Fragile Cord (20 page)

Their lifeless bodies waiting to
be discovered.

Maybe his DC’s guilt was
understandable, he conceded, but for a very different reason.

They
had
been too
late.

They were
detectives, but they didn’t
detect
anything. They merely picked up the
pieces,
after
the
tragedy, time after time after time.

Despite the fact that it kept him in
work Coupland hated that bad things would always keep on happening.
He’d once asked Joe, who had suffered enough hardship to last a
lifetime, why this was so. It was the only time he recalled his
friend stalling, as though for once he didn’t have an answer, yet
it was surely something he’d thought about, a dark voice that
counselled him in moments of doubt.

They’d been sitting on a bench
at Light Oaks Park, working their way through Joe’s roll-ups and
watching a group of small boys play football, the air thick with
concentration. They’d trudged along a well-worn path over lawns
displaying signs to keep off the grass. Joe’s face was covered in a
sheen of sweat, but from exertion, not anxiety. It was hard to
imagine he’d been up three nights in a row, unable to cope with the
recurring nightmares of his last moments on ship, of the last time
he’d seen Marie and Sophie.

He’d blown
smoke rings into the air, the corners of his eyes crinkling at a
passing toddler who ambled John Wayne style beside her mother. The
child slowed by the bench and pointed at the exhaled smoke,
mesmerised by the cloudy patterns, her rosebud lips shaped into a
perfect ‘Ooh’. Joe pulled the edge of his mouth into a smile,
turned to Coupland just as a cheer broke out and someone
shouted
Goal!

Maybe bad
things occur,
he answered slowly,
because it’s the only way we can recognise good
when it happens.

By the time
the tribute band had finished murdering the best of the Gallagher
brothers Coupland was pulling into the car park of the Evening
News, his mouth down turned in distaste. If there was one thing he
hated with a vengeance it was the press. Bloodsucking leeches,
earning their money through trading in other’s misery. He
remembered one time, turning up to tell a young woman she’d been
made a widow, only to find a reporter had got there first. The hack
had also managed to mention that her husband hadn’t been alone when
his car had driven off the road – did she want to make a comment?
Coupland had burst a blood vessel; the insensitive bastard was
already working the street by the time he’d arrived, asking the
neighbours if they’d been aware of any trouble in the couple’s
marriage. Keying the twat’s car hadn’t been enough, gave him no
satisfaction at all. Only later, when his fist had made contact
with the tosser’s jaw, did his temper begin to subside. Coupland
remembered standing over him as he spat out broken teeth and
stringy blood, made a point of asking if
he
wanted to make a comment. The
reporter had cautiously shaken his head in reply, making a mental
note not to cross paths with the narky copper again.

Coupland made
his way to the archive room, intent on finding an article that had
gone to press six months before. A reporter from the paper had
called to give him heads up that he’d written an article on the
growing crime wave among young girls. Girls as young as twelve and
thirteen were resorting to handbag snatching, selling on credit
cards in return for a fix, or a wrap, or a bundle, whatever it was
that floated their pubescent boat. He was sure the girls who’d been
arrested for taking Melanie Wilson’s bag had been interviewed
anonymously in his article – maybe if Coupland found something
useful he’d give him an exclusive? Coupland had grunted his
agreement into his chin, scribbled the word
knob
into his notebook.

An hour later
and ignoring the stony looks from the bloke on the archive desk
Coupland ploughed through the micro-fiche records relentlessly
until he found the article and printed it out. What shocked him
most wasn’t the blatant cockiness of the girls whose pixilated
photos protected their criminal identity, nor was it their casual
attitude towards taking other people’s property. In a way he could
understand their bravado, for he had a damned good idea who was
providing them with local protection,
and
probably selling the goods on
for them as well. And it
was
the girls he and Turnbull had collared, the
tracksuits were the same, newer, the same fake Uggs finished the
look.

It was something else entirely
that jolted him.

‘I need to speak to one of your
reporters.’ He barked at the surly archivist, without bothering to
look up.

It was with
some degree of trepidation that Moreton pulled into the car park
close to the main entrance of Salford University.

She’d not
been back since the end of her first term, when she’d left in the
knowledge that she’d never return – as a student anyway. An
academic career hadn’t been for her. It wasn’t so much that she
didn’t enjoy the Psychology course – far from it – even now she was
fascinated by the vagaries of human behaviour; what made two people
react differently to the same set of circumstances. It was just
that the timing had been wrong. She’d just split up with Carl, felt
driven to start afresh in every aspect of her life.

Although the
topics she’d begun to study were fascinating, she’d been impatient
to embark on a new career. Conducting research into the conditions
of the human mind might well improve the way modern mental health
patients were diagnosed and treated, but it wasn’t for her, instead
she’d been drawn to the impact the mind – especially the conscience
– affected people at a fundamental level. She’d wanted to work with
people at close range, where her actions made a difference.
Policing had seemed the obvious answer, and for the most part she’d
had no cause to regret her decision.

But this
current investigation troubled her. Ate away at her insecurities
and affected her work, her judgement, her family life even. Tracey
Kavanagh’s actions disturbed her on every level: As a wife – the
ultimate betrayal of Angus’s trust, and then as a mother, a symbol
of nurture and love.

The case had
unsettled her, and something Coupland had said – about her needing
help – struck a chord more loudly than she’d cared to admit. All it
had taken was a couple of phone calls to track down an old lecturer
she’d particularly admired and a meeting had been arranged for
today. When they’d spoken on the phone he’d sounded pleased to hear
from her, interested in her choice of career.

Would he feel the same, she
wondered as she locked her Fiesta and made her way to the main
reception in the Psychology Faculty, once he saw the thinly veiled
mass of contradiction and uncertainty she’d become?

The Peel Building was
the oldest on campus. The Gothic style red brick structure sprawled
over four floors, its imposing design mocking the tower blocks
behind it, not yet thirty years old but already earmarked for
demolition. Walking up the stone steps towards the entrance she
felt for a moment as though she’d travelled back in time and was a
student once more, hurrying to her next lecture. Just for a
nanosecond she wondered if she’d made the right choice after all,
wondered how her life would have turned out if she’d finished her
degree. She pushed those possibilities out of her mind as she made
her way to the receptionist to confirm her presence.

‘While an unthinkable crime,
Alex, Filicide, or the murder of one’s children, is seen in many
countries around the world and in every social class. Although
child murder is not common, it is a leading cause of death in
developed countries, and when it occurs, the perpetrators are most
likely to be the child’s parents.’

They were seated in Professor
Robert Ansell’s office, a hodgepodge of a room lined floor to
ceiling with shelves laden with textbooks, research papers, and
periodicals. A cardboard box balanced precariously on the top of
his desk containing test papers, a stack of leather-bound
dissertations beside it were slightly off-kilter and were leaning
into the box, nudging it nearer the edge. A computer and monitor
occupied the only other remaining space. Family photos and academic
awards were displayed on the wall by the window. The professor’s
wife and a number of offspring smiled down at Alex as she sipped at
her tea, balancing the cup and saucer on her knee through lack of
any other available space. The professor had presented a paper on
Filicide at a Symposium in Milan the year before, and like most
academics, was only too pleased to demonstrate his level of
expertise in his chosen field.

In the eight years since she’d
last seen him time had been kind to him. He was much the same build
as she remembered – tall, wiry – and his passion for all things
sweet still hadn’t added anything around his middle. His taste in
clothing was as appalling as ever, garments worn for comfort and
warmth with little care for passing trends in fashion. One of his
daughters had called onto the campus once, when Alex was an
undergraduate – an attractive girl in her late teens, dressed up to
the nines – and Alex’d realised then that the professor probably
got as much ribbing for his poor taste in clothes at home as he did
in the faculty – and he clearly couldn’t have cared any less.

Looking at him now Alex was
grateful he hadn’t changed; the familiarity comforted her, the
knowledge that in a world that seemed to be spinning out of
control, some things remained the same.

‘Society is reluctant to accept
the concept of murderous mothers, Alex. The relationship between a
mother and her child is an especially tricky one to fathom where
Filicide is concerned,’ he went on, ‘this relationship is, after
all, the most pivotal one in life. Primordial, one could say. A
mother brings us into the world, suckles us, nurtures us in the
most critical early stages of our existence. For this reason and
this reason alone, the law is most reluctant to disturb, let alone
rupture this relationship – unless the trust which society places
upon her has been profoundly breached.’

‘You mean society will side
with the mother every time – until she does something to prove
otherwise?’

Ansell nodded.

‘But by then it could be too
late.’ Alex challenged.

A shrug.

‘Nothing’s ever simple, Alex.
There have been a number of large-scale studies into society’s
‘Unthinkable crime’, and a profile of offenders has identified
several distinct groups with their own characteristics and
motivations for committing this crime. A look at this study may
help your investigation.’

Alex nodded;
keen to hear anything that could help her understand
why.

‘Well, this is where it gets
interesting.’ Said the professor as he got up from his chair.
Ansell was a bundle of nervous energy, his larger than life eyes
blinked behind thick glasses. He opened his desk drawer and she
heard the rustling of paper. With a sinking feeling she watched him
pull out a report, which if its thickness was anything to go by
spanned several hundred pages. He offered it to her but she shook
her head.

‘Perhaps you could summarise,
Professor?’

Ansell smiled. Walking round to
the front of his desk, he straightened the pile of dissertations
before plonking himself down beside them and began:

‘One of the most prominent
systems to classify the different types of Filicide was created by
Resnick, back in the late sixties, based on 131 case reports from
world literature on child murder by both mothers and fathers, from
the end of the eighteenth century to the middle of the twentieth
century. The five categories in this system relate to motive, and
they are: Altruistic, Acutely Psychotic, Unwanted Child, Accidental
and Spouse Revenge.’

He glanced at her to check she
was still with him, and for the second time that day she was
transported into the past, this time inside the lecture theatre,
taking notes in a shorthand she never mastered. She nodded to him
to show he hadn’t lost her. Yet.

‘Resnick
describes Altruistic Filicide as murders committed out of love. In
Acutely Psychotic Filicide, the parent is suffering from a severe
mental illness or psychotic episode, whereas an Unwanted Child
Filicide occurs where a child is illegitimate, or his or her
paternity is uncertain.
Accidental,
is rather self-explanatory as is Spouse Revenge –
when one parent seeks to get back at the other, following
infidelity, for example.’

Alex remembered the news
headlines surrounding the trial of John Hogan, who, convinced his
wife had been having an affair threw his six year old son Liam off
the balcony of his holiday apartment in Crete in 2006 before
jumping 50ft with his two year old daughter Mia under his arm. She
was about to ask a question when Ansell, as though reading her
mind, held up his hand to silence her:

‘But wait – it gets more
complicated. Data suggests that most non-violent murders of
children under twelve years old are committed by mothers…’

‘So what is it,’ Alex asked,
‘that tips them over the edge?’

Ansell leaned towards his desk
and prised open the lid of a tin of travel sweets with one hand,
placing one into his mouth and crunching loudly. He held out the
tin to offer her one. She shook her head politely, waiting for him
to acknowledge her question.

‘I think we’re dealing here
with something more primitive, an innate desire to protect, or
remove, their offspring from a harmful situation – taken in the
extreme?’