The Sixth Window

by Rachel Abbott

  ‘What did he have to say?’ Tom asked.

  ‘He said that Jennifer was quite a late developer, and if she was tense, nervous or not aroused, that could explain the lacerations, and the bruising could be down to a number of things – a very bony boyfriend, or perhaps he kept his clothes on and the bruising was caused by a belt. Or just very vigorous sex.’

  ‘Sadly she’s not here to answer those questions,’ Tom said.

  ‘There’s no semen present. They’ve taken the usual specimens, but the pathologist isn’t hopeful. He said she was “scrubbed clean”, and I can’t wipe the vision out of my head of this girl getting herself into a relationship that she didn’t know how to handle, knowing that her parents would have a complete fit if they found out, and then trying to scrub every bit of evidence from her body.’

  ‘So why go back for more?’

  Becky shook her head.

  Tom took a sip of his coffee. ‘It’s a bloody nuisance we’re right at the start of the school holidays. We need to hear what her friends have to say.’

  ‘The head teacher’s been informed and she’s on the case.’

  ‘Good,’ Tom said. ‘We need to find out if anyone knew what was happening to Jennifer, but I don’t like the feel of this one, Becky. I have a hunch it’s more sinister than just girl meets boy, somehow.’

  19

  By early afternoon Scarlett had texted all her friends, trying to get them to come into town. A few had already gone on holiday, and others said was difficult to get to Manchester because they were reliant on parents to drive them to the tram stop, and they were out at work all day.

  Scarlett felt like crying. She had been looking forward to this summer break for so long, and Ed had talked about maybe taking them away for a week if her mum was able to get the time off work. Now she was stuck in this cramped little flat when they could have been living in Ed’s roomy old house. Here she had no friends and nothing to do.

  She sat back heavily on the sofa, her face in her hands, fingers pressed against her eyes in an effort to stop the tears spilling down her cheeks.

  Beneath the self-pity, Scarlett felt some guilt about giving her mum such a hard time. She didn’t want to argue with her like she had with her dad on the very morning that he was killed.

  Scarlett would never forget that morning. She’d had a sleepless night, worrying about what she knew – or thought she knew – about her dad. So when she heard him banging about as he tried to find the puppy’s lead, she had crept downstairs. It was before six and her mum was still fast asleep. She could remember every second of their brief conversation. He had been bending down to put the flashing collar on her lovely puppy, who was squirming with delight at the idea of going out, when he had sensed her behind him.

  ‘Morning, love,’ he said with a big smile. ‘You’re up early. I’m just taking this little one out for a stroll down the lane. Do you want to get dressed and come with me?’

  Scarlett hadn’t answered, and she hadn’t smiled back at him. She was close to tears, and her voice shook.

  ‘I know what you’re doing, Dad. I know you’ve got a secret, and I know what it is. I need to tell you that I think you’re disgusting.’

  Her dad had gone white, but he hadn’t asked her what she meant, so he must have known. ‘Scarlett, love, you don’t know anything. Whatever you’re thinking, you’re wrong. Trust me. Okay?’

  She had scoffed at him, and when he walked across to her with his arms outstretched she backed away, the puppy still dancing around their legs.

  ‘Oh baby, please. Whatever you think you know, don’t say a word to your mum until I’ve had a chance to explain it to you. And I will, I promise. I’ll pick you up after school today and we’ll go to the burger place you like. You’ll understand then, really you will.’

  ‘Well if you don’t want Mum to know, I suggest you don’t leave your phone lying around. Pretty basic mistake, if you ask me.’

  For a moment she thought she had seen a flash of relief on his face. But that couldn’t have been right.

  ‘I love you, Scarlett,’ he said, picking up the dog’s lead again. ‘Just remember that.’

  ‘That’s good, because right now I don’t even like you.’

  And those were the last words she had ever spoken to her dad. All because of some stupid text message she had seen on his phone. She couldn’t even remember the words now. It had said something like, ‘It’s going to be hard, but it’s time to tell the truth’ and had ended with ‘I love you.’ She had no idea what truth he was supposed to tell, but she did know that someone else was in love with her dad, and that wasn’t right.

  Scarlett didn’t know for sure who it was from because the number had been withheld, but she only had one suspect, although it could have been someone her dad had met through work or at the gym. She hoped more than anything that her mum would never find out that he had betrayed her. If only he had made it through that day so he could have explained it. If only she had told him how much she loved him. Because she did.

  Scarlett felt one of her tearful attacks coming on. They were fairly infrequent now, but sometimes the guilt threatened to overwhelm her.

  Remembering her parting shot to her mum that morning, Scarlett felt bad. Saying that everybody had secrets wasn’t clever – her mum had enough to worry about – but where were these weird ideas about Ed coming from? Yes, he was affectionate, but she had known him all her life and she thought of him as a kind-of uncle.

  He had only made her uncomfortable a couple of times – once when he had come into the bathroom while she was having a shower. But it had been an accident, she was sure. And later that day he had fixed a lock on the bathroom door, saying he never thought to knock because he had been so used to living by himself. That made sense, didn’t it? And there was the time she had woken in the night to find him sitting on the side of her bed in his boxers, stroking her arm. He said she had been crying in her sleep and he hadn’t wanted to wake her mum because he knew how concerned she would be. Scarlett had never doubted it was the truth until now.

  She sighed and got up from the sofa, opened a packet of Jaffa Cakes and pulled out three, biting into one as she sat down again. She was so bored.

  With nothing better to do that morning, she had at least made a start on her history project. She had used her iPad to search online and discovered that an archive of records about the Manchester workhouses was held at the Central Library, so she had wandered along to check it out. The thing that bothered Scarlett most, from what she had read, was that when this place was a workhouse about half of the occupants were children, and they were often separated from their parents. The children lived in one part of the building, their parents another, so they didn’t live together as families.

  Scarlett sat back on the sofa and tried to imagine what it must be like to be brought up without the love of even one parent. She couldn’t. She looked at her watch, wondering what time her mum would be back, but it was only one o’clock. With a sigh, she reached for the television remote and was about to click it when she heard something.

  At first it was subtle, just a hint of sound, but it became clearer as she concentrated. She could hear the sound of laughter. This time she wasn’t sleeping. This time she knew it was real. And it was coming from inside the flat.

  20

  As Tom and Becky entered the Grove High School, Tom breathed in. There was a smell that seemed unique to schools, although the modern ones – like this one – had a subtly different aroma to the older ones. There was a vague odour of concrete, and the proximity of the gym provided a whiff of teenage sweat. His own school had smelled of overcooked vegetables – particularly cabbage – and it had hit him every day as he walked through the door.

  A thin colourless woman with a weak smile and short tightly permed hair walked towards them.

  ‘Good afternoon. I’m Mrs Tunstall, the head of the school. I’m sorry we have to be meeting under such unfortunate circumstances.’ She held out her h
and for Tom to shake and merely gave Becky a cool nod.

  Tom was surprised to find such an insipid-looking woman running a school like this, and he could only assume that she kept well out of the way of the students for most of the time. She looked as if they would eat her alive.

  ‘I didn’t know Jennifer personally. We have twelve hundred children here, and one can’t have knowledge of each and every individual, of course,’ Mrs Tunstall said, confirming Tom’s suspicions. ‘I’ve set two rooms aside – one for interviews with members of staff, and one where you can talk to those friends of Jennifer who have agreed to come forward.’

  ‘That’s fine, but we may very well need to speak to those who haven’t agreed to come forward too. Could we have a list, please, of those who are not present today?’

  Becky’s voice was clipped, and Tom knew she wouldn’t have appreciated being treated as Tom’s insignificant subordinate by Mrs Tunstall.

  ‘Of course, if you think it necessary. We’ve sought parental permission across the board in her year group, to be on the safe side, but some have requested that their child be interviewed at home.’

  Tom glanced at Becky and saw her eyes close for a fraction of a second, no doubt thinking how much extra time this would add to the investigation.

  Mrs Tunstall indicated that they should follow her down a corridor lined with classrooms.

  ‘Jennifer wasn’t a member of any clubs or teams,’ she said. ‘Her parents wouldn’t allow it. From what other members of staff have said to me, she was quite isolated. It seems she was a quiet, obedient girl who didn’t necessarily shine, but neither did she often fail to present adequate work on time. Recently, that hasn’t been the case, though.’

  ‘In what way have things changed?’ Tom said, interested in anything that demonstrated a difference in behaviour.

  ‘It started with defiance, as if something inside her had been unleashed and she had developed a level of confidence that she had previously lacked. But the defiance faded after a short time and she appeared more distracted. She missed some days with no excuse, and more recently she has apparently been seen crying once or twice.’

  ‘Thanks for telling us. That’s useful to know,’ Tom said.

  Mrs Tunstall stopped. ‘The rooms we’ve allocated for the interviews are just here.’ She opened the first door and turned to Tom. ‘There was another thing. Last week, just before we broke up, she was in a games lesson. Her parents don’t approve of competitive sport, so she and a couple of other girls were jogging around the perimeter of the playing fields. One minute Jennifer was there, the next she had run off. One of the girls said someone was standing by the fence, and he appeared to be watching her. Unfortunately nobody was close enough to give a good description. All they can say is that it was a man wearing a baseball cap and sunglasses.’

  ‘Did this man speak to Jennifer?’ Becky asked.

  ‘No, Inspector. By all accounts he just stood there, his arms by his side, watching. When she saw him staring at her, she ran off and he walked away.’

  *

  Before arriving at the school, Tom and Becky had agreed to split the interviews. Tom would talk to key members of staff and Becky would concentrate on friends and peers. She settled herself as best she could in a very uncomfortable chair and the first of Jennifer’s classmates was shown in.

  As the afternoon wore on, it became clear that all the girls were saying more or less the same thing.

  ‘Jennifer didn’t really mix with us. She only had a few friends, and I wasn’t one of them. She had been acting weird recently. She’d always been really quiet, but she got quite cocky and lippy for a bit. It didn’t last long, though, and then – if anything – she became even more of a loner than before.’

  Different words from each of them, but the same picture. There was a sense of nervous tension about some of them, as if being interviewed by the police was an exciting event – an occasion to boast about to their friends. Others demonstrated a touch of hysteria, as if somehow what had happened to Jennifer was contagious. Becky spent most of the afternoon reassuring the girls, but got very little information.

  It was getting late, and she had almost given up on achieving anything useful when a small slim girl who only looked about twelve came in with her head bowed. Becky checked her list. This was Naeema, and she was showing signs of tears, though whether down to a fear of being interviewed or genuine sorrow for the death of a friend, Becky couldn’t tell initially.

  ‘Tell me how you knew Jennifer, Naeema.’

  ‘She was quiet and I’m quiet,’ the girl said, her voice so soft that Becky could barely hear her. ‘We couldn’t be friends outside school because of our different religions, but we spent time together when we were here.’

  Naeema was wearing a hijab, and Becky realised that from a belief perspective she and Jennifer were a million miles apart. She cursed the impact of religion when it prevented girls like Naeema and Jennifer from enjoying each other’s company outside the classroom.

  ‘Naeema, some of the teachers have said that Jennifer had changed recently. Did you notice any difference?’

  The girl’s head dropped, and Becky thought she was going to start crying again. Naeema began chewing her fingernail as if thinking what to say.

  ‘People used to make fun of me and Jennifer,’ she finally said. ‘We’re both skinny, and the boys used to mock us because we didn’t have any…’

  She paused.

  ‘It’s okay, Naeema,’ Becky said. ‘I understand. Did that upset Jennifer?’

  ‘A bit, but she wasn’t supposed to date boys, and anyway the boys here are all idiots. But I think there was someone she met when she went swimming. She was so excited to think somebody was interested in her, but she wouldn’t say much about him. She wouldn’t even tell me his name.’

  ‘According to her father, Jennifer didn’t always go swimming when she told her parents she did. Is he right?’

  Naeema’s eyes opened wide, as if she was a little scared at the thought that Jennifer’s secret was out.

  ‘She’d been going to the River View Pool with her friend – I think she’s called Lauren. I don’t know her. She goes to the academy on the other side of town.’

  ‘What happened?’

  ‘Jennifer met someone about the third or fourth time she went, and then I think she stopped going swimming. She went to meet him instead.’

  ‘What did she tell you about him?’ Becky asked.

  ‘She was really excited the first couple of times they met, and then she wouldn’t talk about him. She stopped hanging out with me and she became secretive. It was like she thought she was too good for me, you know?’

  Becky felt for the girl. It was common for boyfriends to come between friends at this age and she didn’t really have any words of comfort to offer.

  ‘Do you know who he was, Naeema?’

  ‘No. I asked to start with if she would show me his photo, but she said he wouldn’t let her take any. She said he took lots of photos of her, though. She smiled when she said that, and I didn’t like it.’

  Becky’s antennae were waving madly in the air, but she couldn’t push Naeema.

  ‘Did she show you any of the photos he’d taken of her?’

  ‘No, she said they were private, but…’ Naeema looked worried again, and Becky waited. ‘I think something went wrong. She started to get upset a lot. She hadn’t had much to do with me for a while, but I didn’t like to see her crying. I asked if it was because of him, and she nodded.’

  Becky leaned towards Naeema, her hands clasped on her knees. She really wanted to give this poor child a hug but knew it would be inappropriate and might send her running out of the room.

  ‘It’s okay, Naeema. Anything you tell me now is only going to help.’

  She lifted her head slightly and raised her eyes to look at Becky. ‘I told her to dump him.’

  ‘That sounds like good advice, if he was making her so unhappy.’

  ‘I tho
ught so too. But Jennifer laughed. She told me I had no idea what I was talking about. There was no way she could dump him. Not ever.’

  ‘Did she tell you why?’

  ‘She said, “You don’t know what you’re talking about, Naeema. I belong to him now.”’

  21

  ‘DI Robinson, may I have a word, please?’

  Back in the incident room, Becky was stopped in her tracks on the way to making a cup of tea. They had been provided with hot drinks throughout the afternoon at the school, but it had either been stewed tea or coffee like washing-up water, and right now she wanted a decent cup. She needed a bit of time to think through everything she had been told that day – especially by Naeema – and she had to check if the team had managed to track down Jennifer’s friend Lauren.

  ‘Give me five minutes, Keith, and I’ll be with you,’ she said to the efficient DS. ‘I’m going to make a cuppa. Do you want one?’

  Keith looked mildly shocked at the idea of Becky making him a cup of tea. ‘No, ma’am, I’m fine. But I’m more than happy to make you one, if you’d like me to?’

  ‘No need. I’ll be straight back.’

  Keith was working on the investigation into the death of Sergeant Bernard Gray, and Becky needed to switch her mind from the current investigation so she could focus on whatever Keith wanted. Making a cup of tea should give her space to organise her thoughts so she could concentrate on Keith’s rather pedantic style.

  Mug in hand, she pulled up a chair next to his desk and plonked her tea down. Keith whipped open a drawer and pulled out a coaster to slip under her mug. Becky looked at all the ring marks on the surface, lifted her eyes to Keith and raised her eyebrows. He said nothing.

  ‘Right. How’s it going, Keith?’

  He pursed his lips. ‘I’m not sure this case is going to be as straightforward as DCI Douglas seems to think. The young man whose DNA matches the whisky bottle found in the car that killed Sergeant Gray is Kieran O’Connor, and he’s adamant that he dumped the car a couple of days before Sergeant Gray was killed. He doesn’t deny stealing it, but he swears he didn’t keep it for any length of time.’