by Millie Vigor
He scuffed his feet as he walked home. It was not turning out to be a good day. He’d been banking on getting a tenner at least and now here he was with nothing at all. If he’d been paid, he could have gone into Salisbury and got that DVD everyone was talking about, now he’d have to make do with what he’d already got.
In his eagerness to get to the police station, Brett drove his car as fast as he dared. The few miles to Salisbury were quickly covered but the streets of the city were crowded, and he fumed as time after time he had to give way. At last, he was driving into the yard in front of the police station. He pulled to a stop, jumped out and slammed the car door. No need to lock it, no one was going to steal it here. He ran to the entrance and pushed through.
‘I want to see DI Barker,’ he said to the man on the front desk. ‘It’s urgent.’
‘Yes, sir, can I have your name and why you wish to see him?’
‘Damn it, man, haven’t I just said it’s urgent? Why do you want to know?’
‘Because it’s the rules, sir.’
‘Oh, damn the rules. I’m Brett McIvor and I know where Virginia Harvey is. I need to see Barker.’
‘Come this way.’
There was a bacon roll on a plate in front of DI Barker and a mug of tea in his hand when Brett was shown into his office.
‘Yes, Mr McIvor,’ he said. ‘What can I do for you today?’
‘I know where Virginia Harvey is.’
‘What?’ Barker put down the mug with a thump, splashing tea over some papers. He swore. ‘Damn.’ Then he looked at Brett. ‘Say that again.’
‘I know where Virginia Harvey is.’
Brett took the photographs out of his pocket and spread them on the desk in front of the detective.
‘She’s being held in the cellar of Curtis Brookes’s house.’
‘The devil she is. Where did you get these?’ Barker indicated the photographs.
Brett reminded Barker that he’d said he needed proof that it was Ginny in Curtis’s house and a friend had offered to get someone to snoop and take photos. He could positively identify the young woman in the photo as Ginny Harvey. Here was the evidence that the detective wanted and what was he going to do about it?
‘Only one thing to do,’ said Barker. ‘We go to the library, pick up Curtis Brookes and arrest him.’
‘I’m coming with you,’ said Brett.
‘Tremayne,’ said Barker to the DC who was also in the office. ‘Come on, there’s work to do.’
‘Right you are, Guv,’ said Tremayne.
‘You drive,’ Barker said to Tremayne as they got into the police car. ‘I haven’t had my breakfast yet.’
He had wrapped the bacon sandwich in a sheet of A4 paper, carried it with him to the police car and ate it while Tremayne drove. At the library, DC Tremayne was detailed to wait at the rear entrance while DI Barker and Brett walked in at the front.
Hazel Thomas saw them coming. ‘Good morning Inspector, Mr McIvor. Can I help you?’ she asked.
‘Curtis Brookes,’ said Barker. ‘Where is he?’
‘That’s what I’d like to know,’ said Hazel. ‘He hasn’t shown up today.’
DI Barker turned to Brett. ‘His house, where is it?’
‘I’ll show you.’
The journey from Salisbury to Blackton took ten minutes. Brett couldn’t manage it in less than seventeen. From his seat in the back of the police car, he could only admire DC Tremayne’s handling of it, particularly the skill with which he swung through the gates, onto the drive and to a crunching stop at the foot of the steps to Curtis’s house. They were out of the car as one, but then DI Barker stopped suddenly.
‘Do you see what I see?’ he said.
TWENTY-NINE
‘ Would you like some more toast, Ginny, another cup of tea?’
‘No, thank you.’
Nancy Graham looked at the woman sitting opposite her, at her peaked face and eyes that had obviously shed many tears.
‘Are you feeling better now?’ Ginny nodded. ‘And are you ready to tell me what happened to you?’
‘It was so stupid, Nancy. Curtis said he had the book he was going to lend me. He said to come in while he fetched it. I didn’t know he lived in Blackton. Why didn’t you tell me?’ Ginny’s face crumpled. ‘He locked me in his cellar. It was awful and I was so afraid that I was never going to get out. It was all so silly and I’m sorry for blaming you for leaving the flowers. It was Curtis all the time. Somehow he got the idea into his head that he loved me.’
Ginny, her contented cat wrapped in her arms, hung her head and put it next to the cat’s soft one.
‘He said he wanted me to stay with him. He said that everyone he loved was taken from him. He wanted to keep me and that’s why he locked me in. He thought it was the only way.’ Her voice dropped to a whisper. ‘It was awful.’
‘But how did he get you there in the first place?’
‘That was the easy part. Like a fool I just walked in. We’d both come home on the same bus and he said why not have that book now, and invited me to step inside while he got it.’
‘And you did.’
‘Yes. I wanted to see what his house was like. Do you remember that poem about the spider and the fly?’
Nancy nodded. ‘ “Will you walk into my parlour?” said the Spider to the Fly.’
I did and all the time I was locked in, I kept wondering if I would die like flies do when they’re caught in a spider’s web. I had to get out, Nancy,’ cried Ginny. ‘And that’s why I hit him. Have I killed him, do you think, have I?’
Nancy put her arm round Ginny’s shoulder and gave her a reassuring hug. ‘I hope not but we’ll find out later. All that can wait. At the moment – as far as I’m concerned – you are more important.’
‘I feel awful because he was kind to me in his way. He cooked some really lovely meals for me. But … there’s something wrong with him … he kept changing, acting as though he was someone else and I didn’t know who he was.’
‘How do you mean?’
‘He’d be Curtis one minute then he’d be someone else. There was Mikhail who was awful. He beat me up. And there was Angel and Peewee and Charlie too and they were all really Curtis. And then … oh, God, Nancy, now there aren’t any because I’ve killed him.’
Keep her talking, thought Nancy, as Ginny clung to her and wept, she needs to calm down before the police come asking questions.
‘And how did you do that?’ she said.
Ginny pushed Nancy away from her and with tears running down her face gabbled, ‘He said that we were going to be married and I said I wasn’t going to and that I wanted to go home and then he morphed into Mikhail, who wanted to kill me. Actually, he tried to throttle me and Angel saved me and then Curtis left me day and night and I thought he was going to starve me to death and I couldn’t stand it anymore.’ She gasped for air. ‘And when he came with my breakfast, I hit him with the laptop … twice. And he fell down and wouldn’t move and I couldn’t make him. Oh God … Nancy … I murdered him.’
‘Shush,’ said Nancy as she held the weeping girl in her arms. ‘We don’t know that. This is not the time to cry. Dry your eyes.’
DI Barker, DC Tremayne and Brett McIvor stood at the bottom of the steps leading up to Curtis Brookes’s front door and looked at it. It was wide open.
‘You don’t leave your front door wide open on a winter morning,’ said Barker. ‘Looks like someone left home in a hurry. Right, in we go, but keep your eyes peeled.’
They went up the steps and through the doorway.
‘You stay with me,’ Barker said to Brett.
While Tremayne was sent to inspect the upstairs rooms, Brett followed DI Barker into the lounge, across the hall, into the television room, the study at the rear of the house, into the downstairs cloakroom and then into the kitchen.
‘Someone was here to make breakfast, but there’s no breakfast and no dirty dishes, so where is it and where’s the cook?’
> ‘Nothing and nobody upstairs, Guv,’ said Tremayne.
‘What about the cellar?’ said Brett. ‘That’s where Ginny was.’
Tremayne was already on his way, Brett and DI Barker not far behind. They were clattering down the stairs when Tremayne called out, ‘I have a body.’
‘Who is it?’ yelled Brett. In his eagerness to know he was ready to push Barker aside.
‘It’s Curtis Brookes, the one we want.’
Kneeling over Curtis, DC Tremayne checked for a pulse.
‘The pulse is a bit weak but he’s still alive,’ he said. ‘He’s had a nasty blow to the head. I would think that’s the weapon over there.’ He nodded towards a laptop.
‘Don’t touch anything,’ shouted Barker as Brett was about to pick it up. ‘And don’t move the body, Tremayne. I’ll call an ambulance.’
‘But where’s Ginny?’ asked Brett.
‘That’s a good question,’ said Barker. ‘At a guess, I’d say she’s escaped and there’s little doubt that she’s responsible for our man here. Looks like she’s legged it. Got any idea where she might have gone?’
‘Either her place or Nancy Graham’s,’ said Brett.
Brett stood in the cellar and looked at what it contained.
‘That little bastard had Ginny locked in here,’ he said. ‘Look at it. There’s nothing but a bed and a chair and a portable toilet. How could he do that to her? You’d better hold me back because I want to wring his bloody neck.’
‘Can’t let you do that. But rest assured, we’ll sort him out.’
Outside the house, Brett was forced to wait while police tape was being looped across the drive, forbidding public access.
The paramedics who came with the ambulance examined Curtis; decided that he had a dislocated shoulder and was probably suffering concussion from the blow to the head. There was a possibility that he could have a fractured skull, but they would find that out when they got him to the hospital. They put him on a stretcher and carried him away.
‘You don’t think he’s done away with Ginny, do you?’ Brett said.
‘I wouldn’t think so, there’s too much evidence that she’s been here recently,’ said Barker. ‘The laptop for instance, someone had to use that to biff his nibs and it wasn’t him.’ Barker’s intercom rang. ‘Excuse me,’ he said and turned away.
So near and yet so far, thought Brett. Where was she now? He had been so confident that the police were going to find her locked in that cellar. They hadn’t.
Barker was coming back and there was a grin on his face. ‘I have a little job for you,’ he said. ‘A phone call was made to headquarters to say that Miss Harvey is having breakfast with her friend, Nancy Graham. Come and show me where she is.’
‘She’s there? Is she all right?’ An eager grin spread across Brett’s face. It was a grey overcast winter day but for Brett, the sun was shining and bells were ringing. Ginny was safe and he was going to see her. ‘What are we waiting for?’ he said.
‘Now that I’ve told the police you’re safe, you ought to ring your parents before the police do and before they get here. I expect they’ll be here before long. Here’s the phone.’
Ginny dialled then listened as a phone far away in Scotland summoned her mother or father to pick it up. Her father answered and his gruff voice rang in Ginny’s ear.
‘Hallo, Dad,’ she said.
‘Ginny?’ There was an audible gasp. ‘Ginny, is that really you?’
‘Yes, it is. I’m all right and I’ll be seeing you soon.’
‘What happened to you, darling? We’ve been so worried. Wait while I tell your mother.’
‘No, Dad, don’t tell her now. I just wanted you to know that I’m OK and safe with Nancy. There are people coming in so I’ll have to stop. I’ll phone you later on and you can bring Mum to talk to me then. Love you, Dad. Love to Mum.’
Ginny put the phone down as DI Barker walked into the room, DC Tremayne behind him, Brett bringing up the rear.
‘Brett,’ she said. ‘Is that really you? I thought I saw you in the road one day with a dog, and then I thought I must have been mistaken.’
‘Yes, of course it’s me, and am I glad to see you.’
So it had been Brett she had seen that Sunday. Oh, how she wished she had known for sure. Tears sprang to her eyes but she dashed them away with the back of her hand. She smiled as she remembered him staring at her.
‘Miss Harvey,’ said DI Barker. ‘I’m Detective Inspector Barker and this young man is acting Detective Constable Tremayne. I’m going to have to ask you a few questions. Are you ready for that?’
‘You’re going to ask me why I killed Curtis, aren’t you?’ said Ginny.
‘Was it your intention to do so?’
‘No, but I had to do something to get out of there. If I hadn’t attacked him, he would have killed me. He’d already tried to. It was him or me.’
‘Well, you can breathe again, Miss Harvey, I’m happy to say that you didn’t kill him. He’s alive and at this very moment, I imagine he’s being tucked up in bed in the hospital.’
‘Oh, thank God for that.’
‘Now, tell me how you came to be locked up in Mr Brookes’s house, because you surely didn’t go there willingly.’
Ginny gave a little chuckle. ‘That’s exactly what I did. I didn’t intend to stay and I had no idea that it was Curtis’s purpose that I should. I was there to borrow a book that he said he would lend me. I climbed the winding stair and was trapped in the web he’d set for me. Did you find the laptop?’
‘We did. Was that what you used as a weapon to hit Mr Brookes?’
‘Yes. I got Curtis to get it for me because I told him I wanted to go on writing a book, but I used it to write a journal instead. Everything he did and everything that happened to me is on it. It’s got all the answers to your questions.’
‘That was very clever of you.’
Barker switched his attention to Nancy, who was sitting beside Ginny with a protective arm round her.
‘Mrs Graham,’ he said, ‘weren’t you just going to put the kettle on and make us a cup of tea?’
‘So I was,’ said Nancy. ‘And I guess you’d probably like a biscuit to go with it, wouldn’t you?’
THIRTY
Nancy refused to let Ginny go back to her own cottage.
‘The writing can wait,’ she said. ‘I’m sure your publisher will understand and anyway, the heating hasn’t been on so the house will be damp. You will get pneumonia if you sleep in a bed that isn’t aired. You will be doing me a big favour if you stay here. I’ve missed you and we’ve got a lot of catching up to do.’
So Ginny had been persuaded to stay with her.
Brett, with Dog at his heels, called in to see her.
‘All the flights to Scotland will be fully booked up this close to Christmas,’ he said when Ginny told him she was making plans to go home. ‘You’ll never get a seat. I have to go home, too. I’m trading in the heap of a car I’ve got and getting a new one so I could drive you there.’
‘No,’ snapped Ginny. ‘I cannot go with you.’
‘Why?’
‘I can’t, I just can’t.’
‘But it would be so much easier for you. Even if you could get a flight, you know what a hassle it is. And then there’s all that hanging about in the terminal while you wait to go aboard. I’m driving home anyway so let me take you and save you all that trouble.’
‘Don’t push me, Brett. I am not going with you.’
‘I don’t understand. I’m not a stranger. I can take care of you.’
Ginny turned in her chair and would not look at him.
‘That’s what Curtis said and look what happened there.’
For a moment Brett did not reply. ‘This is Brett you’re talking to, Ginny. Not some stranger. What’s got into you? What did that evil little bastard do to you? Did he rape you?’
Ginny turned on him. ‘He was not evil. He was very kind to me and he didn’t rape m
e. He looked after me very well.’
‘Don’t give me that. Keeping you locked up is not looking after you.’
‘You didn’t know him. He’s a very unhappy person. He needs help, not punishment.’
‘Oh yes. A good long spell in prison might help to sort that out. I could have gone straight home but I came here to help find you. I’d like nothing better than to take you to your parents. So why don’t you stop making excuses and let me take you home with me?’
‘Why can’t you take no for an answer, Brett? I am not going with you. Go away. I don’t want to listen to you anymore. When I go home I will go by myself. If I can’t get a flight, then I’ll stay here till I can. I’m quite capable of looking after myself.’
‘Huh. I’d say that’s debatable. Come on, Ginny, you’ve known me for at least twenty years. What have I done for you not to trust me?’
‘It’s not that simple.’
Brett stood up, took her hands in his and held them so that she could not pull away. He tried to look into her eyes but she hung her head and wouldn’t let him.
‘So it’s like that, is it? Listen to me, my girl. It was by pure chance that I picked up that paper and read that you had gone missing. I could have left it at that and gone home instead of coming down here. Are you listening to me?’ Ginny nodded. ‘And then I met your friends. There was nothing urgent for me to do at home so I stayed to help look for you. I’m sorry, Virginia, but you might as well throw a bucket of cold water over me as to treat me like this.’
‘You don’t understand,’ said Ginny as she tried to pull her hands away. ‘And I can’t tell you.’
‘What’s there to understand? I’m not some stranger and you know, or at least you ought to by now, that I only have your best interests at heart.’
‘I know that, Brett. Please don’t keep on at me. I’m not going with you; maybe someday I’ll be able to tell you why.’
‘But …’
‘No, please don’t say anymore.’
For a few moments, Brett studied the sad face of the girl in front of him. He let her hands fall.
‘Where’s Nancy, in the kitchen? I want to see her before I go. I might be back again tomorrow and then again, I might not.’