In Guilty Night (40 page)

The candlelight brushed feverish colour on the girls’ cheeks, and drew a contour of light around the shape of the boy.
Shadows moved in the recesses, tense grotesque shapes forming and reforming without any apparent reference to the solid figures and the flickering light and, mesmerized, McKenna watched, wondering on their source beyond his sight. Dewi drifted to his side, whispering, and as he stirred, catching his hand against the glass, the girls leapt from their chairs.

‘Thank the Lord!’ Owen Griffiths exclaimed. ‘It’s worth being roused in the dead hours for news like this.’ He chuckled. ‘I’ll bet Emma Tuttle’s spitting fire, isn’t she? Jack’ll be as mad as hell, too. They shouldn’t be too hard on the girls. They’ve done us all a good turn.’

‘Emma wanted to know why the twins didn’t have the sense to say Gary’d rung, instead of haring after him.’ McKenna yawned. ‘He’s been trying to call them for days, but Jack kept answering the phone.’

‘He’s probably sweet on them both, ’cos he can’t tell which is which.’ Griffiths chuckled again. ‘Where is he?’

‘At home. The hospital said he’s none the worse.’ Huddled by the parlour fire, still in outdoor clothes, McKenna wondered if he would ever be warm again. ‘Janet’s staying ’til morning. Mrs Hughes is close to collapse.’

‘Em threatened to strangle them.’ Clad in dressing-gown and pyjamas, Jack hunched by the sitting-room fire, shivering from head to foot. Reaching for the poker to stir the coals to greater heat, he added, ‘I really thought she’d hurt them. She’s never frightened me with her passion before.’

‘Are they at school?’ McKenna asked.

‘Are you kidding?’ Jack coughed. ‘Mother hen’s taken her chicks out shopping. Let’s hope she doesn’t peck them to death.’

‘You sound very bitter.’

‘So would you cooped up with three bloody women!’

‘I’m sick of hearing people whinge!’ McKenna snapped. ‘Especially when they’ve nothing to whinge about!’

Jack pulled himself from the chair like an old man. ‘Having a whinge now and then’s a damned sight better than letting things fester.’

‘I don’t let anything fester.’

‘Denise eats away at you like a maggot on a corpse, only you won’t admit it.’

‘We’re reconciled to our differences.’

‘Considering she’s flogging her assets round North Wales, that’s very civilized.’

McKenna flushed. ‘D’you always poke your nails in people’s wounds?’

‘You want to be careful yours don’t go gangrenous.’

‘Medicine is rediscovering its origins,’ McKenna said stiffly, ‘and using sterile maggots to clean out the nastiest wounds.’

‘Denise isn’t that sort of maggot.’ Jack sighed. ‘I’ve no quarrel with you, but she makes things fester in Em as well. Discontent, misogynism, even. She wants to taint everybody with her bitterness.’

‘D’you really believe Emma will let her? Can’t you credit her with more sense?’

‘I credit her with everything a human being is capable of, and that’s very frightening.’ Jack rubbed his hands over his face, and McKenna heard the rasp of beard. ‘She’s changed. She started the day you walked out on Denise, and she hasn’t stopped yet. God knows when she will.’

‘People can’t stay the same. They must grow.’

‘Into what?’ Jack demanded. ‘And don’t say “themselves”!’

‘You’re afraid for yourself.’ McKenna rose, and pulled on his coat. ‘Emma already knows you can abandon someone you expected to love for ever. She’s with you because she wants to be, so mind you don’t drive her away.’

Gary sat beside Dewi on the dull brown sofa in his mother’s dull front parlour. He looked wasted, hard-edged and brittle with tension, his youth as dead as Arwel and Tony. His mother stood behind the sofa, and a small fire sputtered in the grate, subdued by an east wind thumping in the chimney and battering at the windows.

‘We’ve a great deal to discuss with Gary, Mrs Hughes,’ McKenna said.

Her hands hovered around her son’s head, then retreated. ‘The doctors said he should take it easy for a while. Get his strength back.’

‘How d’you feel?’ McKenna asked the boy.

‘OK.’ He shrugged. ‘Am I going the police station?’

‘Why should you?’

‘He’s frightened about the running away,’ Mrs Hughes said. ‘And about breaking into the cottage.’

‘We’re more concerned with the reasons,’ McKenna said.

‘People often run when they’re frightened.’

‘I told you before.’ Mrs Hughes brushed one of the wandering hands against her cheek, wiping away a tear. ‘He’s never been the same since he came back from that place.’

‘Was it really torched?’ Gary asked, hope gleaming in his eyes.

‘It burned down,’ McKenna said. ‘We’re not sure how, yet.’

‘It wasn’t me.’ A wry smile added wistfulness to the lisping seductive voice. ‘But I can’t prove it.’

‘We’ve no reason to suspect you.’ McKenna smiled, despite himself. ‘D’you want your mother to stay?’

‘I’m OK on my own,’ Gary said. ‘And don’t bother getting me a social worker. They didn’t do their job before, so they won’t start now.’

‘Some of them might.’

‘Not the ones I know.’

‘A relative, then, or a solicitor,’ McKenna suggested.

‘No!’ As McKenna thought of the determination which kept Gary alive in the mountains, and perhaps out of the way of further harm, the boy turned to Dewi, and said, ‘And I’m not trying to con the system, so you can take that look off your face.’

‘What d’you mean?’ Mrs Hughes’ eyes flitted from face to face. ‘What’s he talking about?’

‘I can’t be charged if I’m not interviewed according to the rules, and I can’t say I don’t want my rights, because I haven’t got any. Hogg made sure I knew that.’

‘I want to discuss the Hoggs, among other things,’ McKenna said.

Mrs Hughes fretted behind the sofa, pulling at her fingers. ‘I don’t know. Maybe somebody should be with you….’

Dewi jumped up. ‘We’ll make a
panad
while Gary has a chat, shall we?’ Taking her arm, he pulled her from the room.

Running long bony fingers through his curly brown hair, Gary smiled. ‘People say I’m very elusive, so you ought to catch me while you can.’ Seeing what others had wrought from the childish clay, McKenna wondered if he deplored the outcome only because those others realized its potential. ‘You didn’t need to get the army out last night,’ Gary added. ‘The twins’ d persuaded me to come and talk to you.’

‘Why?’ McKenna asked. ‘Were you fed up with talking to yourself?’

‘The conversations were boringly one-sided.’ The boy shifted in his seat. ‘Can you spare a fag?’

McKenna tossed over his packet. ‘We’ve searched every
bloody nook and cranny in North Wales for you. We’ve been worried sick.’

‘I know.’ Gary blew smoke towards the ceiling. ‘I saw the troops. I hid in a gully behind the cottage when anyone came up the track.’ He fingered the heavy gold ring in his right earlobe. ‘I didn’t think you’d bother. You didn’t care when we legged it from Blodwel.’

‘You weren’t always reported missing.’

‘Yeah, I know. Bad for Ronnie’s image.’ Gary paused, listening to the sounds of clattering crockery, water gushing into a kettle, and the rise and fall of voices from the kitchen. ‘The twins said him and Doris’ve legged it. Is it true?’

‘They don’t seem to be around.’

‘They’ll be to Spain, or Tenerife, ’cos they like it hot, and he’s got wads of cash. Did they take that horrible dog?’

‘They left it,’ McKenna said. ‘How d’you know he’s got money?’

‘I’ve seen him counting it.’ A shadow passed over the boy’s face. ‘Will you take me down town when we’ve had a drink? Please?’

‘Will this stand up in court?’ Owen Griffiths gestured to Gary’s statement. ‘Was it worse to hear than it is to read? Dear God, man’s inhumanity knows no bounds, does it? God knows how that poor boy feels!’

‘He seemed relieved to talk.’ McKenna lit a cigarette.

‘I’m not surprised with this in his head. What about counselling for him? I don’t want another Tony Jones on my conscience.’

‘His solicitor’s sorting it out.’

‘Not with Social Services, I hope. He’ll be a hostile witness if we ever get anyone in court.’ He drummed his fingers on the desk. ‘What d’you think Crown Prosecutions’ll do? Gary’s a sitting target, isn’t he? Any jury’d sooner put away his like.’

‘If Dewi’s right about Arwel’s secret messages, there’ll be such a wailing and gnashing of teeth everyone’ll forget Gary’s existence,’ McKenna said. ‘Any response yet?’

‘What d’you think?’ Griffiths asked gloomily. ‘How long did DVLA take last time we wanted number combinations fed through the computer?’

‘What combinations? You read from top to bottom of each marked poem. They’re all quite clear.’

Griffiths squirmed in his chair. ‘It’s not quite so clear as you
think. First of all, we can’t be sure it’s not just coincidence. Secondly, we can’t assume what seems to be a vehicle registration isn’t just another coincidence. And thirdly, we can’t presume if they are what they seem, Arwel meant us to read from top to bottom. Maybe you read from bottom up. There’s any number of ways of looking at codes like that, and we wouldn’t want to drop on a perfectly innocent citizen because we got hold of the wrong end of things.’ He sighed. ‘Arwel was no more rational than his sister is, and Dewi Prys only sees the markings as code because he isn’t rational, either. And while the imagination’s a wonderful thing, it can lead you astray like nothing else. Look at what Carol’s imaginings did.’ Smiling, he added: ‘But don’t fret. Look forward to our assignation with Hogg’s boss instead.’

McKenna found Dewi in the CID office, head down amid a welter of papers, snoring gently, the original list of registrations crumpled under his elbow. He wrote a short note, clipped it to the list, and went home to feed the cats.

The deputy chief constable sat beside McKenna in Griffiths’s office, immaculately uniformed, a subtle aroma of pipe tobacco about his person. Equally immaculate in dark suit and pristine shirt, the director of social services sat opposite, beside the ramrod figure of a councillor elevated to committee prominence by Rhiannon’s defection.

‘Children, staff, parents, grandparents, siblings, neighbours, all tell us the same thing about Blodwel,’ Griffiths said. ‘Some might be exaggerating, some might be inclined to malice, some might be attention-seeking, but too many tell us the same tale one way or another.’

‘And maybe “tale” is the right word,’ the director said.

‘People say comparisons are odious,’ Griffiths added, ‘so I won’t make any. Suffice to say a total corruption of ethical concepts and boundaries killed two young boys, and brutally damaged God knows how many other children.’

The director flicked a speck of dust from his lapel. ‘Mr McKenna knows that your inexperience allowed this whole issue to get completely out of perspective. We investigated these allegations, and found them groundless.’

‘We know nothing of any internal investigation,’ McKenna commented. ‘Nor do your staff.’

‘Blodwel staff exhibit a siege mentality, and they’re terrified
of Ronald Hogg. They’re terrified of his wife, too, because she fed him whatever fact or fiction would help settle her own scores.’ Griffiths paused. ‘They describe a regime of pathological oppression. They knew children were beaten and terrorized, but because Hogg promoted the outrages, the staff convinced themselves they were somehow justified, and became utterly desensitized to normal moral concepts, like the children they were supposed to rehabilitate. D’you have any idea how many ex-Blodwel inmates grow up into psychopaths? We’ve been checking records. Two of Hogg’s so-called successes are currently doing life for murder.’

‘It’s par for the course, Superintendent. You know that.’

‘And Mrs Hughes tells us Gary’s conduct and attitudes were infinitely worse after his time in care.’

‘And ninety-nine out of a hundred of these mothers would tell you the same,’ the director said. ‘But if they’re right, I’ve never been able to fathom who breeds all the thugs.’

‘Perhaps they’re bred in places like Blodwel. Let me elaborate,’ McKenna offered. ‘Brutality was so commonplace many children feared they would not live to see another dawn. Those who mutilated themselves in desperation were treated with further violence by Hogg, or scorn by his wife.’ He paused. ‘People see Myra Hindley as the greater evil, don’t they? Doris Hogg provokes the same response. She’s already suffered some revenge, but will she ever pay all her dues?’

‘Mr and Mrs Hogg aren’t able to present their side of the story,’ the director said. ‘How d’you know you haven’t been hoodwinked into believing a pack of wicked, stupid lies? How d’you know these children aren’t perpetrating an enormous fraud, encouraged by gullible police officers?’

‘If they are, Tony and Arwel won’t derive any benefit from it, will they?’ Griffiths said. ‘And Gary’s in no fit state to hoodwink anyone.’

‘Gary Hughes made a substantial statement which will be permissible as evidence,’ McKenna said. ‘He understands the shame and desperation which drove Tony to open his arteries and bleed to death, because he too was sold for sex by Ronald Hogg. The market was there, Hogg could satisfy its demands, and the children had no means to resist his enterprise. He doubtless carried out similar operations in other children’s homes, before coming to this area.’

‘That’s a ridiculous assertion!’ the director snapped. ‘We do not employ criminals! Mr Hogg’s references were impeccable.’

‘He has no convictions, and his previous employer simply shifted the man and his nasty habits on to your patch. Par for the course, we understand.’ McKenna lit a cigarette. ‘People say he’s like a sect leader, and Gary talks of religious mania, of “strange men” giving Bible readings at Blodwel. One of these men took him away for the weekend, painted his toenails with purple varnish, and raped him until he collapsed in his own exhaustion.’ He dragged smoke in his lungs. ‘Gary’s tried to tell us about the unspeakable terror the children lived with, day in and day out. He’s so obsessed with the sound of feet, and even their smell, he makes you want to scream with nerves. He’d lie in bed, waiting to hear Doris’s feet slithering towards his room, or her husband’s heels clipping like gunshots, and his heart kept pace with the sound of them coming for him, faster and faster as they came nearer and nearer, leaving their smell on the carpet like Devil’s spoor.’ He frowned. ‘Didn’t someone once write about rooms of experience some people inhabit that no one else would ever want to enter?’