by Ann Cleeves
‘He’s someone who travelled light,’ Jen said. ‘It could be a monk’s room.’
Ross was standing beside her, his back against the closed door. ‘Or a prison cell.’
* * *
They found Gaby in the kitchen. An old-fashioned airing rack hung from the ceiling and she was taking towels and pillowcases from it and folding them on the table, smoothing the pillowcases so they wouldn’t need ironing. Jen recognized the technique. The woman stopped what she was doing when they came in. An opened bottle of wine and a half-full glass stood on the scrubbed pine table.
‘What time are you expecting Caroline back?’ Jen could have fancied a glass of wine herself. God knew when she’d get home to have one.
‘Not until nine. I think I explained: she’s a social worker for a mental health charity, attached to the church where her boyfriend’s a curate. This is one of her nights for an evening session. She’s passionate about it.’ A pause. ‘Her mother committed suicide. Maybe that’s why she’s so dedicated to the cause.’
‘And Mr Walden was one of her clients?’
‘Yeah,’ Gaby said. ‘Like I told you, one of her lost sheep.’
‘Isn’t it a bit unusual, inviting a client into your home?’ Jen thought social workers were trained to keep their distance. All the professionals she’d ever met had been detached to the point of not caring.
‘Well, I didn’t think it was a good idea.’ Gaby paused. ‘When I first met him, I thought he was odd, creepy. I wanted him out. Caz said if I knew more about him, I’d be more supportive.’
‘Did you find out any more about him?’
Gaby shook her head. ‘Caz said she couldn’t tell me any more because of confidentiality, so that didn’t help much.’ A pause. ‘In the end, it’s her house. I guess she can have whoever she wants to stay.’
‘We’ll need to come back tomorrow to speak to your friend.’ Jen looked at her watch. The briefing would start in half an hour and she didn’t want to miss that. ‘When would be a good time to catch you both before work?’
‘About eight thirty? Neither of us start early.’ She walked them to the front door. Jen thought she could be an actor as well as an artist. She gave nothing of herself away.
* * *
The police station in Barnstaple was concrete, ugly, built next to the civic centre that was already empty and earmarked for demolition. It looked out on the green space of Castle Hill. There was no castle now, and the hill, round as an upturned cup, was all that was left of the earthworks that had supported it. It was grassed over and covered with trees and bushes. Barnstaple stood inland from Ilfracombe. Once it had been a small market town, and the centre still felt like that, with its pannier market and busy high street, but the town had spread, sprawled. It had council estates and retail parks on the outskirts. Tourists coming for the first time might be disappointed by the initial impression it gave. It could have been any other English town. Apart from the river. The river, tidal still at this point, changing with the moon and the weather, made the place wilder, hardly a town at all. In good weather, Jen ate her lunchtime sandwiches on the green and sometimes walked to the top of the hill. Even from there you could smell the salt of the estuary and there was the special light you only find close to the sea. She’d always loved the sea.
She knew she was lucky to be here. There were colleagues who would have given their right arm for a posting to Devon; she’d jumped to the top of the queue because she’d been daft enough to marry a bastard who’d knocked her around. She was grateful for the transfer and she loved the place, but sometimes she missed the buzz and challenge of city policing. And it felt like an escape, a cop-out. Why should she be the one who’d had to move? And why had the CPS cocked up the prosecution of her smooth-talking, brown-nosing accountant husband? He was still there, living it large in her patch, telling the world that she was a psycho, that the police had moved her to Devon because she couldn’t cope with the stress of real policing. She’d been in Barnstaple for five years, but it still rankled.
On her way up the stairs she phoned Ella. Jen knew Ben would have headphones on and he wouldn’t hear his phone. ‘All okay?’
‘Yeah.’ Ella was a swot. She’d be lost in an equation. Or a chemical compound. Jen could tell she was distracted.
‘I should be home by ten. Get yourselves to bed if you’re tired, though.’ Matthew Venn despised meetings that dragged on. He said there was nothing that couldn’t be decided and achieved in an hour.
‘Cool.’ And the line went dead.
The room was full; there were volunteers who’d stayed on after their shift. Murder wasn’t common in North Devon and Jen sensed affront as well as excitement. She wondered if the team would be so keen on justice when they knew that the victim was an incomer from upcountry and not one of their own. Ross had bounded up the stairs ahead of her. He’d bagged the desk with the fastest computer and was obviously checking out the name they’d been given by Gaby Henry in Ilfracombe, digging the dirt on Simon Walden. Jen heard the whir of the printer. Ross would want to present any information he could find about the victim to the team. He’d probably take the credit for the ID too. Sometimes, Jen thought, she found him tricky to work with because he reminded her of her former husband. Competitive. Controlling.
Matthew called the room to order, but before he could speak, the DCI appeared. Joe Oldham was a big, lumbering man, but none of them had heard him coming. He had the ability to walk silently; Jen had looked up from her desk on several occasions to find him there, looking down at her, listening to her chatting to a colleague. Now she took care that he was nowhere around before she passed on any gossip that she wouldn’t want him to hear. He’d moved to Devon as a constable but he was still a proud Yorkshireman, a sports fanatic, chair of the local rugby club. As different from Matthew as it was possible to be.
Oldham nodded to the group. ‘I won’t keep you. I know you’ve work to do.’ He was wearing a sports jacket that had seen much better days and his shirt wasn’t quite tucked into his belt. That was his image: the rugged old-fashioned copper who’d have nothing to do with media types. In contrast, Matthew looked as if he never left his office, smart, suited, closely shaved. His skin was pale as if it never saw sunlight. He could be a banker. Or an undertaker.
Oldham looked around the room. Jen thought she saw him wink at Ross. The son he’d never had. ‘I just wanted to let you know I’m with you on this. Matthew here will report to me and you’ll have all the resources you’ll need.’
Then he disappeared as quietly as he’d arrived. To get in a couple of pints at the club before closing, Jen suspected. Ross, who was the rugby club’s star fly half, would probably join him later and fill him in with all the details of the evening. Oldham didn’t need to eavesdrop when he had a mole like Ross in the ranks. Once, Oldham would have wanted to take over the investigation, but he was on the long slide to retirement and his red face and big belly were signs that he was getting in practice for when the day finally arrived. Ross gave him the confidence that he still had a finger on the pulse.
Matthew took Oldham’s place and waited until the DCI had left the room before speaking. He gave a brief summary of the discovery of the body and stuck photos of the locus on the board. ‘Dr Pengelly has confirmed cause of death as a stab wound to the chest. The killer was facing his victim. No weapon was found at the scene.’
Ross stuck up his hand. ‘Time of death?’
‘Impossible to say with any accuracy. Sometime today. We might have a little more information after the post-mortem tomorrow.’ Matthew paused. ‘There was no ID on our victim, but we found an address in his pocket and I hope that Ross and Jen can shed a little light. You’ve been to Ilfracombe to track it down?’
Ross was on his feet before Jen had a chance to answer. He’d printed out a photo and pinned it to the board. ‘Simon Andrew Walden. Date of birth thirty-first of May 1979.’ It was a classic mug-shot photo. Walden was looking directly at the camera. ‘Joined t
he forces straight from school. Left the army in 2010 and ran his own business – a restaurant in Bristol – until 2013 when he was convicted of causing death by careless driving. He drove from a junction straight into the side of a passing car and a child was killed. Alcohol in his system, but just under the legal limit.’
Jen stared at the face and understood the albatross, the guilt.
‘He served three months in prison. No contact with the police since that date as far as I can tell.’
‘And we are sure this is our man?’ Matthew looked at Jen and she answered immediately.
‘We saw a photo and the tattoo is clearly visible.’
‘Any more information?’
‘The house is owned by a young woman, Caroline Preece. She lets out rooms to cover the rent. To a friend of hers and to Walden. The remaining tenant is Gaby Henry. She works as something arty at the Woodyard.’ Jen paused because she understood that might be a complication for Matthew. Jonathan worked at the Woodyard; he ran the place. Maybe it would be seen as a conflict of interest. ‘No details but it seems Walden had mental health problems and Preece was his social worker. He also volunteered in the Woodyard.’
‘Have we checked out Henry and Preece? Either of them known to us?’
Jen shook her head. ‘Not even a parking ticket. Caroline Preece wasn’t there so I’m going back in the morning.’
Matthew nodded, but said nothing. Jen thought that was classic Matthew Venn. He was a man who never opened his mouth unless he had something useful to say.
Chapter Five
WHEN THE POLICE LEFT, GABY WENT back to the kitchen and poured herself another glass of wine. She needed to pull herself together, to get her story straight before Caroline came in. It was one thing talking to the police, who didn’t know her, quite another talking to Caroline, who knew her as well as anyone in the world, who behaved quite often as if she was Gaby’s big sister, her protector: indulgent, but somehow in charge of Gaby’s morals.
Gaby’s mother had never cared about her in that way. Linda, her mum, had been occasionally wayward herself. There’d never been a father on the scene. The two of them had lived in a council flat in north London and Gaby had often been left to fend for herself. Linda had always been a grafter, cleaning offices, stacking supermarket shelves, just to put food on the table. But as soon as Gaby had got to secondary school, she hadn’t been around much. She’d had Gaby while she was still a teenager and felt she’d missed out on life. Once Gaby was halfway independent, her mum had started making up for lost time. There’d been so many boyfriends that Gaby had lost count. Gaby had just got on with things, had felt her way through life without, it seemed, any rules.
She’d discovered art even before school, scribbling on scraps of paper, losing herself in the designs to block out the chaos of the flat; her mother’s constant exhaustion from work had meant there was little energy to keep on top of things at home. In class she’d doodled instead of listening to teachers. It had been a rough school in a poor area and they’d just been grateful that she was quiet, not disruptive. She still had a maths book decorated with cartoon dragons, strange imaginary landscapes. An art teacher had been her salvation, praising her creations, sending her out at weekends to look at galleries, showing her a different world.
Gaby had come into her own at art college, made friends, become the joker in the pack, still living at home and including Linda’s exploits in stories to entertain the other students. They’d been mostly middle-class kids, with an eye to making it in advertising or film. Her passion had always been painting. A year after college, she’d been doing the same sort of work as her mother – bar work, cleaning – putting off the inevitable slide into teaching, when she saw the advert in the Guardian for an artist in residence at the Woodyard Centre in North Devon. She’d skipped most of the details, just seen there was a salary she could live on. And the words studio space had jumped out at her.
Sitting on the little train easing its way down the Taw Valley from Exeter to Barnstaple, she’d seen paintings in the dense trees, the water and the watchful heron, and decided she wanted this job more than anything else in the world. She’d been interviewed by two men: Jonathan Church, who managed the whole of the Woodyard Centre, and Christopher Preece, who was chair of trustees. Jonathan had already shown her around the centre, describing its philosophy. ‘This is a space where everyone should feel comfortable – the A-level students attending specialist masterclasses and the guys in the day centre who have a learning disability. We very much believe in art for everyone.’ She hadn’t said she only cared about her art. She’d seen the big empty room in the roof and imagined herself there, painting. She’d have promised the earth to get the gig.
The interview had gone well. She’d always been good at telling people what they wanted to hear. And then Christopher Preece had asked her if she’d need somewhere to stay. ‘I could put you in touch with my daughter. She’s looking for a lodger.’ They’d met that evening and Caroline had showed her the house, the room. The place had been pretty boring then, magnolia paint, hardly any furniture.
‘I need so much stuff,’ Caroline had said. ‘But the budget’s pretty tight and I don’t want to ask my dad.’
So, Gaby had introduced her to the joys of charity shopping, freecycling and eBay. As the house filled with Gaby’s purchases and creations, they’d become close friends. Very different – Caroline was so earnest, reliable and punctual and Gaby was none of those things – but strangely interdependent. Gaby cared what Caroline thought and didn’t want to upset or offend her. She thought she’d lightened Caroline, made her more fun. Now, hearing the key in the door, she wondered how she would break the news of Simon Walden’s death to her.
Gaby must have been sitting almost in the dark with her daydreaming because when Caroline flicked the switch as she came into the room, the sudden light came as a shock.
‘What are you doing?’ Caroline disapproved of drinking too much in the week, though she didn’t mind letting her hair down if the mood took her.
‘It’s Simon.’ Gaby turned around in the low sofa and looked at Caroline.
‘What about him?’
‘The police were here earlier. He’s dead.’
She saw that Caroline was as thrown by the news as she had been. They both had their own reasons for mourning Simon. Caroline dropped onto the sofa beside her. ‘Did he kill himself?’ The question seemed loaded with guilt. ‘I didn’t notice he was depressed. If anything, a bit manic, I thought.’ A pause. ‘Oh, I should have realized!’
‘He was murdered,’ Gaby said. ‘On the beach at Crow Point.’ She thought she’d hit just the right tone. Not cold, but not too upset either. Caroline would never believe upset.
Chapter Six
WHEN MATTHEW GOT BACK TO THE house, Jonathan had lit a fire and was sitting on the floor of the living room, the curtains open to let in the moonlight, a glass on the low table beside him. He’d been reading but he set down the book when he heard Matthew.
‘A drink? Something to eat?’
‘I might have to hand over this murder investigation.’ It had been on Matthew’s mind since he’d left the station. He followed Jonathan through to the kitchen. ‘The victim was a volunteer at the Woodyard. And one of the people he shared a house with has a residency there.’
‘Who was killed?’
‘A man called Simon Walden. Did you know him?’
‘I recognize the name. He worked in the cafe with Bob.’ Jonathan took an opened bottle of Chablis out of the fridge.
‘Walden had mental health problems,’ Matthew said, ‘and it seems one of your trustees pulled strings to get him the placement.’
Jon frowned. ‘Whoever it was didn’t go through me.’
‘Christopher Preece? His daughter runs the project at St Cuthbert’s. She was Walden’s landlady.’
‘They must have organized it directly with Bob. He runs his own show there.’ Jonathan handed a glass of wine to Matthew. ‘They can’t
take the case off you just because I manage the place. That’s crazy. It’s the first major investigation since you took over the team. Besides, Joe Oldham’s an idle bastard. He won’t want to run a case like that. He couldn’t do it! He has the sensitivity of a gnat. Imagine him stomping through the Woodyard, upsetting people.’
‘Joe doesn’t stomp.’ But Matthew could understand Jonathan’s point and he smiled.
The Woodyard was Jonathan’s pride and joy, his baby. The site was on the south side of the Taw and had once belonged to a timber firm, that had long since stopped operating. There’d been the carcass of a huge warehouse built of old brick, full of rusting machinery. There’d been plans to demolish the buildings, flatten the site and put up a retail park. At the same time the council was contemplating closing the day centre for adults with a learning disability where Jonathan worked. He’d made the imaginative leap to connect the two. Matthew had been living and working in Bristol then, but he’d been swept up by Jonathan’s enthusiasm. Most of their phone calls had included his plans for the site, his passion for bringing together different groups of people in one place – artists and adults with a learning disability – so it seemed to Matthew that the project almost embodied their love affair, the reckless, unimaginable possibilities of two alien individuals becoming one.
‘Don’t we have enough stores already in Barnstaple?’ Jonathan would rant. ‘The high street’s already all charity shops, hairdressers and estate agents. Why not use the timber yard as a community hub? Let’s have an arts centre, a cafe, a place for people to meet and explore ideas. And my people from the day centre can be there too, right at the heart of things instead of being hidden away from view as if we’re somehow ashamed of them.’
Jonathan had formed a committee, pushed through the plans, persuaded the Lottery Fund to give them cash and had raised match funding. Now the Woodyard was just as he’d imagined. There was a theatre and studio space, a bar and a cafe. The day centre for adults with a learning disability was there too, in a space converted from one of the smaller buildings. And he managed the whole place. Matthew couldn’t have been more proud.