The Various Haunts of Men (41 page)

But when Meriel led her into the drawing room where
people were having drinks, Simon was not the first person she saw. That was the
slim, slight, woman with whom Simon had driven up to his building on the night Freya had been hanging about outside it in the dark.

She felt nauseated as her stomach plummeted as though in a fast-descending lift. Simon was here, then, in some other room but about to return to this one, and to the woman who wore a plain grey cashmere jumper over a long darker grey skirt. She wondered how she could
leave, now, whether she could plead sudden sickness – which would not be entirely feigned – how she could get out without even seeing him.

Meriel had hold of her arm. ‘Freya, I don’t think you’ve met Cat?’

The woman smiled. It was an open, warm, welcoming, friendly smile. Freya hated her. The woman held out her hand.

‘Hello. I’ve heard a lot about you.’

Freya could not speak, she smiled and
shook the woman’s hand.

The woman laughed. ‘Oh, don’t worry … nothing bad, all good.’

‘Sorry?’ She managed the word. It sounded peculiar. It was in a foreign language.

‘I hear a lot about you from Simon.’

She imagined she must look as vacant as a fish in a tank.

Now the woman touched her shoulder. ‘You work with him, don’t you?’

She had not forgotten how to nod and then, somehow, words miraculously
came out of her mouth. Bubbles from the fish, she thought. ‘How do you know?’

‘God, this family is hopeless … Mother didn’t even
introduce you properly. I’m Cat Deerbon. Deerbon formerly Serrailler. Simon’s my brother.’

The room settled back into place.

Freya was introduced to Cat’s husband, to a large osteopath with a thick neck and to a tall and very beautiful woman in an enviable long coat
of printed velvet. The group, Cat Deerbon said, had been in the middle of discussing an article in that evening’s paper.

‘Not the psychic surgeon, by any chance?’

‘Yes. Does this mean the police are interested?’

‘No, no … or not officially anyway. I clocked it all the same.’

When they went into dinner, it was clear that the party was complete. Simon was not there. It was like being a child
again, bitterly disappointed at the cancellation of some treat, a teenager, instantly cast down by a cutting word from an admired teacher … and just as easily uplifted again. But not tonight, she thought, taking a forkful of gleaming fish terrine into which the coral of scallops had been beautifully studded. Tonight you enjoy who is here, you do not pine for he who is not. Tonight is for making more
new friends. Cat, she thought, glancing at her across the table. Yes, definitely Cat and not only because she was Simon’s sister, for all she did not look like him. Cat because she was warm and engaging, intelligent and quick, the sort of person Freya responded to immediately. For the moment, though, she had to attend to those on either side of her. She had been put on the right hand of her host
but at the moment, Richard Serrailler was going round the table pouring wine. Freya turned to her right.

‘We haven’t been properly introduced,’ she said.

He was probably in his fifties, with an immaculately
cut dark grey suit and, she noted, surprisingly elegant, well-manicured hands. Surgeon, she decided, and real not psychic.

‘Aidan Sharpe. How do you do? I take it you sing in the choir with
Meriel?’

‘I do. She took me under her wing …’

‘Meriel has a way of scooping people up and involving them in her doings. She wraps the wonderfully rich blanket of her world around them and before they know it, they’re manning a stall at the hospice bazaar.’

‘Funny you should say that.’

Freya finished her terrine. Her neighbour had cut his into the finest slivers, before picking each one up
carefully on his fork. Surgeon, definitely.

‘Are you a doctor?’ he asked.

This was the moment. Freya collected people’s reactions when she told them her job. She wondered if Simon did too. Some were shocked, some alarmed, some immediately began complaining to her aggressively about the rise in crime/lack of bobbies on the beat in their area/unfairness of traffic forces … others were avid for
inside information about almost anything to do with policing in general and CID in particular.

Now she looked Aidan Sharpe straight in the eye and said, ‘No. I’m a detective sergeant.’

His eyes widened fractionally but otherwise his expression did not change in the slightest. He was a good-looking man – would have been better without the goatee, Freya decided.

‘May I guess at your profession?’

He smiled. ‘I always enjoy this.’

‘Oh?’

‘Do you remember – no, of course you don’t, you’re
far too young … there was a television programme called
What’s My Line?
. People with unusual jobs were quizzed by a panel – I think they were only allowed to answer yes or no – and the panel was supposed to work its way towards discovering their job. They performed a mime at the beginning but that was
the only clue.’

‘OK. Do your mime.’

‘Lord … I don’t think I can.’

‘You must be able to.’

‘Could you? Locking a pair of handcuffs, I suppose.’

A girl in a white apron was going round the table, removing plates. Meriel brought in a huge casserole dish and set it down on the serving table.

Freya looked round at the faces of people talking and laughing in the warm candlelight. Nice, she thought,
good company, good food. Happy. Yes. But Simon … She turned back to her neighbour. ‘Come on.’

He sat silent for a moment, then put his thumb and forefinger carefully together and made a single, careful, almost delicate forward movement with them. Freya watched. It meant absolutely nothing and she said so.

‘In fact, I had you down as a surgeon. But if you are, then I don’t know what you were
doing then.’

He smiled again.

‘Are you a surgeon?’

‘No.’

‘Damn.’

And so it went on, a light-hearted, amusing exchange, which made her feel relaxed. After a few moments, and a pause while their plates were heaped with duck in a rich apricot gravy, Freya said, ‘OK, I give up.’

‘Sure?’

‘I shall probably kick myself for not getting it.’

‘Somehow I don’t think you will.’

‘Go on.’

Aidan Sharpe
gave her an almost flirtatious look. ‘I am an acupuncturist.’

They both laughed, Freya with astonishment, Sharpe with delight. ‘No one has ever guessed. Ever.’

‘I didn’t think much of the mime.’

‘No, I’m afraid it’s almost impossible to do one.’

‘Well, well. In that case, tell me what you think about this man Orford … the psychic surgeon – if you’ve heard about him.’

Aidan laid down his knife
and fork. ‘Oh, I’ve heard about him all right,’ he said, ‘and it makes me very angry. Forgive me if I become quite irrational at any moment.’

The conversation got no further for the moment. The vegetables came round and Freya turned to hand a dish to Richard Serrailler.

‘Thank you, Sergeant.’ There was no mistaking the heavy sarcasm. He turned away abruptly to pass the vegetables on, then picked
up his knife and fork.

‘I’m not on duty,’ Freya said lightly. ‘Freya is fine.’

He merely grunted.

Richard Serrailler was as handsome as his son, with the same nose and brow, the same straight forward-flopping hair, only grey. But his lean face seemed set in a permanent slight sneer and his eyes were cold.

‘I work with Simon,’ she said.

‘I could wish you didn’t of course. He may have told
you.’

Deciding to play both dumb and charming, Freya looked at him with widened eyes. ‘You mean you disapprove of me? But please explain why. You must have heard something derogatory.’

‘Nothing to do with you.’

‘Now I’m very confused. Do sort this out for me, Dr Serrailler.’

He did not offer the use of his Christian name, merely said, ‘My son should have been a doctor. He would have made a
decent one.’

‘He makes a more than decent DCI.’

‘Strange choice of job.’

‘No. Exciting, challenging. Dangerous. Important.’

‘You have a high opinion of yourself.’

If the man had not been Simon’s father she would have asked if he enjoyed being offensive, whether or not she was a guest at his table. Instead, she ate a mouthful of duck very slowly before saying, ‘How many doctors are there in
your family exactly?’

‘Seven living – four of us are now retired. Two generations behind us.’

‘In that case, you can afford to spare one son.’

‘That is for me to decide.’

‘Not for him?’

But Richard Serrailler had already turned pointedly to the man on his other side, the osteopath Nick Haydn. Freya ate, letting her rage subside. She wondered what had caused Serrailler to be so bitter, so
dismissive, so downright unpleasant.

‘Difficult,’ she heard Aidan say quietly.

She grimaced.

‘Don’t worry, my dear, it’s not you, it’s everyone. Forget it.’

‘Thank you for that.’

He smiled and reached out to pour her more wine but she put her hand over her glass.

‘Water?’

‘I can –’

But he was on his feet, and bringing the bottle to her from the other side of the table. The acupuncturist
might not be obviously and immediately attractive, even were she looking for an attractive man, but his manners and kindness were appealing after her brush with Serrailler. At the end of dinner, she made her way into the drawing room behind him, and went straight to where he had made a group with Nick Haydn and Cat Deerbon. Coffee and teapots were placed on two small tables.

‘I wanted to ask
you more about the psychic surgeon,’ Freya said. ‘Partly out of curiosity after reading tonight’s article, though there is a police angle as well, I’d better say.’

‘The person you should talk to is Karin,’ Cat said, nodding to the beautiful woman sitting next to Meriel Serrailler on the window seat. ‘She’s actually been to him.’

‘What?’ Aidan looked horrified.

‘Ask her. But it sounds very much
like an extremely clever magic trick … the sort that makes you blink, it’s so effective. I don’t think this man is actually doing anything other than conning people.’

‘That’s more than enough, isn’t it? Gullible people, vulnerable people … it’s snake oil again.’

‘I couldn’t agree more.’

Cat looked at Freya. ‘Has it anything to do with my missing patient?’

‘Which one?’ Freya asked levelly.

It was ten minutes to one before the party broke up.

‘Freya, here’s my home number,’ Cat had come out to her car, ‘do let’s meet up. I don’t have a lot of time,
what with job and family but I get half a half day and there’s always Sunday … maybe you could come to lunch then?’

Freya took the card with delight. It was something else, someone else, that drew her closer to Simon, a part of his family,
inviting her in.

She turned out of the drive into the dark lane. Meriel had kissed her on both cheeks and given her a warm hug. Richard Serrailler had shaken hands and said nothing, nothing at all.

There was a message on her machine from Nathan.

‘Evening, Sarge … message from the DCI. Case conference about the missing women. High priority. Nine sharp. Cheers.’

‘Good morning, everyone. I’ll get straight into it. As you know, we now have three women reported as missing in Lafferton.

‘May I draw your attention to the fact that until the disappearance of Angela Randall, precisely four women have gone missing from Lafferton in the last six years, and of those, one was subsequently found to have committed suicide, one was found dead of natural
causes, one eventually contacted her relatives, after having gone away of her own volition, and the fourth, an elderly lady with dementia, was found wandering and admitted to hospital. So when three women disappear without trace in a few weeks, we must regard it as highly suspicious.

‘Right. I want to know what we’ve got so far in the way of any links. Are there any links? Did these women have
anything in common?’

‘Well … the fact that they are women obviously,’ Freya said. ‘But they differ in age – one twenty, one fifty-three, one seventy-one.’

‘The Hill links two of them.’

‘Two of them live alone.’

Serrailler nodded. ‘Angela Randall is single and it appears has no close relatives. Mrs Iris Chater is widowed and lives alone. She has no children.’

‘Yeah, but Debbie Parker has a
dad and stepmum. I know they don’t live here but it breaks the pattern,’ Nathan Coates said.

‘The longer I look at it, the more it seems to me that they have nothing in common beyond their sex,’ Freya said.

‘What about that dog?’

The DCI looked blank for a second.

‘Jim Williams, sir,’ Freya said.

‘Oh, right, the man who last saw Angela Randall. His dog ran off. I can’t see how that’s relevant.
Dogs do run off.’

‘It disappeared without trace, on the Hill. So did Angela Randall, so, probably, did Debbie Parker.’

‘Possibly. OK, any other contributions? Anything at all.’

‘Angela Randall,’ Freya said thoughtfully. ‘I found an expensive pair of cufflinks, gift-wrapped and with a cryptic message on the card, in her wardrobe. When I checked with the jeweller in Bevham – Duckham’s – I found
out that she had bought a number of expensive gifts – a watch, a tiepin, a silver letter opener, things for men – from the same jeweller in the course of eight months or so. Now we know from her employer at the nursing home that she apparently had no close relationships, and from her neighbours that she never had visitors. So who were the expensive presents for? The gift card said, “To You, with
all possible love from your devoted, Me.”’

‘If there was a man in Angela Randall’s life he’s the only one in the case. Debbie Parker didn’t have a boyfriend, Mrs Chater lost her husband just before Christmas.

‘Let’s get another radio appeal out, another press conference. I’m going to get uniform to do a house-to-house for the whole of central Lafferton … We’ve done the streets in which all three
women live and the area around the Hill but I want this extended. We’ll get the divers into the river, and we’ll get every area of waste ground, every playing field, the lot. Saturation. I don’t want anyone in Lafferton to be left in ignorance of the fact that these three women are missing.’