by Adam Creed
The benefactors of the House of the Holy Innocents include Lesley Crawford and Bridget Lamb. Most surprising of all, though, is the name of a Thomas Given, of Cobham.
His phone goes and he sees it is an unknown number, which probably means it is the station, so he takes it, but hears a weak, vaguely familiar voice.
‘Sir?’
‘Yes?’
‘It’s me. Josie.’
He wants to say that she sounds terrible, but refrains. ‘You should be resting.’
‘I was going crazy in there.’
‘You’ve no business discharging yourself.’
‘Too late, sir. Where are you?’
‘I’m going to see Given, but keep it under your hat.’
‘Can you pick me up on your way? I can meet you at Whitechapel Tube.’
‘I’m out west,’ says Staffe.
‘I need to get back into the swing, sir.’
‘Tomorrow, Chancellor.’
‘Give me something to do.’
‘Run the numbers again that Sean Degg called from the payphone.’
‘How do we know which were his calls?’
‘You don’t. I’ve got the obvious numbers. There’s just one we can’t match – to a mobile.’
*
Tommy Given’s brow is crumpled, his mouth downturned. He jigs his leg double time and thumps his big clump of a fist up and down on the arm of his Lloyd Loom armchair in the conservatory. Away across the paddock, his beautiful wife is leading his beautiful daughter out on a cloud-white miniature pony.
‘I owe you an apology, Tommy.’
‘You’ll owe me more than a fucking apology if you haven’t pissed off by the time my wife is back. What the fuck, exactly, are you sorry about anyway?’
‘About Miles and Maya.’
‘Kerry’s kids?’
‘I thought you were the father.’
‘You sad bastard.’
‘Who is?’
‘How would I know?’
‘What was your relationship with Kerry?’
‘There wasn’t one.’ Tommy’s leg stops jigging and he puts his hands together, begins to wring them, staring into a middle distance, somewhere between Staffe and his loved ones.
‘You took care of Sean. You made sure he was safe.’
‘That’s your opinion.’
‘Does Ross Denness work for you?’
‘He’s a Bow Bells fuckwit. You should know your geography.’
‘But so was Sean. What makes Sean different? And why would you have a hotline to Miles and Maya’s foster parents?’
‘That’s shit.’
‘And because Sean was safe, I’m thinking there must have been something between you and Kerry. And I’m thinking, I can’t see Sean getting Kerry that residency at the Rendezvous. Not on his own. So that leaves me with the impression that you and Kerry were close. And if you were, and you’re denying it – then, that’s pretty dodgy. You can see that, can’t you?’
‘I don’t need to see anything. I’m not involved. Does Smet know you’re here?’
‘You lost that kind of immunity when you fucked with a police detective.’
‘You know that’s shit. You should have called him.’
Staffe takes out his BlackBerry, scrolls to the attachment to Pulford’s last email. It lists the calls from the payphones down on the New North Road. ‘The last thing Sean did before he died was get wasted. The last thing he did before that …’ He looks at the bold items on the call log. ‘… was call Ross Denness. Within three hours, he’d committed suicide. Supposedly.’
‘Why aren’t you talking to Denness?’
Staffe is looking at the data, keeping to himself the small lie he has just told. Sean did call Denness, but it wasn’t his last call. That was reserved for the unknown mobile. He looks up at Tommy. ‘I wanted to see the organ grinder.’
‘You’re full of shit.’
‘How do you think we found out Sean was in your keep?’
Tommy’s leg jigs again.
‘Why did you give the word to have him taken out of the game?’
‘You’re trying to stir things up. Well, I’m not having it.’ Given stands up, towers over Staffe. ‘You’re out of your jurisdiction, Wagstaffe, and out of your depth. Get the fuck out of my house.’
‘It’s not just Kerry, though, is it? How about Bridget?’
Tommy takes a hold of Staffe’s jacket. He scrunches it tight with one hand and lifts Staffe out of his chair.
Staffe looks Tommy in the mad eyes and fears that, should Tommy decide to kick off, there would be little he could do. He tries to swallow, but can’t, is on his tiptoes now, tasting the angry breath of the man of the house. The dog barks and bounds in from the dining room, it jumps at Staffe and takes his trouser leg in its bludgeon muzzle. Staffe wheezes, ‘And the Reverend Hands. Let go of me. Fuck that dog off. I’ll have you in. Your wife, too.’
Tommy’s mad eyes go wider, but his grip slackens, ever so slightly, and Staffe takes the opportunity to suck in deep, get some air. ‘You’re in the Holy Innocents. I know. So is Lesley Crawford.’
‘That’s crap.’
‘You’re in the shit, Tommy. You have to start talking.’
‘You shouldn’t be here.’
‘I’m here for Kerry, and Sean, and Grace.’
Tommy shakes his head.
‘Is Giselle yours?’
Given takes a hold of Staffe with his other hand, clasps him around the neck and lifts him clean off the ground.
His eyes bulge and his head is light, his face bursting with fluid. He can’t breathe. Tommy’s face becomes paler and paler. Staffe whites out, feels the air all around him, then the wicker crackle of the sofa. The ground slaps him heavily, all along one side.
A dog snarls and he can feel the lick and spray of its spittle. Somehow, he manages to say, ‘I’m on to you.’
‘Tommy, what’s going on?’ Her voice is soft and unmistakably continental.
‘Nothing, chérie,’ says Tommy.
‘I hope not,’ says Sabine.
The dog moves away from Staffe who sits up, his back to the sofa, and says, to Sabine, ‘We were messing about. I bet Tommy the dog couldn’t get me to the floor without biting.’ He takes out a tenner and hands it to Tommy. ‘You win. I’ll get you next time, though.’
‘He bites, for sure,’ says Sabine. ‘Why are you here?’
‘It’s about the Holy Innocents, Madame Given.’
‘The what?’
‘Just give us a minute or so, chérie,’ says Tommy. He takes Sabine by the arm and stoops, brushes her hair behind her ear and kisses its lobe. He might be saying something, but Staffe can’t hear. The infant Giselle, meanwhile, is playing with the killer dog’s head, as if it is a rag doll.
Sabine walks away, trailing her hand in his as she goes, until they are apart. At the door she says, ‘You should tell him, Thomas. You have nothing to be ashamed of.’
They look each other in the eye, clear as day that they are in love. It seems that the trust in each other is unbreachable; seems also that, together, they have something to fear from the world.
Tommy offers Staffe a hand and he accepts it, is pulled to his feet. He and Tommy stand toe to toe, neither quite sure who holds the upper hand. He looks out across the paddock, hangs his head. ‘You should know, I won’t let anything harm Giselle and Sabine.’
‘And the new baby.’
Tommy nods. ‘That’s right.’
‘Your new baby?’
‘It’s mine all right, you prick. Don’t you worry about that. Now, get out.’
‘Tell me about Kerry. What was she to you? Tell me and I can leave you in peace.’
‘Kerry!’ He laughs. ‘Christ, that girl.’ Still looking across the paddock. As if in a trance, Tommy says, ‘I loved her, you know. She’d drive you berserk, but I loved her.’
‘Loved her like …?’
Tommy looks as if he is coming round from anaesthetic. ‘Sh
e’s my sister’s girl. Me and my sister, we weren’t that close, you know. I was young and she killed herself. She left Bridget and Kerry and I did fuck all to help. And when I’d grown up enough to realise what I had done, it was too late.’
‘You’re their uncle? You’re the great-uncle of Miles and Maya?’
‘They don’t know who I am, or what I am, so you don’t say a word. So help me God, you don’t utter a fucking word to Bridget or them kids.’
‘You go to the same church as Bridget. She must know who you are.’
He shakes his head. ‘You’ve got to be joking. She’s not got a loving heart, that one. And that might be my fault, but I don’t care if she calls herself a Christian, or what. There’s no way she’d ever forgive me.’
‘And Kerry?’
‘Kerry was everybody’s favourite, and it ruined her. She could be a monster. A real monster.’
‘That’s why you helped Sean out?’
‘That man was a saint. Don’t you listen to what anybody says.’
‘And Miles and Maya’s father?’
‘He’s fucked off. Knows what’s good for him.’
‘Did you kill him, Tommy?’
‘As if I would.’
‘Maybe I should ask Smet.’
‘Maybe I’ve told you enough and you should be fucking grateful and let just this one sleeping dog lie.’
‘How come you forgave Sean, for what he did to Bridget?’
‘She lost that baby, is all. It was bad fortune, but he loved Kerry. God knows, he loved those kids, too, even though they weren’t his.’
‘Who killed Sean, Tommy?’
‘Sean killed Sean. You believe it. It’s what I want to believe, and that’s the truth.’
‘Where’s Lesley Crawford?’
‘How the fuck would I know?’ He takes Staffe by the arm, leads him to the front door. ‘That’s me done. You leave my family out of it, you hear. I’ve co-operated, but that’s the end of me. Got it?’
Twenty-Seven
Staffe sees her anew, as if for a first time. Her hair is down and he thinks she might have straightened it. Her back straight, she looks elegant. But this time, he doesn’t feel any kind of flutter around the heart.
As she brings him up to date with her end of the case, he tries to work out why he isn’t remotely attracted to her. The answer is unwelcome, and all about Eve.
Alicia Flint says, ‘We’ve checked the cameras all the way along Zoe’s route, and at the railway station.’ She senses that she doesn’t have his undivided attention so she touches his elbow. ‘You were right.’
‘Right?’
‘We interviewed at Wavertree railway station to see if anyone remembered Zoe. But we didn’t ask at the other end.’
‘We didn’t actually know where she was going.’
‘I assumed it was Parkgate – like you said.’
‘There’s no station.’
‘The nearest station is Neston. Nobody knew her. But she’d have to get a bus.’
‘What about the bus driver?’
‘Bingo!’ says Alicia Flint. ‘She went to Parkgate the day she disappeared.’
Alicia gets into a large car outside Nottingham railway station and he gets in alongside. She unfurls a laptop and navigates her way to the file she wants, taps a button, says, ‘This is from Wavertree station’, points at the screen and plonks the computer on his lap, begins the drive to the university campus.
Looking at the screen, Staffe says, ‘That’s Zoe. Who is that with her?’ He squints, angles the screen and peers at the image. ‘It’s … it’s Anthony. When was this?’
‘The same day. The day she disappeared. It’s twelve minutes after the argument with her father.’
‘But he’s hugging her.’ On the screen, Zoe Bright looks around, nervously, as if she might be looking for snipers on a skyline. She clocks the camera and pushes Anthony away. He holds out a hand to her. She takes it. ‘Is that a package? What is he giving her?’
‘We had the frame digitally enhanced. What do you think it is?’
Staffe peers at the screen again. ‘A book?’ He feels a smile pool upon his face. ‘Beloved?’
‘Clever boy.’
‘That means he knew she was going away. Maybe he was expecting her not to come back. What has he said to you about this?’
‘We can’t ask him. His solicitor is saying he is in no fit state to be questioned.’
‘That was no suicide attempt.’
‘He was provoked.’
‘You mean I provoked him,’ says Staffe.
‘They could get litigious. My hands are tied.’
Staffe tries to fathom why Anthony Bright would bid his wife farewell, the day she disappeared, seemingly knowing that she was about to be taken, and catering for that by handing her a favourite book. And then refuse to co-operate in the investigation of her disappearance – indeed, go to extreme lengths to prevent the police questioning him.
‘Have you ever heard of the House of the Holy Innocents?’
Flint shakes her head.
‘No cranky religion in Anthony’s life?’
‘We stripped his house and there was nothing like that. In fact, nothing much at all. You saw their house.’
‘She was a reader with no books.’
‘And no DVDs. Only a few photographs on the walls. No albums.’
‘As if it had been wiped clean?’
‘You think Anthony’s our man,’ says Alicia.
‘What do you think?’
‘I’m thinking Lesley Crawford. She’s why we’re here.’ Alicia Flint turns into the driveway of Moore House, where the Dean of the Faculty of Culture, Letters and Thought has his office. It is a neo-classical building but with Edwardian bay windows. Clematis gropes at the upper storeys and students gaggle and smoke on the lawn that slopes out front.
‘Zoe and Crawford know each other. They read the same books – I mean, precisely the same books. They were here at the same time, involved in the same subject: one an undergraduate, the other a research student.’
‘Surely that means Crawford wouldn’t abduct Zoe,’ says Alicia.
‘Zoe knows and trusts her. It would be easy, wouldn’t it?’
‘But the closer we get to Crawford, the more danger we could put Zoe in. Have you considered what Crawford might do, to protect the path back to her?’
‘Of course. Sean Degg might have paid that price.’
‘She knew Degg?’
‘She’s a member of the House of the Holy Innocents, that crackpot church I told you about, and so was Bridget, Kerry’s sister. Bridget and Sean used to have a thing.’
‘Jesus.’
At reception, they are taken straight through to see the Dean: Professor Robert Flanders. He sports a full, jet-black beard and wild, silvery hair. He wears a crusty old suit and Hush Puppies, and stands with his arms pointing out, his feet planted east and west, a befuddled look on his face, as if he is disturbed in the middle of building new logic.
He offers sherry, which Staffe and Flint decline, then calls through for some coffee, pours himself a large schooner of fino.
Staffe says, ‘We told you that we are trying to discover whether a Doctor Lesley Crawford ever taught an undergraduate called Zoe Flanagan. Doctor Crawford was here writing up a DPhil between 2005 and 2008.’
‘I summoned the class lists.’ Flanders hands pieces of paper to Staffe and Flint. ‘This is Miss Flanagan’s transcript. It shows all the modules she took. I have checked with human resources and Doctor Crawford didn’t ever teach on these modules.’
‘Are you sure?’ says Alicia Flint.
‘Why would I say this to you, were I not sure?’ Flanders smiles, drinks lustily from his sherry. ‘However, Doctor Crawford did supervise some dissertations on Miss Flanagan’s programme of study.’
‘She supervised Zoe?’
‘We can’t tell. We have two and a half thousand students in this faculty.’
‘Wouldn’t the
programme leader remember her?’
‘Probably not. And in any event, she’s moved on.’ Flanders drains his sherry and points to three large boxes under the window. ‘I took the liberty of requisitioning these from our archive. All the dissertations from 2008.’ As Flanders leaves the room, bottle of fino in hand, he says, ‘The building closes at seven during the vac.’
They each take a box and begin by checking the carbon covering sheets with the tutors’ faded, barely legible comments.
Twenty minutes in, Flint holds a copy aloft, waving it in the air. ‘Ahaa. We have a signature of the esteemed Doctor Crawford.’
Staffe takes a copy of the letter from Breath of Life and compares its signature to that on the comment sheet of the twenty-page dissertation. ‘Yes. That’s her.’ He looks at the paper, sees that it is submitted by a Suzanne Byrne, and its title is Jane Austen, mother of chicklit: a blueprint for the inevitable demise of feminism. ‘Quite the reactionary, our good doctor.’
‘I don’t know,’ says Flint. ‘I think the bra-burners have got something to answer for. Here am I – got a 2:1, got a career, not seen my son for two days and I feel like a worthless harlot.’
They race through to the bottom of their boxes looking for a reprise of Crawford’s signature, and then, having failed to find a paper for Zoe, share the contents of the third box. Half an hour later, Staffe finds another script with Crawford’s signature on it. He checks the name of the student and sighs, puts it on the pile and looks at the next. He is tired. Too tired.
Then it hits him. ‘Zoe!’ he says.
‘You got it?’ says Flint.
‘No.’ Staffe goes back to the last paper. ‘But I’ve got Anne-Marie. She changed her name.’ He brandishes the paper.
‘We’ll need to get her deed poll papers.’
‘Crawford knows Zoe Bright, and now we can prove it,’ says Staffe.
‘And it looks as if she was one of the chosen ones. Look. She got a 74. That’s a First,’ says Alicia.
He looks at the script itself, sees the title: Feminism can damage your health: the malnourished mother and the malevolent manifestos of the seventies.
Flint leans back and sits cross-legged, her arms wrapped around her knees. ‘What now?’
‘We can issue an order for Crawford’s arrest. But how does Anthony fit in? He can’t be in cahoots with Crawford, surely.’ Staffe writes a receipt for the Anne-Marie Flanagan papers. ‘You have to speak with Anthony again.’