Bleed for Me (8 page)

‘Do you know his name?’

‘Danny Gardiner.’

‘How long has Sienna been seeing him?’

‘About eight months.’ Helen glances at me, looking for understanding. ‘I tried to put a stop to it because Sienna was only thirteen, but she was always sneaking out to see him. You can’t lock them up, can you? Sometimes I wish I could.’

‘How did Sienna meet him?’

‘Danny went to school with Lance - my son.’

‘Does he live local y?’

‘Somewhere in Bath. His mother works as a tour guide.’

The DCI presses her chin to her chest, choosing her words careful y. ‘Do you know what time Sienna got home last night?’

Helen shakes her head.

‘And you weren’t expecting your husband back?’

‘Not until Friday.’

There is a pause. I’m watching Helen’s body language, looking for signs of outright deception or omission. Shy and unadorned, she strikes me as a hard worker, private and uncomplicated. She must have been a beauty in her youth, but lack of sleep and a poor diet have spun the clock forward.

A few times I’ve seen her walking through the vil age dressed in clothes that might have been bought twenty years ago. She reminded me of a factory worker during the war, when women took over men’s jobs, wearing loose dungarees and oversized cardigans. It made her about as sexy as an older sister, but she went about her business with a quiet acceptance.

‘Who knew your husband was coming home last night?’ asks Cray.

She shrugs.

‘Sienna?’

‘I don’t think so.’

‘How did they get on - Ray and Sienna?’

‘Fine. They had their moments.’

‘Moments?’

Helen holds the cuffs of her cardigan in her closed fists. ‘You try to set boundaries. Kids try to cross them.’

‘Did your husband ever touch Sienna inappropriately? Did he ever give you any cause for concern?’

Helen’s face goes through a transformation from concern to amazement and then anger.

‘Not my Ray! He wouldn’t do something like that.’

Her features have become tighter and smal er, rushing to the centre of her face.

‘How dare you suggest - how dare you think . . . He hated nonces. He put them away.’

Cray reaches out and touches Helen’s hand. ‘I’m sorry. It’s something I had to ask.’

I know exactly what the DCI has done. Sienna is an obvious suspect who has yet to be interviewed. With one simple question, Cray has undermined one of her possible defences -

sexual abuse. Helen might change her mind later, but the impact of her future testimony wil be diluted, picked apart by the prosecution, made less believable.

Cray continues to talk softly, asking if Ray Hegarty had any obvious enemies. Had he argued with anyone? Did he have any money worries?

‘We have to interview Sienna, you understand?’

Helen’s gaze drifts past me to the hospital room.

‘You can be there or you can ask someone else - another adult to be with her. Someone like Professor O’Loughlin.’

‘My Sienna didn’t do it . . . she wouldn’t . . .’

‘Detective Sergeant Abbott is going to take you to Flax Bourton Coroner’s Court. Somebody has to formerly identify Ray’s body. Can you do that for me? I could ask one of your other children.’

‘No. I’l do it.’

Monk steps forward and picks up Helen’s handbag from the floor.

From the far end of the corridor comes the sound of a commotion, heavy boots and shouting. Lance Hegarty knocks over a young nurse who is trying to slow him down. Wearing a scuffed leather jacket and grease-stained jeans, his hair is shaved to black stubble that looks like a skul cap on his pale skin.

Monk intercepts him, hooking one arm across his chest, plucking him off his feet.

‘Get your hands off me, you black bastard!’

Helen yel s, ‘Put him down!’

Monk and Cray exchange a glance. It says more than words.

The DS releases his hold and Lance wraps his arms around his mother, stroking her hair with a tattooed hand. Then he looks at Cray, chal enging her.

‘What happened to Sienna? Did someone hurt her? Who did it?’

The DCI puts a hand on his shoulder. ‘Your father is dead. I’m sorry for your loss.’

‘You’re sorry?’

‘He was a fine man.’

‘He was a fucking monster!’

The words seem to detonate in the enclosed space. Helen puts her hand on Lance’s chest. Fingers spread. Calming him.

Lance looks at her. ‘What about sis?’

Cray answers. ‘Sienna is going to be just fine.’

‘Can I see her? Is she in there?’

Before Lance can reach the door, Monk bodychecks him.

‘Get this goril a away from me!’

The DCI rocks forward and digs a thumb into Lance’s ribs. He flinches and whines, ‘What was that for?’

‘That’s to remind you to show some respect, son.’

Lance gives her a denigrating sneer before lowering his gaze. I watch from the doorway as he approaches the bed. One look at Sienna and his anger evaporates. Reaching out, he tentatively brushes his fingers across her hand lying open-palmed on the sheet.

Sienna’s eyelids flutter.

‘Hey, kid!’

She smiles weakly. ‘You’ve never held my hand.’

‘Sure I have.’

‘When?’

‘When you were little and I took you to school.’

Sienna finds it funny and squeezes his hand tighter.

‘Did you hear about Daddy? I’m trying to be sad, but I’m not.’

7

Three fifteen. Waiting at the school gates with dozens of mothers and grandmothers. I’m the only male here beyond the age of Huggies. I tend to stand apart because I’m not good at making smal talk or remembering their names. I link mothers to their children: Jasper’s mum or Sophie’s mum.

One woman approaches. Young and pretty, with short auburn hair, she buries her hands in the pockets of a Barbour jacket, which looks two sizes too big for her. She’s probably a nanny.

‘Hel o, I’m Natasha.’

‘Joe.’

‘Your Emma and my Bil y are in the same class.’

She’s not a nanny after al .

‘And you have Charlie,’ she adds.

‘How do you know Charlie?’

‘My husband teaches at Shepparton Park.’

Before I can ask her husband’s name, the school bel rings and laughter and young voices fil the playground, jostling for their bags. It takes me a moment to spot Emma, whose schoolbag makes her look like a turtle walking on her hind legs.

I cal her name. She raises her eyes. There’s that smile.

She holds my hand - something Charlie doesn’t do any more. I loop her bag over my shoulder and shorten my stride.

‘How are things, Emm?’

‘Good.’

‘Learn anything to today?’

‘Mrs Graveney said we were getting a male teacher.’

‘Is that so?’

‘I thought the postman was going to teach us how to put letters in mailboxes.’

I try not to laugh. ‘That’s a different sort of mail.’

She looks at me crossly. ‘I know that
now
.’

We reach the terrace and Emma changes out of her uniform into a Snow White dress she has been wearing obsessively for the past two months. By now the neighbours wil think she’s strange, but it’s not worth arguing over. I’m sure she’s not going to be wearing it when she accepts her Nobel Prize.

I’m more concerned about her other ‘foibles’, which is a polite way of describing her neuroses. Last week she launched her dinner plate across the table because a meatbal ‘touched’

her macaroni. What was I thinking, putting them on the same plate!

I have learned some remarkable things since becoming a father and I appreciate how much there is stil to learn. I know, for example, that a pound coin can pass harmlessly through the digestive system of a four-year-old. I know that regurgitated chicken-flavoured ramen noodles and tomato sauce wil ruin a silk carpet; that nail polish sticks to the inside of a bath and too much beetroot turns a toddler’s urine a neon crimson colour.

There is also a mysterious person living in our house cal ed Notme, who is responsible for leaving wet towels on the floor, empty crisp packets on the sofa and chucking buckets of toys around the bedroom. I got so sick of cleaning up after Notme that I made a dummy out of old pil ows, dressed it up and hung a sign on his chest saying, ‘Notme’.

Emma thinks it’s hilarious.

When I discovered locks of her beautiful hair floating in the toilet bowl and more evidence in her bedroom, I demanded to know who did the cutting.

‘Not me,’ said Emma.

I looked at Charlie.

‘Wel , it’s not
me
.’

I went to the dummy. ‘Listen, Notme, did you cut Emma’s hair?’

Emma looked on nervously.

‘Notme says he didn’t do it,’ I announced.

‘Did he real y say that?’

‘Real y.’

‘Real y?’

‘Yes, real y.’

‘Oh.’

After that she confessed and took her punishment like a five-year-old.

Charlie won’t be home for another hour. In the meantime I make Emma a snack and listen to her sound out words on her spel ing list. Then she goes into the garden and chases Gunsmoke, wanting to tie a bonnet on his head. The Labrador lopes, stops, waits and lopes off again.

Julianne phones at a quarter past four. The trial has been adjourned. She’s meeting someone for a drink and wil be home at six-thirty. I listen to her voice and imagine that by ‘home’

she means coming back to me. It’s a nice thought, if hopelessly optimistic.

At five o’clock I turn on the news. A blonde newsreader with Bambi eyes stares unblinkingly from the screen.

A fire investigator today described how he found five bodies in a Bristol boarding house, three of them children, all belonging to the same family of asylum seekers.

The camera cuts to an equal y wel -groomed reporter, struggling to record a piece to camera as the wind tosses her hair.

Giving evidence at a murder trial at Bristol Crown Court, Fire Officer Jim Sherman told the jury that the house was well alight by the time the first fire crews arrived at the scene.

The family, who were all sleeping upstairs, were trapped by the blaze, except for Marco Kostin, aged eighteen, who managed to climb out of a second-floor window and jump to
safety.

Fire officers discovered traces of petrol in the downstairs hallway of the house and evidence that a fuel-filled bottle had been thrown through the front window.

The footage changes and reveals police manning barricades and forcing back protesters outside the court.

Amid extraordinary security, the three accused arrived at the court this morning where they were heckled by protesters and cheered by supporters. British National Party
candidate Novak Brennan waved briefly to the crowd as he and his fellow accused, Tony Scott and Gary Dobson, were led into court. Scott and Dobson are former BNP activists with
links to neo-Nazi organisations. All have pleaded not guilty to charges of murder and conspiracy to commit arson with the intent to endanger life.

Emma wants to watch something else because this is ‘boring’.

‘You might see Mummy,’ I tel her.

‘Why?’

‘She was there today.’

Her brow creases and she concentrates on the TV for twenty seconds, before announcing, ‘Nope, I can’t see her.’

Losing interest, she tries to wake Strawberry, who is curled up on a chair.

Charlie should be home. I try to cal her mobile but get her voicemail. Perhaps she missed the bus.

When the phone rings I’m sure it’s her. Instead a male voice asks for ‘Charlotte’s father’.

My insides seem to liquefy. Nobody ever cal s her Charlotte. He’s a constable from Bath Police Station and he begins explaining that Charlie has been arrested for assaulting a minicab driver and failing to pay a fare.

‘There must be some mistake. She’s on her way home from school.’

‘I’m holding her student card.’ He reads her ful name.

The rushing sound in my ears is partly relief. Mistakes can be rectified. At least she’s safe.

‘Where are we going?’ asks Emma.

‘To pick up Charlie.’

I put a coat over her Snow White dress and lace up her boots. I look at my watch. Julianne should be here soon. I decide not to cal her.

Bath Police Station is in Manvers Street, just up from the railway station. It takes fifteen minutes to drive, during which I have to field Emma’s questions, wishing somebody could answer mine. What on earth was Charlie doing?

I find her slouching on a plastic chair in the custody suite, schoolbag between her knees. The only other person in the room is a middle-aged Indian man holding a bloody handkerchief to his nose.

Charlie looks at me briefly and lowers her eyes to her scuffed shoes. She’s been crying, but the overriding emotion is frustration rather than sorrow.

‘What happened?’

Her answer comes in a rush.

‘I was going to see Sienna, but I didn’t have enough money. I thought I did, but it cost too much. And then he got angry.’ She points to the Sikh cab driver. ‘I was three pounds short.

Three lousy pounds. I said I’d get him the money. I gave him my phone number. My address. But he wouldn’t let me go.’

The driver interrupts. ‘She cal ed me a Paki bastard. Such a foul-mouthed girl. Truly terrible.’ His head wobbles.

‘He had his hands al over me!’

‘She broke my nose!’

‘I hardly touched him.’

‘She’s a thug.’

‘And you’re a pervert!’

A policeman intervenes. Constable Dwyer has gel ed red hair that makes his head look like it’s on fire. He wants to talk to me privately. I tel Charlie to be nice and to look after Emma.

She gives me a death stare - already accusing me of taking sides against her.

The constable explains the facts. The driver, Mr Singh, picked Charlie up from school during last period after she phoned for a minicab. He dropped her outside the Royal United Hospital, where Charlie couldn’t pay the fare. According to Mr Singh, she tried to run away and he had to lock the doors. She then assaulted him.

‘He has a security camera in his cab,’ says the constable.