‘No way it could have been an accident, I don’t suppose?’ Mark looked at Bill thoughtfully.
‘Not the way I heard it,’ said the old man. ‘Strangled. That don’t happen by accident, do it?’
‘Ah. Cops tell you that?’
‘Mebbe. Cops! Pah. Don’t know what they think I do all day apart from sticking my nose into other folks’ business.’
Mark laughed. ‘Trouble is, you usually do know other folks’ business, don’t you?’
‘Too sharp by ’alf, boy, that’s your trouble. You lads today need a couple of years in the army. That’d wipe the smirk off your smug young faces. Put on a bit of muscle too.’ He shook Mark by the shoulder.
Mark tried to wrench away the old man’s hand, but he could not force the bony fingers apart.
‘Jesus Christ, Bill. Let go, will you?’
Bill obliged and Mark rubbed his sore shoulder. Bill looked pleased with himself, he was almost grinning. He secretly enjoyed his encounters with Mark when the young reporter came looking for information. They had had each other’s measure from the beginning, these two. None the less Mark had no idea that Bill was even remotely aware of his attempts to uncover the secrets of the old man’s past. Mark should have expected that, because he knew Bill always found out about anything and everything happening in Pelham Bay. But with the brash confidence of youth, it had somehow not occurred to Mark that Bill would have been aware of his futile investigations. In fact Bill had watched, untroubled, as Mark fruitlessly questioned distant relatives, business contacts, and anyone even vaguely connected with the old man.
In a way Bill accepted this kind of attention as his right – more of an accolade than an intrusive insult, and he was quite certain that no local paper hack was going to make any discoveries likely to cause him concern. The older man would amuse himself giving Mark a bit of a hard time, but even so he always seemed to have some little gem that he would pass on – just as he had on this occasion. There was a lot in Mark which Bill Turpin recognised and which Mark Piddle had yet to learn about himself.
Bill thrust his right hand deep into the pocket of his old grey flannels, and with his left removed the pipe which all the time had been clasped between his teeth.
‘Load of nancy boys, you youngsters today…’
He paused, looking as if he might say more, then shoved the pipe back between his teeth and stomped off towards the Penny Parade. The faithful Jip, dozing in the shade of the deckchair pile, climbed creakily to her feet and followed.
Mark shouted after him. Bill glanced over his shoulder, still walking forwards.
‘Do they know who the dead girl is yet?’ called Mark.
Bill Turpin stopped walking. Mark was by his side again now. Bill blew a cloud of foul smoke into his face. Mark recoiled, coughing, and was sure he spotted a look of some satisfaction on Bill’s face.
The old man turned on his heel and strode off without replying, upsetting the plans of his dog, already looking for another place to settle for a sleep.
‘Thank you so much,’ Mark muttered to himself.
He set off along the seafront towards the lido.
Police were mingling with the crowds asking questions, but Mark did not see any people that he knew. He paused by the lavatory roof, raised a couple of feet above the upper path. The lavatory itself was entered from the lower path, almost at sea level. A girl and a boy were still there, squatting close together, talking intently.
‘Hi. Mark Piddle. Durraton Gazette.’
The girl, shapely and sure of herself, stood up. She was wearing the briefest of bikinis. Mark found his eyes almost directly in line with her crotch and tried not to stare.
‘If it’s Jenny you want, she’s in hospital,’ said the girl.
‘So I heard. Did you see anything?’
‘We heard Jenny screaming and went to help her out of the water. A couple of policemen clambered out across the rocks to try to bring the body in. But we never saw it…’
The girl sniffed and the corners of her lips curled downwards. Mark thought how unpleasant her facial expression was. He preferred to look at her ripe young body.
‘You don’t know who the dead girl was, then?’
‘No.’
The girl caught hold of the boy’s hand.
‘What’s your name?’ asked Mark.
‘Pussy Galore,’ said the girl, simpering.
Mark was suddenly irritated.
‘You wouldn’t know what to do with it, darling, and nor would your boyfriend, I reckon,’ he snapped at her, glaring at the boy and daring him to retaliate. The boy flushed and fumbled for words. It was to be a long time before Todd Mallett would grow into the kind of man who was not easily intimidated by anyone.
‘Clear off,’ he said lamely.
‘Yeah, clear off,’ echoed the girl, no longer quite so sure of herself.
Mark gazed steadily at the pair of them. They were embarrassed now. He was suddenly sure they were both virgins.
‘If you want any more lessons you know where to find me,’ he said.
The girl looked pleadingly at the boy. He tugged at her arm. ‘Come on, let’s go. Ignore him.’
Mark felt better now. He turned and jogged back along the seafront to his car. There was nothing left to see. The body was long gone. The only police in sight were junior officers asking routine questions. Mark supposed the County CID had been called in, but he would probably do best on the phone to the cops that evening.
Jenny Stone. The girl who had bumped into a body while out swimming. That was the obvious story. He climbed into the driver’s seat of the battered Cooper.
‘A nice new open sports job, that’s what you should be driving, Mark boy.’
The Mini started at the third attempt. ‘Come on, heap,’ Mark coaxed.
He grated the little car into reverse gear, kicking up a cloud of dust as he turned sharply and roared out of the car park. He passed a couple of the boys from the nationals just arriving, and started to make his plans. He would stop off at home, make his police calls, see if anyone could name the body and quickly file a few parts of early lineage. If he could get some sort of story together before the staff men, it could be worth a few bob. Then he would drive to Reg Stone’s house and wait for Jenny to be brought home. With a bit of luck, everybody else would go to the hospital. The national pack, area men up from Plymouth and down from Bristol, wouldn’t know where Reg Stone lived, just back from the burrows in Pelham Bay – but Mark did, because Reg Stone was a councillor. The others would find out fast enough, but Mark would have the edge. If Jenny came out of hospital tonight, he might just be alone on the doorstep. He smelt an exclusive. He glanced at his watch. Jenny Stone would not be released from hospital for a bit, he was sure. If he got home quickly now there would be time for more than just filing some lineage. That sexual banter with those two good-looking kids really had made him randy. The girl was sixteen or seventeen, Mark supposed. Irene was twenty-one, but she still had almost the body of a child.
By now he was driving so fast he almost lost the Cooper on the hairpin bend at the bottom of the hill leading to his flat. He regained control by the skin of his teeth, screeched to a halt and ran up the stairs three at a time. The front door was open, and he quickly bolted it behind him. Irene came into the living room from the kitchen to greet him. She was wearing a tight cotton dress. He could see her nipples through the material. She started to speak to him. He unzipped his flies and his cock virtually jumped out through the gap. Even he sometimes wished it wouldn’t do that.
Irene wasn’t sure she could take any more that day.
She took a step backwards. He didn’t even notice. His arms were around her. He picked her up and bent her face downwards over the back of the sofa, pushing her dress up around her waist as he did so.
‘Not there, Mark, please, I’m so sore,’ she said.
‘Open your legs wider then,’ he hissed. She did so.
He thrust into her and started to co
me almost at once. It was like that for him sometimes. Particularly after he had been working.
An hour later he was sitting in the Cooper outside the Stones’ terraced house. Waiting in the dark. He had been joined by the Durraton Gazette’s only photographer. At eleven o’clock, just as he had given up hope, Mr and Mrs Stone arrived home with their only daughter.
The snapper had his instructions. Don’t snatch.
Naturally he disobeyed and immediately shoved camera and flash into Jenny Stone’s face. Her father was not pleased.
‘She’s upset,’ he said. ‘Leave her alone, you buggers.’
In the mere split second of flashlight, Mark had been instantly sure he knew Jenny from somewhere. He cursed his snapper, but resolutely continued with his persuasive routine of logic and sweet-talk. One quick chat with him now and it would keep all the other reporters at bay, he would tell the story sensitively, etc. etc. Jenny stared at the young man. She was coming around from shock. Gradually she began to realise who he was.
‘It’s all right, Dad, I may as well get it over with. They said at the hospital half the world’s press wanted to talk to me.’
Reg Stone gave in reluctantly. ‘Ten minutes,’ he said to Mark. ‘She needs sleep.’
Mark followed parents and daughter into the house and shook hands with all three of them. As he did so Jenny smiled a small half smile. They were in the brightly lit hallway by now, and Mark could see her clearly. In spite of herself and all that was happening, there was a direct challenging look in her eye.
Jesus. It was that kid he’d nearly had at the school dance. Jenny. Of course. He hadn’t bothered to ask her name that night, he’d been so horny, but when she had phoned his office she told them to tell him Jenny had called, Jenny from the dance. She must be seventeen now. God, she’d been ripe then. He remembered the feel of her. She hadn’t just complied. She had gone for it. Extraordinary. He had wanted to go back for her the next day. How he had wanted to, he just hadn’t dared after what had happened. Strange how well he could remember the sensations of that night. Two years on and he could still smell and taste her.
He pulled himself together. Put all those thoughts out of his mind. Gently he began to question Jenny.
He was a good interviewer, a natural. She was very articulate. She spoke in quotes. She was badly shaken, but calm. It was a great talk, and Mark knew it would make first-class copy.
When Mark and the snapper left, Jenny followed him out of the door and called after him. He turned back to her. She was silhouetted against the light from the house and her head was tilted slightly to one side. He could not see her face – just the shape of her standing there – but her body language was eloquent. She looked indignant and purposeful.
‘Why did you never contact me again after the dance?’ she asked quietly.
He was astonished. He didn’t know what to say. She continued to interrogate him. ‘Why were you always out when I called your office?’
He knew he was mumbling and stumbling. How could she throw him like this? She was just a girl.
Eventually he found some words: ‘You were only fifteen, for Chrissake, you were jailbait,’ he said. ‘I was warned off. Heavily.’
‘I’m seventeen now,’ she replied.
The photographer had got into his car and switched on his headlights. As she spoke, Jennifer’s face was suddenly illuminated – one eyebrow raised as if in contempt. She parted her lips very slightly in that half smile. It was a mocking smile – and yet so seductive. She made him nervous. It was ridiculous, she was still only a kid. Mark heard himself giggle weakly. He almost ran to the Cooper, gunned the engine and shot off down the street. He could feel her eyes on the back of his neck as he drove away. It made his skin prickle with excitement.
Jennifer Stone made two decisions that night: firstly that she would have Mark Piddle. This time he wouldn’t get away. He would be the one to take her virginity. He had already very nearly done so after all. Soon, very soon, they would make love together. But this time it would be on her terms. When she chose. And somehow watching him work as a newspaperman had made her want him even more. She sensed the thrill that he got from his job and she wanted that too – which took her to the second decision. She would start writing to local papers tomorrow. She would become a journalist like Mark.
Strange that she could think that way on such a night. But she did.
Exhausted, she fell asleep. But in her dreams she found the body again, only this time it had no face. She woke screaming. It took her mother almost an hour and two more of the tranquillisers she had been given to calm her daughter down.
CHAPTER SIX
Johnny Cooke’s mother heard on the six o’clock local news that the body of a girl, believed to have been murdered, had been found in the sea at Pelham Bay. She shook her head sorrowfully. ‘I don’t know,’ she said to herself. ‘What is the world coming to?’
Mrs Mabel Cooke had been born and brought up in Durraton. She knew everyone, and everyone knew her. She had that smugness about her found among certain people who live in a small town and are overly sure of themselves and their social standing.
She busied herself in the kitchen preparing a high tea. Neither Johnny nor her husband would be home much before seven, but Mrs Cooke liked to be prepared. She sliced meat from the lunchtime joint of pork, put tomatoes in a dish, laid the table with a selection of homemade pickles, and put three apple dumplings in the oven to warm gently. There were cold boiled potatoes and wrapped sliced bread to eat with the meat, tomatoes and pickles. Mrs Cooke did most of her own baking, but saw nothing incongruous in providing tasteless sliced bread along with her homemade delicacies. The apple dumplings she had baked the day before, using big green cooking apples wrapped in a thick layer of shortcrust pastry.
Soon after seven, her husband and son arrived.
They sat at the kitchen table and waited for Mrs Cooke to brew the tea before touching the food. Then they ate quickly. After they had finished, Mr Cooke lit his pipe.
‘Did you hear about that murdered girl?’ he asked his wife.
‘I did. I tell you, Charlie, I don’t know what the world is coming to, that I don’t. Do they know who she is yet?’
Charlie Cooke shook his head. ‘Reg Stone’s maid found the body. Johnny ’eard ’er screaming, didn’t you boy?’
Johnny nodded.
Mrs Cooke rubbed her hands together mournfully. ‘I hope and pray it’s not a local girl, that’s all,’ she said.
‘Why?’ asked Johnny. ‘If it’s not a local girl, doesn’t her life matter then, Mother?’
‘Don’t be so cheeky, young man,’ snapped Charlie Cooke. ‘That’s your trouble, son. Too quick on the draw when you shouldn’t be and not quick enough when you should. You know full well what your mother means.’
Johnny picked up his cup of tea and headed for the sitting room.
‘And where do you think you’re going now?’ said his father.
‘Television. There’s a film…’
‘You get worse, boy, ’stead of better. No chance of you helping your mother wash up is there?’
‘Oh, leave the boy alone, Charlie. I’m happier doing it on my own. Let him be.’
Johnny slunk gratefully into the sitting room and buried his senses in the over-dramatic thriller just starting on ITV. It treated him to a car chase, a shoot-out, half a dozen killings and an armed robbery within the first few minutes.
Mr Cooke soon followed his son into the room and, lowering himself into his favourite chair, grumbled: ‘As if there isn’t enough bleddy violence in real life, you have to watch it on TV too.’
Johnny ignored him. His father grunted, picked up the Sunday Express and turned to the sports pages. When she had finished the washing-up, Mabel Cooke joined her husband and son in front of the TV. About half an hour later the phone rang. It was Mr Cooke’s Rotary Club policeman friend, Chief Inspector Ted Robson. The two men were on a committee together organising the annual fete, and, as t
hey discussed final arrangements, Ted Robson described how he had been called out that afternoon when the body was discovered in Pelham Bay.
When Mr Cooke returned to the living room he remarked conversationally: ‘Ted says that dead woman worked out at the Royal Western Golf Club – behind the bar. Marjorie something or other, Ted said…’
Johnny stopped watching television. He looked blankly at his father.
‘You’ve played a bit there with your Uncle Len, Johnny,’ said his mother. ‘Did you know her?’
‘Know her?’ Johnny repeated vacantly. ‘Urm. I’m not sure.’
Johnny’s father reached sideways and shook his son by the shoulder.
‘Wake up boy, will you? Your mother asked you a question. Did you bleddy know ’er or not?’
‘I … I suppose so. I saw her about the place. Yes.’
Johnny was twiddling a piece of hair around his fingers now.
‘Where was she from?’ his mother continued. ‘What was she like then?’
Johnny shook his head.
‘What’s that supposed to mean?’ his father asked.
‘I don’t know. I don’t know.’ Johnny got up and walked quickly to the door. ‘I’ve got to go out.’
‘I thought you wanted to watch this bleddy film,’ said his father.
‘I did, but I forgot something.’
Johnny was in the hall.
‘Where are you going?’ called his father.
Johnny had already slammed the front door shut behind him and was running down the road.
CHAPTER SEVEN
At the bottom of his street, Johnny stopped running, turned around and walked back up the alley leading to the rear of the house where he stealthily took his bicycle out of the garden shed. He cycled as fast as he could down to Pelham Bay, straight to the golf club. Two police cars stood in the car park. Johnny recognised one of the caddies, a boy who used to be at his school. As casually as he could manage, he asked what was going on.
The Cruelty of Morning Page 6