Water Like a Stone

by Deborah Crombie

  “Sarge,” Larkin interrupted, and Gemma guessed Rasansky had a tendency to be long-winded when he had an audience. “What did they say about the baby?”

  He clicked his tongue. “Shocked, absolutely shocked. I thought the missus might have a coronary on me, poor old dear. Husband had to sit her down and fetch a glass of water. They said they’d no idea how something like that could have happened in their barn, and they certainly hadn’t lost any infants. Their grandkids were ten and twelve when they moved away, so I suppose that lets them out as potential parents.” He scanned the room, ignoring Larkin’s look of disappointment. “Where’s the boss?”

  “Still interviewing Piers Dutton. So what’s all the fuss about, then?”

  Rasansky hesitated, as if debating whether he was willing to lose the cachet of telling Babcock first, but the temptation of listeners on tenterhooks proved too much. “Well, I thought it was a bust, but they insisted on giving me tea and cakes, for all the trouble I’d taken to drive there.”

  Larkin, sitting just out of her sergeant’s line of sight, rolled her eyes, and Gemma suppressed a smile. From the comfortable curve of Rasansky’s belly and the crumbs dotting his tie, this wasn’t an unusual occurrence.

  “Good thing, too,” Rasansky went on, “because it was only when the old man had calmed down and had a few minutes to think that he remembered he’d had some masonry work done in the old dairy, not too long before they decided to sell the place. Hired a fellow off the boats, name of Wain.” He pulled a notebook from his jacket pocket and made a show of consulting his notes. “Gabriel Wain. Now all we have to do is find this bloke—”

  “Oh, Christ.” Sheila Larkin’s normally rosy cheeks had gone pale. “Gabriel Wain. He was right under our noses the whole time, and I didn’t bloody see it.”

  “What are you talking about?” broke in Kincaid.

  “His wife’s name is Rowan—it must be.” She shook her head, impatient with their lack of understanding. “I interviewed him. His boat’s moored at Barbridge, and a woman who lives along the canal said he had a row with Annie Lebow on Christmas Day. He said she’d scraped his boat—he even showed me the damage—and it seemed plausible enough. I didn’t—”

  “Sheila, I’ve told you you’re too gullible—” Rasansky began, but Kincaid cut him off.

  “You’re saying that the same man who might be connected with the baby had an argument with Annie Lebow?”

  Larkin nodded miserably. “There’s more. I was reading through the victim’s case files—Annie Constantine, as she was then. I had them sent over from Social Services. I was just skimming, really, so I didn’t—” The color had crept back into her cheeks, but this time it was a blush of embarrassment. “I didn’t make a connection.

  “There was a case, not long before Constantine retired. The mother was accused of MSBP—Munchausen syndrome by proxy. She kept telling the doctors that her little boy had fits and stopped breathing, but they couldn’t find anything, so the doctor in charge of the case referred it to Social Services. Annie Constantine had the case dismissed, so I didn’t pay all that much attention. But the thing is, the woman had a second baby while the case was under investigation, a little girl called Marie. And the mother…the mother’s name was Rowan Wain.”

  The gears in his brain visibly clicking, Rasansky said, “The Smiths sold up five years ago, so it must have been a bit longer than that when they had the work done in the dairy. Mr. Smith said it was dead of winter—he worried about the mortar setting in the cold.”

  “That would fit with what the pathologist found,” Kincaid put in. “No sign of insect activity on the corpse.”

  Sheila Larkin scrabbled through the papers on her desk until she found the file she wanted, then scanned the pages, running down the text with her forefinger. Her nail, Gemma noticed, was bitten to the quick.

  Larkin stopped, her lips moving with concentration as she read to herself, then looked up at them. “The timing might fit. Constantine worked the case the year before she left the job.”

  “So this Wain bloke, or his wife, was abusing the older kid.” Rasansky sounded positively gleeful at the prospect. “Then they start on the baby, but this one dies. Wain just happens to be working in the dairy, repairing a bit of masonry, so he thinks, ‘Bob’s your uncle,’ the perfect opportunity to dispose of the body, no one the wiser. And they’re gypsies, these boat people. No one keeps track of their kiddies, so afterwards they move on and no one notices they’re one tyke short.”

  “Except Annie Constantine,” Larkin said softly. “When she met up with the Wains on Christmas Day. If that was why she argued with Gabriel Wain, if she threatened to go to the authorities—”

  “Motive.” Rasansky ticked one meaty forefinger against the other. “And he certainly would have had opportunity—if anyone could have found her boat in the dark, it was this Wain fellow. He must know the Cut like the back of his hand.”

  Larkin glanced at the clock on the basement wall. “Where the hell is the guv’nor? I don’t know if he’s going to kill us or kiss us, but we’ve got to get Wain in—”

  “There’s only one problem with all this,” broke in Gemma. They all turned to stare at her.

  She had been listening, first with a rush of relief that perhaps none of this would touch Juliet after all, then with growing dismay as she put the pieces together.

  “More than one, actually. First, Annie Constantine had the case dismissed, and from what you’ve just said, the doctors never found evidence that the child was physically abused. Basically, they were accusing the mother of making up his illness, to get attention for herself.”

  As Larkin nodded slowly, Kincaid raised an eyebrow. “And?”

  “And,” Gemma said, “Marie Wain is alive and well, and as bright and healthy a seven-year-old as you could imagine. I’ve met her.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  Babcock had come into the station whistling under his breath, having left Piers Dutton shouting at some solicitor’s poor secretary and the fraud team beginning a systematic removal of his files. All in a good morning’s work, he’d told himself. He was liking Dutton more and more for Annie Lebow’s murder, and the fact that he’d developed a healthy distaste for the man only added to his satisfaction. Police officers, of course, were supposed to be unbiased, but he’d yet to meet one who didn’t enjoy making a collar on a bastard like Dutton.

  Now, if he could just sort out this business with the baby—

  The whistle died on his lips as he caught sight of the posse gathered round Sheila Larkin’s desk. Larkin, Rasansky, Kincaid, and the lovely Gemma, all watching him with expressions that boded no good.

  “You lot look like a convention of funeral directors,” he said as he reached them, his heart sinking. “What’s happened, then?”

  It was Kincaid who told him, concisely, ignoring increasingly evil looks from Rasansky, who would rather be the bearer of bad news than shoved out of the picture altogether. Larkin was chewing on a fingernail again, a habit he thought she’d broken.

  “Guv—” Rasansky began when Kincaid had finished his summary, but Babcock held up a hand for silence.

  “Just let me think a minute, Kevin.” He patted his coat pockets, as he always did when faced with a problem, then remembered, as he always did, that he no longer smoked. He settled for nicking a pencil off Larkin’s desk and rotating it in his fingers as he said, “Okay, so this Wain fellow can’t have murdered his baby daughter. But it can’t simply be coincidence that he did mortar work in the dairy near the time the infant must have been interred, or that he knew Annie Lebow, or that he had a public row with her a day before she died.”

  “Maybe he didn’t kill his own daughter,” said Rasansky. “Maybe it was someone else’s daughter that he conveniently walled up in that barn—”

  “Then why were no baby girls that age reported missing?” broke in Larkin. “And how would Annie Lebow have known that when she met up with him again?”

  “She kept
her own counsel, Annie,” Babcock replied. “She might have known all sorts of things she didn’t put down on paper.” He tapped the report on Larkin’s desk with the pencil end. “And if he had nothing to do with her death, why did he lie about knowing her when he was first questioned?”

  “That’s easy enough,” said Gemma. “If he’d been in trouble with the law before, especially if he and his wife were unjustly accused, he’d not want to call attention to himself. That’s understandable.”

  Babcock looked at the two women, wondering why they seemed to be defending a man Gemma had not even met. “Well, he’s going to regret it,” Babcock said crossly. He dropped the pencil on the desk and watched it bounce, his visions of an easily solved case evaporating. “We’re going to talk to him again.” Turning to Rasansky, he added, “Kevin, I’ll need you to stay here to liaise with the fraud team. I’m not giving up on Dutton yet.” Then, to Larkin, “Sheila, you’ve met Wain; you’d better come with me.” He eyed his friend. “And I suppose the two of you want to tag along?”

  Kincaid met his eyes with no trace of humor. “Ronnie, I want to see this case solved as much as you do. Maybe more.”

  “All right,” Babcock agreed, against his better judgment. It would be a wonder if Wain didn’t make a run for it when he saw four coppers descending on him like storm troopers. “We’ll make a bloody party of it.”

  Kincaid realized he’d seen the boat, both on Boxing Day and on the following morning, after Annie Lebow’s murder, but he’d paid no attention other than to notice the trickle of smoke from the chimney.

  Now he noticed that it was an old boat, perhaps even prewar, and painted in the traditional style, although it looked as though it had been neglected recently. But a wisp of wood smoke spiraled from a chimney whose brass rings still gleamed, and the scent was sharp on the still, damp air.

  They crossed the bridge and stepped down to the towpath single file, with Babcock leading, but when they reached the boat, it was obvious that the four of them couldn’t crowd into the well deck.

  Babcock stood back and nodded at DC Larkin. “You’ve met him, Sheila. You make the contact.”

  Larkin glanced at him, and whatever passed between them seemed to give her confidence. Although it must have been awkward, with everyone watching, she climbed from the towpath into the well deck nimbly enough, then squared her shoulders and rapped at the cabin door.

  “Mr. Wain,” she called out, “it’s DC Larkin. I—” The cabin door swung open before she could say more.

  The man who stepped out, blinking in the gray light, was tall and well built, with the sort of musculature that comes from hard physical labor rather than time spent in a gym. His dark hair was still thick, but flecked with silver, and his cheeks were sunken, his dark eyes hollow, as if he’d suffered a recent illness, or grief.

  Yet his stance, as he surveyed them, was defiant, and he answered Larkin brusquely. “I know who you are, Constable. I thought we’d finished our business.”

  “So did I, Mr. Wain, until I found out you lied to me.” There was a note of personal injury in Larkin’s voice that made Kincaid think of the way Gemma sometimes made an intense connection with a suspect. “You said you only met Annie Lebow when she scraped your boat,” continued Larkin, “but in fact you knew her very well.”

  Kincaid saw the shock ripple through the man’s body, saw him tense with the automatic instinct to flee, then saw him force himself to relax.

  “This is my boss, by the way.” Larkin gestured at Babcock, reinforcing her position. “Chief Inspector Babcock. And this is Superintendent Kincaid, from Scotland Yard, and Inspector James.”

  At the mention of Scotland Yard, Wain rested his fingertips on the top of the boat’s curved tiller, as if for support, but when he spoke his voice was steady. “I knew her, all right, I’ll admit that. But this is why I didn’t say.” His gaze took in all the gathered officers, and Kincaid thought he saw a flash of recognition as his eyes passed over Gemma, but the man didn’t acknowledge it. “I knew, when I heard she was dead, that you’d pick me out. I’ve had dealings with the police before. I know you lot go for the easiest target, and you don’t care about the truth.”

  “Why don’t you try me and see,” said Larkin, resolute as a bull terrier. “What did you argue with Ms. Lebow about on Christmas Day?”

  “I don’t know any Lebow. She was Annie Constantine to me. I hadn’t seen her in years, since she got the case against us dismissed. That day, I think she was as surprised to see me as I was to see her. She seemed pleased, asked after the children, wanting to see how they were doing.

  “But I couldn’t have that, do you see? It brought it all back, that terrible time. When she came back the next morning, I’m ashamed to say I shouted at her, and she was hurt. She said she’d never done anything but help us, and it was true. I’d take the words back, if I could.”

  Wain’s words rang with sincerity. Still, Kincaid had the sense that he was somehow skirting the truth.

  “And she didn’t ask you what you knew about the infant found in the wall of the dairy barn where you worked?” asked Larkin.

  Kincaid knew instantly Larkin had made a mistake, that the timing was wrong. Juliet had only found the child’s body on Christmas Eve. It was highly unlikely that Annie could have learned about the baby by Christmas morning. In fact, they had no proof that she had ever known.

  “What?” Wain looked stunned. “What are you talking about?”

  Taking a step nearer the boat, Babcock intervened. “The body of a female infant was found mortared into the wall of the old dairy just down the way.”

  “The Smiths’ place?” Wain asked, and seeing Babcock’s nod of confirmation, went on, “I did some work for them, yes, but I didn’t—you can’t think—” He stopped, shaking his head, as if speech had deserted him.

  “I don’t know what to think,” Babcock said conversationally. “It seems a bit much to believe that someone else did mortar work in that barn without Mr. Smith noticing. Or that someone else took advantage of your work to add a little of their own and you didn’t twig to it.”

  Gabriel Wain’s face hardened. “You can’t possibly know that this”—he stopped, swallowing—“this child was put there during the time I did the work for the Smiths. I was only there a few days.”

  He was right, and Kincaid could see that Babcock knew it. They had no physical evidence that could link Wain directly to the body, nor any explanation as to why or how Wain could have acquired the child. Not only that, but Kincaid had dealt with a good number of perverts over the course of his career, and while they sometimes presented a very plausible persona, there was always something just slightly off about them. He’d developed radar of a sort for the unbalanced personality, and he didn’t read the signs in Gabriel Wain.

  Babcock, apparently realizing that he couldn’t push further without more to back up any accusations, changed tack. “Where were you night before last, Mr. Wain?”

  “Here. With my wife and children.”

  “The entire night? Can your wife vouch for you?”

  “You leave my wife out of this,” Wain said, angry again. “I won’t have you hounding her. She’s been through enough.”

  “Mr. Wain.” Gemma’s voice was quiet, gentle almost, but it held everyone’s attention. “Where are your children?”

  Kincaid realized that he’d not heard a sound from the boat, or seen a twitch of the curtains pulled tightly across the cabin windows.

  “Gone to the shops.”

  “And your wife?”

  He hesitated, looking round as if enlightenment might appear out of thin air. “Resting,” he said at last.

  “And the doctor who visited you yesterday, she’s treating your wife? That would be Dr. Elsworthy, I think?” Gemma glanced at Babcock for confirmation.

  Babcock stared back. “Elsworthy? Here? This was the boat she visited?”

  This was a train wreck, Kincaid thought, looking on in horror, a massive miscommunicati
on. Neither Babcock nor Gemma could have known the doctor’s patient and Gabriel Wain were connected.

  Babcock, however, made a recovery that any good copper would have envied. After a muttered, “Jesus Christ,” under his breath, he turned to Wain and said in a tone that brooked no argument, “I think you’d better start by telling me exactly how you know our forensic pathologist.”

  Babcock waited until he was in the privacy of his office before he rang Althea Elsworthy. He tried the hospital first, but was not surprised to be told she’d called in, pleading illness, an occurrence apparently so noteworthy that her colleagues in the morgue had taken wagers on whether she’d been struck down with plague or dengue fever.

  This seemed to be his day for calling in favors. It took a bit of wheedling and downright arm-twisting, but in the end he ran down her home telephone number, and the vague direction that she lived “somewhere near Whitchurch.”

  Hoping the phone number would be sufficient, he dialed and listened to the repeated double burr. No answer phone kicked in, and he was about to give up when the ringing stopped and her familiar voice came brusquely down the line. “Elsworthy.”

  “Babcock,” he replied, just as succinctly, and when there was no response, he sighed and said, “Don’t you dare hang up on me, Doc.”

  There was another silence, then she said with resignation, “I take it you’ve seen Gabriel Wain.”

  “Oh, yes. And aside from the fact that you’ve made a first-class idiot of me, do you realize you could be struck off for this? Colluding with a suspect in a murder investigation? Keeping vital information from the police?”

  “Chief Inspector, you have every right to be angry with me. But I’m a doctor first and a pathologist second, although I suppose it has been a good many years since I’ve been reminded of it.”