And None Shall Sleep

by Priscilla Masters

  Joanna dropped the papers across the desk. Selkirk and Wilde were intelligent men. Surely they must have realized they would eventually be found out? Or had the habit been too difficult to stop?

  She glanced at her watch. Three o’clock, that midway point in the afternoon. Without Mike something was missing. She stood up. Tomorrow they would pay their visit to Rufus Wilde. But for now her arm was hurting. It was only three days since her accident. Maybe it was a delayed response to the anaesthetic, but she felt a lack of enthusiasm for working to the end of the afternoon. She was tired. Matthew was otherwise engaged. She would take the rest of the afternoon off. One of the squad cars was going towards Cheddleton. It proved easy to cadge a lift home.

  Videos have their uses. In a cupboard full of old films Joanna found one that suited her mood, then lay down on the sofa with a glass of French red wine ... She closed her eyes ...

  And was roused from a deep sleep by a brisk knock. It was dark outside. She lay for a while, confused. It wouldn’t be Matthew. Not tonight. Tom?

  She crossed the room and peered through the window. The knock came again, impatient this time.

  In the moonlight she could just pick out a cloud of familiar pale hair and she flung open the door.

  ‘Caro ... Caro.’ She hugged her friend. ‘What are you doing up here? You couldn’t have come at a better time.’

  ‘I wondered whether you’d be in.’

  ‘You’re staying with Tom?’

  Her friend gave her a warm, rocking hug. ‘It is good to see you,’ she said. ‘And, yes, I am staying with Tom. Darling, faithful, loving Tom. I’d be stuck without him. And as for what I’m doing here. Do you want the official version or the unofficial?’

  ‘Both.’

  ‘Well...’ Her friend sat down. ‘Tom told me about your Accident.’ She looked at Joanna severely. ‘You should take more care.’

  ‘Maybe it wasn’t my fault.’

  ‘Well,’ Caro glanced at her arm, ‘I wanted to see you, make certain you were OK.’

  ‘And?’ Joanna said suspiciously.

  ‘There’s a story to cover,’ Caro said smoothly. ‘And I begged the editor to make it mine.’ She grinned. ‘Rather a nasty little case, isn’t it?’ She was watching Joanna very carefully for signs that she was brushing with the truth. ‘Blameless country solicitor with a heart condition gets a hole in the head?’ She looked shrewdly at Joanna. ‘Or was he quite so blameless?’

  Joanna gave a helpless gesture. ‘Come on, Caro,’ she said. ‘You know I can’t discuss these things.’

  Caro sat down, crossed her long, slim legs and leaned against the back of the sofa. ‘I suppose I could always call on the wife,’ she said. ‘Play the old game of bluff ...’

  ‘I’ll give you just a few things,’ Joanna said. ‘As you’re my friend. And, yes, you can use them.’ She drew in a deep breath. ‘The Regional Crime Squad have been called in.’

  Caro’s eyes flickered.

  ‘They believe a known assassin, available for hire, shot Jonathan Selkirk.’

  Caro’s eyebrows shot up. ‘Name?’

  But Joanna made the same quick gesture with her hands. ‘No name,’ she said. ‘But I’m confident he’ll be brought to trial. Fairly quickly.’

  ‘Good.’ Caro scribbled in her quick, angular shorthand. ‘Anything else?’

  ‘We-ell – and I can’t give you details on this – Selkirk and Wilde were under investigation by the Fraud Squad.’

  Caro smiled. ‘Great. Just great.’

  ‘Now perhaps you’ll put the kettle on,’ Joanna said drily. ‘It’s a bit difficult with my arm in plaster.’

  Caro disappeared into the kitchen and returned a few minutes later carrying two cups of coffee.

  She halted in front of the table and saw the square box with its fancy wrapping paper. ‘Wedding present, Joanna?’ Her eyes were wide and warm. She came and sat by her friend.

  ‘Oh, darling, you’re getting married. And you didn’t even tell me. What a traitor you can be.’

  ‘We’re not getting married. Matthew’s bought me crash helmet.’

  Caro was always quick to pick up undercurrents. Her eyes narrowed. ‘I see,’ she said, then glanced around the room. ‘And where is Matthew tonight?’

  Joanna drank her coffee. ‘Jane’s wielding her secret weapon,’ she said sourly.

  Caro looked at her friend quizzically.

  ‘Matthew isn’t here,’ she said, ‘because he’s with Jane tonight.’

  ‘Mmmm.’ Caro looked sceptical.

  ‘ Eloise is playing the flute in a school concert,’ Joanna said flatly. ‘Eloise is Jane’s secret weapon. Whenever she thinks Matthew and I are in danger of forgetting he already has a wife she plays the Eloise card. You know,’ she said bitterly. “You have a daughter. Do not neglect.” And Matthew’s so riddled with guilt he does triple somersaults to prove he’s not neglectful.’

  ‘Hmm,’ Caro said again. ‘And how are you getting on with young Miss Eloise?’

  ‘She dislikes me just about as much as it is possible to dislike anyone,’ Joanna said. ‘And of course that keeps Jane very happy. Matthew only ever sees Eloise on his own. Never with me. So I don’t see her. It’s early days yet.’ she said in defence.

  Caro’s all-seeing, intelligent eyes were trained on her face. ‘Seems to me,’ she said perceptively, that it isn’t just Matthew who suffers from guilt.’ Her face grew angular and sharp. ‘And that’s not all, is it, Joanna? I know you, there’s something else.’

  Joanna frowned, pushing back other fears – fears she had never voiced, even to Matthew. But the day was coming when she would be forced to confront them. She stared helplessly at her friend.

  ‘Come on,’ Caro said gently, ‘tell me.’

  Joanna gave a deep sigh. ‘It’s very muddled. I don’t know if I’ll be able to put it across very well.’

  ‘Try me.’

  ‘Well ... when Matthew left his wife and daughter,’ Joanna said, frowning, ‘I know they weren’t very happy.’ She stopped. ‘But I know too that however unhappy he was at home he would have stayed if it hadn’t been for me.’

  ‘And yet you’re still living apart,’ Caro observed. ‘A year after he finally left her.’

  Joanna nodded and found words even more difficult. ‘I think,’ she began. ‘I think what he wants and what I want are just poles apart. He wants – commitment ... another home. Once or twice he’s mentioned children.’ And now she had actually said it it was a relief. She knew just how much this had been upsetting her.

  ‘I think he expects me to be a wife.’

  ‘And what do you want?’

  ‘I don’t want to be a housewife,’ she said. ‘I want to carry on being a cop.’

  ‘Part time?’

  Joanna shook her head. ‘No,’ she said. ‘The full commitment ... the whole lot. Policing’s more than a full-time job. It’s wherever and whenever you’re needed. I haven’t got time to be a wife.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘I don’t want children,’ Joanna said. ‘I don’t ever want children.’

  Caro leaned back on the sofa. ‘Oh dear.’

  ‘The trouble is ...’ Tears were pricking Joanna’s lids. ‘I have the awful feeling that if I’m honest with Matthew he’ll go home, back to Jane! She stopped. ‘He doesn’t really like living in his flat, alone. He’s pushing me to sell this place and for us to get married, buy a home, and all the rest of the package.’ She gave a low laugh. ‘So I’m sitting here on my hands, trying to buy time.’ She stood up suddenly. ‘But it’s borrowed time, Caro, and I know it.’

  Chapter Nine

  Matthew didn’t ring that night or the following morning, but by now she had learned the pattern. In a day or two he would reappear. Jane’s beseeching and Eloise’s tears always left Matthew confused and guilty. So he never came straight back to her but took a day or two to recover.

  And Joanna spent yet another sleepless night; but it was the precursor to a fruitful
day, the most productive since Selkirk’s murder.

  Mike called at eight thirty, a wide grin on his face. ‘I don’t know what you said to Colclough,’ he chirped, ‘but I’m seconded back to you and Pugh’s got one of the uniformed lads.’

  ‘Excellent,’ Joanna said. And that was just the beginning of her day’s luck.

  During the car journey she told Mike her thoughts from the day before and appreciated his quiet attention, especially when she enlarged on the investigation by the Fraud Squad.

  ‘It’s been a big venture,’ she said, ‘much bigger than I’d realized. Though why Selkirk needed more money beats me.’

  ‘Expensive tastes?’

  ‘Maybe.’ She cast him a swift glance before adding, ‘I’m glad to have you back, Mike. I can think better when you’re around.’

  His neck turned puce. ‘I suppose I’d better look on the bright side,’ he replied gruffly. ‘Things could have been worse. I could have had her for a colleague instead of you. The thought of doing the midnight watch with that moustache ...’ He gave a bovine laugh.

  ‘Watch it,’ she warned. ‘If I thump you with this plaster you’ll know all about it!’

  The second bit of luck that day was waiting for her in the main office.

  Dawn Critchlow was standing by her desk. ‘Surprise, surprise, Inspector,’ she said. ‘I didn’t expect anything to come up on the search. But the computer found Selkirk did have a criminal record. Apart from the Fraud Squad investigation.’

  Joanna looked at her. ‘Really?’

  WPC Critchlow nodded. ‘He was involved in a fatal road accident. Five years ago he knocked down and killed a little girl on a school crossing.’ She stopped. ‘He seriously injured the lolly lady, too. She lost both legs. It was all rather horrible. The little girl died on the road, watched by her school friends. Her injuries were pretty horrific, according to the post-mortem. I remember the case quite well. I just hadn’t realized it was the same man. It happened during the lunch break. The girl had been home for her dinner and was returning to school when the accident happened.’

  Joanna sensed there was more. ‘Go on,’ she said. ‘Selkirk didn’t stop, he drove on. There were lots of people around and they took his number and got a description too.’ She hesitated. ‘The feeling amongst police and the general public was that Selkirk had been way over the legal alcohol limit at the time of the accident. He’d been out to lunch with friends. They all swore he had only had two single whiskies. He was picked up an hour after the accident, at home, swigging from a bottle. Of course the prosecution could not prove ...’ she made a face, ‘... beyond reasonable doubt that he had been over the limit at the time of the accident.’ He had a very good solicitor who put the case forward that his client had been so upset by the accident that he had been frozen, unable to stop. Trauma denial, he called it. And it fooled the court. But it didn’t fool anybody else connected with the case. There were riots outside when the verdict was given and most of the following day when Selkirk was sentenced.

  ‘He was charged with leaving the scene of an accident. A fine and suspended sentence.’ She frowned. ‘There were nearly charges of affray ... The relatives actually made death threats.’

  She looked at Joanna. ‘This is the bit I think you’ll find particularly interesting. They sent him letters. Anonymous letters warning him. Some of them were still on file.’ She bit her lip. ‘Written on a word processor, on A4 paper, no heading. One of them advised him to make will.’

  Joanna sat down open-mouthed. ‘To make a will?’

  She gave Mike a triumphant glance.

  ‘Well,’ she said. ‘This looks like as strong a motive as any. Thanks, Dawn, you’ve done really well.’ She paused. ‘Have you actually seen the letters?’

  ‘There were photocopies of them on file, and superficially they looked the same.’

  ‘We’d better go and visit these people, Mike.’

  ‘There is one thing,’ Dawn put in reluctantly. ‘It’s about the letter. The child’s family was given a warning, unofficially. They were pretty sick about the whole matter. And no charges were ever brought. But after that the letters stopped. That was three years ago, and there hasn’t been a single one since. So why now?’

  They looked at each other and Joanna shrugged her shoulders. ‘We’ll have to climb that gate when we meet it,’ she said. ‘What was the little girl’s name?’

  ‘Rowena Carter,’ Dawn replied. ‘The family still live in the same house. ‘Emily Place, number fourteen. It’s on the new housing estate.’

  ‘We’ll call round there now.’

  Mike interrupted. ‘What about Wilde?’

  ‘He can wait,’ Joanna said. ‘We’ll see him this afternoon. I think Rowena Carter’s family lie a little nearer the truth.’

  Emily Place was part of a neat development built about five years previously. When Rowena Carter died the house must have been almost new. They pulled up outside and Joanna stared at the polished picture window and tidy flowerbeds.

  A car stood in the drive, a four-year-old Vauxhall. All looked cared for and in order. But unlike the other drives on the estate there were no bikes lying around, no colourful plastic toys. No sandpit, no child-proof gate. Perhaps, Joanna thought, it was all a little too orderly. Maybe it could have benefited from just a tiny touch of chaos.

  ‘A difficult interview to open,’ she mused.

  Mike nodded.

  ‘Come on, then,’ and they walked up the path and knocked on the door.

  A man in his late twenties pulled open the door, medium height, wearing a vest and jeans. His shoulders were heavily tattooed with dragons and a mermaid. His head was shaved almost bald. One gold sleeper was threaded through his right earlobe.

  He looked at Joanna, then at Mike, and his face flushed. ‘I can guess who you are,’ he said. ‘Written all over you.’ He stood back to let them enter. ‘I had the feeling you’d come.’

  ‘You’re Mr Carter?’

  His face was puffed, lined and unhappy, older than his years. He had the look of a drinker. ‘Who else would I be?’

  ‘I'm Detective Inspector Piercy and this is Detective Sergeant Korpanski,’ Joanna said. ‘You expected us?’

  Carter nodded and his mouth twisted again. ‘Time was,’ he said, ‘when I’d have done that gladly, and gone to prison for it too. I won’t pretend I weren’t glad.’

  He turned and they followed him into a neat but small lounge-dining room with a polished teak table at one end and a three-piece suite, television and video at the other. Five portraits hung over the gas fire and one empty hook. The sixth was missing. And they were all of the same dark-haired, pretty, laughing child.

  Carter followed their gaze. ‘Yes.’ he said. ‘That’s her. That’s our little Row.’

  And Joanna felt suddenly inadequate. ‘You have other children, Mr Carter?’

  The man wiped his hand across his face. ‘Ann was pregnant when he killed our Rowena,’ he said. ‘She lost ’im an’ all.’ His voice was tough, unemotional and tightly controlled. ‘We gave up then. Didn’t seem like we was meant to have kids. They was taken away.’

  Joanna glanced at Mike then back at Mr Carter. She was still at a loss for words.

  ‘The anger’ll never leave me,’ he said. ‘Not me nor Ann. We’re empty because of ’im. Like old people with nothin’ to say. What’s ’e left us? Bugger all.’

  They were silent and Carter continued. If the law had let us have what was right, if they’d have locked ’im up, put ’im away – something – it wouldn’t ’ave bin so bad. As it was they just took his side.’

  ‘As I understand it,’ Joanna said cautiously, ‘it couldn’t be proved that Selkirk was drunk at the time of the accident.’

  Carter gave her a withering look. ‘Everyone in that whole court knew,’ he said bitterly. ‘Everyone – even the judge. I could see it in his eyes. He knew Selkirk and that smart solicitor chap what was defending him. They all knew. But they couldn’t do anythin
g’ Suddenly he stopped and smiled, and his face was transformed.

  ‘Do you want to see something pretty?’

  They both nodded because they didn’t know what else to say or do.

  ‘Come up here, then.’ And they followed him upstairs.

  It was a tiny landing, no more than a yard square of blue carpet. Four doors led off it. On one of them was a ceramic plaque. Rowena’s Room, it said. And the writing was embellished by a long-stemmed, deep red rose.

  Carter pushed the door wide open. Inside, strewn across the floor, were little girls’ toys. All the favourites. Cindy’s house, Barbie’s car. My Little Pony. A pair of small red leather sandals was tucked underneath the bed, their straps hanging undone. A multi-coloured quilt covered the bed. The window was ajar and the curtains blew gently in the breeze. The scent of fragrant, little girl’s talcum powder still hung in the air. Joanna looked all the way around the room, then back at Carter. His eyes were moist.

  ‘It’s a lovely room, isn’t it?’ he said.

  Joanna nodded.

  ‘We got Rowena to stay at her gran’s one weekend,’ he said, ‘and then we bombed down to the cash-and-carry and got this wallpaper. It were a bargain. By the time little Row got home Sunday night we’d done the lot.’

  He rubbed his eyes with his bare, tattooed arm. ‘Ann done the quilt, while I painted and put the paper on the walls. Row was that excited when she got ’ome she got straight into bed.’ He laughed. ‘It were only four o’clock in the afternoon.’

  ‘You’ve kept the room like this?’

  Carter nodded. ‘She ’as an ’eadstone,’ he said, with ’er name on. But it’s in the churchyard. It don’t seem like ’er somehow! He frowned painfully. ‘She loved pretty things, did our Row. So ’ere’ – he glanced lingeringly around the room – ‘it’s ’er,’ he said slowly. ‘It’s like she’s still in here.’ He stopped. ‘You can still smell ’er, can’t you?’

  He looked at Joanna. ‘What would you do if someone made one of your kids suffer?’ His face was frozen with hatred. ‘In pieces, she were,’ he said brokenly. ‘In pieces. Bits of ’er on the road.’ He couldn’t contain the grief now. ‘Me and Ann, we thought we ’ad it made. I ’ad a job – a good one, solid too. We bought this place. Then little Row, and another on the way. What right,’ he said fiercely, ‘what bloody right did that bastard Selkirk have to take it all away?’