Cold Pressed (24 page)

"Can I help you?"

A woman in her late thirties wore a padded jacket over a
Co-op supermarket uniform and held a heavily loaded carrier bag.

"I'm looking for Eva Webber. I understand she lives
here."

"What do you want with her?"

Beatrice held up her badge. "DI Stubbs, CID. I'd like
to ask her a few questions in relation to an investigation I'm conducting. I
believe she might be able to help."

The woman tilted her watch to the street light.
"Should've come earlier. You won't get much sense out of her now. She just
called up for more supplies." She raised the carrier bag. "Smirnoff,
tonic, fags and a sliced white. Come on; let’s see what we can do."

She moved a miniature watering-can from the windowsill and
picked up a key. The
Eastenders
theme came from the living-room as
forcefully as the stench of cigarette smoke and stale air. Eva Webber lay on
the sofa, a knitted patchwork quilt over her legs. Beside her stood an
occasional table, almost entirely hidden under an empty plate, two remote
controls, a mobile phone, a bottle of vodka with a third remaining, two empty
tonic bottles, a packet of Marlboro Lights, a lighter, an ashtray, a dirty
glass and a pile of magazines. Her slow gaze flickered over Beatrice and came
to rest on the Co-op carrier bag. The room was uncomfortably warm.

"You are good to me, Jen. How much do I owe you?"
Her voice, hoarse and low, had an indistinct looseness, as if she'd just woken
up.

"Receipt's in the bag. We'll sort it out tomorrow. Eva,
this lady is a detective from the police. She wants a word."

Eva blinked slowly. "About what?"

Jen shot a sympathetic look at Beatrice. "Nothing to
worry about, I'm sure. I'll be off now and pop round in the morning. Good
night, DI Stubbs, and best of luck."

As the door clicked shut, Eva began pouring herself another
drink.

"Please sit down, officer. How can I help?"

The affected sobriety struck Beatrice as the most illogical
behaviour when all evidence pointed to the contrary. She sat, taking in the
room. The dust, the stains on the carpet, the gas fire and old-fashioned
cushions piled on every chair.

"I'm sorry to call so late, Mrs Webber."

"Miss." She pulled the kind of haughty look only a
drunk can manage.

Beatrice made a rapid decision. "I'd like to talk to
you about what happened at Swallows Hall."

The trajectory of glass to mouth did not falter. She sipped
twice and cradled the glass to her chest as if afraid Beatrice might steal it.

"Swallows Hall? Haven't thought about that place in
years. What do you want to know?" Her gaze rested on the flames of the gas
fire.

"I want to know about your baby, the one they made you
give away."

Eva's expression did not change. "Jen's very good, but
she never thinks to get the tonic from the cold cabinet. There should be some
ice in the freezer compartment."

The kitchen was messy, but not actually dirty. Beatrice
found a clean teacup, popped out the last three ice cubes and opened the back
door for some fresh air. When she returned, Eva was lighting a cigarette. She
tipped the ice into her glass and swirled the contents with such little
coordination that some spilt onto her lap.

"Thank you. You'd better tell me why you want to
know."

A blanket of tiredness overcame Beatrice, exacerbated by the
warm room, fug of smoke and lack of sleep. She wanted to walk out the door and
leave this wretched woman to drink herself into oblivion. Instead, she turned
off the television.

"That's not how it works. I ask the questions, you give
me answers. If you don't want to talk, we'll go down to the police station. Of
course, you'll have to leave the bottle behind. I know about your pregnancy,
what the teachers decided, who was involved and how your baby was given up for
adoption. What I don't know is anything about the child. I want you to tell me
if it was..."

"He. Not it. I had a baby boy." She stirred the
ice cubes with her middle finger, a tinkling sound providing a counterpoint to
the pings of the gas filaments. "I never even held him."

Something in her tone checked Beatrice's exasperation. The
woman wasn't talking to a police detective, she was talking to herself.
Beatrice would need to sympathise, tease out, engage and encourage – but never
demand.

"It must have been very hard for you. You were so
young."

"I was fifteen." Her face collapsed into a grimace
and Beatrice scrabbled in her bag to find tissues. By the time she'd found
them, Eva was blowing her nose on an ancient handkerchief.

"I understand it's painful to bring all this up again.
I wouldn't ask if it weren't important."

"They ruined my life. And his. I'll never stop
wondering what might have been."

A thin line lay between emotional truth and maudlin
sentimentality. Beatrice had to keep the woman focused or all she'd get would
be a series of country and western clichés.

"I suppose you still think about him, wondering where
he is now."

"I know where he is." For the first time, Eva
looked directly at Beatrice. The rain cloud of grief left her face, leaving an
expression of beatific joy in its stead. "He found me."

Her words pulsed through Beatrice like a shot of caffeine.
The chill breeze from the kitchen pierced the stale air. Still in uncertain
territory, Beatrice knew she was very near to getting the information she
needed.

"How extraordinary! It's much harder to do that via
private adoption agencies. He must have been very determined."

"He was. He said he'd never tried before, but he'll be
fifty soon, so he decided to find me before it was too late. Fifty years."
Eva was shaking her head as she reached for the Smirnoff.

Beatrice seized her opportunity. "How did he contact
you?"

Her eyes were unfocused as she looked past Beatrice with a
soft smile of reminiscence. "He came here. He sat right where you are
sitting now."

"I cannot imagine how it must have felt to meet your
son after all these years."

Tears spilt from Eva’s glassy eyes as she laughed. "Nor
can I. Not really. He turned up late and I'd had a few. When I found out who he
was, I had a few more. I must have fallen asleep, because when I woke up, he'd
put a cushion under my head and a blanket over me. He'd gone. I didn't get to
say goodbye."

Beatrice tried to halt the slide into self-pity. "What
can you remember, Eva?"

She sniffed. "He asked a lot of questions. He wanted to
know why I gave him away. I didn’t! Not willingly, I never had any choice! I
told him that. I told him the truth about what they did.”

"Did you tell him who was involved?"

Eva broke eye contact and shifted her focus back to the
fire. "I don't remember. I said a couple of things, but..." The
downward pull of her mouth reversed suddenly. "I tell you what, though.
He's a looker. A real heartbreaker. Tall, handsome and he looks just like
him."

"Like who? His father?"

Eva scowled and narrowed her eyes. "You're all the
same, aren’t you? They tried that. They tried every trick in the book. Threats
and bribes and trying to catch me out, just like you. Didn't work. I didn't
tell them who his father was. Never have and never will."

"Actually, I'm not really interested in his father.
What I do want to know is who your son is and where he is now."

Eva hummed a few notes, a tune Beatrice couldn't make out.
"I named him, my baby boy. I knew he was a boy and I knew I'd have to give
him up and they'd most likely call him something else, but before he was born,
I used to talk to him, sing to him and tell him stories. I called him Frankie.
They all thought I was daft at school, you know. Me and my LPs. The other girls
were crying and screaming over 45s of The Beatles and The Hollies and The
Stones, but not me. I was an old-fashioned girl in many ways."

"Eva, your son? What name does he use now?"

She burst into loud cackles, pushing Beatrice's annoyance to
the limit. She wanted to slap the silly old lush, who was rocking back and
forth in amusement.

"You'll never guess what he does for a living! At a
caravan park, in Dorset somewhere. When I told him why I'd named him Frank, his
face was a picture."

Beatrice was already on her feet. "You called him
Frank, after..."

"Ol' Blue Eyes. And now my little Frankie is..."

"A Sinatra impersonator." She walked into the hall
and dragged out her mobile, leaving Eva mumbling the words to
New York, New
York
.

The church bells struck the hour at exactly the same time as
Beatrice's phone vibrated in her hand.

"Nikos! I was just about to call you. I need you to
make an arrest. Take Toni Dean in for questioning and I'll gather all the
evidence we need to charge him. Nikos? Are you there?"

"
Yes, I'm here. Beatrice, we have a problem
."

"What is it?"

"
The ship is due to sail, but two people are
missing. One is Toni Dean. The other is Oscar Martins
."

Chapter 27

He smelt him before he saw him. Voulakis, as ever
preceded by the smell of onions, entered the bridge, shadowed by Xanthou. Nikos
acknowledged neither, concentrating on making notes and listening to Beatrice's
voice at the other end of the line. Their third call in the space of an hour.

"
... two key aspects of concern. If they're working
together, are they planning a second attempt on the life of Joyce Milligan, or
returning to the UK to pursue the surviving Hirondelles? Or have they split to
do both? What extra measures have you taken?"

"Alerted all border controls, doubled hospital security
and Forensics are in the process of analysing both their rooms, as you
advised."

"
Good. Keep me informed of every development. I'll
get a flight back as soon as I can, hopefully tonight. The taxi is approaching
the airport now
."

Nikos revolved his chair to face his colleagues.
"Beatrice, one other thing. Chief Inspector Voulakis has taken over as
senior investigating officer, so he'll be your key contact. I am currently in
an assistant role. He's just arrived, in fact, so perhaps you should speak to
him."

He heard her swear with surprising force. "
Why the
hell has he stepped in?"

Nikos summoned all his resources of diplomacy and hoped
Beatrice would pick up the subtext. "After a complaint from Inspector
Xanthou of the South Aegean Region, the Police Supervisory Board asked Chief
Inspector Voulakis to take charge. The case is still a collaboration between
the Cretan Regional Force and Scotland Yard. The Chief Inspector has chosen to
retain both myself and Xanthou as assistants. Would you like to talk to
him?"

"
What I'd like to do is to kick Xanthou's arse.
Bloody weasel. Still, at least they didn't give the case to him. Yes, put
Voulakis on
."

Trust her to get it first time. Nikos grinned, with no
attempt to hide it, and handed the phone to Voulakis. He circled the name Toni
Dean on the pad in front of him and vacated the seat to put some space between
them.

"DI Stubbs, hello." Voulakis settled into the
chair and looked at the paper. He beckoned Nikos. "Yes, a few changes in
recent hours. And just ten minutes ago, I received a call from the airport
police in Athens. They have detained Mr Oscar Martins, attempting to board a
flight to London. I'm sending Inspector Stephanakis to interview him now."

Xanthou exhaled a sound of disgust and folded his arms.
Neither Nikos nor Voulakis paid any attention.

"Yes, of course you can, if you can get a flight this
evening or early tomorrow. I'll inform Stephanakis you'll join him in Athens.
Here in Rhodes, Inspector Xanthou will take charge of hospital security and
protecting the injured lady..."

Nikos scribbled her name on the pad.

"... Joyce Milligan. The
Empress Louise
must
sail in approximately twenty minutes, but forensics teams are searching the
cabins. I understand you have information about Toni Dean?"

As demotions go, it could have been worse. You could
say a lot about Voulakis, but his management of the situation was both
professional and partisan. Nikos was in position to make an arrest, while
Xanthou was babysitting an old lady. Which must have been almost as infuriating
as sharing his office with a senior Cretan officer with a passion for garlic,
onions and olives. Each time fatigue hit Nikos while he waited in Athens Police
HQ for Beatrice, he pictured that supercilious face wrinkling in disgust. It
boosted his spirits without fail.

For the third time, he tried to focus on the Wikipedia
biography of Oscar Martins. A respected professor with several publications to
his name, a widow and father, nothing to link him to Dean or to Swallows Hall,
and no police record. He tried the opposite route. Toni Dean's website ¬–
The
Voice of an Era
– contained photographs, videos, testimonials and reviews
but gave no personal information apart from contact details via Sunnyside
Caravan Park in Weymouth. The ship’s HR records were more useful, confirming
Beatrice's findings, and showing Dean’s age as fitting the profile of the
Swallows Hall child. Yet none of his previous cruise ship contracts had
coincided with voyages taken by Martins, so where did they meet? What would
make two such men work together, if indeed they had?

A door opened. A uniformed officer, talking to someone out
of sight, gestured towards Nikos. Beatrice. Her hair was wilder than usual as
she marched across the deserted room, but her ready smile and bright eyes
reassured him.

"Have you had any sleep since I last saw you?" he
asked, holding out his hand.

She shook it and sat on the edge of the desk. "Enough.
You?"