Read The Truth-Teller's Lie Online

Authors: Sophie Hannah

Tags: #Rapists, #Police Procedural, #Police, #Mystery & Detective, #Police - England, #Fiction, #Literary, #England, #Mystery Fiction, #Missing persons, #Crime, #Suspense, #General, #Psychological fiction

The Truth-Teller's Lie (4 page)

Charlie wondered how many more times the word ‘desperately’ was going to make an appearance.

‘Look, I’m not scared of the police,’ said Naomi.

‘Why would you be?’ asked Simon.

She shook her head, as if he’d badly missed the point. ‘Once you start looking into it, you’ll find that Robert
is
missing. Or something else is very seriously wrong. I don’t want you to take my word for it, Sergeant Waterhouse. I want you to look into it and find out for yourself.’

‘DC Waterhouse,’ Charlie corrected her. ‘Detective Constable.’ She wondered how she’d feel if Simon were to take and pass his sergeant’s exams, if she were no longer higher than him in rank. It would happen eventually. It shouldn’t bother her, she decided. ‘Does Mr Haworth have a car? Might he have taken that to Kent?’

‘He’s a lorry driver. He needs his lorry for work, and he works every minute that he can when he’s not with me. He has to, because Juliet doesn’t earn anything—it’s all down to him.’

‘But does he also own a car?’

‘I don’t know.’ Naomi blushed. ‘I’ve never asked.’ Defensively, she added, ‘We hardly have any time together, and we don’t waste what little we have on trivialities.’

‘So, you were looking through Mr Haworth’s lounge window—’ Charlie began.

‘The Traveltel has a cancellation policy,’ Naomi talked over her. ‘If you cancel before noon on the day you’re due to arrive, they don’t charge you. I asked the receptionist and Robert hadn’t cancelled, which he definitely would have if he’d been planning to stand me up. He would never waste money like that.’ There was something hectoring—punitive, almost—about the way she spoke. You try to be tolerant and patient and look what happens, thought Charlie. She guessed Naomi Jenkins would remain in this mode for the rest of the interview.

‘But Mr Haworth didn’t turn up last Thursday,’ Simon pointed out, ‘so presumably you paid.’ Charlie had been about to make exactly the same objection. Once again Simon had echoed her thoughts in a way that no one else ever did.

Naomi’s face crumpled. ‘Yes,’ she admitted eventually. ‘I paid. It’s the only time I have. Robert’s quite romantic and old-fashioned in some ways. I’m sure I earn a lot more than him, but I’ve always pretended I earn hardly anything.’

‘Can’t he tell from your clothes, your house?’ asked Charlie, who had known as soon as she’d walked into the interview room that she was looking at a woman who spent considerably more on clothes than she did.

‘Robert’s not interested in clothes, and he’s never seen my house.’

‘Why not?’

‘I don’t know!’ Naomi looked tearful. ‘It’s quite big. I didn’t want him to think . . . but mainly because of Yvon.’

‘Your lodger.’

‘She’s my best friend, and she’s lived with me for the past eighteen months. I knew she and Robert wouldn’t like each other from the second I met him, and I didn’t want to have to deal with them not getting on.’

Interesting, thought Charlie. You meet the man of your dreams and instantly know that your best friend would hate him.

‘Look, if Robert had decided to end our relationship, he would have turned up as planned and told me face to face,’ Naomi insisted. ‘We talk about getting married every time we meet. At the very least he’d have phoned. He’s the most reliable person I’ve ever known. It comes from a need to be in control. He’d have known that if he suddenly vanished, I’d look for him, that I’d go to his house. And then his two worlds would crash into one another, as they did this afternoon. There’s nothing Robert would hate more. He’d do anything to make sure his wife and his . . . girlfriend never met, never talked. With him not there, we might start comparing notes. Robert would rather die than allow that to happen.’

A tear rolled down her cheek. ‘He made me promise never to go to his house,’ she whispered. ‘He didn’t want me to see Juliet. He made her sound as if . . . as if there was something wrong with her, like she was mad or sick in some way, like an invalid. And then when I saw her, she seemed so confident—superior, even. She was wearing a black suit.’

‘Naomi, what happened at Mr Haworth’s house this afternoon?’ Charlie glanced at her watch. Olivia was sure to be back by now.

‘I think I saw something.’ Naomi sighed and rubbed her forehead. ‘I had a panic attack, the worst I’ve ever had. I lost my footing and fell down on the grass. I felt as if I was suffocating. I got up as soon as I could and tried to run away. Look, I’m sure I saw something, okay?’

‘Through the window?’ asked Simon.

‘Yes. I’m starting to feel clammy now just talking about it, even though Robert’s house is miles away.’

Charlie frowned, leaning forward in her chair. Had she missed something? ‘
What
did you see?’ she asked.

‘I don’t know! All I know is, I panicked and had to escape. My whole reason for being there was . . . obliterated suddenly, and I had to get away as quickly as possible. I couldn’t stand to be anywhere near the house. I
must
have seen something. I was fine until that moment.’

It was all far too hazy for Charlie’s liking. People either saw things or they didn’t. ‘Did you see anything that led you to believe harm had come to Robert?’ she asked. ‘Any blood, anything broken, any evidence of a fight or struggle having taken place?’

‘I don’t
know
.’ Naomi’s voice was petulant. ‘I can tell you all the things I remember seeing: a red rug, a wood-laminate floor, loads of not very tasteful pottery houses in all shapes and sizes, a candle, a tape measure, a cabinet with glass doors, a television, a sofa, a chair—’

‘Naomi!’ Charlie interrupted the woman’s agitated chanting. ‘Do you think you might be assuming—mistakenly—that this sudden reaction must have been an immediate one to some mysterious, unidentified stimulus, something you saw through the window? Couldn’t it have been an eruption of stress that had been mounting for a while?’

‘No. I don’t think so,’ she said flatly. ‘Go to Robert’s house. You’ll find something. I know you will. If I’m wrong, I’ll apologise for wasting your time. But I’m not wrong.’

‘What happened after the panic attack?’ asked Charlie. ‘You say you tried to run away . . .’

‘Juliet came after me. She called me by my name. She knew my surname as well. How did she know?’ Naomi looked utterly bewildered for a moment, like a lost child. ‘Robert made sure to keep his two lives absolutely separate.’

Women are such idiots, Charlie thought, including herself in the insult. ‘Perhaps she found out. Wives often do.’

‘She said to me “You’re better off without him. I’ve done you a favour.” Or words to that effect. That’s as good as admitting that she’s done something to him, isn’t it?’

‘Not really,’ said Simon. ‘She could have meant that she’s persuaded him to end his relationship with you.’

Naomi flattened her lips into a line. ‘You didn’t hear her tone. She wanted me to think she’d done something much worse than that. She wanted me to fear the worst.’

‘Maybe she did,’ Charlie reasoned aloud, ‘but that doesn’t mean the worst has happened. She’s bound to be angry with you, isn’t she?’

Naomi looked offended. Or perhaps disgusted. ‘Doesn’t either of you know anybody who always turns up half an hour early for everything because they think the world will end if they’re a second late?’ she demanded. ‘Someone who phones if they’re only going to be five minutes early to apologise for being “almost late”?’

Simon’s mother, thought Charlie. She could tell from the way he hunched over his notes that he was thinking the same thing.

‘I’ll take that as a yes,’ said Naomi. ‘Imagine one day you go to meet them and they don’t turn up. And they don’t phone. You’d know, wouldn’t you, as soon as they were five minutes late, even one minute late, that something bad had happened? Well? Wouldn’t you?’

‘Leave it with us,’ said Charlie, standing up. Robert Haworth was probably sleeping on a mate’s floor, moaning over a pint at this very moment about how he couldn’t believe he’d been rumbled, the latest in a long line of men to leave his credit-card bill lying around for his wife to find.

‘Is that it?’ Naomi snapped. ‘Is that all you can say?’

‘Leave it with us,’ Charlie repeated firmly. ‘You’ve been very informative, and we’ll certainly follow it up. As soon as there’s some news, we’ll be in touch. How can we contact you?’

Naomi tutted, fumbling with her handbag. Her hair fell in front of her eyes and she yanked it behind one ear, hissing an obscenity under her breath. Charlie was impressed: most middle-class people tried not to swear in front of the police, and if they slipped up, they quickly said sorry. Ironic, since most cops swore all the time. Detective Inspector Giles Proust was the only one Charlie knew who didn’t.

Naomi threw down a business card on the table, as well as a photograph of herself and a man with dark-brown hair and frameless glasses. The lenses were thin rectangles that barely covered his eyes. He was handsome, in a chunky sort of way, and looked as if he was trying to outstare the camera. ‘There! And if you’re not in touch very soon, I will be. What am I supposed to do, sit and twiddle my thumbs, not knowing if Robert’s dead or alive?’

‘Assume he’s alive until you’ve good reason to think he isn’t,’ said Charlie dryly. God, this woman was a drama queen. She picked up the business card and frowned. ‘“Silver Brae Luxury Chalets? Proprietor: G. Angilley”?’

Naomi winced and drew back slightly, shaking her head.

‘I thought you made sundials.’

‘I gave you the wrong card. Just . . . just . . .’ Naomi rummaged in her bag again, red in the face.

‘Did you go to one of these chalets with Mr Haworth?’ Charlie was curious. Nosey, really.

‘I told you where I went with Robert, to the Traveltel. Here!’ The card she thrust at Charlie this time was the correct one. There was a colour picture on it of a sundial—a tilted half-sphere of greenish stone with gold Roman numerals and a large gold butterfly wing protruding from the middle. There was a Latin phrase too, in gold letters, but only part of it was visible: ‘
Horas non
’.

Charlie was impressed. ‘This one of yours?’ she asked.

‘No. I wanted my business card to advertise my competitors’ merchandise. ’ Naomi glared at her.

Okay, so it had been a daft question. Competitors? How many sundial-makers could there be? ‘What’s “
Horas non
”?’

Naomi sighed, put out by the question. ‘
Horas non numero nisi aestivas
. I only count the sunny hours.’ She spoke quickly, as if she wanted to get it over with. Sunny hours made Charlie think of her holiday, and Olivia. She nodded at Simon to wind things up and left the interview room, letting the door bang shut behind her.

In the corridor, she switched on her phone and pressed the redial button. Thankfully, her sister answered after the second ring.

‘Well?’ Olivia said, her mouth full of food. Smoked-salmon and cream-cheese parcels, Charlie guessed. Or a chocolate-filled brioche —something that could be taken out of the packet and eaten without any preparation. Charlie heard no suspense in her sister’s voice as she asked, ‘What new and unsurprising feat of idiocy do you have to report?’

Charlie laughed convincingly, filing away the unflattering implications of Olivia’s question for inspection at some later date, and launched into her confession.

 

‘Gnomons,’ said Simon. ‘Interesting word.’ He had the home page of Naomi Jenkins’ website up on the screen in front of him. The CID room had an abandoned air: papers scattered over unpopulated desks, broken Styrofoam cups on the floor, quiet apart from the faint hum of computers and striplights. There was no sign of Sellers, or Gibbs, the arsehole. DI Proust’s glass cubicle in the corner was empty.

Charlie read over Simon’s shoulder. ‘“A gnomon is a shadow-caster.” Isn’t that how sundials work? The way the shadow falls tells you what time it is? Oh, look, it says she does miniature ones too. I could get one for my windowsill.’

‘I wouldn’t ask her if I were you,’ said Simon. ‘You’d probably get your teeth kicked in. Look, she does all sorts: wall-mounted, plinth-mounted, vertical, horizontal, brass, stone, fibreglass. Impressive, aren’t they?’

‘I love them. Except that one.’ Charlie pointed to a picture of a plain stone cube with triangular iron gnomons attached to two of its sides. ‘I’d prefer a Latin motto. Does she carve the letters herself, do you think? It says they’re hand-carved . . .’

‘“Time is a shadow,”’ Simon read aloud. ‘Why would anyone commission a sundial with that on it? Imagine: sunbathing, gardening, next to a reminder of your own rapidly approaching death.’

‘Charmingly put,’ said Charlie, wondering if Simon knew she was pissed off with him. Pissed off, upset, whatever. She was trying as hard as she could to hide it. ‘What did you make of
Miss
Jenkins?’

Simon abandoned the keyboard and turned to face her. ‘She’s overreacting. A bit unstable. She implied she’s had panic attacks before.’

Charlie nodded. ‘Why do you think she was so angry and resentful? I thought we gave her a fair hearing, didn’t you? And why did she say, “I’m not scared of the police”? That was out of the blue, wasn’t it?’ She nodded at the computer screen. ‘Is there a page about her on the website, personal information, anything like that?’

‘If this Haworth guy’s avoiding her, I don’t blame him,’ said Simon. ‘It might be the coward’s way out and all that, but would you fancy trying to end a relationship with her?’

‘He’d promised her marriage as well, so it would have been quite a let-down. Why are men such dicks?’

A photograph of Naomi Jenkins filled the screen. She was smiling, sitting on a large black semicircular sundial, leaning against its silver cone-shaped shadow-caster, its gnomon. That word would take some getting used to, thought Charlie. Naomi’s auburn hair was tied back and she was wearing red cords and a faded blue sweatshirt.

‘She looks normal enough there,’ said Simon. ‘A happy, successful woman.’

‘It’s her website,’ said Charlie. ‘She’ll have designed it herself.’

‘No, look, it says “Summerhouse Web Design” at the bottom.’

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