Far Cry

by John Harvey

  'And Paul knew?'

  A slow shake of the head. 'She was going to tell him when the time was right.'

  29

  'I always thought architects made a fortune,' Helen said.

  She was sitting out on the porch at Will and Lorraine's, Sunday afternoon, the three of them with glasses of wine; in a corner of the garden Jake was banging nails into one side of the den he and Will had been building earlier; Susie was sitting, cross-legged, closer by, nappy hanging down beneath her white dress, using an old tablespoon to shovel earth carefully into a plant pot until it was full, then, having patted it down, just as carefully take it out again.

  'Why don't you invite Helen round?' Lorraine had said. 'Sunday lunch or something. I haven't seen her in ages.'

  Several weeks later Helen had arrived, carrying a bottle of Californian white wine and a bunch of flowers that had looked much fresher under the supermarket lights than they did out here in the open.

  'You see them on television sometimes,' Helen said now. 'Richard what's-his-name, who designed that thing in London ...'

  'The Gherkin?'

  'Yes.'

  'Richard Rogers?'

  'Sounds right.'

  'No, I don't think so,' Lorraine chipped in. 'I think that was somebody else.'

  'Anyway, whoever it was, jobs like that, or that bridge over the Thames ...'

  'The one that nearly collapsed when too many people started walking over it ...'

  'You can imagine the money that's involved. Millions. They must be raking it in.'

  'I don't know,' Will said, 'the bloke who built this place ...'

  'He wasn't an architect,' Lorraine said, 'he was just a builder.'

  'Someone would have drawn up the plans, I doubt he'd have done that himself.'

  'Maybe so. What's your point?'

  'My point is, design something like this, you're on a small percentage of nothing very much. You just think how many architects must spend their time on kitchen extensions and new bathrooms.'

  'Why,' Lorraine asked, 'are we talking about this anyway?'

  'The woman who was killed,' Helen said, 'by her husband, you remember? That's what she was. She was an architect.'

  'This is where the husband killed his wife and then himself ?'

  'Yes. She was looking to leave him, apparently. Take her kid ...'

  'Their kid,' Will interrupted.

  'Okay, their kid. Take their kid, this little boy, and move to Australia. When we checked back on her computer, there were all these hits on the Royal Australian Institute of Architects and other sites where she'd been looking for jobs. The money wasn't great, believe me.'

  'But that's why he killed her?' Lorraine said. 'Because she was leaving?'

  'And taking the boy, yes, that's what it looks like.'

  'There wasn't somebody else? She wasn't having an affair?'

  'Apparently not. Not then. Not as far as we've found out, anyway. Though she did have this one affair a few years back and she managed to keep that pretty quiet.'

  'It's not impossible then?'

  'No, it's not impossible.'

  'How old was she? Not young.'

  'What's young? She was nearly forty. Thirty-nine.'

  'Seems a big step to make all on your own, at that age especially.'

  'Depends,' Helen said, with a knowing glance towards Will, 'how badly you want to get away.'

  'I wasn't going to say anything,' Lorraine said, starting to smile, 'but I have just renewed my passport. Jake's too. Canada, I'm thinking. Or maybe New Zealand.'

  'Very funny,' Will said.

  There was a shout and a crash from the far end of the garden, as half of Jake's den went tumbling to the ground.

  'Especially,' Lorraine said, 'now that Will's other career's come to nothing.'

  Will hurried down to rescue Jake, who was sitting amidst pieces of loose timber, crying inconsolably. Susie, lower lip trembling, was looking round, wide-eyed, on the verge of joining in in sympathy.

  'A top-up?' Lorraine said, reaching for the bottle.

  'I shouldn't,' Helen said. And then, 'Oh, all right. Just a small one.'

  'Will?' Lorraine signalled in the direction of his empty glass.

  'Why not?' He picked Jake up and gave him a hug. 'We'll build it again next weekend, I promise, and even better.'

  'Norman,' Lorraine said a few moments later, 'that's who it was. Norman Foster. Who did the Gherkin.'

  'I thought he designed sunglasses,' Will said.

  'You mean like Richard Rogers wrote all those songs?'

  'What are you two on about?' Helen asked, confused.

  'When I first started seeing Lorraine,' Will said, setting Jake down on the porch, 'we used to go out to Saffron Walden to her parents' for lunch on Sundays.'

  'Some Sundays.'

  'After we'd eaten, her dad would come out with a bottle of sherry and we'd sit round listening to songs from the shows on CDs he'd bought in Debenhams; counting the minutes till we could politely get up and leave. Rodgers and Hammerstein's Greatest Hits. I could do you a quick chorus of "Some Enchanted Evening" even now.'

  'Don't,' Lorraine said. 'Please, just don't.'

  'How about you?' Will said, looking pointedly at Helen. 'Any musical interludes with Declan's parents? Bit difficult, since he's married to someone else.'

  'Very funny.'

  'Declan,' Lorraine said, 'that's the new boyfriend?'

  'Bit of rough,' Will said, before Helen could answer. 'I think that's the term you're looking for.'

  'Will ...'

  'How is it going?' Will said. 'Walked into any good doors lately?'

  'Fuck off, Will!'

  'Language,' he said with a grin, clamping his hands over Jake's ears.

  'Just fuck off,' Helen mouthed silently and Will laughed.

  'Ignore him,' Lorraine said.

  'I wish!'

  An hour or so later, the light already slowly beginning to fade, Lorraine and Helen were in the kitchen, belatedly clearing away the lunch things. Will was in the garden, practising headers with Jake, and Susie was asleep on the settee, clutching a white bear missing one ear.

  'What was Will on about?' Lorraine asked, rinsing one of the glasses under the tap. 'Walking into doors?'

  'Oh, nothing.'

  'You're sure?'

  Helen scraped away food from one of the plates before slotting it down into the dishwasher.

  'You know how Will likes to wind me up ...'

  'He seemed pretty serious.'

  Helen sighed and reached for another plate. 'We were just fooling around ...'

  'You and Declan—is that his name?'

  'Declan, yes. Declan Morrison. We were just playing games and I banged my head against the wall. It was an accident.' She shrugged. 'I bruise easily, that's all.'

  'Games,' Lorraine said. 'What kind of games?'

  'Oh, you know...'

  'No, go on.'

  'Go on what?'

  'Tell me.'

  Helen grinned. 'You're not getting turned on by this, are you?'

  'No.'

  'Well, it's just ... just a bit of play-acting, I suppose. I mean, we don't get dressed up or anything.' She laughed. 'The odd bit of fancy lingerie, maybe, but I'm not getting into some French maid's outfit for anyone. It's more, oh, you know, I'll tease him, pretend I'd not interested. Come on all prim and proper. Or carry on as if I'm alone in the flat and I don't know he's there—like when I'm getting ready for bed or getting out of the shower then he'll take me by surprise.'

  'Jesus!'

  'What?'

  'What you're describing. He takes you by surprise. It's a rape fantasy, that's what it is.'

  'Is it, bollocks!'

  'What else would you call it?'

  'A bit of fun?'

  Lorraine sighed and shook her head. 'I don't think so.'

  'Come on,' Helen said. 'It's a game. I'm pretending. I know it's going to happen. And he doesn't force me, not really. He doesn't hurt me.'<
br />
  'He doesn't?'

  'I told you, that was an accident.'

  Lorraine looked at her steadily, then turned aside; there were still a few things on the table that needed to be cleared away.

  'Don't you,' Helen said quietly, 'and be honest now—don't you ever have fantasies about being powerless—tied up or something, held down—while someone makes love to you?'

  'No,' Lorraine said, perhaps a little too vehemently. 'No, of course I don't. And if I did, I think I'd probably ask for help.'

  'A bit difficult,' Helen said laughing, 'when you're handcuffed to the bed.'

  'Well, now,' said Will coming in from the garden. 'What are you two on about?'

  'Oh, nothing,' Lorraine said. 'Just girl talk. Nothing for you to worry your little mind about.'

  'And I think,' Helen said, looking at her watch, 'it might be time for me to go. Leave you two lovebirds alone.'

  'Alone?' Will said, as Jake came in through the door, dirt on his face and in his hair. 'Aren't you forgetting something?' In the other room, Susie had started to stir.

  'See you tomorrow,' Helen said, 'bright and early.' And taking hold of both Lorraine's hands she kissed her on the cheek. 'Thanks for lunch.'

  'A pleasure. Come again, okay?'

  Helen nodded.

  'I'll walk you out to the car,' Will said.

  'No need.'

  He knew that the moment she was outside she would pause and light a cigarette before driving away.

  'You, young man,' Lorraine said, tousling Jake's hair. 'You need a good wash before going to bed. In fact, a bath. That's what you need, a quick bath.'

  'Oh, Mum...'

  'Go on, your dad'll run it for you while I sort out your sister, okay? Okay, Will?'

  'Yes, fine. Come on, Jake, I'll race you upstairs.'

  Smiling, Lorraine went into the living room and carefully lifted Susie up into her arms.

  30

  Before the summer months had been overtaken by the outbreak of violent crime that had stretched resources to the uttermost, Will, still bothered—haunted, even—by the thought that he had failed to check adequately into Mitchell Roberts' past, had given one of his DCs the task, laborious and painstaking even in this computer age, of checking for any unsolved cases of abducted or abused girls to which Roberts could have possible links.

  He still didn't accept Liam Noble's view that the attack on Martina Jones was an isolated incident. In Will's experience, men with Roberts' predilections didn't get to fifty-plus years of age without accumulating a history of offending. And yet, not only had he never, seemingly, been arrested—nor even questioned—in connection with any similar crime, when his property at Rack Fen had been searched, nothing more pornographic than an old copy of Penthouse had been found; no under-the-counter DVDs, no kiddie porn, nothing to fuel the fantasies which had left twelve-year-old Martina naked at the roadside, bleeding and torn.

  Will had tried to convince himself that Noble was right and that circumstances—the heat of summer, the isolated presence of the girl—a girl who, despite her age, was not sexually inexperienced—had led Roberts to behave as he had for the one and only time. Behaviour he now deeply regretted. Noble had claimed that Roberts was contrite: he had paid his penalty, his debt to society, and admitted the error of his ways. And according to Roberts' probation officer, since his release he had been punctilious in reporting, had received eloquent testimonials from the garage where he worked, and had in no way suggested a propensity to reoffend.

  Maybe, Will allowed himself to think. Maybe.

  But then he remembered the lascivious smile that had curled around Roberts' mouth when the older man had confronted him in Cambridge.

  'You got children? I'd like to see 'em some time'

  Remembered and became convinced again that Noble was wrong and he was right.

  Three cases came up that interested Will particularly—those of Rose Howard, Janine Prentiss and Christine Fell—all occurring within a span of seven years, from 1993 to 2000, and all within a hundred-mile radius of where Martina Jones had been attacked, the sparsely populated hinterland of East Anglia. Janine Prentiss and Christine Fell had been abducted, abused and then abandoned; Rose Howard had, to all intents and purposes, simply disappeared.

  Rose Howard had been living on a new housing estate in Peterborough when she had disappeared. Her family had moved there from Corby three years before, when the factory where her father had worked was closed down. She had an older brother, Peter, who hung out with a bunch of dropouts in the town centre and had already been in trouble with the police. Rose tried making friends at her new school, but it was hard, and then, when she went up to the comprehensive—'Your chance, Rose dear,' the headmistress had said, 'to make a new start'—it had been worse. Though even being bullied was preferable to being ignored. She started to play truant, hanging around the shopping centre and the bus station. One day a man gave her five pounds to put her hand down inside his trousers.

  'Where'd you get this from?' her mum said, finding the note, crumpled and green, inside the torn lining of her coat.

  When she told her, her mum slapped her and called her a stupid little whore. Her dad laughed and told her to ask for a tenner next time—'That's closer to the going rate.'

  Rose cried: not because of being hit, but because she'd been saving the five pounds for when she ran away. She started stealing from her mother's purse instead; not much, there was never much there, just enough so it would never get noticed. She stole, too, from the other kids at school, money taken from their pockets in the cloakroom or when they were doing PE; once, she took ten pounds from the teacher's handbag when it was left, one lunch-time, on her desk.

  Her truancy got worse.

  Her mother was told she was in danger of being sent to court if she didn't make sure her daughter attended school.

  On a damp and drizzly February afternoon, Rose packed some clothes into a rucksack, along with two Polly Pocket dolls and a CD by Take That she'd stolen from a stall in the market and never played, and started walking along London Road.

  She was last seen by the mother of one of the girls in her class, getting into the cab of a small, open-backed lorry carrying sacks of what might have been compost or fertiliser.

  That was fifteen years ago: there had been nothing since, so sighting, no postcard. If she were still alive, Rose Howard would be twenty-seven years old.

  ***

  Twelve-year-old Janine had gone missing from her home in Wisbech two years later, 1995. Her parents, who ran a small market garden attached to the property, had left her in the house with her two younger siblings, all three stretched out in the living room, watching TV. Neither parent had gone far, the mother to their shop, filling in for the teenage helper who had failed to arrive; the father to dig in a fresh delivery of bonemeal. They were absent from the house for a little over an hour, in which time Janine went missing.

  When the mother came back into the house and asked where Janine was, her younger sister said she'd gone upstairs to wash her hair; her brother, five, engrossed in some animated film or other, didn't seem to have noticed she was no longer there.

  Janine was not in the bathroom, nor the bedroom she and her sister shared.

  Sometimes, when she was bored, she would go down and help her father but he'd seen neither hide nor hair. Calls to Janine's close friends yielded nothing. Her father drove along the lanes to the east of the town, closest to where they lived: Walsoken, Rosedale, Paradise Farm. Janine had been known to wander off on her own but never far.

  'What the hell you do, girl?' her mother would ask.

  'Nothin', Mum. Just thinkin' 'bout stuff, that's all.'

  Her father tracked back, circled round by Emneth and Oxburgh Hall. Flat landscape, straight roads, tall sky. No sign of Janine.

  'I shouldn't worry overmuch,' the police officer said. 'You say she's gone off before? She'll turn up then, I dare say. Come morning, if not sooner.'

  Come morning she
was still not there.

  A search was raised. Neighbours, friends, volunteers. A line of police in special uniforms walked through the fields closest to the house, a fingertip apart. Divers explored two deep ponds less than half a mile distant. Janine's photograph appeared on hastily printed posters attached to bus shelters and telegraph poles. A long-faced girl with long, straight hair, medium brown; grey eyes, tall for her age.

  Three days after she disappeared, Janine knocked on the door of a farmhouse near Outwell, some six miles, no more, from her home. Her clothing was torn and her hair unkempt—as if she'd been sleeping in a ditch, thought the woman who answered the door. Janine asked please could she have a drink of water and use the toilet and then would the woman kindly phone her mum and dad and tell them where she was.

  The story was slow in coming. Bored with staying indoors, she had gone for a walk along the path through the fields that led on to the road to Paradise Farm and it was there that a van stopped and the driver asked if she were lost. There was a dog in the front with him, a black and white collie, as yet little more than a puppy, and when Janine reached in through the open window the dog had started licking her hand. So when the man said, 'Hop in, why don't you? We'll give you a lift down the turn, me and Ezra here,' Janine had accepted with scarcely a second thought.

  'She would an' all,' her mother said later. 'Anything to do with animals, dogs especially, and every scrap of common sense that girl's got flies out the window.'

  At the turn in the road, instead of letting her out, the man had swung the van around and driven off in the opposite direction.

  All of Janine's screaming had done no good.

  When they stopped it was at a pair of cottages in the middle of nowhere, one of which seemed to be tumbling down. The man pushed Janine into a room and threw a bucket in after her before locking the door. 'Do your business in there.'

  Later that night he came for her, smelling of drink.