Just What Kind of Mother Are You? (29 page)

She’s wringing her hands in a mad way now, and Joanne glances at her watch.

‘Anyway, that didn’t matter,’ she says. ‘I found it. But when I went to take the picture – oh, sorry, I forgot to say I was putting them on eBay, that’s why I needed the photo—’

‘I kind of assumed—’

‘When I went to take the picture, it wouldn’t work. The memory card was gone and I thought,
That’s strange
. There was no reason for it. And that’s when it hit me.’

‘That’s when what hit you?’

‘That it’s my husband. It’s my husband who has been taking those young girls.’

Joanne smiles at the woman in front of her and sighs.

‘Mrs Peterson, I think you may have jumped the gun a bit here.’

She shakes her head. ‘No. I found the memory card in the inside pocket of his coat.’

Joanne raises her eyebrows.

‘That’s why we moved to this area,’ Teresa Peterson says quickly. ‘We had to leave our home because he’d done it before. It was never proven, but Merv says mud sticks and so we came north when we saw the advert for a married couple to run the hotel.’

‘Which hotel?’

‘The George at Grasmere.’

‘Where are you from, Mrs Peterson?’

‘Ipswich. Suffolk.’

‘And your husband’s name is Merv?’

‘Mervyn Peterson. If you check, you’ll see he was taken in for questioning when a friend of our daughter’s claimed he photographed her.’

‘How old was she?’

‘Twelve.’

Joanne strains to keep her face blank.

‘He denied it, promised me it wasn’t true, and I believed him. But now I’ve found this.’ She removes a Sandisk 4GB digital card from her handbag and passes it to Joanne.

Joanne looks at her levelly. ‘What’s on this, Mrs Peterson?’

The woman starts to shake. ‘Pictures. Pictures of girls … it’s got sexual images of adolescent girls on it … and there’s a few of his mother. She was seventy last month, so we went down for a family get-together.’

‘The images on here, you’re quite sure that they’re not of your
daughter? Not personal photographs that she could have taken herself and didn’t mean for you to see?’

Teresa shakes her head. ‘It’s not her,’ she replies. ‘I’m certain.’

38

I
DROP
S
AM AT SCHOOL
, speak to Mrs Corrie, his teacher, about the Christmas fair, and agree to make a few batches of just about the only thing I’m any good at – courgette cake. I’m no cook, we know that. However, it’s basically the same recipe as banana cake but, for some reason, people are way more impressed by it.

Sam’s teacher mouths, tactfully, ‘How is Kate doing?’, to which I mouth back, ‘Okay.’

I rang the hospital last night and was told that, all being well, Kate would be home some time today. When I voiced my concerns about her state of mind I was told that she’d been evaluated and a community psychiatric nurse would stay with her on her return.

Mrs Corrie asks when I think Kate will be
back on her feet again
, the subtext being: Will she be in to help with the Christmas fair? Which is a ridiculous thing to suggest with Lucinda gone, and the state Kate’s in at the moment. But I know she’s only asking because they are going to be totally sunk without her.

Kate is the spine of school fundraisers, from which everything else hangs. Without her, the Christmas fair will be a disaster. No one will do as they promised. No one will bring in the prizes, the wine, the cakes, the games. Nothing will get done without gentle reminders from Kate. As it stands now, it will probably end up costing the school money even to throw the party.

The day is as grey as was promised. And as mild. There’s a noticeable rise in temperature and I have no need for my gloves, my hat. The exhaust on the car is still blowing, but I ignore it. It’ll have to wait.

When I get into work Lorna tells me she’s updated the website and that there’s a message on the answer machine to say Bluey will be returned some time later this morning. They have managed to collect the samples they needed. And there’s another message. A mad message from a frantic woman (who sounds drunk) in Grasmere. She needs us to collect a dog, urgently, because of a change in her circumstances, and she can’t get the dog to us herself because her car has been towed away. The dog is a Doberman.

‘Have you rung her back?’ I ask Lorna.

‘There’s no answer. She’s probably passed out. She left an address, though. Are you going to go up there?’

‘I’ll see how the morning goes.’

‘You look tired, if you don’t mind me saying.’

‘It’s not been the best week of my life.’

‘Want me to go?’ Lorna asks.

‘It’s okay,’ I say, and smile. ‘I’d rather be driving than cleaning out kennels … sorry.’

‘Worth a shot.’

Lorna’s done her hair with henna again and the dye has stained the skin behind her ears and at the nape of her neck. I don’t say anything. Her fingernails are brown as well.

‘How’s your friend?’ Lorna asks. ‘They found her daughter yet?’, and I shake my head. ‘Must be awful,’ she adds, and I feel something stirring softly inside.

I’m gazing over at the door deep in thought, Lorna saying, ‘Lisa, are you okay?’ a sympathetic tone to her voice.

‘What? Yes,’ I reply quickly. ‘Just need to get busy. How are those kittens doing?’

‘Only one left. I’ve christened him Buster.’

‘Buster’s good,’ I tell her, and go through to the back room to get started. See if I can syringe some food into him.

When I walk in I see Lorna has bagged up the last two kittens that didn’t make it through the night ready for collection, and hear the tiny mewling sound of Buster.

I reach down into the cage and pick him up. He’s jet black on his back, with a white chest and white undercarriage and a small, black, triangular patch of fur under his chin. It’s as if he’s wearing a dinner suit, like a tiny James Bond. He purrs as I lift him. I begin checking him for fleas and find two straight away. I grab the comb to get rid of them before starting on with the syringe. He’ll make it, I decide.

I check his gums – they’re a good, healthy pink – and his eyes are bright. ‘Make sure you live,’ I say to him, and he stares back at me wide-eyed and mischievous.

Then my mobile beeps in my pocket and I check the screen. My heart skips when I see it’s from Kate.

Thank you. You’re a life-saver!
reads the text, simply.

And I reply,
Any time
, and sigh.

She must be on her way home.

39

T
HREE SQUAD CARS
are on their way to the George Hotel at Grasmere to pick up Mervyn Peterson. Joanne is in one of them, and, at the moment, as they wind their way along the eastern edge of Lake Windermere, she’s stuck behind a fifteen-year-old Escort with a fish sign in the rear window. ‘Bad case of Christian driving,’ she says to Ron, and taps her fingers on the steering wheel.

This is the bit she lives for. The bit when she gets to string this fucker up by his testicles and deliver him to the courts for the abduction and repeated rape of three young girls.

She knows it’s him. She can feel it’s him. Teresa Peterson detailed the previous allegations against him as well as saying he went AWOL on Wednesday night – when Francesca Clarke was abducted. There’s little doubt in Joanne’s mind. She can’t wait to get him in the interview room.

Ron Quigley’s at the side of her, swallowing Rennies like Smarties, his right knee jumping and bouncing in anticipation.

‘What you thinking?’ he asks her.

‘I’m imagining slapping the cuffs on and holding the bastard down with my knee.’

A fine drizzle has begun to fall as Joanne glances across to the lake. Beyond, the Langdale Pikes are obscured by cloud and the lake itself is granite-grey. Still plenty of snow around on the
banks for now, but it’ll all be melted soon enough. The whole place is in monochrome.

‘Be good to get a conviction before Christmas,’ Ron muses, and Joanne agrees.

She asked Teresa Peterson about the thing that’d been baffling her most about this case. ‘Where could he have taken the girls? Where could he have taken them without being seen?’

Teresa had shrugged. Said she had no idea. So Joanne told her about Molly Rigg. ‘Molly said she could smell laundered sheets and the room was painted cream. She said it was bare.’

And Teresa Peterson had blanched white before answering, ‘The hotel has a couple of cottages on the grounds. They’ve not been rented out for a while, we only open them up when we’re busy.’

‘Can you see them from the hotel?’ Joanne asked, and Teresa had shaken her head.

‘Not really. They’re off to the side of the main building. No one’s got any reason to go near them when they’re not being used.’

Joanne had reported her findings to DI McAleese and the scene-of-crime boys were on their way.

They drive through Ambleside and Joanne tries flashing her lights at the Escort in front to signal for it to pull over – it’s doing less than twenty miles an hour – but the woman driving is oblivious.

She presses hard on the horn while Ron waves his arms around in the passenger seat and finally the woman pulls off to the right towards Rydal Mount – Wordsworth’s house when he wrote ‘Daffodils’. At last Joanne’s able to put her foot down.

Ten minutes later and there’s the sound of gravel crunching and pinging in the wheel arches of the Mondeo as it pulls up outside the George Hotel, followed by the two other squad cars. ‘Let’s hope the lovely Mervyn is at home,’ Ron says, climbing out.

They herd into reception. It’s a huge, oak-panelled space, a stag’s head on the far wall, big oak staircase.

Joanne approaches the young skinny girl with blue-black hair who is behind the desk. Warrant cards are flashed, voices are kept hushed and the girl informs them in a Spanish accent that Mr Peterson is currently with the fire officer up on the third floor. ‘You like, I call him for you,’ she says flatly, and Joanne says, No – thanks, but they’ll go up and find him for themselves.

DI McAleese leads and Joanne follows closely, with Ron and a couple of uniforms behind her. The hotel is overheated and the air is thick with the smells of newly laid carpet and furniture polish. The stairs turn at a right angle and a balding guy carrying a briefcase pauses to let them pass. ‘Something happened?’ he asks McAleese, who’s about to continue on but then changes his mind.

‘You a guest?’ McAleese asks him.

The guy says, No, he’s the fire officer.

‘Have you just been with Mervyn Peterson?’

He nods. ‘I’m on my way to inspect the pool area. Peterson’s finishing taking some notes in room eleven. Top of the stairs, turn right, end of the hallway.’

McAleese sprints up the stairs two at a time. Adrenalin floods through Joanne’s blood as she does the same. They are so close now. She can hear the rush of bodies behind her as she moves. At the top she begins breathing hard. She thinks about whipping her parka off but there’s no time. McAleese is striding ahead of her.

Room eleven. The door is closed. McAleese puts his ear to it, pulls a face to signal there’s no sound from within, and bangs on the wood. ‘Police. Mr Peterson, open the door.’

Nothing.

‘Get ready,’ McAleese whispers.

Joanne’s heart is beating in her throat.

McAleese gestures for Joanne to push down on the handle. Silently, he counts with his fingers: one, two, three.

They burst in, McAleese into the bedroom, Joanne heading straight for the bathroom. Then the wardrobe.

‘It’s empty, boss,’ she says.

‘Next room.’

Ron is sent to check the fire escape while one of the uniforms radios to the officers left downstairs to cover the exits. Strange, Joanne hadn’t expected Mervyn to run. She’d formed a picture of him in her mind as the type of cocky bastard who would stand his ground, try and bullshit his way out. She hadn’t had him down as a runner.

She knocks on the door of room nine. ‘Police!’ she shouts; doesn’t wait for an answer.

The first thing she sees is a pair of calf skin loafers hanging off the end of the bed.

Joanne takes four paces forward and sees his face for the first time. ‘Mervyn Peterson?’

Instantly it’s clear to Joanne how he managed to get those girls into his car. He has a most beautiful face, but her eyes don’t stay on it for long.

He smiles at her, sitting up, ‘You’ve caught me red-handed,’ he says, yawning. ‘I was just about to have a sneaky … nap.’

‘Boss, he’s in here!’ Joanne shouts towards the door. ‘Room nine.’

She hears the pounding of feet, and Mervyn looks taken aback.

‘Heck,’ he says emphatically, ‘whatever is the matter? Has something terrible happened?’ His eyes are shining and he’s smirking like he’s Terry-Thomas caught in a sticky situation with the law.

‘Save it,’ Joanne says, and DI McAleese is at the side of her.

He casts his eyes over Mervyn and his expression falters.

Mervyn’s trousers are bunched around his ankles and his semi-erect penis lies flat across his stomach. He coughs and watches Joanne’s reaction as his dick twitches twice. Bouncing playfully on his flat, taut stomach.

‘Mervyn Peterson, I am arresting you on suspicion of—’

Seconds later, Joanne tells Mervyn Peterson to put it away and to get dressed. So that she can cuff him. She fixes the cuffs tighter than she ought to and leads Mervyn out of the room by his elbow.

As they make their way along the corridor towards the stairs, covered in front and behind by her fellow officers, Mervyn leans in close.

‘I saw you looking,’ he whispers in Joanne’s ear, his voice singing with delight. ‘I saw your face when you found me.’

And Joanne replies, deadpan, ‘Did you.’

40

‘N
O COMMENT
,’
REPLIES
Mervyn smugly. He glances at his solicitor, who nods once in response. Mervyn is wearing a clean, thick-cotton Italian shirt, which he insisted on bringing along with him to the station, as well as clean socks and underwear. ‘In case I get searched,’ he said.