Deborah Crombie - Duncan Kincaid & Gemma James 11 - Water Like A Stone dk&gj-11

by Water Like A Stone

  “I was singing. With the radio. A man Gabriel had worked for had given him a radio that ran on batteries, so it was a special treat to listen. It was a silly song. I don’t know what it was called, but it made me happy.” She hummed a few breathy bars, and Gemma recognized the tune—ABBA’s “Dancing Queen.”

  “I know the one you mean,” she said, and Rowan nodded, as if they had made a connection.

  “I was thinking of what I might paint that night, when the children were in bed.” Rowan stopped. Her face grew even paler, her breathing more labored.

  Moving towards her, Gemma said, “Are you all right? Let me—”

  But Rowan lifted her hand from her husband’s and waved her back.

  “No. Please. Let me finish. I had the mince almost ready. The light was going, and I realized it was past time for Marie to wake. I wiped my hands on the tea towel and went in to her. I was still singing.”

  Gabriel shook his head, a plea of denial, but he seemed to realize he was powerless to stop her. Bowing his head, he took her hand again and they all waited. Gemma could feel Kincaid’s breath, warm on the back of her neck as he stood behind her.

  “I knew straightaway. In the verses I learned as a child, the poets always compared death to sleep, but you can’t possibly mistake it.

  Even under her little pink blanket, she was too still. When I touched her, she was cold, and her skin was blue.”

  No one spoke. The hypnotic hiss of the oxygen regulator fi lled the room, until it seemed to Gemma that it synchronized with her heartbeat. She realized her cheeks were damp, and scrubbed at them with the back of her hand.

  She had held her own child in her arms, so tiny, so perfect, and knew one couldn’t mistake the absence of life. “I’m so sorry. That must have been terrible for you,” she said, and her words seemed to give Rowan a last burst of energy.

  “I tried. Oh, I tried. I did everything we’d been taught with Joseph. I puffed my own breath into her lungs until I could feel the rise and fall of her chest under my hand, but it was no use. We were down near Hurleston, and there was no one moored nearby to call for help. By the time Gabriel came . . .”

  “I found them,” said Gabriel hoarsely. “Rowan holding little Marie to her breast. It was too late. Too late,” he repeated, his face etched with pain. “And then I realized what would happen if anyone knew. We would lose Joseph, too, and Rowan might go to prison. I couldn’t let that happen.

  “I knew I hadn’t much time. Rowan washed her, and dressed her in her best little suit.”

  “No nappy. That’s why there was no nappy,” Kincaid said softly, as if he’d just remembered something that had bothered him, and Gabriel nodded.

  “It was full dark by that time. I wrapped her in her blanket and carried her to the old dairy. We couldn’t risk Rowan coming, and besides, there was Joseph to look after.” Now that he’d begun, Gabriel seemed to feel the same relief as his wife, the long-dammed words flowing from him.

  “I’d been working that week for old Mr. Smith. The dairy hadn’t been used as such for years, but he’d got in mind to sell the place, and much of the mortar work was crumbling. I’d not quite fi nished the repairs, so I’d left my tools. Everything was to hand. There was a manger, half hidden behind some old milking equipment and bits of cast-off furniture—I’d seen it when I’d checked for damage. I made—

  I did the best I could for Marie—” He stopped, swallowing, his face nearly as ashen as his wife’s. “And then I closed her up, safe, where nothing could get at her, and I put everything back the way it was before.

  “The next day I took my pay from Mr. Smith. I didn’t want any talk—nothing out of the ordinary. Then we left the Shroppie, went up north, mostly, where no one knew us. But somehow it got harder and harder to stay away. Maybe it was meant we should be here when she was found.”

  “But I don’t understand,” said Gemma. “Your daughter, the girl you call Marie, who is she?”

  “I can’t tell you who she is,” answered Gabriel. Then he must have seen something in Kincaid’s expression because he added, quickly, “I don’t mean I won’t tell you. I mean I can’t, because I don’t know. But I can tell you where she came from. That first year or so, we lived in fear, thinking someone would find our baby, would somehow connect her with us. But we couldn’t leave the boat—we had nothing else—so it seemed easiest to disappear in the cities. The canals run through the worst parts, the old ware houses and slums, s

  and they’d only begun to be called ‘waterfront properties.’ ” There was a hint of derision in his voice.

  “We were in Manchester—I’d found some day work in a factory there—but the ware houses near the mooring were squats, taken over by drug users, prostitutes, runaways sleeping rough. Rowan got to know some of the women; she helped them when she could. One day they told her they’d found this girl dead, apparently from an overdose, her toddler crouched beside her body.”

  “The mother wasn’t much more than a child herself,” put in Rowan, a spark of pity in her eyes. “And the baby, she looked as if her mother had tried to care for her, in spite of everything. She was well fed, and as clean as could be expected. But she was that frightened, poor little mite, and no one would call for help—the squatters didn’t invite the police or the socials onto their patch for any reason—and no one would take her. So we did.” Rowan said it as if it had been the simplest thing in the world, and the memory made her smile. After a moment she went on. “She was about the age our Marie would have been, and now . . . She is Marie. She doesn’t remember anything else. This life is all she knows. And we—she is our daughter, just as if I’d borne her myself.”

  All the protests ran through Gemma’s head. If the mother had been identified, there might have been a father to take the child, or grandparents, all with more right than Gabriel and Rowan Wain.

  And yet . . . would anyone have loved her more?

  Breaking into Gemma’s musing, Rowan asked quietly, “How did you know? About Marie?”

  “It was her eyes. In Annie Constantine’s notes, she said Marie’s eyes were brown.”

  Rowan sighed. “Dear God. I never thought. I never knew she wrote things like that about the children.”

  Moving Gemma aside, Kincaid spoke to Gabriel, his voice hard.

  “Did she see it, too? Annie Constantine, when you met her again on Christmas Day? She saw the children that day, and again when she

  came back with Dr. Elsworthy. Was that why you argued, because she realized Marie wasn’t your daughter? And then, if she learned about the infant found in the barn, she would have put two and two together. You would have had to stop her, whatever it took.”

  Gabriel loosed his hand from his wife’s and stood. The two men faced each other across the small confines of the cabin, and Gemma felt a sudden surge of claustrophobia, as if all the air had been sucked from the space.

  But there was no defiance in Gabriel Wain’s stance, and when he spoke his voice rang with desperation. “No. I’d swear she didn’t know. And if she heard little Marie had been found, she never said.”

  Resting his hand on his wife’s shoulder, he went on, his words a plea. “I’d not have hurt her, even so.”

  The possibilities ran through Gemma’s mind. Annie might not have seen the girl for a changeling at first, but what if something had triggered a memory on Boxing Day morning, when she’d brought Dr. Elsworthy to see to Rowan? Had she come back, later in the day, to confront the couple?

  No, not Rowan. Rowan would have told her the truth—she owed Annie Constantine that, and she had been ready to tell the truth.

  But if Annie had spoken to Gabriel alone . . . How far had Gabriel Wain been willing to go to protect his family?

  Yet they had no proof. And if they made an accusation against Gabriel, there could be no reprieve for this family, or for Rowan, who had so little time.

  Gabriel regarded them in silence. He had put himself at their mercy; now he could only wait. But Rowan said, “W
hat will you do?” and there was hope in her voice for her children, if not for herself.

  “I—” Gemma hesitated, painfully aware of the risk in either action. But then she knew, with sudden clarity, that she wouldn’t sacrifice this family without proof of Gabriel’s guilt. And that meant they had to find out who had killed Annie Constantine.

  The fire was guttering by the time Juliet reached Nantwich and found a place for her van outside the ring of fire engines and snaking hoses. Two fi refighters still stood, directing streams of water into the sodden remains of Newcombe and Dutton. She pushed through the crowd of onlookers until she saw a familiar face.

  “Chief Inspector! What happened? Did you— Was anyone—”

  “There was no one inside, Mrs. Newcombe,” Babcock hastened to reassure her. “As to what happened, we released your husband’s partner about an hour before the blaze began. The door was padlocked, as we hadn’t got all the files out, but someone remedied that with a pair of bolt cutters.” He surveyed the damage with disgust.

  “It was lucky all of Monk’s Walk didn’t go up.”

  “You think Piers did this?” Juliet’s first relief was replaced with uneasiness.

  “It would seem the logical assumption, yes. There’s only so much even a high- priced lawyer can do if there’s sufficient evidence of wrongdoing. It would have been worth the risk to get rid of it. A can of petrol tucked under an overcoat—” He shrugged.

  “You’re sure the fire was set, then?”

  “You could still smell the petrol. I’ve sent a car to Mr. Dutton’s house. If he’s not at home, do you know where we might find him?”

  “I— His parents live in Chester. I don’t know where else he might go,” Juliet answered, but she was thinking furiously. This seemed much too blatant for Piers. He was a string puller, a manipulator—

  direct action was not his style. And looking at the smoldering, black-ened shell of what had been Newcombe and Dutton, she sensed there had been more at stake than covering up evidence.

  “—looks worse than it is,” Babcock was saying. “Even though some of the papers were strewn around the office, you’d be surprised at what we can re—”

  But Juliet didn’t hear the rest. Muttering “Excuse me,” she eased

  through the crush and slipped into the tree-covered tunnel of Monk’s Lane. Only light powder had drifted through the foliage, and it crunched under her feet as she ran.

  By the time she veered into North Crofts and reached her front porch, a stitch in her side made her bend over, gasping until it had passed. Then she saw that the door stood slightly ajar. Her heart thumping with fear, she pushed it open and walked into her house.

  It took her a moment to identify the unfamiliar smell. Petrol.

  Dear God. Her feet felt weighted now as she followed the scent, and the wet footprints, down the hall and into the kitchen.

  Still wearing his coat, Caspar stood at the kitchen sink, scrubbing at his hands. He looked up when she came into the room, but didn’t seem surprised to see her. “It won’t come out,” he said. “I can’t get it out.”

  “Caspar, what have you done?”

  He turned back to his scrubbing, his words made indistinct by the sound of the running water. “They let me watch while they carried out the files. But they didn’t get them all, so they put a padlock on the door and said they’d come back for the rest in the morning.

  “Some of Piers’s things were left. I wanted to see for myself. To prove you wrong. So I went back as it was getting dark. When no one was watching, I cut the lock.”

  “You cut the padlock?” Juliet said. This was a man who was known for his inability to change a lightbulb.

  Caspar, seemingly unaware of the incredulity in her voice, went on. “I found your bolt cutters in the garage. I put them under my coat. A fl imsy thing, the lock. It was easy, like slicing butter. Once I was inside, I made sure the blinds were closed tight, then I used a torch to look through Piers’s files.” He turned to her, heedless of the soapy water dripping from his hands, down the front of his coat and onto the floor.

  “He was cheating them. Almost all of them.” His eyes were dark s

  with shock. “I couldn’t believe—I couldn’t—I came back from the house and got a can of petrol. I scattered the papers from the files. I thought if I set them alight—”

  “Good God, Caspar, you could have been killed!” Juliet shouted at him. “Pouring petrol and setting it alight! Are you completely mad?” She shook her head in disgust. “And for nothing. You couldn’t have saved Piers. The police already have enough evidence to build a case against him; the rest was just icing on the cake. You might have got by, but now they’ll have you for arson and destroying evidence, and anything you could have salvaged from the business is ruined.

  What in bloody hell were you thinking?”

  Caspar collapsed into the nearest chair, like a scarecrow in a cashmere overcoat. Water still trickled from the tap, an echo of the tears flowing unchecked down his cheeks.

  “I thought we were— I thought Piers would have done anything for me. I thought that if I burned the office he’d be—” He sounded baffl ed by his own emotions. “I just wanted to hurt him, Jules, that’s all.”

  Kit followed Lally down the lane, trying to keep up with her when he felt blind and disoriented and she seemed able to see in the dark.

  Gradually, the snow grew lighter, diminishing to a few dancing flakes, and Lally’s outline solidifi ed.

  “Where the hell are we?” he asked, panting, when he managed a few paces by her side. They’d turned right out of the farmhouse drive, rather than left, the way he’d become accustomed to going in the car.

  “Shortcut to Barbridge. You’ll see. We’ll come out at the bridge over the canal.”

  “Lally, you said you had to meet Leo, but I thought you hadn’t talked to him. I mean yesterday you seemed—I don’t know—pissed off. And you haven’t been allowed to use the phone—”

  “Doesn’t matter,” she said shortly. “Remember yesterday he said

  for us to meet him? He will have waited last night. He’ll be there to night.”

  “But I don’t un—”

  “I have some things of his. Or at least, I’m supposed to have some things of his. The problem is, I don’t.” She giggled, the sound brittle as glass. “And Leo never stops until he gets what he wants.”

  “What do you mean, things of his. What sort of things?”

  Lally slowed enough to look at him. “Oh, Kit, don’t be so dense.

  Pills. And other stuff. You sound just like Peter.”

  “Peter?” Kit struggled to place the name. “Your friend who died?”

  “Drowned. He drowned,” said Lally, with a vehemence Kit didn’t understand. “You even look a bit like him—that schoolboy-innocence thing.”

  Kit felt the blood rise to his face, but before he could protest, she went on, “Leo called him a ponce, but he wasn’t. He was just . . . gentle. He was smart, and he was funny, and he could tell how I was feeling, you know? Without me saying.” Lally’s steps lagged until Kit had to slow his own. “And he knew how to touch me. It wasn’t that he’d been with other girls, it was just that he seemed to know what I was thinking, every minute, and he—”

  “There’s the bridge,” Kit said, knowing it was idiotic but desperate to stop her saying more. He hadn’t realized Peter had been that kind of friend, and he didn’t want to think about what Lally had been doing with him—but then she’d said that he reminded her of Peter—

  After that thought he no longer felt the cold, and was glad the darkness hid his blush. “About Leo,” he said, trying to focus on the other thing Lally had said. Somehow he found he wasn’t surprised that Lally had been holding drugs, or that Leo had given them to her.

  “You said you had Leo’s stuff, but you don’t anymore. Why not?”

  “Because someone went through my fucking backpack and took it.” The swearing didn’t quite hide the fear in her vo
ice. They’d s

  reached the stone arch of the bridge, and instead of crossing it, Lally leapt down onto the canal towpath like a mountain goat. “It must have been my mother, but then why hasn’t she said anything?” she went on. “She should have killed me, grounded me for life, and then some.”

  Kit was forced to follow her again, single file, and her words came back to him in bursts, carried by the wind.

  “Won’t Leo be worried about you getting in trouble?”

  “No—can’t be traced to him, can it? He’ll want me to get it back, or make it up—”

  “What do you mean, make it up?” asked Kit, not liking the sound of that at all.

  But Lally only muttered, “You wouldn’t understand,” and kept walking, head down, as if suddenly afraid she’d said too much.

  It was dark, so dark that Kit could only make out the water to his left as a deeper blackness. When something white flapped at them from the void, he jumped, grabbing Lally’s shoulder and pulling her to a halt. “What the—” Then, as his eyes adjusted, he realized where he was and what he was seeing. Beneath the wind he heard a creak of mooring ropes, saw the faint gleam of letters materializing against a dark hull. It was the Lost Horizon, and the streamer crack-ing in the wind was a loose end of the blue- and-white crime-scene tape wrapped round the boat. He was standing within inches of where Annie Lebow’s body had lain.

  “Christ, Lally.” Kit thought he might be sick. “What do you mean, bringing me here?” he shouted at her. “Don’t you know—”

  “Sorry, sorry.” Lally pulled at his jacket. “We’re not stopping here, but we have to go past. I didn’t think. Come on. We have to hurry.” She tugged at him until he stumbled after her, trying to shut out the images crowding into his mind: Annie, lying in the emerald grass of the towpath . . . his mother, lying against the white tile in their kitchen . . .

  Then he was caught in the rushing corridor of his dream, run-

  ning, running, trying to get help, while the room where his mother lay receded endlessly in front of him.

  Lally’s shaking him brought him out of it.