‘When was this?’
‘The end of last year. She went to uni in Newcastle, but she dropped out after a couple of years, though she stayed in the North East. I don’t think she ever truly settled. She had a string of jobs in marketing, but none lasted long. I heard she had a bit of a breakdown.’
‘Did Orla’s stepfather consider fixing her up with a job at the … uh, holiday home park?’
‘She never showed any interest in caravans.’ Purdey made it sound like a character flaw. ‘I didn’t expect her to move back here. Not many youngish people do.’
No arguing with that. Local children often moved away from Cumbria for good once they left school. Good jobs were easier to find in the cities, and so was cheap accommodation, given that house prices in the Lakes kept being driven up by middle-aged incomers who sold their swish detached homes in order to live the dream up in the rural north. Purdey was lucky, with a successful family business ready and waiting for her to step into.
‘Why did Orla come back? To follow a boyfriend?’
‘None of her blokes stuck around for long, sad to say. She is – oh God, was – quite attractive. Or could be. Though between you and me, she never really did herself justice, and it didn’t help when she lost all her hair.’
‘What caused that?’
‘Alopecia, brought on by stress. She never had much luck, didn’t Orla.’ Purdey hesitated. ‘I hate to sound cruel after what has happened, but I think Dad is right. One of his favourite sayings is, you make your own luck. If Orla was unlucky, in a way she brought it on herself.’
‘How do you mean?’
‘She could be clingy and persistent. Once she got an idea in her head, she didn’t like to let it go.’
Lauren’s mobile sang – her ringtone was ‘Pretty Woman’, what else? – and she moved away to take the call. Gareth turned to Hannah, and she sensed he’d been paying as much attention to her conversation with his daughter as to Bryan and the ACC.
‘Orla found it hard to accept that Callum was dead. Understandable, since there was no proof that his uncle did kill him. Though topping yourself is pretty good circumstantial evidence, I’d say.’
‘Suicide isn’t necessarily an admission of guilt,’ Hannah said.
‘Your colleagues twenty years back thought it as good as.’ Gareth turned to his brother. ‘There were no other suspects, were there, Bryan?’
‘None whatsoever.’
Hannah said, ‘I suppose the people living in your caravans were all checked?’
‘Thoroughly.’ Bryan’s cheeks reddened, thanks either to the champagne or the provocation. ‘It was established that none of our customers had any record of misbehaving with children. No surprise, I can assure you. There’s a good deal of mindless snobbery about caravans, but you only need take a look at our visitors’ car park. You’ll see plenty of BMWs, even the occasional Porsche. We don’t cater for oddballs.’
‘Unless they’re loaded.’ Gareth gave a mischievous grin.
‘By all accounts,’ Bryan said, ‘Orla became irrational on the subject of Callum. Kit was quite concerned about her.’
‘Concerned?’ Hannah asked.
‘About her mental state. He worried that if she didn’t pull herself together, she might need to be sectioned.’
‘That bad?’
‘I’m afraid so. Kit felt he owed it to Orla’s late mother to do his best for the girl. It wasn’t enough, but he can’t be blamed for that. She was a loose cannon. You could never be sure what she might say or do next.’
‘I suppose that’s what led her to do such a ghastly thing,’ Purdey said. ‘She simply lost the plot.’
‘Assuming she did kill herself,’ Hannah said.
Gareth’s eyebrows shot up. ‘Is there any doubt?’
‘Until the inquest verdict, who knows?’
Purdey said, ‘It’s awful for Kit. I feel so sorry for him. After everything he went through when Callum disappeared and then during Niamh’s long illness. Now this.’
Bryan said, ‘He was due to join us today, but of course, in the circumstances …’
‘He’s rebuilt his life,’ Purdey said. ‘New wife, new family. Glenys gave him a son; they dote on little Nathan.’
Bryan nodded. ‘The chap deserved some happiness after Niamh drank herself to death.’
‘Were Kit and Orla close?’ Hannah asked.
‘He made sure she was never short of money.’
Not an answer, Hannah thought.
Gareth seemed to read her mind. A disturbing knack. ‘You have to understand, he wasn’t her real father. Once Niamh was dead, there wasn’t much to keep Orla and her stepdad together. But he did his best for her.’
‘What was the state of her relationship with Mike Hinds?’
‘Uneasy. Mike’s an old mate of mine, and it cut him to the quick when she took Kit’s surname. Callum refused to follow suit, though I suspected that was as much to piss Kit off as to please Mike. Orla was younger, and when Niamh remarried, she went along with what her mother wanted. There were furious arguments about access. But Orla never lost touch with Mike.’
‘Though she never went back to live at his farm?’
Gareth shook his head. ‘No, she stayed with Kit on the park until she started at university. By then, Kit had remarried, and so had Mike.’
‘She told me once she felt there was nowhere she could truly call home,’ Purdey said. ‘No wonder she suffered from stress. First she lost her brother, then her mum, and both her dad and her stepdad began new lives that didn’t include her.’
Lauren was still gabbling into her mobile, no doubt bragging about the dinner to her husband, an insurance broker whose fat commissions kept her in haute couture. She was standing in front of a shot of Gene Tierney in her most famous role as the eponymous Laura – she probably thought that movie about the seductive woman who drove a detective wild with desire should be remade as Lauren.
‘What do you think drew her back to Mike Hinds’ farm yesterday?’ Hannah asked.
Bryan shook his head. ‘Who knows what goes through a disturbed mind?’
‘My guess is,’ Gareth said, ‘they had a row and it was a childish kind of payback on her part.’
‘What makes you think that?’ Hannah asked.
‘Mike hated the way she drank so much, it reminded him of Niamh. And he couldn’t bear her raking up the past. He’d accepted his son was dead, he’d moved on. It was up to Orla to do the same.’
‘He told you this?’
‘Mike wears his heart on his sleeve.’ Bryan grunted scornfully to make clear he didn’t share Gareth’s charitable assessment. ‘Snag is, he has a shocking temper. If Orla got the wrong side of it …’
‘She might have taken it so hard that she felt life wasn’t worth living?’
Gareth downed the last of his champagne. ‘If that’s the way it was, I pray that he can cope. Bad enough to lose one child, but to lose two …’
‘Poor Hansel and Gretel,’ Purdey said.
Three heads turned towards her.
‘Hansel and Gretel?’ Hannah asked.
‘Yes, that’s what they called themselves.’
‘Who?’
‘Orla and Callum. She told me they thought of themselves like the kids in the fairy tale.’ Purdey gave a theatrical shiver. ‘Except that neither of them had a happy ending.’
‘So what did you make of Orla Payne?’ Louise Kind asked.
Eyes closed, Daniel stretched to soak up the warmth of late evening. This was the life, lazing on a vast and colourful Mexican hammock. He’d set up the stand beside the path that wound around the garden of Tarn Cottage. The cipher garden, he called it, secluded and secretive grounds that stretched to the foot of Tarn Fell. The hammock had room enough for three or four, but his sister hadn’t joined him. She lounged in a deckchair with canvas decorated with artwork from Evil Under the Sun. Their glasses and the empty wine bottle stood on the paving. The alcohol had done its job, and blunted his sorr
ow at the death of a woman he’d liked.
‘She was an unhappy woman.’
‘Sounds like it, if she’s killed herself. This story that her uncle didn’t murder her brother, was there anything in it?’
Louise’s tongue was as sharp as her spiky new haircut. A lawyer to her fingertips, she kept asking questions until she prised out an answer. Years ago, she had left private practice for academe; at times Daniel felt a pang of sympathy for her students.
‘She convinced herself, for sure. I felt sorry for her.’
Louise gave a theatrical sigh. ‘I bet the moment she knew who you were, she latched on to you. Another lame duck you took pity on?’
He tried to shrug, tricky in a hammock. Louise had never hit it off with Aimee; after their first meeting, she’d caused a row by asking Daniel if the woman was always so neurotic. Maybe that’s why he’d scarcely mentioned Orla to her until now. Orla reminded him of Aimee, if only because they were guided by instinct, not reason, and their instincts drove them to self-destruct.
‘Not fair. Orla and I talked once or twice when I took a break from writing. She told me she loved history before she knew I was a historian; she described herself as a failed history undergraduate. There was something unworldly about her, which appealed to me. Eventually someone recognised me, usual story, and before long the principal came and said hello.’
‘Goodbye to anonymity?’
‘He urged me to become involved with the library, and asked Orla to talk to me about ways of publicising St Herbert’s and raising cash. Her job was to improve the library’s profile in the region and further afield, but she didn’t seem cut out for it. She preferred mooching through books to hitting the phones. The principal brought in an events organiser to help, so Orla could focus on public relations while he packed the guest rooms with conference attendees.’
Louise stretched her arms, soaking up the last of the sun as it set behind the Sacrifice Stone on the top of the fell. ‘Was Orla afraid of losing her job?’
‘I can’t imagine the principal firing anyone. No, getting the sack was the least of her worries, even though she told me that before she came to the Lakes, she’d been unemployed following a period of illness.’
‘What was wrong with her?’
A heron flew across the garden, and perched at the far side of the tarn. Daniel contemplated its elegant form before answering.
‘I gather she had some kind of breakdown, and her drinking didn’t help. Booze had killed her mother – maybe neither of them got over the loss of Callum. Orla was emphatic that she never felt uncomfortable with her uncle, quite the opposite. He used to tell her fairy tales and she adored that, said it gave her a lifelong love of the stories.’
‘He might have been more interested in boys than little girls.’
‘And perhaps she blanked stuff out, who knows?’
‘So she committed suicide on her father’s farm? Did she talk about her relationship with him?’
‘It was difficult, I gather. Like everyone else, he reckoned his brother killed Callum. But Orla was adamant that there must be some other explanation for what happened.’
‘Such as?’
‘She didn’t say. The last time we spoke, she was in a state. Not making much sense.’
Louise clicked her tongue. ‘Hey, you’re the one who claims that historians make great detectives. Didn’t you ask?’
‘It wasn’t healthy, this dwelling on the tragedy. I tried to steer her off the subject of Callum, but without any success.’
‘You always say that to understand the present, you have to understand the past.’
‘Yeah, yeah, hoist with my own petard.’
Louise narrowed her eyes. ‘I suppose she fancied you.’
Orla’s eager face sprang into his mind as his gaze settled on the Sacrifice Stone, its dark bulk outlined against the sky. What she liked, he thought, was the fact he listened to her without passing judgement. She’d spent a lifetime being ignored.
‘It wasn’t like that.’
‘You didn’t fancy her, by any chance?’ He shook his head. ‘Not your type?’
Louise had this habit of turning conversation into cross-examination.
‘I don’t have a type.’
‘How about Aimee and Miranda?’
‘Are you kidding? They couldn’t be more different.’
‘Only on the surface. You’re a sucker when it comes to needy women.’
‘Thanks for that.’ Better not remind her that she kept falling for selfish bastards who did their best to mess up her life. ‘Orla was fixated, desperate to unravel a mystery everyone else thought was solved twenty years ago. Her stepfather was unhappy about it, she told me; he thought it was doing her no good.’
‘And her father?’
‘I sensed she was afraid of him. I even wondered if she thought she bore some kind of responsibility for his disappearance herself.’
‘How?’
‘Something I heard her mutter to herself on Friday, the last time we met. She’d been working in the library, rather than her office, and we had lunch together. She wasn’t with it, frankly. It was as if something in her life had changed, but don’t ask me what.’
‘What did she say?’
‘“How could you do that to your own brother?”’
‘Meaning?’
‘Dunno. When I asked what was bothering her, she brushed me off. At first, I thought she was quoting Callum. But perhaps in some way she thought she’d betrayed him. If she started torturing herself, that might be why she committed suicide.’
‘Where’s your evidence for that?’
‘If I’d known what she meant to do, I could have asked—’
Louise interrupted. ‘If you are even thinking you may be partly at fault because of what happened to her, I will scream. Please, Daniel, forget it. People are responsible for their own actions, OK? You did your utmost to help her, I’m certain.’
‘On Friday, I suggested she might talk to the police.’
‘There you are, then.’
‘I gave her Hannah Scarlett’s name.’
‘You did?’ Louise sat up in the deckchair.
‘Callum’s disappearance is a cold case. Right up Hannah’s street. Orla may have been obsessive, but she wasn’t stupid. Suppose she was right, and the uncle didn’t kill Callum? If anyone could make sense of whatever was whirling round in Orla’s brain, Hannah could.’
‘And?’
‘And what?’
‘Don’t tell me you haven’t spoken to Hannah yet.’
‘I haven’t spoken to Hannah.’
‘Daniel, for God’s sake, what are we going to do with you?’
‘Don’t start.’
His sister insisted that he and Hannah were right for each other. But he’d decided he wasn’t ready for another serious relationship. He’d fallen for Miranda on the rebound after Aimee’s death, and it had been a big mistake. Besides, things with Hannah were complicated. By Marc, for a start. And there was something else. Hannah had been close to their father, Ben. Daniel couldn’t help wondering if her interest in him was driven by curiosity, because he was his father’s son.
‘I’m just saying.’
‘I’ll phone her tomorrow.’
‘Terrific.’ Louise mimed applause. ‘Faint heart never won, et cetera.’
‘Calm down, it’s nothing to get excited about. All I’m doing is returning a call. She left me a voicemail message this afternoon.’
* * *
Night had fallen by the time the cab dropped Hannah back at Undercrag. The bulb had gone in the so-called security light that Marc had fitted, and in the darkness, the dour old house seemed lonely and uninviting. Not at all like home. At this time of day, the bustle of Ambleside’s shops and cars seemed to belong to a different world. Undercrag was the last of a group of five buildings that had once formed a cottage hospital, and Hannah often thought about the patients who had come here in the hope of a cure, only to die.
God, she needed to loosen up. It wasn’t as if she had drunk enough to induce melancholy. As she unlocked the front door, she reminded herself for the hundredth time to beef up the security around the house – the box fastened high up on the front wall of the house had no alarm inside it – but this was another on the long list of jobs which she never seemed to reach. Better sort it out soon. How embarrassing would it be as a senior cop to find yourself burgled because of a failure to take the simplest precautions?
In the hall, the light on the answering machine was flashing. She swallowed hard. A return call from Daniel, even though she’d said she’d be out this evening? She pressed playback, to be greeted by the voice of her old friend Terri.
‘Hiya, just ringing to confirm timings for tomorrow. See you at seven-thirty? And if you arrive first, mine’s a pina colada. Lots of love.’
Hannah deleted the message and headed for the living room. Kicking off her shoes, she poured whisky into a tumbler. Lately, she’d got into a routine of having a drink on her own before going to bed. It helped her to get to sleep. She never had more than a couple of glasses, but she knew it was a bad habit. She ought to break it, but for this evening, never mind. Just savour the alcohol.
Curling up in her favourite armchair, she closed her eyes and thought about Hansel and Gretel. Two kids with a wicked stepmother, they had ventured into a wood, only to encounter death and destruction. What prompted Callum Hinds to make the comparison? Was it possible that he suspected Kit of wanting to abandon them, just like the horrible woman in the fairy tale?
On the short drive back from Mancini’s to HQ, Lauren had told her Bryan Madsen had asked if Orla’s death might prompt a fresh look at Callum Hinds’ disappearance.
‘Bet he doesn’t fancy that.’
‘Look at it from his perspective, Hannah. The Madsens are in the leisure business, like so many other people in the Lake District. It doesn’t help if there’s a suggestion that a boy who lived on their park was murdered, and the culprit wasn’t found. That sort of thing can deter potential visitors.’
‘Yeah, Philip Hinds’ suicide was a real stroke of luck for them.’
The Hanging Wood Page 6