The Burning

by Jane Casey

  Louise wasn’t wearing make-up and her cheeks were pale, her lips almost colourless, but she looked smart in a navy-blue coat that fitted her frame beautifully. Her hair was scraped back into a ponytail that was so tightly controlled not a single wisp appeared to have worked free. I put a hand up to my own head, suddenly self-conscious about the state of my hair, which had dried wild again. It was hard to look groomed when every gust of the scarifying wind carried a handful of rain. The fact that Louise North had managed it was mildly irritating.

  I was just thinking about going to her rescue when someone jostled my elbow and I moved out of their way automatically, murmuring something that might have been taken as an apology. Instead of going on, however, they stood beside me, a little too close for comfort. Gil Maddick, today film-star handsome in a dark suit with an open-necked white shirt. I guessed it was about as formal as he got. He grinned down at me without the least hint of warmth.

  ‘Fancy meeting you here. What brings you to this part of the world? You can’t possibly think you’re going to find the killer at Rebecca’s memorial service.’

  ‘I’m representing the investigative team. May I ask why you’re here? I had the impression that you didn’t care too much about Rebecca or what happened to her.’

  ‘I was invited.’

  I raised my eyebrows. ‘Really? By the Haworths? Didn’t they know you and Rebecca had split up?’

  ‘Silly Tilly asked me to come along and pay my respects. She helped to organise this ridiculous shindig. A funeral with no corpse. Hamlet without the prince.’ He spoke lightly, but again I had the impression that he was under pressure.

  ‘You didn’t have to come,’ I pointed out. ‘I’m sure no one would have noticed.’

  Instead of answering me, he stared over my shoulder, and I turned to see that he was looking straight at Louise North. Almost as if she’d felt his eyes on her, she looked up and met his gaze. I didn’t see her blink; she might not even have breathed. She reminded me of a hare in long grass, startled to have been seen, ready to run at a moment’s notice.

  The look on his face when I swung back was unreadable, at least to me. It took him a second or two to remember that I was standing there, and I needn’t have bothered waiting for a reply, because all I got was a muttered, ‘Excuse me,’ before he walked off towards the buffet. And when I looked back in Louise’s direction, she had disappeared.

  It took me quite a while to get close enough to Anton Ventnor to strike up a conversation, surrounded as he was by attentive acolytes. In the end, I stalked him until he went to the very posh Portaloos the Haworths had hired, and lay in wait outside. He did not look altogether thrilled to be accosted by me, but good manners or good training won out.

  ‘How can I help you, Miss …’

  ‘Detective Constable Maeve Kerrigan,’ I said firmly, enunciating each and every last syllable.

  He snapped his fingers in recognition. ‘You wanted to talk to me.’

  ‘And you never called me back. Not to worry. Now’s as good a time as any.’

  His eyelids flickered. ‘Is it? I don’t think––’

  ‘It won’t take long.’ I grabbed his arm and steered him through a gap in the tent, towards an unoccupied corner of the garden. He came without demur, probably too startled by the physical contact to offer any resistance. Besides, he was a good five inches shorter than me, and twenty years older, and I didn’t think he was in peak physical condition. I was stronger than him and he knew it. And I had counted on him not wanting to make a scene.

  A small stream cut through the Haworths’ garden, and they had put a wrought-iron bench beside it. Overhung with the long trailing strands of a weeping willow, it was an impossibly pretty, romantic setting in spite of the fact that the willow was bald at that time of year and the ground underneath the bench was muddy. The effect was rather spoilt in any case by the small, cross, middle-aged man in a tight-fitting suit who was sharing the bench with me, even before you noticed that his wig was making a bid for freedom down the back of his head.

  ‘Surely this could have waited until we got back to London.’ He sounded irritated.

  ‘Don’t you want to get it over with now?’ I took my notebook out of my bag and flipped it open. ‘You were Rebecca Haworth’s employer for four years, is that right?’

  ‘If you say so.’ He caught the glint of annoyance I couldn’t quite suppress, and sighed. ‘Yes, then. I hired her four and a half years ago. She was a very important part of my team and I paid her very well indeed.’

  ‘What sort of a person was she?’

  He stared into the distance, considering. ‘If you’d asked me that eight months ago, I’d have told you that she was the dream employee. Hardworking, dedicated, never put herself before the work. She was excellent with our clients. Well liked in the company.’

  ‘Did you like her?’

  He turned to look at me, eyebrows raised. ‘Not more than I should have. We had a pleasant professional relationship, no more than that.’

  ‘Why did Rebecca leave the company?’ I wanted to hear his version of events.

  ‘She left because I asked her to go. She wouldn’t have gone of her own volition, I can assure you. Unfortunately she had developed some bad habits – well, one bad habit, to be precise – and became unreliable. I couldn’t let her continue to work in my company. The damage to our reputation was insupportable.’

  ‘Did you confront her about her cocaine use?’

  He spread out his hands. ‘What could I say? I didn’t want to waste my time with her. If she had genuinely cared more about her job than about the drugs, she wouldn’t have let them interfere with her ability to work. She had made her choice already. I simply formalised it.’

  ‘So you didn’t give her an opportunity to get clean before you sacked her.’

  ‘I think you’ll find that she resigned.’ His voice was nasal and high-pitched, and at that moment utterly smug.

  ‘I’m sure she wouldn’t have had a leg to stand on at an employment tribunal. But she’d worked for you for quite a while. I understand from her colleagues that she was very upset to be leaving Ventnor Chase.’

  ‘That is an understatement.’ He gave a little giggle. ‘I might have been prepared to give her another chance if she hadn’t reacted the way she did. It showed me she had lost all sense of judgement – all her self-respect. She offered me – I think the phrase is sexual favours? I had to decline, of course.’ He took out a purple handkerchief that matched his tie and blotted his upper lip deliberately. ‘I thought it was an extraordinary thing to do. I had known for some time that she was promiscuous, but I was inclined to turn a blind eye. Once she brought it into the workplace, I’m afraid I had had enough.’

  ‘She was desperate,’ I said quietly. She must have been.

  ‘That was nothing to do with me. I couldn’t employ her any longer. Not after she grovelled like that.’

  He stood up and wadded his handkerchief back into his pocket. ‘If that’s all you need from me, I must go. I’d like to get back to London before the end of the working day. You can contact my PA if you have any more questions for me.’

  ‘Great,’ I said unenthusiastically. ‘Thanks.’

  He started to walk away, then stopped and turned back. ‘You know, she was a good member of my team. She’d have kept her job if she hadn’t begged me to change my mind. Never beg, DC Kerrigan, no matter how tempting it may be.’

  I could taste my dislike for him. ‘I’ll try to remember that.’

  He nodded, then strutted away, trying and failing to look like a taller man than he was. Anton Ventnor, prize git. I would have dreaded going in to an office he ran; I would have been delighted to get away from him if I’d been in Rebecca’s shoes. But I wasn’t Rebecca; I didn’t even really know what she was like. The highly organised business-woman. The good-time girl you’d never marry. The loyal, scatty friend. The desperate employee. I had no doubt that I would get a different account of Rebecca’s charac
ter from her parents, when I spoke to them. She had been whatever people wanted her to be, right up to the moment when what they wanted her to be was dead.

  I couldn’t face returning to the marquee immediately – I wanted to let Ventnor get a good head start so I didn’t have to see him again. I wandered in the other direction instead, following the bank of the little stream, my feet slipping on the grass that was still patched with frost in places. I came to a brick wall enclosing a formal garden, its iron gate standing ajar. It was a rose garden, I discovered, and particularly bleak at that time of year when neither leaves nor flowers relieved the greyness of the scene. The bare ashy branches bristled with thorns like an illustration from an old-fashioned edition of Sleeping Beauty. The garden was divided into four beds with a cobbled path between each, leading to the centre where a sundial stood, the spherical kind made of a collection of rings speared through with an arrow. It was a lovely thing but useless in the flat winter daylight that wasn’t bright enough to cast proper shadows. Not, it had to be said, that I was very good at reading sundials at the best of times. I walked along the path to get a closer look. The sundial stood on a stone plinth. Around the base there was an inscription chiselled in narrow script and I tilted my head to one side to read it.

  • DO NOT KILL TIME •

  ‘There’s more on this side.’

  I hadn’t noticed anyone else in the garden, but when I looked up, Louise North was standing opposite me, her hands buried in the pockets of her coat. She had wrapped a soft grey scarf several times around her neck, muffling her up to the ears. Her nose and eyes were red, which could have been because of the cold or her grief, and a few strands of her hair had come loose, framing her face so that she looked softer, younger, more human, and infinitely more likable.

  ‘Let’s see.’ I came around to her side of the sundial and read:

  • IT WILL SURELY KILL THEE •

  ‘Very cheerful.’

  ‘I wouldn’t think that Avril and Gerald imagined a day like today when they commissioned it. It’s the sort of thing Avril loves. Have you been inside the house?’

  I shook my head. ‘I’m talking to the Haworths later on.’

  ‘You’ll see what I mean then. She never misses an opportunity to share a little wisdom, put it that way.’

  I looked back at the sundial and reached out to trace one of the rings with a finger. ‘How does this work, do you know?’

  ‘It’s called an armillary sphere. The arrow runs through it from north to south. When the sun shines on it, you’re supposed to be able to tell the time from where the arrow’s shadow falls on this band around the outside. If you look closely, you can see it’s marked with the hours.’

  I looked at where she was indicating and saw faint indentations in the brass ring that proved to be, on closer inspection, roman numerals. ‘And can you? Tell the time, I mean.’

  ‘Sort of.’ She smiled. ‘Clocks are easier. But this is Gerald’s pride and joy. This little garden is the reason he bought the house in the first place. It was the vegetable garden originally, but the minute he saw it, he knew what he wanted to do with it. He cleared the whole thing, laid out the beds and planted the roses. They’re wonderful in the summer. He only likes the old-fashioned kind, damask roses, because the scent is so incredible.’ She pointed. ‘They all have names, look.’

  I hadn’t noticed it before, but at the base of each bush there was a little plaque. I walked around, reading them. Pompon des Princes. Comte de Chambord. Madame Hardy. La Ville de Bruxelles. Blanc de Vibert. Rose du Roi. Quatre Saisons.

  ‘It’s like heaven when they’re all in bloom. But most of the year, they’re just a hell of a lot of work for not very much reward.’ Her tone was indulgent rather than disapproving.

  ‘Rebecca didn’t take after her father, did she? She didn’t even have a pot plant in her flat.’

  ‘She couldn’t see the point. And a plant wouldn’t have lasted long if she had tried to look after one.’ Louise shook her head. ‘She had enough trouble looking after herself. She never even managed to remember to collect her dry cleaning.’

  I was only half-listening to Louise. My attention had been caught by something else. In shaking her head, she had loosened the scarf around her neck so that the fine material – cashmere, at a guess – sagged forward, exposing her throat. On the right side of her neck I could see an oval blood bruise, shocking against her pallor, shocking also in its implications. Because her neck had been conspicuously unmarked when I’d seen her earlier in the marquee, which meant that somehow, at some point between then and now, she had been branded with what could only be a love bite.

  ‘That looks nasty,’ I said mildly, pointing at it. ‘You might want to cover it up before the Haworths see it.’

  Her hand flew up instantly to hide it, and colour flooded into her cheeks. Most people would have said something to explain it away, even if it was an obvious lie. Louise North had far more self-possession than that. She settled for giving me a meaningless half-smile as she rearranged her scarf, pulling it more tightly around her neck.

  ‘Much better.’

  If she heard the mockery in my voice, she didn’t acknowledge it. She pulled back her sleeve and checked her watch, revealing a reddish mark that circled her narrow wrist just above the strap. She saw it at the same time as me and shook the material down again in a hurry. ‘I’d better get going.’

  ‘Of course,’ I said blandly, and moved out of her way so she could get past me. Instead, she stopped and bit her lip, uncertain for once.

  ‘DC Kerrigan, can I ask you a favour? Could you keep me informed about how the investigation is going? It’s just that – well – I’d like to know what’s happening. If you’re making progress, I mean. I know I’m not part of the family – not formally – but Rebecca was like a sister to me. I just can’t stop thinking about what happened to her and I can’t keep bothering her parents to find out if they’ve heard anything.’ Her voice cracked a little and her eyes were suddenly swimming with tears.

  I told her I would, and then watched her walk out of the garden with her head bent, her arms wrapped around herself. If it was acting, it was impressive. If it was for real, it made me even more confused about Louise North than I had been already.

  The marquee had emptied out by the time I went back. Only the die-hards remained, an odd collection of elderly people who had nowhere better to be and a clutch of younger types, all mid-twenties, who had a little party of their own going on in one corner. Every so often there was a burst of loud laughter from them. It jarred, considering the nature of the occasion, but I had often noticed that these gatherings brought out the heartiness in mourners. It was as if the life force needed to declare itself again, having looked death full in the face for too long.

  ‘Rebecca’s friends from university,’ Gerald Haworth observed, coming to stand beside me. ‘It’s something of a reunion for them. I haven’t the heart to send them home. She would have loved bringing people together.’ He sounded wistful, but also very tired.

  ‘If you don’t want to boot them out, I’m quite happy to direct them to the nearest pub.’

  He looked at me like a drowning man spotting a life jacket within arm’s reach. ‘Would you? There’s one about a mile down the road.’

  I got the directions from him and sauntered over to the little group, nine of them. ‘I think it’s time you moved on and gave the Haworths a bit of peace. Would you mind taking this little shindig to the pub?’

  The man that I had marked down as the troublemaker of the group, tall, broad-shouldered and barrel-chested, with the sparse fair hair and high colour of the classic upper-class Englishman, looked me up and down with frank appraisal. ‘And who are you, might I ask?’

  I introduced myself, leading with my rank and leaving out my first name. He could bloody well DC Kerrigan me and like it, I found myself thinking.

  The girl next to him grabbed his arm. ‘Come on, Leo. She’s right. We’re making too much noi
se.’

  ‘I don’t see why we should have to move just because Plod wants us to,’ he objected, staring down at me belligerently with glassy eyes. I could smell alcohol on his breath from where I was standing, and acting on a hunch, I reached out and slipped my hand into his jacket pocket, coming up with a silver hip flask before he had time to react.

  ‘Classy,’ I said, waggling it at him. ‘Needed a bit of Dutch courage? I hope you’re not driving.’

  ‘He’s not,’ one of the other men said quickly. ‘I’m taking him back to London and I haven’t been drinking.’

  ‘No chance, Mike. You’re not driving my car.’ Leo swayed slightly as he spoke. The girl dragged on his arm again and he shook himself free, snapping, ‘For God’s sake, Debs.’

  ‘I’d like to see you take his keys now, please. And make sure you have insurance that covers you before you take the car on the public road. I’ll be letting my colleagues in Traffic know to keep an eye out for it on the way back to London.’

  Mike held out his hand and after a moment Leo dug into his trouser pocket and dropped the keys into his out-stretched palm.

  I flicked open the hip flask and tilted it so the remaining contents spattered out onto the carpet-tiled floor of the marquee, which soaked it up quickly. ‘Oh dear. You seem to be out of booze. Time to go, I think.’

  The others had already started to drift away, leaving Leo staring down at me like a baffled bull, flanked by the girl and Mike, who had taken his other arm. I kept my expression completely neutral, careful not to suggest any hint of amusement at the man’s expense. Nine-tenths of wielding authority was having the confidence not to make a song and dance of it, I’d always found on the street. You had to leave people a bit of self-respect, and somewhere to go. And in this case, given that the somewhere was a pub, it wasn’t such a tough decision after all.