag of Polaroids.’
‘Maybe I could look at them.’
She hesitates, her eyes lowered, looking at the spot where I’m standing. ‘They’re not here.’
‘Shame.’
I once asked Emma what she’d do if she had one wish. She said she’d buy a house that we could all live in. ‘What would you do?’ she asked me in return. I couldn’t answer. My mind went blank. I could have told her I would banish my Parkinson’s or repair my marriage or asked for world peace, but instead I made some lame joke about not needing a wish because my life was perfect.
That’s my problem – I never ask myself the questions I ask of others. I never say, ‘Joe, how are you feeling today? What do you fear? What have you been dreaming about?’ I refuse to analyse myself because I’m frightened of what I might find.
I have tossed and turned for most of the night, falling asleep at three and waking at six. In my dream Mr Parkinson is a bent, crippled, skulking figure, the Gollum of my nightmares, scuttling after me, pulling at my body, trying to make me play with him. His arms and legs jerk in symmetry and he turns his eyes upon me, cocking his head in curiosity. ‘It won’t be long,’ he says, ‘you’ll be here soon.’
That’s how I wake, arms and legs moving, doing a strangely energetic dance, as though someone is torturing me with a cattle prod. I take my pills and close my eyes, picturing Julianne being wheeled into surgery.
Maybe I fall back to sleep because I dream that a cab pulls up outside the cottage and Julianne is paying the driver.
‘What are you doing here?’ I say in the dream.
‘It was a false alarm,’ she says. ‘There’s nothing wrong with me. I’m famished, let’s have bagels for breakfast.’
I wake at seven, tremors gone, and piss like a horse on steroids. Then I shower and dress. Downstairs I make a cup of woody-tasting tea and sit on the back step in a patch of sunshine. It’s going to be a hot day. On the radio they’re discussing a heatwave and possible storms.
After a while I hear Charlie in the kitchen pouring cereal. She joins me. I slide along the step. We sit side-by-side as she spoons muesli into her mouth, holding the bowl beneath her chin. Her knobbly knees stick out of her denim shorts.
‘Will she be in surgery by now?’
‘Yep.’
‘When can we see her?’
‘Maybe this afternoon – or this evening.’
Charlie puts down the empty cereal bowl and picks up the bag of Polaroid photographs that she borrowed from the farmhouse. ‘I found that place that Harper was sketching. It’s a nursing home.’
‘Did anyone remember her?’
‘I didn’t get a chance to ask.’
‘Good job, but those pictures have to go back.’
‘I know.’
My phone is ringing. I fumble for the receiver, dropping and catching it again.
‘I’m sorry to trouble you so early, Professor,’ says Monk.
‘That’s all right.’
‘You sound anxious – is everything all right.’
‘My wife is in hospital. I thought … it doesn’t matter … how can I help you?’
‘I need to collect the case files.’
‘They’re at the farmhouse.’
‘I’ll send someone to pick them up – along with the keys.’
Monk isn’t in the mood to talk, but I ask him if there’s any word on Elliot Crowe.
‘We arrested him last night on a train to London. He was driven back and will appear in court this morning.’
‘Has he confessed?’
‘He hasn’t entered a plea.’
‘What about the attack on Naomi Meredith?’
‘It’s still being investigated,’ says Monk, growing tetchy.
‘Just one more thing,’ I say. ‘How did you get a warrant to search his bedsit?’
‘We had a call from a jeweller in town. Elliot had been trying to flog a pair of earrings that belonged to his mother.’
‘Why did you dig up the garden?’
‘A tip-off.’
‘From whom?’
‘It was anonymous.’
‘Don’t you think that’s strange – an anonymous caller knowing exactly where to look?’
Monk loses patience. ‘Maybe Elliot mouthed off in the pub, or bragged to a hooker, or he was so high he thought he was King Zog from the planet Untouchable. It doesn’t matter, Professor. We found the knife and Milo Coleman’s wallet. I think that’s enough, don’t you?’ He doesn’t give me time to answer. ‘I wish your wife a speedy recovery. Be at the farmhouse at nine.’
Charlie has been eavesdropping. ‘Where are you going?’
‘I have to give back some keys.’
‘When will you be home?’
‘Later.’
She follows me into the kitchen and rinses her bowl. ‘Do you think Elliot Crowe killed those people?’ she asks.
‘It looks that way.’
‘But you’re not sure.’
‘He’s a junkie.’
‘I thought that made him dangerous.’
‘Addicts can lie, cheat, steal and sometimes kill, but they tend not to be very good at what comes next.’
‘What comes next?’
‘Getting away with it.’
‘But he hasn’t got away with it,’ says Charlie. ‘They caught him.’
I could explain it to her – the difference between an organised and a disorganised offender – the planning and preparation, or the chaos and disorder – but I’d rather convince my daughter to study something else at university.
She is grinding her toe into the linoleum floor as though trying to dig an imaginary hole. She can be disconcerting when she’s like this, unfathomable and truth-seeking, akin to a diamond-cutter examining a rough gem, deciding how to make the first cut.
‘Can I come with you?’ she asks.
‘Someone has to look after Emma. It’s going to be hot today. You should take her for a swim.’
As if on cue, princess number two arrives downstairs, still dressed in her polar bear pyjamas. Her hair is mussed up and she has toothpaste smeared on her cheek. ‘I thought we were going to see Mummy.’
‘That won’t be until later.’
Emma shakes a box of cereal. Satisfied, she sets out her bowl and spoon, making sure they’re centred perfectly on the table. Slowly she begins pouring the puffed rice as though counting each grain.
Charlie pulls a face. ‘She’s such a freak.’
‘I heard that,’ says Emma.
Already the roads are starting to shimmer and pools of heat look like puddles on the tarmac. It’s a picture-perfect summer’s day, but the beauty is wasted on me. I cannot think of anything except Julianne and Elliot Crowe and Naomi Meredith and Milo Coleman.
By nature I’m a problem-solver – someone who likes specific answers to specific questions. I can accept uncertainty but every loose end becomes a flapping shoelace, nagging for my attention.
Bennie is waiting at the farmhouse when I arrive. She’s in uniform, her trousers creased, boots polished, hands tucked into her pockets. I unlock the front door, where crime scene tape is frayed and torn.
‘Have you talked to DCS Cray?’ I ask.
‘Yes, sir.’
‘You don’t have to call me sir.’
‘I know, sir.’
She’s treating me very formally, pretending that yesterday didn’t happen. I remove the memory stick from my laptop and pack the crime scene albums into boxes, helping Bennie carry them to the police car.
‘Does Elliot Crowe have an alibi for the night Naomi Meredith was attacked?’ I ask.
‘I’m not supposed to discuss the case, sir.’
‘You don’t have an opinion?’
‘I’m here to collect the materials.’
‘Were his prints on the murder weapon?’
She doesn’t answer.
‘Has anyone talked to Blake Lehmann or Dion Ferguson or Dominic Crowe or Jeremy Egan? These other attacks are linked to the murders.’
Bennie puts her hands on her hips. ‘I’m not going to talk to you, Professor, and you’re not blackmailing me again. I’ve given a statement to the task force. They know about Milo and me, but it doesn’t matter any more. Elliot Crowe has been charged. He had motive, opportunity, means and the murder weapon. His goose is cooked.’ She gets behind the wheel, tossing her hat on the passenger seat. ‘Nice meeting you, Professor.’
She doesn’t wave or look in the rear-view mirror as she leaves.
I glance at the stables and remember the kittens. Someone will have to look after them. Walking across the field, dodging cowpats and thistles, I enter a copse of trees where fallen leaves rustle beneath my feet. Pulling apart the strands of barbed wire, I climb through the fence and skirt the milking shed, approaching the farmhouse, which is little more than a shack.
Doreen Garrett answers the door. The parchment lines around her mouth suddenly deepen. ‘What do you want?’
‘Is Tommy here?’
‘He’s not s’posed to talk to you. Our solicitor said you put words in his mouth.’
‘I need someone to look after the kittens.’
‘Drown ’em for all I care.’
She is about to close the door when Tommy yells from deeper in the house. ‘I’ll talk to him, Nan.’
‘He’ll only try to trick you.’
‘It’s OK.’
Tommy appears, standing awkwardly in the hallway, keeping his hands in the back pockets of his jeans.
‘You want to sit down?’ he asks, pointing to a small sitting room with a pot-bellied fireplace. The walls and mantelpiece are decorated with family photographs of christenings, weddings and births, many of them in sepia tones or yellowed with age. The men are stern, the women solid, the babies dressed in lace.
‘I need someone to look after the kittens.’
‘I thought you were going to help rehome them.’
‘I will. When they’re ready.’
He stands at the centre of the room, making it feel smaller.
‘I never asked you about your mum and dad,’ I say.
‘What about ’em?’
‘You live here with your grandmother. What happened to your parents?’
‘What do you care?’
‘I’m interested.’
Tommy rolls his red tongue around the pink cavern of his mouth. ‘I don’t give a shit about my parents.’
‘Are they alive?’
‘My dad still lives in town. My mother ran off when I was just a boy. Said she were going to Australia. Promised to send for me. Never did.’
My eyes slowly scan the room and settle upon an object in the centre of the mantelpiece – a small oil burner carved from soft stone. What did Blake Lehmann say he bought Harper for her birthday?
‘Where did you get that?’ I ask.
Tommy has followed my gaze. His mouth opens and closes but no sound emerges.
Doreen has been standing in the hallway, eavesdropping on the conversation. ‘Tommy gave me that as a present,’ she announces.
‘When?’
‘Ages ago … Christmas.’
‘It hasn’t been used.’
‘Haven’t got around to it.’
I haven’t taken my eyes off Tommy.
‘I think you better leave,’ says Doreen.
‘I know you were there, Tommy. Did you go inside?’
Doreen steps in front of me, poking me in the chest. ‘Get out of my house.’
‘Did you see someone, Tommy?’
‘It was a present,’ she says again, louder this time. ‘You tell him, Tommy.’
He doesn’t answer.
‘Just tell me what you saw. Who was there?’
TV cameras and photographers are milling outside North Somerset Magistrate’s Court, waiting for the prison van to arrive. A handful of uniformed police officers are keeping watch over the crowd. Some stories capture the public’s imagination more than others – missing children, murdered teenagers, serial killers, love triangles, matricide and fratricide … I don’t know who makes those choices, but I wonder if the media will be as interested when it discovers that Elliot Crowe is a drug addict. Junkies don’t sell papers. They don’t rate.