Authors: Elizabeth Corley
‘You said one of those, were there many like that?’
‘A few.’
‘Could you give me their names?’
‘I can’t remember after all this time. Why do you keep asking me such pointless questions anyway?’
Nightingale risked stretching the truth although her puritan soul protested loudly.
‘For one reason only, Mrs Smith. We have other statements which claim you were a close friend of Katherine Johnstone at school and it seems odd that you should deny that now.’
‘I
wasn’t
really close,’ she whined. ‘Oh, I wanted to be, everyone did – the Famous Foursome attracted hangers on. I was one of the pests that hovered round them, but I was never a close friend, now do you see?’
Nightingale did, and was sympathetic. Childhood failures were always among the most painful. She suspected that rejection had left its scars on the Leslie Smith of today, but she wasn’t there to sympathise.
‘Who were the Famous Foursome, Mrs Smith?’
‘Oh, I can’t remember now.’
‘Come on, Mrs Smith, that’s not strictly true, is it? It obviously mattered a great deal to you – most people would have a very clear memory.’
‘Perhaps I’ve blocked it out.’
‘I don’t think so.’ Nightingale let the silence develop. It lasted some time.
‘Why don’t you just go
away
and leave me alone?’
‘You know that’s not an option, Mrs Smith. You obviously know something and it’s my job to find out anything I can – anything at all – that may help us find Katherine Johnstone’s killer. You must tell me – and you might as
well tell me now and save yourself the hassle.’
‘Well, there was Katherine, and Debbie and Octavia Anderson. As I said, I just tagged along.’
‘You said there were four in the group, that’s only three. Who else?’
She hesitated then said evasively, ‘Judith – Judy Plaistow, that’s it, she was the fourth.’
Despite further questions that was all Detective Constable Nightingale learnt. It was hardly startling, nothing to get worked up about, so why had Leslie Smith become so disturbed and so defensive?
It was nearly six o’clock on a warm summer evening. Nightingale could hear distant voices from the local riverside pub calling and she hadn’t seen her fiancé all week but she could not relax. Instead of turning left towards home, a decent drop of best and a chance of seeing Jeff on the way, she reluctantly turned right at the end of the Smiths’ road and back to the incident room. It was almost deserted, the air stale behind closed windows. Wearily removing her jacket she toyed with the idea of letting in some fresh air but decided she would be gone in a few minutes. The name Plaistow rang a bell. She had interviewed a Judith Plaistow over the telephone weeks before – with any luck she would be able to confirm Smith’s story at once.
She found her previous notes and the number. There was no indication from the interview that Plaistow was particularly close to Katherine Johnstone. Five minutes later, she knew Leslie Smith had been lying about the fourth member of the group. Plaistow had been at the school less than three terms and had formed no close attachments. Thoughts of the pub now completely forgotten, she was back on Mrs Smith’s doorstep, armed with the old class lists by 6.20 p.m.
Leslie Smith tried to close the door as soon as she saw who it was but a determined size six allowed Nightingale to gain entry.
‘You lied to me, Mrs Smith, and I want to know why.’
‘Mummy, Mummy, who is this?’ A boy of about five or six ran down the hall from the kitchen.
‘Please, it’s the children’s teatime and their father will be home soon. He hates it if I’ve not cleared away and got them into their pyjamas.’
‘Then the sooner you answer my questions, Mrs Smith, the sooner I’ll be gone.’
‘Mummy, who is this lady and why’s she talking to you like that?’
‘Go back to the kitchen, Matthew, now, and finish your beans. I want every scrap gone by the time I come in – go on.’
She watched him run back and then ushered Nightingale into the same sitting room. She looked guilty and defeated. Glancing nervously at the clock she started talking without preamble.
‘I’m sorry I lied to you. I don’t know why I did, it’s just that talking of Carol always upsets me.’
‘Carol? Carol who?’
‘Carol Truman. She was the fourth person. Katherine was very fond of her, we all were. She was a lovely girl. One of the special people you meet in life, you know?’
‘You say
was
a lovely girl. Why?’
Leslie Smith looked at her in surprise and paused before responding. ‘God, don’t you ever stop asking questions? She, she went away. Left the school. The family emigrated or something.’
‘That’s hardly upsetting, Mrs Smith.’
‘No, well it’s not just that, you see.’ Mrs Smith hesitated, searching for words. ‘I was a bitch to her before she went, two-timed her with her boyfriend. She nearly had a breakdown. I never forgave myself.’
‘I see, and you have no idea where she went, what she is doing now? What her family did?’
‘No. They were farmers, I think – her family emigrated because of money troubles. That’s all I know.’
‘And you’ve never heard from her since?’
‘No,’ she sighed deeply, ‘how could I?’
Leslie Smith lifted sad, washed-out blue eyes to Nightingale’s. Either the woman was an exceptional actress or the guilt and regret in them was real. Detective Constable Nightingale was inclined to believe her.
In the car she double-checked the class lists; Carol Truman did not appear after 1980. She had come to a dead-end for the evening. In the morning she would check with emigration to find out whether and when the Truman family had emigrated. She felt deflated and somehow cheated. Earlier in the afternoon she had been sure that she was on the trail of
something
that would take them forward. She didn’t have the keen intuition of Fenwick nor the years of experience of Cooper, but she had a ruthlessly logical brain and a meticulous, structured approach to investigation that had infuriated her fellow students at Police College. That and her ability to focus, analyse, deduce and deliver had earned her top marks and a certain place in CID, despite criticisms of her ‘linear approach’.
She felt Fenwick was right. The connection between Johnstone and Fearnside could not be dismissed lightly. Back in the incident room Nightingale checked her list for Carol Truman. Her heart sank when she found it. According to her notes, the Trumans had emigrated to Australia in 1980. She had already faxed Australian immigration but they had been unable to trace anyone by that name entering the country in any of the months Nightingale had suggested. They had, though, helpfully sent her the complete list of Truemans and Trumans who had arrived in 1980; there were forty-seven names. Nightingale weighed up her hunch against the daunting list, came to the logical conclusion and then carefully filed the fax.
Of the names on the killer’s list, only two remained. No further information was needed – their guilt was certain. One would be dispatched simply and quickly. Her part had been trivial but one that deserved punishment nevertheless: plans for the execution were easily laid.
The last one was different. The victim’s name was ringed in red ink on the page with a wreath of scrolls and loops that almost obliterated the other names listed. This one deserved to die – to be executed in public for the murderer she was. Had there been any justice, she would be hanged at the end of a rope in a public place of execution, her crime and punishment witnessed by her peers. Or better still, put up against a wall and shot, bullets ripping her apart, releasing the slime and bile beneath the deceptively attractive exterior.
The beginning of an idea entered the killer’s mind. It would be daring, perhaps suicidal but it would be right. If anyone could pull off such a plan, the killer could, army trained, used to performing in almost impossible situations. Surely, the years of training and deployment in the field, the move to more discreet and deadly assignments, had been enough preparation. The killer was deeply fatalistic. The idea was right despite its risks, and it might just be accomplished without his own death being an inevitable consequence, not that even his death would be an unacceptable price.
It would take formidable planning, specialist supplies, rehearsals and finally, courage. There wasn’t much time – and
the other killing had to be carried out in the meantime, perhaps only a few days before the main execution in case the ultimate goal became obvious. The killer discarded the list of names and started to compile, on a clean feint-ruled pad, a checklist of supplies.
July continued hot and dry with clear high blue skies and soft breezes. It was as perfect as an English summer could be, except to Fenwick and his team. There had been no new developments in either the Johnstone or Fearnside cases. At least the Fearnside case was now being treated as suspicious. A short but productive inquiry had established that the whole catalogue-modelling opportunity had been cleverly faked but there was no trace of the people that had been involved – interviewer, photographer, chauffeur. Consequently Fenwick had no new leads to pursue. It had been impossible for the Superintendent to ignore the failure of the original investigation into Deborah Fearnside’s disappearance. Inspector Blite, the original investigating officer, was called in for a dressing down by the Superintendent but as his conviction record was the second best in the Division it meant little.
Fenwick pressed on, determined to find and interview anyone who had known Kate Johnstone or Deborah Fearnside in the past twenty years. With a smaller team it was going to take him the whole summer just to get through the names they already had.
He was making no better progress at home but at least things hadn’t got worse. Christopher had been receiving gentle counselling since his visit to the specialists. Some recent improvements, though barely perceptible, encouraged Fenwick to hope he would eventually recover despite the family history.
He still wasn’t speaking and continued to live in his own
little world but the specialists had ruled out autism and favoured a diagnosis of acute and severe post-traumatic stress disorder. He could recover at any time, they said, quickly or slowly, but they could not predict when. Bloody typical, was Fenwick’s reaction, long words dressing up the fact that they hadn’t got a clue.
His mother had booked a holiday cottage in West Dorset, a short walk from the coast. On the spur of the moment Fenwick decided to join them for a few days at a time, leaving behind for the first time in his career a serious crime unsolved. While he was with them he was determined to try to focus entirely on his family and the gentle distractions of a beach holiday.
The weather was indulgent, warm enough every day for the beach or long walks and games along the limestone cliffs. There were no calls from the investigation team, nothing to distract from the simple pleasures of each day. Fenwick relaxed, his mother occasionally succumbed to girlish giggles, and the children blossomed. With Bess it was like watching a daisy open each morning to the sun and tuck down again in the evening tired and happy. With Christopher it was different. At first he appeared unaltered but deep down a change was occurring; colour was re-entering his tight, monochrome world. It started with his conversations with Bess, then his simple pleasure in the waves and spray sprinkling his head, arms and toes. By the time Fenwick had joined them for the second time he could bear to be touched again, even briefly cuddled. Although the tension remained, keeping him closed shut, his struggle to break free was clear. It was incredibly painful to Fenwick, who observed everything, waiting for his first chance to reach out and help his son.
Two days before Fenwick was due to return to work again he found Christopher lying prone on his small bed, sobbing hard enough to jar its wooden frame. At first he was appalled, cast down, unable to think clearly what he should do. He wanted to cradle the child in his arms, hug him, comfort him and take all the pain away, but he was too scared of getting it wrong. In the end, when he could bear to watch no longer, he sat gingerly on
the mattress and lifted the little boy on to his lap.
The crying grew stronger but the child remained limp, hot and damp in his arms. The awful rigidity had finally gone. Fenwick cradled the boy, stroking his hair, kissing his forehead, rocking him to and fro for long minutes. Eventually the weeping subsided enough for a white cotton hanky to be offered and then, slowly, the boy started to talk.
His words ripped into Fenwick like shrapnel, tearing at his heart, leaving him empty and raw: mixed-up memories of rejection and petty cruelties as his mother withdrew into her final breakdown, a deep guilt that it had somehow been all his fault and, worst of all, that his daddy hated him and could never forgive him.
Fenwick continued to rock the child, afraid to speak in case his choked words added to the confusion and hurt. Large, individual tears tracked down his face and soaked, one at a time, into the boy’s curly blond hair where his chin rested against the child’s head. Eventually, an accumulated puddle trickled down Christopher’s temple and behind his ear, causing the boy to start and look up. ‘Daddy, you’re crying. Why are you crying? Please don’t, I’m so sorry.’
For the next half-hour, father and son talked – sometimes calmly, sometimes with tears. Fenwick felt his own sense of family purpose and responsibility take root again and grow, leaving him exhausted, depleted but with returning confidence.
His son was delicate, damaged, hurt beyond any of their understandings by his mother’s illness. He had witnessed more than anyone had realised and, with a child’s limited comprehension, had pieced together his own twisted version of events.
The doubts and self-loathing had lain like a cancer within the boy, distorting and hardening him with the poison of guilt. He had ceased to grow and react to the world, and it would take a long time for the damage to be gently removed. Perhaps the scars from it would always remain. But that was something Fenwick could cope with. It was a real task that he, with expert help, could work on for as long as it would take.