Two
16 April
Detective Sergeant John Noble walked back through the light rain to his car and drove the short distance from the campus to Derby Constabulary Headquarters at St Mary’s Wharf. After parking his car, he lingered a while in the darkness, pulling out his cigarettes. He produced his notebook to peruse the few facts he’d gleaned from Caitlin Kinnear’s ex-boyfriend, a second-year undergraduate, recalling the scorn with which he’d been treated.
With a pen he wrote
Cocky slimeball
next to the name Roland Davison. He would have liked to write something more abusive, but DI Brook might see his notes, and Noble imagined his response.
Swearing is a symptom of a mind that’s not under control, John
, he’d say, before adding,
and control is what they pay us for
.
‘I bet
your
self-control would’ve taken a pasting, dealing with that . . .’ Noble halted in mid-sentence and lit up. If there was ever a time he’d needed Brook to cut a witness down to size, today was it. A few puffs later, equilibrium returned and Noble threw away his butt to head for the smoked-glass entrance, feeling calmer after his tobacco hit.
‘Do the paperwork and pass it on to the Northern Irish police. The PSNI can handle their own missing persons.’
He pushed through into the light and warmth. Seeing DI Frank Ford enjoying a joke with Sergeant Hendrickson at the reception desk brought him up short as they both turned towards him, their grins downgraded into mocking smiles. After a tough day, Noble needed to think, and hankered after the comfort of his office. But he knew from experience that Brook, the socially awkward outsider, scuttled away from these encounters, and Noble was determined not to feel uncomfortable in his own house.
‘John,’ said Ford, hailing him like a long-lost friend.
‘Sir,’ replied Noble, lingering to see if either of Brook’s most voluble critics had anything to impart besides abuse.
‘How’s life without the organ-grinder?’ grinned Ford, glancing at Hendrickson to register the desk sergeant’s approval.
Noble smiled mechanically. ‘Are you calling me a monkey, sir?’
‘More of a gopher, I’d say,’ said Ford. Hendrickson laughed at this.
‘Here to serve,’ retorted Noble cheerily. Deciding this was sufficient banter, he angled his frame towards the stairs.
‘Seriously, though,’ said Ford quickly, ‘when are you going to stop letting that oddball hold back your career?’
‘Sir?’ enquired Noble.
‘Got passed over for DI last time, didn’t you?’
‘In favour of someone else on DI Brook’s team,’ retorted Noble, his polite smile dimming at each of Ford’s barbs. ‘Sir.’
Ford’s eyes narrowed, the implication not lost on him. ‘Where is he? On the sick again?’
Noble stared at Ford and Hendrickson, their grins churning his stomach. Ford was referring to Brook’s mental breakdown while serving in the Met over twenty years ago. ‘Holiday,’ he managed to wrench out, though the smile was no more. ‘Back on Monday.’
‘I didn’t think Brook did holidays.’
‘He takes a week at Easter to walk around the Peaks, blow the winter cobwebs off.’
‘Does he?’ nodded Ford, composing his next witticism. ‘Yeah, I’ve always thought Brook was a bit of a walker.’ He winked at Hendrickson, who laughed again.
‘Yeah,’ said Noble, heading for the stairs. ‘He reckons it helps him think.’ He held the door, considering his two smirking colleagues. ‘Seems to work, judging by the number of cold cases he cleared last year.’
He let the door swing behind him and bolted up the stairs. He didn’t need to see Ford’s face to relish the sudden anger that would have distorted his features. Nor had he needed to add,
Most of them yours!
Still grinning, Noble booted up his computer to check his inbox and flicked on the kettle. Sipping hot coffee, he read an email about an impending court case that had been moved forward to Monday morning. He was required to give evidence and made a note of the time in his phone diary. That was next week up in smoke.
On the positive side, he was pleased to see a couple of prompt responses to his enquiry about Caitlin Kinnear. One, from a DS in the PSNI, carried Caitlin’s name in the subject line. The other, from a friend in Merseyside CID, referred simply to
Missing Irish girl
. Noble read carefully through both emails before pulling his notebook towards him and flipping to a new page to write down a checklist for the morning.
After a few more notes, he flipped back to the previous page, located Roland Davison’s name and wrote Check alibi, triple-underlining it before draining his coffee. He blinked wearily at the monitor, his gaze held. Something nagged at him. ‘Missing Irish girl,’ he mumbled, as though trying to work out its meaning. Repeating the phrase, he loaded the PNC database and typed it into the search engine, adding
Derby
to the tagline.
‘Jane,’ said Noble, pushing open the door to DI Gadd’s office.
A slim woman the same age as Noble looked up from her monitor. Smiling at first, she adopted an air of perplexity. ‘Sorry, who do you want?’
Noble sighed. ‘
Detective Inspector
Gadd.’
‘Inspector Gadd?’ She grinned at him. ‘Oh, that’s me.’
Noble laughed. ‘Not over the novelty yet?’
‘Not even close. What can I do you for?’
‘Bernadette Murphy. Disappeared three years ago. Staying at her aunt’s place in Darley Abbey. You picked it up.’
‘Remind me.’
‘Irish girl from Dublin. Staying with Mr and Mrs Finnegan on Bank View Road.’
‘Got it,’ said Gadd, nodding. ‘What about it?’
‘I picked up another missing Irish girl,’ explained Noble, feeling silly voicing it.
‘Caitlin Kinnear,’ said Gadd. ‘I saw it in the paper. Bit tenuous.’
‘I know,’ conceded Noble. ‘Humour me.’
‘As far as I can remember, it was a routine enquiry from the Garda after Bernadette failed to return to Dublin at the end of August. She left her aunt’s taking all her stuff with her.’
‘That would be early July three years ago.’
‘If you say so. She was on holiday, travelling around, so natural enough. The aunt thought she might have gone to London. I did a risk assessment and a twenty-eight-day review, but as far as I could tell, it was out-of-area and the Garda owned it. End of story. Still missing as far as I know. If there ever was a trail, which I doubt, it was stone cold by the time I came on board.’
‘So not worth me going round to interview the aunt.’
‘To Bank View, no,’ said Gadd. ‘By the time I got involved, the aunt and uncle had separated and she’d already moved out.’
‘Oh? Know why?’
‘If you’re thinking they broke up because Bernadette and the uncle were having it off, forget it,’ said Gadd. ‘He was on an oil rig in the North Sea.’
Noble shrugged. ‘Just a thought.’
‘Though there was something in the aunt’s manner that sent the wrong signal when I interviewed her.’
‘What?’
‘I’m not sure, but I suspect she and her niece might have had a falling-out, probably why Bernadette left. The aunt didn’t want to elaborate and I had no reason to go hard at it. Never heard another thing.’
‘Maybe the aunt killed her and buried her in the back garden.’
‘Not with her physique,’ said Gadd. ‘Or her stone-flagged garden. I can look up the file and email the aunt’s new address if you want to waste your time.’
‘I’d appreciate it. Inspector.’
Gadd grinned again. ‘Call me Jane.’
Two days later, Noble knew his testimony backwards. He closed the file for the impending court case and tossed it on to his desk. A mess of other papers was displaced by the file, some to the floor, and Noble picked them up. One was an enlarged photograph of Caitlin Kinnear, posing for her student union card. She had a nice face, short blond hair, green eyes. Full of the promise of a youth that was a distant memory to Noble, only just the wrong side of thirty.
For something to do, he pinned the portrait on to the corkboard and stared at it, then glanced at the file on his desk and pulled out his mobile. He began to dial Brook’s number, but stopped, realising the late hour; with Caitlin’s trail cold for nearly a month, he wasn’t even sure it was worth it. He thumbed out a text.
In court Monday. Need a favour. Speak tomorrow?
‘Prepare to get laughed at,’ said Noble. He logged off and pulled on his jacket. A second later, the theme from
The Rockford Files
blasted out from his phone.
‘What’s up, John?’ said Brook.
Three
20 April
Detective Inspector Damen Brook placed the tray on the freshly wiped plastic table, gazing about the bright food hall of Derby University, its various outlets barely open for business at ten in the morning. The hall was heavily populated, though most of the students were using it as a common area, sitting around without purpose, not drinking or eating, not even talking that much. Some nodded to unknown music feeding through headphones; others stared hypnotically at iPhones, thumbs scrolling furiously at the tablet for conversational titbits.
‘You’re that detective who looked for those missing students,’ said Brook’s nervous companion, sitting across from him.
Brook returned his attention to the first-year undergraduate, five years younger than his daughter. Laurie Teague was wide-eyed, with mid-length brown hair, slim and petite. Brook pushed her paper cup, half filled with froth, across the table, slid on to the opposite bench and took a sip of his watery tea.
‘That’s right.’
‘Is that why you get to look for Caitlin?’ she said. ‘You’re some kind of expert.’
‘On missing students?’ replied Brook. ‘No. I’m just a detective . . .’
‘Laurie,’ said the girl, staring through an external glass wall towards a covered courtyard beyond. Her fingers fiddled with a cigarette, but unable to light up, she caressed it in her fingers.
‘Laurie,’ repeated Brook, his smile awkward. Noble usually prompted him with the names he habitually forgot.
‘What happened to DS Noble?’
‘He’s busy.’
‘I see.’
‘I didn’t mean it like that,’ said Brook. ‘He had to go to court and didn’t want you thinking he wasn’t taking it seriously, so he asked me to speak to you.’
‘You’re his boss.’
‘Yes.’
She nodded. ‘Thought you’d found a body when I saw your ID.’
‘Don’t worry, we haven’t.’
‘I realise that, or there’d be a junior officer along to do the hand-holding when I go all girlie. At least that’s how it works on the telly. And it’s always a sow.’ Brook raised an eyebrow and Laurie lowered her head, her apology to her sex unspoken. ‘What’s happened to Caitlin, Inspector?’
‘There’s no proof
anything’s
happened to your friend.’
‘Something has,’ insisted Laurie. ‘She’s dead in a ditch somewhere.’
Brook considered her. She was nervous, affecting a worldliness she didn’t possess. ‘If so, her body would’ve been discovered by now. After all, it’s been nearly a month.’
‘And I only reported her missing last week. I explained that to Sergeant Noble. We’re just back from Easter recess.’
‘Which lasts two weeks,’ said Brook. ‘According to DS Noble, you haven’t seen Caitlin since the week
before
the holiday. March twentieth.’
‘We had a reading week,’ explained Laurie. ‘That’s when we read books for our courses.’
There was a slight emphasis on
read books
, and for some reason Brook had to stifle his indignation. As a policeman on a university campus, he should’ve known to expect such jibes, but this morning he was unprepared. ‘I know what a reading week is,’ he said quietly. ‘You said Caitlin was going home to Belfast.’
‘She has a sister in Belfast – Mairead. She took the train to Liverpool the next morning and then the ferry.’
‘Saturday the twenty-first,’ said Brook, darting an eye at Noble’s notebook.
‘Yes.’
‘For which she bought an advance train ticket.’
‘It’s cheaper,’ said Laurie.
‘But she never arrived at her sister’s house,’ said Brook, watching her reaction carefully.
‘So Sergeant Noble said.’
‘But you weren’t aware of that.’
‘No.’
‘Mairead didn’t call you.’
‘Why would she call me?’
‘Oh, I don’t know,’ said Brook, his tone betraying the opposite. ‘To ask why Caitlin hadn’t arrived, maybe.’
Laurie looked coldly back. ‘I don’t think Mairead even knows I exist. I’ve never spoken to her.’
‘What about Caitlin’s other friends?’
‘I’m her best friend,’ said Laurie. ‘If she gave Mairead any number to call it would have been mine. But she didn’t.’
‘That strikes me as odd,’ said Brook. ‘Sergeant Noble thought so too.’
Laurie stared enviously at two students lighting up in the courtyard. ‘Caitlin kept things separate, in compartments, so she could handle them more easily. That’s the way she was. It’s a Catholic thing apparently.’
As a lapsed Catholic, Brook’s interest stirred. He knew the impulse. A different face for home. ‘So she never got in touch during the holidays.’
‘Never. If she was in Derby she’d text. If she wasn’t . . .’ She shrugged the rest.
‘Not even a text from the train. Or to say she’d arrived safely in Belfast.’
‘Not a text, not a call, not an email,’ insisted Laurie. ‘It wasn’t Kitty’s way.’
‘Odd.’ Remembering his own reluctance to use his mobile phone unless he had to, Brook added, ‘For someone of your generation, I mean.’
‘No argument here,’ said Laurie. ‘I’ve known Kitty since September and at first it drove me mad. I’d text her over Christmas or half term and never get a reply, even at New Year. She said that when she was at home, she needed all her powers of concentration to slot back in; that if she divided her mind thinking about her life in Derby, she lost focus.’
‘On what?’
‘On behaving the way that was expected of her.’
‘Her family were very traditional.’
‘So she said,’ said Laurie.
‘And Caitlin didn’t want them to think she’d changed.’
‘If her parents got an inkling of how she lived in Derby, it might have caused problems, so when she went home she was . . .’
‘Playing a role.’
Laurie pointed a finger at him to confirm.
‘And in that way any binge drinking or casual sex couldn’t become an issue,’ probed Brook.
‘Don’t judge people like that.’
‘I’m not,’ said Brook. ‘It’s common for people who relocate from their home town to behave differently. The past is another country . . .’
‘. . . they do things differently there,’ said Laurie. ‘Yeah, I know.’
Brook smiled. Poetry-lovers were thin on the ground amongst his limited circle of acquaintances, most of them coppers. ‘So for instance, I’m willing to bet she never once went to church in Derby, but in spite of her pathological opposition to organised religion went willingly with her family in Ireland, am I right?’
‘Actually, you are.’
‘And,’ continued Brook, ‘leaving home gave her the freedom she craved, the chance to live the life she wanted.’
‘You sound like you know her,’ said Laurie.
Brook took a sip of tea. ‘She started losing her accent as well, didn’t she?’
‘As a matter of fact, yes,’ said Laurie, impressed. ‘It came back when she drank, though.’
‘The return of the unconscious self,’ said Brook. ‘What else did she say about her family?’
‘Nothing. She never mentioned them except to tell me Mairead’s name. That was all the detail she ever gave me. Except that her parents didn’t want her coming to university in England so Caitlin had to lie to them. She would have felt stifled living at home so she turned down an offer from Belfast but told her parents she’d been refused a place.’
‘So when exactly
did
you expect to hear from her?’
‘When she arrived back in England she usually sent a text. She should have been in touch the Sunday before summer term started. That’s when she was due back.’
‘April twelfth?’
Laurie nodded. ‘When she hadn’t turned up by Monday, I began to worry, started texting and ringing her, but her phone was dead. It still is.’
‘We know,’ confirmed Brook.
‘See, that’s suspicious, isn’t it?’
Brook didn’t argue. ‘So the last time you saw her was the night before she was supposed to leave.’
‘We were in the pub – the Flowerpot. There was a gig by a local band we wanted to see.’
‘And you were there for a couple of hours,’ said Brook, reading from Noble’s notes, ‘before Caitlin left.’
‘She’d been going at it pretty hard. She’d been off the booze for a spell and I think she was feeling it. She headed off to the toilet with a hand over her mouth like she was going to spew. The next thing I know, she texts me to say she’s walking home.’ Laurie’s lip began to wobble. ‘I haven’t seen her since.’
Brook hurtled into the next question. Dealing with the tearful was not the strongest part of his repertoire. ‘What’s she studying?’ he asked, careful to use the present tense.
‘International relations. She wanted . . . wants to travel.’
‘Anywhere in particular?’ said Brook.
‘Everywhere,’ answered Laurie. ‘She loved new places.’ She smiled at a memory.
‘What?’
‘I say she liked new places, but oddly, the thing she always loved most was the journey. We took the train to Nice last October and she enjoyed the travelling more than actually being there. She liked being on the move. She was funny like that.’
‘It’s the symptom of a sheltered home life,’ suggested Brook, this time wearing his experience on his sleeve. ‘You feel a constant urge to break away.’
‘I suppose.’ There was a lull in the conversation. ‘Where is she, Inspector?’
Brook was sombre. ‘We don’t know. DS Noble has been working with the PSNI in Belfast.’
‘What did they say?’
‘That Sergeant Noble’s call was the first they’d heard about it,’ said Brook. ‘You were the only person to report her missing. Mairead didn’t contact anyone when Caitlin failed to show up. Not even Caitlin. They checked her phone records. She didn’t text or ring to ask Caitlin where she was.’
Laurie was thoughtful. ‘I didn’t know that. That is weird.’
‘And, at first glance, quite suspicious,’ said Brook.
‘So her family are suspects, then?’
‘They were looked at, yes,’ said Brook, not wishing to exaggerate the quality of enquiries over which he had no control. ‘Especially Mairead.’
Something in Brook’s voice alerted Laurie. ‘But now she’s in the clear.’
‘If you can confirm why her sister might not take Caitlin’s no-show seriously, yes.’
Laurie looked at Brook and nodded. ‘Sometimes Caitlin was . . . unreliable. Is that what Mairead said?’
Brook confirmed it with a blink of the eyes. ‘In what way?’
Laurie hesitated. ‘She had . . . whims, sudden passions that she had to act on.’ Brook prompted her with a raised eyebrow. ‘She could go off for days and I wouldn’t see her. If she met a man, she’d . . . well, you know.’
‘No, I don’t.’ Brook finished his weak tea with a grimace. ‘Tell me.’
‘Well . . . she’d drop everything, put her life on hold for as long as the passion burned. It didn’t need to be a man. If she found a new band she liked, she’d head off the same day to see a gig, even if they were on tour, not caring if she missed lectures or seminars. They could be playing anywhere in the country but she’d just hop on a train without so much as packing a bag. That was Caitlin.’ She closed her eyes to self-admonish. ‘
Is
Caitlin.’
‘And how do you know that isn’t the case this time?’
‘I don’t,’ admitted Laurie. ‘Not for sure. I should have told the sergeant this, shouldn’t I?’
‘It might’ve helped,’ said Brook, closing the notebook with a snap.
‘I’m sorry. But I know something’s happened to her and I didn’t want him dismissing her as some flaky student. Her phone is still dead. It’s been a month without so much as a text.’
‘You said she may have met a man.’
‘I don’t believe it,’ insisted Laurie. ‘She wouldn’t. Not now.’
The force of Laurie’s rebuttal puzzled Brook. ‘What does that mean?’
Laurie hesitated. ‘Caitlin’s off men at the moment.’ She tried to avoid Brook’s searching gaze, then took a deep breath, casting around for a form of words before fixing him with a glare. ‘This has to stay between us.’
‘As far as I’m able to make that promise,’ said Brook, beginning to lose patience. ‘What happened? Boyfriend trouble?’
Laurie hesitated. ‘Caitlin had a . . . termination.’
‘She was pregnant?’ exclaimed Brook. A few heads turned at the raised voice.
‘No, I just said. She had a surgical abortion. A couple of weeks earlier and she could’ve taken a pill, but she missed it. We were at the Flowerpot celebrating . . .’ Laurie pulled up at her choice of words. ‘I don’t mean it like that. It was more like relief that it was sorted. Kitty was putting on a brave face, but I know she struggled with what she’d done because of her background.’
‘And the pregnancy was why she hadn’t been drinking,’ said Brook.
‘Yes.’
‘More facts we haven’t been given,’ said Brook, opening Noble’s notebook to write. He was beginning to feel annoyed. Worse, he was being forced to make his own notes.
‘It didn’t seem relevant at the time.’
‘Everything’s relevant,’ said Brook, squinting at a page. ‘She had an ex-boyfriend. Roland Davison. The father?’ Laurie nodded. ‘As far as you know.’
‘Kitty was no skank,’ protested Laurie.
‘You were the one who mentioned her passions,’ said Brook calmly.
‘That didn’t mean she slept around.’
‘So you say.’ Brook was stern now, assuming the position – push hard to get the best information. ‘According to your previous statement, she broke up with Mr Davison nearly two weeks before she disappeared.’
‘Sounds about right.’
‘Is that because he was opposed to the termination?’
‘The opposite,’ said Laurie. ‘He was all in favour. She broke up with him because he refused to get involved.’
‘Get involved?’ asked Brook. ‘How? Did she want money?’
‘No, nothing like that. Kitty took responsibility. That’s what she was like. She didn’t want a thing from Rollo except a little help and moral support, like go with her to the clinic and hold her hand, that sort of thing. But Rollo wouldn’t man up. He didn’t want to know. You know what men are like,’ she added with a waspish glare.
‘Vaguely,’ replied Brook. ‘Why didn’t you mention the termination to DS Noble? A seismic experience like that in a young girl’s life, a Catholic girl, at that. It’s what we call a stressor – an event that forces people to deviate from routine behaviour. Like now.’