Dead To Me

by Staincliffe, Cath

  ‘I do. More than anything.’ She met Janet’s eyes and all the guile, all the front peeled away. Janet saw how worried Rachel was at finding her future in the balance.

  ‘Well, think before you act and think before you react. You could go a long way under Gill Murray.’

  ‘You haven’t.’

  Janet nearly choked on her hotpot. ‘You’re wrong,’ she said. ‘I don’t want promotion because I don’t want to be stuck sorting out budgets and managing people. I do want to be working major incidents and I do want to be catching killers and I am. I want to be one of the best, and this syndicate is.’

  ‘I know,’ Rachel said, pushing her empty plate to one side. ‘I knew there’d be a lecture.’ There was a glint of humour in her eye and Janet laughed. ‘I need a fag,’ Rachel got to her feet.

  ‘See you back there.’

  By mid-afternoon they hadn’t found any of the ex-Ryelands residents as a complainant in a rape or assault case. Nor flagged up any ex-resident charged with such an offence in the same period.

  ‘You’d think, with this shower, there’d be one or two caught waving their willies about or jumping the local totty,’ Rachel complained.

  ‘They’re not all bad ’uns,’ Janet chided her. ‘Some of them are orphans, or their parents get ill. Kids end up in care for all sorts of reasons.’

  ‘Yeah, but most of them are pretty fucked up.’

  ‘Keen on generalizations, aren’t you?’ Janet said.

  ‘They’re generally true. Have you asked about school?’

  ‘Not yet. She’s been out. There are these girls that Marlene’s put on the email who are still at Ryelands. She says they knew Lisa, time coincided. Could be useful to talk to them.’

  ‘Different ages.’

  ‘Yes, but sometimes the young ones know more about what’s going on than anyone else. Mine certainly does,’ Janet said. ‘I’ll go myself.’

  ‘Why?’ said Rachel.

  ‘It’s called tact and diplomacy.’

  Rachel shrugged. ‘’Kay. I could see Angela Hambley.’

  ‘Rosie’s friend?’

  ‘If I’m allowed?’ Rachel said.

  ‘Be my guest.’

  ‘She’s in Cheetham Hill.’

  ‘Wear your body armour, then.’

  Rachel laughed, ‘Yes, Mam.’ Cheetham was one of the rougher parts of town, dirt poor, mixed ethnicity, still dominated by gang crime and the associated fallout.

  37

  ‘I’M SORRY,’ JANET said as soon as Marlene opened the door.

  Marlene held a hand up to stop her. ‘No problem. There’s always one, isn’t there? Come in. I’ve told Amy and Samantha that you’re coming and that it’s in connection with Lisa’s murder. Do you want me to sit in?’

  ‘Entirely up to you,’ Janet said.

  ‘I’ll leave you to it, then. I’m drowning in paperwork, third-quarter accounts.’

  Sooner you than me.

  Janet spoke to the girls individually in a ‘quiet room’ at the back of the house. It looked out on to lawns and another play area, as well as a fenced-off vegetable plot.

  Amy was a lumpen girl, who chewed gum and answered Janet’s questions in an adenoidal whine. Her eyes watered and she seemed to be upset about Lisa, though she had very little to say. Lisa was OK, according to Amy, but she didn’t really bother with the younger kids. She got into fights sometimes, Amy remembered the fights, but they were with different people, no one in particular. She remembered Sean too, and a faint blush coloured her pasty cheeks when she said his name. Had she had a crush on him? Amy hadn’t ever seen anyone else show interest in Lisa, or cause her bother. Janet asked her if any of the boys were known to hassle girls or act out of order.

  ‘Like rape ’n’ that?’ she said simply.

  Out of the mouths of babes. ‘Yeah,’ Janet said.

  Amy shook her head.

  Samantha, tall and dark-haired, wearing tons of make-up and the latest trendy clothes looked like a wannabe model. She was fifteen and remembered Lisa well. They had even shared a bedroom for a couple of years when Samantha first moved in.

  Her answers echoed Amy’s, though she chattered more and kept interjecting to say how awful it was and ask questions about the murder and the investigation that Janet couldn’t answer.

  ‘We’re going to the funeral,’ Samantha said. ‘You know when it is?’

  Janet shook her head. ‘No date yet.’

  ‘Be a school day, though, innit?’ Hopefully.

  Sweet Jesus, Janet thought, some girl’s dead and all it means is an excuse for a day off school.

  Janet had been to so many funerals for murder victims. The worst, without doubt, were when a young person had died. Parents, friends and family crazed with grief or frozen with shock. Kids nowadays were more often included in the ritual. Or the school would hold a special assembly, plant a tree, initiate an award in the young person’s name. There’d been nothing like that for Veronica. Janet and the rest of her schoolmates not even aware the girl had died.

  Parents burying a child. So very wrong. Joshua’s funeral had been intensely sad. Janet and Ade had got through it by clinging to each other. She had felt brittle and weak, as though she was made of thin glass, ready to shatter, but she had also felt a great depth of emotion behind the glass. Love and pity and sadness and anger that heightened everything: the colours of the flowers, jasmine and hyacinth and tiny narcissi, the breath of wind on her face and the smell of earth and fresh-mown grass. As though her senses were over-compensating for Joshua’s lack of them. Her life swelling, too bold, too bright in the shadow of his silence, his absence.

  As she was leaving Ryelands, she got a call from Rachel. No hellos or intros, just, ‘I’m at Angela Hambley’s, there’s something you need to see.’

  The term mouthy could have been invented for Angela, who on seeing Rachel at the door immediately gave a theatrical sigh. ‘’Aven’t you got nothing better to do?’

  ‘Than what? What do you think I’m doing?’

  ‘Wasting time, innit. Wanting to know who robbed the offie, did I see anything. Well, I didn’t.’

  ‘I’m not here about that,’ Rachel said. She’d noted the off-licence opposite, the windows covered in sheets of plywood.

  ‘Well, what then? I have got a life to lead, you know.’ Angela had a sharp little face, pointed nose, streaked hair pulled back in a ponytail, a Langley facelift. A stud in one nostril. And skin burnt orange, the colour of wood-stain. Rachel could smell the yeasty fake-tan smell on her.

  ‘Can I come in?’

  Another big sigh. ‘Can I stop you?’ She stood aside, forcing Rachel to squeeze past. ‘On the left.’

  It was a bedsit, reasonably tidy, woodchip paper, flat-pack furniture, central heating. A double bed under the bay window, sofa parallel to the hall, table and chairs at the other end. Telly bracketed to the wall. Proper curtains. Rachel had seen all sorts used to cover the windows as she drove up the street: striped sheets, beach towels, one place had a patchwork of cardboard. Angela wasn’t doing so bad. A small kitchenette, fridge and microwave, sink. A noticeboard with photos on over the sofa, too far away to make out.

  ‘I want to ask you about Rosie Vaughan,’ Rachel said.

  ‘’Aven’t seen her in ages,’ Angela said.

  ‘How long ago?’

  She twitched her shoulders. ‘Couple of years, maybe more.’

  ‘Were you still in touch in 2008?’

  ‘No. You talking about when she was raped? I was asked about all that back then by one of your lot. Said I never seen her much after I left Ryelands, innit.’

  ‘I thought you were mates?’ Rachel said.

  ‘For a bit.’ She was defensive. Why? Because she’d jacked Rosie in, then felt bad when Rosie’s life went off track? Let her mate down? ‘You have to make do, somewhere like that,’ Angela added.

  ‘Did Rosie have a bloke, a boyfriend?’

  Angela’s eyes went still, guarded. ‘No,’ she said
, and Rachel didn’t believe her.

  ‘You know she’s dead?’

  ‘What?’ That stopped her in her tracks, some emotion rippling across her face. Fear? Disgust?

  ‘Thursday. She killed herself.’

  ‘Fuck,’ said Angela. She rubbed at her arms, they were bare, the room was warm.

  Rachel couldn’t see any needle marks, no sign in either the girl’s appearance or the state of the flat that she was a hardened drug user. Maybe she was the one that got away.

  ‘She slit her wrists?’ Angela said.

  ‘Why’d you think that?’

  ‘She cut herself,’ she said flatly.

  Rachel nodded. Her throat felt dry. ‘She jumped from her balcony.’

  ‘Oh, God,’ Angela said. ‘Did she leave a note?’ A ring of something in her voice and her eyes. Alarm? Anxiety?

  ‘I can’t tell you that,’ Rachel said, so she’d think there was one. Hoping it might be a lever to prise whatever Angela was hiding out of her.

  ‘So what you here for? Like I said, I ’aven’t seen her for years.’

  ‘You both left Ryelands in 2008,’ Rachel said. ‘See each other at all after that?’

  ‘A bit. We’d not much in common – she was a bit stressed, innit? Probably only seen her two or three times in all. Can’t help you.’ She made to move, but Rachel wasn’t done. ‘What about Lisa Finn?’

  ‘You what?’

  ‘Lisa Finn?’

  ‘She were murdered,’ Angela said. ‘I know that much. All over the telly. Is that what this is about? Is that why you’re here?’

  ‘You were at Ryelands with Lisa too.’

  ‘So?’ She frowned. ‘What you getting at?’

  ‘Two of you didn’t get on so well, from what I hear.’

  ‘She was a right pain, always looking for a scrap. I wasn’t frightened of her, not going to let her muck us about.’

  Rachel said, ‘Lisa have a fella?’

  ‘Yes, Sean. They arrested him. Aren’t you supposed to know that?’ She pulled her lips in a sneer.

  Rachel ignored the jibe. ‘Was there anyone else that had a relationship with Lisa?’

  ‘No, she was a junkie,’ Angela said.

  ‘That make a difference?’

  ‘Skanky, aren’t they? Dirty. Get AIDS.’

  Rachel was getting nowhere fast. On the surface, Angela knew nothing, couldn’t help, so why was she so tense, why the glimpses of fear, of being found out? Rachel tried another tack: ‘Did Rosie have any enemies? Was there anyone who wanted to hurt her?’ The assault had been vicious, uncontrolled.

  ‘No, she was all right really.’ Angela grimaced. ‘Just a bit mental, bit of a nutter. Couldn’t help it.’ Another quick shrug.

  On the way out, Rachel paused by the sofa, to see the photographs on the display-board. Centre place was one of Angela with a birthday cake, candles, 16 written in icing. The photograph had been torn in half so only two people were in it: Angela and a man, blond hair, the look of a tennis player. James Raleigh. Looking younger, but the same guy. Rachel’s scalp tightened. What the hell was he doing at Ryelands? At Angela’s sixteenth birthday party?

  That’s when she called Janet.

  38

  THEY WERE STANDING in the hallway at Angela’s. Janet looked at the photograph. Rachel pointed to the man: ‘James Raleigh,’ she said. ‘Lisa’s support worker in the community. When I spoke to him, he never let on he had ever been near Ryelands.’

  Janet frowned. ‘Hang on.’ She checked her book and called Marlene, introduced herself and asked Marlene if James Raleigh had ever been a member of staff.

  ‘No.’

  ‘In 2007?’

  Marlene hesitated. ‘I was on maternity leave some of the time, but I’m pretty sure we didn’t have any change in the staffing.’

  ‘Do you know him?’ Janet said.

  ‘A little. Lisa was on his caseload. He’s fairly new in the job, North Manchester Area.’

  ‘Marlene, is there any other reason he might have been at Ryelands if he wasn’t on staff?’

  ‘Well … on a placement, possibly? Hang on.’

  Janet watched Rachel pace the hall. A few seconds later Marlene came back to the phone. ‘Yes, he was in the final year of his social work degree then. On placement for six weeks, I was still off.’

  ‘Thanks,’ Janet said, ‘that explains it.’ She looked at Rachel. ‘A placement.’

  ‘Doesn’t explain why he pretended he were never there?’

  ‘Did you ask that specifically?’

  Rachel twitched with irritation. ‘No, but he kept saying things like “Ryelands will be able to tell you more than me”, and “I’ve only known Lisa since she left”. He deliberately gave the impression that he was completely separate.’

  ‘Well, he is – job’s different.’

  The door opened and Angela came out into the hall. ‘I’m not staying there all bloody day,’ she complained. ‘What’s going on? I want my photo back. You can’t just take it.’

  ‘Come in,’ Janet said to Rachel. They went to the kitchen area, Angela sat at the table, Janet too. Rachel stood. ‘Angela,’ Janet said, ‘we want to ask you about this picture.’

  Angela’s face tightened. ‘What about it?’

  ‘This man here, who is it?’

  Angela blinked once. Janet saw the muscles by her ear move as she swallowed. ‘James,’ she said. ‘He were a student.’

  ‘You still know him?’

  ‘No.’ She tapped her fingers over her phone. ‘What you asking about him for?’

  Janet didn’t answer. ‘Who was in this part of the photograph?’

  ‘Can’t remember.’ A red spot flared on each of her cheeks, beneath the orange tan.

  ‘Why did you cut it off?’

  ‘Spilt summat, some tea or something, innit. It’s my photo, up to us what I do with it. Can do what I like.’

  ‘Of course you can,’ Janet said. ‘You know where he is nowadays – James?’

  ‘Not a fucking clue,’ she said. Her hand closed over her phone.

  Liar.

  Janet got out her own phone, set the photograph on the table. ‘I’m just going to take a picture of it.’

  ‘Why?’ The girl’s voice was high with anxiety. ‘Can you do that? Isn’t that against my privacy, like an invasion of my privacy?’

  ‘We could get a warrant,’ Rachel threatened her, ‘take all your gear?’

  ‘What for? You can’t do that, you mad bitch. I ’aven’t done anything, innit. I never seen Lisa Finn since I left Ryelands.’

  ‘Was it Lisa you cut off the photograph?’ Rachel said.

  The girl sat, suddenly mute, looking as if she’d burst, lips tight, cheeks puffed out. Giving furious little shakes of her head, ponytail bouncing.

  ‘It was Rosie, wasn’t it?’ Janet said. ‘She’s not in the picture. You were mates then.’

  ‘No, you’re wrong,’ she said quickly. But Janet was sure she’d guessed correctly.

  ‘Who then?’

  ‘Marlene.’

  The girl was lying; Marlene had been on maternity leave.

  ‘Why cut Marlene off?’

  ‘I told you, I spilt something on it.’

  ‘Or maybe you just wanted the two of you, together,’ Rachel said, ‘all lovey-dovey.’

  ‘Don’t know what you’re fucking talking about,’ she snarled.

  Janet captured the photograph, making sure the date and time stamp showed correctly. ‘What happened between you and Rosie?’ Janet asked. ‘Best mates, weren’t you?’

  ‘Nothing. She was mental. I told her, innit.’ She jerked her head at Rachel. ‘Rosie was freaky, I couldn’t be doing with it. I’ve got to go to work,’ she said, scraping back her chair.

  ‘Where d’you work?’ Janet said.

  ‘What’s it to you?’ Janet didn’t speak and finally Angela added, ‘Tesco’s, if you must know.’

  Janet wanted to congratulate her; jobs were scarce for young peop
le, bound to be harder for someone like Angela whose education had likely been disrupted. ‘Can I take your number please?’ Janet said. ‘We might want to talk to you again.’

  Angela froze, then gave a little snort. She wasn’t happy about it, but she gave Janet her number.

  ‘She says she’s not seen Raleigh,’ Janet said, out on the pavement. ‘Do you believe her?’

  Rachel pulled a face.

  ‘Me neither. We hang on, let’s see if the neighbours know any different.’

  They waited down the street until Angela emerged, wearing a bright red coat, crossed the road and disappeared from view.

  They returned to the entrance and rang the bell for the other flats in Angela’s house. Got one reply. A man who had a room upstairs at the back. His English was fractured, but he understood their questions. And when Janet showed him the photograph of Angela and James Raleigh and asked if he had seen the man at the house, he nodded enthusiastically. ‘Yes, many times, boyfriend.’

  It was just what they wanted to hear.

  ‘Don’t get on your hobby horse again,’ Janet warned Rachel once they were on their way back. ‘It’s a co-incidence, he did a placement there.’

  ‘She was bricking it, especially about the photo. Three years later, she’s still got it on the wall, he’s showing up at her flat all the time – she’s probably shagging him.’

  ‘We don’t know that.’

  ‘Ten quid, twenty.’

  ‘I’m not betting on it,’ Janet said.

  ‘Honestly, Janet – why did Raleigh not mention that he’d met Lisa before she became his client?’

  ‘There might be a simple reason: she absconded during his time there, or was ill, or whatever.’

  ‘For the whole six weeks—’

  ‘Don’t just leap at the first fence, Rachel. Think about it. You’re looking to prove something that might not be there. You’re starting with a narrative and straight away you’re off looking for evidence. We do it the other way around: we look for evidence and then we build the narrative.’

  ‘We need to check him out,’ Rachel insisted.

  She wasn’t listening. ‘First Dalbeattie, now Raleigh—’