Singled Out (21 page)

‘I'm not surprised you were traumatized by what happened with your parents,' said Philip, when she was back at the kitchen table, ‘and I can see why you take it so seriously. But I really think you've got the whole business out of proportion with regard to Tom. Heredity isn't everything. Upbringing is at least as important – much more important, actually. And, anyway, the malign influence was only on one side of the family. Tom's father was –'

‘No,' said Laura. And to her amazement, she found she was telling Philip about Tom's father. She could see the surprise in his eyes turning to distaste as she spelled out the deliberate planning of her pregnancy, but still that did not stop her.

At the end she asked, ‘Does what I've told you make you think less of me, Philip?'

He looked uncomfortable. ‘I don't know about “less”. It certainly makes me think of you rather differently.'

Yes, of course. Philip was at bottom deeply conventional; news like this was bound to challenge his values. ‘What else could I have done?' she pleaded. ‘You were the only person I'd ever loved, was ever likely to love, and you weren't available. I wanted a child, and I wanted to get a child without any emotional involvement.'

‘Yes,' he said slowly, still trying to fit his mind around the new information. ‘Why did you want a child so much?'

‘To prove I could have one. To prove I could put the past behind me and start afresh. To break the pattern of heredity.'

She realized the irony of her words, given the current situation, and suddenly she was crying.

‘It'll be all right. Really, it'll be all right.' Philip stroked her shoulder. Laura felt a new hesitancy in his touch. She should never have told him. Philip would never be able to come to terms with her past. On top of everything else, she had now ruined the only good thing ever to happen in her emotional life. The tears ran more copiously down her cheeks.

When she was again calm enough to be coherent, Philip asked, ‘Putting the genetic business on one side, is there anything else that might make you suspicious of Tom?'

‘What kind of thing?'

‘Incidents of violence in his past, for example?'

‘No, none.'

‘Excessive interest in violence? Talking about violence? Writing about it?'

Laura shook her head. Then a chilling thought came to her. ‘There is something … something that might, I suppose, suggest a kind of obsession …'

‘What?'

‘Come upstairs. I'll show you.'

Philip put down the sheet of photographs with a grim shake of his head. ‘Doesn't look good. Hope to God the police never see this lot.'

‘Why?' Laura asked feebly. For the first time since her early twenties, she felt drained of will, a little woman dependent on the superior strength of a man.

‘Because,' said Philip, ‘this looks like the dossier of a violent obsessive. A collection of clippings about murders.'

‘But Tom's studying journalism,' Laura pleaded hopelessly. ‘This was just him researching his own background.'

Philip shook his head and pointed to the sheet of photographs. ‘Look, two of these women we know to be victims of death by strangling. Your mother … and now Emily.'

‘Actually, it's three,' Laura found herself saying.

‘Three?'

She pointed to the picture of Melanie Harris. ‘That was the woman who was killed by … Tom's father.'

‘Dear God! And to think there's also a picture of you in the same gallery.'

Laura felt suddenly cold. For the first time she believed the possibility that Tom was a psychopathic killer. And that she was on his hit list.

‘What about this one?' Philip pointed to the photograph of Pauline Spanier.

‘Means nothing to me. Don't know anything about her.'

‘Well, I think I'd better find out something about her.'

‘How?'

‘You forget, Laura, I'm deep into newspaper research at the moment. I recognize this typeface. It's
The Times
– well, the way
The Times
used to be.'

‘But you can't check through every single copy of
The Times
.'

‘I can narrow it down. The photo looks late sixties, doesn't it? And that'd fit in with the typeface. So I'll start there. Name might just possibly be in the index, anyway. I can do it in the London Library. They've got a complete set of
The Times
down in the basement.'

‘But what are you hoping to find?'

‘Won't know until I see it, will I? But at least,' he said with sudden vehemence, ‘I'll feel I'm doing
something
for you.'

‘You don't need to.'

‘I do.' His voice dropped, thick and intense, as he said, ‘I think you may be in terrible danger, Laura.'

Philip was unwilling to leave Laura alone and would only do so after Kent had rung back and arranged to come round. Then he called a taxi and caught an early evening train back to London. He would start work as soon as the London Library opened in the morning, he promised.

They kissed formally, like family members. It seemed incongruous that these two people had shared so much passion the night before. Philip had become brisk and businesslike, and Laura knew this was because he had not yet redefined his feelings. Providing her with practical help was easier at that moment than assessing what – if anything – was left of their relationship.

Kent, when he arrived, was not encouraging. He looked washed out, grey with tiredness.

‘Two detectives were round this morning. Looking for Tom.'

‘I know!' he almost snapped at her. ‘Of course I know. I'm working on the bloody case, aren't I?'

‘Oh. So you can tell me what they've got on Tom – what actual evidence?'

‘You know I can't discuss that, Laura,' he said testily. ‘It's just, given the complaint the girl made against him after the earlier attack, he's obviously the first person they're going to want to talk to.'

‘Yes. Look, Kent, if there's anything you can do –'

‘What do you mean – “anything I can do”? Are you asking me to pervert the course of justice?'

‘No, of course I'm not, but –'

‘Listen, Laura, I'm not going to pretend Tom isn't a suspect. I'm very sorry from your point of view, but that's the way it is. I hope to God he had nothing to do with the murder, but if he did the fact that he's what you'd call “family” becomes totally irrelevant.'

‘I know.'

‘If he's innocent, the best thing he can do is to come forward as soon as possible. The longer he stays in hiding, the stronger the suspicions about him become.'

‘I can see that.'

‘And you really have no idea where he might be?'

‘Absolutely none. For God's sake, Kent, don't you think that I'm at least as anxious to contact him as the police are?' He nodded wearily, accepting this. Laura felt again the prickle of incipient tears. ‘I just can't believe Tom'd be involved in anything like this.'

‘Can't you?'

That was all he said, but the two words had wide reverberations. Kent was telling Laura that he had no problems with the idea of Tom as a murderer. It would merely confirm his long-held views about the endurance of ‘bad blood'.

He didn't stay long, but assured her that her phone would be monitored and the house kept under discreet surveillance for the foreseeable future. Like Philip, Kent seemed in no doubt that Laura was seriously at risk. At risk from her own son.

She spent a miserable night. Though she was exhausted from the previous night's minimal ration, sleep eluded her. If she did doze for a few moments, she would quickly be jolted back to life, sweating from some terrible dream image. The waking images were no pleasanter. She felt nauseated, as if there were a physical pain inside her body, a real demonic foetus clawing away at the walls of her womb. The truth was even more hideous. Laura Fisher had actually given birth to a monster.

To be training a brand manager from a yoghurt company in the niceties of television presentation seemed so ridiculous in the circumstances as almost to be a sick joke, but that was how Laura spent the next day. Somehow she functioned. Smiles belied her real feelings. Words totally at odds with her thoughts managed to emerge from her mouth. Neither Andy nor the brand manager was aware of Laura's anguish, nor of the incredible slowness with which the minutes passed for her.

She didn't get away till six. A mournful drizzle had kept up throughout the day and the pavements truculently reflected the glow of headlamps and streetlights. Laura trudged up Brandon Hill and as usual cut across the park to her house. It was only when she saw the area cordoned off by plastic tapes that she realized she was passing the scene of Emily's death.

At the same moment, she was aware of a figure moving out of the adjacent trees and the sound of heavy footfalls behind her. She lengthened her stride, but the footsteps continued to keep pace. Even to get closer. Laura flashed a glance backwards and saw the heavy outline of a man hurrying through the shadows. He was only ten metres behind her. She broke into a run.

There was a muffled shout from the man and the pounding of his feet grew louder. Laura's soles slid on the wet path and she went flying to the ground. She sensed his closeness looming above her. A large hand clasped her shoulder.

‘You should take more care, young lady.'

She looked up. The man's face was shaded from the light, but his voice sounded benign. He helped her to her feet. His face proved to be as benign as his voice.

‘Why were you following me?' Laura gasped.

‘To tell you what a stupid thing walking across this park after dark is. Didn't you know a young girl was murdered here over the weekend?'

‘Yes, yes, I did know. Sorry, it was stupid. It's a journey I make so often, I just do it instinctively.'

‘Well, don't. I'm a police officer. I'm on duty watching the scene of the crime at the moment, but there won't always be someone here. Live near, do you?'

‘That house over there.'

‘Ah.' Recognition came into the policeman's eyes. ‘You're D.I. Fisher's sister.'

‘That's right.'

‘Don't you worry about a thing. We got men watching your place.'

While this was comforting, it was also something of a shock. Kent had meant what he said about surveillance. It showed how seriously the risk to her safety was assessed. ‘And is the phone bugged?'

‘Done today, that was.'

‘Did you break into the house or …?'

‘D.I. Fisher's got keys, hasn't he?'

‘Yes. Yes, of course he has.'

‘He'll see to it you're looked after, don't you worry. Useful brother to have, he is.'

‘Mm.'

‘No, you'll be safe, no problem …' The policeman wagged an admonitory finger ‘… so long as you don't do daft things like walking across parks after dark.'

‘I won't do it again.'

‘You better not.'

She couldn't see any evidence of surveillance when she went into the house, but the policeman had said it was there and she believed him. Maybe he himself had been part of it. Anyway, it didn't make her feel any different. Laura could not remember a time when she hadn't had the feeling that someone was watching her.

The panic in the park had left her even more unsettled. She tried without success to eat, and zapped between television programmes which her mind would not take in. At eight o'clock the phone rang.

‘It's Philip. I would have rung earlier, but I haven't got your work number and I don't even know what the place is called, so I couldn't get it through Directory Enquiries. Anyway, I've got something.'

‘Are you at home?'

‘What? Yes, yes, I am. Why?'

‘I'll call you back.'

Laura didn't know precisely what Philip had to say, but instinct told her to keep it from the police if at all possible. She unplugged the sitting room phone, took it into her study and pushed the lead into the fax socket. It was a reasonable assumption that that line had not been bugged. The police had been expecting suspicious calls from outside the house; they wouldn't be anticipating deviousness from its owner.

‘What the hell was all that about?' asked Philip.

‘Security. My phone line's being monitored by the police.'

‘So –?'

‘I've plugged into the fax. Think that'll be OK. Come on, you said you'd got something.'

‘Yes.' He paused. ‘I found the copy of
The Times
that girl's photograph came from.'

‘Pauline Spanier?'

‘Right.' Philip was again hesitant for a moment. ‘And it's bad news, I'm afraid, Laura … I mean, from the point of view of what we were thinking about Tom's obsession.'

‘Tell me.'

‘Pauline Spanier was also a murder victim. She was strangled.'

‘Oh God …' Sobs began to pulse through Laura's throat.

‘Her body was found in the central private garden area of a square in Mayfair. In 1967. To be precise, on the 27th of June 1967.'

The shock stopped Laura's sobs. That date had great significance for her. It was the day after she had got married.

‘It's preposterous,' said Kent. ‘You're just clutching at straws. Anything that'll get your precious Tom off the hook.' He sat opposite Laura in her sitting room, his body hunched defensively against her theory. The glass of wine she had poured stood untouched on the table in front of him.

‘It's not that.'

‘Yes, it is. I know you. You'd do anything for that boy.'

‘Maybe, but I wouldn't –'

‘And, incidentally …' Kent transfixed her with a pointing finger. ‘If you do hear from him, you make bloody sure you tell me straight away.'