Cruel Comfort (Evan Buckley Thrillers Book 1) (7 page)

'You know what the worst of it is?'
she said suddenly, turning back to face him. Anger had replaced the hurt in her
eyes. 'It looks like it all came out anyway. Ed Guillory told me he'd heard
rumors around town. Rumors which Faulkner must have heard too and which gave
Robbie an alibi. But that was years later, just before he retired, and
obviously he couldn’t be bothered to get up off his lazy butt and open it all
up again.’ Her eyes challenged Evan to come to Faulkner’s defence, but that
wasn’t a cause he was about to take up. ‘What did he care if I still felt like
it was only yesterday. Guillory told me they had more than enough on their
plates, what with budget cuts and all, to re-open an old case like that. It was
only rumors after all, probably just old women's idle tongues wagging.'

Evan could imagine how she must have
tortured herself over the years. It was bad enough that a crucial fact was
buried for all the wrong reasons at the time, but for it to come out anyway
later on must have been almost too much to bear. And to know that the Police
knew it too, and were too busy or indifferent to take it up again - he was
surprised she hadn't gone crazy. He was even more surprised by what she said
next.

'There are some wicked people in the
world, you know,' she carried on. 'Not just the monsters who abduct and kill
children, but ordinary, everyday folk who like nothing more than to cut a
person to shreds with their dirty tongues, just to spice up their sorry, sad
lives.’ She threw her head back and ran her hand through her hair. Evan thought
what a nice neck she had. ‘I'm told it's been said that my Robbie might have
run off with his whore because Daniel saw them together, so they killed him to
keep it secret and then ran away together. What kind of a sick person makes up
something like that?'

Evan didn't have an answer. He
couldn't bear to look her in the eye. Whoever had told her - Guillory
presumably - didn't have as much respect for her feelings as Evan did. No
wonder she chose not to mix with people around town. Chose instead to hide
herself away, refusing to listen to the rumormongers. But Evan knew only too
well you couldn't hide from yourself. In the small hours of the morning all
your doubts and fears come to haunt you.

'I'm sorry, it's been building a long
time,' she said, wiping her nose on her sleeve. 'I don't suppose you expected
this when you knocked on the door.' She gave him a small smile.

'I'm not sure now what I expected,
but this is probably more than I bargained for. Certainly more raw emotion
anyway, but that's fine.' He smiled back at her, letting her know that he was
Mr Emotional Sponge, the man with the inexhaustible capacity to absorb other
people's problems. He just hoped he didn't spoil things and start to cry himself.
He needed to get it back on track.
Time to get back to nice hard facts; less
of the emotional claptrap.

'Do you have any ideas about what
might have happened?' he said.

'Plenty of things might have
happened. As far as what actually did happen, I haven't got the first idea. And
there's not a day gone by when I haven't thought about it.'

'Faulkner mentioned the teacher, Ray
Clements.'

He managed to get Faulkner’s name
out without starting her off again. 'Ray Clements is a good man. As far as I'm
concerned he could no more have hurt Daniel than Robbie could. I know Faulkner
hounded him before he had his epiphany regarding Robbie, but I never thought
that was right either.'

It seemed to Evan that Linda managed
to see the best in everyone - except Faulkner that is. He got the feeling that
when they finally got round to whoever she thought was the prime suspect (and
he was sure she had someone in mind) it was all going to come pouring out
again. Perhaps she thought it was Faulkner, she certainly hated him enough.

'He didn't tell them he'd given
Daniel a ride home. That must have looked like he had something to hide.'

'If you knew what Faulkner was like
back then, you wouldn't have been volunteering any information.' She snorted
again. It wasn't an attractive habit and detracted from the nice neck. 'He
seems such a nice guy now and everyone feels so sorry for him because of his
wife dying, but if he got you in his sights back then, you'd have had a very
different opinion. Ask poor Ray Clements; he ruined his life.'

'What makes you so sure Clements was
innocent?

'I can't say. But just because I
can't prove why he didn't do it, doesn't mean he did. I thought we had a
presumption of innocence in this country. Nobody seems to have told Faulkner.'
Evan agreed, but was getting the feeling that Linda's reasoning was a little
light on facts and biased more towards whether she liked you or not. It seemed
you were just meant to accept what she told you. 'The only reason Faulkner
concentrated on him was because that low life Hendricks convinced him Daniel
never left the campus -  and Ray Clements was an easy target. Faulkner liked
things easy.'

Evan wondered if they'd finally got
round to the point where she was going to let rip. 'I get the feeling you don't
like Hendricks. You think he had something to do with it?'

He thought she was about to snort
again, but she held it in this time. 'You're not kidding I don't like him. He's
a really nasty piece of work. The best part of him ran down his mother’s leg.’
The vitriol in her voice surprised him more than her language. It also seemed
to him that two distinct teams were forming here.

‘Unfortunately, just because I don't
like him doesn't mean I think he had anything to do with it. How could he have?
He was driving a bus full of kids around at the time.' She went suddenly quiet
and started fiddling with her ring again. It didn't take a genius to work out
what she was thinking. If only she'd allowed Daniel to take the bus like all
the other kids, none of this would have happened. Sometimes it takes a while to
get there, Evan thought, but in the end we all end up blaming ourselves.

'Hendricks might not have done it,'
she went on, 'but I think it's fair to say he enjoyed watching what happened to
Ray Clements after he convinced Faulkner that Daniel never left the campus on
foot.'

'Did he have some reason for not
liking Clements?'

'I don't think so; he's just one of
life's truly horrible people. There are plenty of people like him -
schadenfreude they call it.'

'So how he did he get a job driving
the school bus?'

'That I can't tell you.'

Evan's exasperation must have shown
on his face. He was going to have to work on keeping it under control.

'You must be wondering why you
bothered speaking to me at all,' Linda said. 'It must seem like I just deny
everything I don't want to hear, and can't offer anything helpful - despite
having thought about nothing else for the past ten years.'

Evan did a better job of controlling
his face, but, privately, he thought that was a pretty succinct assessment. 'Of
course not,' he said. 'It's been very useful.' He didn’t think that came out
too well - he was going to have to work on his sincere voice too.

Luckily Linda didn’t ask him exactly
how
it had been useful. 'So what are you going to do next?'

'I think I need to talk to Ray Clements
and then perhaps Carl Hendricks.'

Evan thought he'd got about all he
was going to get from Linda. On his way out he asked her to call him if she
thought of anything else, but he knew there wouldn't be anything. After all
these years she'd either thought about every detail a million times over, or it
was gone for good.

He didn't really know what to think
as he drove away. She was adamant her husband didn't do it and that he didn't
run off with another woman either. He didn't know if he agreed with her or not.
In the world he worked in until a few days before, people cheated on their
partners and ran off with each other every day of the week. Did she really know
him? She was probably right about the affair - in his experience most people
had an inkling about what was going on or else why would they come to him.

But just because she got that part
right didn't mean she was right about everything else as well. He couldn't just
accept her word for it; he would need to look into it further and try to find
out if any women went missing at about the same time. Even if he found out that
he had run off with some other woman, it didn't mean he'd killed the boy. He
had to agree with Linda on that score - it would take a special kind of monster
to kill his own son in order to cover up something as run-of-the-mill as a bit
on the side.

He still had Guillory's card and
thought that would be the easiest way to find out. He might be able to give
Evan the official take on the gossip and rumors Linda had told him about. He
felt he had more chance of developing a relationship with Guillory. Faulkner
was likely to be on the defense all the time.

He phoned Guillory on his cell phone.

'Well, well, if it isn't Mr Peeper
himself.' Guillory said after Evan identified himself.

'Mr Ex-peeper.'

'Ex-peeper, eh. I'm glad to hear it.
Got any clients?'

'Ha ha.'

Evan could feel Guilllory smiling
down the phone. 'You liked that one, eh? So, you're working for Linda Clayton
now are you?'

'That's right, and thanks for the introduction.'

'My pleasure.’ It wasn’t just the
routine reply; he sounded genuinely pleased that he was able to help. ‘Pro
bono, is it?'

'We haven't even talked about
money.'

'That's good, because she hasn't got
any. She might not believe her husband did a runner and thinks he's dead, but
the insurance company don't agree. No body, no life assurance payout. She's
poorer than a church mouse.'

'It's not a problem.' Evan said. He
meant it too.

'I know it's not. That's why I gave
her your name. You're a man searching for your salvation. I don't think you'd
charge her if she was a Patty Hearst.'

Evan wondered how he had managed to
make such a good assessment in such a short time, but that was probably part of
his job. 'Okay, you made you point; I'm a sucker for a sob story. But I need
some help.'

'And here I was thinking you just
called me up to say thank you.'

'Thank you.'

'You're welcome...didn't we just do
this? Anyway, what do you want to know?'

Evan told him about the rumors Linda
had heard, and how she completely dismissed them.

'You're right; she won't have a bad
word said about her husband. But anything like that should have been
investigated at the time. All I remember is that one day he just wasn't around
any more. I don't recall anything about another woman.'

'I know it won't prove anything but
it must be worth looking into. Besides, if he ran off with a single woman she
probably wouldn't be listed as missing anyway.'

'No shit Sherlock, I'd never have
worked that out.'

'Always happy to help.'

'Leave it with me, smartass; I'll
see what I can dig up.'

Evan debated whether to ask a more
delicate question that was on his mind. He didn't know Guillory at all but he
seemed pretty straight. What the hell.

'Can I ask you one more thing?' he
said, immediately regretting it.

'Uh oh. When somebody asks you if
they can ask you something, instead of just coming straight out and asking it,
you just know it's something they know they shouldn't be asking.'

He was right about that. Evan had
been about to ask him what he thought of Faulkner and his abilities, but now he
decided not to. It could wait.

'You're right; no tongues on a first
date. Let me know what you find out.'

He was about to end the call when
Guillory said, 'For what it's worth, I think you're doing the right thing here;
you reap what you sow. You probably sleep better at night too.' He cut the
connection before Evan had a chance to reply.

Evan decided he should talk to Ray
Clements while he was waiting for Guillory to get back to him. He didn't think
Clements would have a problem talking to him if he mentioned Linda's name; he no
doubt thought of her as highly as she did him. Despite that he still decided
not to call ahead and drove round to Clements' house, not far from where Linda
lived. The house and yard were small but tidy and well looked after. They
looked every bit like Evan expected a retired school teacher's house would look
like.

As he pulled up, a large woman
wearing too much makeup and totally inappropriate heels for her age was coming
out the front door. Faulkner hadn't lied - she'd been hit with the ugly stick
more than once. Like all ugly women the world over, she insisted on scraping
her hair back so tightly that it stretched her face. Evan hated to think what
happened when all that tension was released at bedtime. And from the
barrel-like shape and size of her, he thought it likely that Clements used her
as a roller to flatten the bumps in his immaculate lawn. If he had any sense
he'd put her away in the shed until next year when he was finished.

'Mrs Clements...' Evan started.

'You must be the private eye,' she interrupted,
looking him up and down in a way that made him feel that he didn’t quite pass
muster. 'Linda Clayton rang Ray and told him she'd hired someone to find out
what happened to her husband and boy. You've got that sort of look about you.'

Evan wasn't sure what she meant by
that but he didn't suppose she was being complimentary. Probably meant he
looked a bit seedy, whatever that was supposed to mean. Luckily she was on her
way out, because his brief encounter with her gave him the impression she would
have dominated any conversation he tried to have with her husband. He hadn't
met the man, but already he was feeling sorry for him.

'Ray's inside,' she continued. 'You
go on in. I've got to go out.'

She left the door open and got in
her car and drove away. Evan knocked on the still open door and called inside.

Clements appeared from somewhere at
the back of the house. He was tall and painfully thin with the beginnings of a
stoop. He was the complete opposite of his wife. If he used her as a lawn
roller, she'd surely use him as a rake. Evan was vaguely disappointed that he
didn't have a neat row of pens tucked into his shirt pocket or any leather
patches on his elbows. At least he had a full head of mad scientist style
silver hair.

'You must be Evan,' he said,
sticking out a surprisingly large hand and shaking energetically. Evan was
surprised by the firmness of his grip. He supposed he'd been expecting someone
old and broken from the allegations made against him. 'Come on in and call me
Ray.'

'Word spreads fast.'

'You can't blame Linda. You're the
first person to take her seriously for years. She told me you wanted to talk to
me.' Evan smiled to himself; he’d been right that Linda was busy lining up
teams.

Clements led him through the house
and out into the back yard. A couple of uncomfortable looking metal garden
chairs sat on a deck at the back of the house. Looking at them, Evan wondered
how Clements’ wife managed to get her substantial butt into them. Or if she
did, how she ever got it out again.
He pictured her walking off with it sticking out behind her,
completely oblivious as it followed her around.

They sat down and Evan’s suspicions
were confirmed; they were as uncomfortable as they looked. It was obviously a
yard for working in, not relaxing in, and it showed. Another immaculate lawn
was surrounded by perfectly manicured shrubs and trees. There was a pond with a
waterfall and Evan was disappointed again to see that there were no garden
gnomes fishing in it. Next to him there was a magnificent Oleander in a pot. He
was tempted to say
nice bush
but thought better of it.

'I hope you don't mind talking to me
- I'm sure it'll resurrect some unpleasant memories,’ he said instead.

Clements shook his head and opened
his arms wide. 'I've got nothing to hide...unlike some people.’ He leant
forward towards Evan in a conspiratorial way as he said it. It made Evan think of
a large vulture inspecting the carcase of a dead elephant. ‘Besides, if there's
any chance of finding out what happened, I'm more than happy to help.'

Evan thought the guy seemed a bit
too good to be true. And what was the
unlike some people
crack about?
Perhaps Clements would turn out to be a better source of information. Evan leaned
back to enjoy the warm afternoon sun on his face and asked him to give his version
of things.

'As far as I'm concerned there are
two known facts and that's all. One; Daniel left my classroom same as usual,
without a scratch on him and two; he was never seen again. Unfortunately as far
as some people were concerned, that made me the last person to see him alive,
and, as we all know, two plus two equals five.'

'You're talking about Faulkner.'

'Who else? When you add the
testimony
’
– he made a show of coughing into his hand – ‘of Carl Hendricks into the
equation, supposedly proving that Daniel never left the campus, that was just
about all Faulkner needed.’ He raised his finger in the air in a eureka-style
gesture. ‘Except some evidence of course. The small matter of some
proof
,
or it that an unreasonable demand from a man whose life is on the line?'

Evan wondered if he’d taught drama
at school. Failing that he must have been a leading light in the local amateur
dramatics society. 'Faulkner said you didn't have an alibi.'

'Well, I must be guilty then. Just
take me away.' He jumped up and held out his wrists as if Evan was going to
cuff them. Evan took the opportunity to get out of the uncomfortable chair
himself. 'Or was I just unlucky to be the one person out of a hundred thousand
other innocent people who don’t go around with a verifiable alibi covering
every minute of their day, who was asked for one.'

'He said you went for a drive.'

Clements let out a short, humorless
laugh. 'Yes, while that scumbag Hendricks went to a strip club. They probably
took the dried stains in his underwear as evidence he was really there. That,
and the word of the tired old whore who'd been busy wiping her syphilitic twat
on his face all afternoon.’ A speck of saliva flew from his mouth and landed on
Evan’s chin. Evan tried to ignore it and not be obvious about wiping it away. ‘At
least he wasn't up to something really disgusting like
driving his car
.'

Evan was taken aback by the
outburst. His mental image of what retired school teachers were like had been
completely blown out of the water. Clements was clenching his jaw so hard by
the time he finished, Evan was surprised he didn't crack a tooth.

'Faulkner also thought he'd caught
me out in some huge, incriminating lie and cover up.'

'Giving Daniel a ride home a few
times?'

'Yes; as you can see, we only live a
few blocks away from each other.’ He took a deep breath and made a visible
effort to relax his bunched shoulders, and then set off towards the pond. Evan
followed. Clements picked up a tub of fish food and started feeding the fish
that had swarmed to the edge. ‘It helps calm me down,’ he said. ‘Linda could be
a bit strange at times and had this thing about Daniel walking home. She was
brought up on a farm. She thought everyone should get lots of fresh air and
exercise, that sort of thing, but you can take it too far.'

He cleared his throat and ran his bony
hand through his hair, leaving little bits of fish food in it. Everyone Evan
talked to seemed to do that. He wondered if he did it himself. 'So I used to
drop him off now and then.' He cleared his throat again. He obviously wasn't
comfortable talking about it. 'But there's no such thing as an innocent act of
kindness, is there? There has to be something sinister going on. Surely some
payment is required for the ride. And since young boys don’t have much money,
they have to pay in other ways. Q.E.D.'

'And you didn't volunteer the
information because you knew Faulkner would do exactly what he did do with it.'

'Yes. People like Faulkner always
like the easy answer. They get sent on a half-day profiling seminar in East Bumfuck, and suddenly they're Professor of Psychology at Harvard. Then they look at my
wife and they look at me and you see their eyes narrow. You can actually see
the wheels turning and see them thinking, "Will you look at the size of
her. And look at him, the skinny runt. I bet she makes his life hell at home. I
bet he goes out and abuses little boys to make himself feel better. I bet he's got
a
really
small pecker." It's pathetic. It makes me sick.'

Evan felt a twinge of guilt for
thinking the same thing - not the part about abusing little boys, just that his
wife dominated him. It was too early to comment on his pecker.

Clements put the tub of fish food
back down and stared absently into the dark water. 'Of course it then looked
much worse when it did come out,' he said.

'How did it come out?'

Clements looked up and beamed at
him. 'Guess.'

Evan thought about the whole
situation. There was only really one explanation that he could be expected to
guess. 'Hendricks?'

'Give the man a cigar!' Clements
shouted, clapping his hands. 'First of all he convinced Faulkner that Daniel
didn't walk off campus, and then he tells him
I know someone who likes to
give little boys a ride in his car
. You'd think he was trying to set me
up.'

'What do you think about Hendricks'
statement?'

'Carl Hendricks was and probably
still is a disgusting, useless piece of shit. If we were talking about whether
a naked woman walked past his bus unnoticed, that's a different matter.’ His
mouth curled into a sneer. ‘She'd have tripped over his fat tongue hanging down
to the sidewalk. The way he looks at women in the street, I'm surprised he
hasn't been arrested for jerking off in public. But one kid out of all the
hundreds milling around? He didn't have a clue who passed his bus that, or any
other, day.'

'Which became obvious when Faulkner
switched his focus to the father.'

'Exactly. But it was far too late
for me by then. Faulkner had me firmly in his sights and it had been in all the
papers. People start out standing by you, but then they start to think there's
no smoke without fire. You can see it in their eyes.’ He looked down
despondently. Evan knew what it was like when people you thought were friends
started to avoid you.

‘There are also a lot of people who
have so much faith in the police they think it must be true or why else would
they be looking at you. A presumption of guilt, you could call it. Then there's
all that unwelcome publicity for the school, of course. We need to punish the
man who brought all this shit down on us.'

Clements had been picking at his
fingernails the whole time. He stopped and stuffed his hands into his pockets.
'End result was, I lost my job and the next thing you know Faulkner has changed
his mind and it's the father, not me. Sorry about your career, sorry about your
life, you're free to go. Except you're not. Not in people's minds.'

There wasn't anything Evan could say
to make him feel less bitter about the almost casual way his life had been
destroyed as part and parcel of the investigation. Clements headed back up
towards the house then made a sharp right towards a plant that obviously
required his immediate attention.

'What do you think about the theory
that the father did it?' Evan said, trailing behind him.

Clements stopped and turned to face
Evan. 'I think it's a crock of shit. I knew Robbie Clayton and I can guarantee
he couldn't have hurt that boy. He wasn't perfect by a long stretch, but he
adored that boy. He'd have done anything for him.'

'You say he wasn't perfect...'

'I'm sure you must have heard about
the rumors that went around.' Evan nodded and told him to go on. 'I know for a
fact that Robbie sometimes had trouble keeping it in his pants, but that
doesn't mean he killed his son because he caught him with another woman and
then they ran off together. That would take a monster.'

'Why was Faulkner so convinced?'

Clements gave a small shrug. 'I
can’t say for sure, but most people like easy answers and half-baked solutions.’

The way he said it made Evan wonder
if he was being put in the
most people
category. He got the impression
that Clements thought he was back in school in front of an unusually dim class.
He had that sort of impatient, waiting-to-be-disappointed look on his face.

‘And Faulkner likes it nice and
easy, that’s for sure. An expert in half-baked. More than that, it’s no longer
an embarrassing, unsolved double murder on his patch just before he retires;
now it's a nationwide manhunt and somebody else’s problem. Much better all
round. Not his fault when they come up with Jack Shit.'

'You really don't like him do you.'

'Can you blame me? He ruined my
life, and his laziness ruined Linda's too.'