The Siren

by Alison Bruce

  ‘Yes, the final crank and tip.’ She pushed her hair away from her face, and he noticed that her hands were shaking even though her voice was not.

  ‘You’ll have to explain.’

  ‘It’s like a rollercoaster: it starts moving and you know you can’t get off. You meant to get on, but at the same time you don’t really know what you’re letting yourself in for. It climbs slowly, seems to take forever, and then when you reach the top . . .’

  ‘You get the final crank and tip?’

  ‘Yeah, and that’s when you really know what’s coming. Rachel and I used to say that.’

  ‘About what?’

  ‘You name it: work, people, going out, staying in.’ She half-smiled; it was a private and cynical reaction. ‘What did you expect? Some big insight, I suppose. Right now I’m looking down and wondering how far I’m going to fall. But it shouldn’t need a detective to work that out, right?’

  He nodded. ‘If there’s still no news of your son at this time, I’m going to take you back to the station.’

  She smoothed two or three imaginary tangles from the ends of her hair. ‘Riley will be fine, I know it. And Rachel, she’s my best friend – I can’t lose her.’

  ‘And there’s her husband.’

  ‘Stefan?’ She looked perplexed, as though she’d forgotten his existence until that moment. ‘Where is he?’

  ‘We don’t know – can’t find him. He could be inside.’

  Kimberly didn’t reply but looked back to the house, and it was as if she could see something different there now.

  He looked back, too, but all he saw was the fire officer stepping away from Gully, leaving her white-faced and hesitant. She possessed new information, that was obvious; she might as well have advertised it with an audible alarm emitting an insistent, multi-decibel screech. He wasn’t the only one who tuned into it, and more front doors had begun to open by the time she was back in the driver’s seat.

  She faced Kimberly briefly, before turning back to slide the key into the ignition. ‘I think we should go back to Parkside Station.’

  Kimberly adopted the same resolute tone. ‘What have they found?’

  ‘There’s been a development.’ Falling back on stock answers was not going to work, and Gully seemed aware of this, but Goodhew could also tell that she didn’t know how to handle the situation. He stayed where he was and kept quiet, but caught her eye in the rear-view mirror and willed her to give Kimberly some information.

  ‘I don’t want to leave until you tell me,’ Kimberly said firmly.

  Gully turned her head to face them both. ‘As I said, there’s been a development.’

  ‘Is it a body?’ Kimberly straightened, bracing herself for the impending drop.

  Goodhew gave up trying brainwaves as a method of communication. ‘I think the basic details would be appropriate, now that we’ve come this far.’

  Gully nodded and he saw the apples of her cheeks brighten with two small thumbprint-sized patches of red. ‘They found a body.’ She raised her hand in a calming motion. ‘They believe it’s adult.’

  ‘Believe?’

  ‘It’s not your son.’

  Nothing in Kimberly’s expression changed, but the fingers of her right hand curled around the internal door handle and Goodhew noticed how the first two fingers of her left hand were already crossed. ‘Is it female?’ she asked.

  ‘It’s too soon to tell.’

  ‘Too burnt?’

  ‘We’ll let you have as much information as we can, as it becomes available, but meanwhile, until formal identification takes place, nothing else can be confirmed.’ Gully seemed to know that this was the moment to close the conversation and leave Gwydir Street. She glanced at Goodhew. ‘Am I dropping you at Parkside?’

  He nodded and Gully turned away to start the engine.

  And, maybe for no other reason than that Kimberly now had a clear view of his face only, she asked him the final question. ‘Will they have finished searching?’

  He shook his head. ‘No, not yet. I’m sorry.’

  The patrol car pulled away from the kerb, but not before two firemen appeared from the house. They carried a stretcher between them, and a sealed body bag lay on it, its burden barely large enough to rise higher than the sides. It looked like something that had been full of air and had deflated, collapsed in on itself, leaving just pockets of nothing. It seemed impossible that there was enough inside there to be anything resembling a person.

  Kimberly’s voice was now quieter, but as firm as before. ‘Actually, I want to go home.’

  THIRTEEN

  Marks was in and out of Parkside Station in a matter of minutes; long enough to hear that a body had been recovered from the Golinski house and to discover that Kimberly Guyver had been there in the street to witness its removal.

  Some days, DI Marks felt like he woke up tired. Today was one of those: he had known it from the moment his alarm sounded and he double-checked the time, momentarily convinced that it had malfunctioned. He felt like he’d just dozed off, but somehow he had obtained his full quota of sleep, and work was calling.

  A deep irritation niggled at him on days like this, and he resented each little rut that jolted his progress. He felt annoyed with his own slowness, annoyed at the minutes wasted before he even left his bed, then increasingly irked with every other small setback he encountered.

  He hadn’t made any comment when he’d been informed, but there was plenty he planned to say. Plenty.

  And each phrase would include the name Goodhew.

  But then what did he expect? For all Goodhew’s capabilities, the results came with a price: a lack of conformity – ‘random’ as his daughter would say. Right now Marks preferred other words like ‘naïve’ and ‘undermining’. What did Goodhew think he would achieve by taking Kimberly Guyver back to the scene of the fire?

  Marks pressed the ‘unlock’ button on his car keys. He would take Gully aside and ask her how she’d been led into it. Her experience as a chaperone was limited but at least she had some; that’s why he had picked her . . . Maybe he himself was to blame: too much too soon, especially for a new arrival.

  Marks recognized the man leaning against a car parked two doors away from Kimberly Guyver’s house. It was Ollie Baker, photographer with a local news agency. As soon as Marks swung into the same road, Ollie raised his over-large camera and rattled off a few shots. This did Marks a favour, since it restored him to a state of outward calm; always the most productive state, he reckoned. If the world was fair he would have thanked Ollie, but instead he blanked him.

  Gully opened the front door and he blanked her too. She followed him into the room by a couple of steps, and found herself a perch on a dining chair in the corner, directly behind Kimberly. He sent Goodhew to make hot drinks then turned his full attention to Kimberly Guyver.

  ‘How are you?’

  She shrugged. ‘What d’you expect?’

  He nodded, taking his time, watching her watching him. She was trying to read his expression, guessing whether he brought news or just questions. It was the usual response.

  ‘We don’t have any news of your son yet, but I can tell you that the body recovered from the fire was adult and female.’ He paused to let her speak but she said nothing, so he continued, ‘Searches are now under way, initially in the grounds of the cemetery and Anglia Ruskin University. We have to pursue all the possibilities, just in case Riley is on his own and hiding somewhere.’

  ‘Because that body is Rachel’s?’

  ‘We start with the most likely options, and since she was the only female occupant . . .’

  ‘I understand.’

  ‘We need some more details on Riley. We’ve checked his birth details and notice you registered his father as Jay Andrews. Is that correct?’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘And does Mr Andrews still have contact with his son?’

  Kimberly nodded and shrugged at the same time. ‘Yes.’

  ‘Yo
u didn’t look too certain. Are you still in a relationship with Mr Andrews?’

  ‘He’s in a nursing home.’

  ‘He’s unwell?’

  Kimberly looked down at her hands, massaged the little finger of her left hand for a few seconds, like it was a talisman.

  ‘He was in an accident.’

  ‘When?’

  ‘Before Riley was born.’

  She looked at him and he suddenly wondered if this was the first time she’d made proper eye contact with anyone, not masked with fear or grief, or blinkered by her obvious disdain for authority.

  Her dark eyes still challenged, but her voice had become quiet and sure. ‘Jay was my first serious boyfriend . . . though I don’t mean the first one I slept with. But I didn’t think you could stay with your first boyfriend forever, so we split up – and Rachel and I went off to work in Spain. She . . . Rachel and I have been friends since our first week of senior school. Jay and Rachel never got on, but that’s how it goes, isn’t it? You see your mate less in order to be with your boyfriend, and you turn your boyfriend down sometimes so you can hang around with your friend. Anyway, Rachel was kind of pleased when we cleared off to Spain, but after a few months she grabbed me one day and said she thought that I ought to make it up with Jay.’

  She fell silent, as if reliving the moment, then continued, ‘I was stunned. I had no idea they’d even been in touch. It was more than that, though. She’d arranged for Jay to visit and, as soon as I saw him. . .’ She paused and, though she was still looking at him, Marks felt as if she’d left the room. And then her remaining words arrived via a burst of warm Spanish sunshine. ‘They say you know . . . you know when it’s right? That’s how it was, and I promised I’d follow him home as soon as I’d worked out my notice.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘He got attacked later that night . . . wrong place at the wrong time, or whatever the saying is. I didn’t hear anything about it, as there were always British tourists getting into trouble one way or another, so it was a couple of days before I was told . . . And another month before I found out I was pregnant.’ She leant back in her chair. ‘Happy?’ she asked.

  That caught Marks off guard. ‘I’m sorry?’

  ‘Do I pass?’

  ‘There’s no test here. We’re just gathering facts.’

  ‘Well, Jay’s at the Hinton Avenue nursing home. He has a brain injury and he’s paralysed, can’t walk or talk. Apparently that’s how he’ll stay. Check it out.’

  Marks nodded. He understood. ‘We also need contact details for your family. Anyone in the immediate area?’

  ‘No one.’

  ‘Sure? Further afield then?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘So no one who’s going to be distressed if they read about it in the paper first?’

  ‘How soon will that happen?’

  ‘The next edition.’

  ‘You mean lunchtime, then? Well, there’s a woman, my friend. She’s like my Mum. Better than.’ The words seemed to knot in her throat, so it took her a few seconds to be able to speak again. ‘I hoped he’d be back soon. I don’t want her upset. She doesn’t deserve it.’

  ‘What’s her name?’

  ‘Anita McVey, but can we just wait? Not for long . . . but ’til the last moment possible, just in case.’

  ‘We can be careful about any details we release, but we also need to stem any press speculation and make sure that what they print helps us as far as possible. Our press officer has released an initial statement which simply explains that we are conducting an urgent search of the area in order to locate a missing two-year-old. We’ll ask people in the neighbourhood to check their outbuildings. We also need to ask . . .’

  ‘Whether you can search here?’

  ‘Yes, it’s standard procedure.’

  He caught another flash of defiance in her expression. ‘I’m sure it is.’

  He chose not to pursue it. ‘The other thing we’ll need from you is a recent photograph of Riley. A clear snapshot – anything that shows his face clearly.’

  ‘I know the type of thing. I’ll go and see what I’ve got.’

  She rose and Gully pointed to herself, to ask if she should follow. He shook his head and mouthed Not yet.’ He glanced at the walls and mantelpiece, noticing there were no photographs on display. He then leant forward and discovered that the mantelpiece had been wiped clean, but the top of the television had not.

  No sounds from upstairs, no opening of drawers, or clattering of photo frames. The kitchen was quiet, too. ‘Seems like Goodhew may need help operating the kettle.’

  ‘Do you want me to go?’

  ‘No, wait here. The hot water’s my department!’

  From the moment Marks told her they were searching the cemetery, Kimberly knew she needed to see for herself, lay to rest any worry that Riley was lying in the deep grass or in one of the sunken hollows left by collapsing soil. An uninvited image had burst into her mind: a huddle of people crowding round something on the ground and looking back towards her with pity. And as hard as she tried to reach them, the harder she was dragged away.

  So she understood the need to produce a photograph, but the need to check out the rear window had grown more urgent still.

  In the window frame Rachel’s house appeared just off-centre, like Mona Lisa’s eye. As much as it commanded attention, all the activity was further in the foreground, as police and volunteers poked through every private corner of the graveyard. Kimberly pressed her hands to the smooth glass. Then she heard the voices drift upstairs from below. They spoke in low tones that were never meant to reach her, but the house had thin walls. At night she could hear the pumping of mattress springs and the subsequent flushing of the toilet which came from next-door, so picking out words spoken in her own home was never going to be a challenge. And she’d expected close scrutiny, since that was the police all over.

  They would be assessing the situation, seeing her and Riley merely as a set of statistics. That DI had already said it: ‘most likely options’. What did that mean in her case? To look for traces of blood that had been wiped from her walls? To contact Social Services and ask what they knew about her? Had they ever been in contact? Were they in any way concerned?

  She could almost see the woman answering their questions: a functional woman, with functional clothes, functional shoes, and with thin pink fingers that tap-tap-tapped efficiently through the child-welfare database.

  ‘Yes, we have her here. Kimberley Guyver, date of birth 27 November 1987? Let me see . . .’ The woman would smile, tight-lipped and disapproving. ‘Nothing recent, but we’ve had her in the system since the early nineties . . .’

  In the system.

  Well, the photo they wanted was gone, along with a small selection of her other favourites. And they’d only get it if she was forced to tell them everything. She rapped the window frame hard with the back of her hand, making her knuckles sting.

  Was that the answer? Was there anything in it that would help Riley? She didn’t know, couldn’t think through all the ramifications. Her head felt jammed with too many thoughts, each tangled with the last, and the next. None of them finding room to breathe.

  She was about to turn away from the window. Afterwards she would wonder whether she had been on the verge of telling the police everything, and whether the outcome would have been better if she had. But at that moment she spotted a figure staring across the cemetery towards her.

  He saw her spot him, and he dropped the hood of his sweatshirt long enough for her to see his face clearly. He made the ‘phone me’ gesture.

  She shook her head and stepped back from the glass.

  He mouthed two words.

  She read them at once, but it was a few more seconds before she understood what they might signify.

  And, to be quite certain, she’d spend as long as possible in the bathroom . . . then stall like crazy.

  Goodhew had no objection to making the hot drinks but on this occasion knew it
translated as ‘get out of my sight’. As a precaution he’d also brewed a pot of tea and a pot of coffee. But such chores often presented opportunity: in this case a chance to look through the kitchen cupboards.

  Marks entered in time to see Goodhew dropping a handful of potato peelings back into the composting bin. Goodhew had washed and dried his hands before Marks inquired, ‘Finished?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘Find anything useful in there?’

  ‘No, sir.’

  ‘You should think about where you direct your energies, Gary. For example, taking Kimberly Guyver to the fire site this morning . . .’

  ‘I know, sir.’

  Marks scowled. ‘You know what? That it was foolhardy? That it’s lucky the repercussions weren’t worse? What exactly were you thinking?’

  Goodhew did his best to look contrite, and lowered his voice so PC Gully wouldn’t hear. She might not welcome any favours, but he couldn’t bring himself to drop her in it either. ‘I don’t know. I didn’t think it through. Sorry.’

  In response Marks lowered his voice, but managed to sound both louder and angrier. ‘I didn’t have you pegged as someone so easily led astray by the charms of the opposite sex.’

  ‘It wasn’t like that.’

  ‘Tell me, how much of that conversation in there did you hear?’

  ‘All of it.’

  ‘Thought so.’ Marks had clearly moved on. ‘I’d like you to check out the Jay Andrews story.’

  ‘I already did. There’s someone of that name who’s resident at Hinton Avenue nursing home. They also confirmed that Kimberly and Riley Guyver are regular visitors.’

  ‘Someone’s going to need to tell him about his son.’

  ‘I can go.’

  ‘Did they say anything about his condition?’

  ‘No, I kept it really brief.’

  ‘Didn’t want to miss anything from the other room?’ Marks managed a wry smile. ‘So what else have you found?’

  ‘Two boxes by the back door: personal papers in one, groceries in the other.’

  ‘No photos?’

  ‘No, sir, but it looks like something was standing on the mantelpiece until recently, so maybe she removed a photograph for some reason.’