by Celina Grace
“Picture quality’s crap.” Chloe leaned in to get a better view.
“Yeah, I know, but it was a rainy night, the camera there is old and it’s the best I’ve got, okay?” They all craned to look. There on screen, a small dark figure walked around the edge of Market Square. It was almost impossible to make out anything of detail, due to the grainy footage, but it was just possible to see that the figure was wearing some kind of dark, hooded coat and was wearing high-heeled shoes.
“A woman,” said Kate.
Theo threw her a look. “Well, I suppose it could be a very small transvestite, but yes, I’d hazard a guess that it’s a woman. Now look...”
They all watched as the figure opened the door of the Farraday’s town house and went inside.
“Are they using a key?” Kate asked, squinting to try and make it out. It was a useless task – the footage was just too unclear. She looked at the time clock on the piece of digital film. It was nine fifty-three pm when the woman – or whoever – let herself in, whether by key or by an unlocked door. “Is that it?” she asked.
“Pretty much.”
Kate frowned. “We don’t see her leave?”
Both Chloe and Theo turned to look at her with the air of people saving the best for last. “No,” said Chloe, folding her arms across her chest. “We don’t.”
Kate’s frown deepened. “What? Not at all?”
“No.” Chloe smiled rather grimly.
“That’s—” Kate broke off for a moment, looking back at the black and white flicker of Theo’s computer screen. “Come on, that’s not possible. She must have gone out the back way. Is there a back way?”
“Yes.” Theo was looking like someone in possession of a juicy secret he was desperate to impart. “But the footage covering that street doesn’t have anything on it either.”
Kate stared at them both. “Nothing? For the whole night? Right up until Mia Farraday arrives in the morning?”
Theo shook his head. “Nada. Not a dickie bird.”
Kate scoffed. “Oh, come on. That’s our murderer, most probably, and they just vanish into thin air? Have you told Anderton that?”
Both Theo and Chloe looked a little sheepish. “No,” said Theo after a moment.
“Right. Because it’s not possible.” Kate looked back at the screen, rubbing her fingers along her jaw. “There must be a missing piece of footage, or something.”
Theo looked even more sheepish. “Well...”
Kate looked up sharply. “What?”
“Well, there is about a fifteen-minute interval when the tape goes on the fritz. The camera in the square. About two am in the morning. Only fifteen minutes or so.”
Kate rolled her eyes and sagged. “Well, that’s it then, isn’t it? That’s when she left. God knows how she timed it right, or maybe it’s just our bad luck and coincidence—”
“Maybe,” said Chloe. She sounded uneasy. “I don’t know, though.”
“Oh, come on. Fifteen minute of no footage, well after the murder’s been committed, where there’s no tape evidence of anyone coming or going? The defence team would be on that like – like a rocket.”
Chloe shrugged. “Well, if there’s no footage of anyone else entering or leaving the house in all that other time, and the only time we don’t have covered is after the murder is committed, then that woman – or whoever she is – seen entering the house at nine fifty-three is the murderer. Got to be.”
Kate looked at the screen again. “Not necessarily.”
“Well, then – what do you mean?”
Kate tapped Theo on the shoulder. “Theo, how far back in these tapes have you looked?”
“What?”
“I mean, have you just looked at footage from the night of the murder?”
Theo looked confused. “Yeah. So far – I haven’t had time to do anything else.”
“What are you getting at, Kate?” asked Chloe.
Kate raised both hands in a shrugging gesture. “It’s just an idea but what if the murderer actually entered the house before the day of the murder?”
There was a short silence. “What, and just – stayed there?” asked Theo.
“Perhaps. It’s only an idea.”
As one, they all looked at the screen again. Theo had paused the footage at the clip of the dark figure letting themselves in at the door.
“Well, I suppose it’s possible,” said Chloe, slowly.
“So, who’s that, then?” Theo demanded, pointing at the figure on the screen. They all regarded it again, as if the answer would suddenly reveal itself.
“It wouldn’t—” Kate began, and then shook her head and shut up.
“What?”
“It wouldn’t be – Simon Farraday, would it?” she said, waiting for Theo’s laughter at the thought. It didn’t come. They all three leaned closer to the screen to see if they could work it out.
“I don’t think so,” Chloe pronounced, a few moments later. “Whoever it is, he or she is quite small. Farraday was a good six foot. And this person has small feet – he didn’t.”
“Mm.” Kate blew out her cheeks in frustration. “Well. Like I said, it was only an idea.”
Unnoticed by any of them, Olbeck had wandered up to see what they were doing. His sudden question made them all jump. “What’s all this?”
Kate explained as quickly and as simply as she could. Olbeck listened, nodding. “Well, I think the quickest thing to do is interview Mia Farraday again, see if she knows if anyone’s been in the house in the last week or so.”
“I’ll start going through the earlier footage,” promised Theo. “First thing tomorrow.”
That made Kate look at the clock. Time had raced by while they were working and it was almost seven o’clock. Merlin would be yowling for his dinner.
“I’ll call for you first thing,” said Olbeck, as they all said their goodbyes and prepared to leave the office. “We’ll interview Mia Farraday together. I’m sure there’s a lot more she can tell us.”
“I’m sure, too.” Kate clapped him on the shoulder in a farewell gesture and then went to gather her bag and coat, yawning and thinking with longing of her home, and her cat, and a very large pizza.
Chapter Seven
When Olbeck drove into the driveway of the Farraday residence the next morning, the only car to be seen on the wide concrete sweep of the driveway was a battered looking little Fiat. Kate gave it a puzzled glance as their own car parked alongside it. Surely that wasn’t Mia Farraday’s car? Women like her (in her own mind, Kate was feeling a little guilty for pigeonholing the woman like this, but she knew what she was trying to say) – women like Mia, stay at home mothers partnered to wealthy men, usually drove gigantic gleaming four wheel drives or something smaller but fashionable, like a new Mini or a Beetle.
The little mystery was solved as the door was answered by Mandy, one of the victim liaison officers. Kate and Olbeck knew her quite well and they exchanged greetings tempered in enthusiasm by the sombreness of their surroundings.
“I’m only here for today,” Mandy whispered as they made their way down the corridor to the huge living area at the back of the house. Mia Farraday was seated at the dining table, concentrating on the screen of a small silver laptop. The sight of it made Kate recall that Simon Farraday’s work and home laptops and computer equipment were currently being examined by the IT department back at the station. She made a mental note to check with Sam Hollingsworth, the head of the IT, whether they’d found anything interesting yet. Presumably Mia’s laptop would have also been seized, especially when she’d been considered a suspect. Clearly, IT had found nothing of interest on it and had returned it to its owner.
As if Mia had read her mind, she looked up and caught Kate’s eye. “Good morning, DS Redman.” Kate saw her looking quizzically at Olbeck, who apparently she hadn’t met. Kate hastened to introduce him.
Mandy excused herself and walked over to the kitchen area, so she was still in view but more or less o
ut of earshot.
“How are you, Mrs Farraday?” asked Kate.
Mia smiled wanly. She looked better than she had at their previous meeting – the cut on her lip was healing – but she looked as though she was losing weight. The sharp angle of her cheekbones was so acute it looked painfully as though the bone was about to protrude through the skin of her cheeks. “I’m surviving. I can’t really say I’m doing anything better than that.”
For the first time, it occurred to Kate to wonder where the Farraday children were. She recollected that there were three of them. Perhaps at school? She asked as much.
“James is. He’s nine. Milo is at pre-school and Sarah’s taken Tilly out to her playgroup.”
Of course, Sarah was the nanny. That was somebody else it might be worth talking to. Kate asked how the children were coping and regretted it when Mia’s face crumpled.
“They’re doing as well as can be expected,” she said in a colourless voice. Another white handkerchief was extracted from the pocket of her jeans to wipe her eyes. “Luckily Tilly’s too little to really understand. Well, so is Milo, I suppose. It’s James that’s—” She broke off, her voice wobbling, and turned away for a moment.
When she turned back, she had a smile on her face but one that looked as though it was actually causing her physical pain. “I’m so sorry, I haven’t even asked if you wanted coffee, or something.”
“I can make that,” called Mandy, from the kitchen.
“I like having her here,” Mia whispered, stowing the damp handkerchief back in her pocket. “It’s another pair of hands to help and it just seems – oh, a little less lonely with someone else here.”
“Do you not have any relatives or friends that might be able to come and help you out?” Kate asked sympathetically.
Mia shook her head. “My brother lives overseas, and my friends are all so busy, I couldn’t impose on them...” She trailed off for a second. “There’s nothing wrong with me, you know, it’s just – it’s just grief. And shock. And I’ve got Sarah, I suppose.”
She broke off abruptly, staring out of the enormous expanse of glass at the back of the room. Mandy brought over some mugs of coffee and a plate of biscuits.
Olbeck and Kate settled themselves around the dining table. Mia sat back down in her chair and flipped the lid of her laptop closed. “Your lot just returned that this morning,” she said, a hint of irritation in her voice. “I’m just trying to catch up with everything I’ve missed over the last week.”
Olbeck obviously recognised that as a good place to jump in. “Are you very involved in your husband’s business, Mrs Farraday?”
Mia looked surprised. “With Porthos? No, not at all. I’m a shareholder but that’s it. I don’t have anything to do with the day to day running of the business.” She glanced down at her closed laptop and added “No, it’s more the property side of things that I have to worry about. The holiday let and the, well, the day to day running of the house. That was what I was talking about.”
Talking about her role in the family seemed to bring her some comfort and a little colour came back into her hollowed cheeks. Kate found herself wondering whether Simon Farraday had left a will. Surely he must have done, a man as wealthy as he had been?
“We met your husband’s business partner yesterday. Well, his deputy, I suppose. Ewan Askell.” Olbeck said this rather apropos of nothing, but Kate recognised his attempt to gain a little bit more information on the man.
Mia half smiled. “Oh, Ewan? Yes, he came round yesterday with some flowers. Very kind of him. He is kind, though.”
“You know him well?”
“No. Only through Simon.” Mia was silent for a moment and then added “Simon never had much time for Ewan. He dismissed him as a bit of a fool. But then he was like that with anyone who wasn’t much like him.”
“Really?”
Mia half smiled. “Simon was a very intelligent man. Very intelligent. And that sometimes made him quite – quite impatient with anyone who he thought couldn’t keep up with him, intellectually.”
Kate regarded Simon Farraday’s wife for a moment. She would have said that Mia Farraday, given her articulacy and her manner, was an intelligent woman. Had his wife been one of the people to whom Simon Farraday had shown his impatience? Did she miss him or mourn him? Kate would have said, by the reaction she’d got from Mia on their first meeting, that it went without saying. Now, she wondered a little. Mia wouldn’t have been the first wife who, while their husbands were alive, had gone through married life wrapped in a happy bubble of denial. Once death came, that bubble as often as not popped and reality was laid bare.
“How did you and Simon meet, Mrs Farraday?” she asked, curious now to get some more background on the Farradays’ marriage.
Mia gave her a surprised glance, as if she’d forgotten Kate was in the room. “I was an intern at his first company. It was my first placement after university.” She smiled rather ruefully. “My parents weren’t best thrilled, me dating a man fifteen years older than myself, and the boss of the company at that time. Still...” She made an eloquent shrugging gesture. “There we go.”
“Where did you go to university?” asked Kate, just for form’s sake. She was confirmed in her view of Mia Farraday being at least of average intelligence, given that she’d gained a place on a degree course.
“Edinburgh. I did History.” Mia looked at her closed laptop. “Gosh, that seems such a long time ago now.”
They were interrupted by the sight of a young woman striding along in front of the glass doors, with a toddler settled on her hip. She was tall and slender, with thick blonde hair pulled back into a messy bun. They all watched her in silence as she opened the back door with her free hand and came into the room.
“Oh! Sorry,” said the woman, looking a little startled at the sight of them all. Clearly the sunlight shining on the glass outside hadn’t allowed her to see through it while she was walking past. The toddler, a beautiful little girl with dark, shiny curls, looked at them silently and put her thumb in her mouth.
“This is Sarah Collins, our nanny,” said Mia. Her tone was neutral, and that in itself made Kate glance at her. What was the relationship between the two women? Warm and friendly or cool and professional? Or antagonistic?
Sarah smiled around at them all rather nervously as Mia introduced the two police officers.
“Good morning, Ms Collins,” said Olbeck with a friendly smile. “We’d like to have a quick word with you at some point, if that’s okay with you – and with Mrs Farraday?”
Mia nodded. “That’s fine with me.” She held out her arms to the toddler. “Hello, Tillikins! How’s my girl?”
Kate watched as Sarah relinquished the little girl. Tilly went to her mother happily and with a smile on her face, her little thumb popping out of her mouth as she flung her arms around her mother’s neck. She wondered what Simon’s relationship with his children had been like. From the sounds of it, he’d been buried in work most of the time. Work and extra-marital relations? She found herself suddenly feeling sorry for Mia Farraday, who, whether or not she’d known about her husband’s infidelity (and had there just been the one, the one who might have killed him, or many?) had obviously been left to shoulder the majority of the domestic chores. Even if she did have a nanny.
“I’ll be in my room,” Sarah said, looking to Mia as if for approval. Mia nodded again, without looking at her, her attention on Tilly.
Kate and Olbeck exchanged a glance. It was going to be a little tricky to question Mia about some of her husband’s more questionable activities if a two-year-old child was going to be present.
Mia seemed, without mentioning it, to understand this. “Come on, Tilly, let’s see if we can find you some Peppa Pig to watch while I talk to these grown-ups.”
“Peppa!” said Tilly with enthusiasm.
“Yes, Peppa. Come on, let’s get you settled over here.”
Kate and Olbeck waited while the big television was tur
ned on and a nest of cushions made for Tilly in front of it. When her daughter was settled with a sippy cup of juice, Mia came back and sat down at the table. She looked tired.
“I’m sorry, I know you’ve got things you need to ask me.” She slumped a little in her seat before pushing herself back upright. “Fire away.”
Olbeck cleared his throat. “Were you aware that your husband—” He stopped for a minute and changed tack. “I’m sorry, but was your husband faithful to you, Mrs Farraday?” He added quickly, “I know it must be painful, I’m sorry.”
Mia didn’t look angry but something tightened in her face. “I didn’t know—” She broke off, pinching the bridge of her narrow nose. “I suppose I had an inkling. I didn’t ever ask him about it. To be honest—” She broke off again, looking a little shamefaced. “To be honest, I didn’t want to know. Cowardly of me, I know, but – but even if he was cheating on me, what was I going to do about it? I’ve got three young children, I don’t work, I haven’t got an income of my own. And Simon and I, we were fine together. Most of the time. I mean, we had our ups and downs, all couples do but there was nothing...” She fell silent again. “I just didn’t want to know. If there was anything. I certainly didn’t realise he was into all of – all of that.”
Olbeck spoke cautiously. “By that, you mean the—”
Now Mia did look angry. “Do you want me to spell it out? That, the handcuffs, the leather. I had no idea—” She broke off, folding her lips together as if to keep her anger in.
She meant it, Kate realised. She hadn’t had any idea. No wonder she’d reacted like she had on finding him. Not just the shock of his death but the manner of it. Again, she felt a brief but keen stab of sympathy for the woman.
“I understand, Mrs Farraday.” When Olbeck wanted to be soothing, he could be very soothing indeed. “So you had no idea who he might have been meeting that night at the townhouse?”
“No. I haven’t any idea at all.”
“You haven’t received any messages from anyone? Anything odd at all?”
“No.”
“You – forgive me – you never checked your husband’s phone or computer, or anything like that?”