The Sleeping and the Dead (17 page)

She didn’t know where to start. She would have liked to go back to the beginning, to her first meeting with Michael and the bonfire on the beach. She would have liked Arthur’s
opinion. He was an expert. But the friendship hadn’t developed to the stage of discussing ex-lovers. And besides, they only had three quarters of an hour for lunch.

‘Did you meet up with your friends?’

‘Yes, and I’ll go back. It’s broken the ice.’

‘But something happened?’

‘Yes.’ She sounded abrupt and ungrateful – Rosie on a bad day. She’d found it easier to talk to Marty. Arthur was a professional. The reassuring voice, the laid-back
manner, these were techniques he’d perfected. He listened to people’s confidences for a living. She felt resentful. She didn’t want to be one of his clients. Anyway,
wouldn’t he resent her spilling out all her fears in his lunch break? It was like asking a mechanic to check your brakes in his dinner hour. Still, she couldn’t stop now and she
stumbled on. ‘Did you hear on the news that a body was found in the lake?’

‘Exposed after the drought. Yes.’

‘I knew him. When I was at school he was my boyfriend.’

There was a minute of silence. It was obviously the last thing he’d been expecting. ‘I’m so sorry.’ The response seemed genuine. But so, she supposed, would his
Monday-to-Friday compassion with the inmates.

‘The police think he was murdered.’

‘Can they tell after all this time?’

‘There’s evidence of a knife wound. Apparently.’

‘You went to the hills to escape all the crime and punishment thing here, then you ended up with that.’

‘I know.’ She forced out a laugh. ‘As Rosie says, it’s shitty.’

‘How is Rosie? Is she giving you grief?’

‘No. She’s being a sweetie.’

There was a slightly awkward pause. ‘She seems a nice kid. Protective.’

‘She is. Usually. I’m sorry she was so prickly when you met the other night.’

He shrugged. ‘Understandable, isn’t it?’

A middle-aged waitress approached with the food. She had flat feet and they could hear her as soon as she left the bar. Arthur waited for her to put down the plates and retreat.

‘Just because it happened thirty years ago doesn’t mean you won’t go through the normal stages of bereavement. You’re bound to feel anger, guilt, all the usual
junk.’

Of course he was right. Hannah supposed she should be grateful. No one else had given her the right to mourn. But it wasn’t what she wanted to hear. It wasn’t any of his business.
She didn’t need a psychologist.

‘It was all a long time ago,’ she said briskly.

‘But you’ll have memories. Intense at that age.’

‘No danger of forgetting,’ she said. ‘The police are coming tonight to interview me.’

‘Whatever for?’

She was about to make a flippant remark. Something like – Perhaps they think I killed him. But that was too close to the truth. That was what really frightened her. She didn’t want
to tempt fate by saying it, even as a joke.

‘After all this time they can’t find out much about him. They haven’t even traced his family. They think I can help.’

‘Ah.’ That satisfied him. He hesitated. ‘Would you like me to be there with you? Not to interfere. Just for support.’

It was tempting. If she hadn’t dismissed his earlier kindness she would probably have accepted. But she’d decided the body in the lake was none of his business. She couldn’t
have it both ways.

‘No,’ she said. ‘Really. It’s just a few questions.’

She looked at her watch. It was time to go back inside.

When Hannah got in from work Rosie was in the kitchen and there was a smell of cooking. A wooden spoon hung over the edge of the bench and dripped tomato sauce on to the floor.
Pans were piled on the draining board. Hannah moved the spoon. ‘This is a surprise.’ A nice surprise. Since the end of exams, Rosie had seldom been there to share a meal with her.

‘I’m supposed to be at work at seven but if you want me to stay while the police are here I can phone in sick.’

‘Don’t be silly. You can’t do that.’

Usually they ate in the kitchen but Rosie had laid the table in the dining-room with the white linen cloth Hannah saved for Christmas and special events. It was a monster to iron but she
didn’t suggest changing it. Rosie proudly carried dishes from the kitchen – a tomato and aubergine casserole with a yoghurt topping, a green salad. She’d bought a bottle of
wine.

‘You should cook more often,’ Hannah said.

Rosie smiled.

Afterwards there was the usual scrabble for uniform and she ran off to work. Hannah watched her through the window. Rosie wore a thin hooded jacket which hardly kept out the rain and every so
often she looked at her watch and put on a spurt of speed. She ran like a toddler, legs flailing out from the knees. Then she disappeared round a corner and the house seemed very quiet. Hannah was
finishing the washing-up when the doorbell rang. There was wine left in her glass and she drank it guiltily before going to the door. Porteous and Stout stood outside. They wore almost identical
waterproof jackets. The sight of them – one tall and lanky, one short and squat – reminded her of a music-hall double act.

‘Come in.’ She had made sure the living-room was tidy before starting on the dishes. The gloom outside had made it seem almost dark and she turned on a table lamp.

‘On your own?’ asked Stout. He took off his jacket and waited for Hannah to take it.

‘There’s only my daughter and I. She’s at work.’ Usually she hated that explanation, but tonight it made her rather proud.

She offered them tea and was surprised when they accepted. She thought it wasn’t a good sign. They expected to be here for a long time. On the way to the kitchen she hung the coats in the
cupboard under the stairs. Stout’s smelled of tobacco and reminded her of the night in The Old Rectory when she’d learned that Michael had been stabbed.

When she returned from the kitchen with a tray the men were perched side by side on the sofa. They sat with their cups and saucers on their knees, looking all prim. Hannah thought they could
have been a committee of volunteers, perhaps organizing a charity jumble sale. She had sat on many such committees. It would have been more appropriate for them to interview her in the prison. That
was the natural home for what Arthur had called the ‘crime and punishment thing’.

‘I’m afraid we’re no further forward,’ Stout said. ‘We checked out your idea that Michael might have been in trouble when he was young. I know you thought he might
have done time in Yorkshire. But no joy. There is a youth-custody institution near Leeds . . .’

‘Holmedale,’ she said.

‘Holmedale, yes. It was a borstal in those days. But no one called Michael Grey was there in the years in question.’

‘I thought you said he must have changed his name.’

‘We’ve tracked down a couple of staff. There’s an officer who’s since retired and a senior probation officer who was a young welfare officer there at the time. No one
recognizes the lad you describe.’

‘It was a long time ago and they’d have worked with a lot of boys.’ She wondered what made her push it. Marty hadn’t known Michael either. Why was she so sure he’d
been inside?

‘Not many posh ones,’ Stout said. ‘Not many who go on to take A levels.’

‘We’ve been looking at boarding schools in Yorkshire too.’ Porteous gave a polite little smile as if to say – You see, we did listen to you, we did take your ideas
seriously. ‘Just in case Michael was telling the truth when he said he’d gone to school there. We started with boarding schools. If his father were a diplomat as you thought, that would
be his most likely education. Don’t you agree? We’ve been asking for a list of boys with the same date of birth as Michael gave to the dentist. We’ve tracked down every
individual. They’re all accounted for. No one’s gone missing. Of course, it’s an incomplete picture. Places close, records are destroyed. The team is working through the state
schools now.’

‘I see.’ She didn’t know what to say. Did he want a pat on the back for his thoroughness?

‘We haven’t found the mother’s grave yet,’ Stout said. ‘But that’s hardly surprising when we don’t have a name, a date or a place.’

That would have been the time to tell them about the cemetery by the lighthouse. It would be possible to explain it away as a stray memory which had returned. But the tone of Stout’s voice
frightened her. He made it clear he hadn’t believed her, that the story of the funeral was a fantasy she’d made up for her own ends. How would he accept she’d forgotten a detail
of such significance, something which might finally pin an identity on Michael Grey? The moment passed without her speaking.

‘So we thought we’d look at things in a different way,’ Porteous said. ‘From the other end, as it were. Not looking into Michael’s origins but into where he was
going. Or where you thought he was going. Because you didn’t report him missing either, Mrs Morton, and that does seem rather odd. You had been his girlfriend for a year. We’ve been
speaking to your friends, to teachers at the school, and everyone says you were very close.’ He gave a sympathetic smile. ‘Deeply, madly in love, someone said. I don’t think
you’d simply accept his disappearance. So he must have given you an explanation. Perhaps he told you the same story as he’d told the Brices.’

Hannah wondered which friends had been talking to him. The prose style sounded like Sally’s.

‘No,’ she said. ‘No story.’

‘Oh but there was.’ He sounded apologetic, as if he didn’t like to contradict her. ‘At least there was a story for the Brices. Unless they made it up.’

‘They wouldn’t have done that.’

‘So it was a story they believed, even if it wasn’t told to them by Michael himself. Let me explain. You were all sitting A levels. Michael’s first exam was art. We know
because we’ve spoken to the school. It hasn’t been easy but we’ve chased up some of his subject teachers. The art teacher is retired but still living in the area. Michael
didn’t turn up for the exam. He was one of the few pupils in the class predicted to get a top grade. It was a subject he enjoyed, so it wasn’t a case of last-minute nerves. The teacher
was frantic – perhaps Michael had made a mistake about dates. He phoned the number on the school record and got through to Stephen Brice, who was perfectly calm, who seemed bewildered by all
the fuss. “Didn’t Michael tell you?” he said to the art teacher. “He’s gone back to his father.”

‘If there was any other information given during the conversation the teacher can’t remember it. He assumed it was a case of family illness or bereavement. It must have been
something serious, he said, because Michael had been working hard for the exam and was determined to do well.’

Oh yes, thought Hannah, remembering lunchtimes in the art room, watching Michael, smudged with paint, working on his display. He was certainly determined.

Porteous set his teacup carefully on the coffee table. ‘You never heard that story?’

She shook her head. ‘I didn’t see anyone much at that time. I went in for the exams and straight home. As soon as the A levels were finished I left the area. I’d found a summer
job in a hotel in Devon. I didn’t even come back for the results. They were posted on to me.’

‘You must have noticed that Michael wasn’t around?’

‘Yes. I realized he’d gone. Back to his family, I thought. Dramatically. The way that he’d come.’

‘But you didn’t go to see the Brices, to ask what had happened, to get a forwarding address?’ Porteous was faintly incredulous.

‘No.’ She hesitated, unsure how much to say. ‘It was a bit embarrassing. We’d stopped going out with each other actually. I suppose I didn’t want them to think I
was chasing him. Pride, you know.’

‘A row, was there?’ Stout asked. ‘Lovers’ tiff?’

He said it casually enough, but then they both looked at her in a way that made her realize the answer was important to them. She sensed the danger just in time. Sally hadn’t just told
them how much in love she’d been.

Hannah matched her voice to his. Kept it light. Implying, You know what dizzy things teenage girls are. ‘I suppose so, but I’m blessed if I can remember what it was all about. Not
wanting to face the details, even after all this time.’

‘Serious though, at that age.’

‘Not as serious as passing the exams. That was our priority at the time. That was probably why we fell out.’

‘You were jealous of the time he spent studying?’

‘I think it was more likely the other way round.’

They looked at her. They were still sitting side by side on the sofa. It was leather. One of Jonathan’s affectations. It didn’t go in the room at all. Hannah thought of
Michael’s audition for
Macbeth
– Jack Westcott and Spooky Spence sitting in judgement on the red plastic chairs at the front of the hall. Porteous and Stout were sitting in
judgement too. They thought she was lying but they were trying to decide if it was because Michael had dumped her and she didn’t want to admit it, or because she had killed him. It was
impossible to tell if they’d reached a conclusion.

‘Why don’t you take us through the last couple of days of his life?’ Porteous said.

‘Is that possible? Do you know when he died? Exactly?’

‘Perhaps not,’ he admitted. ‘But we know when he disappeared. If we can believe the Brices.’

She was starting to panic. Incoherent thoughts pitched one after another into her brain. She forced out a reasonable voice. ‘It’s a long time ago. I’m not sure how much
I’ll remember.’

‘We can help you.’ Porteous leaned forwards so his elbows were on his knees. He clasped his hands. More like a priest than a cop. Or a counsellor. Not very different in tone from
Arthur. ‘There was a school play.
Macbeth
. I’ve seen an old programme. Mr Westcott has kept them all over the years. There was a photograph of Michael – we’ll call
him Michael for now, shall we? It’s different from the one which was in the paper. It’s rather faded and grainy, but it gives an impression. He was a striking boy.’ He stopped,
miming a man who’s had a sudden thought. ‘I don’t suppose you kept a photograph, did you?’