Death of a Mermaid

by Lesley Thomson

  ‘That’s it for now, thank you.’ Toni shut her notebook, gave the time and date, and ended the interview. For a woman used to clients who routinely sank their enemies on the bottom of the Mersey, her questions must have been a stroll on the prom.

  ‘Freddy’s not short of friends.’ Toni put out her hand, ready for Wood to ignore it, but Wood was too good for petty negligence. ‘We may need to talk again.’

  ‘I’m at the Premier Inn in Lewes until Freddy’s finished her business. I’m sure you would rather I remained in the area.’ Sarah Wood let go of Toni’s hand.

  Toni watched Wood walk, with more grace than Toni could have achieved in four-inch heels, to a silver Alfa Romeo that would have had Ricky prostrate with envy. Wood had been clever. The letters were her word against Freddy’s and she was confident that Freddy would confirm it. Wood’s crime was that she was one possessive girlfriend. Mags and Freddy’s passion was over twenty years ago, but she’d practically spat Mags’s name: this Margaret McKee. Toni couldn’t get aerated by women Ricky dated even five years ago. They belonged in his past.

  Mags did not belong in Freddy’s past. Freddy wasn’t over her. Sarah Wood, intuitive enough to see through walls, must have seen it. How happy had Wood been that Freddy was meeting Mags at the battery?

  40

  MAGS

  Random holes let in drifts of light. The only sense Mags had of when day became night. After dark the holes all but vanished. Gradually, she made them out, like far-off stars in the sky. She had lost count of the number of days it had been since that nasty sack had been pulled over her head. She was bundled into a car. Sick with fear, she had tried to note detail. The seats were leather. A satnav said they were on Fort Road until the driver turned it off. She had shuddered with terror. The lunette battery had been hell, but it had been familiar.

  Where was she? What day was it? She was disoriented by terror. She had a percussive pain in her head. She must have passed out because she was no longer at the battery. She imagined she’d heard Freddy’s voice far off, as if under water. Flounder was in there too. At moments the anguished panic at what had happened to her and what was to come overwhelmed her. Otherwise, Mags was numb.

  On the first day – or night – Mags had woken, a headache raging – and automatically moved to get painkillers from the bathroom. She hit a wall. A cymbal clang that vibrated through her skull. She had felt sick and crumpled down. She wasn’t in her bed. Pulling up a coarse cover, she curled up. She must have passed out because when she next opened her eyes there was enough light seeping through the holes to make out her surroundings. Her cell was a metal container. The mattress, a single unyielding futon that smelled fusty and damp. She was under a tarpaulin. The pillow was one of those memory ones and was brand new, she’d found a price ticket from John Lewis on the floor. Trembling with fright and the cold, Mags puzzled that she had a flimsy plastic bucket for a lavatory but had been provided with a fancy pillow that would adapt itself to her comfort. She tried to think like Toni. Did this mean she was going to be kept there a while? If she was a hostage, she might be released. What was she worth?

  Had they found the crucifix? Have you? she asked Toni in her head. If the police had drawn the conclusion that she hadn’t accidentally left it there – Freddy and Toni would know she never took it off – were they searching for her?

  She fought the horror; it made her useless. She tried to think like a detective. If she were Toni, she would notice the paint-flaked metal walls. She would deduce that those stains beneath the holes were where rain had got in. This meant the container was somewhere outside. Mags walked herself pedantically through each observation. She’d resisted the bucket until bodily need eroded inhibition.

  From inside the container she couldn’t make out sounds. She guessed it was on wasteland. It wasn’t in a street or a garden. There was no one nearby.

  Out of nowhere, Mags felt fury. She let rip. She kicked at the door. She screamed at the top of her voice. Subsiding, she heard the incessant drumbeat of her blood in her ears. It didn’t bring her warder running. From the quiet, there was a hushing whisper, a dull hum that could be traffic. She had bruised her knuckles pummelling the walls and, from the pain shooting through her foot, had broken one of her big toes.

  Edward! Let me out.

  There was no way to escape. Even if she had a metal cutter, there were no edges to cut. From the noise when the door was opened, Mags guessed it was secured with a bar. Mags had never suffered from claustrophobia. Fear had changed that.

  If she were to escape, the only chance would be when her kidnapper brought the cheese sandwich and water. Mags scoured her brain for anything Toni would suggest. Toni had gone quiet.

  41

  FREDDY

  ‘How long have you known Mags McKee?’ DS Lane had informed Freddy that, because of her connection to Detective Inspector Kemp, he was leading the investigation.

  ‘Twenty-nine years. Since we were eleven.’ A milky scum had formed on the tea. When the constable had offered it, Freddy thought it would look uncooperative to refuse. ‘I haven’t seen her for a long time.’ Facts only; don’t blather. She raised the cup to her lips and put it down again. She wouldn’t be able to swallow.

  ‘Did you arranged to meet Margaret McKee at the lunette battery?’ DS Lane knew she had. Freddy had heard Toni telling him before she’d got sent beyond the cordon. ‘Frederica?’

  ‘Sorry. Yes. It was Mags’s idea to meet where we used…’ Freddy gulped down tea to hide her embarrassment. Mags. She wouldn’t tell Lane the truth about Mags without asking her first.

  ‘When Mags didn’t come to the battery, what did you do?’ Lane wrote something in his notebook which Freddy couldn’t see. Suspect shoplifted from Co-op.

  ‘I wandered about a bit.’ Freddy tried to appear innocent. She was innocent. ‘I went down to the shore in case Mags was there. I was late. I hadn’t seen her on the road, which is the best route.’

  ‘She wasn’t by the sea?’

  Obviously not. Freddy shook her head.

  ‘For the tape, Ms Power has shaken her head.’ He was severe.

  ‘She wasn’t there,’ Freddy informed the machine. ‘I haven’t seen Mags since we made the arrangement to meet. At my mum’s burial. In the cemetery.’

  ‘What did you do then?’ Lane was scrutinising his notes. Shouldn’t he be examining her every expression?

  ‘I thought I saw her. I ran back up from the beach, but when I reached the battery, it was my… it was Sarah Wood.’ Freddy felt herself flush at the memory of the joy dashed, as if against the cliff.

  ‘Sarah Wood.’ Lane was looking at her now. ‘We have her down as your partner.’

  ‘She’s not my partner,’ Freddy retorted. ‘We split up. On the day I came to Sussex.’

  ‘Was that a mutual decision?’

  ‘No. I texted her.’ She felt sudden shame. What would he think of her?

  ‘Was Ms Wood happy with this outcome?’ If Lane disapproved of digital dumping, he gave nothing away.

  ‘Sarah wants us to get back together. It’s why she came to Newhaven and why she met me at the beach.’ Impatient for him to get out there and find Mags, Freddy had the urge to tell him where to shove it, but the shoplifting had put her on the back foot.

  ‘How did Ms Wood know you’d be there?’ Lane shuffled papers as if he didn’t care about the answer. That old chestnut.

  ‘She tracked me on her phone.’ She flung him a nugget.

  ‘How long had Wood been there?’

  ‘I don’t know.’ Freddy frowned. How long had Sarah been there? ‘I was only down at the beach a few minutes.’ She felt disappointed that he hadn’t pursued the tracking. She was angry Sarah had followed her to the battery. Was that why Mags had left? After a week, this felt less likely.

  ‘Is it possible Sarah had been watching you without you knowing? She tracked you there using her phone.’

  ‘It is possible. But unlikely. Sarah likes to face you with t
hings.’ Freddy felt misery at the mess she had dragged back with her to Newhaven. To Mags.

  ‘Could Sarah Wood have been coming out of the battery when you saw her? Rather than, as you supposed, going in.’ Lane laid down his pen.

  ‘There’s a gate over the entrance. It’s padlocked.’ That had never occurred to her.

  ‘Did you know this already or did you only notice it was locked while waiting for your friend?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Which?’

  Had she seen it? Or was it when she had gone back later, when she found Julian’s book on the beach?

  Freddy was suddenly certain that on the night Mags disappeared the grille had been closed. With no padlock. ‘I’m afraid I don’t remember.’ Had Sarah been in there with Mags? A mad idea. Why had she lied?

  ‘Could she have been hiding in the battery? Could Sarah have glimpsed you through one of the gun-holes on the shore?’ Lane scoured her face.

  ‘I doubt it. Why would Sarah hide?’ Freddy had a falling sensation. The police hadn’t found a body in the battery. Toni would have said. Wouldn’t she?

  …by the time it’s discovered the incriminating evidence has degraded. Alakazam, you have the perfect murder…

  Freddie’s face felt on fire.

  ‘Would you call Sarah Wood the jealous type?’ Lane pounced.

  ‘No way.’ Freddie heard the false ring in the emphasis.

  ‘Sarah was tracking your phone. She knew where to find you. Is she possessive as a rule? She could, for instance, have called and asked you where you were.’

  ‘Sarah gets insecure. No more than anyone.’ Freddy fumbled for the truth. They would get hold of their phone records so would know this was rubbish. Sarah called and texted about thirty times a day. Freddy suspected that DS Lane didn’t get insecure. He had a ring on his wedding finger so there was someone to be jealous of. How could she explain that, beneath the hard as nails exterior, Sarah was a lamb?

  Freddy wished herself on the other side of the desk. As Toni’s deputy. She’d help her sniff out clues and corner killers. She’d go home to someone she loved. Not Sarah. Mags. Freddy blurted, ‘Sarah’s not violent, she’d never hurt anyone.’ In her effort to make it up to Sarah for not loving her, Freddy overegged it. Her nose was itchy, but if she scratched it Lane would see it as a sign of lying.

  ‘Can you vouch for Ms Wood’s whereabouts before your meeting at the battery?’ Lane leaned in.

  ‘We didn’t meet there. I was meeting Mags.’

  ‘It’s possible, isn’t it, that Sarah arrived first. Found Margaret McKee waiting for you and mistakenly thought Margaret was a rival. She flew into a jealous rage, attacked Margaret and dragged her unconscious into the battery. When you arrived, Sarah stayed hidden inside a gun cell. When you were out of sight, she left the battery and met you coming up the ridge.’

  ‘That’s not what happened.’ Freddy scratched her nose. ‘She can’t have hurt Mags. No one could. She’s too lovely for anyone to hate her. Mags is a special—’ Freddy started to weep, her shoulders shaking. She wouldn’t call Mags Margaret, it made her a stranger. Mags was a stranger.

  Malcolm Lane pushed a box of tissues across the table to her.

  Could Sarah have attacked her? The idea was ludicrous. Freddy choked on her tears.

  ‘We’ll leave it for now, Frederica.’ Scraping back his chair, Detective Sergeant Lane rose. He held the door open for Freddy.

  Freddy had expected to spend all night and the following day in the interview room. Until the moment that she owned up to a crime she couldn’t name.

  ‘One more question.’

  Did you steal those Creme Eggs? Freddy blew her nose.

  ‘When did you and Sarah Wood decide to contest your mother’s will?’

  42

  TONI

  ‘We don’t know Margaret McKee has been murdered.’ Malcolm handed Toni the coffee machine’s wrong answer to a latte. At four in the morning the police canteen was closed. Hot and caffeinated, it would do.

  ‘She’s been missing over a week. We have two pieces of crucial evidence. The crucifix and the Julian of Norwich book. Items that Mags would not have left behind. The links on the crucifix were intact. It suggests that Mags took it off deliberately. Was she sending us a message and we got it too late?’ Toni stirred sugar into her cappuccino so ferociously flecks of foam flew across the table. ‘Unless she’s being kept somewhere, it’s unlikely Mags is alive.’

  ‘I’m sorry, Toni.’ Malcolm rarely called her by her first name.

  ‘Thanks, Mal.’ Tears threatened. Compartmentalise. ‘Sarah Wood lied about the letters, she lied about going to the battery. She showed no compassion or concern that Freddy’s ex might have been murdered. Crucially, she showed no surprise that we’re treating this as murder.’

  ‘Frederica confirmed that she requested Sarah Wood to write those letters. You think she lied?’ Malcolm took a pull from his cyclist’s water bottle.

  ‘I knew she’d do that. It’s not a lie. She’s protecting Wood.’

  ‘That figures. Frederica said she was OK that Wood tracked her phone. I’d be filing divorce papers.’

  Toni couldn’t match up the forthright, confident girl who always volunteered to read in class with the desolate-faced woman in Sarah Wood’s car, staring out as if she’d been drugged. How far would Freddy go to cover for Sarah? Toni felt furious with Freddy and protective at the same time. She barked at Malcolm, ‘For God’s sake, stop calling Freddy Frederica.’

  ‘Are you really OK with being my deputy?’ Malcolm talked to the water bottle.

  ‘I told Worricker I was and I am. You have to feel OK with me as your deputy or they’ll helicopter in someone else.’

  ‘I’d rather it was you breathing down my neck.’ Malcolm whistled.

  ‘Worricker is breathing down both our necks. He wants a review every day. Success breeds expectation. He said we got the Munday case wrapped up double quick and he wants an encore.’ Toni gave a wry laugh. ‘If he only knew how that case is rapidly unwrapping. One of the Mermaids is dead, another is missing.’ When she had explained about the Mermaids to Malcolm he had nodded as if he’d once been a Mermaid himself.

  ‘Could the two be connected?’ Malcolm traced his scar with a finger. ‘Could Margaret have killed Karen?’

  ‘Worricker says not. And frankly, I’m not convinced. Mags has nothing to gain from Karen’s death. She does gain by avoiding Freddy.’ Despite her worst fears, she stuck to the present tense.

  ‘Could Frederica be involved?’

  ‘Crap!’ Toni shouted. ‘Listen, Mal, Freddy came to me last Monday – you saw her, at the Tarring Neville piss-up. She asked me to open a missing person’s file on Mags. Why do that if Freddy knew who killed her?’ What better way to misdirect Toni from a murder? Seeing Malcolm resist saying this, Toni said, ‘If, like you think, Sarah Wood murdered Mags in a possessive fit, I truly believe that Freddy would hand her to us on a plate.’

  ‘I think she’s hiding something.’ Malcolm drank from his bottle. ‘I asked Freddy if there was a lock on the battery gate. She claimed not to remember. ’Fraid I didn’t believe her.’ This time he looked at Toni.

  ‘More likely Freddy’s convinced Wood is innocent. Maybe she’s worried Wood had a bit of a nose about the battery. Gotta say my money’s on Wood.’ Toni swilled the latte. ‘The padlock I broke to get into the battery looked new.’ Never mind the case, life was unwrapping. Something had to feel familiar.

  ‘Shall I get Sheena onto the council about it?’ Malcolm said.

  ‘This is your gig. Freddy was at the scene, that makes her at least a person of interest.’ Toni went to tie her hair back, forgetting she’d had it cut shorter. ‘But, here’s where me knowing Freddy is a perk. Freddy would be too squeamish to handle body disposal. I remember one time when we were kids, she went white when their cat devoured one of the gerbil guests. It was Andy who opened the cage. Ask me, it was deliberate. Andy was probably tired of being th
e one dangling from a fish hook. Freddy took the blame because she knew Fred Power would give Andy hell. The worst Fred did to Freddy was make her break the news to the owner that their pet got murdered on his holidays.’ Unknown to Fred Power, Toni had stepped in. It was her first death knock.

  ‘She’s a fishmonger – she guts and fillets for a living,’ Malcolm said.

  ‘It’s not the same as killing the love of your life.’ Toni bit her lip. She should not have shared Freddy’s secret. She tapped her notebook with her pencil. ‘So anyway—’

  ‘Wait. Freder— Freddy – didn’t tell me that.’ Malcolm was flicking through his own notebook.

  ‘Probably didn’t think it relevant.’ Damn. Even Ricky didn’t know.

  ‘You don’t think so?’

  ‘Yes, of course it’s relevant. But please, Mal, tread carefully.’ Toni scrubbed at her hair. ‘In the last year at school, Freddy and Mags were together, OK? It was super hush-hush. Even when Freddy told her parents – she is actually a rabidly honest soul – she kept Mags out of it.’ Toni paused. Freddy had always tried to keep people safe. The Mermaids had done that for each other. ‘Freddy’s dad went mad. Called her cruel names – filthy dyke, freak of nature, worse. He slung some clothes randomly in a Sainsbury’s bag, tossed her a couple of twenties and told her never to darken his door again. Fancied himself as keeper of morals. As you know, he disinherited her. Reenie followed his wishes, which surprises me, as she wasn’t evil like him. He told Freddy that if she told the boys or anyone round here, about her “problem”, she’d burn in hell. Freddy kept her word. I was gobsmacked Reenie didn’t change the will. Freddy was her favourite.’

  ‘You haven’t been tempted to tell Ricky?’ Malcolm’s cheeks tinged pink as he caught himself asking his boss a personal question. Toni rescued him.

  ‘I’m gagging, but I can’t without Freddy’s say-so. She won’t let me. It honestly wouldn’t bother Ricky or Andy. Andy reckons his nine-year-old son is gay. OK, so with Andy it’s because the lad likes pink and does dancing on a Saturday morning, but you get the point. Fred Power was a shit. It’s a miracle his kids turned out so well.’