by Rachael Blok
Henry’s face contorts. His lips are moving, but she has sunk so far, she can’t hear him.
‘Your coffee!’ Henry half calls and half shouts.
With effort, she glances down. Warm liquid is seeping into her jumper. She feels a wetness against her chest. The brown stain on the soft cotton is bleeding into a formless wound.
‘For Christ’s sake, it’s dripping on the carpet!’
Will looks up and sees tears on Jenny’s face.
‘Dad, leave it. I’ll get a cloth. She’s upset. Jen, it’s OK. Fuck, it’s terrible. It’s really sad,’ he says, standing up and pulling her up into a hug.
She falls against his chest and gasps for air. The suddenness of her lungs filling makes her woozy.
‘Henry, get the cake and the cloth,’ Felicity begins. ‘No, not now,’ she says to him, silencing whatever he has been about to say. ‘I think we all need some cake and I can’t move because Finn has fallen asleep. I’ll sit right here until he wakes up and Jenny can have a rest. Would you like to go and have a little sleep, dear? The spare bed is all made up.’
Prising open her mouth, Jenny can’t think of what to say. She puts out her hand to Will, an anchor, unbalanced by a sudden gratitude. Felicity is usually welcoming, but this is kind.
‘Well…’
‘Go on. No one will mind. If he wakes I’ll come and get you,’ Will says and smiles at her. ‘He’s pretty much slept all day and all those books you read say you need to sleep when he does.’
His arm is still around her. It’s unusual – he isn’t demonstrative in the presence of his parents. It makes her feel like crying again; his sense of familiarity, missing for weeks, makes her giddy.
She tries hard not to look at Henry. She knows he will be watching to check for coffee on the furniture or the carpet. She doesn’t want to dislike him.
‘OK then,’ she says. And quickly, before she can allow herself to change her mind, she leaves the room and navigates the wide, elegant wooden staircase.
2
Dredging the lake is cold work. Bodies, bent and busy, fill the park: camera flashes, phones, police tape. The air vibrates.
The trees, covered in frost, hang jewelled in a shaft of sunlight ending in front of Maarten’s boots. Now the snow has arrived, this English winter finally feels real. Last year had been only damp and cold, and he had hankered after the frosty canals of home and stretches of white fields that lie out flat to the horizon, like a solid sea.
Pausing, he allows a brief reprieve. The sky has been grey so far, this morning. Taking a breath, he pulls his shoulders back and looks upwards, judging the likelihood of more snow, wondering if the search will make headway today.
The shaft disappears as a cloud passes overhead, and the colour of the morning darkens. The grey light erases the shine from the snow and frost. Shouts fill the air nearby as something is found and demands a crowd of detail seekers.
‘Here you go, sir.’
He takes gloves from a member of his team, and he nods thanks, pulling them on and flexing his stiff fingers.
‘And you’ll need this,’ says Imogen. She appears quietly to his left, passing a steamy coffee cup into his hands.
He smiles.
‘When did you get time for that?’ He takes a sip. ‘Kak, this one’s yours.’
They switch. ‘Always time for coffee. Seb drove me – I nipped out at the lights. First one for today, and looks like we might need it if we’re going to get anywhere here.’ Taking a last pull on a metal cigarette, she pockets it and reties her scarf.
‘Have you caught up?’ He notices the scarf is pale blue, like the blue of a baby’s room.
She nods.
Maarten scans the scene. Mud and ice make for a murky ground. The cold takes tiny bites out of his face as he unsticks his feet with effort and slides over frozen puddles, unbalanced.
The last few months here have been uneventful: drunks, domestics, pre-Christmas busyness. Today, adrenalin snakes the air.
Aching, his fingers warm through as feeling floods back in. Liv had been talking him through the Christmas timetable when the car had arrived. There are twelve days left before Christmas and the calendar on the wall at home is awash with nativity dates, in-law visits, drinks with friends and office parties. Christmas looms as a to-do list. He’d been scribbling in his diary and wondering quietly what to get her for Christmas. A kitchen mixer? It’s dangerous ground, buying kitchen items for Christmas. Does it constitute a present or a house thing? He wanted a new bike, and had considered getting her one too, so they could ride out together with the kids, but that would definitely be a gift more for him than her. She had mentioned that the boiler was playing up, and he made a note to check it; he had watched her cross things off the lists, and then he had left his gloves on the table, distracted.
The letter sat on the table. He doesn’t have long left to respond. She still won’t talk about it. ‘I’m leaving it to you. You decide what you want to do first and then we will discuss it. Don’t mention it to the girls yet.’
And he doesn’t know. Not yet. Rotterdam. The smell of the city, the trains: their efficiency, graffiti. The port with its open arms; its sea that leans outwards. The architecture: balls, curves, soaring towers. Its pull is physical. He can smell the city, even by this lake. But this is Liv’s home. And the girls have moved so much. English is their first language. Nic would manage, she’d lived there until she was three, but to Sanne it isn’t her home, just a place that is other.
Moving deftly around the edge of the lake, slightly hunched, listening to the crime scene breakdown from his staff, Maarten thinks again of the face of the girl. Young, her features bloated by water, her eyes told them nothing, except she had now vanished. He interrupts his staff with questions, and stores others to run through later. Like Liv, he relies on lists. The A–Z of procedure his map to the truth.
Imogen is beneath the trees on the far side, her red hair falling over her face, staring at something, not touching.
‘Anything?’ he shouts.
‘Not sure. It’s a wallet; it’s covered in snow. It’s been photographed, but hopefully some fingerprints are on there.’
The call had come that morning to say a body had been discovered. His first assumption had been that someone had fallen in. The ice made the pathways around the lake lethal. If someone toppled in, after a few drinks, then that would be that.
But then in came a report of a missing girl. Her parents had checked on her when she hadn’t come down to breakfast, venturing upstairs to discover her room hadn’t been slept in. She was too young to wander off without permission, and it was completely out of character. Moreover, when her mother had tried to contact her, the mobile phone had been switched off. She had never been known to turn her phone off, even when asked.
‘She would never stay at a friend’s without letting us know. Never,’ the mother had said, holding back the tears, when he’d phoned to ask for a photo.
It had been the father who had come down to the station to make a report. Her mother had wanted to stay at home, near the house phone. Just in case.
‘She’s a good girl,’ the dark-haired man had said. He had spoken clearly, making a visible effort to keep himself in check. A fading northern accent pulled at the edge of his vowels. Maarten made a study of the English accent, with all its connotations of education, wealth, class waiting to be decoded syllable by syllable.
He had made reassuring noises, without making any promises: the cars were already heading to the lake to look at a body.
It did indeed appear to be Leigh Hoarde. Aged fourteen, a pupil at one of the local comprehensives. Now drowned. The official identification yet to take place, but the picture her father had brought down that morning indicated it was merely a formality. Unlike the face he had seen that morning, the photo had burst out at him like many similar snaps: taken on a holiday somewhere, a smile, white teeth, guileless. The shards of broken youth, mourned by a nation the moment the photo
is out, and Leigh Hoarde will be frozen for ever in the split-second frame.
In his boots and by this still lake, he is cold and nervous. Facts are his bible, not instinct; however, a sepulchral feeling sits heavily at the bottom of his stomach. He waits for evidence, but inevitably so. She didn’t simply slip on snowflakes.
‘Sir!’
A shout comes from further down the pathway, near an overhanging willow, standing winter bare.
He moves forwards, glancing around.
‘Imogen?’
She steps alongside. Her breath clouds before her.
There are three police officers in a cluster, around the ground. They are bent low and are moving carefully. The photographs have finished and the tape is in place.
‘Here,’ one calls out, and another moves over with a notepad, scribbling as the first one speaks.
‘What have we got?’ Maarten asks. He can taste the answer on his lips and closes his mouth. He will be told, rather than ask the question, no need to encourage such news.
‘Footprints, sir,’ the officer nearest to him says.
‘Yes.’ The second one stands up. Maarten struggles to remember her name, Adrika? She’s quite new.
‘They’re moving away from the lake,’ she continues. ‘They’re quite fresh and we’ve found some clothing too. It looks as though it’s been dropped. It’s marked with what looks like fresh blood.’
‘What is it?’
They look down. It looks a pale purple; drenched, it drips as it’s raised. Dark patches scatter the front.
‘A jacket. Looks like she put up a fight, if it’s hers. Not sure there’s enough blood to be the cause of death. I’ll let you know what comes back from Forensics.’
Footprints and blood. Moving away from the lake, past the bushes, where tiny icicles hang over the top of branches like jewelled tiaras.
‘Good job. Confirmation on a suspicious death, then.’ He thrusts his gloved hands back into his pocket, where he can feel the buzz of his mobile.
‘Imogen?’
‘Yes, sir, I’ll call in and get going.’ She turns and walks away, her phone rising to her mouth. ‘Can you let the CSM know we’ve looked at…’
He avoids looking at the body again. The post-mortem will come soon enough. Observing the treads, running away from the point where the girl has been found, he rocks with a brief flash of apprehension. Its force is fleeting, but it sinks within him, a curdled viscous drink.
His phone rumbles again in his hand and this time he pulls off a glove and turns back to the path. He answers without looking at the caller ID.
‘Yes?’
‘Maart? Are you busy?’
Liv.
Oh God, he thinks. He will be late tonight, and she’s got this dinner planned with the parents of their daughter’s best friend.
‘Maart? Can you hear me? I heard they found a body, a young girl. Is that right? Are you busy with it?’
‘Yes, love. I’m at the site now. There’s no real evidence to say what has happened, and we’ve not gone public with it yet. But yes, it’s a young girl, drowned in the lake.’
There is a moment’s pause.
‘Looks suspicious,’ he says. ‘Probably be quite busy today.’
‘Shall I tell the girls, in case they see the news? Nic’s got Becky Dorrington here – they’re making their party invitations and then Becky’s sleeping over. Remember her parents are here for dinner tonight – perhaps I should wait for them before I break the news to Becky? God, such horrible news,’ she says. Her voice is tight. He can imagine her fingernails tapping the table as she speaks, bold with the orange varnish she’d painted on in quick long stripes, for her design meeting tomorrow.
Fuck it. He doesn’t know. He needs to call Rotterdam later too, and he’d been hoping to talk to her. To balance out his thoughts.
‘I won’t say anything to them yet.’ Her voice is clear, cutting into the crime scene, taking him briefly back home.
Neither of them speak and he hears a shout from further down the riverbank.
‘Look, liefje, I’ve got to go. I’ll try not to be late. Kiss the girls for me. Don’t say anything. But keep the TV off. I’ll try and let you know about dinner.’
‘OK, Maart. Try your best though please. I really want to meet the Dorringtons before the girls share their party.’
He puts the phone away and moves heavily down the muddy track, skirting the roped off area, the flash of photographs and forensic collection. Each boot sinks deeper into the sodden ground. His large print is grey on the white snow.
3
‘Could’ve gone worse,’ Will had said, when getting into the car.
Jenny had not answered, instead, she had curled against her rolled up coat and closed her eyes, waking only as they entered the edges of the tiny city, the darkness folding them like a blanket, watching the blackness and the silence. They pass no more than a handful of cars, crawling back through the whitened, Sunday evening roads.
It is still so new, she thinks. Its criss-crossed streets, small and cobbled, are wrapped like a present waiting to be opened, if she can just find the right piece of string. The two months they’ve lived here have seemed longer. St Albans skirts the brow of Zone 6, a breath above London. Its train route pumps into the heart of the city, taking Will under an hour to his desk.
Fleeing their home in London, which burst like an over-packed suitcase after Finn arrived, Jenny remembers she had loved it immediately. She had been swept to a standstill with déjà vu – she had felt at home, a burst of the familiar and unfamiliar as she had stood at the heart of the park. The city, the lake, had felt like slipping on a forgotten coat, found buried in a wardrobe. She had caught her breath.
To move quickly, they had rented out their flat and signed a lease on Hope Cottage: a chocolate box three bed set back off a tiny, winding lane leading up from the park.
The narrow streets are slippery.
‘Bugger, I’m going to have to leave it,’ Will mutters, as the wheels whir beneath them. They are at the top of their narrow, cobbled lane.
‘Do you think you can walk from here?’ he says.
He vanishes out of the car into the dark carrying the bags and Jenny jumps out. The icy air is biting but still against her cheek; there is no wind. She doesn’t bother waiting for Will to return, and climbs out, slipping as she closes the door and Finn stirs. She steadies herself against the car, waiting for him to settle, and then opens his door carefully, releasing his seat belt through his travel sleeping bag. She counts to three in her head, lifting him on the third and pulling him to her chest. The change of air makes him squirm, but his eyes stay closed, and she picks her way carefully down the hill. Will has put the lights on in the front room and the bathroom, but left the stairs and bedroom dark. She can hear him unloading the bags in the kitchen.
Carrying her heart in her hands, his breath is warm against her neck. She places him gently in his crib, holding his hand, watching him settle.
A blast of cold air, tunnelling through the house, makes her shiver as she heads downstairs. The clock in the front room shows just after nine p.m. Sitting on their battered leather sofa, she opens a note found on the doormat. It’s from the police, asking them to call. Jenny thinks again of the girl in the lake and before going to turn on the kettle, she dials the number.
‘Hello? I’m Jenny Brennan, I live in Hope Cottage on Lake Lane. We’ve got a note asking us to call… Yes, of course I’ll hold.’
Will enters the room as she waits for the desk to connect her to the officer concerned. He raises his eyebrows and she passes him the note.
‘I’ll go and make coffee,’ he whispers. ‘And bring biscuits.’
As he leaves the room, she smiles, the frustration she felt with him earlier dissipates. She wishes she could call her dad, to let off steam about the day, but at sea there is a patchy signal at best and it will be even later over there; tomorrow will be better. She taps out a text anyway: Hope you’re having fu
n in the sun. Much to tell you. Love J xx
The line clicks and a male voice takes over.
‘Hello? Mrs Brennan? Thank you so much for calling us back. I’m Detective Chief Inspector Jansen. We were down your way this afternoon interviewing everyone who lives on The Lanes. We’re anxious to make some headway quickly. Sorry, I’m just assuming you’ve heard…’
‘Yes, we heard,’ Jenny says, not wanting to be told again.
‘I know it’s late, but would you mind if we came out to run through a few things with you? It wouldn’t take long.’
‘Yes, that’s fine,’ Jenny says. ‘They want to come out now,’ she mouths at Will, as he enters with drinks.
He shrugs. ‘I don’t think we’ll be any help. It’s bloody late.’
She nods at Will as DCI Jansen explains the station is only a few minutes away. But what with the snow…
‘Yes, fine. Goodbye,’ Jenny says.
‘They said they should be done by ten,’ she says, taking a biscuit out of the tin.
‘Well, I might go and open some wine before they get here,’ Will says. ‘They probably won’t want a drink but I do after that journey. The car will need digging out tomorrow. I can’t see the trains running either, so I think it will be a working from home day.’
Jenny smiles. It is better with someone around. The snow has been bad recently and she’s struggled to get the buggy out. Aside from a few coffees, she’s spent too long inside. The house has felt tight. Ill-fitting.
Being in the house for too long is a challenge. Some moments, life’s jewels, she’s incapacitated with the love. But feeding Finn and changing nappies can swallow a day. It is wonderful and lonely. The rooms have shrunk. Having someone around, just to talk to, helps. Some mornings, when Will leaves for lunch hours and drinks after work, she hates him. Viscerally.
They each hold a glass of wine when the knock comes. Will answers the door.
A man and a woman enter the room, both in plain clothes.
‘Hello, no, please don’t get up,’ says the man to Jenny, as he follows Will in. ‘I was just saying to your husband, I’m DCI Jansen and this is Detective Inspector Deacon.’