by Sarah Ward
‘Are you going to be able to confirm whether there is a drug and, if so, what it is?’ asked Dahl.
‘From the body, possibly not. Some drugs pass through the system quickly post mortem. We also have a terminally ill patient probably on a cocktail of drugs. A good way to hide a drugs presence would simply be to increase the dose of something the victim is already taking, such as diamorphine. The most accurate method of identifying the drug may well be from the contents of the drip and what is on the floor.’
Connie looked at the dead woman’s hand, still bruised from where the cannula had been. ‘You think someone might have given this woman drugs to speed up her death? She was terminally ill.’
Bill looked across at them. ‘There’s some interesting history from the last few days. According to her records, they were having trouble stabilising her recently. It might not just be this drip we need to look into.’
‘Who’s her next of kin?’
Bill moved away from the body, peeling off his gloves. ‘There’s a daughter, apparently. She was particularly concerned that her mother didn’t have any visitors.’
‘Was she?’ Dahl was alert. Again Bill shot him an admiring glance.
‘Yes. That’s interesting, isn’t it? I can do the PM tonight and I’ll have more information then but it’ll be toxicology that will be crucial.’
Dahl went over to the door where a nurse was hovering. ‘Can you give us a moment?’
He shut the door behind the retreating figure. ‘What about the possibility of interference from other medical staff?’
Bill looked grim. ‘That’s a possibility too. It could be something innocent. An accidental puncture of the bag. Mistakes do happen. Or—’
‘Something deliberate,’ finished Connie.
‘Yes. Not a mistake but murder.’
24
Numb, Mina drove back to the Evening Star. She tried to call Jo, ignoring any qualms she had about using her mobile in the car, but there was no answer. When the ring tone changed to a voicemail message, she disconnected the call. She shouldn’t even be behind the wheel. At traffic lights, she saw people drift past who may have well have been ghosts. At the car park beside the wharf, she stumbled out, desperate to get to the safety of the boat. Neither Charlie nor Anna were to be seen and, grateful for the opportunity for solitude, she climbed down the steps and shut and bolted the cabin door.
Feeling chilled, she lit the wood burner, her fingers fumbling over the matches until the paper caught and glowed. She watched the blaze, drawing comfort from the orange sparks. It was the day she’d been both dreading and expecting. She’d refused to think about it, knowing she’d have to face it one day and would cope. Her mother had offered her no advice. They’d never got to the discussion of ‘after’. If time had not been on their side, neither had it been rushing away from them. The suddenness was a shock. Mina, now that the moment had arrived, had no idea what to do.
Staring into the flames, faces from the past flitted through her mind. Her grandfather, who had shown her how to plant seeds and more importantly keep them watered so they grew and flourished. The absent father that her mother had refused to speak of. Her mother as a young woman, expression wary, keeping her secrets. Mina closed her eyes and allowed the grief to wash over her.
‘Hello! Is anyone there?’
Mina opened her eyes. It wasn’t Anna. Someone else from the houseboat community? She went to the hatch and opened it up. Standing on the bank was her mother’s old colleague Carol leaning on her bicycle.
‘I got the message from Joseph. I know you want a chat and I thought I’d drop by and see if there was anything else to do for your mum while she’s in hospital.’
Mina looked across to her van. A thin figure was lurking under one of the tall trees near the water. ‘Mum passed away this morning.’
‘Oh no.’ Carol whitened and her eyes filled with tears. ‘I’m so sorry.’
The figure, as if aware of Mina’s scrutiny, turned away and retreated up the path. Mina turned her attention back to Carol, feeling the chill from the canal. ‘It wasn’t a complete shock but I still can’t believe it’s happened.’
‘What terrible timing. I should have got in touch earlier. Is there anything I can do?’
A cold wind swept over them as Mina shook her head. ‘I don’t think so.’
‘You have my number, don’t you?’ Mina nodded. ‘If there’s anything you need, anything at all, give me a call. You shouldn’t have to do all this yourself.’
‘I’ll ring if I’m stuck.’
‘You’ll let me know the funeral arrangements?’
‘Of course, but it’ll be small.’
‘Lots from the library will want to come, though.’
Mina nodded.
‘Joseph said you were asking about school friends. That’ll be harder because she never mentioned any of them to me.’
‘It doesn’t really matter now, does it?’
Carol shook her head. ‘Of course not. I’ll let the library staff know, if that’s okay. It’ll save you having to make the calls.’
Mina watched her mother’s kind friend hop on to her bicycle while wiping tears from her cheek. Carol had cared. People had cared. Perhaps life isn’t about wild gestures of grief, but the smaller pinches of being sorry.
As Mina sat back in front of the fire hugging her knees she pulled out her diary from her rucksack and studied her commitments for the rest of the week. Tomorrow, she was due at North Lees Hall and the following day, at Cold Eaton. Surely she could cancel the latter. That particular journey, with its stuttering start, was at an end. Valerie, whoever she had been, would be consigned to the mists of the past. A memory of her mother’s that wasn’t even that any longer. She would telephone Emily Fenn and say that she would come the following week and complete the clearing up and that would be it.
She put her diary back in her rucksack and leant back. Valerie. I don’t care who you are, she thought. You’re not important to me.
Even as she said it, she was aware of the lie in her words. In the cabin gloom, with the water lapping against the boat and the glow of the fire, Mina could hear the past calling out to her, confirming the fear that she’d confided to Jo. This isn’t journey’s end, it’s the beginning.
PART TWO
The Girls
25
Sunday, 13 October 1957
Thunder rumbled across the Peaks, moving in from the east and hanging over the spine of green hills as it met the cold air that had settled over the limestone landscape. On the escarpment facing her, Valerie could see black clouds rolling down the slopes, the darkening sky moving stealthily towards them. As the pressure dropped, electricity imbued the air around them and settled on top of her head. Her hair, which she routinely battled to keep in place under her hat, was beginning to rise from her scalp. Valerie cast a look around the group to check that they hadn’t seen her crouching amongst the trees, before thrusting a hand under the brim and scratching her head.
She was desperate to look at her watch, a birthday present that she was careful to keep dry, but the movement might draw attention to the tree under which she was sheltering. Tea would already be on the table. The fruitcake from the Pudding Shop bought specifically for Sunday afternoon had been carefully sliced and the thin cheese sandwiches, crusts removed just like her mother had seen in Woman’s Own, would be fanned out on the best china. Four o’clock prompt, when her father came in from the garden, her mother would turn off the television and they would sit down for tea. Why hadn’t she stayed with them after church? She was supposed to be doing her homework and the excuse she’d concocted to get away sounded, to her own ears, lame. Her mother hadn’t minded, though, and approved of the girls sitting in a broken circle. Liked the fact that most of them came from families a fraction above the social rank that Valerie’s own occupied.
In the silence, Valerie finally stole a look at her watch. Ten past three. There was still time to rush back afterwards. Her five fr
iends were sitting cross-legged under the great yew tree, planted, it was said by some villagers, around a thousand years ago. Once, it must have been a small sapling rooted ten or so paces from the front of the church door, placed there, according to Valerie’s father, to stop cattle trampling over the graves. The poisonous leaves were an incentive to farmers to keep their precious livestock away from the church, although Valerie feared that the dark tree thrived on the nutrients from the graves. She could see the tentacles of its roots, creeping out beneath where they were sitting and stretching towards those ancient corpses crumbled into the soil.
Thunder grumbled again, louder this time. Valerie looked up anxiously at the canopy of the different yew tree under which she was sheltering. Ancient was good, wasn’t it? The tree must have withstood thousands of similar tempests and its dense leaves would shelter them until the storm passed. Or perhaps you weren’t supposed to stand too near trees during thunderstorms.
‘We haven’t got long.’ In her anxiety, Valerie missed who had spoken but she saw the group shift uneasily at the acknowledgement of time. There were other families waiting, tables laden with jam and cake. The girls made a broken circle under the tree and no attempt had been made to close the gap. They had taken their places as usual, following the same pattern as if an invisible hand was guiding them, as if it had been natural to leave the empty place for the girl who wasn’t there. The space gave Valerie hope. There would be forgiveness and a reconciliation and the gap would be closed.
Ingrid picked up one of the thin branches that had fallen from the tree and broke it in half with a snap. She showed the inside of the limb to the other girls and each peered forward looking at the pattern inside the branch, as distinctive as a piece of rock. They had seen it before but it was part of the ritual and still an object of wonder.
‘At the centre the heartwood is red, which symbolises our blood sisterhood that we would gladly give our lives to protect.’
Valerie shifted nervously at the girl’s ominous tone in the failing light. She’d heard from the vicar one Sunday morning that the red symbolised the blood of Christ. Just like her friend to change it to suit her purposes. The other girls were looking, their eyes round in wonder, enthralled. Ingrid waved the stick around the circle.
‘The sapwood encircling the heartwood is white, which represents our purity. Our devotion to the earth and to each other.’
Valerie put her head down. Had she broken the vow of purity? She lifted her head and looked around in fear but no one was paying any attention to her, their disapproval directed at an absence.
‘The yew tree was planted in churchyards to ward off evil spirits. It’s your help we’re invoking.’
Valerie lifted her head as the girl raised the broken shards of the tree. This was a deviation from the normal script. What was she playing at? The gap in the girls, her place, yawned wider and Valerie could feel her head begin to swim. In the distance, she could hear the hiss of an approaching train. If she looked behind her, she’d be able to see the steam belching out over the hill, just visible from this secluded valley.
The girl too had heard the train and she turned slightly, looking over her shoulder. She stayed in the position, not moving, staring at the engine disappearing down the valley. When she faced the group again, she had a smile on her face.
‘The tree has spoken. The purity is broken. The punishment has been chosen.’
26
Wednesday, 1 November 2017
The problem with having a brother for a policeman is that you expect him to be on call even when he’s on holiday. Camilla tried Sadler’s mobile again. She resented the fact she couldn’t get hold of him even though she cautioned herself that she was being unreasonable. He’d been warned by HR about the amount of leave he had outstanding and, with the end of the year approaching, it was a case of take it or lose it. It was typical, however, that the very time he was away and out of touch, she needed to get hold of him.
Their mother Ginnie was now in St Bertram’s, the best place she could be. A sudden onset of chest pains had revealed fluid around the site of her pacemaker that needed draining. The hospital had admitted her as a precautionary measure and, at her mother’s insistence, Camilla hadn’t called Sadler. ‘He deserves his rest’ had been her mother’s only comment and, given that the hospital weren’t particularly worried, she’d happily gone along with Ginnie’s request. Only today, Ginnie would be having the op to drain the fluid and, all being well, she would be coming home tomorrow. Ginnie was still insisting that they leave Sadler in peace but, for once, Camilla was going to overrule her mother. Being under observation in hospital was one thing, an operation another.
Camilla tried Sadler’s mobile again. Still switched off. Where had he said he was going? Wales sounded familiar. Cross with the responsibility of coping with their mother on her own, she turned on her sons fighting in the back of the car.
‘What’s the matter with you? I need to stop at Nana’s and check everything’s okay. Can’t you stop bickering for five minutes?’
She swung the car into the drive, noticing the bins of other houses on the street pulled out onto the pavement. Damn.
‘Stay here and don’t argue,’ she cautioned her young sons. ‘I’ll be two minutes.’ She pulled the black wheelie bin onto the pavement and let herself into the fifties semi, frowning at the chill of the interior. Her mother, amply funded by her husband’s pension, had enough to live on but insisted on keeping the house at a low chill. Camilla couldn’t remember it ever being this cold, however, so she opened the door of the downstairs cloakroom and checked the boiler. The pilot light was visible and the heating was set to come on again in half an hour. How had the house become so cold since this morning’s burst of heat?
Camilla poked her head into the front living room but, apart from the usual messy pile of books and newspapers, it looked fine. The dining room was shut up but when Camilla opened it and went inside, the air was warm and dry. She moved to the back of the house and through to the kitchen where a stale smell hung in the air. Checking the fridge, she threw out a few wrinkled vegetables and bagged them up to drop them into the bin outside.
Samuel came through the door hugging himself. ‘It’s freezing in here.’
Camilla rounded on him. ‘I thought I told you to stay in the car with Ben. Where is he?’
‘Still in the car.’
‘For God’s sake.’ Camilla went back into the drive and pulled a teary Ben from the back seat.
‘What’s happened now?’
‘He won’t let me play Minecraft. He says it’s his turn on the tablet.’
Camilla looked at her defiant son standing on the doorstep trying to look nonchalant. ‘Where’s your iPad?’
‘I left it at home.’
‘That’s not Ben’s problem, is it?’ Camilla thought of the still undetected source of the chill. ‘Right, both of you get inside the house. I’ll put the TV on.’
‘But Nana’s not got Sky.’
‘Then you’ll have to find something else to watch, won’t you?’
She left her two sons tussling over the remote control and shut the door on them. She went back to the boiler and overrode the settings, turning on the heating. Back in the kitchen, she poured bleach down the sink and sprayed liberal arcs of air freshener around the room.
She should get her mother a cleaner. When she’d raised the idea, a year or so ago, Ginnie had been adamant that it wasn’t necessary and, given her mother’s house was considerably tidier than her own, Camilla hadn’t forced the issue. The room still kept its chill. She could hear from the roar that the boiler was functioning and, opening the lounge door, she inhaled the welcome scent of her children and warming air. She went back to the still cold kitchen and checked the radiator. The metal was warm but it was failing to heat the room and, as she stood still for a moment, she felt a draught against her neck.
She opened the pantry door and saw that the little window at the back was open. Standing on
tiptoe, she tried to pull it shut but it wouldn’t give. She peered at the hinge and pulled fruitlessly at the metal.
‘Samuel. Can you come here?’ she shouted to make herself heard over the sound of the TV set.
A set of trainers squelched along the kitchen lino. ‘You all right, Mum?’
‘I can’t shut this window. If I lift you up, can you have a go?’
A gleam of pride came into Samuel’s eyes. ‘I’ll climb up the shelves.’
‘Well, all right, but be careful.’ Camilla kept a steadying hand on her son’s backside as he made his way up towards the window. He tugged at the window and closed it a fraction.
‘Keep going.’
‘I can’t. It won’t shut properly. The metal is all warped.’
‘What do you mean warped?’
Samuel hoisted himself up further, one foot against the wall. ‘It’s bent out of shape. It looks like someone has tried to get in.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘It’s all twisted. You’ll be able to see properly from outside. Nana sometimes keeps it open when she’s in the house because she says the larder gets smelly with damp but she always shuts it when she goes out.’
‘She leaves it open when she’s here?’
Ben had appeared at her side. ‘It’s true. We’ve hidden in here loads of times and the window’s sometimes like that.’
‘But when Nana goes out she shuts it,’ said Samuel. ‘She’s taller than you. She pulls it no problem.’
God, my children know more about my mother’s habits than I do, thought Camilla. How long has the window been like that?
‘Is there a burglar in the house?’ asked Ben.
Camilla looked down at the anxious face of her younger son. ‘Of course not. Look how small the window is. Go back and watch the TV and I’ll phone your dad.’
‘What about Uncle Francis? He’s the policeman. You should call him,’ said Ben.