A Game of Minds

by Priscilla Masters

  ‘You believed Shane and Marvel had some sort of … relationship?’

  He nodded and tugged at the mask. ‘Where did she get that money from?’ he demanded. ‘And then there was the way he was with her. They’d go in a huddle. In his room. Those two had secrets.’

  ‘Shane’s told me they smoked pot.’

  He was shocked. ‘You’ve asked him?’

  She nodded. ‘At the time did you think Shane had something to do with Marvel’s disappearance?’

  ‘I’ve always wondered. I hoped not. But now I just want the truth to come out whatever it is. We owe her that. A Christian burial.’

  ‘Even if your son was responsible?’

  He opened his eyes wide, the whites a dirty yellow. Miserably, he nodded. ‘For years I’ve hoped it was Kobi. I hoped he’d confess and put my mind at rest. But when he didn’t, I wondered. And then her body’s never been found. And now I’m near to meeting my Maker I want the truth to come out.’

  Claire was silent for a while digesting all that Tom had said, as well as observing Yvonne’s upright posture and disapproving face. She reached across to Tom’s hand. ‘For what it’s worth I don’t think Shane killed Marvel; neither do I believe that you had anything to do with it.’

  ‘Well, who then? Was it him after all?’

  ‘I don’t know for certain – yet.’

  Yvonne stood up. She was about to say, You’re tiring him out or You’re upsetting him.

  Time to leave.

  Claire drove back to Greatbach feeling despondent. When would this morass be cleaned up?

  The answer was less than a minute later. An email pinged through from the Biddulph comprehensive. And there it was. One girl’s name.

  Jessica Wilson, a pupil there for one term in the autumn of 2013.

  FIFTY-ONE

  It still didn’t prove anything. Kobi had only worked there for two days in July. There was every likelihood that he hadn’t even taught Jessica. There was nothing linking Jessica to Marvel who would have been two years younger. But if Jessica had studied a degree in history she would have taken it at school.

  Claire had no jurisdiction over Jessica Kobi. She could not force the girl to speak to her. She had no choice but to go through DS Zed Willard.

  He listened to what she had to say without making any comment but even over the phone she could sense his disbelief. But as she spoke, gradually, his scepticism melted. She didn’t need to help him join up the dots; neither did she now need to convince him to focus properly on the case of Marvel Trustrom. As they should have done six years before.

  ‘I take it,’ he said testily, ‘that you want us to bring Mrs Kobi in and question her?’

  ‘She will be resistant,’ she warned. ‘You need to direct your questions to the fact that she has “got away with it” for all these years. Appeal to her ego. Get her to talk.’

  That drew a grunt from DS Willard.

  ‘Particularly get her to talk about the relationship between her and Kobi and eventually she will trip up. She’s conceited. She’s got away scot-free for years and, even cleverer, her husband has taken the blame. After all – what difference does it make to him? He’s in jail anyway. He picked her out of scores of schoolgirls. Something must have attracted him to her rather than repelled him. Work on that aspect, Zed. Feed her ego.’

  ‘Is there any chance you can be in on it?’ He was already doubting his capabilities.

  ‘I’ll try and attend. Let me know when you’re bringing her in.’

  ‘I will. And, Claire – thanks.’

  ‘For nothing, so far.’

  She should have commented that this was simply a theory at the moment, that she had neither proof nor a confession. And, staring at her phone, she realized she had not reinforced the need to keep Kobi on suicide watch.

  It was seven p.m. when her mobile pinged with a withheld number and she knew it would be Zed. She’d just arrived home.

  ‘We’re going to start questioning her,’ he said. ‘Can you get here in about half an hour?’

  ‘Yeah. Where did you pick her up?’

  ‘At her home.’

  ‘Has she had a chance to tell Kobi she’s being questioned?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Did she make a phone call?’

  ‘She could have done. She went upstairs to get changed. She had her phone with her. She could have rung him, Claire.’ He paused before adding, anxiety in his voice, ‘Does it matter?’

  ‘I hope not. But you still have Kobi under suicide watch?’

  ‘Yeah.’ She picked up on the hesitancy in his voice and was instantly worried.

  ‘Zed,’ she said. ‘This is important. The one thing a narcissist can’t tolerate is being bettered. He needs watching.’

  ‘OK. I’ll call the prison again.’

  8 p.m.

  She watched through the window as Jessica Kobi was led in and cautioned.

  Jessica had lost none of her self-confidence. If anything, she seemed to have grown in self-assurance. She gave a mocking glance towards the window and Claire studied her demeanour. She displayed no concern that her dark past had been rumbled.

  Claire had already primed Zed Willard which questions to focus on.

  He too seemed to have grown in confidence. She knew he was glad to be doing this and to show – years too late – his determination to find the truth this time around.

  Zed Willard gave Jessica a confident, apparently friendly smile. ‘Thanks for coming.’

  Her response was stroppy. ‘You didn’t give me much choice.’ And yet she had waived her right to have a solicitor present.

  ‘Ah, no. Sorry for that.’ His tone was still warm and friendly, the ‘I am on your side’ fallacy.

  ‘So …’ He slid a piece of paper across the table. Claire had suggested he do this, present her with a fact. She had been a pupil at the Biddulph comprehensive between September and December 2013. Jessica’s eyes slid over the sheet of paper. Then she licked her lips. ‘So?’

  DS Willard presented her with fact number two. ‘You met Jonah Kobi, your history teacher, there.’

  Jessica’s response was a hard stare and another: ‘So?’

  ‘Something clicked between you.’

  She gave him a look of scorn.

  But Willard held his ground. ‘You recognized something in each other.’

  Jessica’s demeanour changed. She gave a little toss of her head as though to shake something off. A fly on her shoulder or a stray hair; more likely a memory.

  Willard pressed on. ‘Marvel Trustrom was also a pupil at the same school.’

  ‘Two years behind,’ Jessica said before she could stop herself.

  ‘Yes.’ Willard picked up. ‘That’s right. Two years behind. But you knew her, didn’t you?’

  ‘I knew her,’ Jessica said, ‘as in when she went missing I remembered her.’

  ‘Exactly. You know that we’re still looking for her body?’

  That drew a scornful look. ‘Like you’ve been looking for it for years?’

  ‘Luckily, thanks to your husband, we have a lead.’

  It’s an old game. Split the team up. They are no longer a team but a pair of liabilities because each knows the truth about the other. Kobi and Mrs Kobi are deprived of communication which makes them suspicious. Feel vulnerable.

  For the first time Jessica looked concerned.

  ‘A lead – really?’ There was a mocking tone in her voice, and she raised her eyebrows but it didn’t quite convince and Zed Willard had picked up on this.

  He leaned in further, almost spitting the words out. ‘What was it, Jess, that told you that you and Kobi had a shared passion?’

  ‘I don’t know what you mean?’

  ‘Did he pick up that Marvel was annoying you?’

  ‘That little—’ She stopped abruptly.

  ‘I don’t have enough to charge you, Jess,’ Zed said. ‘But we’re working on it.’

  ‘So …?’

  ‘Yo
u’re free to go,’ he said. ‘But I think it might be worth you considering. If we do pick up that you and your husband collaborated in Marvel’s murder we won’t be looking at any sort of defence, that you were coerced into it, that there was undue influence, or that you married Kobi so he would use spousal privilege. That was your payoff, wasn’t it? Your reward. He would refuse to testify against you. You stay free. He stays inside – for as long as he lives.’

  Willard shuffled around in his seat as though preparing to go. ‘Is there anything else you want to tell me at this point, Mrs Kobi?’

  Jessica didn’t respond. Claire could read the signs. She’d lost her way.

  Willard’s next sentence was spoken quietly, as though he was speaking to himself. ‘Of course, when we find the body we’re bound to pick up on something that tells us how Marvel died and who killed her. Unless you were very careful, Mrs Kobi. And I suspect that you were actually in a bit of a hurry. And not careful at all. Or not careful enough.’

  ‘Am I under arrest?’

  ‘Not at the moment. Not until we find her body.’

  Jessica hadn’t quite run out of bravado. ‘After six years,’ she said scornfully. ‘What makes you think you’ll find her this time round?’

  Willard faced her square on. ‘Oh – we’ll find her. And by the way, whose idea was it to set family members against one another? Oh, of course. Has to be Jonah, doesn’t it? He has to have his little bit of fun.’

  FIFTY-TWO

  Zed Willard rejoined Claire in one of the side rooms. ‘How did I do?’

  ‘Good,’ she said. ‘Really good.’

  ‘Thanks.’

  There was a knock on the door. A uniformed officer stood there. And then all hell broke loose.

  ‘Fuck,’ Willard exploded. ‘Fuck.’

  The look he gave Claire was desperate and she knew.

  ‘Kobi,’ she guessed.

  Willard nodded, his colour as green as someone who is about to be sick.

  ‘They’ve taken him to hospital.’

  ‘He’s still alive?’

  ‘Just about.’

  While Claire felt anxiety, she also felt elation. She had anticipated this. And at the same time, it might just be the lever they needed to persuade Jessica to break.

  Thursday 31 October, 8.30 a.m.

  Driving into Greatbach the following morning, she reflected on Jonah Kobi’s plan. With the delicate touch, rumours and one small silver trinket, he had placed suspicion at the heart of the family, turned mother against son and husband, father against son, son against father. They had lived with this edgy suspicion for years, distancing themselves from each other, at the same time trying to maintain some sort of family relationship. But hostility had been at its heart. The son had tried to protect his father and Tom had tried to protect his son. Until he was dying. When he had needed the truth.

  The real tragedy? They were all wrong.

  It was wicked. It was worse than wicked. But up until now Jessica was right. They had no body and the police would never prove a case on a psychiatrist’s say so. Kobi wouldn’t have testified against his wife and no one could force him to now they were married. And Jessica? She was never going to confess.

  So how?

  And that is the greatest difficulty. Knowing someone is guilty is only part of the solution. Proving it beyond reasonable doubt in a court of law is quite another challenge.

  She rang Zed Willard. ‘Can you find out where Jessica and her family lived while they were in the Potteries?’

  She was banking on the fact that Jessica had only lived in the Potteries for a number of months and was unlikely to know its geography well.

  A phone call later, Claire knew the answer. A place with a dark history already. Another unsolved murder.

  Many places in England have a dark past, still tangible years later, even to the casual visitor. There is one such place six miles north of Stoke-on-Trent. Mow Cop Castle was a folly of a ruin built in 1754 at the summit of a hill, outlined against a more often than not grey sky. It was accompanied by a sixty-five-foot-high rock feature affectionately called the Old Man O’Mow. Believed to be the site of an ancient burial ground, the area is peppered with numerous quarried areas and caves which have their own history. The village which is a hotch-potch of cottages, terraced houses and a few detached dwellings, winds its way towards the summit. Today the area is under the management of the National Trust, but its dark and unhappy past clings to it and the air around it, reminding visitors of a crime which was all too easy to solve and an ugly mystery which has never been resolved.

  On Friday 8 February 1963, the body of Mrs Mary Elizabeth Walton was discovered in a red Mini Traveller parked in the high street. It wasn’t a difficult crime to solve. Gwen Massey, a Sunday schoolteacher and choir soloist from nearby Rudyard, had been having an affair with Mr Walton, which had ended in October of 1962, when his wife had found out.

  During the subsequent court case, the court heard how Miss Massey had tricked Mrs Walton to a meeting at the Plough Hotel in Endon where Miss Massey had attacked her victim with a brick hammer. Miss Massey had then put the still alive but unconscious body of Mrs Walton in the back of the Mini Traveller and driven to Mow Cop where she’d abandoned it. Miss Massey had then walked the eleven miles home. The case against Miss Massey was backed up with bloodstain forensic evidence and several witnesses had seen Miss Massey walk home on that cold February night.

  On Wednesday 29 May 1963, the jury returned a verdict of guilty. Miss Massey was sentenced to life imprisonment.

  But Mow Cop has another murder, more recent, which has never been solved. Taxi driver. Steven Johnson, twenty-five, whose throat was slashed with a knife by his killer in the early hours of 22 December 1990. Mr Johnson’s body was found later that day by dog walkers, twenty yards from his vehicle, in a snow-covered farm track off Castle Road.

  Despite a high-profile manhunt and repeated appeals for information, the six-foot-four-inch Stoke taxi driver’s killer has never been found. The motive for his murder has never been established and the deceased’s fifty-pound takings for the night were still in his cab.

  So one murder solved and another unsolved. And coincidentally Mow Cop was where the Wilson family had set up home for their brief stay in the Staffordshire Potteries.

  And now another one was due to join Mow Cop’s history.

  Suspicion falls like a cloud of dust, blown hither and thither by the wind, landing indiscriminately on any surface where it will stay until it is wiped away. Kobi had used both location and this fact to entertain himself and his wife. In this case the obscuring dust was about to be cleaned.

  Claire picked up the phone and spoke again to DS Zed Willard.

  ‘This is my theory,’ she said, ‘given the facts.’ He listened and even in his silence she could hear incredulity. Finally he spoke. ‘You are kidding,’ he said. ‘I just don’t believe it. It’s impossible.’

  ‘Find Marvel’s body,’ she said, ‘and you’ll have confirmation.’

  ‘Find her body? When we’ve been looking for it for six years?’

  ‘I think I know where it is,’ she said.

  FIFTY-THREE

  Back at Hanley police station Claire met Jessica again face to face. She gave Claire a tight smile and followed her into the interview room. As they entered Jessica gave the red eye in the corner a mocking glance and sat down – almost primly. She was dressed in her usual jeans and hoodie.

  Claire sat opposite her. ‘I’m sorry to hear about your husband,’ she began.

  Jessica met her with hard eyes. ‘Are you?’

  Claire drew in a breath ready to drop her bombshell.

  ‘We have a lead.’

  Jessica’s face became wary, guarded as an animal under threat, and Claire continued smoothly.

  ‘So, now we have some idea of time, place, perpetrator, we can start on the right track.’

  Jessica didn’t even blink but regarded her steadily.

  Claire
had to hand it to her. She had nerve. She decided to circumvent her attack. ‘I’ve made a study of marriages to lifers. Some are motivated by a sort of do-gooding pity, a feeling they can reform a bad character. There are others who are drawn to that dark character.’

  Jessica simply looked bored. ‘Per-lease,’ she said. ‘Spare me the mumbo jumbo.’

  ‘But I don’t think that’s the case here, is it, Jessica. I think you quickly recognized that you and Jonah were the same. And your focus was this unfortunate girl. I daresay she clung to you. Was an irritant. Two outsiders. You were new, she had no friends. Maybe Jonah came across some sort of altercation between you and boy did he see something he admired. You lured her, didn’t you? She was going to meet you in Hanley that day. That’s why she dressed up the way she did and why she insisted on going in spite of the filthy weather.’

  Jessica’s stare was still outwardly bold but Claire sensed that inside she was shaken. But her stare didn’t waver.

  ‘And as for your husband. That was a puzzle. Initially I couldn’t work out why you and he married. You’re not the vulnerable type. Neither are you impressionable. So that left one explanation. You and he were the same. He’d never shown any real interest in women. His first marriage barely lasted two years. The only thing he had was disdain for schoolgirls. And then I realized. You were partners in crime. You weren’t different. He had something over you. And so you were married and he gained a channel to the outside. You could set up this little game where you taunted the police with a missing body, set doubts and suspicion between the family members. So easy to do. A little whisper to someone in school, that Shane was abusing his sister. And a tiny ornament planted in Tom’s car. Your entertainment was in observing the family suffer and wonder. I suppose it was Jonah who suggested you marry and then no one could force either of you to testify against the other. It was a devil’s pact. How you both enjoyed your game. Put the cat among the pigeons and watched the fur and feathers fly. Tom, Shane, DS Willard and then me. Even I was part of the fun, wasn’t I? We were all dragged into your slipstream. Especially Tom who might have died before his daughter’s remains were found.’