by Henry James
‘Why on earth not?’ Clarke asked.
‘I couldn’t say, Detective,’ Bickerton replied casually. ‘She was upset? Humiliated, perhaps?’
Clarke tried to imagine herself in Marie Roberts’s position – what would she do? To be attacked in such a degrading, intimate way, and then to be discovered by an adolescent boy – the humiliation of having to relive it for the police would be powerfully off-putting. Nevertheless, she could never let a man who’d raped her get away with it.
‘Perhaps,’ she replied, ‘but she’d want the attacker caught, surely.’
‘And so she does, Detective. Please have the good grace to appreciate that she was in shock. I called the police after comforting Miss Roberts for an hour or so, until she had calmed down.’
‘I understand,’ Clarke said, quietly.
‘How’s that leg of yours?’ the head asked suddenly, smiling and catching her unawares. Clarke blushed at the reference.
‘Forgive me for appearing unsympathetic’ – Frost torched the tip of a Rothmans – ‘but if you had comforted Miss Roberts a bit sharper, we might have stood a better chance of catching whoever did this. Another woman, also a schoolteacher, was raped on Monday in the Denton area, and it would have been of some comfort to them, I imagine, if you were quicker off the mark. Now, if you’d be good enough to show us the cubicle where the attack took place.’
Frost turned the key in the ignition.
‘He’ll go far,’ he said, puffing on another cigarette.
‘Who will?’ Clarke asked, winding down the window.
‘That lad; remarkable initiative. Wish I’d thought to do that at school.’
‘Jack, for heaven’s sake, a woman’s been raped!’
‘I know. Took her time reporting it, though. Odd.’
‘Well, if there was the slightest chance you could understand women, you might see it from her point of view; the humiliation …’
The head was an odd fish too, he thought, ignoring Clarke. His mind turned to Waters, who had been watching a call box on the Southern Housing Estate for the best part of a week; Joanne Daniels had been receiving dozens of crank calls from that phone box, and had then been raped outside the Bricklayer’s Arms. As yet they didn’t even know if the calls were connected to the rape. A pub at closing time and a school first thing in the morning – the scenarios couldn’t be more different; but could it be the same attacker? The only link so far was that both victims were teachers. All the same, he felt justified in giving the headmaster a hard time. He reached over for the handset.
Clarke interrupted his train of thought. ‘Jack, I need to talk to you.’
‘Just a minute, love. Control? Frost here. Is DS Waters back?’ He started to pull out of the school car park but found, as he had on many occasions, that it was pretty difficult to drive, smoke and speak on the radio all at the same time. No, Waters wasn’t back, came the answer, but a number of other people were after Frost.
‘Jack, please.’
‘What’s that?’ he barked into the crackling handset. ‘My mother-in-law? Tell her I’ll call back as soon I can.’ Beryl Simpson had been on the phone, apparently quite beside herself. There was also something about Mullett, which Frost couldn’t quite make out through the static. ‘You what? He’s not …? Well … what? Really. Flaming hell … OK.’
He let the handset drop to his lap, and turned in annoyance to Clarke. ‘The super wants an end-of-week briefing.’
‘I know, I heard.’
‘It’s not really on. I had my weekly quota of his horn-rimmed highness this morning. What’s the matter, love?’
Frost saw something was up. He could no longer ignore the petulant pout, hoping it would go away. ‘What’s on your mind? You look troubled.’
‘Pull over, Jack.’
He didn’t argue. He pulled off the road into a bus stop. Whatever this was, it wasn’t going to be good. Unless she was transferring to Rimmington; that might help them both …
‘What’s up?’ He looked into her eyes, and could see she was on the verge of tears. God, he thought, it can’t be anything I’ve done, surely? Burying the missus couldn’t have upset her, could it?
‘I’m pregnant,’ she blurted out.
‘FuckinghellIdon’tbelieveit!’ he mumbled, choking on a cloud of exhaled smoke.
‘I’m sorry?’
‘Well, that’s a surprise.’
He smiled faintly, but she didn’t respond. He felt his breast pocket for cigarettes before remembering he had one alight in the other hand. Blimey, he thought, she must be telling me this because … knickers, she can’t really mean … no, not a chance. He stared dead ahead through the windscreen, watching two schoolkids having a tiff by the bus stop – the girl gesturing indignantly, the boy coatless, shirt out, palms outstretched apologetically. Frost felt queasy and closed his eyes. When was the last time he’d slept with her? No, it couldn’t be his – Mary had always said she had more chance of being impregnated by next door’s cat, a neutered tom …
‘Mmm, that’s a surprise,’ he repeated, opening his eyes and turning to face her.
She looked down at her nails, which were bitten short. ‘Yes, it was a bit of a shock for me too, I can tell you.’
‘Are you sure?’ he couldn’t resist asking, though he cringed as the words slipped out.
She raised her head and gave him a withering look as if to say, Yes you berk, of course I’m bloody sure – but instead said, ‘Who’s ever sure of anything, eh, Jack?’
‘What you got?’ DS John Waters asked, seeing a disgruntled Derek Simms sitting smoking at his desk in the main CID office. It was just gone eleven. Waters was hoping to file his report then slink off home for a couple of hours’ kip.
‘A dead paperboy … and a couple of severed limbs.’ Simms smiled sardonically. ‘You?’
‘A big fat zero. Frost has me staking out a phone box on Brick Road on the Southern Housing Estate. Which nobody ever seems to use.’
Simms frowned. ‘Are you sure the box you’re watching isn’t out of order? There are two public call boxes on Brick Road, one at either end.’
‘You what? He just said Brick Road. I thought it was deserted because of the rain!’
‘When in fact it’s probably not even working and your man’s been using the other one all this time. Just a thought.’ Simms was laughing good-naturedly.
Waters slumped, deflated, at the opposite desk and snatched up a Post-it note from Frost; he squinted at the barely legible scrawl. Wheeler, it read, check Unsolved. Wearily he dragged himself over to the bank of filing cabinets in the centre of the office.
‘What about your body parts?’ he said, trying to summon an interest in Simms’s case, having just been told they may well have wasted the best part of two nights.
‘We found a hand and foot in a field, but that’s it.’
‘And the paperboy?’
Simms frowned, betraying his uncertainty. ‘Waiting on the lab report before I go wading in to add to the parents’ grief, telling them their lad could’ve been murdered rather than hit by a random car.’
‘Seriously, the boy could have been murdered? What’ve you got to suggest it’s anything other than a hit and run?’
‘Nothing concrete,’ Simms replied, ‘but I’ve got to check all the facts now that this clown in uniform has put the call in, you know how it is.’
‘What do you think, though?’ Waters felt his younger colleague had matured in recent months; he seemed far more measured and less likely to blow a gasket at the drop of a hat.
‘Maybe, who knows … but that git Watkins has given me the right hump.’ He lit another cigarette, waving the match out aggressively. ‘I mean, I don’t need telling what the rules are …’
‘Of course not,’ Waters agreed, flicking through the files in search of W. He opted to change the subject. ‘Cheer up, it’s the weekend soon. Doing anything?’
‘Seeing a band tonight with Sue.’
Waters fingered t
he file out. Jane Wheeler, RAPE, May 1979.
‘Oh yeah, who?’
‘A Wing of Plovers … some new-wave thing.’
‘Man, your musical taste is getting more dubious by the day. Have you seen that dude’s hair? Must cost a small fortune in hairspray.’
‘Sue’s choice, mate, nothing to do with me. Besides, who cares what they look like? Take Freddie, now he may look unusual, but there’s no doubting the talent.’
‘Yeah, yeah …’ Waters knew better than to criticize Queen’s frontman. ‘His talent has never been in question; but this lot have one-hit wonder written all over them.’
‘Never mind my superior musical taste, what you got there?’
‘Note from Jack to check out an unsolved rape case. Jane Wheeler, three years ago. Wants me to check for links with the teacher attacks. Nuisance phone calls maybe.’
‘I remember that case – I was in uniform. Been on the beat for all of six months. Not sure what happened, though; I was on … err … race relations training shortly after.’ He smiled cheekily.
Waters waved the slender file towards his colleague with raised eyebrows. ‘Looks thorough.’
‘Hmm. Your sarcasm is hurtful, Sarge. Such a wafer-thin file could mean one of two things: we either caught the bastard pronto … or …’
‘Or found absolutely sod all?’
‘Wouldn’t be the first time, and certainly won’t be the last.’
Friday (4)
‘Rain, mon dieu. Rain, rain, and more rain.’
Charles Pierrejean tutted, looking out on to Gentlemen’s Walk from the dry interior of Avalon Antiques.
‘Don’t worry about it, Charlie, mate.’ Brazier clapped his hands loudly, causing Charles to start. ‘You’ll get used to it. Besides, the rain encourages punters to come in out of the cold and wet, eh?’
Clueless buffoon, Charles thought. ‘I shall take your word for it,’ he replied gloomily.
A woman with a headscarf tied over her blonde hair stopped in front of the window to check her appearance; she wore a pair of enormous tinted spectacles and a beige raincoat. Then, stepping closer, she removed the glasses to clean the rain off, revealing a pair of young, glinting, greeny-brown eyes. She puckered her lips. Charles was bemused and then transfixed by what he considered rare beauty – sharp cheekbones and a tiny upturned nose with a dash of freckles across it, topped off by those mesmerizing eyes. Vraiment magnifique. He stared in wonder. Suddenly she caught sight of him beyond her reflection on the other side of the window and was gone. The vision of beauty was abruptly replaced by the bright attire and spiky garish hair of a pair of leering teenagers.
Charles continued the conversation where he’d left off. ‘Though I’m not sure I’d want certain “punters” to take shelter here. What is it with the youth of this country? It seems everyone under thirty is some androgynous drone in make-up. One cannot tell girls from boys and boys from girls, so … unsophisticated. And please, Julian, don’t call me Charlie. D’accord?’
‘Roger that, Charles …’
‘And don’t sit on that chair, it’s Queen Anne.’
‘What can you do with a chair if you can’t sit on it?’ He laughed.
‘People were smaller in the 1710s, more delicate – certainly not of your bulk. Some respect, if you please.’
‘People won’t buy them if—’
‘Enough,’ Charles said purposefully. Gaston would be here soon, and his friend’s nervous disposition would be sorely tested by this English chump. ‘People aren’t buying anything as it is – we’ll be lucky if we sell one porcelain thimble. Now, I’m busy. And though I appreciate your company, I have work to do … but I thank you for dropping by, and do thank Mr Palmer for the dinner invitation tomorrow; I have heard much about him and look forward to making his acquaintance enormously,’ he said politely, though he had a feeling the man might have been in the shop when it first opened.
‘And he has heard much about you and your delicate chairs,’ Julian said, winking playfully.
Charles Pierrejean smiled in spite of himself and opened the door to allow the car dealer out. The truth was he didn’t mind Brazier that much, as long as it was in small doses, and he certainly had his uses. He figured that business in general must be slack if the man had that much time to gas away. Upon shutting the door he flipped over the Closed for Lunch sign and hurried to the back office. Fortunately though, Charles was not entirely dependent on Denton punters to buy his antiques of somewhat dubious authenticity – he was cash rich.
Removing a key from the toby jug on the mantelpiece he used it to open his roll-top desk. Taking a letter opener, he inserted it under the far right edge of the green leather inlay, causing it to pop up. Beneath was a mahogany base. In the bottom right-hand corner was a faintly discernible plug, about the size of a halfpence piece, not something one would notice unless looking for it. Removing it with his fingernail, he revealed a tiny keyhole into which the ornate butt of the roll-top key slipped effortlessly. An identical lock was located at the top right. The chamber underneath was stuffed full of banknotes.
Pierrejean pulled out a wedge, replaced the top and took a bank paying-in book from one of the smaller drawers on the desk housing.
‘Well,’ he sighed. ‘If nothing is selling, we shall have to pretend.’
A sullen WPC stepped back from the door, allowing Detective Constable Clarke to pass through into the tiny second-floor flat. Marie Roberts sat uncomfortably on the edge of a velour sofa, as though the act of sitting itself brought a degree of pain. Roberts’s dress sense struck Clarke as awkward too; a blouse with a frilly collar that would look more appropriate on a woman twice her age, and a shapeless skirt neatly tucked underneath clamped legs.
Clarke had come solo. Frost had crime stats to attend to for Superintendent Mullett and had said that Clarke and a WPC would be more than enough – they didn’t want to fluster the poor woman. If truth be known, that suited her; she’d rather not have him around her just now. He’d barely shown a flicker of emotion on hearing the news of her pregnancy. Then, when she’d dropped him off at Eagle Lane, he’d just tapped her gently on the shoulder and said that the best approach with rape victims was to start gently with a woman’s touch. Patronizing git.
But in any case, here she now was with the pretty, strawberry-blonde teacher who, shockingly, had been raped a few hours ago at Denton Comp. Clarke took the only available seating in the cramped room, opposite the WPC and Marie Roberts, in what she quickly discovered was a rocking chair. Clarke met the victim’s eyes for the first time. She seemed calm considering the ordeal she’d been through – Clarke imagined that having been violated in such a manner she herself would be suicidal. Though she looked pained, Clarke knew Roberts had refused an examination by a doctor. This in itself was not unusual. She had, however, taken a couple of Valium.
‘Miss Roberts, I understand this must be painful for you, but please, if you can try and remember …’
‘I don’t think you have the first idea of how … how painful …’ Marie Roberts took a cigarette from a packet resting on arm of the sofa. ‘Miss …?’
‘Clarke.’
‘Miss Clarke, do you realize it happened on school premises?’ She gave a shudder. ‘In the lavatories.’ Clarke noticed a faint Scottish accent. The WPC placed a sympathetic hand on Marie’s knee.
‘Can you recall anything – anything that might help us catch your attacker?’
‘It all happened so quickly.’ She was shaking her head, on the verge of tears. ‘There I was … a quick visit before class …’
‘Before class? That would be, what? Before nine?’
‘No, no. The bell had rung, the children were in class … I was running late.’
‘I see.’ Clarke noted the reported duration of the attack was from just after nine to nine fifteen; she was surprised that such a brazen assault would have lasted as long as ten minutes, maybe more …
‘I know you have already stated that you can’t
give a detailed description of your attacker …’
‘That’s correct – he pinned me down before I knew what was happening … I … I was too shocked to take in what he looked like.’
‘But perhaps you can recall something small, that may seem irrelevant – the colour of his shoes, a type of wristwatch, perhaps?’
Marie Roberts sat pensively for a moment. Clarke was desperate to get to the bottom of this mystifying attack. What she found most alarming was its sheer audacity, in broad daylight and in a busy place. Someone must’ve noticed an unfamiliar adult on school premises, surely?
Roberts shook her head.
‘Miss Roberts, do you mind if I ask if you have a boyfriend?’
Roberts’s pale grey eyes registered surprise at the question.
‘No … I’m not seeing anyone.’
‘It may seem an odd question,’ Clarke admitted, ‘but I wondered if perhaps you recognized any scent your attacker might have been wearing? Hence why I asked if you had a boyfriend, and might be familiar with aftershave.’
Again she shook her head.
‘But was your attacker wearing aftershave, or was there any other smell you were aware of?’
‘I’m sorry … I don’t think so.’
She reached for a tissue from a box of Kleenex on the arm of the settee and dabbed at her eyes, which had started to brim with tears. She then got up. ‘’Scuse me a sec.’
‘Of course.’
She paused in the doorway. ‘Can I get you anything? Tea or coffee?’
‘I’m fine, thank you.’
Clarke was impressed by the woman’s ability to be so polite in such circumstances. A few tears aside, she seemed remarkably composed. On hearing the bathroom door close, Clarke got up to survey the room; the WPC remained seated in silence. There wasn’t much to go on; two cheap veneered bookcases and a small portable television with a hooped aerial. She took a step closer to one of the bookcases which held a graduation photo of Roberts with, presumably, her parents. It must’ve been taken recently as she looked exactly the same.