I reach Blaen Cedi and pull the key from my pocket, but when I put my hand on the door it moves a little, and I realise it isn’t locked. The door is old and the mechanism unreliable: Iestyn showed me how to pull the door just so, and turn the key at such an angle it clicks home, but at times I’ve spent ten minutes or more trying. He left me his number, but he doesn’t know I threw away my mobile phone. There’s a phone line to the cottage, but no telephone installed, so I will have to walk to Penfach and find a telephone box to see if he’ll come and fix it.
I have only been inside for a few minutes, when there is a knock at the door.
‘Jenna? It’s Bethan.’
I contemplate staying where I am, but my curiosity gets the better of me, and I feel a leap of excitement as I open the door. For all that I sought an escape, I’m lonely here in Penfach.
‘I brought you a pie.’ Bethan holds up a tea-towel-covered dish and comes in without waiting for an invitation. She puts it down in the kitchen next to the range.
‘Thank you.’ I search for small talk, but Bethan just smiles. She takes off her heavy woollen coat and the action galvanises me. ‘Would you like tea?’
‘If you’re making,’ she says. ‘I thought I’d come by and see how you’re doing. I did wonder if you might have popped in to see me before now, but I know what it’s like when you’re settling into a new place.’ She looks around the cottage and stops talking, taking in the sparse sitting room, no different from when Iestyn first brought me here.
‘I don’t have much,’ I say, embarrassed.
‘None of us does, round here,’ Bethan says cheerfully. ‘As long as you’re warm and comfortable, that’s the main thing.’
I move around the kitchen as she talks, making the tea, grateful for something to do with my hands, and we sit at the pine table with our mugs.
‘How are you finding Blaen Cedi?’
‘It’s perfect,’ I say. ‘Exactly what I needed.’
‘Tiny and cold, you mean?’ Bethan says, with a ripple of laughter that slops tea over the rim of her mug. She gives an ineffective rub at her trousers and the liquid sinks into a dark patch on her thigh.
‘I don’t need much room, and the fire keeps me warm enough.’ I smile. ‘Really, I like it.’
‘So what’s your story, Jenna? How did you come to be in Penfach?’
‘It’s beautiful here,’ I say simply, wrapping my hands around my mug and looking down into it, to avoid meeting Bethan’s sharp eyes. She doesn’t push me.
‘That’s true enough. There are worse places to live, although it’s bleak at this time of year.’
‘When do you start letting the caravans?’
‘We open at Easter,’ Bethan says, ‘then it’s all systems go for the summer months – you won’t recognise the place – and we finally wind down after the October half-term. Let me know if you’ve got family visiting and need a ’van – you’ll never squeeze guests in here.’
‘That’s kind of you, but I’m not expecting anyone to visit.’
‘You don’t have any family?’ Bethan looks directly at me, and I find myself unable to drop my gaze.
‘I have a sister,’ I admit, ‘but we don’t speak any more.’
‘What happened?’
‘Oh, the usual sibling tensions,’ I say lightly. Even now, I can see Eve’s angry face as she implored me to listen to her. I was too proud, I can see that now; too blinded by love. Perhaps if I had listened to Eve, things would have been different.
‘Thank you for the pie,’ I say. ‘It’s very kind of you.’
‘Nonsense,’ Bethan says, unperturbed by the change in subject. She puts on her coat and wraps a scarf several times round her neck. ‘What are neighbours for? Now, you’ll be dropping in for tea at the caravan park before too long.’
It’s not a question, but I nod. She fixes me with rich brown eyes and I suddenly feel like a child again.
‘I will,’ I say. ‘I promise.’ And I mean it.
When Bethan has gone I take the memory stick from my camera and load the photos on to my laptop. Most are no use, but there are a few that capture perfectly the writing in the sand, against a backdrop of fierce winter sea. I put the kettle on the range to make more tea, but I lose track of time, and it’s half an hour later when I realise it still hasn’t boiled. I put out a hand only to discover the range is stone cold. It’s gone out again. I was so engrossed in editing photos that I didn’t notice the temperature falling, but now my teeth start to chatter and I can’t make them stop. I look at Bethan’s chicken pie and feel my stomach growl with hunger. The last time this happened it took me two days to relight it, and my heart sinks at the thought of a repeat performance.
I shake myself. When did I become so pathetic? When did I lose the ability to make decisions; to solve problems? I’m better than this.
‘Right,’ I say out loud, my voice sounding strange in the empty kitchen. ‘Let’s sort this out.’
The sun is rising over Penfach before I am warm again. My knees are stiff after hours spent crouching on the kitchen floor, and I have smears of grease in my hair. But I have a sense of achievement I haven’t felt in a long time, as I place Bethan’s pie in the range to warm through. I don’t care that it’s closer to breakfast than supper, or that my hunger pangs have been and gone. I set the table for dinner, and I relish every single bite.
7
‘Come on!’ Ray bellowed up the stairs to Tom and Lucy, looking at his watch for the fifth time in as many minutes. ‘We’re going to be late!’
As if Monday mornings weren’t stressful enough, Mags had spent the night at her sister’s and wasn’t due back until lunchtime, so Ray had been flying solo for twenty-four hours. He had – rather unwisely, he now saw – allowed the children to stay up late to watch a film the previous night, and had had to prise even the ever-chirpy Lucy out of bed at seven-thirty. Now it was eight-thirty-five and they were going to have to get a shift on. Ray had been summoned to the chief constable’s office at nine-thirty, and at this rate he was still going to be standing at the foot of the stairs shouting at his children.
‘Get a move on!’ Ray marched out to the car and started the engine, leaving the front door swinging open. Lucy came racing through it, unbrushed hair flying about her face, and slid into the front seat beside her dad. Her navy school skirt was crumpled, and one knee-length sock was already round her ankle. A full minute later Tom sauntered out to the car, his shirt untucked and flapping in the breeze. He had his tie in his hand and showed no sign of putting it on. He was going through a growth spurt and carried his new-found height awkwardly, his head permanently bowed and his shoulders stooped.
Ray opened his window. ‘Door, Tom!’
‘Huh?’ Tom looked at Ray.
‘The front door?’ Ray clenched his fists. How Mags did this every day without losing her temper, he would never know. The list of things he had to do loomed large in his mind, and he could have done without the school run today of all days.
‘Oh.’ Tom meandered back to the house and pulled the front door closed with a bang. He got into the back seat. ‘How come Lucy’s in the front?’
‘It’s my turn.’
‘It isn’t.’
‘It is.’
‘Enough!’ Ray roared.
Nobody spoke, and by the time they had driven the five minutes to Lucy’s primary school, Ray’s blood pressure had subsided. He parked his Mondeo on yellow zig-zags and marched Lucy round to her classroom, kissing her on the forehead and legging it back just in time to find a woman noting down his registration number.
‘Oh, it’s you!’ she said, when he skidded to a halt by the car. She wagged her finger. ‘I would have thought you would have known better, Inspector.’
‘Sorry,’ Ray said. ‘Urgent job. You know how it is.’
He left her tapping her pencil on her notepad. Bloody PTA mafia, he thought. Too much time on their hands, that was the trouble.
‘So,’ Ray started, gla
ncing over to the passenger seat. Tom had slid into the front as soon as Lucy had got out, but he was staring resolutely out of the window. ‘How’s school?’
‘Fine.’
Tom’s teacher said that while things hadn’t got worse, they certainly hadn’t got better. He and Mags had gone to the school and heard a report of a boy who had no friends, didn’t do more than the bare minimum in lessons, and never put himself forward.
‘Mrs Hickson said there’s a football club starting after school on Wednesdays. Do you fancy it?’
‘Not really.’
‘I used to be quite the player in my day – maybe some of it has rubbed off on you, eh?’ Even without looking at Tom, Ray knew the boy was rolling his eyes, and he winced at how much like his own father he was sounding.
Tom pushed his headphones into his ears.
Ray sighed. Puberty had turned his son into a grunting, uncommunicative teenager, and he was dreading the day the same thing happened to his daughter. You weren’t supposed to have favourites, but he had a soft spot for Lucy, who at nine would still seek him out for a cuddle and insist on a bedtime story. Even before adolescent angst had hit, Tom and Ray had locked horns. Too similar, Mags said, although Ray couldn’t see it.
‘You can drop me here,’ Tom said, unbuckling his seat belt while the car was still moving.
‘But we’re two streets away from the school.’
‘Dad, it’s fine. I’ll walk.’ He reached for the door handle and for a moment Ray thought he was going to open the door and simply hurl himself out.
‘All right, I get it!’ Ray pulled over to the side of the road, ignoring the road markings for the second time that morning. ‘You know you’re going to miss registration, don’t you?’
‘Laters.’
And with that, Tom was gone, slamming the car door and slipping between the traffic to cross the road. What on earth had happened to his kind, funny son? Was this terseness a rite of passage for a teenage boy – or something more? Ray shook his head. You’d think having kids would be a walk in the park compared to a complex crime investigation, but he’d take a suspect interview over a chat with Tom any day. And get more of a conversation, he thought wryly. Thank God Mags would be picking the kids up from school.
By the time Ray reached headquarters he had put Tom to the back of his mind. It didn’t take a genius to work out why the chief constable wanted to see him. The hit-and-run was almost six months old and the investigation had all but ground to a halt. Ray sat on a chair outside the oak-panelled office, and the chief’s PA gave him a sympathetic smile.
‘She’s just finishing up a call,’ she said. ‘It won’t be much longer.’
Chief Constable Olivia Rippon was a brilliant but terrifying woman. Rising rapidly through the ranks, she had been Avon and Somerset’s chief officer for seven years. At one stage tipped to be the next Met Commissioner, Olivia had ‘for personal reasons’ chosen to stay in her home force, where she took pleasure in reducing senior officers to gibbering wrecks at monthly performance meetings. She was one of those women who were born to wear uniform, her dark brown hair pulled into a severe bun, and solid legs hidden beneath thick black tights.
Ray rubbed his palms on his trouser legs to make sure they were perfectly dry. He had heard a rumour that the chief had once blocked a promising officer’s promotion to chief inspector because the poor man’s sweaty palms didn’t ‘inspire confidence’. Ray had no idea if it was true, but he wasn’t going to take any chances. They could get by on his inspector salary, but things were a bit tight. Mags was still on about becoming a teacher, but Ray had done the sums, and if he could manage another couple of promotions, they’d have the extra money they needed without her having to work. Ray thought about the morning’s chaos and decided Mags already did more than enough – she shouldn’t have to get a job just so they could afford a few luxuries.
‘You can go in now,’ the PA said.
Ray took a deep breath and pushed open the door. ‘Good morning, ma’am.’
There was silence as the chief made copious notes on a pad in her trademark illegible handwriting. Ray loitered by the door and pretended to admire the numerous certificates and photographs that littered the walls. The navy blue carpet was thicker and plusher than in the rest of the building, and an enormous conference table dominated one half of the room. At the far end, Olivia Rippon sat at a big curved desk. Finally, she stopped writing and looked up.
‘I want you to close the Fishponds hit-and-run case.’
It was clear he wasn’t going to be offered a seat, so Ray picked the chair closest to Olivia, and sat down regardless. She raised an eyebrow, but said nothing.
‘I think that if we just had a little more time—’
‘You’ve had time,’ Olivia said. ‘Five and a half months, to be exact. It’s an embarrassment, Ray. Every time the Post prints another of your so-called updates, it simply serves as a reminder of a case the police have failed to solve. Councillor Lewis rang me last night: he wants it buried, and so do I.’
Ray felt the anger building inside him. ‘Isn’t Lewis the one who opposed the residents’ bid for the limit on the estates to be dropped to twenty miles per hour?’
There was a beat, and Olivia regarded him coolly.
‘Close it, Ray.’
They looked at each other across the smooth walnut desk without speaking. Surprisingly, it was Olivia who gave in first, sitting back in her chair and clasping her hands in front of her.
‘You are an exceptionally good detective, Ray, and your tenacity does you credit. But if you want to progress, you need to accept that policing is about politics as much as it is investigating crime.’
‘I do understand that, ma’am.’ Ray fought to keep the frustration out of his voice.
‘Good,’ Olivia said, taking the lid off her pen and reaching for the next memo in her in-tray. ‘Then we’re in agreement. The case will be closed today.’
For once Ray was glad of the traffic that held him up on his way back to CID. He was not looking forward to telling Kate, and he wondered why that should be his overriding thought. She was so new to CID still, he supposed: she wouldn’t yet have been through the frustrations of having to file an investigation in which so much energy had been invested. Stumpy would be more resigned.
As soon as he got back to the station, he called them into his office. Kate came in first, carrying a mug of coffee she put down next to his computer, where three others sat, each half-full of cold black coffee.
‘Are they from last week?’
‘Yep – the cleaner refuses to wash them up any more.’
‘I’m not surprised. You can do them yourself, you know.’ Kate sat down, just as Stumpy came in and nodded a greeting to Ray.
‘Do you remember the car Brian and Pat saw on the CCTV for the hit-and-run?’ Kate said, as soon as Stumpy was sitting down. ‘The one that seemed to be in a hurry to get away?’
Ray nodded.
‘We can’t make out what type of car it is from the footage we’ve got, and I’d like to take it to Wesley. If nothing else we might be able to eliminate it from our enquiries.’
Wesley Barton was an anaemic, scrawny individual who had somehow secured approval as a police CCTV expert. Working from a windowless basement in a stuffy house on Redland Road, he used a staggering array of equipment to enhance CCTV images until they were suitable to be used as evidence. Ray assumed Wesley must be clean, given his police association, but there was something seedy about the whole set-up that made him shudder.
‘I’m sorry, Kate, but I can’t authorise the budget for that,’ Ray said. He hated the thought of telling her all her hard work was about to come to an abrupt end. Wesley was expensive, but he was good, and Ray was impressed with Kate’s lateral thinking. He hated admitting it, even to himself, but he’d taken his eye off the ball in recent weeks. All this business with Tom was distracting him, and for a moment he felt a stab of resentment towards his son. It was inexcusable to let
his home life affect work, particularly such a high-profile case as this one. Not that it mattered, he thought bitterly, now that the chief had issued her decree.
‘It’s not a huge cost,’ Kate said, ‘I’ve spoken to him, and—’
Ray cut her off. ‘I can’t authorise the budget on anything,’ he said meaningfully. Stumpy looked at Ray. He’d been around the block enough times to know what was coming next.
‘The chief has told me to close the investigation,’ Ray said, keeping his eyes on Kate.
There was a brief pause.
‘I hope you told her where to stick it.’ Kate laughed, but no one joined in. She looked between Ray and Stumpy, and her face fell. ‘Are you serious? We’re just going to give up on it?’
‘There’s nothing to give up on,’ Ray said. ‘There isn’t anything else we can do. You’ve got nowhere with tracing the fog light casing—’
‘There are a dozen or more index numbers outstanding,’ Kate said. ‘You wouldn’t believe the number of mechanics who don’t keep paperwork for their jobs. That doesn’t mean I won’t be able to trace them, it just means I need more time.’
‘It’s a waste of effort,’ Ray said gently. ‘Sometimes you have to know when to stop.’
‘We’ve done everything we can,’ Stumpy said, ‘but it’s like looking for a needle in a haystack. No index number, no colour, no make or model: we need more, Kate.’
Ray was grateful for Stumpy’s backing. ‘And we don’t have more,’ he said. ‘So I’m afraid we need to draw a line under this investigation for the time being. Obviously, if a genuine development comes in, we’ll follow it up, but otherwise…’ He trailed off, conscious that he was sounding like one of the chief’s press releases.
‘This is down to politics, isn’t it?’ Kate said. ‘The chief says “jump” and we say “How high?”’ Ray realised how personally she was taking this.
‘Come on, Kate, you’ve been in the job long enough to know that sometimes there are difficult choices to make.’ He stopped abruptly, not wanting to patronise her. ‘Look, it’s been nearly six months and we have nothing concrete to go on. No witnesses, no forensics, nothing. We could throw all the resources in the world at this job and we’d still have no solid leads. I’m sorry, but we’ve got other investigations, other victims to fight for.’
I Let You Go Page 6