Piece of My Heart (32 page)

“I’ll take it that you do, then. Otherwise there might be charges under the vagrancy act.”

McGarrity leaned back in his chair and crossed his legs. His clothes looked old and worn, like a tramp’s, Chadwick noticed, not like the bright peacock fashions the others favoured. And everything he wore was black, or close to it. “Look,” he said, “why don’t you just cut the crap and get it over with? If you’re going to charge me and put me in a cell, do it.”

“All in good time, Patrick. All in good time. Back to the cannabis. Where did it come from?”

“Ask your pig friends. They must have planted it.”

“Nobody planted anything. Where did it come from?”

“I don’t know.”

“Okay. Tell me about this afternoon.”

“What about it?”

“What did you do?”

“I don’t remember. Not much. Read a book. Went for a walk.”

“Do you remember receiving a visitor?”

“Can’t say as I do.”

“A young woman.”

“No.”

Chadwick’s muscles were aching from keeping the rage inside. He felt like flinging himself across the table and strangling McGarrity with his bare hands. “A woman you terrorized and assaulted?”

“I didn’t do any such thing.”

“You deny the young woman was in the house?”

“I don’t remember seeing anyone.”

Chadwick stood up so quickly he knocked over his chair. “I’ve had enough of this, constable,” he said to Bradley. “Take him down and lock him up.” He glared at McGarrity for a second before he left and said, “We’ll talk again, and the next time it won’t be so polite.” Outside in the corridor, he leaned
against the wall and took several deep breaths. His heart was beating like a steam piston inside his chest, and he could feel his skin burning. Slowly, as he mopped his brow, the rage subsided. He straightened his tie and jacket and walked back to his office.

15

D
etective Sergeant Kevin Templeton relished his latest assignment, and even more he relished the fact that Winsome was to accompany him as an observer. Even though he had got nowhere with Winsome, not for lack of trying, he still found her incredibly attractive, and the sight of her thighs under the taut material of her pinstripe trousers still brought him out in a sweat. He’d always thought of himself as a breast man, but Winsome had soon put the lie to that. He tried not to make his glances obvious as she drove out of town and onto the main Lyndgarth road. The farmhouse was at the end of a long, muddy track, and no matter how close to the door they parked, there was no way of avoiding getting their shoes muddy.

“Christ, it bloody stinks here, dunnit?” Templeton moaned.

“It’s a farmyard,” said Winsome.

“Yeah, I know that. Look, let me do the questioning, right? And you keep a close eye on the father, okay?” Templeton hopped on one leg by the doorway, trying to wipe some of the mud off his best pair of Converse trainers.

“There’s a shoe scraper,” said Winsome.

“What?”

She pointed. “That thing there with the raised metal edge, by the door. It’s for scraping the mud off the undersides of your shoes.”

“Well, you live and learn,” said Templeton, making a try at the shoe scraper. “Whatever will they think of next?”

“They thought of it a long time ago,” said Winsome.

“I know that. I was being sarcastic.”

“Yes, sir.”

Nearby, a dog was growling and barking fit to kill, but luckily it was chained up to a post.

Templeton shot Winsome a glance. “No need for you to be sarcastic as well. Don’t think I didn’t catch your tone. Are you okay with the way the super wants us to play it?”

“I’m fine.”

Templeton’s eyes narrowed. “Am I to take it you don’t–”

But before he could finish, the door opened and Calvin Soames stood there. “Police, isn’t it?” he said. “What do you want this time?”

“Just come to clear a couple of things up, Mr. Soames,” said Templeton, bringing out his best smile and offering his hand. Soames ignored it. “Is your daughter at home?”

Soames grunted.

“All right if we come in?”

“Wipe your feet.” And with that he turned back into the gloom and left them to their own devices.

After further wiping their feet on a bristly mat, they followed him into the inner recesses of the house and heard him call out, “Kelly! It’s for you.”

The girl came downstairs, and her face registered disappointment when she saw Templeton and Winsome standing there in the hallway. “You’d better come through,” she said,
leading them into the kitchen, which was marginally brighter and smelled of bleach and overripe bananas. A black-and-white cat stirred lazily, jumped off its chair and sidled out of the room.

They all sat on sturdy hard-backed chairs around the table. Calvin Soames muttered something about work and headed out, but Templeton called him back. “This concerns you, too, Mr. Soames,” he said. “Please sit down.”

Soames let a moment pass, then sat.

“What’s this all about?” asked Kelly. “I’ve told you everything already.”

“Well, that’s just it, you see,” said Templeton. “Being the untrusting detectives that we are, we don’t take anything at face value, or on first account. It’s like first impressions, see, they can so often be wrong. Any chance of a cup of tea?”

“I’ll put the kettle on,” said Kelly.

She was definitely fit, Templeton thought, as he watched her move towards the range with just the barest swinging of her hips, encased in tight jeans. Her waist was slender as a wand, and she wore a jet belly piercing, which made a nice contrast to her pale skin. Her blonde hair was tied back, but a few tresses had escaped and framed her pale, oval face. Her breasts moved tantalizingly under the short yellow T-shirt, and Templeton guessed that she wasn’t wearing a bra. Lucky bugger, that Barber, Templeton thought. If the last thing on earth he had done was shag Kelly Soames, then it can’t have been such a bad way to go. He began to wonder if, perhaps when they’d got this business over and done with, he might be in with a chance himself.

When the tea was served, Winsome took out her notebook and Templeton sat back in his chair. “Right,” he said. “Now,
you, Mr. Soames, returned back here at about seven o’clock on Friday evening. Am I right?”

“That’s right.”

“To check if you’d turned off the gas ring?”

“It’s sometimes on so low,” he answered, “that a puff of air would blow it out. A couple of times I’ve come home and smelled gas. I thought it best to check, as I don’t live far from the Cross Keys.”

“About a five-minute drive each way, is that right?”

“About that, aye.”

“And you, Miss Soames, you were working at the Cross Keys all evening, right?”

Kelly chewed her thumbnail and nodded.

“How long have you been working there?”

“About two years now. There’s not much else to do around here.”

“Ever thought of moving to the big city?”

Kelly looked at her father and said, “No.”

“Nice place to work, is it, the Cross Keys?”

“It’s all right.”

“Good spot to meet lads?”

“I don’t know what you mean.”

“Oh, come on, Kelly. You’re a barmaid. You must meet lots of lads, get chatted up a lot, nice-looking girl like you.”

She blushed at that, and the ghost of a smile crossed her face, Templeton noticed. Maybe he was in with a chance after all. As Calvin Soames looked on, the frown deepened on his forehead in a series of lines down to the bridge of his nose.

“Do they tell you their troubles?” Templeton went on. “How their wives don’t understand them and they’re wasted on the jobs they’re doing?”

Kelly shrugged. “Sometimes,” she said. “When it’s quiet.”

“What do you do for fun?”

“Dunno. Go out with my mates, I suppose.”

“But where do you go? There’s not exactly a lot for a young girl to do around here, is there? It can’t be very exciting.”

“There’s Eastvale.”

“Oh, yes. I’m sure you enjoy a Saturday night out in Eastvale with the lads, listening to dirty jokes, getting bladdered and puking your guts up with the rest of them around the market cross. No, I mean, a girl like you, there must be something better, something more. Surely?”

“There’s dances sometimes, and bands,” Kelly said.

“Who do you like?”

“Dunno.”

“Come on, you must have a favourite.”

She shifted in her chair. “I dunno, really. Keane. Maybe.”

“Ah, Keane.”

“You know them?”

“I’ve heard them,” said Templeton. “Nick Barber was really into bands, wasn’t he?”

Kelly seemed to tense up again. “He said he liked music,” she said.

“Didn’t he say he could get you into all the best concerts down in London?”

“I don’t think so. I’ve never been to London.”

Templeton felt Winsome’s gaze boring into the side of his head. Her legs were crossed, and one of them was twitching. She clearly didn’t like the way he was drawing the interview out, postponing the moment of glory. But he was enjoying himself. He closed in for the kill.

“Did Nick Barber promise to take you there?”

“No.” Kelly shook her head, panic showing on her face. “Why would he do that?”

“Gratitude, perhaps?”

Calvin Soames’s face darkened. “What are you saying, man?”

Templeton ignored him. “Well, Kelly?”

“I don’t know what you’re on about. I only talked to him at the bar when he ordered his drink. He was nice, polite. That’s all.”

“Oh, come off it, Kelly,” said Templeton. “We happen to know that you slept with him on two occasions.”

“What–” Calvin Soames tried to get to his feet, but Templeton gently pushed him back down. “Please stay where you are, Mr. Soames.”

“What’s this all about?” Soames demanded. “What’s going on?”

“Wednesday evening and Friday afternoon,” Templeton went on. “A bit of afternoon delight. Beats the dentist’s any day, I’d say.”

Kelly was crying now and her father was fast turning purple with fury. “Is this true, Kelly?” he asked. “Is what he’s saying true?”

Kelly buried her face in her hands. “I feel sick,” she said between her fingers.

“Is this true?” her father demanded.

“Yes! All right, damn you, yes!” she said, glaring at Templeton. Then she turned to her father. “He fucked me, Daddy. I let him fuck me. I
liked
it.”

“You whoring slut!” Soames raised his hand to slap her, but Winsome grabbed it first. “Not a good idea, Mr. Soames,” she said.

Templeton looked at Soames. “Are you telling me you didn’t already know this, Mr. Soames?” he said.

Soames bared his teeth. “If I’d’ve known, I’d have…”

“You’d have what?” Templeton asked, shoving his face close to Soames’s. “Beat up your daughter? Killed Nick Barber?”

“What?”

“You heard me. Is that what you did? You found out what Kelly had been doing, and you waited until she was back working behind the bar, then you made an excuse to leave the pub for a few minutes. You went to see Barber. What happened? Did he laugh at you? Did he tell you how good she was? Or did he say she meant nothing to him, just another shag? Was the bed still warm from their lovemaking? You hit him over the head with a poker. Maybe you didn’t mean to kill him. Maybe something just snapped inside you. It happens. But there he was, dead on the floor. Is that how it happened, Calvin? If you tell us now, it’ll go better for you. I’m sure a judge and jury will understand a father’s righteous anger.”

Kelly lurched over to the sink and just made it in time. Winsome held her shoulders as the girl heaved.

“Well?” said Templeton. “Am I right?”

Soames deflated into a sad, defeated old man, all the anger drained out of him. “No,” he said, without inflection. “I didn’t kill anyone. I had no idea…” He looked at Kelly bent over the sink, tears in his eyes. “Not till now. She’s no better than her mother was,” he added bitterly.

Nobody said anything for a while. Kelly finished vomiting and Winsome poured her a glass of water. They sat down at the table again. Her father wouldn’t look at her. Finally, Templeton got to his feet. “Well, Mr. Soames,” he said. “If you change your mind, you know where to get in touch with us.
And in the meantime, as they say in the movies, don’t leave town.” He pointed at Kelly. “Nor you, young lady.”

But nobody was looking at him, or paying attention. They were all lost in their own worlds of misery, pain and betrayal. That would pass, though, Templeton knew, and he’d see Kelly Soames again under better circumstances, he was certain of it.

Outside at the car, dodging the puddles and mud as best he could, Templeton turned to Winsome, rubbed his hands together and said, “Well, I think that went pretty well. What do you think, Winsome? Do you think he knew?”

Banks had a great deal of information to digest, he thought, as he parked down by the Co-Op store at the inner harbour and walked towards the shops and restaurants of West Cliff. He passed a reconstruction of the yellow and black HMS
Grand Turk
, used in the
Hornblower
TV series, and stood for a moment admiring the sails and rigging. What a hell of a life it must have been at sea back then, he thought. Maybe not so bad if you were an officer, but for the common sailor, the bad, maggot-infested food, the floggings, the terrible wounds of battle, butchery thinly disguised as surgery. Of course, he’d got most of his ideas from
Hornblower
and
Master and Commander
, but they seemed pretty accurate to him, and if they weren’t, how would he know?

Thinking back on what Keith Enderby had just told him, he realized he would have been living in Notting Hill at around the same time as Linda Lofthouse and Tania Hutchison. He was sure he would have remembered seeing someone as beautiful as Tania, even though she wasn’t famous then, but he couldn’t. There were, he remembered, a lot of beautiful young
women in colourful clothes around at the time, and he had met his fair share of them.

But Tania and Linda would have moved in very different circles. Banks didn’t know anyone in a band, for a start; he paid for all his concert tickets, like everyone else he knew. He also didn’t have the musical talent to perform in local clubs, though he often went to listen to those who did. But most of all, perhaps, was that he had always felt like an outsider, had felt somehow merely on the fringes of it all. He never wore his hair too long, couldn’t get much beyond wearing a flowered shirt or tie, let alone kaftans and beads, couldn’t bring himself to join in the political demonstrations, and most times he found himself involved in any sort of counterculture conversation, he thought it all sounded simplistic, childish and boring.

Banks leaned on the railing and watched the fishing boats bobbing at anchor in the harbour, then walked to a café he remembered that served excellent fish and chips, one thing you could usually rely on in Whitby. He went into the café, which was almost empty, and ordered a pot of tea and jumbo haddock and chips, with bread and butter for chip butties, from a bored young waitress in a black apron and white blouse.