A Deadly Thaw (14 page)

Philip Staley’s mother lived in a dingy terrace in Macclesfield. Because of thick fog, it had taken Connie over an hour to drive over the hill known to locals as the ‘Cat and Fiddle’ because of the pub perched on top of the moor. It was a dangerous stretch of road at the best of times, but the thick fog had slowed her car to a crawl. Her drive wasn’t helped by the idiots trying to overtake her. It was with relief that she finally made her way down the hill into the town centre.

Janice Staley was around eighty, with sharp eyes in a wrinkled brown face. The house smelt of fried food and stale smoke. ‘I’ve got the chip pan on. Eric’s due home at five. He likes his tea straight away as he’s hungry by then.’

‘Eric is . . .’

‘My son. My other son. He works in the plastics factory up on the industrial estate. He likes it. Regular income and so on. On the phone you were asking about Philip.’

Her face had an impenetrable look that had Connie’s instincts on high alert. She would need to ask the right questions. By the look of things, here was a mother ready to protect her son. ‘His name’s come up in an investigation and we just wanted to ask him some questions.’

‘What kind of investigation?’ Janice demanded.

‘A woman’s body has been found. Suicide,’ Connie hastily added. ‘But we think she might have been friendly with your son.’ This was stretching the truth somewhat given that Philip Staley was supposed to have ruined Stephanie’s life.

‘When did she die?’

‘Last week.’

The woman’s face relaxed slightly. ‘Then it’s nothing to do with Philip. He emigrated to Australia.’

‘Emigrated?’

‘That’s right. He was talking about it for a while. Wanted permanent sunshine. He used to spend too long on the sunbeds, he liked having a nice tan.’

‘Do you have a picture of him, Mrs Staley?’

The woman frowned. ‘Of course I have a picture of him. He’s my son.’

Connie bit back the retort on her lips. ‘Do you have anything recent? Perhaps a photo?’

She had hit a nerve. Janice’s mouth settled into a thin line. ‘I’ve not had sight nor sound from him since he emigrated, the ungrateful little beggar.’

‘Ungrateful?’

‘I lent him five hundred quid for the ticket. Put the money straight into his bank account. He called me up. Could I lend him the money for the airfare. Five hundred pounds. I’m not rich. It was everything I had.’

‘He never said why he was leaving?’ The blood was beginning to stir in Connie.

‘The last I heard from him was when he called to say he’d received the money and he’d ring again when he got there. Ungrateful little sod. I never heard from him after that. He’ll call again some day. Probably when he wants more cash.’

‘Is that normal? I mean, not to hear from him for long periods of time?’

‘Normal? What’s normal for kids these days? The problem with Philip was that he could never settle at anything. Tried all sorts of jobs but he’d leave after six months. Get bored and then he was off. He went all over the place. Nottingham, Swansea, London.’

‘So when was it exactly that Philip emigrated?’
Could this be the breakthrough that we need?
thought Connie.

‘Quite a few years ago.’

This time Connie couldn’t hide the sigh. ‘When you say “quite a few years”, how many exactly do you mean?’

‘I can’t remember.’ The woman folded her arms.

Time for a change of tack
, thought Connie. She leaned forward. ‘Mrs Staley. We’re worried about the welfare of your son. I’m extremely concerned about the fact that you’ve not heard from him for a few years. Could you tell me exactly when you last heard from him?’

‘August 2004,’ said Janice promptly.

Connie exhaled a long breath.
Well, bloody hell
, she thought.
Bloody, bloody hell.

‘Why are we here?’ Kat was standing in a field in the middle of nowhere. Well, that wasn’t completely true. They were about ten minutes from the old Macclesfield road. Ten minutes on foot, that was. After depositing Charlie and her suitcase at his house, Mark had taken her out in the car up onto the Moor. When he had parked up at a lay-by, for a heart-stopping moment, Kat had felt fear. Perhaps her instincts about her client, or, rather, former client, had been wrong.

Then Mark had turned to her and said, ‘I want to show you something.’ And so they had tramped along no known path to this spot. All Kat had to distinguish the ground from the rest of the bleak landscape was the linear indentations that criss-crossed underneath her feet. ‘Where are we? What are we doing here?’

He was looking around him. ‘A mate told me about here. He’s ex-forces too. Obsessed with the First World War. He knows all about this area. Hale’s End too.’

Kat groaned. ‘Don’t mention Hale’s End to me.’

He turned to her. ‘Why not mention it? It’s where your brother-in-law was found killed.’

‘But that’s nothing to do with me, is it?’

‘But why Hale’s End?’

‘I don’t know. Why have you brought me out here to ask me all this?’

‘Because here’s somewhere neutral for us. Not my house or yours. And not the consulting room. A neutral place, but relevant. Where do you think we’re standing?’

‘In the middle of the moors.’

He moved towards her and put his arm around her shoulder. ‘Right. But look at your feet. What do you see?’

She peered down. ‘There are a load of indentations in the ground. Like lines.’

‘Very good. It’s where something has been infilled. Look at the shape of the lines? What do they look like? Connected to the war. The First World War?’

Kat stepped away to get a wider view of the ground. Suddenly the fog in her mind cleared. ‘They look like trenches.’

He beamed at her. ‘Excellent. That’s exactly what they are. Former trenches.’

‘You’re kidding. Why are there trenches in Derbyshire?’

‘We’re not sure. Experts think that they were maybe used for training exercises. The Coal Board found them in the eighties when they were surveying the land.’

Kat crouched down and touched one of the indented lines with her hands. ‘We’re a long way from the fields of France here.’

‘Geographically, yes. But men who were going off to fight, going off to be killed, they did some kind of training here. Even if it was just to learn how to dig a trench.’

‘What’s this got to do with me?’

Mark’s eyes were on her. ‘Think, Kat. I know this is difficult for you, but part of the solution must be something you know. You know your sister better than anyone else, I’m sure. What’s the connection to the First World War?’

She looked at him in frustration. ‘I swear to you, I have no idea. No one in my family served in that war, as far as I’m aware. Perhaps Hale’s End was just a convenient place to put a body.’

‘And what about the Luger? That’s a German gun and it’s old. I reckon easily the same period.’

Kat took a deep breath. ‘The only thing I know about that war is what I learnt at school. You know, the poetry and so on. Lena and I weren’t into that stuff. It was Dracula and
Top of the Pops
for us.’

Mark drew her to him and put both arms around her. ‘Fair enough but I still think the answer lies somewhere in the past.’

Mark dropped her off in Bampton in time for her next client. He seemed reluctant to go to her practice, so she hopped out at the lights and walked the rest of the way. When she put her key into the door she noticed that it was stiff from the recent rain and gave it a kick with her foot to prise it open.

The place smelt damp. The whole of Bampton was clearly going through a fetid phase. She hung her umbrella on a hook and shut the door behind her. When she glanced at the floor, she saw with a jolt the package lying on the inside.

‘I don’t believe this.’ She said it out loud to the empty space. She kicked it gingerly to one side and hurried over to Terri’s shop.

Terri was inside, reading a book. ‘Have you seen someone go through my door this morning?’

Terri looked confused. ‘I haven’t seen anyone at all. Is there a problem? Have you had something stolen?’

‘Not stolen. It looks like someone dropped something off inside the door. It’s just that I’ve not given my key to anyone.’

‘Sorry. I saw nothing.’

Kat made her way back to her rooms. Lena had a key. It was natural to give her sister a key when she came out of prison but she was sure that Lena had put it with the others on the hook in the kitchen. Had she used it to get in? Kat bent down and picked up the package.
Now what do I have to face
?

The package was wrapped in the same way as the gun. While the shirt had been loose in the plastic bag, the one she held in her hand was a thick parcel wrapped up in newspaper. Resisting the temptation to tear at it with her fingers, this time she went to the kitchen to examine it before cutting into it. The newspaper was from the
Observer
– a Sunday paper and Lena’s preferred reading choice. Kat squinted at the date. Last week’s edition. After Lena had gone missing. This time she got her scissors and cut carefully along the tape.

The object had been wrapped carefully in some kind of thick plastic. Kat carried on cutting. Inside, something glinted. She took it carefully from its casing. It was a gold chain with a small pendant. She laid it out on her palm and saw that it was a dolphin. She took it over to the table where she could examine it in a better light. This time the item was familiar. It had been their mother’s.

She remembered the story. When her mother had been training at Guy’s Hospital in London in the sixties, she had been a regular visitor to Portobello market. She had spoken sentimentally of those days, before she had met their father and before the daily toll of having their own GP practice had taken the spring from her step. This necklace had been something that she’d cherished. A sign of freedom, the mammal’s back arched as it frolicked through water. It wasn’t valuable. She’d let the girls play with it, even when they were seven or eight.

But Kat couldn’t remember the last time she had seen the necklace, let alone worn it. She weighed the charm in her hand and thought. The gun had no resonance for her. Her rational mind told her that it was connected to the shooting of Andrew and therefore linked to Lena’s involvement in the 2004 killing. But it held no deep-seated feeling for her. The shirt too, initially, had held little meaning, but she had been forced to recognise that for Lena it was part of the narrative of their teenage years. Perhaps so too was this dolphin pendant but Kat could only remember wearing it during her childhood. She and Lena had fought over it occasionally. Had Lena, eventually, claimed it as her own?

Possibly.

Kat lounged across one of the large sofas in the living room. Her parents were on week-end call, and they both had been summoned to separate patients. That left her, bored on a dull morning, with the silent Lena. After two terms away at university, she’d hoped that things would have thawed with her sister. Absence makes the heart grow fonder and all that. Fat chance. Lena hadn’t even bothered to say hello when she’d come home for the Easter holidays. Kat stuck her headphones in her ears and let the portable CD player whirr as she clicked onto the first track. A movement in the doorway made her start. She pressed pause.

‘I’m off.’ Lena appeared with an oversized khaki rucksack.

‘Where you going?’

‘Off to Whitby. I’m not at the shop this weekend, so I thought I’d get away from it all.’

‘Lena! I’ve only just come home. You could spend some time with me.’

Lena said nothing, her features calm. ‘You won’t miss me. You’ll be back at Sheffield next week.’

Kat swallowed to stifle the hurt. ‘But I do miss you.’

Lena’s features, for an instant, softened. ‘I have to get away sometimes, Kat. It’s the way things are.’

‘But why Whitby?’

‘Because it’s not Bampton. That’s why. Don’t ask so many questions. And don’t go out all the time. I think Mum and Dad would quite like to see something of you.’

‘More than could be said of you,’ muttered Kat under her breath as she listened to her sister make her exit.

Theresa was back. She’d called to cancel the appointment and then telephoned again to ask if she could come after all. Now Theresa was in the chair opposite her, looking composed. Only a slight flicker underneath her left eye indicated repressed tension.

‘You called to cancel this session.’ Kat kept her expression neutral.

The flicker in Theresa’s eye grew more marked. ‘It’s not you. I thought after the last meeting that you were really good. Very empathetic. But—’

‘If there’s any issue with our relationship you want to tell me about, this is a safe and secure environment for you to let me know.’

‘It’s not you. I just heard about your sister and thought you had enough on your plate without listening to my problems.’

It was inevitable that her clients knew about Lena. It was, however, not surprising that none of them had mentioned it in a session. Kat had become accustomed to the lack of curiosity displayed by the people she saw in her rooms towards her own personal life. Theresa’s reference to her sister reminded Kat that here was a patient who had spent years in therapy and who was prepared to push the boundaries slightly.

‘I’m able to leave any personal problems I may have outside our sessions.’

‘I just thought with the police investigation and everything, you might need a break from work.’

‘I don’t. But thanks.’ Time to move things on. ‘Theresa.’ Kat leant forward in her chair. ‘Have you ever thought of going to the police?’

Theresa left looking troubled. Perhaps Kat had pushed it too far, but she had thought it important to mention the possibility of judicial intervention. A crime had been committed, and Theresa might stop blaming herself if she accepted a process that would, in essence, be an independent inquiry into those traumatic events. Kat could also sense resistance from her client, and she hadn’t referred to the police again. It was something to be explored, possibly, in a later session.

And now, she herself had the police to deal with. Her client was replaced, three minutes later, by Connie. To be fair to the detective, it seemed that she’d stood in the courtyard outside the rooms waiting for Theresa to leave, judging by how quickly the knock came after her client’s departure. Kat appreciated the courtesy, even though she didn’t want any police in her professional place of work.

Connie was making her nervous. She was roaming around Kat’s rooms, picking up the few items she kept as trinkets. ‘I’d have preferred it if you’d come to my home. It’s more suitable for a discussion about my sister. This is my workplace. I have to earn a living here.’

Connie put down the wood carving that she’d been examining. ‘I went there first. You weren’t there, were you though? It’s gone six, and I assumed you’d be here. That you’d have evening clients, I mean.’

‘It’s that urgent?’

The detective looked a little shamefaced, but then her eyes lit on one of Lena’s paintings hanging on the wall. ‘That’s by your sister. It’s similar to the ones I saw in your house.’

‘It is. Her style is easy to recognise, isn’t it?’

‘Is that all she paints? Flowers, I mean.’

‘Well, why not? She left school to work in a florist’s, and you’re told to paint what you see around you. That’s what she saw every day. Flowers.’

‘But they’re always blue? I mean, not just the flowers. Even the black background’s got a slight blue tinge. Is it her favourite colour?’

Kat’s thoughts strayed to the yellow blouse. ‘I wouldn’t say so but, for her paintings, that’s what she uses. It’s her motif. Big blue paintings of flowers.’ She glanced at Connie and smiled. ‘I wouldn’t read too much into it. Blue is also one of my favourite colours, and I’m not a depressed person. It’s just a colour.’

Connie reached out and touched the canvas. ‘It’s really beautiful but also sterile. You don’t get emotion from the image. It’s like a photograph. Perfectly captured but no emotion.’

Kat didn’t look at the picture. She’d seen it often enough. She kept her eyes on the young detective. ‘You’re right. It is sterile. Yet flowers don’t have to be like that. Have you heard of the American artist Georgia O’Keeffe?’

Connie shook her head.

‘She paints these pictures of petals and stems. They’re lush, sensual drawings. Full of sexual imagery. Don’t laugh. There can be something sexual about flowers. In shape and form. But not Lena’s. You’re right.’

‘Why? She was married. She presumably wasn’t a cold person. I mean, sexually.’

Now Kat did look at the picture, its icy perfection repellent to her. ‘I’m not sure I can answer that question. About her sex life.’

‘Did she have any boyfriends before Andrew?’

‘A few. I didn’t live at Providence Villa for about ten years and Lena was a private person. But, yes, I believe there were boyfriends.’

Connie seemed unable to drag her eyes from the canvas. It was almost casually that she asked, ‘Do you know someone called Stephanie Alton?’

For a split second, Kat was tempted to lie. She wanted it to be all over. Sick of death, sick of that rackety old house. And, yes, sick of Lena. ‘She was a friend of Lena’s.’

Connie swung around. ‘How? How was she a friend of Lena?’

‘They met when Lena had a Saturday job. At the florist’s. This was before she left school and worked there full-time. Anyway, she met Steph through her work.’

‘And they were close?’

Kat tried to remember. Her sister had still been fun then. She’d enjoyed her Saturday job, and the three of them had gone out to bars. She picked her words with care. ‘I didn’t know Stephanie well. She was more Lena’s pal than mine but we were friendly.’ Kat took a deep breath. ‘There’s a photograph. Of the three of us.’ She felt Connie’s eyes on her. ‘I found it while I was going through the attic looking for something.’

‘Do you have it on you?’

Kat reached for her handbag and pulled out the image she and Mark had looked at.

Connie studied it. ‘So you knew each other as teenagers? What about more recently?’

‘I haven’t seen her for about twenty years.’

‘And Lena?’

Kat looked angry. ‘Lena was in prison until last year. The only person she saw was me.’

‘It’s important, you know. It’s another connection between Stephanie and Lena.’

‘Another?’

Connie looked at Kat, assessing her. ‘Do you know a man called Philip Staley?’

Kat shook her head. ‘I don’t think so. In fact, I’m pretty sure I’ve never heard the name. Who’s he?’

‘As I mentioned, another possible link between Lena and Steph.’

‘I’d heard Steph’s death was suicide. Don’t look at me like that. This is Bampton, remember. Nothing stays secret around here for long. Everyone’s talking about it.’

Connie’s cheeks took on patches of red. ‘She didn’t just die. No one just kills themselves. They do it for a reason. There’s a chain of events that are entwined, and I don’t know what they are.’

Kat took the photo off Connie. Should she tell the detective about the other clue? She thought of the yellow blouse and shook her head. ‘I can’t help you, I’m afraid. I have no idea what this is about.’