Max was beginning to believe he’d end his days in this interview room. This afternoon it was stuffy and airless, and Grace, questioning Alan Turner with him, had a stinking cold. Even when she wasn’t coughing and sneezing, it was almost impossible to catch what she was saying. Max would bet his life he’d catch her confounded germs.
Alan Turner was a cool, arrogant individual. What would he make of Donna Lord’s description? Geoff Morrison’s bit of skirt, she’d called him. He was medium height, and had dark hair that was messed up. Max suspected it cost a fortune and took time to keep it looking that untidy. He had very full lips, and was inclined to pout.
‘How do you earn your living, Mr Turner?’ Max asked curiously. ‘I know you’re in a band, but I can’t believe that pays the mortgage. Or does Mr Morrison keep you in luxury?’
He smiled at that. ‘No, he doesn’t. And no, the band doesn’t keep me, either. It brings in a bit, though, and I write songs which some big bands have recorded. Added to that, I produce records.’
‘I see. So what is the average day like for you?’
‘Well, I’m usually up around six thirty.’
‘Why so early?’
Turner sneered at that. ‘It’s the best part of the day. I usually prepare breakfast for us both, and then Geoff goes for a run. If our newspaper’s been delivered by then, I sit and read that with a couple of cups of coffee. I need my coffee in the morning.’‘
And Geoff Mr Morrison goes straight to the school after his run?’
‘Usually, yes.’
‘Then what?’
‘Then, if I’m not in the recording studio, I play my guitar for a couple of hours before starting work on the song I’m currently writing. I stop for lunch, and usually do the crossword, and then work until Geoff gets home at around five thirty.’
‘You’re in the house alone a lot then,’ Grace said, snuffling.
‘Not really. I’m often in the recording studio and I’m out in the evenings.’
‘How do you feel about Mr Morrison’s job?’ Max asked him. ‘Don’t you mind him being around young boys good-looking young boys?’
‘Why should I?’
Max tried to remember what Jill had said. She’d thought Turner might be jealous, but he couldn’t recall her theory.
‘No reason, I suppose,’ Max said. ‘When you and he were out together, did you ever see any of his pupils?’
‘Sometimes. Harrington’s not that big a town.’
‘True.’
Max had had enough. He needed coffee, and he needed air that Grace hadn’t coughed and sneezed into. In any case, it would do Turner good to sit and worry for a while.
If Max could drag Jill away from her phone calls to every Tom, Dick and Harry in Dublin, he’d like her to talk to Turner.
He got himself a coffee and set off to find her.
As he walked along the corridor, he wondered what it must be like to have a normal job, in a normal office, where everyone watched the clock and chatted amiably as they waited for five o’clock to arrive. Here, it was frantic.
Phones didn’t stop ringing, people didn’t stop shouting to each other because it was the only way to make yourself heard, people dashed in and rushed out again
He heard Phil Meredith talking to some unfortunate just ahead of him and quickly doubled back. He could do without updating him on the lack of progress. He could also do without another bollocking regarding his lack of delegation skills.
He was almost back at the interview room when he found Jill. She’d also got a coffee in her hands.
‘How’s it going?’ he asked.
‘Nothing so far, but I’ve left a message for a friend of mine. Babs and I were at uni together’ She broke off suddenly. ‘You met her.’
Babs? The name meant ‘Oh, yes. Big woman? Can talk for England?’
A smile lit her eyes briefly. ‘That’s her.’
When he and Jill had lived together, Babs had stayed with them one weekend. She was almost as wide as she was tall and hadn’t given two hoots about that.
‘A nice woman,’ he added. ‘She enjoyed my spaghetti bolognese, I seem to recall.’
‘She did,’ Jill agreed, her eyes on the carpet. ‘Anyway, she works in Dublin now. She might be able to help.’
Max thought it doubtful, but he didn’t say so.
‘Will you come and talk to Alan Turner?’ he asked. ‘He’s an arrogant so-and-so, and I think he’s hiding something.’
‘Like what?’
‘I still think he’s lying about being with Geoff Morrison the day Martin Hayden vanished. It’s too convenient.’
‘OK. I could do with a change of scenery, and a rest from the phone would be good.’
She was about to set off.
‘Have your coffee first,’ he said. ‘It’ll do him good to stew for a while.’
‘Is he stewing?’
‘Most people do when they’re in that interview room.’
‘True.’ She met his gaze. ‘You look shattered, Max.’
He felt shattered.
‘Being dead on your feet won’t keep Harry any safer,’ she pointed out.
‘You don’t look so great yourself. Have you slept?’
She shrugged, and he knew she hadn’t.
‘Jill, when this is over ’
‘But it’s not, Max,’ she cut him off. ‘Come on, let’s go and see Turner.’
She refused to discuss a future. All Max had been going to suggest was well, he didn’t really know what he’d been going to suggest. They belonged together though, and he wished she would give them a chance.
He caught her arm to halt her flight. ‘You will see us see the boys at Christmas, won’t you?’
‘Of course,’ she said softly.
‘Christmas Day?’ At her hesitation, he said, ‘Don’t tell me you could survive Christmas with your parents. Or with your sister and her brood.’
‘Probably not,’ she agreed, smiling.
‘Good. So I’ll tell the boys you’ll spend the day with us? Kate’s already planning the menu so no worries there. Although what there is to plan, I have no idea. Call me a bluff old cynic, but I bet it’ll be turkey and –’
He broke off as he spotted the shimmer of moisture in her eyes. What caused that? Memories of Christmas spent together? Fears for Harry?
‘Harry’s safe, love,’ he promised her.
‘I know.’ She drew a deep breath. ‘Come on. Let’s go and talk to Turner.’
They walked to the interview room, which was just as stuffy as when Max had left it. Alan Turner looked as calm as he had when Max had left, too.
Max switched on the tapes and named those present.
‘Why have you brought a shrink along?’ Turner sneered.
‘I’m a forensic psychologist,’ Jill corrected him, bristling as she did every time someone called her a shrink. ‘Have you ever seen a shrink, as you call them?’ she asked.
‘No. Why should I?’
‘Why not? Plenty of people do.’
‘Not me.’
‘How about your boyfriend?’ she asked. ‘Has he seen one?’
‘Of course not.’
‘Oh, I just wondered. He’s had trouble in the past, hasn’t he? A few what shall we say? misunderstandings? Young boys thinking along sexual assault lines.’
‘For God’s sake,’ he muttered. ‘One boy thought he was masturbating in the park. He was having a slash, that’s all.’
‘So he told you,’ she said pleasantly. ‘You’re his boyfriend. He’s hardly likely to tell you he had the hots for one of his pupils, is he? Why should he? People have affairs every day. They don’t tell their partners about them, do they?’
Why did Max always cringe when she got on to the subject of affairs? And why did she always get on to the blasted subject?
‘Of course they don’t,’ she pressed on. ‘They lie, they pretend, they buy gifts and they carry on having affairs. They don’t confess to them until it’s all over.’
Max cleared his throat, and she swung her face in his direction.
‘Are you all right, DCI Trentham?’
‘Fine.’
She returned her attention to Turner. ‘What about you?’ she asked him. ‘Do you have affairs?’
‘No.’
‘Really?’
‘Really.’
‘He watches the boys in the swimming pool, you know,’ Jill went on affably. ‘One boy said he always made sure he had an erection when he went swimming just to get your boyfriend going. He called him a pervert.’
‘Look –’ Turner lashed out with his fist so viciously that, for an awful second, Max thought he was going to land one on Jill. Instead, he hit the table.
‘You were about to say?’ Jill prompted, as he clamped his jaw shut, biting back on the abuse he’d been about to give her.
‘Forget it,’ he snapped. ‘You shrinks are all the same. It all comes down to sex, doesn’t it? Why’s that? Don’t you get enough? You wanna take a look in the mirror, sweetheart, and ask yourself why.’
Turner was losing his cool. He didn’t like to think of Geoff Morrison looking at anyone else. Max had to agree with him, though; psychiatrists and psychologists always brought everything round to sex.
‘I get plenty, thanks,’ Jill replied pleasantly. ‘More than you, I expect. Your boyfriend’s too busy out running, too busy keeping fit, and too busy watching boys swimming with erections or racing around a football field. He’s busy with the football team after school and at weekends. Why’s that, do you think? Because he enjoys football, or because he’d rather be surrounded by young boys than spend his time with you?’
‘Crap!’
‘Is it?’ She shrugged. ‘You never saw Martin Hayden, did you? Well, let me tell you, he was a good-looking boy. The photos in the paper and on TV didn’t do him justice. You had to see him in the flesh.’
‘I saw him in the flesh!’ He realized what he’d said, and a tide of red colour flooded his face.
‘Where?’ Max demanded.
‘In Benedict’s,’ he said quietly. ‘Only once. And yeah,’ he said, talking to Jill, ‘he had the hots for Geoff. I could see that. But Geoff wasn’t interested.’
Martin Hayden in a gay club? Never. Surely not. What in hell’s name would he be doing there?
‘Nice-looking boy, wasn’t he?’ Jill said. ‘And you’re telling me Geoff wasn’t interested? Ha! I don’t believe that. According to Martin, your boyfriend was all over him.’
‘You’re lying.’
‘Nope. He told his sister all about it. Said he was a perv.’ She smiled. ‘So what was he doing at Benedict’s? How many gays did he know apart from Geoff Morrison?’
‘Why should I know what he was doing there?’
‘Then I’ll tell you. He was after your boyfriend.’
‘‘No!’
‘Yes.’ She sat back in her chair, looking relaxed. ‘That’s rich, isn’t it? You give him an alibi say he was with you the morning Martin Hayden disappeared and all the while, he was probably with the boy anyway.’
His head flew up at that. ‘No!’
‘I imagine so,’ Jill said. ‘When did you see Martin Hayden in Benedict’s? I bet it wasn’t long before he vanished, was it?’
‘It was the night before,’ Turner admitted.
‘Thought so,’ Jill murmured. ‘So your boyfriend would have arranged to see Martin on Wednesday at school. I bet he left early that morning, didn’t he? Sure to have done. He’ll have wanted to be at the school waiting for Martin. He wasn’t with you that morning. You lied. He told you to lie, didn’t he? He told you to say you were with him but really, he was with Martin Hayden.’
‘No!’
‘Yes. Oh, I doubt they did much at the school. A kiss maybe, a bit of a fumble’
‘OK, OK,’ he cried. ‘I lied. Geoff wasn’t with me that morning. He did leave early, but he didn’t see the boy.’
‘You don’t know that,’ Jill scoffed.
‘Yes, I fucking do. Bitch!’
Finally, Turner looked as if he wanted to run and hide.
‘You followed him, didn’t you?’ Jill said suddenly. ‘You know he didn’t see Martin Hayden because you followed him. He left early, and you were suspicious, weren’t you?’
Turner nodded, and he looked close to tears.
‘He said he was going jogging,’ he admitted, all bluster gone, ‘and I didn’t believe him. So yeah, I followed him. He drove out towards the park he often runs there but then I lost him. I got stuck at traffic lights because the idiot in front of me well, that doesn’t matter. I lost him. But he was heading out towards Burnley. He couldn’t have been going to see the boy because he was driving in the wrong direction. He couldn’t have.’
‘What do you know about Lower Crags Farm?’ Max asked.
‘What? The farm where the boy came from? Well, nothing. I’ve never seen the place.’
‘Liar,’ Max scoffed.
‘On my life, I have never seen it. I know roughly where it is, but I’ve never been along that road. I’ve had no cause to. There’s nothing there.’
‘So you’ve never driven past?’
‘No.’
‘Not even out of curiosity?’ Jill said scornfully.
‘Never.’
‘So if you’ve never been past the place,’ Max said, ‘how would you know there are more police than residents there?’
He looked at Max as if he was speaking in Swahili. ‘I wouldn’t.’
‘Someone told me you’d said exactly that,’ Max informed him.
‘Well, I didn’t. I swear on my life that I never said that. Why would I? I’ve no idea how many police are there or how many people live there.’
‘So you’re saying the person who told me is a liar?’ Max asked.
‘No,’ he replied. ‘I’m saying they’ve got it wrong. I never said that. Either they’re confusing me with someone else or hell, I don’t know. I didn’t say it, haven’t thought it, wouldn’t say it.’
‘And we’re supposed to take your word for that?’ Jill said, shaking her head. ‘Why would we do that? You’ve lied to us before, why should we believe you now?’
‘You can believe what you like,’ he retorted, those full lips in pout mode now.
‘OK,’ Max said. ‘You’ve been most helpful. Thank you.’
‘Can I go then?’ he asked hopefully.
‘Yeah,’ Max told him, smiling. ‘Soon.’
Max nodded to Jill and they both left the room.
‘Thanks for that,’ Max said. ‘Do you believe he’s never been past Lower Crags Farm?’
‘If it were anyone else, I wouldn’t. Most people would have to look. They would see Martin Hayden as competition and go along to see where he lived. But Turner, I’m not so sure about. He was satisfied that Morrison didn’t go near Martin Hayden. That may have been enough.’
Max checked his watch. ‘I need to collect Harry and Ben from school, so I’ll have a chat with our friend Morrison while I’m there.’