by Anita Waller
‘He does. He’s called Hector.’
‘Bye, Hector,’ Kat called as she left the house.
It was a fair walk as she headed back down through the village, and although it was cold, she enjoyed the exercise. Her mind was on Martha and Sue, and she hoped they were having a lovely day. She didn’t notice Ewan Barker’s small red Fiesta that was parked on a side road, with a clear view of Connection ahead.
Mouse was in her own office, continuing with the paperwork that was an essential part of the business she hoped to dazzle with the following week. Doris was in reception, unable to concentrate on work. She was sitting reading her book when Kat walked through the door.
‘Perfect morning,’ she said. ‘I took some flowers to Craig’s grave, then went for a quarter of an hour in church. I needed some peace. Finally walked up to George’s cottage where I met a hamster called Hector, but more importantly he’s coming tomorrow morning to fit the new system for us. If he can’t track one down that quickly, he’ll let me know.’
‘He’s got a hamster who’s coming to fit the new lock system. Wow, I’m impressed.’
‘Okay, maybe that didn’t come out quite right.’
‘I like hamsters,’ Doris said. ‘We should have one in the office, like a mascot.’
‘Can we make do with a goldfish? I’m sure they’re a lot less trouble, and they don’t look like little rats. George seemed to be going to an awful lot of trouble cleaning the cage out. Nah, a fish is so much easier.’
35
Tessa and Hannah spent their morning repeating every question they had asked Steve Barksworth first time around. He could tell them nothing new, other than giving three names of clergy who would vouch for him having been at Sheffield Cathedral from two o’clock until late at night.
It was a relief that they had the names; no trips to see a bishop were needed. They had spoken to one vicar, Reverend Ashton, as they attempted to find out if Barksworth’s alibi was solid. Ashton had ratified what Steve had told them, but they needed more confirmation than one other person. Now they had Reverend Kieran Michaels, and Reverend Isaac Reece.
They had also spoken to Ruby Barksworth, who had corroborated her husband’s words, but added the rider that they could believe her above everybody else, because she would dearly like to see him squirm as he was charged with Orla’s murder. However, she had added, he simply didn’t do it. He hadn’t been there at the time they were saying were the crucial hours.
They got back in the car and Hannah turned to Tessa. ‘One unhappy woman, yes?’
‘Oh yes, I think Steve Barksworth should be grateful she’s bedbound and relies on him to get her through each day, because if she was fighting fit, he would be out of a marriage, and a job. She was positively vitriolic, wasn’t she. Did you feel like that about David?’
‘No, but that was different. I’d stopped loving David. She hasn’t stopped loving Steve Barksworth. She’s hurting and can’t hold that hurt in.’
Tessa sighed. ‘You’re probably right. We’re a funny lot, aren’t we, human beings.’
Hannah grinned and started the car. ‘Hope? For the Carr siblings?’
‘No, we have to interview them at work, I think. They’ll not be home for about four hours. Let’s go and get some lunch, then head for Emily Carr first.’
Emily stared at the two police officers, a blank expression on her face. ‘But I’ve told you all I know. What more can you possibly want?’
‘We’re rechecking everything. Can you get somebody to cover for you, please?’
‘Actually, it’s inconvenient. My relief is on her lunch break.’
‘Okay. Close everything down as you would when you go home at night. Get your coat, we’ll take you to headquarters.’ Tessa’s tone brooked no arguments, and Emily stared at her.
‘I’ll see if Lindsey is on the premises.’
Within a minute, Lindsey had joined them, and Tessa, Hannah and Emily moved to the small room where they had conducted the first interview, before the investigation had really got going.
‘Thank you for your cooperation, Emily,’ Tessa began.
‘Would you really have taken me to the police station?’ Emily stared at the two women, disbelief etched on her face.
‘Yes.’ The answer couldn’t have been clearer. ‘I’m here to go through your statement, make sure there is nothing you’ve forgotten. Something you may have thought of later. DS Granger, can you read Emily’s statement back to her, please.’
Hannah did so, while Tessa watched Emily for any response. It was only when Hannah reached the part where Emily said she didn’t know of any man that Orla was seeing, that was there a reaction. Very slight, but there. She waited until Hannah finished.
‘Did you lie, or omit to tell us anything, Emily?’
‘No.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘No.’
Hannah looked up, startled.
‘No, you’re not sure?’ Tessa pushed the girl.
A slight shrug of Emily’s shoulders spoke volumes.
‘Talk to me,’ she urged the young woman. ‘There can be no secrets in a murder enquiry. What do you know that you haven’t told us?’
‘It’s not what I know, it’s more what I saw.’ There was still hesitation. ‘It was seeing them together, at church. I saw Orla change, she used to dress quite… primly. I know that’s a strange word, but I mean she wore jeans and jumpers, jeans and T-shirts, she wasn’t showy, more… ordinary. Know what I mean?’
Tessa nodded, but didn’t speak. She didn’t want to stop the flow of words in case some nugget came from Emily Carr.
‘Orla began to wear low cut tops, hipster jeans, bare midriff, that sort of thing, all through the summer. And he couldn’t keep his eyes off her, Mr Godalmighty Barksworth. He followed her everywhere, but she encouraged him. He’s married, and with a really poorly wife. How could she do it?’ It came out almost as a wail. ‘She never told me she was seeing him, but it was obvious. They would disappear into the vestry, and come out looking… different. I don’t know how to explain it. One day I asked her if she was sleeping with him.’
‘And?’ Tessa said.
‘She admitted it. I made some comment about her throwing her virginity away for a married man, and she laughed and said I’d got that all wrong. She’d already lost her virginity before sleeping with the randy vicar.’
‘You don’t like him?’ Tessa asked. ‘Is that because of his affair with Orla, or for some other reason?’
There was a long pause. ‘He took my virginity. That was before Orla started chasing him. He seduced me over about six months, and I eventually gave in. I fell for the smooth talk, imagined I loved him really. It happened twice, and I said stop. I saw Ruby look at me, and knew that she knew. I couldn’t bear that. Orla didn’t know, I didn’t tell her, and I’m pretty sure Steve wouldn’t have. Steve immediately moved onto Orla, and I was history. And before you ask, yes it hurt, but it didn’t hurt enough to make me kill my best friend. And I know I’m being hypocritical slagging her off for sleeping with a married man when I’d done it with the same married man myself, but I recognised it for what it was, wrong and sleazy. She didn’t. It would still have been going on now, if…’ Emily wiped a tear from her eye.
Hannah was scribbling furiously, keeping up with the words pouring out.
‘Why didn’t you tell us this before, Emily,’ Tessa asked, her voice gentle.
‘I was ashamed. I haven’t killed Orla, I was sitting in my mum’s house waiting for her to arrive that awful night, not out there killing her. Telling you I’d slept with Steve Barksworth wouldn’t have helped anybody.’
The door opened and a tall dark-haired woman stood in the doorway. ‘Are you going to be much longer, Emily?’
Tessa held up her warrant card. ‘Emily will be as long as it takes, Ms…?’
‘Cartwright, Yolande Cartwright. I need Emily back on reception, to free Lindsey up to do some filing.’
‘Okay, Ms
Cartwright,’ Tessa said. ‘Keep yourself available because when I’ve finished speaking with Emily, who is helping us to piece together what happened before a young girl was brutally murdered, I’ll also need to speak with you.’
‘I’m going out in ten minutes so you’ll have to come back tomorrow.’
Tessa sighed. ‘DS Granger, please place Ms Cartwright in the back of the car and transport her to Chesterfield headquarters. I’ll be there later to take her statement. You’ll have to come back and get me once you’ve placed her in the interview room.’
Cartwright went white, and began to bluster. The outcome was that she went back to her office, Lindsey remained on reception, and they completed their interview with Emily, finally knowing they had the full story.
Yolande Cartwright, feeling full of trepidation for what this commanding woman would say next, confirmed that Emily never left before five, and after checking her rotas said she had been in work on the day that Orla French had been killed. She added that Emily was collected every day by her brother, so actually never left work at five, it was usually ten minutes later as he finished at five and had to have a wash before picking up his sister. Tessa thanked her, and stood. ‘Your cooperation has been helpful; we’re corroborating alibis and you’ve been very informative regarding Emily. I trust this will have no comeback on her, she has done nothing wrong, and had no choice in whether to talk to us or not. Is that understood?’
‘Of course.’ Yolande Cartwright’s tone was stilted, but Tessa guessed she’d got the message.
Tessa and Hannah walked out and said goodnight to Emily, telling her they were going to pop round and speak to Paul. ‘Please don’t ring him, Emily,’ Hannah said. ‘We don’t want him to wind himself up with thoughts of a second interview.’
Emily smiled. ‘I won’t. And I’m glad I’ve told you. As per your request… instructions… Paul and I will be in Chesterfield tomorrow morning to amend our statements. Although his won’t need amending because he knows nothing of Steve and me. I’ll catch a bus, make a day of it. Then only one of us will lose a day’s pay.’
Tessa laughed. ‘Oh, I don’t think you’ll lose pay over this, but let me know if you do.’
Paul Carr had nothing to add to his first statement, and they didn’t ask that he report to headquarters. He did decide, however, that he would book a day’s holiday and take Emily to make her statement. Until they had caught whoever had killed Orla French, he didn’t want his sister out unaccompanied.
Tessa and Hannah discussed events while sitting in the car, both feeling they had done enough. They had spoken to the main people in Orla’s life, confirmed times and dates, and both of them felt it was time to move on to the bit part players.
‘You certainly get them to cooperate by threatening them with being taken into Chesterfield,’ Hannah said with a laugh. ‘Everybody’s terrified of you. Good job they don’t see you like I do, doughnut smeared all over your face, or half a bottle of vinegar on a tray of chips.’
‘Don’t be cheeky, young Hannah. You get us back to the station while I organise sending for a car to pick up Steve Barksworth. For a vicar, he’s a pretty good liar, isn’t he? If it weren’t for his wife, I’d make sure we kept him overnight.’
And so the day passed into late afternoon, heading towards a general exodus of office and factory workers at the magic hour of five o’clock.
Connection had closed their doors at half past four, and Kat arrived home ten minutes later, ready to welcome Martha and Sue back from their adventure.
By six o’clock, she was in complete meltdown.
36
‘But what if she’s had an accident?’ Kat said, struggling to hold it together. Carl had arrived home, and was enfolding her in his arms. He had fully expected Martha and Sue to be back by the time he pulled onto the drive, but there was no sign of Sue’s hire car. Kat had sounded frantic at half past five, and initially he had given a gentle laugh, but soon realised how serious she was.
‘Is her phone still switched off?’
‘Yes, it’s going straight to voicemail. What do we do, Carl?’
He moved to the phone, and dialled Chesterfield HQ. They had had a report of one road traffic accident, but an elderly black woman and a baby hadn’t been involved. Carl then moved on to ringing around all the hospitals, including the Children’s Hospital in Sheffield, but there had been no admittances of either a Susan or a Martha Rowe.
‘Okay,’ he said. ‘You stay here. I’ll go down to Bakewell, to the Parkside, and see if she’s there. If she isn’t then we’ll bring in the troops. Alert Doris and Mouse, in case they see her car anywhere.’
The Parkside was a small hotel, probably around twenty rooms, and Carl walked up the front steps and into reception. He’d checked the car park situated to the side and back of the building, but had seen no sign of the hire car.
The receptionist smiled as he walked to the desk. ‘Can I help you, sir?’
He held up his ID, and the smile all but disappeared as she realised he wasn’t there to book a room.
‘You have a Mrs Susan Rowe staying here?’
‘Yes we did, she checked out this morning. I understood she was returning to Canada early. She said she would see to the return of the hire car to Jameson’s.’
He felt the blood drain from his face.
‘Thank you,’ he said, turned, and ran back to his car.
He spoke to Tessa on the way back to Eyam, and she arrived within two minutes of him getting home. She had already put in place the airport checks, and Dave Irwin, Ray Charlton and Fiona Ainsworth were all heading back to work to monitor information.
Mouse and Doris were there, both with their laptops. Mouse was at the kitchen table, her fingers flying across the keyboard. Doris was in the lounge, trying to support a distraught Kat.
Carl walked in, and Kat stood, moving rapidly towards him. He held her, stroked her hair, but could say nothing. He wanted to kill Sue Rowe.
Tessa arrived with the news that Sue wasn’t booked on any flights to anywhere in the world, let alone Canada. ‘She’s somewhere in this country, and we’ve contacted the car hire company to see if she’s returned it. She hasn’t, so we can at least get that registration out all over the place. Kat, you can take some comfort from the fact that she can’t take Martha out of the country, as Martha hasn’t got a passport yet. All ports are alerted, and train stations as far as we can. Certainly she’ll not get to the continent by train, because we’ve blocked that avenue.’
‘And what if she went as soon as she set off with Martha this morning?’ Kat’s tearful face turned towards Tessa. ‘She could already be on the continent.’
‘Kat, in these glorious days of Brexit, she’s going nowhere without a passport for that baby. We’ll find her for you. Does she have enough formula for Martha?’
‘It doesn’t matter, does it? She knows what she has, and she can buy more.’
‘Think about this, Kat. Is she making you pay for exposing Leon?’
The room went quiet.
Kat’s bottom lip trembled. She couldn’t focus her thoughts. ‘I… I suppose so. She’s never said anything, not ever, about blaming me, but that doesn’t mean she’s not thinking it. But Leon’s dead! She’s not planning the same thing for Martha, surely.’ Her eyes were wide as the implications of Tessa’s question sank in.
‘No, of course she isn’t.’ Tessa tried to soothe her friend. ‘She’s Martha’s nan. She won’t hurt her. It’s probably you she wants to hurt.’
Sue sat on the park bench, watching the baby as she slept in her pushchair. She gave a brief passing thought to Kat, who she knew must be going frantic by now, and smiled. Thanks to Kat, she had spent months wondering where Leon was, not knowing if she would ever see him again. Kat had only had two hours of feeling scared, nowhere near long enough.
Sue took out her phone and looked at it. Smashed, the screen a myriad of tiny cracks. She was pleased she had brought her old one with her, she had known it
would have to be shattered at some point, and her shiny new one couldn’t be part of the sacrifice. She had rung the car hire people to say the car wouldn’t start, then in the middle of saying where she was she had deliberately dropped the phone, then disconnected the call. The small rock had destroyed the screen. It would take time for them to find her, even with the car’s tracker activated.
She had set aside a day to pay Kat back, to make her fear for her daughter’s life, but Sue had no intentions of charges being laid against her. She had a story of delay, being unable to contact Kat to tell her because Kat’s number was in the wrecked phone and she could no longer access it. Oh, silly me, she would say, I never thought of using Directory Enquiries for the landline number.
Sue stood, carefully lifted Martha out of the pushchair and placed her gently in the car seat. She stirred and waved her arms around, then settled back into her sleep. She was fed and changed, and Sue knew the little girl would be fine. She would wrap her pushchair blanket around her to keep her warm, and Martha would sleep until she was eventually returned to her tearful mummy.
Sue reckoned if the car hire people turned up in the next fifteen minutes, she could have Martha home before ten. Kat would be at screaming point by then, as Sue had been when somebody thought to ring and tell her Leon was dead, two days after the event.
Opening her bag, Sue took out two of the tablets her doctor had insisted she needed. Edge of a breakdown had been his words as he wrote out the prescription. She swallowed them by using the last of her water, and then watched as the car pulled up in front of her.
It only took the car hire employees a minute to reconnect the loose battery cable that had only taken her a minute to loosen, and they asked her why the police had contacted them about the car. She said she should have been back for five, and her daughter was concerned about her, but she had been in touch so all worries had been dealt with.