by Gary Newman
And Pat? I looked at my watch: five-thirty. Frank would still be at the shop – the police must’ve interviewed him first. No, I wasn’t thinking straight: he must’ve called them in in the first place to report Pat’s absence. Shaken to the core, I went to the bathroom and sloshed my face with cold water, then flung on my jacket and went out to the car.
I found Frank ten minutes later in the sanctum behind his shop, sitting in a massive teakwood chair behind a fretted mandarin’s desk, the grimness of his expression matched by that on the Noh mask on the wall above him.
‘I honestly don’t know what the hell’s up this time, Seb,’ he began in answer to my urgent enquiry. ‘You know how it is between Pat and me these days.’
I avoided his glance as he went on.
‘We go our separate ways and so on – but the fact is, she left her car in the garage and didn’t take her purse or anything else with her. The only thing I could do was call in the police.’
‘Had there been anything, er . . . brewing in particular?’ I asked as I paced up and down on the faded kilim.
‘Mmm . . . no, there wasn’t any particular issue between us – that was the first thing the police asked me – she was just her usual bright, cutting self. Not a cloud in the sky that I could see.’
‘What’s her usual Thursday routine?’
‘Well, during term-time she can be back from the university any time after about four, depending on what she’s got on there – students, seminars, meetings, etc. Well, that morning, she told me that it would be one of her early days at the university, and that she was going to work on her book in peace at the boathouse, and that if some stuff came from the States – she’d been banging on about it for ages – would I ring and tell her straight away, since the lack of it was holding up her work.’
‘Didn’t she have official mail delivered to her office at the university?’
‘She said they held it for ages in the post-room – she’d had run-ins with them before about it – and as often as not it went into the wrong pigeonholes, so some items she had delivered here. Well, a packet with an American stamp arrived for her just before lunchtime on the Thursday, and I rang her at the university, and she asked if I could drive round to the boathouse with it later on. I did, at about quarter to five, and found the shutters up at the boathouse and no reply to my ring, which I thought was odd. I thought she must’ve gone off suddenly, so I went across to the garage and opened it up, to find her car inside, which was odder still. Finally, I went back to the boathouse, let myself in with my key, and found the raincoat she’d been wearing when she’d gone out that morning, with her purse and car keys and so on. I asked around the other houses and moored boats if anyone had seen or talked to her – zilch – so I decided then to call in the law.’
‘And there’s been no news since of Pat? It’s been four days now.’
‘Not a thing – no one’s reported seeing or hearing from her, and she’s not been seen in any of her usual haunts. Seb, you said you’d been round to the boathouse to see her after four last Thursday, about half an hour before I turned up?’
‘Yes.’
‘Did you see or talk to anyone there?’
‘No, there wasn’t a soul around.’
In any case, I recollected, I’d been too angry at the time at Pat’s having led me up the garden path to have noticed anyone else, let alone talked to them rationally.
‘Well,’ Frank went on, ‘that means you were the last person to see Pat; or rather, not see her, if you see what I mean.’
‘You mean, the police only have my word for it that I didn’t actually meet up with her in the boathouse?’
‘Right, so watch your step with them in future, old son.’
‘I suppose they’ll have asked you about your movements, too.’
‘Not that there was much to tell: I’d spent the afternoon valuing the contents of a house near the wood at Rowhedge – the late owner’s son was with me nearly all the time – and I left there around twenty past four. I came back here to the shop, picked up Pat’s American packet and set off for the boathouse, arriving there about fifteen minutes later, as I’ve told you.’
‘Have the police been asking you questions about me?’
Frank shook his head. ‘They keep things in compartments – never let the left hand know what the right hand’s doing – then it’s gently backwards and forwards, ever so relaxed, checking your story again each time they come round . . .’
He seemed to know a lot about the police and their methods, I thought, but then my old school chum looked up at me with real anxiety in his eyes.
‘It’s her having left her things behind, Seb – ID, money, car keys, the lot – I don’t like it at all.’
A delicate matter came to mind.
‘Frank, I, er . . . don’t like to ask – none of my business, and all that, but could Pat have had . . .’
My friend gave one of his snuffly little laughs.
‘Was she whisked away by one of her toy-boys, eh? Some hairy young deckhand? That what you mean? I don’t think so: for one thing, she’d have needed her purse more than ever . . . On the other hand, you know how she likes to play with people: well, not everybody’ll take it.’
I felt a little pang when I remembered that I’d told Detective Sergeant Morris the same thing about Pat: maybe the Detective Sergeant was thinking she’d tried to play with me on the Thursday, and on that occasion, I hadn’t taken it.
‘Mmm . . .’ I murmured thoughtfully. ‘I see what you mean.’
‘And what have you been up to?’
‘I flew to Jersey first thing on Friday morning, and I was over there and in France till Monday morning – doing research.’
‘You’ve told the police that?’
‘Yes, of course.’
‘I’ll bet they’ll be faxing Pat’s details to all the police stations in France now.’
‘This is a real facer, Frank.’
With that, we agreed to keep in close touch till things had been cleared up, and I left the shop and, as if by a homing instinct, drove to Leah’s flat in the university grounds. She met me at the door of her flat in paint-stained overalls, and with a bright red bandanna round her head. She explained that she was in the throes of decorating the kitchen, which, when she led me in there, I saw involved a sort of eau-de-nil paint, and it was all I could do to prevent her from shoving a brush into my hand.
‘The buggers are supposed to redecorate it themselves,’ Leah ruled with a snort, as she climbed back to the top of the stepladder she’d set up against one wall. ‘It’s clearly stated in the conditions, but I thought: enough of dinge and sleaze.’
My anxiety must have shown, and she paused, brush in hand, and looked down at me from the stepladder.
‘What’s up? You don’t look too chuffed.’
I gave her a shorthand version of everything that had happened to me since we’d last talked, and her eyes sombred over.
‘Can you make some coffee?’ she said when I’d finished. ‘The paint . . .’
I did so, and by and by she joined me at the kitchen table with a steaming mug.
‘It looks serious,’ Leah said. ‘Very serious – even Pat wouldn’t just have goofed off with no money or keys. You go out to come back again . . .’
‘You haven’t bumped into her around the university, have you?’
Leah shook her bandannaed head.
‘Parallel lines, and we’re hardly on the same wavelength. Occasional brittle smiles across the floor of the Level Six coffee area’s about the limit of our communication. And what was that email again you said she sent you on Thursday?’
‘Would I care to come over for “Pidgeon” pie – words to that effect.’
‘Right, she must’ve meant this guy who’s been stalking you and yours: maybe Pat had a visit from him – after all, you said he’d tried to contact her at the boathouse once before.’
‘That’s right, after I’d followed him down from Sou
thwold, where he’d had the meeting with Reet.’
‘Pat may have included him in her latest mind-game – how else would she have found out his name unless she’d first met him? After all, it’s meant your working more or less full-time to suss out that he’s descended from the Vickybird.’
I recalled Frank’s remark that not everyone might take Pat’s winding-up in good part, and feared for the worst.
‘Are you thinking what I’m thinking?’ I said to Leah.
‘That Pat’s had some sort of tussle with this Pidgeon guy? Yes . . .’
‘It would depend on exactly what trick she’s tried on him. For instance,’ I conjectured, ‘if she’d hinted to him that she knew where there were more Rawbeck treasures, then left him dangling, Lord knows what might have happened.’
Leah frowned as her full upper lip embraced the rim of her coffee mug.
‘Go through your visit to the boathouse again.’
I did, with all the detail I could remember, but all I got was another grim shake of the paint-flecked bandanna.
‘And you didn’t come across anything during your cross-Channel jaunt that might have tied in with Pat?’
‘Absolutely nothing, and anyway, she simply wasn’t in my mind at any stage of the trip. It was all about Grandfather, the Pidgeons and the Barres – my lot.’
‘The Sons of Carrie Bugle . . .’ Leah remarked with a chuckle.
‘And now this bloody tape of my voice the detectives have pulled out of their hat – they said it was found in Pat’s office at the university. It’s got me fairly spooked.’
‘Hypnosis is my bet on that score.’
‘I’ve never been under hypnosis in my life. I can’t even imagine how I might hand over my mind to anyone else. No, it’s just not on.’
‘But that’s what makes it look so hilarious on the stage – the po-faced types they get to strip down to their underpants, stand on their heads, sing like Elvis – the very ones who “can’t imagine how”, as you’ve just put it. And you have had these odd fugues from time to time, haven’t you?’
I was reminded of my odd lapse on Easter Monday – where did the day go? – but I’d taken Dr Cousins’ view at my check-up, and put it down to overdoing things; that and the after-effects of the medication I’d been recently weaning myself off. But then my mind went back to the odd walkabouts I’d gone on in the past – sort of blue plaques in my memory – always after a big emotional upset like my run-in with my son Paul at the cottage in Dunstanburgh when Reet and I had been in the process of breaking up. And always ending in white cliffs . . .
Could someone, somehow, somewhere along the line have been using hypnosis on me? And didn’t you have to plant a trigger in the mind of whoever you were hypnotizing? What would the trigger have been in my case? No, it was too fantastic . . .
‘Sorry,’ I said, dismissing the issue, ‘but I don’t buy hypnosis. The fact is that Pat had the tape, and the answer as to how it was made must lie with her.’
‘Last Thursday,’ Leah went on, ‘when Pat was supposed to have disappeared, I’d have left the university around the same time she did. I’d a dental check-up in Wivenhoe at four-fifteen, but no one could’ve missed her big black Bristol 400 on the road out from the university. And I wonder who this Mr Francis is – the name Pidgeon asked after when he visited your aunt in Malmesbury?’
‘I tell you, the name rings absolutely no bells for me – yet another aspect of this mix-up I’ve got to get to the bottom of.’
‘And this address the detectives asked you about before they left you – Cwm-whatsit?’
‘Cwmdonkin Drive – they must’ve found some reference to it among Pat’s stuff at her office. I daresay they’ll be following it up. Funny . . .’
‘What?’
‘I seem to have heard it somewhere before, but I can’t quite remember in what context. And there’s another possible pointer to Pat’s movements: d’you recall when she buttonholed us at the petrol station the other week? When she made that remark about your letter to the Guardian?’
‘Yes, it was a Saturday morning.’
‘She was in a tracksuit –’
‘Shellsuit.’
‘Whatever – anyway, maybe it was her health club morning. There’s one in Colchester – I see its van buzzing around from time to time. A white van with the name on it in blue.’
‘I think I know the club you mean.’
‘There’s a branch in London, too – same colour scheme – I’ve noticed it there. It’s got a name like a Greek holiday resort – Troiana, Triana, Triada – that’s it! The Triada Health Club . . .’
But Leah made no response, and I was damned if I could place the London branch of the health club. I supposed I’d have to leave that one for the time being.
Chapter Twenty-Two
I’d stayed for supper at Leah’s, and we’d parted on a serious note. She’d promised to keep her ear to the ground at the university regarding Pat’s disappearance, with particular reference to the comings and goings of the police.
Back at home, unaided sleep was out of the question that night, and after nearly three hours of tossing and turning, with the shrill, terrified, taped voice – my voice, for God’s sake! – ringing in my head, I’d finally had to pop a tablet. Feeling defeated – I’d been making such progress recently in weaning myself off the medication – as I phased into the light sleep the tablet allowed, my last clear thought was of whether, unknown to me, the childish voice would cry out again unheard that night.
Next morning, Wednesday, I awoke unrefreshed and went through the motions: tub, shave, breakfast, post – all junk – then, like some doggedly dutiful lighthouse-keeper, I went up to my workroom to check my Inbox. Spam was all that I found there, so having machine-gunned these unwanted messengers at the gate with the Delete, I turned to the bit of bio-rewrite I’d been working on. But it was no use: my eyes refused to engage with the text. I tried again with the first sentence: Tod Slaughter’s association with the film producer George King would mark the turning point of . . . But my mind was rearranging the words into: Pat Hague’s association with Cwmdonkin Drive would mark the turning point of . . .
I jumped out of my chair and began to pace the room. Damn it to buggery! I had to get to the bottom of whatever was going on before I could settle down to serious work again . . . What the hell had happened to Pat Hague?
I whipped out my mobile, and rang Frank for a progress report – nothing new – then Leah. I hadn’t asked for this new stress, she advised, so no disgrace in my popping a tranquillizer. Damned if I would, though . . . No, I’d be no one’s crock – get down to work again, set my course, and sail straight through it all. I went back to the computer, and, gritting my teeth, worked through the chapter, and I think made a decent job of it. Then I started on the passage in Chapter Eight of my Tod Slaughter biography my agent had advised me to tweak up, the one about the actor’s role in the film The Crimes of Stephen Hawke. All about this guy in 1880s London who was an evangelical moneylender by day and a garrotter by night: Meet me on the terrace this evening, my lord, and we’ll come to grips with the business . . . If only life could be that simple.
I soldiered on till one, then broke off to eat some scraps or other, after which sleepiness overtook me, and I just stretched out on a rug in the sitting room and crashed out for almost two hours. Coming round, I rang Frank again, but there was no reply. I decided to give Leah a rest – what a gift to her I was proving to be! – then, just before five, I had another visit from Detective Sergeant Morris and DC Conlon.
The saggy-faced Morris was as urbanely matter-of-fact as he’d been on the previous afternoon, and Conlon was there with his document case, like a Central European office worker clutching his lunch.
‘No word yet about Mrs Hague, I’m afraid,’ the Detective Sergeant kicked off from the sofa. ‘In the meantime, we’re filling out and firming up her most recent movements. Astonishing what a little, newly dropped detail can do. Will you
please describe in as much detail as you can the last time you actually saw Mrs Hague?’
‘At a filling station – not last Saturday, but the one before.’
‘26th April,’ Conlon muttered, to a nod from his boss.
‘Can you remember which filling station and at approximately what time?’ Morris pressed on.
‘The big one at Old Heath – I never take any notice of their names – and it would’ve been round nine-thirty, or maybe nearer quarter to ten in the morning.’
‘Were you alone at the time?’
I noticed that Conlon had stopped taking notes, and was staring fixedly at me from deep behind his high, sweaty cheekbones, and his boss’s eyes were wary and attentive. This was clearly some sort of cue-moment.
‘I was with a friend who lectures at the university – Dr Leah Rooney – and was giving her a lift there.’
Conlon was flicking back the pages of his notebook, clearly for reference.
‘This Dr Rooney,’ the Detective Sergeant went on. ‘Does she lecture in the same department as Mrs Hague?’
‘No, she’s a psychologist.’
‘What would we do without them?’ Morris murmured pleasantly. ‘And does she know Mrs Hague?’
‘Oh, yes – we’re all friends.’
‘And at the filling station – did you both pass the time of day with Mrs Hague?’
‘Yes, actually Pat – Mrs Hague – did most of her talking to Dr Rooney, congratulating her on a letter she’d written to the Guardian on the Thursday. I just sort of greeted her – friendly chit-chat . . .’
‘“Friendly chit-chat”,’ Morris echoed as Conlon took notes. ‘Did Mrs Hague give any indication of where she was going on that occasion?’
‘No, but she was dressed in a tracksuit and trainers, so I guessed she might be off to a health club or something of the sort.’
‘Ah! Are you in the health club habit, Mr Rolvenden? Wife’s always telling me to sign up . . .’
‘I don’t think I’ve ever set foot in one, Sergeant.’