A Private Investigation

by Peter Grainger

  ‘According to her, all the children think he’s wonderful.’

  ‘When you say a new boyfriend, any idea how new?’

  ‘I didn’t ask directly but she said something about meeting on a day out at the beach. Can’t be last year, so it must be this, and in the summer, presumably.’

  ‘Maybe four or five months, then. The kids are on the beach, splashing about and along comes Roy and gets chatting to mum…’

  There was a pause, and both thought, the job does this – sunshine, sand and a little dark cloud of suspicion on the horizon, every brief moment of happiness and laughter tainted by doubt. And the better you are at the job, the more it does this to you.

  Smith said, ‘But Roy was with Mrs Johnson all yesterday evening, when Zoe disappeared, and he stayed the night, presumably?’

  ‘According to Mrs Johnson.’

  That was two “According to Mrs Johnson”s. Serena Butler had no problem remembering the ABC of detection. She rarely made an assumption, she had no difficulty in believing no-one and she was very good at checking everything.

  ‘Alright, then. Waters has the girl’s phone number but he got himself sent to the head of year’s office, and he’s gone off with the photo as well. Maybe you could…’

  Serena had both, and as she set to work transferring the picture to her desktop so that she could edit it to show only Zoe Johnson, Smith asked more questions. Serena told him that the girl’s bedroom was shared with the younger twins; it was cramped and untidy but Zoe had marked out a corner for her own things. There was a set of drawers and a makeshift dressing table with a mirror. Zoe had makeup and clothes but there was no sign of a laptop or an iPad – Serena said there wasn’t much money in the household.

  Smith said, ‘It’s down to her phone then. That’s where she lives. Is it on a contract?’

  It was – Serena had covered those bases as well. Mrs Johnson pays the bill each month and this appeared to be her main weapon in the running battle between mother and daughter. They needed to get into the account as soon as possible, but authorising that was beyond the detective sergeant’s pay grade, of course, which is why you need senior officers to be in the room occasionally.

  On his own screen, Smith could see that there were five Roy Greens apparently alive, well and still offending in the county of Norfolk. None were registered sex offenders, which is always good, but that hardly took matters forward. If this Roy Green was one of the five, maybe he just hadn’t been caught at the nasty stuff yet. It was just as likely that he was not one of the five, and hadn’t been caught yet. Or maybe he was a perfectly decent bloke who would be the salvation of the Johnson family. If he, Smith, had been there face to face with Penny Johnson, he would know more. He would have studied her until she realised what he was doing, and then she might have given something away. At the very least, he would have asked her where this Roy Green lived.

  The sound of voices in the corridor distracted Smith for a moment and then his mobile was ringing. It was Chris. Zoe was not in school. He had spoken to the form tutor and head of year together, and he had a decent picture of her situation at Lake Community; Zoe was an average student who did not generally draw attention to herself. She had a circle of friends and there was no knowledge of any personal issues that might have led to her running away.

  Terek and Reeve came into the room. Again on the detective inspector’s face there was a look of surprise that might also have been irritation; no-one had told him about Detective Constable Butler’s return either. Smith wondered how his own role was being perceived by the DI in these final weeks – some sort of airport public address system announcing arrivals and departures? If you want to be told what’s going on, stay in the office; if you want to find out what’s going on, go out of it and into the big wide world, sir.

  Smith had almost forgotten that Waters was still on the line.

  ‘…so I spoke to the friend, Jaimee, in the head of year’s room. She gave me the same story as she gave Zoe’s mother, which was that she hadn’t arranged to meet Zoe last night and she didn’t hear from her. When I questioned her a little, I got quite a lot more.’

  ‘Hold on, Chris.’

  Terek and Reeve were by his desk now, and the DI asked who was on the phone. Smith said, ‘It’s Waters. He’s at the school but there’s no sign of Zoe Johnson.’

  Alison Reeve said, ‘Put him on speaker, DC.’

  Smith took a guess and pressed the main button – Waters had told him to do this if in doubt. Luckily there was a speaker symbol to press. Nevertheless, he still held it to his ear as he said, ‘OK, Chris, we’re all listening now. What did this girl Jaimee have to say?’

  ‘Well, she made it clear that they’re not as close as they used to be. Zoe’s made some new friends in the year above and Jaimee’s feeling left out. I got the idea that Zoe has been up to things that her old friend didn’t approve of, but the teacher being present didn’t help.’

  Reeve said quietly to Smith, ‘Names?’ but he was already noting it, halfway down the second A4 page.

  He said, ‘Chris? Did Jaimee give you any names?’

  ‘Yes, one, and from the way she said it, it’s the person she likes the least. Gemma Powell. And before you ask, yes, she’s in school today. I thought I’d check in with you before I speak to her.’

  Terek said to Reeve, ‘As Zoe Johnson isn’t at school, we should have someone else there, ma’am. Two people should interview the students from now on.’

  She nodded, and then Terek said to Waters, ‘Chris, hold off on that next interview. I’m sending someone else in case we get more names and need to get through them quickly.’

  It’s impossible to say whether Simon Terek had seen the tiny movement as Smith began to ease his chair away from the desk, but he said to Serena, ‘The community college, please, straight away. Let me know the moment there is any useful intelligence about the girl and her movements.’

  Serena reached for her coat, her eyes meeting Smith’s as she did so; of all of them she was perhaps the most loyal once she had taken a liking to you, and she needed something from him because she had not missed that movement as he readied himself to join Waters. She received the familiar raised eyebrow and that was enough.

  But before she reached the door, Smith said, ‘Serena, just a moment.’ And then to Reeve he said, ‘I think the college’s day ends at three thirty. If we get no leads this morning, we should prepare them to make an appeal for information about Zoe before the students leave.’

  Terek said, ‘That’s going quite public. I’m not sure we should raise the alarm in that way yet, ma’am.’

  Smith said, ‘If we don’t do it today, it will be another eighteen hours before we can. Lake Community College has fifteen hundred pairs of eyes and ears.’

  Reeve took her time, and didn’t hide the fact that she was looking down at the page of notes in front of Smith, though from where she stood she could not have read them. Then she said to Serena, ‘Mention it to them. I’ll phone the principal myself before one o’clock this afternoon, depending on what you and Chris find out in the next couple of hours.’

  Smith said into the phone, ‘Right, help is on its way. You can go and have a kick around in the playground until Serena arrives.’

  When that exchange was over, Smith saw that Terek was back by his own desk and on his mobile. Alison Reeve was listening and asking questions. It had to be Wilson calling from the shopping centre. Smith made out that there had been four arrests in the past half an hour, including one who had decided to make a run for it – but having eluded those officers working inside, he had crashed straight into one DC Murray who was just entering the building to join the operation. Wilson thought the arrested man might have mild concussion as a result.

  Alison Reeve left the office, and Terek sat at his desk. Smith made a couple more notes, and waited because the detective inspector would have to say something eventually. And eventually he did.

  ‘OK, DC?’

 
; ‘Never better, sir.’

  ‘Good. I …’

  ‘Sir?’

  ‘Well, interviewing school children… I’m sure Chris and Serena are more than capable.’

  ‘I’m absolutely certain of it.’

  Terek busied himself on his desk for a few seconds.

  ‘So I decided that with your experience there was no-one better to run the desk on this one at least until we know what we’re faced with. We should know what that is by the time the shoplifting operation is over.’

  Smith was busy then, widening the search of Roy Greens to neighbouring counties and preparing the requests that would need to be sent to authorise the search of Zoe Johnson’s mobile phone records. The office was so quiet that he might have been sitting there on his own once again.

  Chapter Six

  Mrs Masters thought about the question she had just been asked, and at the same time she was thinking, it’s true, policemen are getting younger, and policewomen too, because neither of these is near thirty. It isn’t so many years since they were in school themselves. The young man had been very pleasant when he was asking about Zoe Johnson earlier on but now the young woman was doing the talking and asking the questions as if she was in charge, even though both had announced themselves as detective constables.

  ‘I think it would be fair to say that Gemma is a different kettle of fish.’

  The head of year was looking at Waters because he had a reference point for that which was the interview he had already conducted with Jaimee Pokora, but it was the female detective who spoke again.

  ‘You said she is a year older than Zoe. So Gemma is in year 11?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Students usually socialise within their own year groups, don’t they?’

  ‘Yes again, but girls particularly tend to ignore that as they get older. Some girls, anyway.’

  ‘Do you think Gemma Powell would have been a good influence on Zoe?’

  ‘I really couldn’t say.’

  Serena Butler looked back at the older woman with a nod that said fair enough, I know I was pushing it with that one. Then, ‘It would be helpful if you could tell us how Gemma is “a different kettle of fish” to Zoe’s friend, Jaimee. That might be useful to us.’

  The teacher was choosing her words with care, this being not the first time she had found herself in the complicated space between being in loco parentis and doing her duty as a law-abiding citizen.

  ‘Gemma is more street-wise than Jaimee, and probably more street-wise than most of our girls. People often imagine Kings Lake is a sleepy rural backwater but we have many children from difficult backgrounds. Some parts of the town are deprived by any standards.’

  Mrs Masters had spoken in code but she could see that both detectives had understood. She wondered how Gemma would relate to them – she should be here any moment now. The young woman, Detective Constable Butler, looked like a tough customer and sounded as if she might have come from the wrong side of the tracks herself. Maybe there would be a connection with Gemma, then, but the young man, Detective Constable Waters, was tall and rather good-looking. They might do better to let him take the lead.

  Someone knocked at the door, and the head of year’s look said, ready?

  There was a time when all children were afraid of the police, Mrs Masters thought, but neither of these would remember that. And the lack of fear has become something else in recent times – a lack of respect. Last year, during one of those community relations visits by a uniformed officer, she had seen a constable surrounded by laughing twelve-year-olds, hands tugging at the cuffs on his utility belt and asking what else he had in all those pockets. Had he got a Taser or some tear gas? What about a gun? Chants of “Show us your gun!” before the teachers got them back under control.

  Gemma Powell was suspicious and a little surly but she was not afraid. Her face had the pale, stark look of one that is already accustomed to wearing make-up; she had probably worn some on the way to school and removed it before this interview, thinking she was in trouble with the head of year. Once the questions began, her demeanour had changed; she looked all of them in the eye and kept her first responses short. It looked as if she had something they wanted and there might be a deal to be done. And besides, this was keeping her out of Maths.

  Serena Butler said, ‘It’s a simple enough question, Gemma. Is Zoe a friend of yours or not?’

  ‘I wouldn’t say a friend exactly.’

  ‘What would you say?’

  ‘She hangs about with us sometimes.’

  ‘And who is “us”?’

  ‘Me and my other mates.’

  ‘Your other mates from year 11?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  Serena looked directly into the schoolgirl’s eyes but there was nothing coming back, nothing she could use to refine or redirect her line of questioning.

  ‘OK. So, Zoe is a year younger than you. Do you often hang about with younger girls?’

  A simple tactic which brought no change in the girl’s expression, but when she answered there was a note of annoyance at what had been implied.

  ‘No, I don’t. We don’t.’

  ‘So why Zoe, then?’

  ‘Like I said, we didn’t ask her. She just sort of invited herself. Started turning up and hanging around with us.’

  ‘Where was this?’

  The man had spoken to her for the first time. He was more posh than the woman copper.

  Gemma looked at him pointedly before she said, ‘In the playground an’ that, lunchtimes.’

  He was leaning back casually in the chair, the ankle of one leg resting on the knee of the other. His hair was blond and he had a few days of stubble on his face, which was thin but sort of interesting. He looked nothing like a policeman, Gemma concluded – more like an actor or something. He saw her looking at him and smiled.

  ‘Right, and anywhere else, out of school?’

  ‘Sometimes.’

  ‘Whereabouts? Remember, Gemma – we’re not asking about what you’ve been doing. We’re not interested in that unless it involves Zoe. We just need some places to go and look for her.’

  ‘What d’you think’s happened to her?’

  ‘We’re not thinking anything particular at the moment. But it’s not a good situation when a girl of Zoe’s age goes missing, and it looks as if she has. You know this isn’t a good situation, you understand that, don’t you?’

  ‘Yeah, course…’

  The two women in the room watched and waited; it was clear that Detective Constable Christopher Waters had the girl’s attention, and clear that she was thinking something over. He waited just long enough, and then said, ‘So, when did you last talk to Zoe?’

  ‘Yesterday, after school, on the way home. She walked along with us.’

  ‘That’s helpful. What did she say? Did she seem OK to you?’

  ‘Yeah. Just normal. She w…’

  ‘She what, Gemma?’

  ‘Nothing.’

  But there was something. Waters had seen Smith do this often enough, and so he did what Smith would have told him to do; don’t chase after it, and it might come back to you. He said, ‘So you walked home with her?’

  ‘Some of the way. We don’t live in the same road or nothing.’

  Waters said, ‘I see. But you do live on the Dockmills estate?’

  Gemma nodded.

  ‘Right, so you said goodbye to her somewhere on the way home. And we know she went home, her mum’s told us that, which confirms what you are telling us. You’ve told me that was the last time you saw her, as well. Did she say whether she was planning to go out anywhere later or meet anyone else?’

  He was close now – there was something here in the girl’s face. She swallowed and was blinking more than she was before. He prayed that Serena and Mrs Masters would keep their silence a little longer.

  ‘Gemma, we need to know. You said you understood that Zoe disappearing might be serious. Of course you do, you’re more than old en
ough to know why. Telling us now isn’t going to get you into trouble, and it might help us to find Zoe.’

  The girl said, ‘She wanted to know where we was going after school. I said I didn’t know but we might go down the Railway about eight.’

  ‘The railway? Where is that?’

  ‘Railway playpark. It’s just some kids’ swings and slides an’ all that.’

  Waters didn’t look at Serena but he could tell that she was tapping on her iPad, no doubt getting up the map of Kings Lake. Then he said to Gemma, ‘And did you? Did you go down to the railway last night?’

  ‘No. Started rainin’. Then my mum took us down to the pizza place for our tea. I didn’t go out last night.’

  It’s important not to show the disappointment but he felt it – if he could have accounted for another few hours of Zoe Johnson’s time, that would have been something. Waters looked at the teacher and nodded his thanks.

  ‘But Zoe went down there.’

  Three pairs of eyes swivelled back to the girl.

  Waters said, ‘Zoe did go to the railway? How do you know that, Gemma?’

  ‘She texted me. Asked me when I’d be there.’

  Don’t chase after it and it might come back to you.

  ‘OK. Gemma – do you have your phone with you now?’

  The girl glanced at Mrs Masters before she said, ‘Not allowed ’em in school.’

  The teacher said, ‘Gemma, it’s fine.’

  The phone appeared out of her schoolbag, was opened and then presented to Waters. There were two texts – 20.21 and 20.30. The second said that she, Zoe, was going into town, that’s where she would be if Gemma still wanted to meet up.

  Waters said, ‘I’m going to ask Detective Constable Butler to make a copy of the messages, and then you can have your phone back. Is that alright?’ and she nodded.

  Then, after a little while, Gemma Powell said, ‘If something’s happened to her, it’s not my fault, is it? I only said we might go down there. Didn’t know it was going to rain, did I?’

  It was Serena who said in the end, ‘No, Gemma. It’s not your fault.’