by Amanda Fleet
‘It’s a project that works with the homeless children in Blantyre. They end up on the streets because either their family has died or can’t afford to look after them, and Samala works with the kids and any remaining family they have to help the kids get back to school. Often, just the fact that Samala can pay for their school uniforms and books is enough to allow their families to let them go to school rather than beg on the streets.’
‘And if there’s no family?’
‘There’s usually someone—there’s a big extended family system in Malawi so the kids might end up with grandparents or aunts or uncles or cousins. Samala just has to be sure that the child will be safe and looked after properly. Moyenda ensures that the kids are okay and works with the schools and the communities to support them.’
‘Who’s Moyenda?’
‘Moyenda Mkumba. He’s the project manager out there.’
‘You seem to know a lot about Samala.’
‘Patrick got very interested and did a lot of fundraising for it when we came back. I donated some of my photographs to the fundraising effort.’
LB drank some soup and crumbled bread into his bowl. ‘This is very good.’
‘Thank you.’
‘So, you went to Malawi with Patrick. What then?’
‘Well, it’s a long flight and Malawi is a very beautiful but very challenging place. Steals your heart and breaks it at the same time, you know?’
She looked up and LB nodded.
‘And we got talking and so on.’
The barriers were rising again. LB weighed his words. ‘And so on. Okay, that’s how you met. What was your relationship like? Other than short if this was last autumn and by February things were more strained, shall we say?’
‘It was good fun at the start. Patrick can be a laugh. He’s very easy-going, free-spirited.’
‘Too free-spirited?’
‘Not for me. Probably for others.’
LB raised his brows, requesting clarification.
‘He’s not big on monogamy. But as you appear to know already, that’s not why we broke up. There are other kinds of trust that can get broken.’ She sipped from her soup and LB waited for her to continue. There was a long pause before she did.
‘He stole from me.’
‘Go on.’
‘I went away for a few days. Up to the Highlands. Slept in a bothy. I was away for four days. When I came back, I went to get some money out of the bank and my card was refused. When I went in to see why, I found out I was completely broke. Apparently, I had drawn out three hundred pounds from an ATM in Edinburgh on each of the days I was in the bothy, taking me up to my overdraft limit. Various other payments were scheduled to have been made that weekend, but there were insufficient funds and so I was stung with massive charges.’
Her eyes were hard and her mouth pinched fine lines around her lips.
‘Where had your card been?’
‘In my bag in Patrick’s flat. There was no need to take it north. No ATMs where I was.’
‘Did you tell him your PIN?’
‘No. But then, I didn’t make a big palaver about shielding it from him while I used the machines when he was with me. He could have seen it.’
‘Did you ask him about it?’
‘We weren’t really speaking. And there was no evidence. My card was completely devoid of fingerprints. Even mine.’
‘Yeah. I’d be livid about that too. Did you ever get the money back?’
She shook her head. ‘You don’t get receipts from a bothy. Oh, it was all very tightly worked out. I couldn’t prove I didn’t draw the money out, nor could I prove that he did. And even if I could, he knew my PIN so I would have been liable anyway. Thank God there were some good pictures from the trip! The right kind of clouds, as Patrick would say.’ Her voice was light with sarcasm.
LB looked up, seeking more information.
Summer smiled. ‘Clear blue skies can be boring in a photograph. Small fluffy things aren’t very good either. You need big dramatic clouds that have light and dark in them so you have something to accentuate with filters and so on. I’ll show you some pictures later. Actually, just above your head is precisely what I’m talking about. Top right. Look at the clouds.’
LB peered at the pictures, staring at an image of sunlit hillside against ominous-looking clouds. ‘Ah, I see. I’ve never thought about it before. So you made the money back off pictures from the trip?’
‘Yes. But then I would have sold them anyway. I was still twelve hundred pounds out of pocket, and my credit record damaged.’
Her fluidity had gone. LB knew that politeness dictated he should change the subject but he still needed to ask something.
‘Are you still upset about you and Patrick?’
‘Not about us breaking up. I’m not really a keeper. I don’t want kids—I would probably fuck them up worse than my parents did me—and if I ever find Mr Right, then great. Until then, Mr Will-Do-For-Now suits me just fine. It was already nearly over between us, even before he wiped me out of money. But yes, I’m still fucking furious about the money.’ She jutted her chin.
‘Your parents can’t have done you too much harm. You’re a smart, artistically gifted woman who has a house, a business, respect and acclaim. What did they do so wrong? Apart from give you quite a stupid name.’
Summer shrugged, grinning suddenly. ‘Could have been worse. I found out later they were seriously considering calling me Caraway, because my mum likes seed cake.’
LB laughed loudly.
‘On the subject of names, what does LB stand for?’
‘Ah. Maybe later. Were you just making soup for dinner or is this other cutlery going to have a purpose?’
Summer leaned over and took his bowl, stacking it with hers on the tray.
‘Nice deflection, L, B.’ She marked out the initials deliberately, almost mockingly. ‘Shall I leave the bread?’
‘Mmm. Please.’
While she was away fetching the next course, LB leaned back in his chair, thinking. He still couldn’t piece this woman together. She was trying not to be her parents, who’d surely been the epitome of flower-power given her name and the scraps she’d revealed, yet she appeared to have an inherent aversion to a conventional way of life, so hadn’t fallen too far from the tree.
Her return broke his thoughts. She placed a dish of vegetables on the table and a plate bearing a fillet of fish in front of him.
‘Can I get you another drink?’
‘Same again? Thanks.’
She disappeared with his glass, returning a moment later with it replenished and with her bottle of wine.
Once they were settled again, LB asked, ‘So why you? Why, when something bad happens, does he call you? From what you’ve just said, I wouldn’t have thought you were his first choice. No offence.’
‘I don’t know. I really don’t know. That’s what doesn’t add up for me.’
LB lowered his eyes. To him, there was a lot more than this that still didn’t add up. He said nothing, concentrating on the meal.
‘I wondered if my number was just top of the list,’ she went on. ‘But phones tend to store them alphabetically and if I was listed as Summer, I would be way down. A name like Adam would be at the top, right?’
‘True. Perhaps you were on speed-dial?’
‘Still? Maybe. It’s as good a reason as any, I suppose.’ She sipped her wine, looking unconvinced. ‘So, that’s me and Patrick. Can we talk about you now?’
‘Me? What about me?’
‘Why are you a cop? Following your father? Or mother?’
‘No. Neither. I like to solve puzzles. I like the “whys” in life.’
She cocked her head, looking expectantly at him.
‘Why someone has done something is far more interesting, to me at least, than the when, how, or who. The when and the how are usually someone else’s job anyway. The “why” is the important thing.’
‘What did your parents do?’
‘That’s a very “why” question. Why are you what you are?’ He smiled. ‘My father was an architect. He’s retired now.’
‘And your mother?’
‘Was a mother. Is a mother. I guess you don’t retire from that.’
‘Do they live in Edinburgh? Your accent is pure posh East Coast, if you don’t mind me saying.’
He laughed. ‘I don’t mind you saying at all. It’s what I am. No. They live in France now. My father has arthritis that doesn’t appreciate Scottish dampness. My mother is French.’
‘Ah. The auld alliance.’
He sighed involuntarily. He’d heard the phrase a thousand times and was bone-weary of it. She glanced away, her regret at the quip writ large and he tried to scrub the hard edges off his expression when she looked back at him.
‘So. Half French. I wouldn’t have got that from your accent.’
‘You would if I spoke French.’
‘Presumably you would sound French and not be butchering such a beautiful language?’
He shrugged modestly. It was merely a reflection of his parentage. He could butcher most other languages, sounding either Scots or French in the delivery.
‘And you? Where do you hail from?’
‘Lincolnshire.’
‘But you live in Scotland now.’
‘Mm. Bugger all mountains in Lincolnshire. Too much sky. Makes for piss-awful photos.’
He laughed, a deep rumbly sound that came from the heart and wore no pretences. She smiled at it.
‘I read an article about you today, which talked about you having synaesthesia.’
‘Oh. The interview in The Guardian. What about it?’
‘I hadn’t realised you were famous.’
‘I’m not. I won some awards for my work. No one would recognise me on the street. Are you about to ask me about the synaesthesia?’
‘If you don’t mind.’
She shrugged. ‘Everyone always asks about it once they know. I wish I’d never revealed it. Go on. What do you want to know?’
‘The article said you felt emotions as colours. How does that work?’
‘It does what it says on the tin. My days are suffused with colours in my head that correspond to how I feel.’
LB was struggling to understand. ‘In the article you said it helped you to judge when a picture was just right. How? How do you know when you’ve really nailed a picture?’
‘It’s red—the feeling I have about the picture. Blood-coloured if it’s perfect. I don’t see the colour in my vision, but in my head. It’s almost impossible to describe.’
He wished he hadn’t asked. She seemed prickly talking about it and all her lightness had gone.
‘I suppose you want to know what colour I’m feeling now.’ She sounded resigned.
‘No. Unless you really want to tell me.’
She smiled softly. ‘Shall I get dessert? I assumed you were a pudding man.’
‘Based on what evidence?’
‘Your size. I guessed it takes a fair number of calories to maintain that frame.’
As soon as she’d cleared the plates and was out of the door, LB self-consciously ran a hand over his stomach. Was he getting fat? He didn’t think so. He sipped his drink, feeling uncomfortable. He was out of practice talking to women socially. Perhaps he would feel more in control once they got back to discussing Patrick and his disappearance.
Was he getting fat?
Summer returned and put a bowl in front of LB and a jug of cream in the centre of the table. Her bowl had a smaller helping of the dessert—a dark chocolate torte—and she drizzled some cream over it. She offered the jug to LB but he eschewed it. She looked amused.
‘I meant you were big-framed. You’re not overweight. The torte needs cream because the chocolate is extremely bitter.’
He hesitated, then added cream to his dish. ‘Who says I’m concerned about my weight?’
‘Your face did when I said you were a big man.’
They locked gazes. LB broke first.
‘What are you thinking?’
She smiled, but it didn’t reach her eyes. ‘I’m wondering how well I’m being rated. Am I still wrong? All wrong?’
‘Oh.’ He dug his spoon into the torte and watched the cream fill the space, letting her question still lie.
‘Ben?’
He glanced up, startled by her use of the name. He breathed deeply. Judging by how she had reacted so far, he was likely to offend her, however he phrased things.
‘Okay. Please don’t get upset. If I was judging you as a fresh-faced detective on their first case, I would tell you that I think your assumptions are narrow. That you don’t consider widely enough. That you jump to the obvious.’ He shook his head as she blinked angrily. ‘Don’t get upset! Why should you suddenly think like a detective? I don’t think like a photographer.’
She looked mollified. Just.
‘I honestly don’t mean to offend you,’ he said softly. ‘I was merely answering your question. And trying to challenge you to widen your perspectives. You’re too intelligent to think so narrowly.’ He held his hands up rapidly. ‘And take that as the compliment it is!’
‘Have you always been like this or did it develop when you became a cop?’
‘Maybe I was always like this and it became accentuated by being a cop.’
‘Okay! I get your point.’
She stood up abruptly and cleared the table, piling things on to the tray and then kicking the door open and leaving without looking at him.
‘Go back through. It’s comfier,’ she called over her shoulder. ‘I’ll be with you in a moment.’
LB waited until he could hear the clink of crockery in the kitchen, picked up his glass and returned to the lounge. He looked at the titles of the million paperbacks that filled the walls while he waited.
He was still scrutinising her books when she returned.
‘Eclectic taste.’
‘Thanks,’ she said without warmth.
She took up residence in the chair again, coiling long legs up beneath her. She settled her notes on her lap and waited for him to sit down.
LB picked up his notebook. ‘We’d got to you going to the MSA and talking to Ed. What next?’
She worked her way through the rest of that day, taking her time. LB made copious notes, occasionally stopping her to seek clarification. Finally, he asked to hear the recording from Patrick’s answerphone. Summer handed over the small recorder and he played it, listening carefully and replaying it several times.
‘The machine doesn’t have a date stamp?’
‘No. Just the day.’
‘And Patrick often screened calls when you were together, and may well still do that, so the day needn’t be this week or last?’
‘Correct.’
‘Caller ID log on the phone?’
‘Only the last number that called. Which of course would be me. Probably something else that makes me wrong.’
He glanced up, his mouth twitching. ‘Probably. So, you think that the first message and the last are from Kate Hampton?’ He played them again, his eyes closed, and then frowned. ‘Maybe. I wouldn’t have immediately picked her out as the caller but I can’t say I know her well enough to be sure one way or the other. They do sound like the same woman and I agree with you that the first male voice sounds like a loan shark or at least someone he owes money to. He’s quite menacing.’ He played through the tape again, stopping after the second message. ‘And no idea who this is?’
Summer shook her head.
‘The appointment could have been today, or last month, or maybe next month, though if it were next month it would probably have said May in there,’ he thought out loud. ‘How long did Patrick keep messages when you were with him? Could this go back beyond last month?’
‘I doubt it. If the appointment had passed, he’d probably delete it. My guess is that it would have referred to today on that basis.’
‘Okay.’ He clicked
the play button. ‘Someone demanding money, so maybe a shark, maybe one of the grand schemes. Maybe nothing of the sort, just someone he owes money to from the pub. No real indication of which Monday the call was, other than it was after the last message, which didn’t have a month stated.’
LB scribbled down possible dates for the appointment, drawing up a grid of them and cross-referencing them to the potential dates of the threatening message. He moved on to the next message.
‘There’s absolutely nothing to say that this is Paul Hampton. It fits your theory about Patrick, but that’s the wrong way around. The evidence should lead to a theory. You had a theory and now you’re saying the evidence supports it. This could be anyone.’
He finished the rest of the tape. ‘Three angry messages. Higher than your average I would say… it’s two days since he called you. Time for your theories. Where do you think he is?’
‘I don’t know. He must be mixed up in something. Money would be my first choice. Child trafficking in Malawi would be my second choice.’
LB flicked through his notes to find the relevant bits of information.
‘Why that order? Is it an either/or? You think he might be blackmailing Kate Hampton, so obviously you think that’s something he would do. Could he be blackmailing someone at work? Could someone in the MSA be involved with a child-trafficking ring?’
‘Fair point. Patrick was a journalist at the start of his career. Fancied himself as an investigative journalist, I think. Moyenda thinks Patrick has disappeared because of things he was digging up in Malawi. That seems a bit far away though. Unless there is someone involved here at the MSA who knew what he was looking at.’
LB took the sheet with the mind-map from her and scanned it, flicking between it and his notes, deep in thought. Finally, he looked at her.
‘It’s two days,’ he said carefully, knowing she’d catch his drift.
She nodded, biting her lips together. ‘I know. Even I had considered widely enough to think he might be dead.’ She closed her eyes.
‘Hey.’ He reached over to take her hand. ‘Hey. I didn’t mean to upset you.’
She pulled away and laughed hollowly. ‘If you’d asked me on Monday what I felt about Patrick, I’d have said he was an untrustworthy piece of shit. But now? Now I feel gutted that I was the person he chose to call for help and I’ve not only been useless but according to you, I’ve possibly screwed it all up too.’