by Ann Cleeves
Now he did answer. ‘Nearly fifteen years.’
‘So you arrived when you were a small boy?’
He nodded. ‘I went to the village school up the lane, then to the high school in Alnwick.’
‘What brought your mam to this place then?’
There was a pause and Vera thought again there would be no answer. It required judgement, opinion, and it seemed Alex still wasn’t ready for that. But in the end he spoke.
‘She grew up in Newcastle and always dreamed of living on the coast. One of her books was adapted for television that year. Tony had written an article the Christmas before and described her as one of the best writers of her generation. It made a huge difference to her career. Until then she’d still been working in London, in the university library. Suddenly we had money to spend. She saw the house as an investment for our future. And a pleasant place to bring up a child.’
It was, Vera thought, almost as if he were reciting a story he’d learned by heart. The words were Miranda’s, not his own.
‘So at first you just lived here?’ Vera said. ‘She hadn’t set up the Writers’ Centre.’
‘No.’ Alex sounded dreamy now, half-asleep. ‘Then it was our home. A proper home. I loved it. We’d been living in London, a tiny flat because my mother was just assistant librarian at St Ursula’s – and even when her first book was published, it made peanuts – and suddenly I had the garden to play in and the beach. All that freedom.’
‘When did your mother start the business?’ Vera wondered what it must have been like to have the place overrun with strangers. Surely Miranda must have felt as if her home had been invaded. Or had she relished it? The talk about writing and the gossip, the like-minded people sitting round the table for dinner. It must have been lonely for her here, with only her son for company.
‘I was twelve,’ Alex said. It was clear that he, at least, hadn’t relished the intrusion. ‘Mum’s books weren’t doing so well. She’d thought that the TV adaptation of Cruel Women would be the start of a great flowering of her career. It turned out to be the high point. We needed the money. Mum had always enjoyed mentoring younger writers, so she had the idea of running the residential courses.’
‘How did that work?’ Vera asked. She was genuinely interested. Hector had claimed lack of money as the reason for his night-time adventures, had made Vera feel guilty – How can I get a proper job when I have you to look after? He’d drawn her in that way. ‘You can’t have done the cooking then?’ she said. ‘You’d still be at school.’
‘I helped. But the students cooked for themselves then. There was a sort of rota. That was when I first got interested in food. I loved it: an activity that’s practical and satisfying at the same time.’
‘What happened to your dad?’ She hadn’t meant to be so abrupt, but the question had come to her suddenly.
He shook his head. ‘I never knew him.’
‘Dead? Divorced?’
‘Neither,’ Alex said. ‘My mother never married him. I never met him.’
‘But you knew who he was?’
‘She told me who he was.’ Alex bent down to stroke the cat that was rubbing against his legs. ‘I’m not sure I believed her.’
‘What did she tell you?’ Vera demanded. This was like wading through treacle. ‘Let’s hear the fiction – if that’s what it was.’
‘My father was an older man. A publisher. She’d met him at a book launch and fell for his intelligence and his wit. They had an affair. It was the most exciting and wonderful time of her life. He introduced her to theatre and opera, took her away for romantic weekends – Barcelona, Rome, Paris. He was charming and attentive, and she’d never known anyone like him.’
‘But he was married,’ Vera put in.
Alex nodded. ‘With a child whom he adored. When she discovered she was pregnant she finished the affair. She didn’t want my father to be forced to choose between the families.’
‘Did the man have a name?’ Vera failed to keep the scepticism from her voice.
‘I’m sure he did, Inspector.’ For the first time Alex showed a flash of humour. ‘If he existed at all. But my mother never told me.’
‘You didn’t try to find him?’
Alex shrugged. ‘I was worried what I might discover. Like my mother, I preferred the fantasy.’
‘I did wonder if Tony Ferdinand might be your dad,’ Vera said. She looked at Alex, hunched in the rocking chair. He’s still just a child himself, she thought. A bright, screwed-up child.
‘So did I,’ Alex said bitterly. ‘Like I said, I preferred the fantasy.’
‘Did you ask your mother about him?’
‘No. I was scared she might tell me the truth. Tony was a manipulative man and I wanted nothing to do with him.’ He looked up at Vera. ‘He never liked me, you know. I wasn’t bright enough to catch his interest.’
They sat in silence. Joe Ashworth seemed to be looking out of the window. He managed to make himself still – almost invisible – during interviews, but Vera knew he was completely engaged with the conversation.
‘Are you sure you didn’t hear your mother come in last night?’ he said now, turning back to the room. Vera took the interruption as a sort of rebuke: Joe thought she should focus on the time of death. Important information that might move the investigation on. There would be time enough for all the relationship crap later. When Alex didn’t answer immediately, Ashworth continued, ‘You do see how it might be important? If your mother came in yesterday evening after the readings had finished and then went out again, or if she went to bed and went out early this morning, that would make us look differently at her death.’
But Vera knew Miranda hadn’t gone to bed. She was still wearing the garments she’d been in the night before. White silk shirt and long black skirt. Not the clothes for an early walk on a freezing October morning.
‘I didn’t hear her,’ Alex said. He looked up at Joe. ‘I didn’t want to hear her. I listened to music until I fell asleep.’
There was another moment of silence. Then outside a shout, so loud that it penetrated the thick walls of the cottage. ‘Has anyone seen the boss? They’ve found something!’
Joe slipped out of the door, but Vera stayed where she was. She pulled herself slowly to her feet. ‘Where did your mother keep her books then?’ she asked. ‘I’d have thought they’d be in pride of place in the main house, but I couldn’t find any in the library.’
‘She didn’t want the students noticing that it’s years since she’s been published,’ Alex said. ‘They’re upstairs in her bedroom.’
‘I’ll see myself up there, shall I?’ Vera said.
He seemed not to hear her and sat where he was.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Joe Ashworth stood outside the cottage door and took a deep breath. Inside the house there’d been a sweet and unpleasant smell. Chemical. Air freshener or some kind of cleaner? Maybe trying to hide the smell of incontinent cat, maybe something more sinister. The CSIs would move on to the cottage when they’d finished on the terrace.
The yard was busy. A couple of men in overalls and navy uniform jackets were deep in conversation, and a CSI, peeling off her crime-scene suit close to the van, hopping as she pulled it over her foot, shouted to a colleague, ‘Where are the toilets? I am so desperate for a piss.’ Beyond the end of the track Joe saw the aerial of a radio van. So the press were there already. The journos, who’d been camping out there since Ferdinand’s death, had dwindled away the day before, and now they were back. He was glad someone had had the sense to keep them well away from the house. And Charlie was there, leaning against the bonnet of his car, drinking tea from a mug with the Writers’ House logo on it. The whole place was still lit with the sunshine that bounced off the car windscreens and the frozen puddles and turned faces the colour of butter.
Joe called over to Charlie, ‘Someone was shouting for the boss. She’s busy. What have they got?’
Charlie pushed himself upright. �
�The murder weapon,’ he said. ‘They think.’
‘Where?’
‘Down on the beach. I’ll show you. Apparently they were lucky to find it.’
Charlie bent to put his mug on the doorstep and walked round the house until they were looking out to the sea. On the terrace, work continued in the white tent. The nylon fabric, with the sun behind it, displayed the figures inside as slowly moving shadows.
Walking through the garden, Joe remembered what Alex Barton had said about moving here from London, about how much he’d loved the place when it was still just a family home. This would be a paradise for a child. Trees to climb and dens to build, rock-pools to poke around in, and on the odd good day when it was warm enough there’d be the sea for swimming. And a child would know every inch of it. If anyone could find a hiding place close to the house, it would be Alex Barton.
Charlie had started on the steep path down to the beach. He slipped once, ripping a tear in the leg of the crime suit, and swore, and by the time they’d reached the shingle he was breathing heavily and sweating despite the cold. He leaned forward, rubbing the stitch in his side.
‘You’re out of condition, man.’ But Joe was feeling the effort too. Too many greasy breakfasts and not enough exercise. There were times, kicking a ball round with the kids, when he felt age creeping up on him.
Three figures stood at the base of the cliff. From this distance and in this light it was impossible to tell if they were men or women. A small flock of wading birds ran along the tide line and took off, calling, as Joe and Charlie approached, black commas against the white sky. The figures near the cliff became clearer, more than silhouettes. Two men and one woman. One was the crime-scene manager Billy Wainwright, who would have been at the house already, working on the terrace. Two others Joe didn’t recognize. Members of the search team.
They’d heard Joe and Charlie approach over the shingle, and Billy waved at them. Closer still and they saw he was grinning.
‘What have you got?’ Joe asked the question. Charlie was wheezing.
Billy moved to one side. Still Joe saw nothing unusual. There’d been a small rock-slide, a pile of boulders at the foot of the cliff. Water leached from the ground, a spring or a hidden stream, and ran across the sand to the sea. Joe imagined his bairns playing here, building dams, castles and moats.
‘The rock-fall’s not recent, is it?’ He was starting to lose patience. Billy was a great one for playing games. Practical jokes. ‘What am I looking for?’
‘Here!’ And in the shadow of the rock-slide there was a rusting outflow pipe, more than half a yard in diameter. ‘Once it would have carried the waste water from the house. They use mains drainage now, I guess.’ He shone a torch into the pipe, at an angle so that Ashworth could see inside. In the distance, an arm’s length from the cliff face, there was a glint of metal and something soft and dark.’
‘What is it? The knife?’
‘Definitely the knife. But something else. Clothing? I’ve done all I could in situ. I was just going to pull it out.’
He spread a plastic sheet over the shingle beneath the outflow pipe and reached inside. First out was the knife. A black handle with a serrated blade.
‘Similar to the one in the kitchen up there,’ Joe Ashworth said. ‘The bread knife.’
‘Similar to knives you’d find in every kitchen in the county.’ Billy dropped it onto the plastic sheet.
‘The murder weapon?’
‘Not for me to say.’ Billy straightened for a moment. ‘You’d need to ask Mr Keating. But I’d bet my pension on it.’
He lay on his stomach and reached in once again. This time it was harder to retrieve what was inside. It was a snugger fit and caught on the jagged edge of the pipe.
‘This might help you, though.’ He pulled the bundle free and allowed it to fall onto the sheet. ‘A waterproof jacket. Gore-Tex. Large. And I’d guess that those stains aren’t just salt water and rust.’
‘Blood.’ Ashworth squatted to get a closer look. He felt relief, the comfort of tangible evidence. Let Vera Stanhope get deep and meaningful with her witnesses. He preferred forensics. Fingerprints and DNA. ‘I don’t suppose there’s anything on the jacket to identify the owner. Anything in the pocket?’
Billy Wainwright turned the jacket over and felt with his gloved hands into the outside pockets: a tissue, a biro and thirty pence in change. ‘You should get DNA from the tissue. Though surely someone will recognize the coat anyway.’ He slipped his hand into the inside pocket and pulled out a piece of paper. A newspaper cutting. Or rather, Ashworth decided, a cutting from a colour magazine. Billy laid it carefully on the plastic and smoothed it out so they could read it. A picture of a younger Miranda Barton. The blonde hair shorter and more flattering, the body slimmer. The caption read: One Cruel Woman.
‘What is it?’
‘Looks like something from a women’s magazine,’ Billy said. ‘I don’t think it’s a Sunday supplement from a paper. An interview with the victim. I didn’t realize she was famous.’
‘She’s not.’ Ashworth stood up. ‘Not any more.’ It occurred to him that this was no coincidence. The piece had been put in the jacket pocket specially. The killer had expected it to be found. They’d thought they’d been clever finding the evidence, but all the time the murderer had been playing with them.
‘Look at this.’ Billy had moved his fingers to the neck of the jacket. A white label had been sewn inside. On it in permanent marker the words: For use by Writers’ House residents. Feel free to borrow in bad weather, but please return to cloakroom after use. ‘It belonged to the house,’ he said. ‘Not to any individual. I guess any of your suspects could have worn it. Let’s hope we can get DNA on the tissue.’ He sounded almost cheerful. Ashworth couldn’t bear the flippant tone and turned his back on the group and looked out towards the sea. He knew they’d get nothing useful from the contents of the pockets. This was a set-up, a piece of theatre. The coat and the knife were props, just there to distract them. He resented being made to look a fool.
Someone was making their way down the path from the house to the shore. The figure was tall, wearing a full-length black coat. It took a while for Joe to realize it was Nina Backworth.
‘What the shit’s she doing here? Who let her onto the beach?’ He was glad to have an outlet for his frustration. Nobody answered, and he took off suddenly and strode towards the woman, allowing the salt water and the wet sand to splash his trousers.
‘You shouldn’t be here, you know,’ he said, while she was still at some distance away from him. His voice was raised.
‘Why?’
She was very pale. He knew she’d found the body. Her story had predicted the murder. Her sleeping pills had knocked out Tony Ferdinand. And now she was here. Checking they’d found the coat and the knife? But still he couldn’t imagine her as a killer.
‘Because the area’s forensically sensitive,’ he said.
‘Don’t be ridiculous!’ She spoke to him as if he were a particularly stupid student. ‘The tide’s been over here this morning. Any evidence will be halfway to Norway.’
They stared at each other. He didn’t know what to say to her.
‘I’ve been sitting in the library all bloody morning,’ she said at last. Tears began to roll down her cheeks and he saw how tired and scared she was. ‘Nobody will tell me anything. Holly talks at me, but there’s no information, just fatuous empty words. Am I under arrest? Do you all think I killed Miranda Barton?’
‘No!’ As he had in her room the day before, he wanted to put his arms around her shoulders. If it hadn’t been for the audience in the shadow of the cliff he might have done it. ‘But you can’t stay here. Come back with me, and I’ll try to find out if you’re free to go. Or at least if you can join the others in the hotel.’
‘No!’ She was standing very close to him. The refusal, an echo of his own word, reminded him of his daughter in one of her stubborn moods. At those times, nothing would persuade the c
hild to change her mind. She’d just repeat herself: No, no, no.
‘Don’t you see?’ Nina cried. ‘One of those people is a killer. They slashed Miranda’s throat. How can you expect me to sit in a room with them all? To drink tea and make polite conversation.’
She turned away from him and stamped back towards the house. He had to run to catch her up.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Vera climbed the narrow stairs in the Bartons’ cottage and dipped her head under a low beam to reach a landing. A narrow passage with three doors off. It was almost dark; the only light slanted up from the kitchen below. She presumed Alex Barton was still there, sitting in the rocking chair, still not communicating with the uniformed officer she’d called back to mind him. Vera pulled on gloves before opening each of the doors and looking inside. There were two bedrooms and a bathroom.
She checked out the bathroom first. It was tiny, with a small corner bath and a shower built over it, a basin and lavatory. No room for a chair or a cupboard, except for a small unit fixed to the wall above the sink. Mirrored doors. Inside a wrapped bar of soap and some toothpaste. Over-the-counter medicines, remedies for colds and flu, indigestion. No sleeping tablets. Had Alex Barton come here last night and showered? Had he stood in the bath and washed his mother’s blood from his skin? If so, they’d find traces of it perhaps, in the outflow pipe. But the room seemed spotless to Vera. There was a smell of bleach. Not in itself suspicious. Perhaps the Bartons were naturally very clean. She wasn’t that way inclined herself, but it was known.
Alex had the smaller bedroom. It was built into the roof at the front, with a view over the yard. There was no double-glazing and Vera could hear the talk from below, could sense the anticipation even from here. There’d been a discovery. She knew she’d be excited later, but at the moment the chatter was just background noise in her head and she tried to filter it out. Now she wanted to focus on these people and the strange relationship that there’d been between them. A single parent and an only child. It could make for the closest relationship in the world. But it could be a deadly combination.