What She Saw (15 page)

Without hesitation the young teacher said, ‘I'd trust her with my house keys.'

Bellwood sat back, made a brief motion with her hand.
Tell me more
.

‘She's on free school meals, you understand,' said Miss Harvey. ‘But when she found a £10 note outside school, she brought it straight in to the office and handed it over.'

‘When did this happen?' asked Bellwood.

‘Yesterday. She just did the right thing. It was around the end of lunchtime – she'd been to the doctors.'

‘What did the head teacher do with the money?'

‘She handed it over to our community police officer. Macy's very kind to the. . . less able children. When she finishes her work, she
wants to be the teaching assistant, she's quick to go and help the strugglers. I say, “Look, Macy, I have this extension activity for you,” and she'll do that but then she'll be looking out for others who are still halfway through the thing she finished ten minutes earlier.'

‘She's never been in trouble in school?' Rosen pitched the question into the pause.

‘Never.'

‘Mr Finn, your site manager? You mentioned a report. . .'

‘Yes?'

‘She relates to him?' asked Rosen.

‘She worships him. On Friday afternoon we have Golden Time. The kids who've worked hard and been good all week can chose an activity: TV; computer; sit and chat. Every Friday, Macy gets Golden Time and she spends it shadowing Mr Finn, watching him do jobs, passing him a screwdriver, whatever.'

Rosen recalled there had been no mention of a father by Macy and asked Miss Harvey, ‘Any dad at home?'

She shook her head.

Like a surrogate father then
, thought Rosen.

The staffroom door suddenly opened and Mrs Price said, ‘Excuse me!' glancing at Rosen and Bellwood. ‘Jenny, I need you in the office now as I talk to the girls. I want to double-check the story Macy, Su Li and Lucy-Faye told you, before Chester's mother gets here.'

Miss Harvey stood and apologized to Rosen and Bellwood for leaving so abruptly.

‘I'd like to come and listen to this,' said Rosen, standing and addressing the head teacher.

‘Why?' she replied, defensively.

‘As I said on the phone this morning, Macy Conner is our key witness in a very serious crime. It's entirely probable that she'll have to testify through the judicial system. I gather there's been an incident in school this morning?' Silence. ‘I want to see how she copes in your office.'

The head teacher's face relayed the story: she was not in the habit of being told what to do by others.

‘Follow me!'

35

11.01 A.M.

‘W
here's Chester now?' Rosen asked Mrs Price.

‘In the library, dictating a statement to Mrs Judd, our Special Needs co-ordinator.'

The head teacher's office was the opposite of the staffroom. Here, every paper clip knew its place, just as every hair on her head appeared to sit correctly, according to the brush of its mistress's hand.

Macy and her friends appeared in the open doorway.

‘Come in, girls.'

As Miss Harvey ushered the three girls into the office, they didn't seem to notice Rosen and Bellwood watching from the corner nearest the door.

‘Are we in trouble?' asked the blonde one, her face lined with vague but deeply felt anxiety.

‘Not at all, Lucy-Faye,' said the head teacher, shutting the door as Miss Harvey directed the girls to a trio of seats on the other side of Mrs Price's desk. The head teacher looked at Macy, who met her gaze directly, confidently.

Good girl
, thought Rosen.

‘Macy, would you like to tell me what happened this morning?'

Macy scanned the surface of the head teacher's desk.

‘Is that Miss Harvey's camera?' Macy pointed to the small silver digital camera on the desk. Mrs Price nodded.

‘What happened, Macy?'

‘I left the hall because Miss Harvey'd forgotten some props for the class assembly rehearsal. It was about a minute after Chester left the hall to go to the toilet. I asked Miss Harvey if Su Li and Lucy-Faye could come with me because the props were heavy chairs. We were in the corridor and Chester was way past the boys' toilet on the left and was turning into our classroom. I went' – she held a finger to her lips – ‘what's he up to? Lucy-Faye and Su Li were there.'

Mrs Price looked away from Macy's gaze and at solemn Lucy-Faye.

‘Lucy-Faye, carry on.'

‘We walked down the corridor, quietly. Macy was first to our classroom door. Macy said, “Don't make a sound!” It was just awful. . .' Lucy-Faye dissolved into tears.

‘Macy?' Mrs Price prompted her.

‘Chester didn't seem even aware we were there, he just stood there, the gerbil in one hand, with the compass in his other. . . stabbing it and laughing as he did it. I crept across the classroom to Miss Harvey's desk and picked up the camera and turned to video. The camera made this small sound. Chester seemed to wake up – it was like he was in a daydream but then he saw us all there and he dropped Mr Big on the ground. There was, like, a weird silence about the room and I filmed the lot on Miss's camera. Did you see the film, Miss?'

‘Yes, I did see the video. That showed great presence of mind, Macy. Have you got anything to add to that account?'

‘All this happened in the lesson before playtime. The truth is on the camera.'

‘Thank you for your help, you can go back to class now. One thing, girls. You mustn't discuss this with anyone in school. Do you understand?'

‘Yes, I promise,' said Lucy-Faye.

Su Li echoed, ‘Promise?' and Rosen wondered how much English the Chinese girl spoke or understood.

Macy looked directly at Mrs Price and said, ‘I swear on my grandmother's life, I won't discuss this with anyone in school. And I'll make sure these don't either.'

On their way out, Rosen made a mental note of the three little girls' faces: Su Li and Lucy-Faye serious and stone-like, with Macy in the middle, her eyes dancing with intelligence.

Mrs Price walked towards Rosen, having guessed his next request.

She gave him Miss Harvey's digital camera. Bellwood stood at an angle to Rosen, the better to watch the recording. ‘Ready?'

‘Yes.'

They watched the brief footage.

Chester retracted the point of the compass from the gerbil's body, laughing
. Rosen thought how a significant number of serial killers started their careers on vulnerable, available animals.

The boy turned his head, saw he was being filmed and dropped the impaled gerbil. Silence
.

It was just as Macy had testified.

The sequence ended, and he handed the camera back to Mrs Price.

Rosen did a quick mental calculation – Chester at ten years, he at the gate of fifty – and worked out that when the boy got into his stride, he would be retired, leaving the aftermath to some other, younger officer.

And so Hell's merry circle would keep on turning.

‘Can I have your mobile number?' said Rosen.

‘All those empathy sessions with the RSPCA,' said Mrs Price, raising her hands briefly in mannered disbelief. ‘It seems that was a waste of time.'

‘A waste of time?' Rosen questioned. ‘What's the alternative?'

‘There is none. He was signed off by the child psychologist last month. He's had us all fooled.' She wrote down her mobile number and handed it to Rosen. ‘For a kid with special needs, he put on quite a performance of innocence.'

36

11.20 A.M.

A
s Bellwood drove the car away from the front entrance of the school, Rosen suddenly said, ‘Pull over, Carol!'

Through the railings, Rosen caught sight of the back view of a woman hurrying inside the building. As she entered the school, Miss Harvey walked out through the same door.

Rosen got out of the car and headed across the road.

Miss Harvey had a trowel in one hand and a small cloth package in the other. She crouched close to the ground at the circular plant bed near the front door to the school and dug in the soil with her trowel.

As he approached, Rosen noticed a blue plaque with white writing on the wall.

In memory of Denise Rainer aged 6, Jane Rainer aged 4, Gail Rainer aged 2

We will never forget

As he arrived at the railings, Miss Harvey stopped digging and looked up, over her shoulder.

‘I didn't mean to disturb you,' said Rosen. ‘I saw you coming out of the building as we were on our way from the school. Then I remembered.'

She stood up and approached the railings, the small cloth package almost entirely concealed by her hand.

‘What did you remember?'

He offered her his card in between two railings. She placed the trowel on the flowerbed, took the card and slipped it inside her pocket. Rosen indicated the flowerbed.

‘What are you doing?'

‘Burying a gerbil. That's the first and last time I bring in a class pet.'

‘Not every class has a Chester.'

‘But they might do, they just might.'

Rosen felt saddened: disillusionment didn't sit well on her.

‘You OK with me calling you Jenny?'

‘The only ones who don't are the kids in my class.'

‘I was wondering two things. If we need to talk in the future, let's meet someplace else. I'm not crazy about Mrs Price.' Her face softened into a conspiratorial smile. ‘Do your kids keep a diary?'

‘Ten minutes first thing each morning during register as the stragglers arrive.'

Henshaw crossed his mind. Rosen had a job for him. ‘Can I borrow Macy's diary and Chester's diary?'

‘It's Friday,' she thought out loud. ‘Bannerman Square. Your Portakabin – Macy told me. I'll drop them off at lunchtime. Listen. We're not supposed to. . .' She glanced back at the main door.

‘I'll make sure they're photocopied and back to you before the close of school.'

‘No problem.'

‘So, what's the drill for Chester now?'

‘His mum's just arrived. She's going off the deep end. He'll be excluded for five days, the ed psych will call an emergency case conference, then he'll come back to school and face the hatred of every kid in the class – unless his mother manages to persuade some other school to take him on.' She sighed, then said, ‘I'll sort the diaries for you.'

Through a gap in the railings, she shook hands with Rosen and, shoulders a little slumped, returned to the flowerbed.

Rosen watched her dig and then asked, ‘Jenny?'

‘Yes?' She didn't turn but carried on digging. ‘Who were the three children that the flowerbed commemorates?'

‘It was before my time. But if the eldest girl was still alive, she'd have been in my class now.'

She placed the cloth package in the hole in the ground and started scraping soil on top.

‘How did they die?'

‘Some sort of accident. No one ever discusses it. No one ever discusses the past here – we're all too busy sprinting to keep up with the present.'

She patted the earth down and placed a fist-sized stone on it.

‘David!' Bellwood was out of the car, animated. ‘David!'

He hurried back to the car. She was behind the wheel and into first gear as soon as Rosen's door was closed.

‘Another burned body. Under the arches. Loampit Vale. Two minutes from the Lewisham Centre.'

‘Dead or alive?'

‘Dead. Young male, teenager.'

A hideous noise followed them as they sped off down Bream Street. It sounded like a banshee. It was the school's alarm.

37

11.35 A.M.

L
ife flowed past the scene-of-crime tape, with constables moving along interested passers-by. Buses, lorries and cars streamed in counter-flowing directions on the high street.

Scientific Support Officer DC Eleanor Willis waited at the entrance to the white tent she'd erected around the body. In silence, DCI Rosen and DS Bellwood dressed quickly in protective suits at the rear of Willis's Scientific Support van and went to join her.

‘It looks like it happened late last night or in the early hours of this morning,' Willis informed them. Natural light was in short supply and deep shadows from the arches fell across the crime scene.

Petrol. Burned flesh. Coldness flooded Rosen as he flicked on his torch. He pulled back the flap of the tent and his beam picked up the victim's waist where the elasticated band of his running bottoms had burned into the skin and muscle of his lower torso. He trailed the light down the victim's legs. The tracksuit bottoms were smart, expensive. He flicked left and right to pick out the hands: it appeared the victim was holding a burned cloth in his blackened fingers.

Rosen paused, fearing the worst damage was to come.

The upper clothing was unrecognizable. On his chest, the charred clothes were indistinguishable from his torso. His face and upper body
had been the primary targets. His teeth were visible to the gums and gave his visage a look between astonishment and agony. Rosen checked the skull and saw at least two clear depressions, indentations that looked like hammer blows.

Rosen tracked light back down the body to the trainers. A bell tolled inside his head and he hurried to get the light back to the face, to the eyes, but all he found were two burned-out pits. Back to the trainers. Red. Intricate silver pattern of parallel lines. Nike.

He crouched on his haunches next to the victim and played the light over his hands, on the material twining round his fingers and embedded in his palms.

They're going to do it again!

He felt a presence behind him and a bleak epiphany within.

‘Carol?'

‘Yes.'

‘Where's Gold?' Rosen needed a second opinion from the officer who'd greeted him at Bannerman Square on the night Thomas Glass had crawled from the burning Renault.