Dead Silent (2 page)

Standing at the door, I stretched and gazed at the view outside my cottage. Clear skies and rolling Lancashire fields. I could see the grey of Turners Fold in the valley below me, but the sunlight turned the tired old cotton town into quaint Victoriana, the canal twinkling soft blue, bringing the summer barges from nearby Blackley as it wound its way towards Yorkshire.

Turners Fold was my home, had always been that way—or so it seemed. I’d spent a few years in London as a reporter at one of the nationals, a small-town boy lost in the bright lights, but home kept calling me, and so when the rush of the city wore me down, I headed back north. I used to enjoy walking the London streets, feeling the bump of the crowd, just another anonymous face, but the excitement faded in the end. It didn’t take me long to pick up the northern rhythms again, the slower pace, the bluntness of the people, the lack of any real noise. And I liked it that way. It seemed simpler somehow, not as much of a race.

The summers made the move worthwhile. The heat didn’t hang between the buildings like it did in London, trapped by exhaust fumes, the only respite being a trip to a park, packed out by tourists.

The tourists don’t visit Turners Fold, so it felt like I had
the hills to myself, a private view of gentle slopes and snaking ribbons of drystone walls, the town just a blip in the landscape.

But it has character, this tough little town of millstone grit. My mind flashed back to the London rush, the wrestle onto the underground, and I smiled as the breeze ruffled my hair and I felt the first warmth of the day, ready for a perfect June afternoon. I heard a noise behind me, the shuffle of slippers on the stone step. I didn’t need to look round. I felt sleepy lips brush my neck as Laura wrapped her arms around my waist.

‘I thought you were staying in bed,’ I said.

‘I want to take Bobby to school,’ she replied, her voice hoarse from sleep. ‘Early shift next week, so I won’t get a chance then, and I need to start revising.’

‘Sergeant McGanity. It has a good ring to it,’ I said.

‘But I need to get through the exams first,’ she said. ‘What are you doing, Jack?’

‘Just enjoying the view.’

Laura rested her head on my shoulder and let her hair fall onto my chest. She had grown it over the winter, dark and sleek, past her shoulders now. I looked down and smiled. Cotton pyjamas and fluffy slippers.

‘What about later?’ she asked.

‘I’m not sure,’ I replied. ‘I might take a look at the coroner’s court, see if there’s an inquest.’

‘Morbid,’ she said, and gave me a playful squeeze.

‘Where there’s grief, there’s news,’ I said. ‘And the Crawler has been quiet as well, so the paper needs to be filled somehow.’

Laura grimaced at that. Blackley had been plagued for a couple of years by a peeping Tom, loitering outside houses in a balaclava, taking photographs. Some thought that he
had even gone into people’s homes. There had been no attack yet, but everyone knew it was just a matter of time, and so the local press had attached a tag and criticised the police. The name made for great headlines, and sales went up whenever his name went on display.

‘He has lean patches,’ Laura said. ‘The surveillance must take time.’

‘So no suspect yet?’

Laura gave me a jab in the ribs. ‘You know I wouldn’t tell you anyway.’

I turned around, moved her hair from her face and kissed her, tasting sleep on her lips, stale and warm. ‘I hate a discreet copper.’

Laura’s green eyes shone up at me, her dimples flickering in her cheeks. ‘I’ve learnt to avoid trouble, because it follows you around,’ she said, and then she slipped out from under my arm to go back into the house.

I listened as she grabbed Bobby when he skipped past, his yelp turning to a giggle. He was seven now, getting taller, his face longer, the nursery cheeks gone. It seemed like the morning was just about perfect. We’d settled for drifting along, now the buzz of new love had worn off, and there were more carefree mornings like this: Laura happy, Bobby laughing. He was Laura’s son from her now-defunct marriage, but he was starting to feel like my own, and I knew how much he brightened up the house, except for those fortnightly trips to see his father, when the house seemed too quiet.

My thoughts drifted back to work. I’m a freelance reporter, and I write the court stories, because crime keeps the local newspaper happy. People like to know what other people are doing.

But if I was going to get the stories, I knew I had to go
to court. It was enthusiasm I was lacking, not work, because it was harder to get paid these days. The recession had hit the local papers hard, with estate agents and car showrooms no longer paying for the double-page adverts and people increasingly turning to the internet. The paper needed me to fill the pages, but wanted to pay less and less for each story, and so it felt like I had to run faster just to stay in the same place.

I turned to go inside and was about to shut the door, when I heard a noise. I paused and listened. It was the steady
click-click
of high heels.

I was curious. There were no other houses near mine, and the shoes didn’t sound like they were made for walking. Unexpected visitors made me wary. Working the crime stories can upset people—names spread through the local rag, reputations ruined. The truth doesn’t matter when court hearings are written up. The only thing that matters is whether someone in court said it.

The clicks got closer, and then she appeared in the gateway in front of me.

She was middle aged, bingo-blonde, dressed in a long, black leather coat, too hot for the weather, and high-heeled ankle boots.

‘You look like you’re a long way from wherever you need to be,’ I said.

She took a few deep breaths, the hill climb taking it out of her, her hands on her knees. She stubbed out a cigarette on the floor.

‘There are no buses up here,’ she said, and then she straightened herself. Her breasts tried to burst out of her jumper, her cleavage ravaged by lines and too much sun, and her thighs were squeezed into a strip of cloth three decades too young for her.

Before I could say anything, she looked at me and asked, ‘Are you Jack Garrett?’ Her accent was local, but it sounded like she was trying to soften it.

‘You’ve come to my door,’ I replied, wary. ‘You go first.’

She paused at first, seemed edgy, and then she said, ‘My name is Susie Bingham, and I’m looking for Jack Garrett.’

‘Why?’

‘I’ve got a story for him.’

I nodded politely, but I wasn’t excited yet. The promise of hot news was the line I heard most, but usually it turned out to be some neighbour dispute, or a problem with a boss, someone using the press to win a private fight. Sex, violence and fame sell the nationals, the papers wanting the headline, the grabline, not the story. Local papers are different. Delayed roadworks and court stories fill those pages.

But I had learnt one other thing: it pays to listen first before I turn people away, because just as many people don’t realise how good a story can be, who see a rough-cut diamond as cheap quartz.

I opened the door and stepped aside. ‘Come in.’

Susie nodded and then clomped past.

Bobby went quiet as Susie entered, suddenly shy. As I followed her in, I nodded towards the stairs. ‘Can you tell Mummy I’ve got a visitor?’ As Bobby trotted off on his errand, I gestured for Susie to sit down.

She put her coat onto the back of the sofa. ‘I like your house,’ she said, looking around. ‘I’ve always wanted a house like this. Cosy and dark.’

I smiled to show that I knew what she meant. The windows to the cottage were small, like jail views, the sunlight not penetrating far into the room, only enough to catch the dust-swirls and light up the table in the corner where I write up my stories.

‘We like it,’ I said, putting a pad of paper on my knee, a pen in my hand. ‘And if we’re talking home life, where do you live?’

‘Just a small flat in Blackley,’ she said. ‘Nothing special.’ She went to get another cigarette out of her packet, and I noticed a tremble to her fingers. I gave a small shake of my head, and so she put the cigarette away. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘I didn’t mean to be rude, but I’m a bit nervous.’

‘That’s okay,’ I said. ‘Just tell me why you’re here.’

Susie smiled and looked embarrassed. The powder on her face creased and, as she showed her teeth, I saw a smudge of pink lipstick on the yellowed enamel. I’d guessed Susie’s age at over sixty when she’d first arrived, but she seemed younger now that she was out of the sunlight. She sat forward and put her bag on her knee. She looked like she was unsure how to start. I raised my eyebrows.
Just say it
, that was the hint.

‘It’s about Claude Gilbert,’ she blurted out.

I opened my mouth to say something, and then I stopped. I looked at her. She didn’t laugh or give any hint that it was a joke.

‘I’ve met Claude Gilbert,’ she said.

‘The
Claude Gilbert?’ I asked, and I couldn’t stop the smile.

Susie nodded, and her hands tightened around the handles on her handbag. ‘You don’t look like you believe me.’

And I didn’t.

Blackley was famous for three things: cotton, football, and for being the home of Claude Gilbert, a barrister and part-time television pundit who murdered his pregnant wife and then disappeared. It was the way he did it that caught the public imagination: a blow to the head and then buried alive.

‘Claude Gilbert? I haven’t heard that name in a while,’ I said, and then I tried to let her down gently. ‘There are Claude
Gilbert sightings all the time. And do you know what the tabloids do with them? They store them, that’s what, just waiting for the quiet news days, when a false sighting will fill a page, the same old speculation trotted out. Newspaper offices are full of stories like that, guaranteed headlines, most of it padding. Ex-girlfriends of Ian Huntley, old lodgers of Fred West, all just waiting for the newspaper rainy day.’

‘But this isn’t just a sighting,’ she said, frustration creeping into her voice. ‘This is a message from him.’

‘A message?’

She nodded.

That surprised me.
From
Claude Gilbert? I looked at her, saw the blush to her cheeks. I wasn’t sure if it was shame or the walk up the hill. The Claude Gilbert story attracted attention-seekers, those after the front-page spot, but Susie seemed different. Most people thought Claude was dead, but no one really knew for sure. If he was alive, he had to come out eventually or be caught. And anyway, perhaps the truth didn’t matter as much with the Claude Gilbert story. A good hoax sighting will still fill half a page somewhere, even if it was only in one of the weekly gossip magazines.

‘Wait there,’ I said, and shot off to get my voice recorder.

Mike Dobson peered into the bathroom, the door slightly ajar. The shower had been running for a long time, and he could see Mary through the steam, her head hanging down under the jets, her shoulders slumped, the water running down her body until it streamed from the ends of her fingers.

He looked away quickly, not wanting to be caught, and leant back against the door frame. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. He glanced towards the bed, too large, cold and empty. Was middle-age meant to be this lonely?

But he fought the feeling, tried not to think about it. He knew it would end like it always did: a drive to the back streets, always looking out for the police, then over in an instant, a grope in his back seat, the crinkle of the condom, then quick release; forty pounds gone and just the shameful churn in his stomach as a reminder.

His wife must have sensed his presence, because she shouted out: ‘Close the door.’

He clicked it shut and then returned to the large mirror in the bedroom, a mock-gothic oval. There was a spotlight over it and he stepped back to button his shirt, a white collar over red pinstripe, and put on his tie, not fond of what he saw in the glare. His cheeks were sagging into jowls and the lines around his eyes no longer disappeared when he
stopped smiling. He flicked at his hair. It was creeping backwards, showing more forehead than a year ago, and some more colour was needed—the grey roots were showing through.

He looked towards the window as the water stopped and waited for the bathroom door to open. He could see the houses just outside his cul-de-sac, local authority housing, dark red brick and double-glazing, most of the gardens overgrown, with beaten-up cars parked outside and a satellite dish on every house. He had grown up on that estate, but it had been different back then. He wasn’t sure when it had changed. Maybe the eighties, when a generation had got left behind and had to watch as everyone else got richer.

Mike enjoyed the view normally. His house was different, a large newbuild, five bedrooms, the showhome of an estate built on the site of a former warehouse, but they’d had no children, and so four of the bedrooms were either empty or used for storage.

The bathroom door opened. Mary appeared, a large towel wrapped around her body, her face flushed, her hair flat and darkened by the water. She looked down as she walked over to the dresser and started to rummage through her drawers, looking for underwear.

‘Don’t watch me,’ she said, not looking at him.

‘I’m not watching.’

‘You do,’ she said, her voice flat, emotionless. ‘You do it all the time.’

He felt the burn of his cheeks. She had made him feel dirty again. ‘I’m going downstairs,’ he said.

She looked at the floor, her hands still, her body tense, and he could tell that she was waiting for him to leave the room.

‘I’ll make you breakfast,’ he said.

Mary shook her head. ‘I’ve set the table already. I’ll eat when you’ve gone.’

Mike took a deep breath and left the bedroom.

The house was quiet as he walked downstairs. There was a window open and the curtains fluttered as he walked into the living room. Pristine cream carpets, lilies in vases, pale-coloured potpourri in a white dish. The breakfast table was immaculate, as always, with a jug of juice in the centre of the table, cereal in plastic containers and napkins in silver rings; his dining room looked like a seaside guest house. He heard a noise outside and saw a group of smiling children going to school, their mothers exchanging small talk or pushing small toddlers in prams. His house seemed suddenly quiet and empty.