by Jane Adams
‘Who knows?’ Tynan waved a dismissive hand. ‘The mind is capable of some strange things. Someone figured out once that we recognize faces by referring to only about a half-dozen factors. Maybe if they stay consistent it’s possible to fill in the gaps.’
Mike thought about it, then shook his head. ‘No. That’s pushing coincidence too far even for this mess. We’ve got to start dealing with facts.’
They were interrupted by Rose, bringing coffee in a large blue pot. She set it down on the table and busied herself pouring, telling them that dinner would be about another half-hour. Mike smiled his thanks, wondered, as she sat down with them, if they ought to turn the conversation elsewhere. Bill had no such qualms.
‘Been talking about the Cooper girl,’ he said. ‘You remember, the little lass that disappeared when we were both kids.’
Rose frowned in concentration for a moment, then her expression cleared and she nodded. ‘Certainly, I remember, be about ten or eleven she would be. Think that could be who you’ve found, Mike?’
Mike replied that he didn’t know, that it was possible. Rose frowned again then went on, ‘Hell of a noise was made at the time, but they never did find her.’ She shook her head sadly. ‘My mum, she wouldn’t let any of us out of the house for weeks after that. She was superstitious like.’ She nudged her husband cheerfully as though reminding him of a joke. ‘Said they’d no right to let children play on the fairy hill anyhow.’ She turned to Mike. ‘You know what they used to say about the place, load of rubbish that was, used to say it was a gateway. A road into fairyland, if you please.’
She got up to offer more coffee. Mike commented, ‘It seems that was a popular idea even up to Suzie Ashmore’s time.’
Rose nodded. ‘Some things are slow to change,’ she said. ‘We might have television, satellites, news in minutes from all across the world, but some things just cling on.’ She paused as though searching for the right analogy. ‘Like thistles,’ she said.
‘Thistles?’ Mike was momentarily mystified.
‘Thistles,’ she repeated calmly. ‘Long roots, you know. Try and pull them up without gloves on and you know about it. Deep tap roots too and you only have to leave the smallest piece in the ground and there you’ll be, having to uproot it all over again.’
Mike nodded. He wouldn’t like to comment on the botanical accuracy of the statement, but he knew what she meant. Odd ideas and misconceptions had become the heart wood of this affair. Maybe it needed a different approach. Maybe they’d been looking so hard to make connections that they’d forgotten how to see straight. He took a deep breath.
‘Supposing,’ he said slowly, ‘that there is no connection. Supposing that Cassie Maltham being here is pure coincidence and we should treat this as a whole new series.’
They were looking at him, all three of them, as though he’d suddenly lost his mind. Mike exhaled, a deep, exasperated sigh. ‘No,’ he said, ‘I don’t believe that either, but I’m damned if I can fathom it.’
He glanced down again at the cuttings and notes Tynan had given him. ‘You say this vicar, Emsbury, he’s still living around here?’
Tynan nodded. ‘Yes, we’ve kept in vague contact. Christmas cards, that sort of thing.’
‘Go and see him, see if there’s a thread, not just to the Cooper girl but to any others.’
Tynan looked askance at him.
Mike shook his head. ‘I don’t know what I’m looking for, John, probably nothing, but it seems to me we’ve got three cases which may, or may not be connected. It’s worth a look.’
‘Wouldn’t police records be better?’ Tynan asked. Mike grimaced. ‘No. Not really. For one thing we’ve been told to play down the weirdness, as Bill says. For another thing, what I’m looking for might go back further.’
‘Oh?’
Mike almost looked embarrassed. He said, ‘The truth is, John, I’m probably flying off at a tangent and sending you on a wild goose chase. It seems to me, though, that a place like the Greenway and Tan’s hill, with the kind of reputation it’s got, well, maybe there’s a reason for it.’ He hesitated, then added, ‘Like Rose’s thistle. The original plant is long gone but this one’s had time to set seeds.’
Rose looked at him in surprise. ‘You surely don’t believe in all that witch and fairy nonsense,’ she demanded.
Mike laughed shortly. ‘No, but what I believe doesn’t matter. It’s what other people believe about the place that does. Maybe their ideas about it trigger something very deep, something inside them that’s normally hidden, kept in check.’ He shrugged again. ‘I’m probably way off base,’ he said, ‘but anything’s worth a look.’
Mike could feel that John looked speculatively at him, but made no comment. The fact was, though he was far too embarrassed ever to admit it, the dream he’d had a couple of nights before, continued to haunt him. It had disturbed him enough for him to have spent the last few nights sleeping with the light on, and to have made his visits to Tan’s hill episodes equipped with a slight frisson of unease, even in daylight. He had to admit to himself that nothing would entice him there at night. Stupid, he knew, particularly as all three children had gone missing in the full light of day, but it was a notion that he couldn’t shake. Perhaps, like Cassie Maltham, he was going to have to learn to lay his ghosts when this was over. The thought filled him with unease and vague, but potent, self-contempt.
* * *
He had not left the Enfields’ until evening. The talk had moved on to other things and Mike had found himself looking at albums, listening to reminiscences. He’d been quite content to do so though, not realizing before just how starved he had felt of casual, easy company, of a sense of family. He arrived back at the flat feeling more relaxed, but also, even more acutely aware of its functional emptiness. He’d rented the place partly furnished, and not without difficulty, accommodation, other than the holiday type, being in short supply. He had added what was required for his immediate needs and left it at that. Looking around now at the two armchairs, the TV, the few bits and pieces of assorted and very utilitarian furnishing he’d bothered to purchase, the tiny flat had an air of transience, of dissatisfaction.
He felt the ebullient mood of earlier evening dissolving, decided to check his messages, and perhaps go for a walk, even phone the hotel to see if Dr Lucas had returned yet. The idea cheered him somewhat. She’d told him she had to return home but would be back on Sunday. She might well be back already.
He wandered somewhat listlessly over to the answerphone, pressed playback. The first message was from his ex-wife, reminding him that the house sale was about to go through and there were things he had to sign. She sounded cheerful, business-like, quite unlike the woman he’d been married to. The second message made him turn, gaze intently at the answerphone. ‘Sergeant Holmwood here, sir. Sorry to disturb your Sunday but a Doctor Lucas wanted you to get in touch with her.’ Mike cursed inwardly that he’d not thought to give Maria his home number. It hadn’t seemed worth it, he was hardly ever there. ‘It seems Mrs Maltham’s been taken ill, sir. She wants you to call her asap on the following number.’
Mike grabbed a pen, began to scribble down the number, suddenly angry with himself for not being available.
He checked that was the end of the message and pounced on the telephone, rapping impatiently with the pen as he listened to the dialling tone.
‘Come on, come on . . . Yes. I want to speak to Doctor Maria Lucas. Tell her it’s Mike Croft, that I’ve only just got her message.’
‘Would you hold please, Mr Croft? I’ll have her paged.’
Mike held, impatiently, his ears offended by the tinny sound of ‘soothing’ music being played to him. It seemed like a long time before he heard the familiar, pleasing voice of Maria Lucas replacing the Muzak. He apologized profusely for not getting back to her sooner. Launched himself into an explanation, which, characteristically, she cut short.
‘Mike, behave yourself and listen.’
Grinning to hims
elf, Mike proceeded to do as he was told.
‘Cassie’s here, back at Oaklands, with me.’
Oaklands, he remembered was the psychiatric hospital where Cassie Maltham had been treated before.
‘On a section?’
‘No, that wasn’t necessary. She’s here voluntarily and will be undergoing assessment tomorrow, but I don’t think a section will prove relevant. Fact is, Mike, she’s running scared and this is as safe a place as she can get.’
‘Is Fergus with you?’
‘Yes. He’s gone home for tonight. The Thomas’s are still at the caravan, but they’re going to have to get back to their jobs soon, so unless you need them . . . Look, Mike, I’m bushed. I’ll see you in the morning, no, I’ll meet you for lunch. The best thing you can do meantime, is to talk to the Thomas’s, they were with Cassie, be able to fill in the details and I’ll be able to tell you more tomorrow.’
She sounded uncharacteristically cagey, but it was clear he was going to have to be satisfied. He said goodbye to her and glanced at his watch. Not quite eight-fifteen. It would take about forty minutes to get out to the caravan. Mike turned, headed out and back to his car. Sod the rest day. Running scared, Maria had said. Scared of what? He felt suddenly angry with himself for not pressing her for answers over the phone. Common sense told him that he wouldn’t have got any.
Sighing impatiently, he concentrated on making the best speed he could along the winding roads.
* * *
Anna turned weary eyes on him, then she went back to staring down into her cup. Slowly revolving it on the saucer, swirling the dregs of cold liquid round and round like some fortune teller about to predict a bleak future.
‘It was just awful,’ she said. ‘I’d never seen her like that. When she was ill before, I didn’t really see her much.’ She broke off, swallowed, painfully. ‘Poor Cassie.’ She looked up again at Mike, a swift, appealing glance, as though trying to make him understand. ‘She just kept saying these things, about the woman on the hill, you know, the dead one.’
‘Saying things like what?’ Mike asked gently.
Anna looked embarrassed, glanced over at Simon, who answered reluctantly, as though he felt it a betrayal of friendship.
‘She kept saying that it was Suzie. The woman, I mean. We kept telling her that it couldn’t be, that the dead woman was too old for one thing, but she wouldn’t have it.’
He glanced at Anna as though for confirmation and she nodded anxiously. ‘She got really upset, really angry, so Fergus went down to the village to phone Doctor Lucas. By the time she’d got here, Cassie was saying different things altogether.’ She hesitated, as though not certain how to explain what had happened to her friend. ‘It was like she was trying to work something out. Get it straight in her head and didn’t quite know where to start.’ She broke off and looked over at Simon once more.
Mike prompted them. ‘So then, what did she say next?’
Anna turned and looked at him as though coming to a sudden decision. Her eyes showing the bewilderment she felt, she said, ‘Cassie started saying that she’d killed her. That she’d found a big stick and hit her over and over again until she didn’t move any more. She kept lifting her arms above her head like this.’ She raised her own arms in demonstration. ‘Then bringing them down, like this.’ Anna shook her head slowly. ‘I don’t believe Cassie could have done that.’ She turned to look directly at Mike once more. ‘Cassie’s not dangerous. She’s been hurt, she’s tried to hurt herself, but she’s not dangerous.’
She was looking for reassurance, but Mike felt he could make no comment. He knew how common it was for the disturbed to take on guilt that wasn’t their own. In this case though, was it possible? Common sense argued that Cassie had opportunity. Her elusive morning walks alone would give her that and the motive could be one in her head that needed no external reasoning to make it adequate.
Simon had reached for his wife’s hand. ‘She didn’t stick to that for long, though. Like Anna said, it was as though she was trying to work things out, as though the memories had got all jumbled. She knew there was something she had to remember about the woman dying and about Suzie, but she just couldn’t get it into perspective.’
‘So the story changed,’ Mike asked, realizing, as Simon frowned, that he could have made a better choice of words.
‘Yes,’ Simon said, somewhat coldly. ‘She kept insisting that Suzie was dead. It was like something in her head had cleared then. As though she’d finally straightened things out. She kept saying that the woman had killed her.’
‘The woman whose body we found?’ Mike asked quickly.
Simon looked puzzled for a moment, then said, ‘I think so. It was getting very confusing by then.’
‘Did she say how her cousin died?’
Simon looked at him in surprise. ‘You’re taking this seriously then?’ he asked.
Mike thought for a moment before replying, then spoke cautiously. ‘I think it has to be taken note of, at the very least. The dream woman turned out to be real, though Cassie’s images of her were just as confused. Maybe something of this will help us.’
‘I can’t believe Cassie did anything wrong,’ Anna protested. ‘Cassie’s just not like that,’ she finished, sounding a little helpless, evidently not knowing what to think any more. She got up, took the cups to the sink. ‘I’ll make more tea,’ she said, speaking to no one in particular.
Simon was silent, thinking about what to say next. Mike watched Anna as she filled the kettle, set it to heat on the Calor stove. It was, he noted, a whistling kettle, like Tynan’s. Did Anna race the kettle, he wondered vaguely? No, he decided, that wasn’t her style.
He glanced around, not wanting to break the profound silence. The noise of the gas flame the only active sound in the entire room. Simon sat, head bent, glaring at the table top and Anna stood beside the tiny sink, arms folded in front of her, a look of puzzlement creasing her face, her neat, well-cut hair, for once not quite so tidy, and her make-up looking as though she’d not renewed it since morning.
At last he spoke. ‘Cassie claims now that her cousin died way back then. Yes?’
Simon nodded.
‘Which implies she must have witnessed her murder?’
Again, Simon nodded.
‘So, the body. Did she say where the body was?’
Simon hesitated this time, looked to Anna for support. ‘Not exactly,’ he said. ‘But from the way she was talking it was where you found the skeleton.’
Mike nodded slowly. Well, the hidey hole could be searched again. No problems there.
‘There was something else really strange,’ Simon went on. ‘Right from when we heard about the body she kept saying that it wasn’t Suzie.’
‘She knew that?’
Simon nodded. ‘Absolutely adamant,’ he said.
Mike thought carefully. Cassie and her cousin had played often on the Greenway, knew the hidey hole, played there. What if they’d found the skeleton all that time ago? It hadn’t been buried deep, the experts said the grave was no more than a hurriedly made scrape in the ground. It didn’t seem right somehow. Surely, finding something like that when you are ten or twelve years old would be terrifying? Something to run home to safety from and cry to your mother about?
Or would it? Children have a strange sense of honour, of logic. What if they were more afraid of something else? Or what if Cassie hadn’t realized just what the bones were until the skeleton had been unearthed? No, surely that didn’t make sense. Even if she’d not known as a child that these were human remains, wouldn’t she have realized as she grew older and thought to tell someone about their childhood find?
He shook his head again. No, the last thing Cassie Maltham had wanted was anything that could make it necessary for her to come back here. If Dr Lucas’s experiments were to be believed, Cassie had blocked all memory of the hidey hole from her mind until now.
So. What then?
Anna had returned to the table and was pou
ring the tea. ‘We talked it over,’ she said, ‘after Cassie and Fergus had gone. We think she did see something, maybe even Suzie being killed, that scared her so much she had to forget about it.’
Simon nodded. ‘We think they must have known about the skeleton too. I mean, they played there. Maybe they found it.’
Mike sipped his tea in silence. Something at the back of his mind told him that, finally, he was on the right lines. That in some way, Suzanne Ashmore’s death (if she was dead, he reminded himself, he had that one to prove yet) was linked to the children’s knowledge of the skeleton. Had someone found out that they knew? Frightened them into silence then tried to make certain by killing Suzie?
Then why spare Cassie’s life?
He reminded himself abruptly that this was the Ashmore case he was discussing with himself That he then had to take account of the Cassidy abduction and the woman whose body they’d found on the hill.
Where was the link? Was Sara Jane telling the truth about remembering nothing?
And the woman — her injuries had been horrifying and had the look of deliberate and premeditated infliction. How did that fit in?
Mike finished his tea, suddenly aware that the Thomas’s were watching him closely. He rose to go.
‘I’m meeting Doctor Lucas tomorrow,’ he said. ‘Perhaps we’ll all know more by then.’ He paused, looking at Simon and Anna, strain showing on their faces, reminding him of just how tired he was himself.
‘Meantime,’ he said, ‘try and get some sleep.’
Simon laughed, a sharp uneasy sound. ‘Just try,’ Mike said and left them, still sitting at the table staring miserably into cups of cold tea.
Outside the wind had risen, the rather wan half-moon illuminated the feathered edges of rapidly scudding clouds. Glancing out over the headland Mike could glimpse the sea, denser black against the darkness of the night sky. It was well after ten, but even so, dark early for the time of year. There should still be some evening grey in the clouds, perhaps even a touch of red close to the horizon. He shrugged. No one seemed to have informed the night that it had come a little too early.