Broadchurch (13 page)

Miller disappears to talk to Faye while Hardy talks to Nige on the driveway.

The bloke’s a nervous wreck, his shaved head sheened in sweat. Hardy is on full alert.

‘Yeah, I was with Mark pretty much all night,’ he says. ‘We met up, had a drive, a bite to eat.’ He lets out a weird giggle: this poor sod makes Mark look like an accomplished liar.

‘See each other a lot socially?’

‘On and off.’

‘Where’d you meet him that night?’

‘Car park by Briar Cliff,’ says Nige, almost before Hardy’s finished talking. ‘It’s just convenient.’

Hardy doesn’t see anything convenient about a car park up a dirt track in the arse of nowhere.

‘What time did you get home?’

‘One-ish. Dunno.’

‘What were you doing till one?

‘Drinking, chatting, bite to eat.’ Nige looks miserable.

‘Where did you eat?’

‘Pub in the Vale. The Fox.’

‘What’d you eat?’

Nige’s eyes flick up like they’re pulling up a pub menu. ‘Chips… and a pie, steak pie.’

‘Lot of places open till one round here?’

‘We get lock-ins, at the Fox.’

‘So they’ll remember you, when we talk to them.’

Miller bursts out of the house. ‘Nigel, d’you want to stop pissing about? Your mum says you were in with her, till half ten. That you went out round the corner for last orders.
Not
with Mark.’

A sunbeam cuts the interview room in half: high noon. CDs are stacked on top of a winking digital recorder. Mark Latimer looks at his lap while DI Hardy tells him how it is.

‘Since we talked earlier, we’ve checked up on a couple of things. Number one, the woman who holds the keys to the hut on Briar Cliff has no memory of you fixing a burst pipe.’

‘What? That’s bollocks! I got the keys off her. She was in a caravan. She had a dog.’

‘She says not.’

‘Well, she’s lying.’ He keeps looking at Miller, like she’s going to save him.

‘Number two,’ and this is the big one, ‘your alibi is rubbish. Your mate Nige isn’t a good liar. Let’s not insult each other’s intelligence. Your son has been killed, so I’m a bit at a loss as to why you’d mislead us. Point three: we had a look at your boat. And there’s bloodstains in it.’ He sniffs to fill the dead air. ‘Whose blood is in the boat, Mark?’

‘Dan’s.’ He meets Hardy’s eyes without apology. ‘We took her out weekend before last, that hot spell. Me, Dan and Chloe, fishing about a mile offshore. Caught three bass, we took ’em back and barbecued ’em. Danny was messing about, caught the end of a line in the bottom of his foot. Gashed it open. He was all hopping around, yelling. Chloe was there, ask her.’

‘We will.’ Miller is soothing rather than threatening.

‘Why are you lying about where you were Thursday night?’ says Hardy. ‘We can’t rule you out until you tell us where you were.’

‘How is me being here helping you find Danny’s killer? Everything’s becoming part of this and it’s nothing to do with it.’ He brings his hand down hard on the desk.

‘Everything matters now,’ says Hardy. ‘Who did what, who was where. Everything connects and feeds this case. If we don’t get the truth, we won’t find who killed Danny. And that starts with you.’ He folds his arms and sits back.

Indignation pushes Mark’s voice up the scale. ‘I told you about the hut, and you’re saying I’m lying and I’m not!’

‘Mark,’ says Hardy softly. ‘My son dies, I’d tell a police officer everything. I just would. Why did you ask Nigel to give you a false alibi?’

Mark cricks his neck. ‘Everything I’m saying is getting twisted. I can’t think straight.’

‘Mark Latimer, I’m arresting you for obstruction of a murder inquiry.’

‘Sir, no, do we really need to —’ starts Miller.

‘Enough!’ barks Hardy, and she stops mid-sentence. ‘You do not have to say anything, but it may harm your defence —’

‘Is this what you do, Ell?’ says Mark.

‘Don’t make us hold you,’ she pleads. ‘Tell us the truth.’

‘Take his things, Miller.’

The uniforms put him in the cells.

Hardy’s alone with Miller in the interview room. He slides the disc from the machine and labels it.

‘You think he’s blameless now?’ he asks her. Surely she can’t still be in denial?

‘He’s in shock,’ says Miller feebly.

‘His son is dead. Why would he not tell the truth about where he was?’

He waits for her denial, but she can’t answer him. Hardy savours the moment. He might be making slow progress on the investigation, but for the first time there’s a glimmer of hope that he might make a good copper out of DS Miller.

19

After her fruitless visit to Jack Marshall’s paper shop, Karen decides to take Olly with her when she goes to see Nige Carter. It’s a smart move: the welcome is warm. ‘Olly, all right?’ Nige pauses from loading the van with tools – he must be exhausted, covering all of Mark’s calls – to shake Karen’s hand. He gives her a sweet, slightly gormless smile. He reminds her of an Alsatian puppy, taking up too much space, eager to please, not particularly bright.

‘Blimey,’ he says. ‘Never had so many visitors in a day.’

‘Who else has been round?’ she asks.

‘No one,’ he says, suddenly wary. Now he looks Karen up and down properly. She’s newly conscious of the formality of her work clothes and wonders if she ought to have dressed down, taken off the tailored jacket, put on a hoody or something. ‘Don’t think I should be talking to papers.’

‘She’s all right,’ says Olly. ‘I’m chaperoning.’ Karen allows herself a private smile at the thought of this.

‘All right,’ says Nige. ‘Quick though.’

She opens with flattery. ‘Everybody says you’re the go-to men in the town. Not rip-off merchants.’

‘Soon run out of customers if you did,’ smiles Nige. ‘We turn up when we say and don’t overcharge. Down to Mark.’

‘And they’re a close family.’

‘Oh yeah.’ He grins. ‘Always off somewhere together. That’s Beth, outdoors girl, dragging them up hills whether Mark likes it or not!’

‘Compromise, that’s what being married’s all about,’ says Karen, thanking her lucky stars she’s single.

‘Yeah, well, nothing’s perfect,’ says Nige, then realises how that sounds in the circumstances. His grin vanishes.

‘And you knew Danny well, obviously.’

It’s a moment before Nige can speak. ‘He’d come out with us sometimes, in the holidays. He liked it, so did the customers, we’d have a laugh. Same when I babysat. I’d take Call of Duty over, we’d sit and shoot away.’ He shakes his head in sad bewilderment. ‘You go about your day and then you remember he’s not here. Listen, I’ve gotta go. Hey, Olly, how’s your mum now?’

The blush from this morning returns to Olly’s cheeks.

‘Umm, yeah, all right,’ he mumbles. It’s clear that he doesn’t want to talk about it, but Nige is thick-skinned.

‘All sorted, is it?’

‘Pretty much.’ Olly addresses the pavement, looking as though he’d quite like it to swallow him whole.

Mark still isn’t back and Beth has cleaned the house from top to bottom. With all the housework done, and unable to stand another second of daytime television, she puts on her coat and is out of the door, ignoring Chloe’s demands about where she’s off to and Liz’s offer to go with her.

She is going mad inside, turning over the night before Danny’s murder and wishing now that she had woken up when Mark came in, just so the police would get off their backs. She can see what they’re doing: they’re trying to drive a wedge between them. It is not only pointless but it’s cruel. As if they aren’t going through enough. She wants to know that the police are on their side.

It feels good to walk. She takes the shortcut through the field: long grass whispers either side of the path. Walking in the other direction is a thickset man about her own age, body-warmer and gold-framed glasses. As they get close she can tell that he’s looking at her the way they did in the supermarket, part sympathy, part voyeurism. What’s different about this one is the way he holds steady and even offers her a shy smile. Beth’s appreciation at this acknowledgement, this tiny mark of respect, turns to unease as he keeps on staring. She hurries into town and although she doesn’t look back, she knows he’s still watching her.

It’s only half a mile to the tourist office, the place where Beth used to work. Where she still works. It occurs to her she hasn’t actually called in her absence and she wonders who did that for her, who is making the arrangements. The machine of her life is ticking over without her effort or consent.

Tourist Information shares premises, and a front door, with the
Broadchurch Echo
. Beth didn’t know about this condolence book they’d set up and it’s a shock to find Danny is waiting for her at the door, a blown-up picture from last year’s sports day. It almost makes her lose her nerve, but she pushes in anyway.

At her entrance the talking stops, laying bare the hum of the machines and the photocopier churning something out in the background. Her colleagues sit in appalled silence as she dumps her bag and sits at her desk.

‘Hiya,’ she says. ‘Can I help anyone? No? Shall I restock the leaflet racks?’ Janet gulps at her and stares like she’s a freak. And Beth
feels
like a freak. This is the opposite of what she came here for.

Maggie Radcliffe is at her side. ‘Sweetheart, what are you
doing
?’ she asks. ‘You shouldn’t be here. You’ve had a terrible thing happen.’

‘I want to be useful,’ Beth snaps.

‘Let me drop you back home,’ says Maggie.

‘I’m not going home.’ Beth’s fervency embarrasses everyone except her. ‘I’ve just come from home. I can’t stay in that house.’

‘Oh, darling,’ says Maggie. ‘My heart is breaking for you.’

‘I don’t need bloody broken hearts!’ says Beth. She shakes Maggie off and heads out the fire exit, into the side alleyway. Someone follows her. She doesn’t look back to see who it is. One more gentle hand and she’ll bite it off. She walks the length of the High Street, cheeks burning, and keeps going until she reaches the bench at the top of the town.

Up there, she lets out all her breath. Getting out of the house has solved nothing. Danny and the loss of him follow her everywhere she goes. If anything, it’s worse here. It’s not safe to look anywhere. To the left, there’s the beach where they found him. Ahead, the sea where he sailed and fished. To her right, the hill where they flew kites. Behind her the town, the school and home. Grief is like a splinter deep in every fingertip; to touch anything is torture.

‘Do you mind if I sit here?’ says someone.

It’s the man from the field earlier. Has he been
following
her? Beth flinches, then realises she doesn’t actually care. What’s the worst he can do to her? She shrugs and he puts himself gently at the other end of the bench.

‘I love this view,’ he says. Beth waits for it. One, two, three… ‘I’m sorry if it’s rude, but I know who you are. I can’t imagine what it’s like for you. But you’ll get through it.’

‘And you know, do you?’ When she shakes her head, he tilts his to one side in sympathy. It’s as though he’s parroting her body language.

‘Don’t take this the wrong way, but I’ve got a message for you. From Danny.’

It’s the cruellest thing anyone’s ever said to her, and it’s made worse by the way he’s got the gall to maintain eye contact.

‘Don’t you dare,’ says Beth. ‘Stop speaking to me! Get away from me!’

‘I’m not trying to upset you! I just had to tell you! Please!’ His words hound Beth back to the house she can’t stand to be in.

20

Tom Miller carries his red skateboard into the police station like a security blanket. Hardy says nothing as Joe, the appropriate adult, hands the little one – Alfie? George? – to Ellie for the duration of the interview. He notices the food stains on Joe’s top and the rushed, patchy shave. He honestly doesn’t know if he envies Joe the time he spends with his children or pities it.

They do the interview that Miller insists they call a
chat
in the family room. Grubby toys that wouldn’t entertain a pre-schooler are piled in one corner. The Venetian blinds are pulled flat.

‘Just took him to the skate park,’ confides Joe as Hardy fiddles with the video camera. ‘Thought it’d take the edge off his nerves, you know. But instead the other kids were crowding round him, grilling him about Danny. They think he’s got insider knowledge because of who his mum is.’ He sighs from his belly. ‘I shouldn’t have taken him there. I was only trying to do something normal, you know?’

Hardy, checking to make sure Tom is in shot, nods absently. The boy blinks nervously into the lens.

‘You last saw Danny when?’ Hardy begins. Joe flinches, as though he was expecting a more gentle build-up.

‘Before we went on holiday,’ says Tom.

‘When was that?’

Joe answers for him. ‘Three and a half weeks ago. We went on Thursday morning.’

Hardy seethes inwardly. Sometimes the parent is not the most appropriate adult. He saw this when he was interviewing Pippa Gillespie’s friends, the protective instinct of the parent overriding everything else. It’s actually easier to talk to a kid who’s in care: at least a social worker lets him get on with his job.

‘Sorry,’ says Joe, apparently reading Hardy’s mind. He sits back in his seat.

‘Three and a half weeks ago,’ Tom echoes his father. ‘We went on the Thursday morning. The afternoon before, we went to the Lido.’

‘Did he have his phone on him?’

‘Don’t know.’ Tom bites the inside of his cheek.

‘But Danny
had
a phone.’

Tom nods.

‘What did you talk about?’

‘Football. Xbox. Usual.’

‘What else? Girls?’

‘No!’ It’s the first unguarded response Tom’s had. Joe, shifting in his seat, doesn’t take his eyes off his son.

‘Did he say he was worried about anything?’

‘No,’ says Tom.

‘Did you argue?’

‘No!’ Again, the word comes too quickly.

‘Can you think of anyone who’d want to hurt Danny?’ Tom doesn’t answer but his eyes triangulate between Hardy, the camera, and his father. ‘How’d he get on with his dad?’