“Tim?” Robin said.
Crusher nodded. “And his dumb friends. Set me back about two years—well, I thought it did at the time. But then, maybe what happened helped that.”
“You’re talking about the Incident?” Robin said, not expecting an answer.
And he was surprised when Crusher nodded. “Imagine being afraid of clowns, then have all clowns disappear inside a tunnel. Does wonders for your anxiety. The doctor tried to convince me I was afraid of bad people—turns out I was just afraid of Tim Claypath.”
“You’re the only person I’ve talked to that seems to hate the Standedge Five. Everyone else seems to think they were God’s gift.”
“Well,” Crusher said, “let’s just say I keep my opinions to myself.” Robin didn’t buy that, seeing how easily she had offered her opinions. He expected the reality was more that Liz Crusher didn’t really have anyone to tell those opinions to. She didn’t seem like the easiest person to talk to, her abrasive manner leaving a lot to be desired.
“You still think McConnell’s crazy, though?”
Crusher’s mouth twitched up. “Of course he is. Maybe I’m not openly grieving about what happened, but what that psycho did—you’ve got to have more than one screw loose to do something like that.”
“You saw Matthew McConnell that day too. How did he seem?”
“I didn’t know who he was. He had his uniform on, so I assumed he was just a guy who was taking the others through the tunnel. He seemed fine, normal. Whatever a man who’s just about to murder five of his friends looks like, he didn’t look like it.”
Robin nodded.
Rodney looked up at him and pushed past him. Robin stepped aside. Crusher nodded and started moving, then stopped abruptly. “I’d appreciate it if you kept what I said to yourself.” She almost looked friendly.
“Of course,” Robin said, smiling his confirmation.
Crusher’s friendliness vanished in an instant. “Because if you write any of what I said in your book, I’ll bloody sue. Say you took advantage of my worldliness.”
Robin dropped his smile and nodded.
He watched as Crusher walked away. And then just as she was moving out of earshot, he thought of another thing to ask her. “Mrs. Crusher?” he called, half thinking she wouldn’t look back, and pleasantly surprised when she did.
“What?” she grunted.
“If you don’t mind me asking, why do you not talk to your daughter anymore?” Robin knew he was stepping out of bounds. But if he didn’t try, then he wouldn’t get anywhere.
Crusher mulled over the question, as though wondering whether to throw him a bone. And just when he was about to give up, she obviously decided to allow him something. “I found out that my daughter was canoodling with him, with Tim Claypath. So I forbade her to see him. She said that if I enforced it, she’d never talk to me again. Let’s just say we both kept our promises.” She turned and walked away.
Robin looked after her. Amber had gone out with Tim Claypath—it sounded a lot more serious than Amber had made it out to be. She had downplayed it. Had Amber been lying to him? And more than that, he had another thought—intrusive and a little out of turn. If Amber held a candle for Tim Claypath, well—No.
Was she involved somehow?
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Walking into Diggle Community Centre was like going back in time. The lobby reminded Robin of his old primary school in London. It was small and cramped—an empty reception area was cordoned off at the start of the room and beyond that was a small waiting area with a couple of budget gray sofas. The overall impression of the area was one of clutter—the walls were lined with overlapping flyers and pamphlets and posters stuck on with Blu Tack: flyers about the classes and happenings in the Community Centre, pamphlets open in all their glory about alcohol and drug awareness, and posters about shows happening at the Community Centre. Apparently, Diggle was about to be shaken by an amateur production of Glengarry Glen Ross by Diggle and Marsden Theatrical Society.
Sally was nowhere to be seen, and with no idea where in the building the Ghosts of Marsden were, Robin started his search. For the next ten minutes, he completely covered every corridor of the Community Centre, looking into all the rooms. Most of them were empty, with only a few having a semblance of life. He walked in on a pasta-making class in the kitchens and an AA meeting on the second floor.
Finally he found the last room with anyone in it. He looked through the small window to see an empty round of chairs, and a table at the back with assorted cakes on it, and a man with his back turned.
Robin opened the door as quietly as he could and entered the room. It was a pale classroom-type setup and there was no indication of what he had just walked in on. The man seemed to be doing something at the table at the back and didn’t show that he had heard Robin. Sally was leaning against the window, looking out. She didn’t hear him either.
“Hi,” Robin said, and they both turned.
“Where the hell did you go?” Sally said.
Edmund Sunderland was the spitting image of his father. James Sunderland was taller, slightly more rugged and weathered, but he was definitely his son’s father. He was middle-aged, with a gray streak through his unkempt hair. That coupled with the dark bags under his eyes and his thin frame made him look a lot older than he actually was. It didn’t help that he wore small circular glasses that looked incredibly old-fashioned. Robin’s mind, rather cruelly, went to a walking corpse. “Hello, friend.”
Robin tried to smile. “Hello. I was expecting more people to be here.” He gestured at the empty circle of chairs—a sure sign of absentees.
James looked at the circle with a mix of sadness and tiring anger. “No. They’re all gone, I’m afraid. Have been for a while now.”
Robin looked to Sally to see she had turned back to the window. “Do you mean we’re late or...?”
“No.” James reached behind him and picked up a biscuit. He got it halfway to his mouth before he decided against it and put it down again. “Unless you mean late by about two months. The Ghosts of Marsden are dead.” He laughed flatly. “There’s nothing left here for anyone. Just silly old me.” He reached up and took off his glasses, wiping them on a handkerchief. Robin saw his eyes were tearing up. “I’m sorry,” Sunderland said, replacing his glasses. “Sally has told me why you are here. I just want to say thank you for trying to find out what happened to my son. I don’t suppose anyone else in this godforsaken place has offered you such a courtesy.”
Robin shook his head, but said, “Where is everyone else?”
James sat down. “Quit. They don’t believe in the cause anymore. Or they’ve had their fun speculating. That’s what most of them were here for, I expect. Frivolous talk—busybodies getting their rocks off. But there’s only so much talk you can do about ghosts and witches and spells and aliens until you have to step back and take stock, I suppose. I’m the only one left who thinks McConnell’s innocent. Even my wife has gone and I can’t even blame her. I don’t blame any of them, not really. What is that saying? ‘There are many truths of which the full meaning cannot be realized until personal experience has brought it home.’ Who said that? John Stuart Mill, I think. That’s why I think she left. She left the group. And she left me. And she left Marsden. After that, everyone else was gone soon after. If my wife was gone, why shouldn’t they be gone too.”
Sally stepped away from the window. “I have a feeling Robin’s about to get his notebook out, so I’m going to get a drink.” She left without another word.
Robin sat down and did indeed get his notebook out. “That must have been hard—after everything that happened.”
James smiled sadly. “You can only play make-believe so long until you have to accept the reality, I suppose.”
“You accept that it was make-believe?”
“Of course,” James said, like it was t
he most obvious thing in the world. “You don’t really think I believe in all that stuff, do you? It was about hope. Hope in the human race, if you want to get all grand about it. Hope that one boy couldn’t be so evil. That was what it was for me, anyway.”
“What was your son like?”
James sniffed. “Edmund was a good lad. Not perfect, but wholly good. When he was having trouble at school and could have gone down a different darker path, he found them. They all found each other. Tim, Rachel, Robert, Pru, Matt—and my son. And when they did, everything just clicked for them. They were like pieces of a jigsaw—and when they all got together, you could finally tell what the picture on the box was. Any of them would have happily died for any other—maybe Matt most of all.”
“What do you mean by that?” Robin said.
“Everyone knew that Matt was the odd one out. Everyone except the group itself. They didn’t treat him any different from any other member. In fact, sometimes I think Edmund liked Matt most of all. But Matt was different to the others. It’s going to sound terrible, but he was simpler, had a less complex view of the world. He didn’t have such lofty ambitions—didn’t seem to have any interest in going to university, or broadening his horizons—he just wanted to stay in Marsden and become a tour guide for that damn tunnel. So he did. And none of the group thought any less of him for it. They all loved each other—sometimes in weird ways. It wasn’t like they loved each other as friends, but it wasn’t like lovers either. It was like they were all tied together by something deeper—true love.
“That’s why there’s no way McConnell did it. No way in hell.”
“You truly believe that?” Robin said, already knowing the answer.
“Yes, sir,” James said. “And what’s more, it’s blatantly obvious to me, and it should be to everyone. Matthew McConnell is not a killer. And I don’t like Roger Claypath going around convincing everyone he is.”
James Sunderland, a father just like Claypath—but he wasn’t letting his emotions get the best of him. Claypath and Ethan Pack were taking the easiest path by blaming Matthew, and now Robin almost understood it. James was feeling more pain than those two could ever take on, all because he believed in Matthew. He had lost everything for that.
Robin braced himself for the next question. He thought he was going to get one hell of an answer. “What do you think happened to them? Your son and the rest of the Standedge Five?”
“I can’t say for sure,” James said, as if stating fact. “It’s hard to believe I’ll ever meet anyone who could. But I know one thing. It has to do with the hole.”
Robin thought he’d misheard for a second. “The hole? What is ‘the hole’?”
The door opened behind him and he didn’t have to look around to know that Sally had returned. He heard her opening a plastic bottle with the familiar fizz of a carbonated drink. “We all caught up? I hope so because I’m all boned up over here waiting.”
“James,” Robin said, trying to get him back on track. “What are you talking about?”
Sally sat down next to Robin with a clatter, the chair scraping backward slightly. “Ditto.”
James’s eyes flitted around the room, as if making sure they were alone. Robin could have told him there was barely anybody else in the building, let alone the room. “I’m in construction—work for a building company in Huddersfield called Laker’s. A couple of years back, we were hired by the Canal and River Trust to perform some maintenance on the disused canal tunnel that runs parallel to Standedge. I’m going to assume you know what they use it for—the vans that follow the tours.”
Robin nodded and so did Sally.
“The tunnels with the live train lines are fine. But. Well, the two other tunnels are notoriously unstable. When they built the canal tunnel, they started from either end. One team started in Marsden and one team started in Diggle. They came together slowly, but they misjudged it. When they got to the middle, they had to create an S-type shape to join it up. There have been loads of patch jobs throughout the years to the canal tunnel—that’s why if you go through you can see that some parts have brick walls, some parts are stone and some parts are just rock.
“The railway tunnel has fared a little better, but still had plenty of repairs done to it. And a couple of years ago, my team was hired to do some. An employee’s lights had gone out when driving through the tunnel and his van had slammed into a load-bearing column. Part of the outer wall of the tunnel was damaged, and we had to go in, assess the damage and see if it was safe.”
“And was it?” Sally said, sharing a look with Robin.
James shook his head and laughed. “No. No. Not by a long shot. The guy who did it was lucky that the whole damn tunnel didn’t come down on his head. We instantly told them that they had to shut down, until we could stabilize the structure. The disused railway tunnel and Standedge are intrinsically linked. A house of cards. One weak link and everything could come tumbling down.”
“I don’t suppose the Trust took kindly to you saying they had to close up shop,” Robin said.
“Of course not,” James agreed. He shuffled his chair closer to Robin and Sally. Robin remarked that he had come a bit more alive since starting his story. His voice had become stronger. “We spent two weeks reinforcing the tunnel, with the Trust leaning on us the entire way. If I’d had it my way, it would have taken four weeks. I wanted to do an entire sweep of the tunnel—make sure that no other areas had been compromised. Like I said, house of cards. But the Trust wanted the job done so they could reopen. It was peak business time for them—July, I think. And we didn’t have time for the overall survey. The higher-ups said no. So it went unchecked.
“Not that that was what the public heard. Laker’s said it was all fine and dandy—we did a great patch job and the place was as safe as a padded cell. That was when the rumors started.”
“Rumors?” Sally said.
“Among the grunts at the firm, including me. There were whispers that the collapse had opened up a—a hole of some kind in the side of the railway tunnel. Tiny but there. No one actually went to find it. No one offered up any proof that it actually existed. But one man—I don’t remember his name—went to ask the boss about it. Next time we saw him, he was carrying his belongings out of the office in a big plastic bag. He didn’t come back.” James scratched his nose and looked at them. “That helped to get people to shut up about it. And I forgot about it—even when...it happened...if you can believe it. It was so far from my mind. That job’s long gone, and my memory ain’t what it used to be. Still, I should have remembered. I should have...”
“What jogged your memory?” Robin asked.
James ran his tongue over his top row of teeth. “I want to trust you. Both of you.”
Robin looked at Sally and then back. “We just want to help. We want to do what the police aren’t doing. We want to find out what really happened to your son and his friends. We want to ask the question everyone in this place seems to be avoiding.”
“And that is?” James said.
“How?” Robin said simply.
James looked at him closely and then gave a small, almost-imperceptible nod. “Okay.” And then he did the same to Sally. “Okay.” He reached into his back pocket and brought out a folded and crumpled yellow piece of paper. “A couple of days ago, someone knocked at my door. I don’t really answer it anymore. I know it’s not going to be anything important, and I don’t want to talk to some arsehole about how I need new double glazing. You could say losing a son puts everything into perspective. Still, I wish I answered the door then.
“I forgot anyone had ever knocked, just went on watching television until I fell asleep on the sofa. I woke up in the early hours and went up to bed. Wasn’t until the next morning when I came down the stairs that I found this—” he held up the folded note “—on the damn doormat.”
He held it out to Sally and she took
it and unfolded it.
“It took me a moment to realize what it meant. And then it all came flooding back.”
“Who do you think left this?” Sally said, staring at it. From the way she was holding it, Robin couldn’t see what was on the paper.
James shook his head. “I have no idea. Wish I did.”
Sally held the piece of paper out to Robin and he took it. It was a sheet of weathered yellow lined paper, seemingly ripped out of a pad. On it, in hard pencil, someone had drawn four thick parallel lines down the page. They were each spaced out equally, with no deviation. At the top of the page, where the lines ended, there was written an M. At the bottom a D. Two-thirds of the way down the page, just next to the fourth line, there was an X that looked like it had been gone over in pencil about five times.
“What is this?” Robin ran his finger over it and felt the bump that happened when you ran something over too much with a pencil.
“Isn’t it obvious?” James said. “Four lines, four tunnels. M—Marsden. D—Diggle.”
“X marks the spot,” muttered Sally, nodding.
Robin looked at them both, finally getting it. He looked at it again.
“It’s a map.”
Chapter Thirty
Robin was out the door and into the late afternoon air. He heard Sally behind him but he didn’t stop. He was halfway down the street before she caught up, grabbing his arm.
“Robin, wait. Let’s just think about this a bit first.”
He realized he was still clutching the piece of paper, squeezing it so hard it had ripped a little. Sally was looking at him, wide-eyed. He almost shrugged her off and kept going, but she looked genuinely concerned. “What?”
“We need a game plan here. We’re going to lose the light in two hours. Do you think now is really the time to go on a treasure hunt?” Sally said, as he looked behind him. James Sunderland was standing in the entrance to the Community Centre, watching them. “We need to regroup. Really think about this.”
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