Guilty Waters

by Priscilla Masters

  Will put his hand on her arm. ‘Mum,’ he said.

  It was just one word, but it stopped her dead in her tracks.

  ‘We’re searching all the properties in Rudyard just in case, you know.’

  ‘They’re not here.’

  ‘Do you mind if I just take a look around?’

  Wendy Murdoch shrugged. ‘Help yourself,’ she said.

  The house was a small two-bedroomed cottage. Dawn even managed to take a peek into the tiny loft space, which was hardly big enough for two bodies. Then she went into the shed. The chest freezer practically filled the space. Why such an enormous freezer for just two people? Dawn wondered. No, something wasn’t right … She lifted the lid.

  TWENTY-ONE

  Later, when she related her encounter during the briefing, Joanna asked her what her private thoughts were. Did this mother and son relationship have any bearing on their case?

  ‘I don’t know, Joanna,’ Dawn said, frowning. ‘I don’t know. But I feel there’s something strange about the place, about the relationship between William and his mother. He plays the protective son looking after his frail mother but it all seems a bit plastic. A bit staged. Put on for my benefit, almost. But there’s no doubt he has her where he wants her. He gets the carer’s allowance and a certain amount of freedom, somewhere to live and the upper hand.’

  ‘You saw nothing in the house? Nothing of any interest in the freezer?’

  ‘No. The house is too small to conceal anything. Besides, with Wendy Murdoch there all the time I don’t see how two girls could possibly have been killed and their bodies concealed without her knowing something about it.’ She gave a shame-faced grin at the memory. ‘I got excited when I saw the chest freezer in the garage but it was full of ice cream. Will was obviously holding stock for the van. Or he’d pinched it,’ she added.

  ‘Hmm, shame that. Wouldn’t it have been nice—’ She stopped herself. What was she saying? Nice if they’d found two preserved bodies? ‘It was always a long shot. Why would he have any designs on the two girls? He doesn’t look like a sex fiend to me and we’ve no evidence they encountered each other.’

  DC Alan King stepped forward. ‘No, Joanna,’ he agreed. ‘We have nothing to connect him to the girls. No sightings, no contacts. No one ever saw them together.’

  ‘But he probably did meet up with them at some point,’ Joanna said, thinking. ‘He was selling ice creams, remember? And serving coffee and sandwiches in café. Perfect opportunity for an introduction, maybe? A little light banter?’ She looked around the room. ‘Anyone got anything more?’

  Jason Spark put his hand up. ‘I’ve been manning the phone lines,’ he said. ‘We have a member of the public who says he thought he saw two French girls talking to two men back in July.’

  ‘Where was this?’

  ‘On Ramshaw Rocks. One of the climbs on the Roaches.’

  ‘Ah – the place where the girls planted the letterbox.’ Privately her heart was sinking. If they had to widen the search for the missing girls to the entire Staffordshire and Derbyshire moorlands they might never find them. The area was simply too vast.

  ‘Do we know when?’

  He was on holiday in the middle of July.’

  The right time period.

  ‘Was he able to give a description of the two men?’

  Spark shook his head and looked a little crestfallen. ‘Apparently they had their hoods pulled down over their faces. It was one of those rainy days. He wasn’t even absolutely certain it was two girls and two men but he thought he heard someone speaking French.’

  ‘You’ve got his name and number?’

  Spark nodded.

  ‘Is he local?’

  ‘He’s from Macclesfield.’

  ‘OK. Tomorrow, show him the pictures. And we need to rope the media in too. We need all the help we can get. In the meantime we’ll spread our search to encompass the area right around the lake.’ She crossed the board to a large map of the area. The north side of the lake was less popular than the south. One had to walk quite a distance to encompass the area and round the top of the water. On one side were a few cottages and holiday lets, and on the other the terminal of the small railway and the end of the cycle track. Heavily wooded, sparsely populated, largely farmland. If a body – or in this case two bodies – had been hidden here, it was less likely they would be found quickly.

  It was as the officers dispersed that Joanna recalled something the Stuart brothers had said and suddenly knew why she had not fixed on Barker one hundred per cent.

  ‘We often go there.’

  They’d been there before. Of course they’d been there before. She practically slapped her forehead. The Roaches was a favourite challenge to climbers. A chance to hone their skills with so many different climbs, some easy, some hard and all the intermediates. The place swarmed with climbers who arrived well equipped with ropes and crampons. She and Matthew had seen them many times right through the summer: healthy, happy climbers, just like James and Martin, standing at the bottom looking up to the challenge, swapping stories of near misses and information about their equipment. The question was when had they been there before? July, maybe? And rather than in September had they found the letterbox then and maybe met up with them? They were a good-looking pair of guys. Fit and healthy. This seemed a much more plausible explanation for an involvement than either Barker or Will Murdoch. Two girls, two guys. That was a bit easier. But why had they come back, searching for them?

  And so, as the search continued for the two girls, Joanna prepared to revisit the brothers.

  But for now she needed to get home.

  Unusually she was back at Waterfall Cottage by seven, a little before Matthew. And to add to the gold star which should be pinned on her apron, by the time he came in the spaghetti bolognese was almost ready for a sprinkle of parmigiano.

  ‘Hey,’ he said, putting his arms around her. ‘What’s this? Domestication.’ He planted a smacker of a kiss on her lips. ‘At last? I like it,’ he said with gusto.

  She laughed with him. This happy détente could last, she thought. And how great it would be if it did. ‘Well, there’s nothing pressing at the moment and I seemed to remember it was my turn to cook tea, so I thought I’d crack on.’

  ‘Lovely,’ he said. And then his face changed, became abstracted. She turned around. There was something in his voice. Some doubt.

  ‘Matt,’ she said, concerned. ‘What is it?’

  ‘Eloise,’ he said simply. She might have guessed. ‘Jane rang me at work. She says Eloise is not eating properly.’

  ‘I thought she looked a bit …’

  ‘We should have her round a bit more,’ he said firmly. ‘I’m the one who lives near. Jane’s miles away. Eloise elected to come here, to Keele, to be near me.’

  Or to annoy me. To get in the way.

  ‘I shouldn’t neglect her,’ Matthew went on, oblivious to her private thoughts. ‘I should talk to her. I mean, Jane’s miles away,’ he repeated limply.

  Suddenly Joanna felt awash with guilt. Whose fault was it that Matthew and Jane had initially separated then divorced? Whose fault was it that Jane now lived in York and, yes, she was miles away from her daughter?

  Wait a minute, she thought as she dropped the pasta on to the plate then spooned the meat sauce over it. It’s not entirely mine. But still.

  ‘OK by me, Matt.’ She reached across and touched his hand, but her husband was still preoccupied, worrying about his daughter.

  She was racked with guilt. And she knew, like oil floating on water, that that guilt would always be there. No amount of detergent would ever wash it away.

  They ate in silence, which he broke as they were sipping wine, glancing up at one another but not quite finding the right words to continue the conversation.

  Matthew looked up brightly, attempting at a grin which was only half successful. ‘How’s your case going?’ It was a valiant attempt at breaking the subject.

  ‘The gi
rls are dead, Matt,’ she said. ‘I’m sure of it. We have to find their bodies.’

  Matthew watched her.

  ‘They’re here somewhere,’ she said, ‘somewhere not too far from the lake itself. When or if we do find them we may have trouble proving the cause of death. It might be difficult to get trace evidence of their attacker. We’ve found nothing so far at the home of the chief suspect and Fask is bloody scrupulous. Their bodies will almost certainly be decomposed.’

  ‘That doesn’t bother me.’ Matthew sounded almost cheerful. ‘I’ve done it before. I can handle a bit of putrefaction, a few bluebottles buzzing around.’

  She almost threw the pepper pot at him.

  ‘So you think they died somewhere in the vicinity?’

  She nodded. ‘I’m sure of it, Matt, unless – well, I’m just hoping we don’t have to widen the search to encompass the moorlands too.’

  ‘What makes you so certain they’re dead?’

  ‘Everything points to it. Nothing points to them being alive.’

  Matthew waited.

  ‘Barker has to be our main suspect, but I haven’t ruled out the two Stuart brothers – the letterboxers. We’ll bring them in for questioning. The real question is where are the bodies? And why haven’t we found them?’

  Matthew grinned. ‘I’m not teaching you to suck eggs, Joanna, but …’

  Again she reached across and touched his hand. ‘No,’ she said, studying his face and reading his mind. ‘They’re not at the bottom of the lake. We’ve checked.’

  They ate in silence, the dual subject of Eloise and the missing girls temporarily dropped as they talked a little about their next holiday.

  When they’d finished and the dishes were loaded into the dishwasher, Matthew looked meaningfully at the open doorway. ‘Ah,’ he said, eyeing the sofa. He pulled her to him. ‘You’ve changed,’ he said, ‘and I like it. I like the married you, Joanna Piercy.’

  ‘I haven’t really changed.’ She was anxious for him not to be misled by her small spurt of domestication. ‘I’m the same,’ she said, wanting to be honest. But she would realize that Matthew liked to believe things that were not necessarily true. He would believe what he wanted to believe.

  He was nodding, his green eyes alight with merriment and happiness at having found her – or what he believed was her. ‘Oh,’ he said, his mouth inches from her own, ‘yes, you have changed. And what’s more I like it. In fact,’ he said with a burst of confidence, ‘I love it.’

  She wasn’t going to argue.

  Barker was hovering at the bottom of the staircase when she descended. ‘Did you sleep well, my dear?’

  In actual fact, she hadn’t. She had become acutely aware of the quiet of the house, and that there were only two people in it – herself and Barker. At one point she’d even fancied she’d heard him breathing outside her door. Unnerved, she had softly risen from the bed, tiptoed to the door, gently turned the key and pushed the bolt across.

  And yet, she would not have said she was a fanciful woman. So what did that mean? Was she right? She studied Barker’s pale face. There was something twitchy about it. Something nervous, almost rodent-like.

  Only two more days to go.

  ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘I did sleep well. Thank you.’

  ‘Good. I’m glad of that.’ His hands were moving, fingers twining and loosening. ‘And what would you like for breakfast this morning? Full English?’

  Charlotte felt vaguely nauseous. ‘Could I just have a little scrambled egg?’

  ‘Of course, my dear. Whatever you like.’ Barker moved softly, a slight waddle in his gait as he exited the room. She heard the sharp metallic clatter of pots and pans being moved in the kitchen and chided herself for being silly. But as she poured her coffee, something else registered.

  Something was wrong with him. Mr Barker was afraid of something.

  Had he been anyone else she might have asked if he was all right. Perhaps he was still upset at the death of his … what was the family member? He hadn’t said. So she didn’t ask anything, simply sat down and waited, listening to him humming in the kitchen. And eventually he reappeared with perfectly cooked scrambled eggs on toast.

  Whatever else he might be, Mr Barker was a fantastic cook.

  James and Martin were less than enthusiastic to meet up with the police again. James huffed and puffed when Joanna rang their home number. ‘You can either come here or to the station,’ she said, ‘or we can come to your flat. This morning?’ she added. ‘But we do need to talk to you.’

  In the meantime, the search for the missing girls continued. Divers searched the lake. Sniffer dogs were brought in, trained to recognize the scent of putrefaction and primed with the scent of the girls taken from clothes removed from their rucksacks. Houses, the woods, all areas came under scrutiny. Gradually they were covering the area around the lake. They only had the northern end to complete. Then they must decide where to extend the search which had so far turned up nothing except Dorothée’s purse. A briefing was set for 8.30 a.m., which Korpanski would take.

  Joanna took DC Alan King with her down to the brothers’ flat in Birmingham. His powers of observation plus his knowledge of IT could prove useful.

  The brothers obviously weren’t short of a bob or two. Their flat turned out to be in a smart area in Edgbaston, on the third floor, with a nice view of the university and Big Joe, the clock tower.

  The brothers let them in warily, perched on the edge of the sofa and waited.

  ‘We’ll come straight to the point,’ Joanna said. ‘Obviously we know that you were at the Roaches a couple of weeks ago, but you were also there earlier in the summer, weren’t you?’

  They glanced at each other, shocked into silence by the statement. Joanna held her breath. She hardly dared look at DC King.

  There was a silence, then James said, ‘How did you know?’

  ‘I just guessed,’ she said. ‘And you were seen. You met the girls then, didn’t you? Spent some time with them. And then came back six weeks later. Why?’

  Had it been, she wondered, because they’d been worried they’d left some clue? Had they pretended to be looking for the girls in case anyone saw them, when it had actually been to replace the girls’ picture in the box planted at Ramshaw Rocks?

  James became the spokesman. ‘We did meet them at the Roaches back in July.’ He smiled. ‘But there’s really nothing sinister in it. It was a really shitty day – heavy rain – and the rocks were slippery. The girls were trying to have a go at climbing the spout but they were useless. Annabelle slipped and we sheltered under the Tor and shared our flask of coffee and sandwiches with them. It was us who told them about letterboxing. It all seemed such a laugh. We spent the afternoon with them and then met up the following day. At the time, when I met Annabelle, I was in a relationship. I’d thought Kay and I would be getting engaged and probably marry, but she dumped me in August, just after Martin and I got back from our trip. Then I started thinking about Annabelle. I knew she wasn’t in a relationship because she’d told me so. I hadn’t taken her mobile number because of Kay, but when Kay dropped me I started thinking about her. I remembered telling her about the letterbox and how you could use it to communicate. So we went back, and, sure enough, found the box with the photo and the message. So we retraced the girls’ steps and realized …’ He looked helplessly at his brother.

  ‘Why didn’t you alert the police that the girls appeared to be missing?’

  ‘There was nothing to alarm us. Barker was strange but we didn’t seriously think there was anything in it. It could simply have been that Annabelle hadn’t been quite as keen as I’d thought.

  ‘But I did I want to meet up with her again,’ James continued. ‘Even if it didn’t lead to anything. She’s a really nice girl and there’s just a chance that my firm will send me to Paris for a couple of years. My French is, well, OK.’

  Joanna caught a look of doubt creeping along Alan King’s face. She met his eyes with a questi
on of her own. The story held water.

  The brothers looked at each other. ‘We couldn’t seem to track them down,’ Martin continued the story. ‘They hadn’t left a phone number with the note, so we decided to play detective. We went back to Mandalay and retraced their steps. And then we did get a bit rattled.’

  His brother nodded, his shoulders slumped. ‘I suppose I just assumed it had been a bit of a flirtation and she hadn’t meant it when she’d said that she’d like to see me again. I thought maybe the language barrier … maybe I’d just misunderstood. Maybe …’ He shrugged. ‘C’est la vie.’ Then he said frankly, ‘When you started asking questions we did wonder what on earth had happened. Then when the newspapers ran the story that the girls were missing I thought we’d better keep schtum. When I realized they hadn’t been seen since the weekend after we’d met up with them I got really worried.’ He glanced at his brother. ‘We both did. Maybe someone had seen us talking to them. It could look bad for us. We thought they’d gone back to Europe after their stay at Mandalay. But they hadn’t, had they? And their mothers didn’t know where they were.’

  His brother was nodding his agreement with vigour. Joanna was thinking, trying to reason it through. If James and Martin had had something to do with the girls’ disappearance why would they return to the area, risking that they might be recognized, publicly ask questions and draw attention to themselves?

  The story not only held water but, in her mind, it pointed towards their innocence.

  TWENTY-TWO

  In the end it was DC Danny Hesketh-Brown who made the discovery. At the northern end of the lake was a small cluster of cottages, usually rented out to holidaymakers, reached by a single track road that was little used. One of the cottages had not been let all summer. In fact it was, as the brochures would have put it, in need of some tender loving care. Plus new electrics, new plumbing – the lot. It was a wreck and hadn’t actually been let for the last seven summers. Also, it was built partly of asbestos and the fence around it, topped with razor wire, warned people to keep out. Summerland, optimistically named, belonged to a local farmer who hadn’t yet decided whether he wanted to renovate the cottage, knock it down and return the plot to grazing land, or sell it to a speculator who had intimated he might just want to put a caravan park there. Every week Joseph Shannon came up with a different idea. But he wasn’t particularly materialistic and was content with his lot in life. As he would put it in broad Staffordshire, when pestered, ‘I inna bothered.’