Salt Lane

by William Shaw

  ‘Mine too. Have you still got it?’

  ‘Yeah. But it’s totally screwed. Won’t turn on. There must be someone who can get the data off it, mustn’t there? Besides, you got one of the people from the caravans, didn’t you? Can’t we just interview him? Then she won’t have to say anything.’

  ‘He’s not talking. And he has no reason to because he understands perfectly well he’s going to be deported whatever he says. If we catch any of the others, my guess is they’ll be exactly the same.’

  ‘I think she wants to help us,’ said Ferriter. ‘I know she does. Shall I go there now? It’s only up the road. I wouldn’t mind. I could wait for her to come back.’

  ‘Don’t be mad,’ said Cupidi. ‘Did Peter Moon call?’

  ‘No. Why?’

  ‘Nothing.’

  She left the constable sitting on the sofa, crutch at her side, watching her silent television.

  She was back at her desk, trying to tidy it. Hilary Keen’s list of offences had been sitting in her in tray. She picked it up and read through it again: CONVICTIONS (8). DATE FIRST CONVICTED, 14/1/1983.

  It was strange. Sometimes you could look at the same document and notice completely different things.

  When she had first seen it, she had been drawn to the six convictions for possession of controlled substances, probably because it had chimed with what she knew of her dental record. This time she looked at the first two and realised there was something unusual there. They were both for criminal damage, one in 1983 and the next in 1985. Both had been heard at Newbury Magistrates’ Court. She noted the dates. Hilary Keen would have been eighteen when she had been arrested for the first. But both convictions had resulted in thirty-day prison sentences. That in itself was extraordinary.

  She looked up and said aloud. ‘Why would an eighteen-year-old woman be given a custodial sentence for her first offence of criminal damage?’

  ‘What did she damage?’

  ‘Very good point. I don’t know.’ She peered at the printout again. As always, the details were so vague. Just a conviction and a sentence.

  Moon said, ‘You went to see Jill, did you?’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘How is she?’

  ‘Why don’t you give her a call and ask?’

  ‘Has Jill got a boyfriend?’

  ‘What’s it to you?’

  ‘Nothing,’ said Moon, then looked back at his computer screen and said, ‘Refused to pay the fine.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘You asked why an eighteen-year-old would have been given a custodial for criminal damage. Maybe refused to pay the fine. Judge wouldn’t have much choice then.’

  ‘Yeah. But then the fine would show up on her sentencing. There’s no record at all of her being fined.’

  ‘Suppose.’

  Moon didn’t seem to be interested in pursuing it any further. Cupidi looked at the date of the conviction again: 14 January 1983. The scab beneath her eye was prickling again, but so was her entire skin. There was something here, something important, but she didn’t know what.

  On a hunch she put ‘News UK January 1983’ into her browser. It came up with a Wikipedia list of events that month.

  There was nothing special there. So she clicked back to the previous month.

  There it was in the middle.

  12 December 1982. Greenham Common Women’s Peace Camp: 30,000 women hold hands and form a chain around the 9-mile perimeter fence.

  She followed another link. And yes, Greenham Common was in Berkshire. Anyone committing an offence there would have been tried at Newbury Magistrates’ Court.

  She checked the news for that day.

  On New Year’s Eve 1982, forty-four women had broken into RAF Greenham Common in Berkshire. They had been protesting about the British Government’s decision to allow American cruise missiles to be based there. Tens of thousands of women had camped around the base for years. That night, the protesters danced on top of the silos before they were all arrested. Of the forty-four, thirty-six of them were imprisoned; all had refused to pay a fine.

  Now it made sense. The protesters must have told the court they would refuse to pay any fine. So the judge would have had no option but to give them a prison sentence.

  Hilary Keen had been one of the protesters at Greenham Common.

  The winter of 1982 had been when her mother disappeared.

  Growing up, Alexandra Cupidi had lived in a large house in Stoke Newington with her parents, an only child.

  That December, a few weeks before Christmas, her mother had left home. She had been thirteen. As she remembered it, there had been no explanation, no particular build-up to her leaving. It hadn’t been the result of an argument with her father, or a breakdown. One day she had been there, the next she was gone. When she had asked Dad when her mother was coming back, he had been tight-lipped.

  To say ‘disappeared’ sounded dramatic, but it was the way she had thought of it at the time. There were no phone calls or postcards.

  From then on, that winter and into next summer, her father looked after her alone. Just her and Dad. She had even started cooking for him when he came back from work.

  It wasn’t that her mother had been entirely absent; Cupidi remembered again how she had come back for a night or two at a time, always with other women, some short-haired, dressed in baggy trousers and monkey boots.

  The visits had been unannounced and random. Alexandra had wanted her mother’s attention when she was back, to talk to her privately about her periods and about her A+ in maths. Instead, her mother had huddled in the kitchen with her new women friends, talking late into the night, smoking cigarettes and drinking, surrounded by leaflets and documents.

  And then she had disappeared into the bedroom with Dad, ignoring her completely.

  She remembered that ‘Ghosts’ by Japan had been in the charts. She had sat in her bedroom listening to it on the record player.

  Cupidi had thought it was the best song ever.

  At 7 p.m., she drove from the station to Najiba’s building and parked outside again and rang the same bell. There was a slow trickle of people arriving back from work, entering through the main front door.

  Nothing.

  She held her finger on the buzzer, but still no one answered.

  Stepping back, she looked up, expecting to see a face peering out of the curtains as it had last week, but the room was dark, even though the curtains were open now.

  She heard a voice calling on the car radio. ‘They were trying to reach you on your mobile,’ a voice said.

  ‘It’s in a pot of rice at home. What’s wrong?’

  ‘Nothing. Incident room duty officer was just calling to say they found that woman from the caravans yesterday. Rasa Petrauska. She’s at the William Harvey.’ The local hospital.

  Cupidi remembered chasing her; barefoot, the white soles of her feet. ‘Why is she in hospital?’

  ‘They didn’t say. She’s in the antenatal unit, apparently.’ She got back in the car and was about to start it when she saw the woman sitting on the wall by the bins, crutches propped against her leg.

  Cupidi sighed, got out of the car and walked over.

  ‘How long have you been here?’

  ‘’Bout two hours. Set off after you’d gone.’ On the wall next to Jill Ferriter sat one of those bottles of water with a charcoal filter in it and a packet of Japanese rice crackers.

  Cupidi looked at her supplies. ‘Proper stake-out.’

  ‘I’m so bored at home,’ she said.

  ‘You shouldn’t be here. You’re not on duty.’

  She looked away, sucked at her cheek for a second. ‘That’s why I’m here. Because I’m not on duty. Not a copper.’

  Cupidi looked at her: summer dress, bandaged leg and crutches. ‘So you thought you can just chat with her, off the record and she’ll tell you what’s going on?’

  ‘Kind of.’

  ‘It doesn’t work like that,’ said Cupidi. ‘But you may n
ot need to speak to her. We’ve found someone else. They just picked up the woman from the caravans, the one I tried to catch. She’s at the hospital, in the antenatal unit.’

  ‘What’s she doing there?’

  ‘At a guess, I’d say she’s pregnant, wouldn’t you? I’m just going to see her.’

  ‘Can I come?’

  ‘No. I’ll drop you home.’

  ‘I’ll wait in the car. I promise. You can drop me off after. Then you can tell me what she says.’

  Cupidi said, ‘I thought you’d have seen quite enough of hospitals by now.’

  It was ten minutes’ drive to the William Harvey. Cupidi parked in front and spent another ten trying to find the antenatal ward. ‘Tell me,’ she asked. ‘Have you ever heard of Greenham Common?’

  ‘Is that in London?’

  ‘No. Berkshire. It was a big demonstration in the early 1980s.’

  ‘Way before I was born.’ Ferriter shook her head.

  Cupidi showed her warrant card to a nurse on the desk, a smiley, middle-aged woman wearing a blue uniform. ‘I’m looking for a Rasa Petrauska,’ she said.

  ‘I’ll take you down there,’ said the nurse, standing.

  ‘How did she end up here?’ asked Cupidi as they walked down the corridor, avoiding a man coming the other way pushing a trolley loaded with monitors.

  ‘She appeared at A & E about two hours ago asking for a doctor… Well, asking for something. The receptionist couldn’t understand a word. Luckily there was this cleaner; anyway he was passing by and understood what she was saying, and he’s been interpreting for her. He’s in there with her now. She was quite distressed, you see. I don’t think she’d eaten for a while and she was pretty dirty.’

  ‘How pregnant is she?’

  ‘We think about five months.’

  ‘Christ.’ Cupidi remembered chasing her across the field, seeing her vault the fence. She felt bad about how hard she’d run now.

  The nurse stopped outside a plain door with a small window in it; the blind behind the glass was down. ‘Has she committed some kind of offence? Because I’m not having her going into custody. She needs to be properly examined. She doesn’t appear to have seen a doctor at all since she was pregnant.’

  ‘Nothing like that. Not as far as I know,’ said Cupidi. ‘We just need to question her.’

  ‘OK,’ said the nurse, knocking on the door, then opening it. Rasa Petrauska lay on a bed in a small side room. Cupidi hadn’t had a good look at her before; she had been chasing her. Her chubby face had a large strawberry birthmark on one cheek. As she realised who had just walked into the room, her eyes opened wide. Like the man in the interview room, she was terrified.

  THIRTY

  A young broad-shouldered man in a blue NHS shirt sat on a chair by Rasa’s side, his name on a badge: Kriss Jansons. ‘Hello,’ he said, standing. He grinned. ‘I think Rasa is feeling a little better.’

  If she had been, seeing Cupidi had not helped. Petrauska sobbed out loud; said something in her own language. Looking back at the patient, the porter registered the expression of panic on her face, and asked her a question. The answer came back in a whisper.

  Jansons looked at Cupidi, frowning. ‘She thinks you have come to arrest her.’

  Cupidi held up her hands. ‘I just want to talk.’

  The cleaner translated again. ‘It’s OK. It’s OK,’ he said, trying to calm her.

  ‘Are you Lithuanian too?’ Cupidi asked.

  ‘I am Latvian,’ he said. ‘The language is a little the same, but different.’ His accent was strong, but his English was clear. ‘Rasa said you were chasing her and her boyfriend. She is very, very frightened of you.’

  ‘Tell her she has no need to be. We weren’t chasing them. They just ran when they saw us. I just want to know what she was doing there.’

  Jansons nodded and translated for Petrauska. She frowned at them, as if not believing what Cupidi was saying. ‘She was very upset, I think. Her boyfriend told her to run. Since then she has been looking for him, but she can’t find him anywhere. Last night she slept in a car park.’

  ‘What is the name of your boyfriend, Rasa?’

  Kriss translated.

  ‘She says his name is Hamid.’

  ‘Hamid Fakroun?’

  Rasa Petrauska nodded.

  ‘And he is the father of your child?’ she pointed at the woman’s belly. The swelling was not large for five months.

  Again, the woman nodded. Her movements were swift and bird-like, her big eyes blinking nervously.

  ‘Well, that explains why she hasn’t seen him then. He’s in custody. He’s an illegal immigrant.’

  When Jansons told her this, she began to weep.

  ‘What is she saying?’

  ‘She says they are going to be married. Before the baby.’

  The nurse clucked her disapproval. ‘Mother of God,’ she said.

  ‘Can she tell us where she met him?’ asked Cupidi.

  ‘In a meat-packing plant,’ came back the answer. ‘She was working there in the spring.’

  ‘Which one?’

  Jansons asked her. ‘She doesn’t know. She has been labouring in factories and on farms here. I think, from what she says, she has been paying this man money. It is hard to understand what she says. She is confused.’

  ‘Have you asked her why she didn’t come to hospital before now to check on her baby?’

  ‘Because Hamid was afraid they would find out he was an illegal immigrant. I don’t think he would permit her.’

  ‘Hamid would not allow her to come to hospital?’

  ‘Yes. That is what she said.’

  Cupidi looked at her: young and scared. ‘Can she give me a list of all the farms she’s been working on?’

  Jansons and Petrauska spoke for a little while, then he shook his head. ‘She does not know. They are just driven to the places. They work, then they are driven away again.’

  ‘She must know some names.’

  Jansons looked at the woman sympathetically for a second, then turned and said, ‘I don’t think she is a very clever woman. She has speaking difficulties.’

  ‘Learning difficulties?’

  ‘Exactly.’

  The nurse shook her head and said, ‘Oh Christ. What a story.’

  ‘Which agency does she work for?’

  ‘When she came here she worked with one agency, but after she met Hamid she worked for another one. She does not know the name. Hamid arranged it.’

  ‘What about the names of the people she worked for?’

  After Jansons had translated, the pregnant woman shrugged. She had no idea.

  ‘What does she think is going to happen to her after the baby?’ asked Cupidi.

  ‘She will live with Hamid, she says. I told her she should go home. To her mother or father. But she is worried now, because she is pregnant. And by a black man too. She is like a child.’ Jansons smiled at Petrauska sadly and ran his hand over her hair. Petrauska looked back at him through damp eyes, grateful for his kindness.

  ‘I have heard of this,’ said Jansons, still looking at her. ‘They get a girl pregnant here because it means they can stay.’

  ‘That’s right,’ said Cupidi. ‘A father of a child born here could apply for leave to remain.’

  ‘Yep. We’ve had a few like this already this year,’ said the nurse quietly. ‘The fathers come in. All they want to see is the baby is out and then they bugger off. The mothers can be crying their heads off, they don’t care. They’ve got what they want. At least, we assume that’s what’s going on. Nothing we can do about it, ’cept look after the mums.’

  ‘Do you think it’s that cynical?’

  ‘Absolutely,’ said the Latvian. ‘Completely, absolutely. These people like Rasa come here. They are country girls, they are not well educated, they don’t speak English, they don’t understand this country. They are easy to control.’

  ‘What a horror,’ said Cupidi.

  Rasa Petra
uska was looking from one to the other as they spoke, a concerned look on her big moon face, understanding none of it.

  She found Ferriter sitting on an orange plastic chair in another corridor.

  ‘Did she say anything?’

  ‘Not in as many words,’ said Cupidi. ‘But quite a lot in other ways, yes.’

  Cupidi explained; it was possible that she had been made pregnant by the man simply so that he could stay in the country.

  ‘That’s horrible,’ Ferriter said. ‘What vile rock have we just turned over?’

  ‘I know.’

  She got into the car slowly, wincing as she swung her bad leg in. They drove back to Najiba’s flat and tried the bell again, but no one answered; no lights were on.

  ‘I’ll stay here,’ Ferriter said, a crutch under one arm.

  ‘No. I’m taking you home.’

  ‘You’d only be making a cripple walk twice as far as they need to. I’m coming straight back here.’

  Cupidi stood a second, then nodded, and got into the car alone.

  Afterwards, she drove back to the station, swapped cars and then drove back towards Dungeness. But instead of turning off towards Lydd, she carried on south, taking the turning towards Saddlers Wall.

  She found the small house again easily, set back from the road, a NO HUNTING sign fixed into the ground by the gate, just as there had been in the field with the caravans. There was a single light on in the kitchen when she drove past it, but another appeared at the porch before she’d switched off the engine. Connie Reed was already at the front door, peering into the gloom.

  ‘Oh,’ she said. ‘You again.’

  ‘I brought back the clothes you lent me,’ she said, holding up a plastic shopping bag.

  Reed peered into the bag and grunted. ‘How’s your friend?’

  ‘Angry,’ Cupidi said.

  ‘Not surprised.’ Reed stood in the doorway, lit from behind.

  ‘Can I come in?’ said Cupidi. ‘Just for a minute.’

  The woman paused; frowned. ‘I suppose. Don’t normally have visitors, this time of day. Or at all, really.’ She gave a small laugh and stood back to let Cupidi enter the house. ‘Can I offer you a cup of tea?’