The Watcher

by Kate Medina

  At the press conference that morning, Marilyn had asked the assembled journalists and TV reporters to respect the Fullers’ relatives’ grief – he didn’t mention there were no relatives apart from Hugo’s stepmother Valerie Fuller, who was very far from grief-stricken – and keep reporting to a minimum, though he held out little hope that they would accede to his request. A brutal murder was gold dust when it came to circulation and viewing figures, though at least he had, so far, managed to keep a lid on the more specific and horrific details. The last thing he and his teams needed was hysteria overtaking this sleepy corner of West Sussex, or worse, another loon fancying himself as a copy-cat.

  And even Paws for Thought, the little local dog charity that had taken in the Fullers’ dog Lupo, had called asking for Surrey and Sussex Major Crimes to send a policeman to stand outside their front door and ward off journalists and ghoulish sightseers. Marilyn had passed that call on to Workman, having absolutely no interest in getting into a debate with a crazy dog lady about the effect too much stranger attention would have on an already deeply traumatized Siberian husky. The mind boggled.

  ‘Is this your first “knock”?’ Cara asked, looking across, but not quite meeting Jessie’s gaze.

  She nodded. ‘DI Simmons thought I’d benefit from a few hours’ experience at the sharp end, as he puts it.’

  ‘I’m not sure that trudging from house to house in small Sussex villages interviewing bored housewives and retirees qualifies as the sharp end. Detective Sergeant Workman and I already spent the morning telephoning every one of Hugo Fuller’s clients who might possibly have held a grudge against him and turned up nothing useful, and I was hoping for something more exciting this afternoon,’ Cara said, rolling his eyes.

  Jessie raised an eyebrow in exchange. ‘Keep an open mind. We may yet hit the jackpot, young Darren.’

  ‘I’ll try, aged Dr Flynn.’

  ‘Jessie,’ she countered. ‘Call me Jessie. Or aged Jessie, if you prefer.’

  Despite the gruelling barbarity, stress and sleeplessness of the past couple of days, she was enjoying these few hours spent with DC Darren Cara on the knock. Wandering from house to house in the mellow afternoon sun – the clouds had cleared mid-morning to reveal the first warm autumn day in weeks – it was easy to feel relaxed, as if they were canvassing opinion for a neighbourhood survey or collecting for a local charity. In his early twenties, Cara was a good six or seven years younger than she was, but she had already worked out, from the flitting, flirty eye contact that never stuck and the amusing quips he perennially slipped into their conversation, that he was keen on her. If it hadn’t been for Callan and the age gap, she would have been quite keen on him too. He was handsome, fit, more city worker than policeman with his well-cut grey suit and well-trimmed jet-black hair, square jaw and intense, dark brown eyes. He was hot, and he was sweet, though she knew he’d be horrified to hear her refer to him by the second of those two adjectives.

  ‘Ready?’ He flashed her another disarming smile as he raised his hand to knock on the sage-green front door of a neat, detached red-brick house, down a quiet, leafy lane on the north-western edge of the village of Stoughton. The back gardens of the houses on this, the north side of the street, were bordered by countryside, fields and woods, the same countryside and woods that segued, a couple of kilometres away, to the Fullers’ grounds and house. Marilyn was spreading his net wide, and DCI Janet Backastowe, fearsome head honcho of Surrey and Sussex Major Crimes, still smarting from the car crash that had been the ‘Two Little Girls’ investigation, had thrown him an embarrassment of resources.

  ‘Ready as I’ll ever be. Go for it, Darren.’

  A blonde-haired woman, mid-thirties, answered Cara’s knock.

  ‘Good morning.’ Her tone was a tentative question. She raised a sudsy yellow Marigold-gloved hand to swipe at her fringe, an unconscious tic that she snagged just before the glove made contact. Dropping her hand, she wiped the suds into her floral, Cath Kidston apron. She was very pretty, Jessie thought, in a wholesome way. She could imagine her modelling clothes for Boden. A little blond-haired boy, aged three or four, was hiding behind her legs, one hand clamped to her left kneecap. Jessie saw a flash of blue-and-white-striped sailor T-shirt, navy trousers and one bare foot. She could imagine him modelling clothes for Boden kids. The picture-perfect Boden family.

  ‘Good morning,’ Cara said.

  He’d dug out his warrant card before he’d raised his hand to knock, bitter experience reminding him that, despite the suit, the appearance of a well-built, multi-racial, twenty-something man, knocking on front doors on a weekday morning in rural Sussex, might arouse mistrust. It shouldn’t be that way, but too often it was, though Jessie had already worked out that he was too down-to-earth to let it bother him, that he enjoyed his job too much to care.

  ‘I’m Detective Constable Darren Cara from Surrey and Sussex Major Crimes, and this is my colleague, Dr Jessie Flynn.’

  The woman’s eyebrows rose into her choppy blonde fringe. ‘Doctor?’

  ‘I’m a psychologist,’ Jessie said. ‘Working with the police.’

  ‘Oh.’ She giggled. ‘I hope you haven’t come to analyse me. I’d hate to think what you’d find.’

  Not much, Jessie thought, immediately regretting the unnecessarily bitchy observation. She knew nothing about the woman beyond that she was a mother – Envy, twisting my bitter heart out of shape – and probably a housewife. She forced a smile, one that she hoped looked genuine.

  ‘Don’t worry, I’m only here to observe. I’ve just started working with the police and evidently going on the knock, as it’s called, is part of the baptism.’

  ‘Is it about that poor couple’s, uh—’ She broke off, glancing down at her son. ‘About that couple in the paper?’ She had very large, silvery-blue eyes that widened as she spoke. Jessie glanced at Cara and imagined that he might be thinking about diving into them.

  ‘Yes,’ Cara said.

  ‘Oh, you’d better come in then. I’m Denise Lewin and this is my little boy, Leo. Kick the door closed behind you. Leo and I were just doing some tidying up.’ She stepped backwards, walking as if through thick mud, her arms spread wide, a high-stepping comedy walk, dragging her son with her. ‘You’ll have to let go of my leg, bean, or we’ll both end up flat on our backs on the hall floor and embarrass ourselves in front of these nice police people.’ Bending at the waist, she unpeeled her son’s fingers from her leg. His hand immediately flew to grip the sudsy Marigold-glove. ‘Just give me a moment to switch the television on for Leo.’

  Jessie and Cara waited in the hallway while Denise settled her son on the sofa and found a cartoon for him to watch.

  ‘Would you like a cup of tea?’ she asked, leading them into a spotless and airy farmhouse-style kitchen, an oak table seating six set in front of glass double doors. The doors opened out onto the garden, framing a pale silver weeping willow, halfway between sapling and tree, which occupied a space in the centre of the lawn. Jessie’s gaze strayed from the willow to the broken-down garden fence and the trees beyond it clustered thick and dark, as far as the eye could see.

  ‘Grab a seat,’ Denise said.

  ‘Is your husband here?’ Cara asked

  ‘No, it’s just me and Leo, I’m afraid. Simon left this morning for a three-day business trip to Wiltshire, so we’re on our own until Thursday evening. I can speak for him though. We were at home together on Saturday night.’

  Unpeeling the Marigold glove from her hand, she dropped it next to the sink and flicked the kettle on.

  ‘It’s horrible, isn’t it?’ she said, as she set down a full teapot, a jug of milk and three cups, a couple of minutes later. ‘Really horrible. The local news didn’t say much, just that they’d been found dead in their house on Sunday morning. Do we need to be concerned?’

  ‘We don’t believe that the killer will strike again, but there’s no harm in being vigilant,’ Cara said. ‘Obviously lock doors and windows at night.’
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  At his words, an image of a blonde woman reaching to unlock the door to her dog rose in Jessie’s mind. The Fullers had locked their doors and windows and it hadn’t saved them. The killer – her killer, she needed to think of him as her killer, crawl deep into his mind, live with him in hers, if she was ever going to be able to understand him and be of any help to the investigation – was smarter than that. Locked doors wouldn’t stop him. Her gaze tracked around the kitchen, looking for a dog basket, dog bowls. There weren’t any. They were safe, here, from that trick at least.

  ‘I heard a helicopter buzzing around all day Sunday.’ Denise’s voice pulled her back. ‘Simon said it was just people being ferried to Goodwood, but I knew that something was wrong. I looked out of the window, saw the numbers under its belly.’ She patted her own trim stomach. ‘It was clearly a police helicopter and hopefully us taxpayers aren’t paying to ferry rich people to Goodwood horse races in police helicopters!’

  A look of concern pushed the fleeting smile from her face. Denise was an open book, Jessie thought, emotions and thoughts ticker-taping across her face almost as they would on the face of a child.

  ‘It was so low, hovering just above the treetops, and so close to our house at times, that I thought it would either get swallowed by the trees or burst in through our sitting room window. We watched Apocalypse Now a couple of weeks ago, as Simon is such a war nut, and it reminded me of that film, of the American army helicopters hovering low over the paddy fields, machine-gunning all those poor people.’

  Cara nodded. ‘Did you know the Fullers?’ he asked. ‘Had you ever met them?’

  ‘I saw them in the summer at a village fete. Walderton village, just up the road. But apart from that, the Fullers and us don’t … didn’t quite move in the same social circles.’ She pointed a finger at the ceiling. ‘They were up there somewhere and we’re just … normal, I suppose. Just normal, middle-class, if I can dare to use that term, people.’

  Cara smiled and nodded again.

  ‘But I think that my husband …’ she tailed off, another look of concern capturing her expression, silencing her voice.

  ‘What?’ Cara pressed.

  She shook her head and laughed. ‘No, nothing. Simon says that I talk too much. You’re always wittering on, he says.’

  Simon was right – Denise did like to talk. However, she was probably lonely, stuck in the house all day with a small child, Jessie reasoned. And though she sympathized, the slow pace and meandering chat were beginning to irritate her. She doubted that Cara had had much experience with bored housewives, and he was struggling to focus the conversation on what they were here to achieve. She had a ton to do, they both did, and she couldn’t imagine that Denise, lovely though she was, would add anything constructive to the picture they needed to build of this killer, of what had happened out there, in that isolated house across the woods, three nights ago. Laying her hands flat on the table, she cleared her throat.

  ‘Did you see or hear anything suspicious on Saturday evening, Mrs Lewin?’ she asked. ‘We estimate that the murder happened between ten p.m. and one a.m.’

  Denise tucked her top teeth over her bottom lip and, after a brief pause, shook her head.

  ‘Nothing?’ Jessie pressed.

  Another shake. But there was something about her expression …

  ‘I’m not a hundred per cent sure about my geography,’ Jessie continued. ‘But isn’t the Fullers’ house just on the other side of those woods?’

  ‘Well, not just,’ Denise replied. ‘It’s probably two or three kilometres away. Well, two maybe, so no, not just.’ There was an edge to her voice, an edge, Jessie sensed, that was driven by nerves, fear, even. Alone in the house all day with only a small child for company, a small child to protect. It could set the imagination running riot and Jessie had the impression that Denise’s defences against wild-running imaginations were minimal.

  ‘But the woods are the same as those that border the Fullers’ property?’ she pressed. They were here for a purpose, to gather crucial information; they couldn’t afford to be oversensitive to people’s feelings, even childlike Denise’s.

  Denise bit her lip again and nodded, her gaze slipping to the double doors, fixing on the woods beyond. ‘They own most of the woods evidently,’ she murmured. ‘But there are public footpaths cutting through them. There’s one that runs just the other side of our garden fence. It’s used by dog walkers mainly. The woods are thick and I don’t think many dog walkers can be bothered to fight their way through it, so they stick to the paths. And obviously there’s shooting in the autumn and winter, so there are notices up.’

  Jessie nodded. She sat back and withdrew her hands from the table, sending Cara a body language signal that she hoped he understood: that she knew this was his show and he was the lead player. He was as perceptive as she had expected him to be.

  ‘How about in the few days preceding the Fullers’ murder?’ he asked. ‘Did you see anyone suspicious hanging around, either out in the woods or in the neighbourhood?’

  Again, Denise shook her head.

  ‘A man you haven’t seen before? A car that you haven’t seen before? One that doesn’t belong to one of your neighbours? Any odd or unexpected activity?’

  ‘No. I’m sorry.’

  Jessie was watching her closely, her changes of expression. Something was troubling her – something more than imagined fears.

  ‘Mrs Lewin—’

  Her silvery-blue gaze moved to meet Jessie’s. Moved, but didn’t quite meet, focusing somewhere around Jessie’s left ear.

  ‘Is something bothering you, Mrs Lewin?’

  She smiled, a vague, distracted smile. ‘Can you see into my mind, Doctor?’

  ‘If I could see into people’s minds we wouldn’t be here asking you questions. We’d have the Fullers’ murderer in custody by now,’ Jessie replied flatly.

  Denise half-nodded. ‘Yes, of course—’

  ‘Mrs Lewin. I can tell that something is bothering you. Please tell us what it is.’

  Silence for a long moment and then, ‘It’s just that—’

  ‘Just that what?’ Jessie prompted.

  Her gaze found Jessie’s fully now. ‘I’m sorry, I’ve forgotten your name, Doctor.’

  ‘Flynn. Jessica Flynn. But please call me Jessie.’

  ‘I’m pretty sure that you’ll think I’m mad if I tell you.’

  Whatever Denise had going on in that head of hers wouldn’t even scratch the surface of some of the loonies – totally unprofessional term, but hey, she was only thinking it, not saying it – that Jessie had met in her years as a psychologist. Wouldn’t scratch the surface of her own tormented mind.

  ‘Really, I won’t think you’re mad. Please just feel free to tell us anything.’

  ‘OK, well, it’s just that last … last night, Leo woke up screaming. He said that he’d seen something in the garden. A ghostie, he kept saying.’ She smiled apologetically. ‘I questioned and questioned him, we both did actually, but he didn’t say any more than that. He’s only three so it can be hard getting sense out of him.’

  Cara leant forward, steepling his fingers. Encouraging body language – Jessie suppressed a smile.

  ‘Did you see anything in the garden?’ he asked.

  Denise shook her head. ‘His scream woke me up. I was half-asleep when I went into his bedroom. Simon … my husband, had left the curtains open and it was a bit breezy.’ She glanced over her shoulder to the double doors to the garden. ‘I never leave the curtains open as Leo has an active imagination, so I was cross when I saw them open, cross with Simon.’ She gestured over her shoulder, without turning. ‘There’s that weeping willow in the middle of the garden and it was moving in the wind. The moon was bright last night and it made the willow look almost luminous … luminously white. I’m sure that was what Leo saw.’

  Her perfect white incisors dug into her bottom lip again.

  ‘Did you see anything?’ Jessie asked. ‘Anything a
part from the willow?’

  She shook her head.

  ‘Are you sure? I really won’t think that you’re mad. Neither of us will. Anything, any tiny detail, can be really helpful.’

  Denise shook her head again, a vague, non-committal shake that turned into a half-nod. ‘Just, uh, just … there were some footprints,’ she murmured.

  ‘Footprints?’ Cara asked.

  ‘Yes. A man’s, Simon thought they were.’

  ‘Where?’

  ‘In front of the weeping willow. Simon went out in his pyjamas and dressing gown with a torch to search the garden to make Leo feel better, and then I saw him stop and have a good look at the ground in front of the willow. The grass is a bit sparse and often damp there as the tree shades it from the sun, and when he came back in he told me that he’d seen a couple of footprints.’ She glanced over her shoulder again, at the garden. ‘But it’s really nothing to be frightened about. The fence is broken, as you can see, and dogs do run in here. As Simon pointed out, I found dog poo on my dahlias last week and we don’t have a dog.’

  ‘So, your husband thought it was someone trying to catch their dog?’ Cara asked.

  ‘Yes.’

  At the mention of dogs, Jessie felt something in her chest tighten.

  ‘Can we see the footprints?’ she asked.

  Denise’s eyes widened in surprise. ‘Why do you want to see them?’

  ‘Purely because we’re here and we might as well,’ Jessie answered. ‘It’s nothing more than that.’ She eyeballed Cara across the table, willing him not to contradict her, alarm Denise.