THE JAGGED LINE

by Carolyn Mahony

  ‘Cartwrights. They’re in the High Street. Give them a call and tell them we’re heading over there, will you? Bit of a long shot but you never know, we might pick up something useful from them.’

  Then again they might not, he thought fifteen minutes later, as Dominic Cartwright stared at Harry from across his desk. He was a tall man in his late-fifties, and as he listened to what Harry had to say, it was clear that he was visibly shaken.

  ‘Murdered? Good God.’

  ‘How well did you know him?’

  ‘Not well. He paid his rent on time, didn’t give us any aggravation. We only heard from him if there was a problem with the flat or occasionally when he did a bit of decorating work for us.’ He shook his head. ‘I can’t believe it.’

  ‘When did you last see him?’

  ‘He was here a couple of days ago. My son Robert saw him. He said he was thinking of giving notice on the flat.’

  Harry looked through the glass partition to the other office, where a younger man was busy talking on the phone. ‘Is that your son?’

  ‘Yes. Do you want to talk to him?’

  ‘If he can spare us a couple of minutes?’

  Dominic Cartwright moved over to the partition and knocked on the glass, making a beckoning sign to his son. Within a couple of minutes Robert Cartwright was looking as shocked as his father.

  ‘Jesus – that’s terrible. When did it happen? I only saw him Monday morning.’

  ‘We reckon that was probably the day he was killed. How was he when you saw him?’

  ‘Fine – apart from the fact he looked like he’d been in a bit of a fight.’

  ‘Oh? His girlfriend didn’t mention that when we saw her.’

  ‘Well, it could have been an accident of some sort, I suppose. He had a black eye and a split lip from what I remember. I assumed someone had taken a pop at him.’

  ‘Why did he come to see you?’

  ‘Said they might be looking to move – either another rental or possibly even to buy – asked if we’d do a reference for him. I said yes and told him the terms of his contract for giving notice.’

  ‘Did he seem agitated in any way?’

  ‘Not that I remember. He asked me to let him know if any cheap flats came up. I told him I would and that was it.’

  ‘How well did you know him?’

  ‘I used him a couple of times for the odd bit of decorating when we were pushed, but apart from that I had very little to do with him.’

  ‘What about his girlfriend, Susan?’

  ‘I’ve met her a couple of times. She seems nice enough, although I remember him once saying she was like a pit bull when she got her teeth into something – usually him.’

  He gave a shaky smile. ‘But we all say things like that, don’t we? He was only kidding around.’

  ‘So no reason you know of why someone might want to hurt him?’

  ‘God, no. He seemed an ordinary chap, a bit rough, but one of our better tenants as far as paying his rent went.’

  Harry sighed and stood up to go. ‘Well, thanks for your time. We might need to see you again, but in the meantime.’ He pulled out another of his cards and passed it over. ‘This is my number if anything else comes to mind. Don’t hesitate to call me.’

  Robert took the card from him. ‘I guess I’ll need to go and see his girlfriend. See what she wants to do about the flat. That’s not going to be an easy conversation, is it?’

  ‘Might be better if you leave it a day or two, but if she says anything you think might be useful to us…?’

  ‘Sure, I’ll let you know.’

  He saw Harry and Beth to the door and they took their leave unaware of the man standing watching them on the other side of the street. Once they’d driven off he sauntered across the road and made a study of the houses for sale in the window before walking, as any prospective buyer might, into Cartwrights Estate Agents.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Kirsty was just leaving Raoul’s Boulangerie with a bag full of goodies, when she felt her mobile phone vibrating. She managed to hook it out of her pocket and looked at the caller display. Robbie, her brother. She sighed. When she’d split with Luke he hadn’t been there for her as much as she’d have been there for him, and it hurt.

  ‘I’d have thought you, of anyone, would completely get where Luke’s coming from,’ he’d said, in one of their early conversations.

  ‘I do. I just don’t get how he can be so rigid about it.’

  ‘Kirsty, coming from you …’

  ‘I know.’

  ‘You’re the worst for seeing things in black and white, you know you are. But we can’t all be saints a hundred percent of the time, as you’re finding out. Life isn’t like that.’

  It had infuriated her, mostly because she knew that what he said was true. She did have very clear-cut lines on what was acceptable or not – it was those same principles that were responsible for her self-imposed banishment now. But only her father knew the real reason for that, and these days, the fact that she occupied the moral high ground was proving very little consolation.

  She put the phone to her ear. ‘Hey, Rob …’ she said brightly.

  ‘Kirsty?’

  From that one word she could hear the distress in her brother’s voice.

  ‘What’s up?’

  ‘Jesus. I don’t know how to tell you this – there’s no easy way. Dad’s been involved in an accident. He was hit by a car today.’

  Kirsty gasped, stopping dead in her tracks.

  ‘Is he –?’

  ‘It’s not looking brilliant. He’s in intensive care at Barnet Hospital. He’s in a coma.’

  ‘Oh, God … I must come back.’

  ‘Can you change your flight, do you think?’

  ‘I’m sure I can. But … what happened?’

  ‘We don’t really know. It looks like it was a hit-and-run.’

  ‘No! Is Mum alright?’

  ‘Bearing up. Just get back as soon as you can, will you?’

  ‘I’ll get onto it and call you back.’

  She was already running towards the office as she snapped the phone off, a desperate prayer tumbling from her lips.

  ‘Please let him be alright. Please don’t let him die before I see him …’

  ***

  The bounce of the wheels was followed by a squeal of brakes and the roar of the reverse engine thrust as the plane landed smoothly on the runway at Stansted Airport.

  Kirsty was up from her seat the minute the plane had stopped, grabbing her carry-on bag from the overhead compartment, making sure she was one of the first passengers off the plane. A relatively short wait at the baggage reclaim, during which she phoned Robbie to let him know she was ready for picking up, and she was heading briskly out to the pick-up area where she knew her brother would be waiting for her.

  Outside, the evening was setting in and she wrapped her jacket around her as her eyes scanned the waiting cars.

  ‘Kirsty!’

  She followed the sound of the voice along the line of parked cars until she made out the familiar outline of her brother hurrying towards her.

  ‘How is he?’ she asked, as they hugged.

  ‘Not good. He’s still in intensive care.’

  ‘Oh Rob.’

  He relieved her of her suitcase and swung back towards his car. ‘Come on. I’ll take you straight there.’ Kirsty had to half-run to keep up with him. ‘What have they said? Is he going to be alright?’

  ‘They don’t know. They say it’s a waiting game now.’

  At the hospital they went straight to the intensive care unit. Their mother was already there and she lifted a tear-stained cheek for Kirsty’s embrace, clutching at her hand briefly, before letting it go and returning her gaze to the still form of Dominic Cartwright, lying lifelessly on the bed.

  Kirsty’s eyes followed the direction of her gaze, absorbing the solid frame, the familiar features … and all the animosity, all the shame, simply dissipated into nothing. T
his was her father, Dominic Cartwright – a man who, despite what he’d done, had only ever acted out of love for his family. That’s what he’d told her and deep down she knew he believed it. It was just that somewhere along the line his scruples had become a little blurred, as had his definition of ‘family’ – and he hadn’t liked it that she’d questioned the moral fabric of what he’d done.

  ‘Running your own company isn’t a piece of cake, Kirsty,’ he’d admonished severely. ‘Sometimes the lines are grey rather than black and white, and you have to make tough decisions. You’ll find that out yourself when you come into the business. I’ve never claimed to be perfect, but I’m telling you now that every decision I make has you, your mother and brother at the heart of it. Remember that before you judge me.’

  And when it came to it, after endless soul-searching, she had remembered it – and she’d despised herself for letting him organise a temporary job for her with a friend in France. An opportunity to give her some space, he’d called it.

  Running away was how it felt.

  But her breakup with Luke had clinched the matter. It was a timely escape from everything.

  ‘I’m glad you’re here, Kirsty.’

  Her mother didn’t even look up as she spoke, but any encouragement Kirsty might have taken from her words was dispelled with her next. ‘I just wish you’d come back sooner.’

  ‘Not now, Mum. We just all need to get through this.’ It was Robbie who stepped in and Kirsty felt his hand squeeze her shoulder reassuringly. On the way to the hospital he’d told her what little he knew. Their father had carried out a valuation on a house that morning and had then been the victim of a hit-and-run in the road outside.

  ‘Surely someone must have seen something?’ Kirsty had said, and her brother had shaken his head.

  ‘Apparently not. The car was a dark colour. That’s all they’ve got. It won’t be easy tracking the driver down unless someone comes forward.’

  Kirsty looked down at her father. He’d always been so vital, such a forceful, larger-than-life character. It just wasn’t conceivable that he might …

  They all turned as a doctor approached. ‘No signs of returning consciousness yet?’

  ‘No.’

  It was her mother who spoke.

  The doctor picked up the chart at the foot of the bed and studied it, before replacing it quietly. ‘Well, we’ve made him as comfortable as we can. He has marked swelling to the brain, which we hope will reduce over the next few days, several broken ribs, a broken leg – and a ruptured spleen. We’ve operated on that but I’m afraid we can’t rule out the possibility of further internal bleeding, so we’ll need to keep a close eye on him.’

  He saw the horror on their faces and was quick to try to reassure them. ‘He’s in good hands and we’ll do our best for him. The most immediate issue we’re facing is the brain trauma. It’s very difficult to assess how severe that is or how long it might be before he regains consciousness.’

  ‘And what if he doesn’t?’

  Again it was her mother who asked the question neither Kirsty – nor, she was sure, her brother – could bring themselves to ask.

  The doctor’s voice was gentle. ‘We’ll cross that bridge if and when we come to it, shall we? For now, all we can do is watch and wait – and hope that he’ll come round fine.’

  He looked at his watch. ‘Why don’t you folk head off home for the night? We’ll call you if anything changes. You can come back in the morning anytime you like after eight-thirty.’

  They were a sorry bunch, Kirsty thought, as they picked up their bags and headed for the lifts. Outside the intensive care unit, a man and his son sat quietly weeping. Hating herself for even thinking it, she couldn’t help wondering if that could be them in the not-too-distant future.

  ‘You go on, I’d like to stay with Dad a bit longer,’ she said impulsively to her mother and brother.

  ‘We’ll stay with you,’ Robbie said.

  ‘No. I’d rather have some time with him alone, if you don’t mind?’

  ‘Then we’ll wait for you in the canteen,’ her mother said in a tired voice. ‘I could do with a strong coffee.’

  Back in the room, she sat by her father’s bedside, took his hand in hers and gently squeezed it.

  ‘Hey, Dad, it’s Kirsty. If you can hear me, I’m sorry I’ve stayed away. I’ve missed you all.’ She hesitated. ‘None of what we argued about seems important now. Just get better, that’s all that matters. I love you.’

  There was no response – no returning pressure of fingers, no flickering of eyelids to reveal the twinkling blue eyes that captivated everyone who stared into them. He could have been a marble statue lying there so still, if it hadn’t been for the ugly abrasions and bruising showing through the bandages on his head.

  She sat there for another half-hour, memories bombarding her of what she’d always considered to be an idyllic childhood … nice house, lots of friends, a family life she was proud of and had totally taken for granted – until the day she’d been forced to realise that her beloved father wasn’t quite the man she’d so unquestioningly thought him to be.

  She frowned. There’d be questions, she knew, from her mother and possibly even her brother, over what exactly had gone on and she didn’t know how she was going to answer them.

  She was still none the wiser when she finally left his bedside to rejoin them in the cafeteria.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Harry walked into the police canteen that evening and was surprised to see Beth Macaskill sitting at a table, sipping a drink and poring over some notes. Her spiky, auburn head would be recognisable anywhere, he thought, and whilst it wasn’t an unattractive style, the thought popped into his mind that with longer, softer hair, she’d be stunning. It shouted rebellion at him and he was aware of an unexpected stab of envy. He’d never done the rebellion bit himself when he was younger and, ridiculously, had always felt a shaft of regret about that. If he’d been living with his parents like most kids did, he liked to think he might have been a bit more challenging as a teenager, a bit more interesting – but somehow it hadn’t felt fair putting all that crap on his grandparents when they’d done so much for him. So he’d been boringly conformist – an image that probably hadn’t harmed him when it came to applying to join the police.

  He bought himself a mug of hot chocolate and walked over to join Beth.

  ‘Haven’t you got a home to go to?’

  She looked up and grinned. ‘Aye, but not one I’m in any hurry to get back to,’ she drawled in her soft accent.

  ‘Why not?’

  She shrugged. ‘Put it this way. I’m twenty-six years old and living in a flat share – with four women I don’t know from Adam. The place is a mess and full of people I have nothing in common with.’

  ‘Ah right, I see.’

  She threw him a cheery look. ‘I doubt you do somehow, Harry, but never mind.’

  ‘Have you got a boyfriend?’

  She blinked, as if he’d caught her on the hop, then said cautiously, ‘No … there was someone a few years back, but he died.’

  ‘God, I’m sorry. Don’t talk about it if you don’t want to.’

  Beth shook her head. ‘It was a while back now – he died trying to save someone else.’

  ‘That’s awful.’

  ‘Yeah, it was. I won’t go into details, but I will say this. He turned my life around. I wouldn’t be here doing this job if it wasn’t for him.’

  ‘Wow, that’s some legacy to leave behind. Has there been anyone since?’

  ‘Nope.’ She grinned suddenly, her manner relaxing again. ‘Why? Are you offering?’

  He looked shocked. ‘No – not at all.’

  ‘Well, that’s flattering.’

  Taking her cue, Harry smiled back. ‘I never mix business with pleasure,’ he said. ‘I found that out to my cost a couple of times – once when I was working on a case. It was a lesson well learnt.’

  She shrugged. ‘I’m sure yo
u’re right. But sometimes it’s nice to open the door and let someone in for a while, don’t you think? It blunts the crap of everyday life.’

  Harry looked at her a little closer. He was beginning to suspect that still waters ran deep with Beth Macaskill.

  ‘That sounds cynical for one so young.’

  She laughed. ‘I feel like I’m fifty sometimes. How old are you?’

  ‘Thirty-three.’

  ‘Not that old, then. I wouldn’t feel too embarrassed being seen out with you.’

  ‘Well, I’d feel like a cradle-snatcher being seen with you. What made you move down here – away from your friends and family in Northumberland?’

  She tapped her nose and even while she grinned, he sensed her withdrawal. ‘Too many questions. Now … want to see what I’ve got here that’s quite interesting?’

  He took the change of subject without comment and watched as she withdrew a piece of paper from a plastic wallet. ‘I’ve been looking into our victim’s background, and it seems he had a bit of a past.’

  ‘Oh?’

  ‘Yup – served two years in prison for dangerous driving and only came out in June this year. He put a woman in a wheelchair. A Mrs Lazard.’

  ‘Really? That is interesting. And your thinking is?’

  A light came into her eye. ‘Well, the woman’s husband’s got to be worth questioning, hasn’t he? He kicked up a real stink with the local media when Paul Copeland was only jailed for two years and then released after fourteen months. It wouldn’t be that surprising if the guy decided to take matters into his own hands, would it? Apparently Copeland refused to apologise – said she’d brought it on herself, crossing the road where there wasn’t a crossing.’

  Harry read the brief report she passed him, then handed it back. ‘Good work. I’d say definitely interview him – and I’ve had an interesting development, too. You remember the estate agent we went to see, Dominic Cartwright?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘Well, he was the victim of a hit-and-run accident earlier today. It could be just an unlucky coincidence that both he and one of his tenants came to grief in the same week, but again, I think it warrants following up.’