by Fiona Barton
It was quiet outside and when she opened the door there was no one there. She almost felt disappointed. Get a grip, Lesley, she told herself. You’re supposed to be avoiding the press.
But she still looked up and down the corridor, hoping to see them. The truth was that the reporters and photographers had become their neighbors, the familiar faces in a country of strangers. They asked how she was, how she was coping, and talked about Alex. And Lesley knew things about them. All Kate’s troubles, obviously, but also that Mick was getting married—“The price of a bit of salmon and some salad for the reception is a fucking scandal,” she’d overheard him say outside her door—that Joe was saving up to buy a flat, and that George had developed a jippy stomach. She almost took some Imodium out to him but Malcolm said it was a step too far.
She’d still asked him if he felt better the next time she saw him.
And she waved to two of the photographers who were having breakfast when she got to the dining room.
* * *
• • •
Malcolm was writing on the hotel notepaper when she came back to their room, carrying two cups with coffee slopped into the saucers.
“Mind you don’t drip on your notes,” she called from the en suite as she unrolled toilet paper to soak up the spills.
“The undertakers are sorting out the civil registry death certificate, the certificate of embalming, and the document for the transfer of remains to the UK,” Malcolm said. “Clive says we can book flights home.”
She sat down hard on the loo seat. “Transfer of remains” was like a punch in the stomach.
They’d decided to bring the girls back intact because they couldn’t bear the thought of them being cremated without a funeral.
“Are you all right in there?”
“Yes, just catching my breath. Do Jenny and Mike know?”
“No, I’m just about to go and knock. Who’s outside this morning?”
“No one. Bit strange. Wonder what they’re doing. I’ll go.”
* * *
• • •
Jenny Shaw wasn’t dressed. She couldn’t face the physical effort of taking her pajamas off, choosing clothes, and pulling them over her head, she told Lesley when she let her into her darkened room. She wanted to go back to sleep and never wake up.
Lesley wanted to shake her but opted for brisk action, instead.
“I’ll open the curtains, Jenny. Things always look better in daylight.”
“Rosie is still dead, even in daylight, Lesley,” Jenny said. And Lesley wheeled round to face her.
“I know. Of course I know that, but we need to keep going. We can’t just collapse in a heap. There are things we need to do, Jenny.” She cast about for tasks that Malcolm hadn’t already got in hand.
“We need to buy clothes for the girls. To give to the undertakers.”
“Clothes?” Jenny said as if she didn’t understand the word.
Lesley sat down next to her on the unmade bed. Jenny’s grief dripped down the walls of the room. It was there in the tortured sheets, the discarded empty miniatures from the minibar, and the untouched dinner congealing on the bedside table.
The world had stopped here in this room. She turned to Jenny and took her by the shoulders.
“Don’t you think we are all dying inside, too? You are not alone in this, Jenny. Mike is in bits, too.”
Jenny hugged herself. “Mike’s going home. That’s how in bits he is. Imogen needs him, so he’s leaving me here to sort everything out. Selfish bastard.”
Lesley tried not to react—it would just wind Jenny up further—but she was furious with him. Couldn’t he have waited a couple more days? she thought. She’d get Malcolm to go and see him and try to persuade him to stay.
“Look, Jenny,” she said quietly, “we can’t change what has happened. But what we can do is make sure everything is done properly so the girls can come home with us. Malcolm’s doing his bit and we need to do ours. Come on. Get dressed, and we’ll go to the mall near the embassy.”
* * *
• • •
It was while the two women were flicking mindlessly through the racks of unsuitable clothes that Jenny asked the question that changed everything.
“What were they wearing when they were found?” Jenny said.
And they both stopped, letting the hangers clatter back into place.
“I don’t know, Jenny. The police colonel said they had wrapped themselves in matting for protection from the fire, didn’t he?”
“But nobody mentioned their clothes. Nobody has offered to give me Rosie’s clothes. I want to know what they were wearing. There must be photos from the scene. Ring Clive.”
Lesley fumbled with her phone and stood as rigidly as one of the mannequins. “Clive, it’s Lesley. We want to know what the girls were wearing when they were found. Well, ask someone. Someone must know.”
* * *
• • •
The two women clung together for a moment before pushing past the assistants to get to the exit.
Lesley’s phone was ringing as they walked down the hotel corridor.
“Clive? Let me get into the room. We’re almost there. Okay. What have you found out?”
The silence in the lavishly decorated bedroom stretched into minutes as she listened, pressing the phone to her ear so hard it was leaving a mark on her cheek.
Jenny was looking at her, trying to read her eyes.
Malcolm sat on the bed, uncomprehending, but Lesley knew he would wait for her to finish. He liked a complete story—couldn’t bear soap operas with their cliff-hangers and dramatic drum solos. Their son Dan teasingly called him a box-set sort of man.
When she hung up, she sat heavily on the bed beside him.
“Tell me,” Jenny said, jumping out of a chair. “What did he say?”
“They were naked, Jenny.”
THIRTY-FIVE
The Detective
FRIDAY, AUGUST 22, 2014
Sparkes was toying with a flabby lasagna in the staff canteen when Salmond found him.
“That looks revolting,” she said, plonking herself down.
“Thanks for that,” he said, pushing the plate away and then covering the remains with his napkin so he didn’t have to look at it again.
“I’m having my lunch—twenty minutes of carbs and quiet. Whatever it is, can’t it wait?”
“Not really,” the DS said seriously. “Our two girls were naked when they were found in the cold store.”
Sparkes got up and led the way back to his office.
* * *
• • •
Salmond recounted the hysterical phone call she’d had from Lesley O’Connor and her follow-up call to the Bangkok embassy.
“She’s right. The vice-consul has confirmed it with the police. Their report states that the bodies were naked and no clothing was found at the scene.”
“And they’ve known this from the start? And not mentioned it? Bloody hell. We need to see their report and find out what else hasn’t been mentioned. Is this just shoddy police work? Or is it a deliberate obfuscation of the facts?”
“The second one,” Salmond said, “whatever the word is. It doesn’t fit their theory that the girls died trying to escape from the fire, does it? This evidence opens up all sorts of scenarios, none of them good.”
“No. What the hell was going on in that guesthouse?”
“That’s what Lesley said.”
“How did you leave it with her?”
“I said I’d find you and you’d ring her back.”
* * *
• • •
The conversation didn’t start well. He got Jenny Shaw first and she wouldn’t let him get a word in as she ranted about the appalling investigation, the lies, the missed evidence. He let her wear herself ou
t and made notes to himself until she stopped.
“Jenny?” he said into the silence.
“Yes, I’m still here,” she muttered. “We all are. I’ll put you on loudspeaker.”
“Okay. Why did you ask the police the question? Is there anything else you need to tell me?”
“No, I don’t think so. Lesley and I were buying clothes for the girls to wear for the journey home. And I was thinking about a dress she’d bought just before she left. And I wondered if she’d been wearing it when she died. I don’t know why. I have such strange thoughts.”
“It was an excellent thought, Jenny. It may be a step toward finding out the truth about what really happened.”
“Except the police here don’t want to know. They’ve closed the case.”
Lesley’s voice came on the line. “They won’t listen, Inspector. We’ve been down there to try to talk to the colonel, but he’s unavailable. A junior officer came down and smiled at us. He insisted the death certificate was the final word on the subject. We asked for a copy of the police report, but he said no. I suppose it might contain other things they don’t want us to know,” Lesley said. “When we pressed him about them being naked, he said, ‘Perhaps they took their clothes off because it got too hot?’”
Sparkes groaned. “Really?”
“I think he would’ve said anything to get rid of us.”
“I will take this up with the Thai police,” Sparkes said. “What you need to know is that I will be investigating the deaths—I have discussed the new developments with the coroner for West Hampshire and he has asked me to look into them.”
“Thank God,” Lesley said.
“Obviously, it is very important that the girls are not cremated in Bangkok. We need to be able to carry out an autopsy. If the bodies are embalmed prior to repatriation, this may help preserve evidence of how they died.”
Malcolm spoke up. “I’m organizing all of that now, Inspector. I’ll be in touch as soon as we have a date.”
“Thank you,” Lesley called from across the room. A distant voice.
“Do you have any further questions?” he asked, more from habit than from a desire to prolong the agony.
“No. None until we get home,” she said.
THIRTY-SIX
The Mother
MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 1, 2014
She’d made herself focus on getting Alex home, shutting her mind to all the questions and horrors of the last days in Bangkok. She had closed down to a narrow strip of activity, ignoring the increasingly lurid headlines about the girls’ naked bodies and Jake Waters—“The Murky Truth about ‘Fire Hero’”; “Drugs Turned ‘Hero’ into Monster”—and the casual questions of the last couple of reporters left in the hotel.
For days she hadn’t been able to look any further than landing at Heathrow. But when they’d finally unlocked their front door, she’d felt something break inside her. She’d come back to the real world—her little life of work every morning, weekly pub quizzes and supermarket shops, singing along with the radio while she ironed Malcolm’s shirts. But it had no longer meant anything to her. She’d felt like an actor in a play. Going through the motions as she opened the pile of post at the kitchen counter, pretending to read letters from the bank and insurance companies.
The need to know the truth about what had happened to Alex filled her head like the ocean roar of tinnitus.
She needed to know whether someone had deliberately hurt her child; she needed the physical evidence the Thais were ignoring.
Had someone drugged her? Raped her? Left her to die in a fire?
She caught herself, hauled herself back from the edge of madness. She had to be strong now. I can’t save you, my darling girl, she told Alex. But your dad and I have made a pact that we won’t rest until we know the truth. We will get you justice.
Lesley didn’t really know what justice would look like. But it was a goal that others seemed to understand, especially the press. They’d written that an inquest had been ordered in Hampshire, and the pictures of the coffins had made the front page, but the story was slipping gradually out of sight now. The political party conferences were on the horizon and the news agenda was moving on. The Silly Season that Kate had told her about had been folded and put away like beach towels.
“We’ve got Thai death certificates,” Malcolm had told the coroner’s officer, an unexpectedly cheerful woman in a busy dress, when they’d sat in her office in Winchester, the morning after arriving home. “I’ve had all the paperwork translated.”
“Call me Hilary, Mr. O’Connor. That’s very good. I’ve already got copies from the funeral directors,” she’d said, rustling around the room with all the documents.
“We need to find out what happened,” Lesley had heard herself say, as if in another room.
“Of course you do.”
And Lesley had found herself trying to identify the birds flying across Hilary’s dress. Cranes? Herons?
“And the funeral . . .” she’d heard Malcolm say.
“I’m sorry, Mr. O’Connor. We cannot release Alex’s body until all investigations are complete.”
The coroner’s officer had leaned forward and patted his hand. “We will get things done as quickly as we can. The postmortem is scheduled for the end of the week.”
When they got home, Lesley had gone to bed and cried for the rest of the morning, burying her face in the damp pillow, until Dan came in with a cup of consoling tea and broke down at the sight of her. She made herself stop.
I won’t cry again until Alex’s funeral, she promised herself later, picking up a tea towel to dry the dishes on the draining board.
* * *
• • •
Jenny and Mike had been told the same thing in an apparently identical meeting. Lesley had volunteered Malcolm to go with them—to referee if needed—but Jenny’s sister, Fran, had come from somewhere up north to help.
“That’s good,” Lesley had said. “You need family around you.”
“Fran never stops talking,” Jenny had complained. “I won’t get a moment to myself while she’s here.”
Lesley had given her a hard stare and Jenny had added lamely, “I know she means well.”
When Fran and Jenny got back, Fran had recounted to the O’Connors the whole conversation the Shaws had had with the coroner’s official. Lesley had tried to interrupt, muttering, “Yes, well, she said the same to us,” a couple of times, but Fran wanted her moment.
“How was Mike? How is he coping?” Lesley had asked. He’d disappeared back to his other life as soon as the meeting had ended, according to Fran.
Jenny, who had not said a word since sitting down, had suddenly come back to life.
“Who knows? He looked like he wished he wasn’t there.”
“He’s lost his daughter as well, Jenny,” Fran had said, marching straight onto the thin ice.
“He lost her a long time ago, when he walked out on her. I don’t want to talk about him. This is all his fault.”
Malcolm had picked up his cup and said, “Anyone for another coffee? There’s more in the cafetière.”
Fran had looked at him gratefully. “I’ll have one. I’ll come with you, Malcolm.” She had still been talking as they left the room.
Left alone, Lesley had tried to talk to Jenny, but the other woman wouldn’t meet her eye.
“It isn’t Mike’s fault, Jenny,” she’d said. “You know that. But I understand how hurt and angry you are. Because I am, too.”
Jenny had sagged in her chair. “She wouldn’t have died if she hadn’t gone. And she wouldn’t have gone if he hadn’t given her the money.”
“Jenny . . .”
“I know, I know,” Jenny had snapped. “I’m being unreasonable.”
Lesley had looked down at her hands. Not the moment.
“The
thing is, Fran keeps going on about him,” she’d carried on. “Picking at the scab. What Mike must be feeling, how sad Mike must be. He should be here with me, Lesley. I need him.”
She’d looked as shocked as Lesley when the truth tumbled out.
“Have you talked to him about how you are feeling?” Lesley had said quickly.
“No. I can’t. I can’t bear the thought of Imogen answering if I ring.”
“Then ask Fran to ring and get his mobile number.”
Jenny had nodded.
THIRTY-SEVEN
The Reporter
MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 1, 2014
The white, handwritten envelope was still damp when I picked it up off the doormat, presumably having sat in a postman’s bag during the morning rain, and the ink had smudged. I opened it without thinking, my thumb finding the weakness in the flap and ripping it apart as my eyes flipped through the rest of the post.
“Great,” I said when I glanced at the first line and sat down at the kitchen table. “A bloody speeding ticket.” And I threw it aside. The last mean kick of a bastard day.
* * *
• • •
It’s Steve who reads it properly when he gets home an hour later. “Hello,” he shouts above the radio news, playing at full volume to reach me wherever I am in the house.
“Katie, turn it down, for God’s sake! The whole street must be able to hear it.”
I poke my head round the kitchen door and stick my tongue out at him. “I see Mr. Sunshine is home. Bad day?”
He grunts. It has clearly been a very bad day. I know his noises by heart now. Twenty-five years of marriage have fine-tuned my ear to the nuances of his verbal tics.
“Me, too. Let’s have a glass of wine and toast self-pity,” I say, kissing him lightly. We’re drinking more lately. Taking the edge off the panic that is simmering just below the surface.