The Cradle in the Grave (31 page)

‘Let me guess,' said Charlie. ‘When you told Simon that Grace Brownlee was invoking Leah Gould's eye-witness account as proof of Helen Yardley's guilt, he decided that talking to her couldn't wait any longer.'

‘If Proust finds out I covered for him, my life won't be worth living,' said Sam glumly. ‘What am I supposed to do? I told Simon no, unequivocally no, and he ignored me. “I want Leah Gould to look me in the eye and tell me what she saw,” he said. I should go to Proust . . .'

‘But you haven't.' Charlie smiled.

‘I ought to. We're supposed to be investigating Helen Yardley's murder, not something that might or might not have happened in a Social Services' contact centre thirteen years ago. Simon's more interested in finding out if Helen Yardley was guilty of murder than he is in finding out who shot her. If Proust gets even a whiff of that, and he will, because he always does . . .'

‘Sam, I'm not just sticking up for Simon because he's Simon, but . . . since when do you disregard the life story of a murder victim? Helen Yardley had a pretty dramatic past, in which Leah Gould played a crucial role, by the sound of it. Someone
should
talk to her. So what if it was thirteen years ago? The more you can find out about Helen Yardley the better, surely? About what she did or didn't do.'

‘Proust's made it clear what our collective attitude has to be: that she's as innocent and undeserving of what happened to her as any murder victim,' said Sam, red in the face. ‘For once, I agree with him, but it's not up to me, is it? It's
never
up to me. Simon flies around like a whirlwind doing whatever the hell he wants and I can't even pretend I've got a hope of controlling him. All I can do is sit back and watch events slip further and further from my grasp.'

‘There's something Simon cares about more than he cares whether or not Helen Yardley was a murderer, and more than he cares who shot her dead,' said Charlie, not sure she ought to be sharing this with Sam. ‘Proust.'

‘
Proust?
'

‘He was at the contact centre that day too. Simon's only interested in what Leah Gould saw because he wants to know what the Snowman saw – if he witnessed an attempted child murder and lied about it in his eagerness to protect a woman he'd already decided was innocent. Proust's the one he's going after.' Charlie admitted to herself that she was scared of how far Simon might go. He was too obsessed to be rational. He'd been up most of last night, apoplectic with rage because Proust had tried again to invite them for dinner. He seemed convinced the Snowman was trying to torture him by forcing an invasive friendship on him, one he knew would be anathema to Simon. It had sounded far-fetched to Charlie, but her doubts, when she'd voiced them, had only inspired Simon to flesh out his paranoid fantasy even more: Proust had worked out a new genius way to humiliate him, rob him of his power. How can you fight back when all someone's doing is saying, ‘Let's have dinner'?

Easily, Charlie had told him, desperate for sleep – you say, ‘Sorry, I'd rather not have dinner with you. I don't like you, I never will, and I don't want to be your friend.'

Sam Kombothekra rubbed the bridge of his nose. ‘This gets worse,' he said. ‘If Simon's going after the Snowman, I'm going after a new job.'

 

‘Where's Waterhouse?' was Proust's first question. He was arranging envelopes in a tower on his desk.

‘He's gone to Wolverhampton to interview Sarah Jaggard again,' said Sam. One he'd prepared earlier, no doubt. Charlie tried not to smile. ‘You didn't say you wanted to see Waterhouse, sir. You only mentioned Sergeant Zailer.'

‘I don't want to see him. I want to know where he is. The two are different. I take it you're up to speed on our case, Seargent Zailer? You know who Judith Duffy is?' Proust flicked the envelope tower with his finger and thumb. It shifted but didn't fall. ‘Formerly a respected child health expert, latterly a pariah, shortly to be struck off the medical register for misconduct – you know the basic facts?'

Charlie nodded.

‘Sergeant Kombothekra and I would be grateful if you'd talk to Dr Duffy for us. One pariah to another.'

Charlie felt as if she'd swallowed a metal ball. A faint groan came from Sam. Proust heard it, but went on as if he hadn't. ‘Rachel Hines could well be our killer's next target. She's vanished into the ether, and there's a chance Duffy knows where she is. The two of them met for lunch on Monday. I want to know why. Why would a bereaved mother have a nice cosy meal with the corrupt doctor whose fraudulent evidence put her behind bars?'

‘I've no idea,' said Charlie. ‘I agree, it's odd.'

‘Conveniently, Duffy and Mrs Hines are each other's alibi for Helen Yardley's murder,' said Proust. ‘Duffy won't talk to us, not willingly, and I was on the point of hauling her in unwillingly, but this strikes me as a better idea.' Proust leaned forward, drumming his fingers on his desk as if he were playing a piano. ‘I think you could persuade her to talk to you, Sergeant. Establish a bond. If it works, she'll say more to you than she would to us. You know what it feels like to have your ignominy splashed all over the papers; so does she. You'd know exactly how to approach her, wouldn't you? You're good with people.'

Pariah, ignominy – they were only words. They could have no power over Charlie unless she allowed them to. She didn't have to think about the events of 2006 if she didn't want to. Recently, she had been choosing not to, more and more.

‘You don't have to do it, Charlie. We've no right to ask you to.'

‘By “we”, he means me,' said Proust. ‘The disapproval of Sergeant Kombothekra rains down like an avalanche of tissue-paper, feather-light and easy to shake off.'

‘I knew nothing about this,' said Sam, pink-faced. ‘It's got nothing to do with me. You can't treat people like this, sir.'

Charlie thought of all the things she'd read about Judith Duffy: she'd cared more about the children of strangers than her own, both of whom had been sub-contracted out to nannies and au pairs so that she could work day and night; she'd tried to fleece her ex-husband when they got divorced, even though she earned a packet herself . . .

Charlie hadn't believed a word of it. She knew what trialby-media did for a person's reputation, having been through it herself.

‘I'll do it,' she said. The Snowman was right: she could persuade Judith Duffy to talk to her if she tried. She didn't know why she wanted to, but she did. She definitely did.

My mobile phone buzzes as I emerge from the underground. One message. A lifelong believer in sod's law, I expect it to be Julian Lance, Rachel Hines' solicitor, calling to cancel the meeting I've just travelled halfway across London to get to, but it's not. It's Laurie. I can tell straight away, because at first all I hear is breathing. Not heavy, not threatening – just the sound of him trying to remember which button he pressed, what he wanted to say and to whom. Eventually, his recorded voice says, ‘I've got the latest version of my
British Journalism Review
article for you, the one on Duffy. Yeah.' There's a pause then, as if he's waiting for a response. ‘Do you want to meet, or something? So I can give it to you?' Another pause. ‘Fliss? Can you pick up the phone?' The sound of air being expelled through gritted teeth. ‘Okay, then, I'll email it to you.'

Can I
pick up the phone
? No, you numbskull, I can't, not once it's gone to voicemail. How can Laurie Nattrass, recipient of every honour and plaudit the world can bestow upon an investigative journalist, not understand this basic fact of twenty-first-century telecommunications? Does he imagine I'm staring at my mobile disdainfully while his voice blares out of it, wilfully ignoring him?

Is this his way of saying sorry for treating me so shoddily? It has to be. There's no point debating whether I ought to forgive him; I already have.

I listen to the message eight times before calling him back. To his voicemail prompt, I say, ‘I'd love to meet or something so that you can give it to me.' Which might be the perfect casual-but-encouraging teaser, except I ruin it by giggling like a hyena. I panic and end the call, realising too late that if I'd only waited a few seconds, I'd have been given the option of re-recording the message. ‘Shit,' I mutter, looking at my watch. I should have been at the Covent Garden Hotel five minutes ago. I pick up my pace, weaving in and out of the convoy of shoppers, glaring at the ones that have enormous bags fanning out from their sides like batwings, ready to smack me in the arm as I hurry past. It's doing me good to be out, busy, surrounded by people. It makes me feel ordinary – too ordinary for anything bad or newsworthy to happen to me.

I expect Julian Lance to be wearing a suit, but the man I see walking towards me as I open the door of the Covent Garden Hotel is wearing jeans, tasselled loafers and a zip-collared sweater over an open-necked striped shirt. He's got short white hair and a square, tanned face. He could be anything from fifty to a well-maintained sixty-five. ‘Fliss Benson? I recognised you,' he says, smiling at my questioning look. ‘You had your I'm-about-to-speak-to-Ray-Hines'-lawyer face on. Everyone does, the first time.'

‘Thanks for seeing me on a Saturday.' We shake hands.

‘Ray says you're the one. I'd have met you in the middle of the night, missed Sunday lunch – whatever it took.' Having made clear his commitment to his client, Lance proceeds to inspect me, his eyes taking a quick head-to-toe tour. For once, I'm not worried about looking a state. I dressed this morning as if for court, as if I was the one on trial.

I allow Julian Lance to steer me towards a table with two free chairs at the back of the room. The third chair is occupied by a woman with dyed red hair with lots of clips in it, and red-framed glasses. She's writing in a ring-bound notebook: big, loopy scrawl. I'm wondering whether I ought to suggest to Julian Lance that he and I sit elsewhere, somewhere more private, when the woman looks up and smiles at me. ‘Hello, Fliss,' she says. ‘I'm Wendy, Wendy Whitehead.'

‘You know who she is?' Lance asks.

I nod, trying not to look flustered.
She's not a killer
, I remind myself.

‘Ray said you wanted to talk vaccinations, and Wendy's the expert, so I thought I'd invite her along, give you two meetings for the price of one.'

‘That's very helpful, thank you.'

I sit between the two of them, feeling totally out of my depth. Lance asks me what I'd like to drink. My mind is a complete blank; I can't think of any drinks, let alone one I might like. Luckily, he starts listing types of coffee and tea, which jolts my brain into action. I ask for Earl Grey. He goes off to order it, leaving me alone with Wendy Whitehead. ‘So, Ray told you I gave Marcella and Nathaniel their first vaccinations?' she says.

‘Yes.'
Their only vaccinations.

She smiles. ‘I know what she told you. “Wendy Whitehead killed my children”. She wanted to make you listen, that's all. When you're in the public eye in the way Ray was, nobody listens to you. You'd think it'd be the other way round, wouldn't you? Suddenly, you're a household name, you're all over the tabloids and the TV news – you'd think people would be hanging on your every word, eager to hear what you had to say. Instead, they leap to ill-informed conclusions, for and against, and start talking
about
you, telling more and more outlandish stories, whatever they need to say to liven up their boring suburban dinner parties: “I heard she did this, I heard she did that.” And your poor little story, your
real
story – that's just a distraction, getting in the way of the fun they're all having. There's too much for it to compete with, so it gets lost.'

I ought to be recording what she's saying. Will she say it all again later, if I ask her nicely? Will she say it to camera? ‘Rachel told me—'

‘Call her Ray. She hates Rachel.'

‘She told me vaccines killed her babies.'

‘Vaccines administered by me.' Wendy Whitehead nods.

‘Do you agree? Was that what killed Marcella and Nathaniel?'

‘In my opinion? Yes. Obviously I didn't think so at the time – I'm not a baby-killer any more than Ray is. If I'd had the slightest idea . . .'

Julian Lance sits down, indicates that she should carry on. I have the sense that the two of them know each other well. They seem comfortable around one another. I'm the one who's uncomfortable.

‘Anyway, I'm no longer a practice nurse. Many years have passed since I last injected a baby with neurotoxins. For the past four years I've worked as a researcher for a legal practice. Not Julian's,' she adds, seeing me glance at him. ‘I work for a firm that specialises in vaccine damage compensation claims.'

‘Marcella Hines was born two weeks prem,' says Julian Lance. ‘Babies are supposed to have their first jabs at eight weeks, their second at sixteen . . .'

‘It's changed now,' Wendy Whitehead tells him. ‘They've accelerated the schedule again, to two, three and four months.' She turns to me and says, ‘It used to be three, six and nine months, then two, four and six. The younger a baby is when it's vaccinated, the harder it is to prove it was destined to develop normally, if it has a bad reaction.'

‘Biologically, Marcella was only six weeks old when she had her first jabs,' says Lance. ‘Ray rang up and asked for advice, and her GP told her to proceed as if Marcella were a normal eight-week-old baby, so Ray did. Immediately after the injections, Marcella took a turn for the worse.'