Perfect Sins

by Jo Bannister

  At first they walked in a companionable silence. But Ash was still pondering the enigma of the Byrfield family dynamic. “Pete’s mother might not be the sweetest-natured woman in the world,” he said, worrying at it like a troublesome tooth, “but it’s a big step from being sharp with the staff to murdering your own child. What has she ever done to make Pete think she was capable of that?”

  Hazel hadn’t told him about Byrfield’s fears, which had been shared with her as a confidence. She stopped, thunderstruck, and stared at him in the deepening twilight. “What … why … what makes you think…?”

  Ash blinked at her. “I haven’t passed the last six days in a drug-induced coma! When David was so certain it couldn’t be his brother he’d dug up, and Norris said the child was disabled, Pete started to worry. Really worry. He called his sister up from London, and had a stand-up argument with his mother. Bits of which percolated through shut doors and plastered ceilings. There might be other explanations, but that seemed the likeliest one. Are you saying I got it wrong?”

  “Well—no,” admitted Hazel. “But it was supposed to be a secret. I wouldn’t want Pete thinking I’d been gossiping about it.”

  “Of course not.” It was one of the things he was good at: keeping his own counsel. And another was this: putting together snippets of overheard conversations and significant exchanges of looks, and the things people were about to say and then didn’t, and arriving at a conclusion that might have occurred to almost no one else. Sometimes he was wrong, but not often. Being right was the basis of both his careers, first as an insurance investigator, then as a security analyst. It was hard to keep secrets from him, even now.

  Especially when it meant keeping them from Patience as well.

  Hazel, recovering her composure, decided there was nothing to be lost now by answering his question. “I’ve never heard that she’s done anything dreadful. But then, I didn’t grow up in her house. Pete would have a better idea what she’s capable of than I would.”

  “People seem to remember his father more fondly. You said he helped David get to university?”

  She nodded. “It was the sort of thing he’d do from time to time—identify a need and step in. He didn’t have to. But he recognized that David had the brains to do well, and maybe needed to get away from Burford, but wouldn’t have made it on his own.”

  “Diana couldn’t help?”

  “Diana’s talented, but I don’t think she makes a lot of money from her painting.”

  Again, Ash seemed to hear what she hadn’t said. “Do you suppose she’d have helped him if she could?”

  Hazel had her mouth open to say “Of course she would,” then shut it again and thought. “I don’t know. That’s another family that doesn’t enjoy the easiest relationship.”

  “David’s convinced his mother doesn’t like him. I wonder if he knows why.”

  “Apart from him being a loudmouthed smart-arse, you mean?” In the dusk they smiled at each other. Hazel went on thoughtfully. “I suppose losing her elder son—I know she thought he was safe with his father, but she’d still lost him—was bound to affect how she related to the one she had left. She might have smothered him, kept him close for fear of losing him, too. Maybe what she did instead was put a distance between them so that if Saul came back for David, she wouldn’t be hurt as much. And once she started telling herself that losing her younger child would be less of a wrench, the rest followed. She convinced herself that Jamie was the precious one, the perfect one. David was an also-ran.”

  “He didn’t know that his brother was disabled,” murmured Ash.

  “I suppose he was too young to have noticed. And Diana may have edited her memory of him—really does remember him as perfect. Which is a lot easier to do with someone you’ve lost than someone you see every day.”

  They’d nearly reached the gate lodge. A battered horse box rumbled past the end of the drive.

  “I wonder what happened,” Hazel mused. “Saul Sperrin hardly went to the trouble of coming back here to murder his elder son. And then there’s that grave—that took time, and trouble, and love. He must have wanted Jamie with him. But something went wrong. Perhaps the child panicked, started yelling for his mother, and Saul tried to hush him and managed to suffocate him. Something like that?”

  “It’s possible,” agreed Ash. “Jamie might have been his son, but he was breaking the law by abducting him. It would have been important to get away without causing a disturbance.”

  “It’s the cards that break my heart,” admitted Hazel. “Thirty years’ worth of Christmas and birthday cards that he shopped for and sent, all the time knowing Jamie was buried a short walk from his mother’s house.”

  “I suppose the search for a man who’d taken his own child back to his own country was never going to be as intense as a murder hunt. While Diana thought Jamie was safe, Saul was safe, too. At least”—he paused as another trailer rattled past—“safer than he would have been with the police forces of two countries hunting for him.”

  “Well, they’ll be hunting for him now.”

  “Do you suppose they’ll find him?”

  “It’s not easy to disappear for good,” said Hazel. “So many things these days mean having to prove who you are—financial transactions, traveling, getting a child into school—and a flag comes up on a computer to say you’re being sought. It was easier thirty years ago.”

  “Yes. But that applies more to people like us—the settled community.” Ash said it with hardly a trace of irony. “Travelers are still hard to keep tabs on. It’s the nature of their life—it suits them, and you have to conclude it suits the authorities, too. If Saul Sperrin hadn’t been a gypsy, he’d have been found years ago. But for someone wanting to assume a new identity, the traveling community is a good place to do it, and thirty years should be time enough.”

  Though Hazel nodded, her attention was elsewhere. She was looking up the Burford road with a puzzled expression. “Isn’t it a bit late for people to be going to a horse show?”

  “Er—I suppose.” Her ability to ride two trains of thought at the same time always unsettled Ash slightly.

  “And here comes another,” said Hazel, stepping back to let the trailer pass and then craning on tiptoe. “And … yes, it’s another black-and-white one.”

  Ash frowned. “The trailer?” He’d have put a fair bit of money behind his judgment that it was, although in need of painting, brown.

  “The occupant of the trailer. In the three trailers that have passed us there were a total of five horses, and three of them were black and white. What does that tell you?” She looked at him expectantly.

  Ash was slowly smiling. “Not a horse show—a fair. A gypsy horse fair. They’re going to park up somewhere overnight and trade tomorrow.”

  “Exactly.” Hazel sounded like a schoolteacher who’s finally got one of her dimmer pupils to recognize the difference between there and their. “Now, if those trailers are passing every couple of minutes, it seems likely that the fairground isn’t too far from here. Come on, the car’s right here—let’s follow.”

  “Now?” Ash had always been someone who planned ahead. Hazel’s impetuosity startled and often alarmed him.

  “Of course now.” She had the gate lodge door open and was shouting to her father. “Why not—do you turn back into a pumpkin at midnight?”

  “I just feel we ought to think this through.”

  “I have,” she assured him. “I think those trailers are going to meet up with a whole lot of other trailers, and about half the people towing them are going to be related, one way or another, to Saul Sperrin. If they don’t know where he is, or even if he’s still alive, no one will.”

  “You’re probably right,” conceded Ash. “But Saul Sperrin is now a murder suspect. Looking for him is the job of the police.”

  “I am the police.”

  He took in her determined expression and refrained from pointing out that she was a fairly recent component of the
police and was currently on sick leave. “I mean Detective Inspector Norris won’t thank us for interfering in his investigation. If there are people at the fair who know where Sperrin is, he’ll want to be the one asking them.”

  “But he isn’t here,” she explained, unnecessarily, “and we are. If we don’t follow these trailers, they’ll disappear into the countryside and Norris won’t know where to begin looking for them. Plus, even if he finds them, if the police show up at that fair tomorrow, no one will admit to knowing anything. Tonight, in the dark, with people arriving from all over England, with people unloading ponies and unhitching caravans, and everybody tired and wanting something to eat, it’ll be chaos. There’ll be lots of strange faces about. Anybody could wander around asking a few questions, as long as he doesn’t seem too pushy and doesn’t look like a policeman. Neither of us looks like a policeman. You look like a gypsy at the best of times. And Patience is the perfect dog for the job. No one who sees us walking our lurcher will challenge our right to be there.”

  Ash was horribly afraid that she was right. Afraid, because he knew that what she was proposing was dangerous. He knew he couldn’t talk sense into her when Hazel was in this mood. He looked down at his shoes. All he could do was refuse to go, and if he did that, she would go alone. “I should let Pete know.…”

  “We’ll phone him. You know—that little gismo I made you buy, that you’re supposed to carry with you but which, in fact, leaves home even less often than you do? It’s really clever. You tell it some numbers, and then you can talk to somebody even farther away than the end of the street. Get in.”

  Hazel was already starting the engine. Ash let Patience onto the backseat and climbed in the front. “All right, so we’re going to a gypsy horse fair and we’re going to ask if anyone knows where Saul Sperrin is. Even if we ask someone who knows, do you really think he’s going to tell us?”

  “Probably not,” she said ironically, “if I say he’s wanted for murder! I’m not stupid, Gabriel. I’ve no intentions of starting a fight. I’ll just say”—she slowed down, thinking it through as the words came—“I need to talk to him about a horse. I’ll say someone died and left him a horse, but if I can’t find him, it’ll go to someone else. The gypsy hasn’t been born who’d pass up the chance of a gift horse. Rather than let that happen, someone will remember where Saul Sperrin hangs out these days and how to get in touch with him.”

  Ash was unconvinced. “He was Saul Sperrin thirty years ago. He may have been someone else for most of the time since.”

  “He may have been someone else as far as the authorities are concerned. My bet is, among people who’ve known his people back to Finn MacCool, he’s still Saul Sperrin. Or at least they’ll know who I mean. Maybe we’ll get lucky and he’ll be here. But if not, maybe someone will let him know he’s due a horse and he’ll come looking for me.”

  “Hazel—are you sure you want him looking for you? This is a man who may well have killed his own ten-year-old son. Maybe it was an accident, but even so it’s the kind of accident that happens more to people who’re quicker with their fists than their brains. And he’s had thirty years to get over whatever guilt he felt, to get used to the idea that he got away with it. If some stranger starts asking questions about him, the prospect of a gift horse may not be enough to stop him wanting to shut you up.”

  “Then aren’t I lucky to have someone to protect me?”

  Ash felt himself flush. “Hazel, you know I’m not much good in a fight. I’ll do my best, but you really don’t want me to be the only thing standing between you and physical injury.”

  There was a moment’s silence. Then she said cheerfully, “It won’t come to that. I’ll be careful.”

  As they drove down the road, Ash heard a modest voice from the backseat saying, Actually, I think she meant me.

  CHAPTER 15

  THEY DROVE FOR fifteen minutes into the night. Twice, unsure which way to turn, Hazel pulled over and waited until another horse box came trundling along. Both times a pied rump was visible over the tailboard, and when she had let it get far enough ahead to avoid suspicion, she pulled out and followed. The second time she kept the taillights in view until suddenly they glowed extra red and the tow car began pulling off into a field on the right. All across the field were the lights of other vehicles, cars and lorries, caravans ancient and modern, and the flickering light of campfires. It was a scene that touched something primitive in Hazel’s heart, and she could not have said whether it was a good thing or a bad thing—yearning, or fear.

  Ash had his mouth open to say, “You’re not going in, are you?” when she did.

  They were, he felt sure, about to be challenged, when Hazel did one of those very clever things that kept surprising him. She was a lot younger than him, most people would not have accused her of sophistication, and everyone who met her—unless already in handcuffs—marked her down as a pleasant girl, a kind girl, a nice girl, rather than a smart girl. Being pleasant and kind and nice can be an effective disguise. Ash had known her long enough now to realize she was a lot smarter than most people gave her credit for.

  So as they approached the knot of men by the gate, men keeping a casual but still keen eye on who was arriving, she lifted one hand off the steering wheel to wave to them—and then lifted it higher still and waved energetically to some imaginary friend in the crowd farther up the field. Nodding vigorously that she was on her way, and with a last friendly wave to the men at the gate, she drove steadily through the press of bodies, human and equine, and the randomly parked vehicles toward a vacant spot near the far hedge. And nobody, Ash realized, nobody at all was watching them. Hazel had performed her fitting-in magic again. Somehow, nobody ever looked at her and saw a stranger. Even here, where almost every head was dark and every skin tanned, her fair hair and rosy, freckled face did not mark her as different.

  And somehow, because of that, and because in this place of friends and families people let their guard down without even knowing they were doing it, she was able to talk to the travelers as easily as she passed among them. Ash, bemused, moved in her wake and offered no contribution beyond his own vaguely Romany looks; and he marveled at how these private, suspicious people who had never seen her before took her on trust, and chatted away without realizing they were being questioned, and offered her and her companion mugs of strong tea from the supper fires.

  Patience, too, was attracting admirers. Several of the children, yawning with tiredness, paused to stroke her, and one of the men offered to buy her. Ash gave a troubled, apologetic shrug. “I’m sorry, I couldn’t…”

  “Okay,” came the amiable reply, but Ash felt eyes following him afterward in a way that they had not before.

  When they were alone, Hazel hissed, “Try to keep your mouth shut. The moment you speak, it’s like a great big neon INTERLOPER sign flashing over your head.”

  Ash knew it. What he didn’t understand was why the same sign didn’t light up when Hazel spoke. She didn’t sound like a gypsy any more than she looked like one, and yet she could chatter away for half an hour without raising either hackles or suspicions. “It’s probably getting time we left.”

  Hazel nodded. “I’ve one more guy to talk to. He’s down by the gate. We’ll take the car.”

  Ash allowed himself a tiny sigh of relief. At least, if they had the car with them, they could make a run for it if they were rumbled. “This guy—does he know where Sperrin is?”

  “Maybe,” murmured Hazel. “No one else seems to. But they all reckon if anybody’s going to know, it’ll be Swanleigh.”

  “Swanleigh?”

  Hazel gave a graceful shrug. “That’s his name.”

  They found Swanleigh, as directed, by the gate. He was a big man in his fifties; something about the way other men were orbiting around him, going where he pointed and laughing when he made a joke, suggested he was one of the movers and shakers in the camp. Hazel wound her window right down and leaned her elbow on it. “Are you Swanleigh?
”

  He looked her up and down, took in the dark man beside her and the white lurcher on the backseat, and did a sort of facial shrug. “Who’s asking?”

  Hazel left the car running and got out. “My name’s Hazel Best. Everyone’s telling me you’re the man I should be talking to.”

  One thick eyebrow lifted quizzically. “About the fair, is it?”

  “No. But it is about a horse. It’s not my horse—it belongs to Saul Sperrin, except he doesn’t know it yet. Is he here, do you know? Or is he coming?”

  The big man’s head tilted over to one side in a manner he clearly believed made him look cunning. “A horse now, is it?”

  “A horse and a half.” Hazel laughed. “Damn great black-and-white thing with more hair than a seventies rock group, and it’s eating me out of house and home!”

  “And this is Saul’s horse?”

  “It belonged to a neighbor of mine. She was traveler folk. When she died, I said I’d look after it until the solicitors could contact Saul to collect it. But they say they can’t find him. And I can’t keep it for much longer—I need the stable. I’m going to have to sell it and give the money to the solicitors to dole out among the other heirs.”

  “Don’t be doing that!” exclaimed Swanleigh, horrified, as if she’d suggested barbecuing the animal. “I’m sure we can find your man for you. Saul Sperrin, you say?”

  Hazel nodded. “You know him?”

  “Oh yes, yes,” agreed the big man. “Now, I haven’t seen him for a little while, but I’ve a good idea where to find him. You could always—”

  She interrupted his hopeful suggestion. “You’re not expecting him at the fair tomorrow, then?”

  The man shrugged. “Anything’s possible. Anyone can turn up at a horse fair. Now, this big colored horse of his—where do you have it?”

  Hazel gestured in the direction of Byrfield. “He has family in the area. At least he had.”

  “We could pick the horse up. You know—for him.…”