Hidden Depths (6 page)

She looked at the blank faces, waiting for someone to reply. Is it any wonder, she thought, that I’m not keen on delegating?

At last Ashworth spoke. Teacher’s pet again. Though she guessed they called him a lot worse than that when she wasn’t around. ‘No one saw anything unusual, according to the team who did the house-to-house.’

‘What about the car Julie remembers seeing in the street on Wednesday night?’

He looked at his notes. ‘It definitely wasn’t there at nine o’clock apparently. A woman was bringing her daughter home from Guides. She says she would have remembered.’

No one else spoke. There was a moment of silence. Vera was sitting on the edge of a desk, as fat and round and impassive as a Buddha. She even closed her eyes for a moment, seemed lost in meditation. They could hear distant noise from the rest of the building – a phone ringing, a hoot of laughter. She opened her eyes again.

‘If this wasn’t the father playing silly buggers,’ she said, ‘we have to consider what was going on at that crime scene. It was like a work of theatre. Or one of those art installations. Dead sheep. Piles of elephant crap. The sort of art where the meaning’s more important than what it looks like or the skill that’s gone into making it. We need to know what this artist was
saying.
Does anyone have any ideas?’

They looked back at her, rather like dead sheep themselves. And this time she couldn’t blame them. She didn’t have any ideas either.

It was Friday afternoon and the traffic on the dual carriageway leading from Newcastle to the coast was heavy. People had left work early to enjoy the sun. Windows down, music loud, the weekend had already started. Luke Armstrong’s father lived just off the coast road in one of the sprawling new housing estates on the outskirts of Wallsend. Vera knew it wasn’t her job to talk to him. She should leave the legwork to the rest of the team. How would they learn otherwise? But this was what she was good at. She pictured Julie Armstrong holed up in Seaton with her daughter and her memories, and she thought she wasn’t going to leave this to anyone else.

The house was a red-brick semi. It had a small patch of front garden, separated from the neighbour’s with a lavender hedge, a block-paved drive, integral garage. The developers had squeezed every inch out of this land which had once held three collieries, but the estate was pleasant enough if you didn’t mind communal living. It had been designed around lots of small cul-de-sacs so children could ride their bikes safely. Trees planted in the gardens were starting to mature. There were hanging baskets outside the houses, spotless cars on the drives. Nothing to sneer at, Vera told herself.

She hadn’t been sure Geoff Armstrong would be in. When she’d phoned there’d been an answering machine, but she hadn’t left a message. She’d just as soon catch him unprepared. She drove slowly down the street looking for the right house. It was three o’clock and the younger children were coming out of the primary school on the corner. Mothers waiting in the playground looked pink and dazed after an afternoon in the sun. Vera was standing on the step with her finger on the bell, when Armstrong walked into the drive. He was holding the hand of a little girl only just old enough to be at school. An ad-man’s dream cute kid – blonde curls, freckles, huge brown eyes, dressed in a regulation red gingham frock.

‘Yes?’ he said. Only one word, but spoken with that undertone of aggression which had scared Julie.

Before she could explain, the front door opened. A slight woman was framed in the doorway. She was wearing a dressing gown, blinked out at the sunlight, but wasn’t embarrassed to be caught like that. She knew she still looked good.

‘Kath works nights,’ Armstrong said angrily. ‘I finish early on Fridays so I can fetch Rebecca. That way Kath gets an extra hour in bed.’

‘Sorry, pet.’ Vera spoke to the woman, not to him. ‘No one said.’ She held out her ID so they could both see. ‘Can I come in?’

They sat in the small kitchen, leaving Rebecca in the lounge with juice, a biscuit and children’s TV. Kath put the kettle on then excused herself to get dressed. When Vera apologized again for waking her, she waved it away.

‘It’s impossible to sleep in when the weather’s like this. Radios in the gardens and the kids playing out. Anyway, this is important. Poor Luke.’ She stood for a moment in the doorway, then went upstairs. They heard her progress: footsteps, a cupboard being opened, the shower.

They sat on tall stools next to the breakfast bar. Vera thought they must look ridiculous. Two overweight gnomes on toadstools. ‘Did Luke spend a lot of time here?’ she asked.

‘Quite a lot, before he was ill. More than Laura. I thought she’d be excited when Kath had the baby. A little sister. But she seemed to resent her. Luke was better with Rebecca even when she was tiny.’

‘He hadn’t been here since he left hospital?’

‘No. Kath wanted to have him over to stay last weekend, but I wasn’t sure . . .’

‘You were worried about your little girl?’

‘Not that he’d hurt her, like. But that if he behaved strange, she wouldn’t understand.’ He paused. ‘I never handled Luke well when I lived at home. Pride, Kath says. I wanted a boy who was strong, competitive, good at games. Like me only better. I suppose I was ashamed because he was different from other lads.’

Vera thought he’d changed since he left Julie. Kath must be a civilizing influence. Or maybe she’d just taught him how to talk a good game.

‘You used to lose your temper with him.’

He looked up, shocked. He was a bereaved father. She wasn’t supposed to talk to him like that.

‘It was a bad time,’ he said. ‘I’d lost my job, no money, Julie and me weren’t getting on. Lately I’d been trying to understand him better. Then that lad he was knocking around with drowned and it freaked Luke out. No one could get through to him then.’

‘Did you visit him in hospital?’

‘Kath and I both went. I’m not sure I could have faced it on my own. First few times you could tell he was really doped up. I mean, I’m not sure he knew we were there. But even then he looked scared. He jumped whenever anyone came up behind him. When he got better we took him out for an afternoon. A pizza and a bit of a walk round Morpeth. He was more chatty then, but still very nervy. He kept saying it was his fault, that lad drowning. We got to the bridge, you know over the river by the church, and he really lost it. Shaking, crying. We’d only just got him calm when we arrived back at the hospital.’

‘Did he say
why
he was scared? Did anyone blame him for the boy’s death?’

‘He was never able to explain himself very well even before the breakdown. We asked, but questions only made it worse.’

‘You’d been to see him a couple of times after he came out of hospital?’

‘Yes, and he seemed better. He didn’t like to leave the house, Julie said. But he was more himself.’

‘His sister will have been glad to have him home.’

Armstrong leaned forward across the breakfast bar. His hands were hard and callused, the nails very short. ‘Aye, perhaps.’ He paused, seemed to study his fingers. ‘But it wasn’t easy for her. She found it hard to get on with Luke at times. Maybe she’s got too much of her father in her to make allowances. Maybe she was just fed up with him getting all their mother’s attention.’

They heard a door shut upstairs, more footsteps and Kath appeared. She was wearing her uniform and had put up her hair.

‘Is it OK? Or would you rather talk to Geoff on his own?’

‘Come away in,’ Vera said. ‘I’m just about to get to the hard bit. Could do with a woman’s common sense. Stop your man flying off the handle.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘I need to ask you both what you were doing when Luke was killed. That doesn’t mean I think you had anything to do with his death. But I have to ask. You do understand?’

‘Of course,’ she said.

‘Geoff?’

He nodded reluctantly.

‘I was at work,’ Kath said. ‘The gynaecology ward at the RVI. There were three of us on. It was frantic. A couple of emergency admissions from A&E. I didn’t even have time for a break. Geoff was here all night, babysitting Rebecca.’

‘Do you always work nights?’

‘I have done since I went back after Rebecca. It suits us. Geoff’s self-employed. Most of his work comes from a builder in Shields, Barry Middleton. Geoff does all his plastering and joinery. Barry’s well thought of and the work’s regular, but Geoff can suit himself pretty well, fit it in round the family, school holidays. He has Rebecca ready for school in the morning when I get in and Fridays he picks her up. It’s almost her bedtime when I leave for the hospital in the evening. Neither of us gets much of a social life, but it means Rebecca sees plenty of us.’

‘Did your daughter wake up the night Luke was killed?’

The question was directed at Geoff, but it was Kath who answered again. ‘She never wakes up! She’s a miracle. She’s slept through since she was six weeks. Once she’s in her bed you don’t hear from her till seven the next morning.’

There was an awkward silence. Almost as she spoke Kath realized the implication of her words. ‘But he wouldn’t leave her,’ she cried. ‘You’ve seen what he’s like with her. He’d never go away and leave her on her own.’

‘Geoff?’

‘I didn’t leave her,’ he said. She knew he was controlling his temper, to prove to her and to Kath that he could, that he didn’t lose it any more. ‘I couldn’t even go to the end of the road without imagining things. That the house was on fire. That she was sick. I wouldn’t do it. Anyway, I could go to see Luke any time. Why wait till the middle of the night?’

‘Right, then,’ Vera said. ‘Now that’s out of the way, we can move on.’ Though it wasn’t out of the way. Not really. He could have got someone in to sit with Rebecca. Or if he was desperate enough he could have left her whatever he claimed in front of his wife. She’d get the team chatting to the neighbours tomorrow. Check if anyone was called in to babysit, or if anyone saw his car moved from the drive. She took a breath. ‘Do you have any idea who might have wanted to kill Luke? Julie said he had no enemies, but a mam always thinks her bairn can do no wrong. I need something to work on here. Somewhere to start.’

From the living room they heard the little girl singing along to a rhyme on the television. Vera didn’t know much about children but thought it must be unusual to get one this undemanding. It was a very different household from the one in Seaton where Luke had grown up. This was calm, ordered. The family lived by routine. Julie needed a bit of drama in her life to get through the day. Vera kept her eyes fixed on the adults, waiting for them to speak.

‘Luke could wind you up,’ Armstrong said. ‘He didn’t mean to. He just didn’t understand what you were saying to him. You’d ask him to do something and he’d look at you like you were the daft one for expecting him to catch on. I can imagine that getting him into bother. Some of the people he mixed with, they were used to being treated with respect.’

‘Like the Sharps?’

‘Maybe.’

‘Did the Sharps blame Luke for their son’s death?’

It seemed Armstrong needed time to think about that. ‘I don’t mix with them,’ he said at last. ‘I wouldn’t know. They’re not famous for their patience, though, are they? And our Luke would have tried the patience of a saint. If one of them had asked him what happened that night Thomas died, Luke wouldn’t have been able to answer. He’d get stressed, flustered. The words wouldn’t come out and he’d just end up staring. Like I said, that would wind you up. Even if you didn’t believe Luke was responsible, it would still make you mad.’

‘Not mad enough to go round to his house and strangle him,’ Kath said.

Armstrong shrugged. ‘I can’t think of anyone else who’d want to kill him.’

‘Did Luke ever talk to you about the accident?’

‘Not the accident itself,’ Kath said. ‘He came here soon after it happened. He talked about all the flowers that had been thrown into the river afterwards. How pretty they were. He’d gone with Julie and seemed really moved by it. There was a picture on the front page of the
Chronicle.
He brought it for me to see.’

Rebecca appeared at the kitchen door. She stood shyly, curious about the stranger.

‘Do you mind starting on the tea, Geoff?’ Kath said. ‘I need to get ready for work.’

She followed Vera towards the front door. In the kitchen Geoff had switched on the radio and he and Rebecca were singing along to a pop song.

Vera had dozens of questions. She wanted to know how Kath and Geoff had met. What had she seen in him? How had she seen the potential doting father under the loutishness and the anger? But that was probably just prying and none of her business and she contented herself with a single comment. ‘I was told your man had a bit of a temper,’ she said. ‘No sign of that now.’

Kath paused for a moment, reaching out towards the door handle. ‘He’s happy,’ she said. ‘There’s no reason for him to get angry any more.’

Vera thought that sounded a bit glib. Too good to be true. But she didn’t push it. She had an appointment, someone else to see.

Lying in the bath, the window open a crack, the water deep and very hot, Felicity found herself brooding on the past. She wasn’t given much to introspection and wondered what might be the cause of it. Peter’s sixtieth birthday perhaps. Anniversaries occasionally had that effect. Or a menopausal moodiness. Meeting Lily Marsh had unsettled her. She was jealous of the young woman’s youth and vitality, the firm skin and flat stomach, and she had envied her independence.