‘Back here.’
‘Are they going to court?’
‘For what?’
‘For whatever you arrested them for.’
‘They weren’t arrested. They were questioned.’ Janet lit a cigarette. ‘About Sukie.’ Again, Daisy’s eyes flicked over her. ‘Nancy was also questioned about being the school bully. Her antics seem to be common knowledge, but unfortunately, unless someone makes a specific complaint, we can’t do anything about her.’
‘You couldn’t anyway.’
‘Bullying isn’t one of your school games!’ Janet snapped. ‘And you don’t win prizes for it. In the real world, bullies get prosecuted for assault. They even get sent to prison.’
‘So? Why tell me?’
‘Because you asked.’
‘Did I?’ Daisy slid off the stool and carried the used dishes to the sink. ‘How long am I going to be here?’
‘I don’t know. Why?’
‘It’s boring. I want to go back to school.’
‘You’re here for your own protection, as you’ve already been told.’
Wide-eyed, Daisy said, ‘I thought Torrance was still in hospital.’
‘Oh, stop acting dumb! You know perfectly well we can’t risk your gossiping about her.’
‘Why didn’t you say that, then? Anyway, I only talk to Alice, but she isn’t here, so I couldn’t.’ She looked at the floor. ‘And even if she was here, she wouldn’t be speaking to me. You heard what she said yesterday.’
‘You talk to Grace, too.’
Crossing the room in three small strides, Daisy said, ‘But not properly. I told you, she’s stupid.’ Then, breathing in Janet’s face, she added, ‘To save us both getting bored out of our skulls, why don’t you take me for a walk? Everyone will be in chapel, so you needn’t worry about me talking to anyone. There won’t be a soul in sight.’
3
As McKenna negotiated one of the crazy turns in the Hermitage drive, a security van suddenly materialised in front of him. Trailing in its wake, he peered right and left, but was no wiser about where it had come from when he reached the forecourt. He parked between two unfamiliar cars and watched the van bump along the track towards the arena.
Small groups of police officers, wearing an air of boredom, stood about in the lobby. McKenna learned that one of the cars belonged to the Roman Catholic priest who took Sunday morning Mass in the refectory, the other to the Protestant minister who, with the bulk of girls and staff and another group of officers, was in the chapel in the grounds. Until religious observances were completed, it seemed there was little for anyone to do.
He wandered back to the forecourt, to stand, hands in pockets, gazing at nothing, while the wind whispered through the trees, touching his face with cool fingers as it went on its way. The sky was a chilly blue, criss-crossed with vapour trails and torn cloud.
He had two hours to kill before the solicitor and social worker arrived to sit in with Daisy while she gave her statement and was interviewed about the sabotaged saddle. Long, empty hours, he thought, strolling across to the mobile incident room, a hiatus in the frenetic activity of the past three days. Torrance would be cautioned and questioned, provided her doctors allowed it, once Daisy’s allegations were down in black and white. Alice was due back at two thirty. Imagining the various kinds of purgatory she would have made her mother suffer since yesterday, he went into the little office and sat down.
When he called Janet, she asked if she might take Daisy for a walk in the grounds and, seeing no harm in the suggestion, he agreed. Scribbling himself a reminder to obtain Daisy’s consent for her things to be searched for knives, scalpels or suchlike, he next called Dewi, who was at the hospital, waiting to speak to Imogen if she regained consciousness.
‘She’s still completely out of it, sir,’ Dewi told him. ‘And she’s still pretty sick. One of her kidneys is threatening to pack up.’
‘How are her parents taking that?’ McKenna asked.
‘They don’t know yet. They left in the early hours and they haven’t come back.’ Dewi paused. ‘They were giving Vivienne a lot of grief because she wouldn’t go away.’
‘I hope you told them she saved Imogen’s life?’
‘Yes, I did. I don’t think it made much of an impression. They’re far more bothered about screwing money out of somebody for negligence. The school’s first in line and us second. They’ve got their solicitor in tow, you see, and she decided it was “only fair” to tell me “which way the wind was blowing”, so I told her that as the local weather’s famous for being completely unpredictable, an almighty storm could suddenly blow up from an entirely unsuspected direction.’
‘Berkshire won’t question them without Imogen’s formal statement.’
‘Maybe not, sir, but it won’t hurt to give the Olivers something to think about.’
‘As long as that’s all you say,’ McKenna warned. ‘By the way, keep an eye on Vivienne. Make sure she’s fed and watered at least, and find out when she intends to come back here.’
‘She doesn’t, except to pack her bags,’ Dewi replied. ‘She’s had the Hermitage, so she said, “up to the gills, and more”.’ After a moment, he added, ‘I couldn’t swear to it, but I’m sure she hasn’t smoked anything apart from ordinary ciggies since she’s been here and not many of those. Let’s hope I’m right, eh?’
Two new pieces of paper had been put in front of McKenna while he spoke to Dewi, one a fax from the pathology department, the other a photocopied and faxed page from a jeweller’s catalogue.
Eifion Roberts’s efforts to identify the smudges left by the killer’s fingers on Sukie’s T-shirt had proved fruitless, and as his attempts to extract evidence from the partial footprint on her jeans had been equally futile and disappointing, he intended to send both garments to a laboratory in the Midlands for a last-ditch round of tests.
McKenna glanced at the other paper before putting it aside for Nona, who would know if the jewel in the rather grainy photograph matched either of the pendants she had found in Imogen’s room. The piece was not priced and McKenna wondered if it were one of those things people could not afford if they had to ask the cost. It looked expensive, but a pear-cut diamond weighing almost a carat was bound to be, he thought. The setting — a starfish-shaped platinum claw — was particularly unusual.
Jack was at the police station, supervising a thorough cross-check of every single item of information that had come their way since Thursday. He had nothing to report.
Shortly before eleven, McKenna took himself for a walk, setting off down the tarmac path towards the sprawling complex of swimming pool, sports hall and playing fields. As ever, the trees closed about him within yards and the air was heavy with earth smells. Where the trees cast their deepest shade, the path bloomed with moss, and as it began its downward slope he could see the distant roof line of the sports hall to the right. To the left, embraced on three sides by the woods, was the paddock. Some of the horses were moving about, searching for grass among the bald patches and tracts of mud. Purdey, her coat glistening, stood with her head over the fence, nose to nose with Tonto. Two figures suddenly came into view: Daisy, instantly recognisable, still garbed in black, and Janet, slender and pale-clad. Daisy ran towards the horses, reaching out to Tonto. He threw up his head, reared and, wheeling on his hind legs, took off at the gallop. Purdey followed suit, making the others stampede. Daisy seemed to be laughing.
He quickened his pace, but lost sight of them when the path veered to the right and they had gone when he neared the paddock. Now in the far corner of the field, the horses tensed as he approached and the skewbald mare advanced, ready to defend her herd. Head extended, neck dished, nostrils flaring, she stopped some ten feet from the gate and he was shocked to find himself afraid. Quietly but hurriedly, he walked away, listening intently for pounding hooves. Preoccupied, disconcerted, his sense of direction went the way of the four winds.
4
‘You frightened those horse
s,’ Janet said, rather accusingly, as she and Daisy meandered through the woods towards the swimming pool.
‘I didn’t! Tonto was just fooling around.’
‘It didn’t look like that to me.’
Daisy stopped. ‘But do you know much about horses? Have you ever kept your own?’
‘Have you?’
Favouring her with a scowl instead of replying, Daisy took off at a jog trot, her dark figure camouflaged by the dappled sunlight striking through the branches. Janet strode after her, imagining she was the cat stalking the mouse in this game they seemed to be playing and reminding herself that she could be caught unawares by a reversal of roles. Every so often, Daisy glanced over her shoulder, to make sure Janet was still with her.
Who was leading whom? Janet wondered. Then, her attention caught by a snatch of music on the wind, she paused, and hearing voices lifted in praise somewhere not too far away, felt again that stab of nostalgia. But for what? she asked herself, as the rustle of leaves overwhelmed the hymn. For games of tennis so hard fought they blistered the hands; for Sunday morning service and the scent of incense; for dew-kissed grass to roam on a summer morning; for twilit rendezvous in hidden places; for secret passions and shared secrets; for the agonising extremes of youthful emotion; and for the first experience of love that simultaneously opened the gates of Hell.
‘What’s wrong with you?’ Daisy blocked her way.
Janet’s heart thumped in her throat. ‘Don’t do that!’
‘Why? Did I scare you?’ Daisy’s eyes gleamed. ‘Did you think I was Sukie’s ghost?’
5
The path McKenna next found himself following was gravelled, snaking through a plantation of massive ancient oaks. As the wind stirred their crowns, the trees groaned mournfully and low-hanging branches touched his face and body. Completely disorientated, he crunched onwards, hoping to find a clearing so that he could feel the wind and see the sun, but the further he walked the more lost he became. Like the crazy drive, the path led him towards each compass point in turn and when he stopped to peer skywards through a break in the great leaf canopy he saw only that the sun must be nearing its zenith. Then he heard a car door slam somewhere ahead. Almost at the run, he reached the top of a gentle slope, where below was what his bemused eye perceived as a fairy-tale cottage. He expected to see smoke curling from the chimney, peeping fawns, a woodcutter, Snow White, the Seven Dwarfs, but all he saw was the witch. She was stowing suitcases into the boot of a sleek red car.
He pulled up short and, supporting himself against a tree, in full view should she glance in his direction, he watched her. She put away the last suitcase, hesitated briefly, then made for the open door of a square white house that was as stark as the memory of their Friday encounter, which continued to play in the theatre of his mind like a blatantly contrived bit of drama, where he was at once audience, actor and critic.
She emerged carrying a large carton, which she placed on the ground beside the car. Twice more she went back and forth, adding to the stack of paraphernalia with each trip, working methodically and systematically, and despite the ignominy of her exit, looking as cool and collected as ever. At one point her head jerked up, as if, like the horses in the paddock, she sensed his presence, but the moment passed. Shutting the car boot, she went into the house and closed the door decisively.
6
Arms loosely folded, Janet stood beside Daisy at the side of the swimming pool, gazing about admiringly. At one end the tiered diving platform hung against a backdrop of trees, its austere lines complementing nature’s inconclusive arrangements. The pool house at the opposite end balanced the other structure, pulling the eye back and forth across the great expanse of water. The wind disturbed the water’s surface, fragmenting reflections and making the drowned dolphin wriggle among the brilliant blue tiles. The scene reminded her of a David Hockney painting, where a quiet emptiness touched on a sense of something gone but something to come. The soft splashing noise as the water hit the sides of the pool and the whispering wind evoked the ghostly cries of girls at sport and, mesmerised by the shivering dolphin, she imagined Imogen upon its back, cleaving the water as if whole. The ghostly cries became the jeers of Nancy’s cruel games when Imogen hauled herself back into the solid world and was forced to beg for mercy and her crutches.
Daisy nudged her. ‘Had Sukie been chewed up by rats and crabs?’
Janet’s flesh threatened to crawl off her bones. ‘What a horrible thing to say!’
‘Why? It happens, doesn’t it?’ Daisy touched her again. ‘Well? Had she?’
Turning on her heel, Janet moved away from the water. Her legs were suddenly stiff. ‘No,’ she replied curtly. ‘She had not.’
‘That’s good, isn’t it? Otherwise, it would have been even more horrible for her parents when they identified her.’ Trotting to keep abreast, Daisy asked, ‘Have you seen lots of bodies? Did you see Sukie’s body? What did she really look like?’
Janet stopped in the lee of the pool house. Refusing to meet Daisy’s eager eyes, she said, ‘Yes, I’ve seen lots of bodies. No, I didn’t see Sukie. However,’ she went on, teeth gritted, ‘my colleagues tell me she simply looked very dead and very sad.’
‘They must mean before she was cut up. We dissect corpses in biology, you know. They look awful when they’re in bits.’
‘What is it with you, eh?’ Janet rounded on her. ‘You’re like some damned ghoul!’
Daisy stepped back as if she had been struck. Her face sagged, she mumbled something unintelligible, then took off in the direction of the playing fields. She moved fast and, once under the cloak of trees, became as one with the other shadows.
Janet went in pursuit, the play of light and shade constantly deceiving her, as if the woods were a magic place where people could lose their bodily selves. She caught up with her at last by a set of tennis courts that were, like the pool, relics of another era. Daisy had her fingers hooked into the high, dark-green netting surrounding the complex and was staring at the puddles still lying on the dusty clay and the angular shadows cast by the umpire’s tall seats. Separated internally by the green netting, the four courts lay at the foot of a broad sweep of shallow steps leading to a wooden pavilion with an ornately canopied veranda, but courts and pavilion wore an air of abandonment and the veranda was heaped with drifts of dead leaves.
‘I don’t suppose anyone’s played here for a long time,’ Janet commented, when the heavy silence began to weigh on her.
‘Well, you suppose wrong,’ Daisy replied sharply. ‘The sixth form use it for exhibition matches on Sports Day while the parents and teachers have tea in the pavilion.’ Unhooking herself, she wandered towards the building, trailing her fingers along the netting. Twice she stopped to open the gates to the courts and the squealing bolts set Janet’s teeth on edge.
‘Did Sukie play in the matches?’
Daisy shook her head.
‘I wish I knew why she went into the woods on Tuesday,’ Janet said. ‘Wild horses wouldn’t drag me in there after dark.’
‘Maybe she thought Nancy was going to hack off one of Purdey’s legs.’
Janet felt sick.
‘Nancy reckoned it would be a properly biblical revenge for Imogen’s leg, you see,’ Daisy went on, coming to a stop by the pavilion. The white-painted brick walls on which the building rested were stained with moss and damp, while trumpet-flowered bindweed crept upwards and outwards from a tangle of roots on the ground.
Shocked into immobility, Janet asked, ‘How did Nancy know about the accident?’
‘Sukie told her.’ Daisy began beating a passage through the undergrowth.
Watching her batter the plants, Janet imagined how Sukie had been persuaded to open her mouth. ‘And how did you find out?’ she asked.
Instead of answering, Daisy disappeared round the corner and Janet was forced to follow. Her legs felt weak and she trod gingerly on the moss that carpeted the paving behind the building.
Daisy was
standing at the foot of a steep, narrow flight of concrete steps leading to a slatted door green with mould. With a triangular space underneath, the steps leaned against the building like a small replica of the fire escapes at the main school. The handrail looked very flimsy. ‘We can get in this way if you want,’ she suggested. ‘There might be some racquets and balls inside.’
‘I don’t want to play tennis.’ Janet snapped. ‘I want you to answer my question.’
‘I overheard. OK?’
‘And when did Nancy dream up that diabolical idea about Purdey?’
Daisy shrugged. ‘Dunno.’
‘Well, then, when did she intend to do it?’
Daisy sat on the bottom step. ‘She was probably just tormenting.’ Picking dirt from under her fingernails, she added, ‘Like Therese said she’d wrecked Charlotte’s clothes to upset Dr Scott.’
Absently, Janet brushed away a dandelion puff sticking to her sweater and watched it drift in Daisy’s direction. ‘But like Dr Scott,’ she said, half to herself, ‘Sukie couldn’t know it was an empty threat.’
Pursing her lips, Daisy blew back the puff.
As the delicate little seeds touched Janet’s face, she focused on Daisy. ‘Who else has found out?’ she asked.
‘What about?’
‘The accident.’
‘Charlotte.’ Daisy paused, then said, ‘Imogen didn’t need telling, did she?’
‘Do you really expect me to believe you haven’t spread it around? It was dynamite.’
Daisy’s eyes flickered. ‘Nancy doesn’t know I was listening. She’d kill me if she found out.’
‘Would she? Perhaps she killed Sukie.’
‘No way!’
‘What about Charlotte, then?’
‘Oh, get real! She can’t stand the sight of blood. She was sick all over the school the first time she saw Imogen legless.’
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