Far off a siren whoo-whooped, dipping and soaring and then fading away.
‘James Markham smashed into a tree.’ Stella flapped the photocopy of the newspaper article. ‘Since these are the only trees we can assume…’ She marched over to the nearest tree and, kneeling, shone her torch at the trunk.
Jack joined her. He ran his hand over the bark carefully, as if the tree were a person.
Stella allowed her mind to wander briefly. David Barlow had said he would stay at the pub to eat his supper; wistfully she supposed he had left by now.
‘There!’ Jack nudged her. ‘This is where he died.’
A gash cut into the tree two feet up from the ground. Over the decade since the accident, the exposed wood had spotted with grime and moss. They wouldn’t have seen it had they had not been looking. The bark was closing over the scar.
‘Trees are two-thirds below ground, a substantial tree like this would have held fast when Markham hit it, even at speed. A wall might give way. Wait a minute, what’s this?’ Jack scrabbled in the earth around the roots. One by one he placed little chips of stone on the pavement.
‘Stones.’ Stella got up and stamped about to stop the pins and needles in her right foot. ‘Not everything’s a sign.’ She swung the torch out along the road; it fell short of a shape fifty metres away. A rubbish skip, although in the dim light it was hard to tell. ‘Let’s get out of here.’
Stella had forgotten to lock the van and had left her phone in view on the seat. It was glowing. Jackie had left a voicemail. Sitting at the wheel, Stella listened. ‘Can Jack go to Amanda Hampson’s at eight o’ clock tomorrow morning as well as Tuesdays? Of course she’s taken to him!’ Jackie enjoyed telling Stella they had more business. Stella wished they had spoken; she wanted to make up for leaving at lunchtime. While she hadn’t actually lied to Jackie, she hadn’t told her the truth. This didn’t sit comfortably with her.
Jack was still by the tree. ‘Jack, come on!’ She gesticulated through the windscreen. Jack waved, but didn’t move. Without asking him, Stella texted Jackie that he would be there. Jackie would see she was working. More deceit. Stella huffed in her seat. It was no good. She would return the blue folder to Terry’s basement and attend to her business.
‘This is a wild-goose chase,’ she declared when Jack finally joined her. ‘So what if there was an accident here? Terry took the picture because he was there that night.’ She started the engine. ‘It’s a souvenir.’
‘You don’t believe that.’ Jack was businesslike. He was jingling something in his palm. ‘Was Terry in all the streets? Life is rife with coincidence, but this seems implausible.’
‘He was a police officer.’
‘Not on Traffic. I asked Suzie.’
Stella pulled out into the road.
‘Your lights are off.’ Jack examined his cupped hand.
Stella flicked to full beam. ‘What was that?’ She rubbed a porthole in the fogging windscreen.
‘What was what?’ Jack dropped whatever was in his hand into his pocket and clipped on his seat belt.
‘I saw something.’
‘A fox probably.’
‘This place gives me the creeps.’ There, she had said it.
‘A man died here, that’s why,’ Jack replied amiably. He tilted his head back against the cushioned rest. ‘His ghost is here.’ He was matter of fact.
Further along the road, Stella remembered the dark shape. They must have driven past it. She looked in her rear mirror and saw the sweet chestnut trees silhouetted against the sky. Ghosts indeed. She had imagined the car and the fox. Nevertheless she confirmed the central-locking switch was activated.
Jack pulled on the gloves that Stella had found in Terry’s jacket pocket after he died and had given him. The brown leather accentuated his long slender fingers. The folder, still open at Britton Drive, lay on his lap. ‘I should imagine Terry was puzzled how it was that Markham came off the road. It’s as quiet as a grave here.’
‘It would have been thriving ten years ago.’
‘Not in the middle of the night.’
‘Maybe he suspected suicide, unless the guy fell asleep.’
‘Or murder.’
On Britton Drive it had seemed the dead of night. But Uxbridge Road was bright and noisy with cars and late buses. Teenagers and returning commuters bunched outside late-night groceries and off licences; knots of tardy smokers sat at pub picnic tables nursing last orders as if for warmth. Glad of the bustle, Stella didn’t resent braking when a man wove his way in front of the van. She wasn’t a detective, she ran a cleaning company and should be in bed now. She jumped when Jack batted the dashboard.
‘That was Marquis Way.’
‘Not tonight. It’s late.’
29
Friday, 27 April 2012
‘I’m off to the police station. You can manage without me, can’t you?’
‘I’ll try.’ Jack screwed the cap back on the toilet cleaner and smiled at Amanda Hampson. So far she had hardly spoken to him. If she was going out, he would finish on time although he found he was disappointed not to hear how her investigations were going.
‘Jack. Darling. We shall celebrate.’ She stamped her foot, clutching a book and a pink plastic wallet garish with yellow and red flowers. ‘I shall force them to reopen the case!’
‘I see,’ Jack said in a neutral voice. He squirted a stream of yellow scouring cream around the sides of the bath.
She sighed. ‘Don’t you be sceptical. I rely on you. And that so-called journalist, she’s next in my firing line.’
He gathered himself. Although he had only known Amanda Hampson a short while, he was drawn to her energy. She was indefatigable in her quest, however ill-judged it might be.
‘Which journalist?’
‘Lucille bloody Ball. I love Lucy, I don’t think. Making sheep’s eyes at Charlie even when he was dead. She’s got me to answer to now!’
‘What have you found?’ Jack tried to keep Amanda focused. He suspected this was how it had gone wrong with the previous cleaner.
‘They can all sit up and listen.’ She did a dipping motion on the landing. For a split second Jack expected her to ask him to join her in a dance. He would accept.
‘Charlie was pursuing compensation.’ She brandished the book, which Jack saw was a history of racing drivers.
‘Was Charlie a racing driver?’ he tried carefully.
‘What? Don’t be a twerp. Charlie killed a child. Poor lamb, horrible in general, of course, but a dreadful business for him.’ She did another dip.
Jack put down his scourer. ‘What happened?’
‘It wrecked our lives. Stephen thingummy… name’s gone… chasing a ball or a pet. God knows. Charlie never stood a chance. He got blamed anyway and damn near lost his job. They don’t think of the drivers. It’s not only the victim’s family that suffers. Do you read?’
‘Do I what?’ Stella would have no truck with this, even without knowing about Amanda’s body-scan meditations in the temple by the lawn.
The telephone began to ring. Amanda swooped off to her bedroom extension. Jack could not hear the conversation. He snatched the chance to finish the bath. Rinsing away cleanser, he pondered that she was not well. Perhaps when her husband was alive Amanda had been a lot of fun, if unburdened by principles, but now her indomitable spirit could atrophy in her quest to prove wrong was right. The grey man in the portrait was a Host. Cold and ruthless and self-serving. He would stop at nothing. He had stopped at nothing. Charlie Hampson would dub a dead child an irritant.
Amanda was back.
‘Dentist. They ring to remind you of your appointment, as if you forget.’ She clacked her teeth together. ‘I must fly. Hold on until next time for the next episode. Wish me luck, Jack my sweet. No, wish them luck!
‘Inspector Whatsit will bloody listen.’ She tapped the file. ‘I have the missing jigsaw piece. The murderer has underestimated me. Ad mortem!’ She went down the stairs.
; ‘Good luck.’ Jack was ashamed at his surprise that Amanda knew Latin.
Charles Hampson had killed a child. This made suicide more likely. It would be hard to live with causing the death of a child even if it was the boy’s fault. Doubtless the police thought so too. ‘To the death’ or not, Amanda might be home sooner than she intended.
Jack’s arm ached with scrubbing at the film of grease. Something nagged. He dredged his mind, but nothing came to light. What with the old man and the model, his A–Z and Stella’s blue folder he had enough to nag at him.
Jack leant against the curving external wall of Amanda’s meditation temple and rolled a cigarette, enjoying the warm sunshine. Amanda’s lawn needed cutting. He fished in his pocket for his cigarette case and found his job sheet. He hadn’t filled it in. He wandered back up the crazy paved path to the sitting room, avoiding several jutting stones.
On his way out to the garden Jack had been disappointed to find the room had reverted to a pickle. Papers strewn on the bureau, over the dining table, piled on the carpet and on the chesterfield. It had given him an inkling of how Stella felt when she visited Suzie.
He found a biro by a newspaper on Amanda’s desk, tested it in the margin of his job sheet and then scribbled in his hours and dashed his signature under ‘Operative’. He placed a cross where Mrs Hampson should sign if she approved his work. Stella had designed a clearly accessible form, but Amanda would be too distracted to make sense of it.
He was looking for a prominent place to leave it when a photograph on the newspaper caught his attention. It was the article Amanda had been reading when he saw her through the window that first night. It was no coincidence that Amanda had called the office. Scrawled next to the photo of Stella at her desk were the words ‘call first thing’. Amanda had rung at sunrise.
Underneath were two newspaper cuttings. One showed another funeral. A mound of floral tributes spilled over a kerb, dotted with teddies, stuffed lambs, giraffes and other cuddly animals. Cards were slipped in plastic bags to protect the messages. Inset was a close-up of one: ‘For Stevie, Mummy’s little angel. Sleep tight. xxxxx’.
Heart-stopping, but it was not the words that caused Jack to rush out of Mrs Hampson’s house still holding his job sheet.
It was the photograph in the other newspaper clipping.
30
Monday, 20 June 1966
Mary saw the Angel from a long way away; her white gown shimmered through the yew trees (Number 9 in Trees of Britain). She headed towards her but the Angel dodged out of sight as Mary zigzagged along rutted tracks and clambered over fallen headstones.
The Angel’s wings were folded behind her back and she was very tall, as tall, Mary told her brother, as the Scots pine (Number 3), the cypress trees and the thin larches (Number 1) that were all around. Mary shivered when the sun dipped behind clouds.
Today she was eleven. The thing about being born on 29 February was that she was allowed to choose the date for her birthday for three years out of four. When she had told Clifford Hunt that her birthday was today he had given her a pear drop, but did not say ‘Happy Birthday’ as if he didn’t believe her.
He knew you were lying, you can’t have two birthdays.
Her mum and dad would be doing a surprise so she must not spoil it by sneaking in as Michael had done when he was seven.
Mary could not make up her mind about Michael being dead. There were good things: more food and no one bothering her. But the bad things were bad. Her mum let her go to bed when she was tired instead of at her new grown-up time. Michael was not there to be jealous so there was no fun in staying up. Her dad went out on insurance visits every night and never came to the park to see her perform astonishing feats. Before he had missed the feats because Michael got in the way, but Michael was not in the way now.
The Angel stood on the hole where they had put Michael.
IN LOVING MEMORY OF
MICHAEL
AGED 7
15TH MARCH 1959 – 6TH MAY 1966
BELOVED CHILD OF
ROBERT AND JEAN THORNTON
‘WHO IS LIKE UNTO GOD’
‘BONNY AND BLITHE AND GOOD AND GAY’
Mary turned and ran. She crashed helter skelter through the foliage and along the paths to the high stone wall. All around were dead people with plastic flowers or flowers that were brown and drooping. The trees crept closer when she wasn’t looking, like Grandmother’s footsteps. She had run for ages but the Angel was still watching her.
Mary let herself into the silent house. She found her mum in the kitchen frying fish fingers.
‘Where’s Daddy?’
‘At work.’ Her mum slid the fish fingers on to a plate heaped with beans. When Mary did the tea, she made it neat for Michael. His chair was tucked in tightly at the table.
‘Wash your hands. After this, go and play in your bedroom.’
When she was drying her hands, the towel stiff and rough on her skin, Mary understood something impossible had happened. Her mum and dad had forgotten it was her birthday.
31
Friday, 27 April 2012
Stella backed into the administrator’s office, pulling her cleaning cart after her, and was disappointed to find a woman seated at the desk. It was empty the last time she cleaned and at half-seven in the morning she had presumed it would be today.
‘Would you rather I returned later?’ Stella apologized to hide her annoyance; she preferred to clean alone.
‘I’ll still be here when you do,’ the woman said, coming around the desk, ‘Say when you need me to move.’ She put out her hand. ‘You must be Stella. Marian Williams. I’m so pleased to meet you at last. I used to work with your father. I was at the funeral, but naturally you were taken up with so many people.’
The woman’s grip was stronger than Stella expected.
She let go. ‘Have you got what you need?’
‘Yes thanks.’ Stella rattled the cart. ‘If you don’t mind me being here?’
‘Carry on. I’ll be too busy to notice.’ As if on cue, her telephone rang. Marian Williams took up the receiver and, guiding the flex around her computer, sat down again.
Relieved that Williams was reasonable – it made her job easier – Stella began taking files from the shelves and stacking them on a row of cabinets. Although not actively listening, she could not help hearing Marian Williams’s conversation.
‘…Yes, forgivable. I’ve done the paperwork. Joel’s mother is on tranquillizers. Mr Evans has hurt his hand.’ She paused. ‘He punched the wall when Paula and Phil broke it to them and broke a finger. I took them to the site. She came over faint, had to take her into Marks to recover. Breaks your heart.’ Another pause. ‘…No, they have an older girl. Poor love was a shadow…’
Joel Evans was the boy killed by a car on King Street. As an executive officer, Marian Williams had to process road traffic accidents and, from the conversation, Stella guessed her duties included liaising with the bereaved parents.
‘Let me know if you get the Nominal.’ Marian Williams ended the call.
Stella thought back to the news bulletin: a man had been seen checking his car on Chiswick High Road. From Williams’s conversation, no one had confessed.
The woman caught her eye. ‘I’ve been at this for years. It never gets easier.’
‘Sorry?’ Stella assumed an expression of distraction.
‘FATACs. Fatal accidents. Collisions, we call them now, because frankly there’s no such thing as an accident. Reckless motorists think they own the road and a child is so much flotsam. The excuses I read in the report books the officers fill in at the scene. You’ll know from your dad.’ She waved an orange booklet at Stella. ‘This one is a hit and run so no driver statement, but I’ve lost count of the ones who bleat it wasn’t their fault. They don’t come out and blame the pedestrian, but they’re itching to. Did you hear about Joel Evans?’
‘Yes.’ Stella was glad she had. Ignorance would have counted against her. For Marian
Williams the death of a child outweighed everything. While her manual didn’t encourage conversation with clients, it did advise that operatives took interest if engaged in chat. ‘Have they found the driver?’
‘He will have washed his car and had the bodywork repaired with cowboys who don’t ask questions. No qualms that a young life is wasted and a family destroyed.’
‘It isn’t only the victim who dies.’ Stella heard herself echo Terry. She rummaged in her cart for the beeswax polish.
Mrs Williams might remember James Markham’s crash on Britton Drive. Perhaps she had gone there with the wife and son. She could imagine Mrs Williams being unsympathetic about Markham; she’d think he deserved it.
Williams’s phone rang again.
‘Hello, Detective Chief Superintendent Cashman’s office… What? Martin’s not here. Tell her to make an appointment, not that he’ll see her. Thanks for the warning, or rather no thanks. Next time keep that portcullis shut.’ Marian Williams slammed down the receiver. All her good nature gone.
The door burst open and a woman in a tightly belted rain mac, long blonde hair streaming over her shoulders, marched in on sharply clicking high heels. Her handbag threaded through an epaulette, swung from her shoulder and she waved a plastic wallet as if clearing a path before her. Stella retreated to the shelves and began rearranging the files. Marian Williams stood her ground from behind her desk.
‘I have come to see Detective Chief Superintendent Darnell.’
No one moved. The words took on horror-movie proportions in Stella’s mind.
‘DCS Darnell promised that if I found him fresh evidence he would reopen my husband’s case.’ She smacked the brightly coloured wallet down on the desk. ‘My name is Amanda Hampson. My husband was Charles – yes, I see you remember me – his file is in that lot.’ She gestured at the box files heaped on the cabinets and saw Stella. She addressed her: ‘Now they have to listen.’
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