by Nicola Ford
‘You really can’t remember anything at all about what happened?’
‘Like I said, I remember heading down the lane. The weather was just awful – I could hardly see a thing. David had given me your waterproof from out the back of the Land Rover. And I pulled the hood up real tight to keep the rain out. So I guess I wouldn’t have heard or seen much before I got hit anyhow.’
‘Jo, I know this is difficult. But you need to think. This is really important. Can you recall anything at all about the vehicle that hit you?’
Jo looked exhausted. ‘I’ve told you I don’t remember anything. Some asshole hit me and drove off. End of.’ Jo paused. ‘What’s this about, Clare? Have they caught the driver? Do they know who it was?’
Clare shook her head. ‘It’s not that.’ She took a deep breath. ‘David found multiple sets of tyre tracks.’
‘There was more than one of them?’
Clare shook her head. ‘No, they were all the same vehicle. A four by four by the look of the tread marks. But the thing is, it didn’t just hit you once. They had a second go. What happened to you wasn’t any sort of accident. They were trying to kill you.’
‘Back up a little. I know I’m pretty bust up, but my brain is functioning just fine. The waterproof I had on was yours. There’s no way anyone could have known it was me under that thing. If they were trying to kill someone, it wasn’t me – it was you. And the way I see it, it wasn’t the first time.’
Clare nodded. ‘I know – that thought had crossed my mind too. I’m so sorry, Jo; I think I’m the reason you’re in here.’
‘Screw that. I’m here because of the son of a bitch driving that four by four.’ Jo signalled towards her mouth for another sip of water and Clare duly obliged. ‘This has to be connected to Jim Hart’s death somehow. Have you been rattling skeletons in too many closets?’
Clare laughed. ‘That’s rich, given what you do for a living.’
But Jo’s expression was entirely devoid of humour. ‘If I’m lying in a hospital bed because some mad bastard wants you dead, I think the least I deserve is to be taken seriously. We need to figure out who wants you dead.’
‘It’s not just me, Jo, not any more. Whoever ran you down doesn’t know you can’t identify them. And that makes you a target now too.’ Clare held Jo’s hand and gave it a squeeze. ‘Do you trust me?’
Jo smiled. ‘I guess having the same person trying to kill us must count for something.’
Clare picked up the report from the bedside cabinet. ‘I’ve been going over your report on Jim’s cremation. And I need your professional opinion about something.’
‘My memory might not be so hot right now. But bones I can do.’
Clare wedged another pillow behind Jo’s head as she winced, struggling to lever herself into a semi-upright position.
‘You said in your report that the marks on one of the ribs were caused by a weapon with a serrated edge.’
Jo nodded. ‘That’s right.’
‘Could it have been a bread knife?’
Jo raised an eyebrow. ‘A bread knife.’
Clare nodded, but didn’t elaborate.
Jo thought for a moment before shaking her head. ‘Well, no. No way.’
‘Are you absolutely sure?’
‘Sure as anyone can be. A bread knife would have been all wrong. Whatever the weapon was, it had substantial serrations – teeth.’
Clare said, ‘And the marks on the second rib fragment. They were caused by a blade with a more conventional cutting edge.’
Jo nodded. ‘That’s right. They’re entirely different.’
Clare looked around, glancing over her shoulder towards the office at the end of the ward before picking up her bag from the floor and withdrawing the plastic bag containing the bowie knife. For a moment she had a vision of alarm bells ringing and orderlies running towards her. But as she slipped it onto the edge of Jo’s bed, the only sounds were the rising and falling notes of the elderly lady’s snoring in the neighbouring bed.
Jo picked up the bag, looking first at its contents and then the numbers written across the plastic in bold black marker pen. ‘This came from site.’
She nodded. ‘From Gerald’s backfill.’ She paused. ‘Could it have caused both sets of cut marks?’
Clare watched as Jo examined the knife again, turning it over again and again until finally she was satisfied. ‘Yes. I think it could. This could be the knife that killed Jim.’
Looking down at the great sweep of land that lay at her feet, Clare could see why Barbury Castle’s Iron Age builders had chosen this spot to create the ancient earthworks on which she stood. Below her, a series of sinuous green lines threaded their way across the landscape, marking the boundaries of ancient fields. Some had been tilled and harvested by the same hands that built the hillfort over two thousand years ago.
At the base of the hill, the fields flattened out into an expansive plain, set in the middle of which was the sprawling mass of concrete and tarmac that was now Swindon. Somewhere within the network of ring roads and thrumming railway tracks lay a young American woman who’d given her the news that she’d expected but dreaded hearing.
She leant into the gusting wind, pushing through the drizzle as she navigated her slippery course along the chalk-incised crest of the bank. The air was chill and damp. She jammed her hands down into the pockets of her new waterproof. Her fingers clasped the plastic bag containing the knife, the handle of which poked a little too conspicuously out from beneath the pocket’s Gore-Tex flap. She hadn’t been able to bring herself to leave it in the car. It felt like the one thing connecting her to the truth about what was really going on at Hungerbourne.
She slithered her way down the bank, her thoughts a kaleidoscope of competing versions of reality. At one moment forming a discernible pattern, the next dissolving into unrecognisable fragments. Estelle had lied to them – that much was obvious. But why? It seemed unlikely she was trying to protect Gerald’s reputation. After all, Estelle had implicated him in covering up the aftermath of Jim’s death.
She trudged the muddy footpath back to the Fiesta, deep in thought, barely noticing her surroundings as the drizzle thinned and the cloud began to lift. Her concentration was broken by the metallic jingle of an ice cream van coming from the car park. She smiled. That sort of optimism should be rewarded. She ordered an ice cream with a Flake and sat down at a picnic table situated close by a life-sized reconstruction of an Iron Age round house. She began her methodical dissection of the sugar-laden treat with the Flake, hoping the energy intake might boost her powers of reasoning.
For a Saturday during the school holidays, the country park was quiet. No surprise given the weather. But a handful of hardy parents were resolutely ignoring the elements, determined to make their offspring enjoy their day out. A few metres away from where Clare was sitting, a family group were trying to have a picnic in the lee of the round house. Mum was fighting a losing battle with plastic plates and paper serviettes as the wind whipped at the corners of the blanket on which she’d staked out their territory.
In the doorway of the Iron Age hut, dad and son, a youngster of no more than eight or nine, were engaged in mock battle. The boy, face set in earnest concentration, was dressed in a horned helmet and wielding a small plastic sword. Dad, meanwhile, was forced to make do with decidedly inferior equipment and had selected a short length of hazel from among the wind-blown debris in the nearby shrubs as his weapon of choice.
The little boy parried and thrust, but, lacking his father’s reach, was finally outmanoeuvred as dad sent the plastic helmet tumbling to the floor with a deft blow. He plucked the helmet from the ground and perched it precariously on his own head as the youngster proceeded to give him a good striping with the flat of his plastic blade in recompense for the theft.
Clare licked her ice cream and watched the mother looking on proudly at her two boys. For the briefest moment, more out of curiosity than envy, she wondered what it would have been
like to have been part of that sort of family. But having a dad around was no guarantee of happiness – look at Peter.
Clare shuddered. For several moments she sat quite still until the sensation of cold, sticky ice cream trickling down between her fingers jolted her into activity. She rammed the remains of the cornet into a nearby rubbish bin and wiped her hands with a paper tissue. Fumbling in her pocket for the car keys, she made her way to the Fiesta and climbed in.
She took her mobile out of her bag and dialled David’s number, trying to calm her breathing. ‘It’s me. I need you to meet me at the manor.’
‘When?’
‘Now.’
‘But I—’
She cut him off short. ‘Estelle lied.’
‘What?’
‘She’s been lying to protect Peter. I’ll explain when I see you.’
‘You can’t be serious? You think Peter killed Jim?’
‘I’m not arguing, David. I’ve got proof. I’ll see you there in twenty minutes.’
‘Wait! Don’t be a bloody idiot, Clare.’
She pressed the disconnect button.
Clare barely registered the presence of the speed camera signs on the long, undulating road that switchbacked its way through acre upon acre of open wheat fields between Barbury Castle and Hungerbourne. She prided herself on being a good judge of people. But she’d been wrong about Stephen and now it seemed she’d misjudged Peter too.
Her heart was pumping double-time as she slewed the Fiesta round onto the manor’s gravel drive. Pulling up in front of the house beside Peter’s black BMW four by four, she hurtled out of the car and up the steps, jamming her finger into the decrepit bell seated beside the flaking front door. No response. She wiped the grime from the hall window with the flat of her hand and peered in. There were no evident signs of life.
She returned to the front door, hammering on it with her fist. ‘Peter!’
Finally, she heard Peter’s muffled voice coming from somewhere beyond the hallway. ‘Steady down. You’ll have the door off.’
When he opened it, the same engaging smile played on his face that she remembered from the day she’d first met him. He looked her up and down, surveying her breathless state, his expression one of anxious concern. ‘My God, Clare, what on earth’s the matter?’
He was a cool character. She had to give him that. But then he’d had years of practice.
She made a conscious effort to control the tremor in her voice. ‘I need to talk to you, Peter – now.’
He looked perplexed, but said nothing; instead, he held the door open and ushered her inside. The shabby elegance of the drawing room was a stark contrast to the clean, functional lines of his Marlborough flat. An open laptop and mobile on the side table next to the wing-back chair by the fireplace were the only visible concessions to modernity. Expecting him to sit in the chair, she perched on one end of the sofa opposite the fireplace.
But, instead, he sat down beside her. ‘You’re lucky to catch me. I’m only here because I’m still waiting for the electrician to turn up to give me a quote for rewiring this place.’ He looked at her, apparently trying to take stock of her unaccustomedly serious expression. ‘What’s this about?’
Now that she was here, faced with confronting him on her own, she realised she had no idea what to do. Peter seemed to mistake her hesitation for distress and slid his hand forward to rest on hers. She snatched her hands away, depositing them firmly in her lap.
He craned his neck forward, peering into her face. But she looked away, unwilling to meet his penetrating blue eyes. ‘What is it, Clare? You’re frightening me.’
She glanced down at her watch. Where was David?
She drew in a breath and looked at Peter. ‘I need to talk to you about something. Something I swore to David I’d never discuss with anyone else.’
Peter stiffened. ‘What’s between you and David is none of my business.’
‘It’s not just between me and David. It involves someone else.’
He looked at her questioningly.
Clare said, ‘Your mother.’
‘My mother!’
Whatever he’d been expecting, this obviously wasn’t it.
‘A few days ago David and I paid her a visit.’
Peter shifted slightly on the sofa. ‘What on earth for?’
‘Can’t you guess?’
Peter leant back and looked at her. She had the impression he was examining her – reappraising what this new Clare signified.
‘I haven’t the faintest idea what you’re talking about. If you’ve got something to say, why don’t you just come out and say it.’
Clare glanced down at her watch again. She’d been certain David would be here by now. Surely he wasn’t going to let her down when it really counted.
‘For pity’s sake, Clare, what is this about?’
She couldn’t stall him any longer. She’d said too much to stop now. ‘Your mother told us she’d known about your father’s death.’
Peter’s eyes left hers. He mumbled, half to himself, ‘She knew?’
Clare nodded, her eyes fixed firmly on his face. ‘She told us Gerald had been protecting someone.’
Peter’s eyes returned to hers. He looked bemused. Could she have got this wrong? She told herself not to be such a fool. He’d kept this act up for almost three quarters of his life. It must come as easily as breathing to him now.
Well, she wasn’t going to allow herself to be manipulated again, not by Peter or anyone else. ‘She told us she’d killed your father.’
She held her breath, waiting for his response. He looked genuinely shocked. He stood up and made his way over to the window, staring out down the long sweep of the drive. For a few moments neither of them spoke.
He turned to face her. ‘You’re lying.’
His tone was cold and distant. She was surprised to find she felt hurt by it. But then she hadn’t had much practice at this sort of thing. And as he remained motionless in front of her, her hurt began to change to fear.
‘Why would I lie? Estelle told us she stabbed your father. If you don’t believe me, you can ask David. He’ll be here any moment.’
She fervently hoped that was true. Where the hell was he?
Peter’s expression was one of complete incomprehension. ‘I don’t know what sort of game you’re playing, Clare, but I don’t believe you. My mother isn’t a murderer. Why would she say she killed my father when she didn’t?’
‘She told us Gerald helped her cover it up. He disposed of your father’s body.’
He shook his head, waving his hands in the air in a frantic gesture of denial. ‘This is nonsense.’
What had she expected? That he would admit everything and meekly offer to turn himself in? She’d been a naïve idiot. He’d allowed everyone he supposedly loved and cared for to take the blame for his actions for the last four decades. Why on earth had she expected him to behave any differently with her?
She stood up. Her cheeks scorched red with anger. ‘You’ve used me, Peter, and you’ve hurt the people I care about. There was a time when I couldn’t have believed this of you. It was bad enough that you were prepared to let everyone believe Gerald was responsible for your father’s death. But then somewhere along the line you got the idea you could silence anyone getting close to the truth. But surely even you aren’t prepared to let your own mother take the blame?’
He shook his head. ‘I’ve told you. My mother is not a murderer.’
‘I know.’ She spoke the words slowly, deliberately. ‘We found something buried in Gerald’s backfill. A bowie knife. Sound familiar?’
She could feel the weight of the knife jostling in her jacket pocket. What the hell had she imagined she was going to do – confront him with it? Face him down and demand an answer? That didn’t seem such a good idea right now. In fact, as she sat here, murder weapon in pocket, with Peter just a few feet away on the other side of the room, there was quite a lot about her decision-making skill
s that she was beginning to question.
He said, ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’
Her mouth felt dry. But she’d gone too far to back down now. ‘No.’ She almost spat the single syllable at him. ‘You wouldn’t, would you. You’d rather allow your uncle and your own mother to clean up your dirty work. I’ve seen the knife before, Peter. You showed me a photo of it when I came to your flat that first time. Remember? The photo of you and Gerald.’
She struggled to control her anger. Tears pricked her eyes. Her shoulders heaved. The rest of her words came in huge gulping sobs. ‘How could you? How could you stand there in cold blood and show me that photograph, knowing you’d killed him with it?’
All at once his expression changed from blank denial to limp exhaustion. His shoulders sagged and he seemed to shrink in front of her. He shuffled the few feet from the window to the chair as if in a catatonic state and folded into it. And there he sat, bent forward, head in hands.
His words when they eventually came were directed towards the floor. ‘I didn’t know. Not when I showed you that photograph.’
Clare stood up, just a few feet in front of him. ‘Oh, please. What do you take me for? Are you seriously trying to tell me you didn’t know you’d killed him?’
He repeated the words. ‘I didn’t know. Not until that day in the coroner’s court. You can’t begin to imagine what it’s been like since I found out.’ He looked up at her, his blue eyes unblinking.
Her voice was flat, drained of all emotion. ‘What happened?’
He held his arms outstretched, palms upturned, in front of him. ‘I don’t remember all of it. Ed and I had been drinking. There was a place we used to go to up in the copse. I was in a bit of a state by the time I got back here and I wasn’t feeling too good.
‘I went into Gerald’s study to help myself from his whiskey decanter. And that’s when I found my father with the safe door open. I screamed at him and asked him what the hell he thought he was doing. But he just looked at me and sneered. If I’d been sober, I’d never have spoken to him like that. But after everything Uncle Gerald had done for him, I was furious. I knew he was a bastard, but I never dreamt he’d stoop to stealing from him. I remember shoving him and then him taking a swing at me. After that I don’t remember a thing. I must have blacked out. When I came to I was in my bedroom with the most almighty hangover, a lump the size of an egg on the back of my head and a black eye.’