Dying to Know (A Detective Inspector Berenice Killick Mystery) (17 page)

Much later, as she lay next to him in bed, the events of the day played through her mind. She wondered whether Tobias was badly scalded. She remembered how calm Liam had been. She remembered the lab, how Liam had reached up and dried Tobias’s tears. She remembered his warmth, his grace.

She
saw in her mind the glances cast between Virginia and her husband. ‘You’re my priest,’ the woman had said, staring straight at him. As if that gives her the right, Helen thought, to have him on her arm at the police station tomorrow… and the way he’d agreed, too, so quickly, not a moment’s hesitation, agreed to give up his morning to her, I can’t think why…

He’d
been silent on the walk home from Virginia’s. The moon had been high in the sky, almost full, and they’d walked along the sea front. The tide had been a long way out, a murmuring blackness in the distance. The pebbles on the beach shone in the moonlight, the railings sparkled at their side.

She
could have raised it then. It’s nice of you, she’d have said, this visit to the police station.

But
he’d only have repeated the same excuse about being her priest.

And
you’re my husband, she wanted to say, now, lying next to him.

She
wasn’t sure whether he was asleep or not.

‘Are
you awake?’ she murmured to him.

‘Hmmm?’
He shifted, his back still turned towards her.

‘The
name in the book,’ she said to him. ‘It’s Van Mielen.’

She
waited, but he didn’t reply, and a few moments later she heard him snoring.

*

The phone was ringing, sharp through grey daylight. Helen, instantly awake, blinking, stumbling down to the landline in the study, aware of the drizzling dawn against the windows.

‘Hello?’

‘ – the vicarage?’ the voice said, a man, and Helen realized it was Liam.

‘Yes.
Hello. It’s me.’

‘Oh,
Helen, thank God….’

‘What?
What’s happened?’

‘I
didn’t know who to tell,’ he was saying. ‘Virginia just called me, terrible state, it’s Alan, you see, they’ve found him… He’s dead, Helen. He fell from Hanks Tower.’

‘Alan
– ’

‘Yes,
the Professor. Anyway, the God-awful thing is, Tobias is missing. No one’s seen him since last night, Virginia swears he went to bed, but this morning, no sign of him, bed not even slept in, he must have crept out during the night…’

Helen
listened, the phone held tightly to her ear. Outside the guttering dripped, its rhythm making rivulets against the window’s edge.

Chapter Twelve

‘Look.’
Berenice slid the photograph across the desk.

Mary
picked it up. ‘That man…’

‘Clem
Voake.’ She snatched the image back. ‘Bad-boy Dad of Lisa Voake.’

‘Where’s
that taken?’

Berenice
handed her the image again. ‘CCTV from the back of the industrial estate on the Faversham Road. There are lock-ups there. The boys reckon that whatever was stolen from the warehouse raid is being stored in them. They think it’s weaponry, sawn-off shot guns.’

‘Maybe
it’s the kid,’ Mary said. ‘Maybe she’s an expert in overseas armaments markets.’

Berenice
shook her head. ‘Nah. Not her.’

Mary
sighed.

‘There’s
no need to look like that.’ Berenice smoothed a hand over her hair. ‘I’m right about this.’

‘You
weren’t right last time. That butter-wouldn’t-melt blonde kid from Pudsey, and there you are seeing him as a child in need, talking to social services, and all the time he’s coining it…’

‘
- He was still damaged.’

‘Putting
his own mother on the game. In the end it was the mother who needed the social worker…’

‘I
want this Lisa away from that man. And I want that man brought in for questioning.’

‘We
need more than just feeling sorry for his kid.’

‘We’ll
get it. We’re watching the lock ups now – Enter,’ she added, as there was a knock at the door.

‘Ma’am.’
DS Ben Conway stood there. ‘Another death, on the beach…’ He was pink-cheeked with nerves. ‘Thing is, it’s the Prof. From the lab. Dead. Same as the other one. His car at the tower, just the same. The tide was lower, he hasn’t been in the water so long.’

‘Two
– two physicists?’ Mary stared at him.

He
nodded.

‘Bloody
Nora.’ Berenice whizzed her office chair across to her desk.

‘Antimatter,’
Ben said.

She
looked up from her computer. ‘Yeah?

He
pulled at his earlobe. ‘What I mean is, both the deceased were working on it.’

‘I’m
only a copper, not bleeding Stephen Hawking.’ Berenice eyed him. ‘And now you’re going to tell me it’s not rocket science, is it?’

Ben
seemed to relax. ‘Rocket Science is quite easy, actually.’

She
looked at him. ‘Studied it, have you?’

‘Just
a bit. In the first year.’

Mary was trying not to smile.

‘Bloody
graduates.’ Berenice shuffled the papers on her desk. ‘Still, for once having a physicist on the team might be helpful. For the first and last time in my career, I reckon.’

‘I
didn’t finish my degree, Ma’am,’ he said, still blushing. ‘Once I decided I wanted to join the Job – ’

‘Very
wise,’ she said. She took the papers he handed her, riffled through them.

‘Threats
to the lab,’ he said.

‘Have
they had any more?’

‘There’s
one there addressed to Prof Moffatt.’

Berenice
held the plastic folder up. ‘So there is.’

‘There
was a lot of hostility to the lab round here. Talked about in pubs, you know.’

Berenice
narrowed her eyes. ‘The pubs I go to, DC Conway, no one discusses particle physics. Mostly we’re watching the football.’

Mary
laughed. Ben laughed too, nervously.

‘And what about the other one? Was there a direct threat to Maguire before he washed up on the beach?’

‘That’s
what we’re trying to find out, Ma’am.’

She
leaned back in her chair. ‘Good,’ she said. She looked at her watch. ‘I want everyone in the conference room. Five minutes. Make that ten.’

‘Same
old trouble?’ Mary said, as Ben left the room.

Berenice
stood up. ‘If they can find anti-matter, they can bloody well find a cure for cystitis.’

‘They’ll blame me.’ Virginia stared straight ahead, watching the to and fro of the windscreen wipers.

‘They
can’t blame you.’ Chad braked as the lights ahead turned to red.

‘Murdo
dead, Moffatt dead, and Tobias missing. I’m the only person at the centre of all that.’

The
lights changed. Chad joined the line of traffic heading into the town centre.

‘It
doesn’t make you a suspect. Just tell them what you know.’

‘I
can’t do that.’

There
was an odd certainty about her tone. He glanced at her. ‘Why ever not?’ he said.

‘Because
it will make it all worse.’ She folded her hands together in her lap.

Another
set of lights on red. The windscreen wipers tick-tocked against the rain.

‘Do
you want to tell me more?’ he said.

They
set off again, stop-start in the morning traffic.

‘It
would have been all right if she hadn’t come back. That woman. If she’d left us alone…’

‘Which
woman…’ but he knew the answer.

‘…
She’d just come to the lab from Geneva. And then everything goes wrong, everything…’ She glanced up at the window, ran a finger through the condensation. ‘She’s a minx that Elizabeth,’ she said. ‘Worming her way into Tom’s affections now too, I wish she’d never come back…’ She stopped, her lips pressed tight together.

‘It’s
her name in the book,’ Chad said, then wondered if he’d dreamt it, his wife telling him so last night, murmured words in the silent darkness.

‘Van
Mielen,’ Virginia said.

‘Yes.’

Virginia sighed. ‘I’m not telling them a thing, you hear me? It’ll make it all much much worse.’

Chad
pulled the car up in a parking space. The police station loomed ahead of them, muted in the rain. He switched off the engine and turned to face her. ‘Virginia…’

She
turned towards him. He saw her face, lined with pain. He saw a life lived in the shadows. Her eyes met his. He lifted a hand towards her, brushed her fingers with his own. ‘Even if you don’t tell them…’ he began.

‘What?’
Her hand went back to her lap.

‘Will
you tell me?’

She
gazed into his eyes. ‘That depends,’ she said.

‘On
what?’

‘On
whether you can keep a secret,’ she said.

‘I’ve
never tried,’ he said.

She
threw him a thin smile. ‘Never? You’ve never had to lie?’

‘No,’
he said. ‘Not that I can remember. Maybe as a child…’

‘You’ve
had a charmed life,’ she said. The warmth in her eyes faded. ‘Don’t let me spoil it.’

Once
again, the urge to take her in his arms. Instead, he looked at his watch. ‘We should go in,’ he said, reaching behind him for his umbrella.

They
crossed the car park in the rain. He held the umbrella over her head.

‘Two physicists. Murdo Maguire and now Alan Moffatt. Both hit over the head and pushed from Hank’s Tower.’

Berenice
surveyed the room. ‘And the sort-of step-son of one is missing. What have we got? How’s imaging going? Ray?’

A
crumpled man with thin grey hair got to his feet. ‘As of this morning, we think we’ve got the kid. If I may, Ma’am?’

She
gestured to the screen by her side.

‘Here
– ’ Click. On the screen, a fuzzy black and white image. ‘The sea front. You can just see the old lighthouse in the background…’ Click. ‘There. There’s someone, you can see him, approaching the old Scallop Tower.’

There
was laughter. ‘Showing your age, Ray,’ someone said.

‘Hank’s
Tower,’ Ray said, tight-lipped. Click. ‘There.’

The
figure was visible. Male, tall, slightly stooped. ‘Answers the description. You can see the lettering on his sweatshirt.’

‘And
the timing?’ Berenice leaned in to see the screen.

‘This
is 9.04 pm.’

Berenice
looked across the room. ‘Claire?’

A
brisk, white-shirted woman stood up. ‘Time of death is between 8 pm and anything up to about 4 am. The seawater doesn’t help, I’m afraid. But he was on the way out when he hit the water, that’s all we know. Bleeding from a severe blow to the head. It was low tide, his injuries are clearer than in the previous deceased. We’re doing more tests.’ She gave a brief nod, sat down again.

Berenice
returned to the screen. ‘So, this kid here. If it is the sort-of nephew, step-son, whatever. DS Ashcroft?’

‘Tobias.’
Mary spoke. ‘He worked at the lab. From what we can gather he was told last night that he was no longer needed and now he’s gone missing.’

‘Whose
nephew?’ someone asked.

‘Well,’
Mary clasped her hands together, ‘technically not a nephew. He’s the son of a cousin of Virginia, wife of Murdo Maguire, but the cousin died when Tobias was in his early teens, and Virginia took him in and raised him. He has some kind of learning difficulty, but seemed happy working at the lab, and from what we’ve gathered so far was very upset last night when Professor Moffatt told him he was no longer required. And this morning he’d gone.’

She
turned back to the photo. ‘And could this be him? Sighted by the tower?’