by Anna Legat
‘That’s why I called you here, Gillian. You don’t know yet but I just got a call from the hospital. Giacomo Vitoli died in the early hours of this morning from complications – septicaemia, I’m told. That means, of course, that CPS will have to amend the charges against Ryan Parks and Megan Vitoli.’
‘You want to go for murder? What if there was an element of medical misadventure in his death?’
‘I’ll let the CPS worry about details. For me it’s a clear case for murder, plus four counts of unlawful and dangerous act manslaughter. See to that, will you?’
*
The office is quiet – the usual calm after the storm. Webber is wiping the whiteboard. He has taken down the photographs thus dispelling the ghosts of the victims of the Poulston head-on. As soon as he is done, he will go home to his wife and children. Perhaps he won’t see much of his wife and children – he has sergeant's exams next week and the last two weeks he was flat out chasing shadows on Gillian’s say-so. He looks tired too, gaunt and grey, even though his shirt is immaculately ironed and his tie is holding his neck in a tight, professional grip. It is admirable that Webber never lets his guard down. One day he will replace Scarfe; possibly go higher than him.
‘Done and dusted,’ he says when he sees Gillian.
‘I’m not sure, Mark. I’ve my doubts.’
‘You always have doubts.’
‘And I’m usually right.’
Webber laughs.
Gillian sits on his desk, puts her feet on his chair. ‘Why did Margaret Adams collide with the offside of the petrol lorry? She was a very careful driver. But let’s assume she threw caution in the wind and started overtaking the lorry down that hill, why did she not brake and duck back behind it when she saw Giacomo’s van? Why did she just slam into the side of that damned lorry?’
‘Maybe she didn’t have enough time to brake? The woman was seventy, her reflexes were slow... Maybe she had a death wish?’
‘Then she would’ve driven into the rear of the lorry, or head-on into the oncoming traffic, wouldn’t she? But she didn’t, she just swerved suddenly into the offside. Why? Wouldn’t you want to know why?’
‘She changed her mind – that’s what I think. And I’m bloody exhausted and I can’t even afford to go straight to bed. I’ve so much to read up on!’
Gillian, as is her callous habit, ignores Webber’s grievance. She says, ‘Okay, let’s assume she changed her mind – what made her change her mind?’
‘I don’t know. And we can’t ask her so maybe we should just let it rest. We’ve got Parks in custody. The evidence is overwhelming, Megan Vitoli’s corroborated everything: they planned it together, he went and did the brakes and it all rolled on from there. And I’m rolling off home!’
‘The sabotaged brakes do not explain Margaret’s behaviour, or Emma Rydal’s behaviour for that matter. Why did Emma charge at the bloody petrol tanker? How come she didn’t see it coming? Was she not looking? What was she doing?’
‘No one knows and no one will be able to tell you. Giacomo Vitoli is dead and he didn’t even see her – he saw a man!’
‘Exactly! Who was that man? Was he there in that car with Emma Rydal? Did he distract her, or worse? I have a feeling, Mark, that something is missing – someone is missing! There was someone else involved in that collision and we’ve missed him.’
Webber shrugs his shoulders. He puts the lid on the archive box where he has deposited the last few photos. ‘There was no one else. Giacomo Vitoli was confused, heavily drugged. He didn’t know what he was saying. Remember how unbalanced he was, especially after you told him about his wife. If you want my opinion, he was trying to draw our attention away from her, from any woman. He got confused between Emma Rydal and his wife. He thought he was protecting her, sending us on a wild goose chase after an imaginary man. There was no man.’ Webber collects his blazer from the back of his chair. ‘I have to be going home. I told Kate I’d be home for dinner.’
‘You tell me he was confused and drugged, and in the same breath you tell me he managed to come up with this ingenious plan to incriminate an imaginary man? It doesn’t make sense.’
‘It doesn’t make sense that there was a man! What would’ve happened to him? Would he have evaporated after the pile up? Walked away? Could anyone have walked away from that!’ Webber’s frustration reaches shouting point. He is definitely knackered. Gillian should stop tormenting him and let him go home, but she can’t help herself. The scent is there – she has to follow it.
‘If you look at it calmly,’ she begins, her lips puckered into her trademark beak, a tone of admonition in her voice, ‘without letting your emotions fly off the handle, DC Webber, you will find at least two other men at the scene: Robert Cane, the man who reported the incident –’
‘He came into it later, from the other side of the hill,’ Webber growls, although his voice is low and controlled. ‘He can’t have been there in the midst of it all – he would’ve died like the rest of them.’
‘But maybe he saw more than he told us. It’d be good if you could talk to him again – refresh his memory.’
‘Not tonight. I am off. Officially, I’ve been off all day today. And I really don’t think that guy would’ve seen anything. He arrived after the fact.’
‘Trevor Larkin didn’t. He might’ve seen more than he lets on.’
‘He has no memory of it.’
‘Memories can be jogged.’
Webber lifts his hands in a gesture of surrender. ‘Not me! I’m not jogging anyone’s memories, Gillian. This case is closed. We were told yesterday.’
Gillian can’t hear him. She is on a blood trail. Her brain is still lagging behind her, but her instincts are beginning to see through the mist. The truth is trapped somewhere between Trevor Larkin and Ben Rydal – the two men who know each other. They both know more than they have told her. They may be deliberately withholding the truth, or they just don’t realise what they know. ‘Find me Trevor Larkin, Mark. This is the last thing I’ll ask of you in this case.’
‘This case is closed – Super’s orders.’
‘Since when did Scarfe’s orders stand between us and a case?’ Gillian jumps off Webber’s desk. She will get on her knees if that’s what it takes. ‘One last thing, Mark, OK? Just find him. He’s not telling me something. I must know what he’s holding back from us.’
‘I’m going home, Gillian. The case is closed.’ Webber picks up the archive box and carries it down the corridor to the Records Office.
*
Jon is only a phone call away. He is Gillian’s last resort. As she slumps at Webber’s desk and dials Jon’s number, she promises herself she will take his word for it. If he tells her she can’t possibly be right, she’ll let it go.
‘Mark! What brings you to my humble –’ Jon starts, but doesn’t have the time to finish the sentence.
‘Jon, I need you!’ Gillian doesn’t believe in preambles. ‘It’s the Poulston head-on.’
‘Gillian! Wow, what can I say? You can have me anytime, anyplace.’ She can picture Riley’s Chinese mandarin’s face crumple in a lecherous grin. ‘Your place or mine?’
‘Give it up, Jon! I don’t need you – I need your opinion. Does that sound better?’
‘Not to my ears.’ There is an unmistakable scowl in Riley’s reply.
‘Poulston head-on –’
‘I thought that case was closed. I thought we had the two culprits in custody. I even felt sorry for the two lovebirds. A bit of a Bonnie and Clyde story, no?’
‘No! I mean, yes! The case is closed according to the Gospel of Scarfe, but I have grievous doubts –’
‘As you do.’
‘I need your help – your opinion.’
‘I’m flattered. Shoot!’
‘Before he died, Giacomo Vitoli told us he saw a man overtaking his van. He was pretty positive about it. Are you a hundred-percent positive that Emma Rydal was behind the wheel of that car –’
‘Unle
ss they switched the bodies in the mortuary or she had a post-mortem sex change, I’d say it was Emma Rydal. If she was the driver of the red Audi, if she was the one prised out of it immediately after the pile-up and there was no other body found in that car, then I’d say Giacomo Vitoli couldn’t have been right. The facts are straightforward: at the very moment of the collision Vitoli was being overtaken by a red Audi cabriolet driven by Emma Rydal. There’s no doubt as to her identity. McKane told me of no other bodies found in the Audi.’
‘Who’s McKane?’
‘The bloke from the Collision Investigation Unit. He was in charge of body recovery and reconstruction, and all that. Surely he would’ve told me there was a male body in that car!’
‘And there were no other cars involved?’
Riley begins to sound concerned. ‘Gillian, you were there, what, within half an hour of the collision. Did you see any other cars?’
Gillian pauses for thought. She trims with her teeth the already well-chewed nails of her left hand. She is thinking, visualising the scene, trailing down memory lane. She can see nothing. She bites into her thumb’s cuticle, and winces. ‘So there is no chance of a man driving or being a passenger in Emma Rydal’s car?’
‘And what would’ve happened to him?’
‘That’s the question Webber has put to me.’
‘You want to hear the answer from me, don’t you? So here it goes: there was no man in that car, only a woman – Emma Rydal.’
*
Defeated, Gillian takes herself home. She has the whole evening to fill, not the most exciting proposition especially when she has no case to dig into. At least she has done some basic shopping: cat food and human food. Fritz can smell juicy bits through the tin. Before she has a chance to unpack her bags, he begins his ritual of yodelling and swiping his feline body around her ankles. She feeds him first – it goes without saying that he is the priority in this household.
As promised, she is not thinking about the case. No inventorising of facts to be done, which is to be expected since she is not in possession of all the facts. It’s a case full of holes and assumptions, and it rests squarely on the fallibility of human psyche: drunkenness, hopelessness, suicidal intent; lots of maybes and several perhaps-yes-perhaps-nots. She has made a promise to herself to let it go.
She puts on the TV and returns to the kitchen to make sandwiches. It’s a shame she forgot butter, so she simply slaps a couple of paper-thin slices of ham between bread and, on second thoughts, adds the healthy accent of a lettuce leaf. The kettle clicks – she now has a kettle that switches itself off when it’s boiled. The one that used to whistle had kicked the bucket and boiled itself to a crisp while Gillian was dozing off in the lounge, oblivious to the goings-on.
She makes a cup of tea and takes that, plus her sandwiches, to the lounge. The Six O’Clock News is halfway through. The anchor talks about a mother, a grieving mother. Photographs of a snow-white blonde, young woman appear – she is smiling for the camera. That’s the daughter. Her mother has greying hair in an untidy bob. She is looking straight into the lens of the camera when she speaks of her loss. Gillian doesn’t know what loss and how it came about. She doesn’t normally watch the news. She is too busy with her job to follow the world’s affairs. But these are not affairs of the world – these affairs are too close to home for comfort. The mother’s words hit home with Gillian, and she puts away her half-eaten sandwich, and listens. ‘Even a couple of those diet pills are potentially deadly. They contain an industrial chemical, DNP, which is not suitable for human consumption. My daughter got them without prescription, over the net. She stood no chance...’
Gillian breaks out in a cold sweat. Is she meant to be listening to this? Is this a warning from some higher – divine – authority? Is she meant to act on it? She is trying hard to focus, listening for the brand of the pills, the name of the chemicals. She picks up the remote and rewinds. Plays the whole interview over again. The names on the boxes and bottles from Tara’s drawer that she threw into the rubbish bin fade before her eyes. She cannot remember them. She can see the colours and the images, but not the names. What if –
She calls Tara. There is little hope of Tara answering the call. She has not returned any of her mother’s phone calls since her huffed departure a month ago. She is still sulking. It will take a long time before she is persuaded to speak to Gillian again. She is stubborn, like her father. Gillian is faced with an automated message. She shouts into the phone in the vain hope that the louder she screams the greater the chance of her daughter hearing her out, ‘Tara, pick up the phone! Talk to me! I want to make sure you’re all right! This isn’t the time for moods, for pity’s sake! Pick up the phone! Did you see the news? Did you? I want you to put on the TV – listen to the news! Did you know about that girl? Did you? Answer me! It could be you! Do you hear me? Pick up the –’
Her ravings are cut short by the automated secretary. Her time is up.
She drops her phone in her lap, and waits. She is waiting for Tara to call her back. She needs reassurance; she needs promises; she needs to hear her child’s voice. She is counting seconds. How long was her message? A minute? She will give Tara a minute to listen to it, then she’ll expect her telephone to ring.
But it doesn’t ring. Not within the minute. Not within five minutes. Gillian calls Tara again – answer phone; she hangs up. She repeats the process several times.
*
Their front door isn’t locked. It’s never locked. Gillian storms in, the stained glass of the door vibrates in the frame as she flings it open and it bashes against the wall. She finds them in the dining room, sitting on opposite ends of the table, facing each other. Mother has just poured soup into the bowls – they are steaming. Fresh, green leaves of basil haven’t had time to soak up the liquid and sit perkily on its surface.
‘Gillian! What are you doing here?’ Mother gazes at her in surprise, her hand holding a spoon is suspended in mid-air over the bowl of soup.
Gillian stares at her, equally surprised, short of breath. Does she really need to explain what she is doing here? Don’t they know? They must know. Only they don’t realise how bad things have got with Tara. They live in the blissful oblivion of their old age. Funny how old people hide behind their age. They choose not to know anything that may upset them.
Father, ever the pragmatic, asks, ‘Do we have any of that soup left? Are you hungry, Gillian? Come, join us. We just sat down to dinner.’
‘There’s plenty left. I’ve made enough to last us a few days,’ her mother tells him. Then she addresses Gillian, ‘It’s mushroom soup. You like mushroom soup.’ She gets up to fetch another bowl from the sideboard. She is a tiny person, even tinier than Gillian can remember, and for a split second Gillian has the impression that her mother had shrunk since she saw her, only last month. Mother smiles at her, must be very pleased to see her. Her smile lifts her face and smooths out her wrinkles.
‘Mum,’ Gillian battles with her breath. ‘I... I’m not hungry.’
‘You’ll have a drop of soup, surely.’
Gillian needs to sit down. Her mother fills the bowl with soup and drops a basil leaf into it.
‘Bread?’ her father pushes a bread basket towards her. He is also smiling, though his smile is a bit puzzled and inquiring. Still, he doesn’t ask any other questions and lets Gillian gather her wits in her own time. He is joined by his wife as both of them gaze at their daughter, wondering what brings her here and what the matter is.
She calms down. It can’t be as bad as she has imagined it. Tara simply refuses to pick up the phone, but she will speak to her grandparents.
‘I came to ask you to call Tara. She won’t speak to me,’ Gillian says.
‘Can it wait until after the dinner?’ Father wants to know.
‘No, Dad. I really must talk to her. Did you see the news?’
‘We always do, you know that. We’ve just finished watching. What’s this all about?’
‘Mum,
please call her.’
Without further ado, her mother gets up and goes to the hallway where the phone is kept. She brings it with her to the dining room. Tara’s number must be on a speed dial for mother presses only a single key and within seconds Tara answers.
‘Oh, hello darling! Gran here. Oh yes, we’re both fine. Are you all right? Oh good... Listen Tara, your mum wants to have a word. I’ll pass her to you.’ She gives the handset to Gillian.
Frantic, Gillian grabs the phone. ‘Did you get my message? Did you watch the news about that girl? She died from those cursed slimming pills. For God’s sake, Tara, promise me you aren’t taking any of –’
The phone goes dead on her. The pulse of the engaged signal sends Gillian into a torrent of tears.
*
After she told them about the girl on the news and the arsenal of slimming pills in Tara’s drawer, they had made her finish the soup and join them for egg and chips. ‘You won’t make any difference if you starve yourself, too,’ her father told her.
They ate in silence. Then they sat over empty plates, to talk.
‘I may’ve overreacted,’ Gillian admits at last, ‘but what would you have done differently? She’s out of control. Skinny as a rake. I don’t know what she’s up to. She won’t take my calls. Won’t speak to me. I imagine the worst.’
‘She’ll be OK. Have some faith in her,’ Mother assures her.
Gillian shakes her head. ‘I can’t, you see? I can’t! How can I trust her? I don’t even recognise her. She isn’t herself. She isn’t acting like the old Tara. I don’t know what to make of her.’
‘There’s been lots of changes in her life: moving to a big city, university, new people in her life...’
‘I’m worried about those new people. Who are they?’
‘You may never know. You need to get used to it.’
‘I can’t.’
‘We had to,’ Father says, and there is hardness to his voice. Gillian can’t remember the last time she has heard it.