by Lisa Cutts
She allowed her words to hang in the air as Pierre scrutinized Mrs Lewis’s face for one of the fundamentals of police work – the initial reaction. There was nothing that came close to observing the involuntary realigning of facial muscles and flash of emotion across the eyes. It replaced a hundred questions and answers and even the most poised witnesses and suspects rarely masked what they were really thinking.
A little wave of fright swept across her face, followed swiftly by a glance towards the staircase behind her.
As he stood impassive on the doorstep, Pierre took all this in and concluded that Monica was at home upstairs, probably in her bedroom. It explained why the initial signs of trepidation displayed by Mrs Lewis were now being replaced by interest and annoyance.
She folded her arms across her chest and said, ‘I’d rather you didn’t bother her, she’s off sick from school.’
‘I’m sorry to hear that,’ said Hazel. ‘We’re not from Sussex police and we’ve come a fair distance to speak to her. Can we at least come in and talk to you?’
Perhaps her curiosity got the better of her or maybe Mrs Lewis had more time for the police than Pierre had expected. Whatever it was, she dropped her hands to her sides and let them into her home.
She led them to the dining room at the back of the house. Most of the area was taken up with a large table and eight chairs, along with a glass-fronted display cabinet.
After closing the door, Mrs Lewis pulled out a chair for herself and said, ‘Please take a seat. It’s not the most comfortable of rooms but Monica’s bedroom is at the front of the house and there’s less chance of her overhearing us if we’re in here.’
‘What’s the matter with her, Mrs Lewis?’ said Hazel. ‘I don’t want to intrude if it’s serious.’
‘Call me Louise. I wouldn’t say serious.’ Her eyes fluttered up to the ceiling, in the direction of the front of the house. She seemed to sag as she thought about her answer.
‘What happened to Monica was horrendous and we have to live with it every day. I’m probably far too lenient with her. Bruce tells me that I let her get away with too much. He’s probably right but I can’t help but think I’ve got to try to make it up to her. I let her down. My own daughter and I failed to protect her. She was in the street one minute and gone the next.’
It was simply stated as if she wasn’t expecting an answer. Something no doubt that had become her mantra over the last six months.
‘She’s twelve now, it was her birthday last week, and she seems so grown-up compared to how she was before all this nightmare began. Ever wish you could turn back the clock and do one thing differently?’
Again, Louise Lewis didn’t seem to expect an answer; she seemed to be talking to herself if anything. The two detectives at her dining table let her speak.
‘There are days, if I’m honest, when I think she loves the attention. I know what a terrible thing that is to say about your own daughter, especially one so young who’s been through so much. Monica has always known how to manipulate me, never more so than the day Dean Stillbrook took her into his house and …’
Her voice cracked and she began to clasp and unclasp her hands in her lap.
‘We don’t want to upset you, Louise,’ said Pierre, who intended to let Hazel do most of the talking but felt he should contribute something. ‘We know what happened to Monica. Hazel and I are here to ask some questions about Dean.’
His years as a police officer, particularly those spent investigating murders, had taught him that sometimes the less said the better.
‘I hope you don’t think that we had something to do with why he committed suicide?’ she said, a harsher edge to her words. ‘He moved away from here as soon as he was arrested and bailed from the police station. He shouldn’t even have been let out. For an offence as serious as that, he should have stayed in prison.’
It was something that hadn’t passed Pierre by. He wondered, not for the first time, why Dean Stillbrook hadn’t been remanded for a sexual offence against a child. He kept his thoughts to himself, not wanting to interrupt Louise. He found himself automatically nodding at her, trying to coax more out of her.
‘I’m not entirely sure that Dean was all there,’ she continued. ‘For a start, what sort of a monster wants to make an eleven-year-old girl do stuff like that with them? God. Would you listen to me? After all that’s happened, I still can’t bring myself to say what he did to her. You’d have thought I’d have toughened up a bit, wouldn’t you?’
This time, Pierre thought that he needed to speak, to keep her on track, if nothing else.
‘Why did you think Dean Stillbrook had difficulties?’ he asked, not wanting to use her exact words.
‘He seemed a bit of a simpleton, he always had. That was before he messed about with Monica. His family had little to do with him and I think that he struggled with some day-to-day things. It doesn’t excuse for one minute what he did, although perhaps if he’d had the right guidance, he would have kept his nose clean and led a better life. At least, that’s what I like to think. The alternative is that he was born a monster. The fact that he took his own life too. I appreciate that committing suicide doesn’t mean someone is of limited intelligence, far from it. I had a cousin who killed himself and he was so smart. As far as Dean’s suicide goes, his family have my deepest sympathies. I know what it feels like to wonder if you could have spotted the signs, could have made the call you’d been putting off because you were so busy. That leaves you thinking if only you’d made a bit more of an effort, the whole outcome could have been—’
She broke off and stared first at Pierre, then at Hazel.
‘I think that Dean Stillbrook expected to go to prison for what he’d done and when he didn’t, he took the only option he thought was available to him.’
‘You’re right. Suicide is a terrible thing,’ said Hazel, inching forward in her seat towards Louise. ‘The thing is, we’re not entirely convinced it was suicide.’
Once more, Pierre studied their witness’s face. He watched her blanch.
‘You, you … You think someone killed him?’ Louise said. ‘We didn’t have anything to do with it, if that’s why you’re here. I don’t have the strength, my son’s only seven and Bruce has a heart condition. We hate that bloody man, but none of us would kill him or even hurt him. The police sort out the criminals. That’s what you do, isn’t it? If the police don’t deal with it, then the mob take over. What if they get the wrong man?’
Her voice had got louder and louder, so much so that none of them heard Monica walk downstairs and open the dining-room door.
A round-faced young girl, grey nightshirt, messy brown hair, stood watching them from the doorway. Her eyes were wide open, her mouth gaping slightly.
‘Mum, I—’ she started to say.
‘It’s OK, sweetheart,’ said Louise. ‘I didn’t hear you get up. Go back to bed and I’ll bring you up a drink. These officers are about to leave.’
The girl’s face filled with panic. She stepped forward, one bare foot in front of the other.
‘Please don’t go yet,’ she whispered. ‘I’ve got something I need to tell you. Mum, don’t hate me. I’ve done a terrible thing.’
No one spoke. There was a chance that the three adults in the room were holding their breath.
‘I heard you say that Dean didn’t kill himself.’ She looked at Pierre, her blue eyes full of tears.
He nodded at her.
‘If someone killed him, then it might have been because of me.’
‘That’s not something—’ Louise said but Monica put out a shaky hand to stop her, eyes still locked on Pierre.
‘He didn’t do it, you see,’ said Monica, cheeks now awash with tears. ‘It got out of hand when everyone was asking me where I’d been. He didn’t lay a finger on me. Please don’t hate me, Mum. I didn’t know how to make it stop.’
Chapter 47
Pleased by the effort he had made to shower and put on clean clothes, ne
ver mind the petrol-station flowers he had stopped to buy his sister, Ian paused at the front door, finger poised at the doorbell.
If he wasn’t mistaken, he heard the sound of laughter tinkle along the hallway as he stood stock-still at the stained-glass window to the side of the heavy wooden door. He thought he could make out the shape of two people sitting at the kitchen table. Through the uneven glass, which distorted everything in his eager eye line, it was difficult to distinguish his sister from the other person sounding as though they were lifting her mood. Something he had been intent on doing.
It certainly wasn’t how he’d seen his morning with his little sister heading.
As tempted as Ian was to stand outside and listen, his desire to get inside the house and find out who she was talking to was greater.
He pressed the bell.
The sound of Millie tripping down the hallway was loud and clear as he imagined her racing towards the front door and flinging it wide, welcoming him in.
She at least hastened in his direction.
The gap between the door and the frame didn’t grow as fast or as large as Ian had expected. Even then, if he wasn’t very much mistaken, no sooner had she opened the door than Millie stepped street-side of it and pulled it behind her.
This was definitely a first.
‘Mills,’ he said, moving to his right to try to see through to the kitchen. ‘Everything OK?’
A three-second pause told him that it wasn’t.
‘Ian,’ she said as she forced her face into a smile. ‘Lovely to see you. Are those for me?’
He had forgotten that he was holding a bunch of £4.99 carnations from a petrol-station bucket. He held them out and leaned in for a kiss.
‘Come on in,’ she said. ‘Dave’s here too. We were just talking about you.’
He hesitated before he stepped over the threshold. ‘I heard laughter.’
If Millie thought he was implying something, she didn’t show it.
‘We were also talking about Clive,’ she said as she made her way back to Dave, leaving Ian to shut the door after himself, flowers still in his hand.
He followed her into the kitchen.
‘Hi Dave,’ said Ian. ‘Thought you’d be at work this morning.’
‘All right?’ said Dave. ‘I had some leave to take so thought I’d use it wisely. How are you?’
‘Not too bad. I wanted to see my sister and bring her some flowers.’
‘Thank you, Ian,’ she said, ‘they’re lovely.’
He handed them over, and the briefest of genuine smiles appeared on her face. His pleasure at her reaction was equally as fleeting as his eyes were drawn towards the enormous floral display next to the sink.
She looked at him over her shoulder as she ran water into the washing-up bowl and said, ‘Dave brought me some too. I don’t get flowers for ages and then you both bring them on the same day. What’s brought this on?’
Ian glanced over at his friend who sat watching him, half-drunk mug of coffee on the table in front of him.
‘Well, I know that I can’t speak for your brother,’ began Dave, raising his voice to be heard over the sound of the running water, ‘but I wanted to make sure that you’re OK after all that’s happened. I’d guess that he wants to do the same.’
For a few seconds they locked eyes, Ian risking Millie turning round and seeing the grim expression on his face as he stared at the one person who could be the undoing of him.
The abrupt silence as soon as Millie turned the tap off forced Ian to say something.
‘Yeah, that’s right. I wanted to check how you were bearing up and apologize for ringing you the other night when I’d been drinking. I know you hate it when I do that.’
He stood with his hands in his pockets in the centre of the kitchen, Dave to his right at the table, his back to the wall, and his sister to his left, still at the sink, now removing cellophane from the pink carnations. He hadn’t expected the morning to begin like this. He had envisaged a long chat with Millie, a catch-up about the children and then gently coaxing out of her how she was feeling and exactly how her weekend had gone.
He hadn’t factored Dave into the equation, although going by the look on Dave’s face, he hadn’t expected company either.
‘Sorry if this is a bad time,’ Ian said. ‘I can come back later.’
‘Don’t be daft,’ said Millie. ‘I put another pot of coffee on minutes before you arrived. I’m glad you’re both here.’
She walked over to the table with a fresh mug of coffee and took the chair furthest away from Dave. Ian was convinced it wasn’t the one she had been sitting on before he rang the doorbell, and he couldn’t fathom out why he should be so bothered about that. This whole scenario was making him feel uneasy and the reason for it was escaping him. There was a time when he would have welcomed Dave into his family, and been only too pleased for his best friend and his sister to get together. That, of course, was before Clive.
It was also before Albert Woodville.
‘The coffee’s for you,’ she said, staring straight at her brother. ‘Why don’t you sit down? You look as though there’s something on your mind.’
Her eyes smiled at him as he stood feet away from the two of them, unable to say what he had been so intent on sharing that morning when he set out from his own home.
‘I meant to call you over the weekend,’ Ian said as he pulled out a chair.
‘Which one of us are you talking to?’ asked Dave.
‘Both of you, I suppose. Mills, I’m sorry that I called you so late on Friday night. I was drunk and I shouldn’t have risked waking the kids.’
The more awkward part of Ian’s apology was still to come, so to avoid having to turn in his friend’s direction, he leaned across to pick up his coffee. At the same time as he navigated his trembling hand through the milk jug and sugar bowl, he said, ‘And Dave, ta for, you know, making sure that I got home all right from the pub and putting me to bed.’
‘Not the first time, mate,’ came the reply. ‘I tried to wake you up to say bye, but you were dead to the world.’
A small gasp came from Millie at the word ‘dead’ and her hand went up to her forehead.
Ian’s shaking hand shot in the direction of her arm, narrowly missing the coffee.
‘Hey, sis. What’s wrong?’
As she rested her head in her hands, Millie said, ‘Tell me that you didn’t do anything daft?’
‘Me?’ said Ian. ‘Why would I do something daft? What are you on about?’
‘Please don’t lie to me.’
He took his hand away from her arm, gave a sigh and said, ‘I shouldn’t have called you and said that Woodville wouldn’t bother you again. I hope you don’t think I went round to his place and beat him up. I’m not stupid.’
She closed her eyes and spoke in a whisper. ‘Then when you telephoned me on Friday night, how did you know he was dead?’
‘Dead? Woodville’s dead?’ said Ian.
‘Bloody hell, Millie,’ said Dave. ‘Isn’t Woodville the bloke that you were seeing?’
‘As drunk as I was,’ said Ian, ‘I know that I told you not to worry about him any more. I certainly didn’t tell you that I’d killed him. I warned him, that was all. I bumped into him in town coming out of one of the coffee shops, and I told him to stay away from you and the kids. That was it.’
Several seconds of silence followed before Dave said, ‘We were out together that evening, so anywhere Ian went, I went. We didn’t see him and we certainly didn’t kill him.’
‘Aren’t you going to ask how I know this?’ she said through her tears. ‘I find it a little odd that you haven’t asked how I know he’s dead.’
‘Was it on the news?’ asked Ian before he took a sip of his drink. He saw Millie fix her reddened eyes on him. He hated that she was so sad. At least the pervert couldn’t hurt her any more, whatever she was going through.
‘No, the police came round to see me.’
Ian knew
that his reaction was a little slower than it should have been.
‘The police came here?’ he said, almost dropping his mug to the table. ‘You should have called me.’
‘I watch television, you know.’ Millie looked from her brother to Dave and back again. ‘The police do stuff like check telephone records. You’d already rung me once on Friday night. The last thing I wanted was a whole load of calls going backwards and forwards.’
Now it was her turn to lean over and place her hand on his sleeve. ‘I’ll only ask you this once: did you go to Albie’s and do anything to him?’
He stroked the back of her hand with his fingers. ‘I didn’t touch him. Me and Dave went out for a couple of jars, went back to mine and I all but passed out. Ain’t that right, Dave?’
‘That’s exactly what happened,’ said Dave. ‘What did you tell the police?’
‘I didn’t tell them that Ian called me on Friday and told me not to worry about Albie any more. I think they’d have come straight round to see you otherwise. They asked me who else knew that I was seeing him and about his, well, you know … past.’
‘And what did you tell them?’ said Ian, unintentionally applying a little more pressure to the back of his sister’s hand with his fingertips.
‘I couldn’t lie,’ she said. ‘I told them that you both knew. I left out the part about how angry and upset you were, Ian.’
Unable to resist, she found herself casting an eye over the cracked glass oven door, a vivid reminder of when, only ten days ago, her brother had shouted at her, ‘How can you be so bloody stupid?’ immediately before he picked up a stoneware casserole dish from the worktop and threw it across the kitchen.
Chapter 48
Once again, murder was very much on DCI Barbara Venice’s mind. She had thought about little else for most of the morning and even earned herself a very worrying pep talk from Assistant Chief Constable Barrett.
Barbara liked Sally Barrett and despite the fact that the woman was half her age and had got to a rank higher than Barbara had even set her sights on, she was a decent woman.