Flesh And Blood (37 page)

‘We already have.’ Elder turned sharply at the sound of Maureen’s voice; he hadn’t been aware she’d come back into the room.

‘As far as we can tell,’ Maureen said, ‘Katherine left the changing rooms at the track between eight thirty and a quarter to nine. One of the others offered her a lift, but she turned it down. Said something about catching a bus.’ Maureen paused. ‘That’s the last sighting of her we’ve traced so far.’

A quarter to nine to half past four: Elder was doing the arithmetic in his head. Not so far short of eight hours since his daughter had gone missing.

‘That boy she was seeing…’ he said to Joanne.

‘Gavin?’

‘I don’t think so.’

Joanne looked back at him, puzzled, as Elder searched for the name.

‘Stuart, I think it might have been.’

‘I don’t know any Stuart.’

‘He was in her athletics club; drove an old 2 CV.’

Joanne shook her head.

‘It wasn’t one of the names we had,’ Maureen said. ‘No one we’ve spoken to so far. I’ll have it checked.’

As she left the room, the WPC came in with mugs of coffee on a tray.

‘You mentioned Gavin,’ Elder said, turning back to Joanne. ‘Gavin who?’

‘Salter. He’s a student, at the university.’

‘Which one?’

‘Not Trent, at least I don’t think so. No, the old one, I’m sure.’

‘And Katherine’s going out with him?’

‘She was. I think they had some sort of a bust-up. Just before the end of the summer term.’

‘Have you any idea where he lives?’

‘Lenton, somewhere. I don’t know exactly.’

‘Christ!’ Elder exclaimed, just under his breath.

Joanne pressed her forehead against the heel of her hand. ‘Frank, please don’t make it any more difficult than it already is.’

‘There’s coffee,’ the WPC said.

Nobody moved.

‘His name’s Stuart Reece,’ Maureen said, reappearing from the hallway a few minutes later. ‘High jumper, apparently. Lives out at Lady Bay. Someone’s on their way to talk to him now.’

Elder nodded and gave her the name of Gavin Salter. It was possible but unlikely, Maureen knew, that the phone book might supply a listing. He could be on the electoral roll, although with the migratory habits of most students that was far from a certainty. Most probably they’d have to wait till morning and check Salter’s address with the university.

‘Jo,’ Elder said quietly, ‘why don’t you go up and lie down? Get some rest.’

‘I couldn’t sleep,’ Joanne said, but she stood up nevertheless, though less than steadily, and walked towards the staircase, Elder beside her.

‘Where’s Martyn tonight?’ he asked.

She looked at him without her expression changing and then turned away and walked slowly out of sight.

♦

Elder and Maureen Prior sat on the curve of concrete steps that went up to the front door. The door itself was on the latch, Joanne restlessly asleep above. The sky was already lightening noticeably towards the east. Both of the uniformed officers had reported back to the central police station, where a separate inquiry team had been set up with Colin Sherbourne, a youngish DI who had recently transferred from Humberside, in charge. Sherbourne had driven out earlier to talk with Elder and assure him that they were doing everything they could.

‘It’s not that long since he started shaving,’ Elder commented when Sherbourne had gone.

‘He’s a good officer, Frank. Organised. Not the kind to get into a flap easily.’

‘He hasn’t the experience…’

Maureen laid a hand on his arm. ‘Frank, we’ve got a good start. You know that as well as I do.’

‘Eight hours, more now…’

‘Most cases like this, we likely wouldn’t have been alerted till morning.’

Elder let out a deep breath, almost a sigh. ‘This isn’t a separate investigation.’

‘Frank…’

‘Come on, Maureen,’ Elder on his feet now. ‘Isn’t that what you’ve been thinking ever since I first called you?’

‘No.’

‘No? You’re a bad liar, Maureen. It doesn’t come naturally.’

‘What I think, Frank, is that, come morning, Katherine’ll come walking back home. A little sheepishly, perhaps, but she’ll be back. And not so many hours from now.’

‘I’d like to think you were right.’

‘You know what I think happened? I think she met up with her student – Gavin, is it? – they met up and made up and she spent the night at his place. Sixteen, Frank, likely not the first time, though you’ll not thank me for saying so.’

But Elder was shaking his head. ‘He’s got her, Maureen. Keach. He’s taken her, I know it.’

‘Frank, you’re not being logical. There’s a hundred and one explanations more feasible.’

‘Are there?’

‘You know there are. And besides, why would Keach do such a thing? Just suppose for a moment it had crossed his mind and somehow he got close enough to have the opportunity, why take the risk?’

‘Why kidnap Emma Harrison in broad daylight? Carry her body across open country? Why send a postcard advertising what he’d done? To impress McKeirnan, that’s why. And what better way to impress him than to take the daughter of the man who was largely responsible for putting him inside?’

Maureen sat staring off into the gathering dawn; there was an electric glow pale behind a scattering of blinds and curtains now, the early barking of one dog answered by another, far off. What Elder was saying was conjecture and little more, but conjecture was pretty much all they still had. Conjecture plus a feeling in Elder’s gut, a feeling that in the past Maureen had learned to trust.

Rising, she stood alongside him.

‘There’s a massive search on for Adam Keach. And it’ll intensify now, I promise you that. If he’s moving around he can’t stay hidden for long. Meantime, let Colin Sherbourne get on with his job. I’ll keep a watching brief on both inquiries, Colin’ll not mind that. He’ll expect it.’

‘And I stand around torturing myself? Kicking my heels?’

‘Get some rest, Frank. That’s the best thing you can do.’

‘You’re joking, of course.’

‘Stay here at the house, Frank. There must be a spare bed, all these rooms. Joanne’ll need you when she wakes up.’

‘What are you going to do?’

‘Me? Catch a couple of hours. I’ll call you round seven thirty if you haven’t called me first.’

Katherine Elder didn’t come walking back home, tail between her legs or otherwise.

A search of the area between the athletics stadium and the bus stop yielded nothing: no discarded articles of clothing, no torn-off buttons nor signs of a struggle. It would all be checked again, centimetre by centimetre, inch by inch.

By a little after two that afternoon, officers had traced all of the athletes who had been at training the previous evening and taken statements. Everything confirmed the story they had first been given: once the session was over, Katherine, sports bag on her shoulder, had gone off alone. Those who had thought about it at all had assumed she was setting out to catch the bus home. Of course, it was possible that she’d arranged to meet somebody, but she hadn’t mentioned any such arrangement and no one could recall seeing any cars they couldn’t identify parked nearby.

‘This youth,’ Elder had said to Colin Sherbourne earlier. ‘Reece. When you talk to him, I want to come along.’

‘I don’t know, Frank…’

‘I’ve met him, spoken with him.’

‘Even so.’

Elder had rested a hand, not heavily, on Sherbourne’s arm. ‘I won’t interfere. Embarrass you, lose control. I promise.’

With some reluctance, the DI had agreed.

Stuart Reece was clearly shocked to hear that Katherine was missing and anxious to help. He had been at the track for a good couple of hours that evening, practising his jumping along with some general fitness and speed training; yes, he’d chatted to Katherine, the last time just before she’d gone off to shower and change.

‘How did she seem?’ Sherbourne asked.

‘Normal. The same as usual.’

‘She wasn’t worried?’

‘No.’

‘Preoccupied?’

‘No.’

‘And what did she say she was going to do later on?’

Reece made a loose, shrugging motion. ‘She didn’t.’

‘You’re sure?’

‘Yes.’

‘You have a car, don’t you?’

‘Yes, an old 2 CV. Why?’

‘Did you use it yesterday evening?’

‘Yes, I nearly always do. From where I live it takes an age otherwise, one bus into town and then another out, the same performance coming back.’

‘You offered Katherine a lift?’

Before answering, Reece glanced towards where Elder was standing, just a few paces back from Colin Sherbourne’s shoulder. ‘Yes. Yes, I did. I said did she want a lift home and she said no thanks.’ Reece shrugged. ‘That was it.’

‘And did that surprise you?’ Sherbourne asked. ‘Her saying no.’

Reece reached up a hand to push the hair away from his eyes. ‘Not really. I mean, there wasn’t any sort of arrangement, you know. Sometimes she came with me and sometimes she didn’t.’

‘And you’ve no idea why, on this particular occasion, she said no?’

Reece shook his head. ‘No.’

Elder took a pace forward. ‘You like her, Stuart, don’t you?’ he said.

‘Yes, of course. Katherine’s great, always good fun. Everyone…’

‘No, I mean, you like her. Really like her.’

Reece’s feet performed an odd little dance. ‘Well, yes, you know, like I say, she’s… Yes, yes, I do.’

‘The first time I saw you, the two of you together, you were kissing her.’

Reece flushed. ‘That didn’t mean anything, it was just…’

‘Just a bit of fun?’

The redness around Reece’s neck and along his cheeks deepened and spread.

‘Because it looked more than that to me.’

Reece had to will his gangly body to be still.

‘You know what Katherine said to me, Stuart? What she implied? After you’d driven away. That you wanted the relationship to be serious. Is that right?’

Reece was staring at the ground. ‘Yes, I suppose so.’

‘And how did my daughter feel about that?’

‘She didn’t want to know.’

‘I’m sorry, speak up.’

‘She didn’t want to know,’ Reece almost shouted.

‘And how did that make you feel?’

‘How d’you think?’

‘Pretty lousy. Small. Rejected.’

Reece twisted his head from side to side and breathed deeply through his mouth. ‘I’m not stupid. I can see what you’re trying to suggest. That I got all screwed up because Katherine turned me down, didn’t fancy me, wasn’t interested. So screwed up about it that I… I don’t know, did something, lost my temper, hurt her.’ He stopped and steadied himself, looking at Elder directly. ‘Look, I like her, you’re right. More than she likes me. But that kind of thing happens all the time. There’s scores of girls around. At school, athletics, everywhere. And when I get to university there’ll be more. I’d’ve liked to have had a relationship with your daughter, I still would. But the fact that I haven’t hasn’t made me go crazy. What I told you about last night’s the truth. I drove home alone and I was in the house by nine or nine fifteen and if you ask my parents they’ll back me up. Okay?’

Elder held the youth’s gaze for several seconds and then nodded.

‘Thanks for your time,’ Colin Sherbourne said. ‘We’ll speak with your parents in due course. All right, Frank?’

Elder nodded again.

‘Katherine, Mr Elder,’ Stuart Reece said, ‘I hope you find her. I hope she’s okay.’

♦

Tracking down Gavin Salter proved less straightforward. The university confirmed that he was a second-year student reading law and provided two addresses, one for term-time, one his parents’ home.

The house he shared with six other students in Lenton was just off the main road, a three-storey building with paint flaking away from around the windows and dustbins out front which were overflowing. Four of the students were still around, but Salter wasn’t one of them.

Later that morning, two officers from the Hampshire force drew up outside Salter’s parents’ house in Stockbridge. His mother was just returning from church and met them in the drive; Gavin’s younger brother was washing down the Land Rover and Gavin himself was still in bed. ‘Sorry,’ he said blearily, fastening the belt of his dressing-gown. ‘Bit of a night last night, I’m afraid.’

They sat at a round table in the drawing-room; having politely refused the offer of coffee, the officers watched Salter dissolve two Alka-Seltzers in a glass of water, then drink it down.

‘Katherine Elder,’ the senior of the two men began. ‘When did you last see her?’

Salter’s answers were cautious, careful: his training in law, perhaps, coming to the fore. He and Katherine had had a bust-up in early June, before the end of term. He’d wanted her to go away with him to France – take Eurostar and then the TGV to somewhere like Avignon – and first off Katherine had said her mother would never let her, but then confessed she didn’t really want to go away with him anyway. Salter admitted to saying something rather unpleasant, accusing her of being a silly little schoolgirl who didn’t have a mind of her own and it had all got rather heated and nasty.

‘How nasty?’

‘Well, you know, a certain amount of shouting and bad language.’

‘You hit her?’

‘Good God, no.’

‘The heat of the moment, you’re sure?’

‘Listen, it’s not the way I was brought up. To strike women.’

‘So how did you leave it? After this row?’

‘We didn’t. Kate went storming off, slamming doors – we were at the house in Lenton – and that was that, pretty much.’

‘She was angry, upset?’

‘I suppose so.’

‘And you?’

‘I think I was annoyed with myself for losing my temper as much as anything. I mean, Kate and I, we’d had a good time for a couple of terms and France would have been fun, but you know, it had just about run its course. So all for the best, in a way.’