Home Help

by Gwyn GB

  'Yes I clean for the Parkins on a Tuesday and a Saturday, although Melanie called today and said she didn't need me.'

  'At around ten am on that Tuesday, a phone call was made to a Mr Terence Morgan from the house. Did you make that call?'

  Gillian shook her head. 'Who is he?'

  'You don't know him? Never spoken to him?'

  'No.'

  'Did you notice if any of the other people in the house made any phone calls?'

  'Let's see, Melanie had one of her school committee meetings that morning. I remember because it’s always difficult for me to clean in that room when they're there. You'd think she'd arrange them for a day I'm not due in wouldn't you? I couldn’t say if any of them used the phone, but I think James did. He came back briefly around 10am and went into his office and I heard his voice talking to someone, so I'm assuming that was a phone call as there was nobody in there with him.'

  'You definitely heard him talking to someone at that time?' Claire asked now.

  'Well I definitely heard his voice in what seemed to be a one-way conversation, couldn't say who it was to. I was in the downstairs toilet at the time cleaning, which is next door to his study. He's not in any sort of trouble is he?'

  Bob and Claire looked at each other.

  'It's routine enquiries as part of an investigation,' Claire smiled at her.

  There was a cough from behind them and a bearded young man briefly peered at them before disappearing into a room like a feral cat.

  'That's my son, Peter. He's got Asperger’s, spends all day on his computers. Rarely leaves our flat I'm afraid, lives through his games.' Gillian explained.

  'How long have you cleaned for the Parkins?'

  'Oh forever, I started when my husband left us, couldn't hack Peter's condition he couldn't. I needed to earn but I needed something that was flexible because I couldn't leave him on his own outside of school hours. Doesn't leave you with too many choices with jobs. Peter's nineteen now and he was three when his dad left. Jersey's a lovely place to live if you have money, but it's an expensive one if you don't.'

  'Yes I can appreciate that,' Claire replied. 'I hope you don't mind us asking, but does Melanie and James's marriage seem solid? I understand the children are at boarding schools in the UK.'

  'Yes, they'll be back for Christmas. I think they're happy. Melanie loves her lifestyle, James is very busy but he loves money. I have struggled to get him to give me a pay rise to keep up with the cost of living, on more than one occasion. He's not a man who likes to part with his cash.'

  'Have you ever heard James mention the name David Lyle?' Claire asked.

  Gillian thought, creasing her eyebrows together and pursing her lips.

  'I have a vague recollection of seeing something on his desk with that name. Photograph of a young fellow. It was on his desk about two or three weeks ago I think.'

  'Definitely David Lyle?'

  'I couldn't say definitely, but I remember thinking Tate and Lyle when I saw it, so that fits.'

  'Well thank you for your time,' Bob said and started to rise from the sofa, 'we appreciate it.'

  'No problem at all,' Gillian smiled in return.

  Claire also got up to follow Bob. As she went she noticed a small table lamp. It looked somehow out of place in this utilitarian flat. A pretty, mini Tiffany style lamp made from different colours of plastic or glass, chandelier style.

  Gillian noticed her looking at it.

  'My dad gave it to me when I was little. Not worth anything, it's all plastic, but lots of sentimental value,' Gillian smiled at Claire.

  'It's pretty,' Claire smiled back, feeling pity for her. A forever mother and bread winner to her son who was unlikely to ever go out and earn and lead his own life. She looked around at the other ornaments in the flat. They were cheap and almost tacky. The cushions on the sofas, the table mats and the curtains, all looked like they were from the discount store. No one to spoil her on her birthdays and surprise her at Christmas. Just one pretty lamp from her childhood.

  They said thank you again and left.

  36

  Gillian, Saturday 11th November 2017, Jersey

  Gillian shut the door on the two police officers and smiled to herself. All was going exactly as planned. They'd find the photograph of David and if James's fate wasn't already sealed, it would be then. Peter had told her James's computer was now in the hands of the police, and he'd shut down the spyware. That must mean James was already in custody, no wonder Melanie cancelled on her.

  'Peter do you want a cup of tea?' Gillian went into her son's bedroom. The heat from the bank of computers hit her as she entered. He didn't answer because he had his headphones on, concentrating on some new game he'd just downloaded. It wouldn't last long, he'd have played the whole thing and mastered all the levels within a couple of days.

  She was coming to the end of her game play and the rewards were going to be so much more satisfying.

  37

  Claire, Saturday 11th November 2017, Jersey

  Their chat with Gillian had thrown the cat amongst the pigeons - and James Parkin was looking like their prize bird again.

  'Have you been through the items taken from James's office yet?' Bob asked as they walked back to the station.

  'No. It was FCU who had it all,' replied Claire.

  'Well, their enquiry and ours have different priorities. It's possible that a photograph of David Lyle is among his papers, but they simply don't recognise him. We need to go through it all carefully. Perhaps I should pull Lew and a couple of others over, we've got to be careful that we're not missing something because FCU are all over it.'

  Claire agreed, although with more staff over here they might also notice that her father was sticking his nose in. He'd still not called her. She'd checked her phone as soon as they left Gillian's and all she'd had was a text from her mother saying she and Theresa had just been for a lovely lunch at El Tico's and were continuing their drive. Had she heard from her dad? Claire didn't text back, her mum was having a good time. There was no need to start a conversation with her when she needed to get back to the office and start ploughing through all the evidence from James's office.

  'I've got just one more interview with a member of the ball committee who met that Tuesday, a Jane Carter. She could only see me late this afternoon.' Claire told Bob, 'I can't see that she's going to give us much more information, but I might as well go just in case.'

  When they got back, Claire left Bob to go and inform FCU that they would be looking through the evidence that afternoon. Nobody had mentioned her altercation with Larry, but she didn't want the Jersey team thinking they were doing it because they thought they weren't doing a good job. Bob would explain it all diplomatically.

  She grabbed a quick sandwich from the canteen and tried calling her dad again. Still no answer. She was absolutely fuming with him. Didn’t he realise just how much trouble he could cause?

  She set herself up in an empty office with the boxes from James's desk and soon after Bob joined her.

  'Everyone denies going to see Melanie Parkin yesterday,' Bob told her, 'I've got them checking with local media to see if they could have gone round, but if it's not, we could be looking at a third-party who we haven't yet identified. He doesn't fit the description of pizza man, so this could be someone new.'

  Claire nodded, but said nothing. Every time she thought about it her stomach churned over and she felt sick. Instead she concentrated on ploughing through the stacks of paperwork.

  It seemed James Parkin liked working from home, his secretary said he could concentrate better there. Just one hour in, Bob found it.

  'Bingo,' he said, 'Look at this.' He held up a photograph of David Lyle, a candid shot taken of him walking down the street, obviously not posed. On the back was written "David Lyle, 34 Haddon Road, SW2" 'And he told us he didn't know him! I think we need to have another chat with Mr Parkin.' Bob slipped the photograph into its own evidence bag with a big grin on his face.<
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  'I'll go let Custody know we'll want to see him,' Claire said and headed back to the office.

  As Claire entered the room, Ed waved her over.

  'Found it,' he brought the blue Ford Focus up on his second screen, 'but it's not been hired out to a bloke.'

  Claire's heart started to beat faster, all thoughts of James Parkin out of her head.

  'It's been hired for the past week to a Theresa Jones.'

  A cold grip caught Claire's breath and for a moment she felt almost dizzy with the rising shock.

  'Were you able to get a close up of the driver?' she asked Ed, her throat closed tight in fear.

  Ed looked up at her, 'You alright?' he asked, studying her face.

  'I think I might know who it is,' she told him, almost whispering, 'can you see the driver at all?'

  'You can't see too much detail obviously,' Ed explained, and pulled up a pixelated photograph of what looked like a blonde woman's face.

  Claire took a sharp intake of air and then forgot to breathe again.

  Ed was still looking at her.

  'I've actually managed to track the car live if that helps?' he said.

  Claire was reaching for her mobile phone, her mind in panic mode. Her mother, Theresa - Rachel. All this time Rachel had been seeing her mother, right under her nose. She dialled her mother's mobile, it rang, and rang, but she didn't answer. She said it was their final meeting, that Theresa was leaving soon.

  'Claire? Claire are you OK? Do you want me to show you where the car is now?' Ed was asking again.

  'Yes. Yes please,' she replied.

  On the screen Ed brought up some CCTV shots of the blue Ford Focus passing the airport.

  'It's just been caught going past the airport towards St Brelade, about ten minutes ago.'

  'Oh my God,' Claire whispered, pressing her parents' home number on her mobile. The phone rang and rang until the answer machine clicked and her mum's cheery tones told her there was no one home.

  'Any other sightings?' she asked Ed.

  'Yup turning right up Route de Orange and that's all we have I'm afraid.'

  'I know where it's going,' Claire replied, as blood rushed around her head.

  Five minutes later Claire was in a police car being driven at full pelt down the Avenue towards St Brelade. Over the radio she could hear the call going out to anyone closer to get round to her parents' address. As she was driven Claire kept dialling her mum's number, mobile and house. All this time, she'd been talking to her and Claire hadn't been listening. Maybe if she'd taken more notice of what she'd said she would have realised how strange it was that this Theresa had appeared out of nowhere. How could she have been so stupid, so uncaring? Her mum, always there, always looking after them and yet she and her dad just took her for granted. She just wouldn’t forgive herself if something had happened to her.

  The anger towards her dad also rose again in her. Where was he when his wife might need him? Interfering in her investigation, risking her police career. He'd never done anything but think of himself all these years.

  The car sped up Beaumont Hill and past the garden centre, cars clearing to the side to let them pass. It still wasn’t fast enough for Claire, nothing was going to be fast enough.

  38

  Claire, Saturday 11th November 2017, Jersey

  Claire had the car door open before it had even skidded to a halt outside her parents' home. There was no sign of the blue Ford Focus. Another squad car had arrived before them and the two uniformed officers were already knocking on the front door.

  Claire could hear the music even before she'd reached them. It was loud, Michael Ball and Alfie Boe belting out Phantom of the Opera.

  She nearly dropped her front door key as she reached for the lock. Part of her didn't want to go in, didn't want to see what she feared most, but another part of her couldn't get through the door fast enough - desperate to see her mother was alive and well.

  She almost fell across the threshold, the officer who had driven her there said something, something about maybe they should go in first, but she ignored him. Nothing was stopping her.

  'Mum. Mum?' she shouted into the house. She got nothing back apart from Michael and Alfie.

  Then she saw her. Looking through the kitchen and out into the back garden, she saw her mother. Susan Falle was bent over, her back to them. She had on a pair of old jeans and her house jumper and she was scrubbing at something in a bucket at her feet.

  Claire's heart and mind did a double flip, relief that her mother was absolutely fine and then the realisation that she'd just had half the island's police force tearing up the roads to her parents' house to find there was absolutely nothing wrong.

  'Mum,' Claire shouted to her as she opened the back door. Annoyance now that her mother hadn't answered her phone calls.

  Her mother looked up startled, smiled and then her face dropped again when she saw the police officer behind her.

  'What's happened? What's the matter?' she said, dropping the brush and the muddy welly in her hands. She looked from Claire to the three police officers who followed her outside, and pulled rubber gloves from her hands.

  'Mum I've been calling you,' Claire said, her voice starting to falter.

  'Sorry, I had the music on loud so I could hear it out here. What's happened? Tell me.'

  'Nothing mum, nothing's happened. I thought you might be in danger, I thought Rachel, Theresa, might have hurt you.'

  'What are you talking about? I texted you, I told you we'd had a lovely day, lunch and then she drove me home. She's leaving soon, you know.'

  Claire's head throbbed as her blood pressure subsided.

  'There's no one else in the house,' one of the officers said to Claire.

  'Thank you,' she replied quietly. 'I'm sorry.'

  'No problem,' he said, giving his partner a look. 'If everything's in order we'll be off then.'

  'I'll put the kettle on shall I?' Claire's mum said cheerily to everyone. 'You know you gave me quite a turn Claire, I thought something had happened to your dad.'

  They headed back into the house, where Michael and Alfie were now in full swing with Les Misérables. Susan Falle reluctantly cut them off in their prime before filling up the kettle.

  Simon Revell, the officer who had driven Claire there, looked somewhat stormy faced, but he was the least of her problems. Through the sitting room window, Claire saw another car draw up outside and Bob got out walking down the path to their front door.

  This was not going to look good. If Claire could have run up to her bedroom, shut the door and hidden under the bedclothes, then she would - only that wasn't an option. Instead she opened the front door to her boss whose face made Simon Revell's look like a storm in a teacup compared to his.

  'What's going on? I went to interview James Parkin to be told you'd put an emergency call out and were rushing here. Something about your mother being in danger, but I hear she’s alright?'

  Bob looked past Claire's pale face to see her mother in the kitchen chatting to Simon.

  'Yes, she's fine, thank you.'

  'OK, so are you going to explain?'

  Claire nodded Bob into the sitting room. If she was going to get completely shouted at by her boss, she didn't want it done in front of her mother and a colleague.

  'Look, I'm really sorry...' she tailed off when she saw Bob's face, and realised the pleading approach wasn't going to work. There was nothing for it, but to tell the truth. 'The day of the meeting I saw a woman drive past me when I was waiting to see who David Lyle was going to meet. I would have sworn that it was Rachel Hill.'

  'Oh for God's sake Claire,' Bob hit his forehead with his palm and sighed deeply, ending with a frown.

  'Look I know what you said and I have been concentrating on this case, but I couldn't ignore it. Anyway, my mum has been seeing this woman who just turned up out of the blue, said she was a daughter of a friend or something. Theresa her name is. So, I get the CCTV to check the registration of th
e car I thought I'd seen Rachel in and it comes up with a Theresa Jones. It was her Bob I'm sure of it. We pulled up a photo of the driver on CCTV and it was her. Rachel, or Theresa, was out with my mum and it's the last time they were going to see each other as she was leaving Jersey, I thought...'

  Bob's face was tight with anger.

  'DI Falle, I thought I had made it quite clear to you that you need to let go of whatever this obsession is with Rachel Hill. Are you telling me that you made an ID based on a CCTV shot of a driver in a car. You and I both know that it would have been highly pixelated and you can see whatever you want to see in a shot like that.'

  'I know...' the absurdity of the whole situation was starting to sink in to Claire. Bob was right, there's no way you could make a positive ID from the photograph she saw. She wanted to see the driver as Rachel and so she did. It could have been anyone, it was just a blur of a face with pale hair.

  'You have wasted police time, dragged us both away from a murder inquiry and made yourself the subject of a great deal of gossip, all because of a wild theory and an unhealthy obsession. This can't go on. You need to get some counselling when you go back, deal with whatever it is you are holding on to with regard to Rachel Hill.'

  'Yes sir,' the fight had gone out of Claire. Exhaustion from the emotional strain had sucked her dry. How could she have been so stupid? Bob was right, why was she obsessing about Rachel? What was it? The fact she never quite worked out who or what Rachel Hill was and had done? Was that it? Or had she really affected her psychologically, somehow wriggled under her skin and into her psyche?

  'I'm not even sure I should keep you on this case. If you can't be trusted..' Bob started.

  'Please Sir, I can. I'm sorry, I realise that I over-reacted. My mum told me she'd been diagnosed with dementia this week so maybe I was being over-protective.' Claire felt a bit guilty for using her mother as an excuse, but right now, she needed whatever she had.