The Betrayal of Trust (18 page)

‘Please sit down. I was making some tea. I try to keep the day to its normal pattern even when I’m on night shift, otherwise there’s no logic to your life. I don’t suppose you do night shifts,
do you?’

‘Not officially but I still get called out.’

‘How do you like your tea, Superintendent?’

He waited on the camel-coloured sofa, his feet on a cream rug. The walls were off-white with a couple of bland landscape pictures and a pale-framed mirror. Blonde-wood sideboard. Television tucked into one corner. A glass-topped table with a few magazines, splayed out in a fan. The sofa had coffee-coloured
velour cushions. There was a tall plant in a china container beside the door. Show home. It was also very markedly a home without children or animals. It smelled faintly of vanilla.

He thought of his sister’s farmhouse, tumbled with children, cat and dog, books and papers, folders and files, games and rugs and coffee mugs, always clean, never tidy.

Katie Morris came in with a handled tray of
pale wood. China teapot, small china mugs, a plate of iced biscuits, arranged in a circle.

‘How long have you been at Bevham General?’

She set the tray down. ‘I trained there, did general nursing, then I went to the National Heart Hospital for two years and that was it. I became a scrub nurse, theatre sister. Then back home. I can’t see me moving again. And of course I met Dave.’

She poured
tea and handed it to Simon, then sat in the blonde-covered chair opposite to him.

‘But you came to talk about Harriet, didn’t you? This will sound awful but I’m just so glad you’ve found her – never mind the rest, I’m just glad. Not knowing, always at the back of my mind … Where is she? Is she OK? Can she be alive? If she’s dead, where have they put her? All that. This is something else to get
my head round but still …’

‘I think her father feels the same way.’

‘So would her mother. It killed her, you know. Indirectly, directly, whatever. Harriet disappearing like that killed her. I wish she could know. At least puts something to rest, doesn’t it?’

‘Would you mind telling me something about Harriet? What sort of girl she was?’

‘I said all that – you can find it in the files, surely?’

‘I can. But I’d like you to tell me about her now. Time can lend a different perspective and you gave that interview when you were shocked and upset.’

She set down her mug and leaned back. This was always the moment when Simon knew he must not prompt – must not say anything at all. He watched her. Her face took on a slightly distant expression as she brought Harriet Lowther to mind again and
tried to organise her thoughts. He looked out of the window. A few plants in pots or even a climber up the fence would have made it look less raw. Perhaps they had not lived here for long and this time next year it would be rich with colour and foliage – but he somehow doubted it.

‘Self-contained,’ she said now. ‘Everyone thought of Harriet as self-contained and maybe she was. In school, if she
came to tea with us … she was quiet. She worked hard. She wasn’t the cleverest by a long chalk but she was good at maths, though she couldn’t get her head round languages at all, so she got tapes out of the library and listened to them till she got better. That’s how she was. She loved music. And tennis. Most games actually but tennis was her real thing. Tennis. Music. Maths.’

She stopped and
leaned forward to pour more tea, offering the pot to Simon but he shook his head. She was still with Harriet. He didn’t want her to come back yet.

‘She was pretty self-sufficient. I mean, I was her friend, probably her best friend, and she got on fine with most people, but you always got the feeling she’d be just as happy by herself. Or with …’ She hesitated and looked at him.

‘Go on.’

‘It
sounds funny but, well, with older people … she liked being with adults. She liked my mum and other people’s parents, she liked most of the teachers. I don’t mean she sucked up to them or anything … she just liked to talk to them.’

‘Anyone in particular?’

‘I’m not sure. You know, I haven’t said this before … it’s only looking back that I wonder. I just sensed there was someone, some particular
friend.’

‘A boyfriend?’

‘I don’t know. No. It wasn’t that she ever said anything … the opposite really. But she’d say she couldn’t come into town after school or on Saturday morning because she was “doing something”. But she never said what. I don’t think it was a family thing or she’d have just said, wouldn’t she? I mean, she did sometimes say “I’m going to London with Mum and Dad” – that sort
of thing. But I just got the feeling this was different. I don’t know now. I could have imagined it. I probably did.’

‘Did she ever mention a boyfriend?’

‘Never. We all talked about boys – the ones at the Cathedral School, and at Burdon Hall – not at the Comp, we didn’t really know anyone there. A few people had boyfriends, but she didn’t. At least, if she did she kept it very dark.’

‘So what
makes you think there was someone – some friend she often saw?’

Katie shook her head. ‘I don’t know. I did ask her once … she said she wasn’t going straight home, she was meeting someone in town, and I asked who but she just – I think she pretended not to hear. Maybe you’d better just forget it.’

He did not reply. But he would not forget it.

‘I know you said everything about the day she disappeared
and we’ve got your original statement, but I’d like you to go over it again, if you would. Think yourself back – and try to remember it as if this were the first time you’d had to tell anyone. I know it’s difficult but –’

‘No. I owe it to Harriet. Everybody does.’

She sat forward and stared out of the window, not seeing what was there, seeing a different day.

He listened, waiting, waiting for
something else, something new, something previously forgotten, trivial, mentioned in passing, vital, but there was nothing and he knew it had been too much to expect otherwise.

Then she said, ‘I did wonder for a minute though – she said she was meeting her mother at the hairdresser’s in the square and they said it on the television, on the news. Her mother was saying it. “We’d arranged to meet
up at my hairdresser’s but Harriet never arrived.” So it must have been true. But … no, nothing.’

He waited, knowing that she was going to venture it, even so.

‘I just wondered if she was going somewhere else – meeting someone else. There was just something in the way she said it. Only – well, I was wrong, wasn’t I?’

‘Had she ever done that, to your knowledge? Told you where she was going but
actually planning to be somewhere different?’

‘If she had I didn’t find out. I said she was quiet and that’s true. But sometimes it wasn’t just quiet – it was closed up. Oyster-like. You always wondered what was going on inside her head. She made you feel like there was something. I’ve met people like that since – you get a feeling they’re carrying these huge secrets or have a fascinating other
life. Well, they’re not. They’re just not. What you see is what you get.’

‘But in Harriet’s case, perhaps not entirely?’

‘Perhaps.’

He always knew the precise moment. Something went click, as if they had come out of a trance, and that was it, back in the present, and you’d got everything you were going to get.

At the door, she said, ‘I’ve thought about her, you know, probably every day … it’s
always been there. So now I don’t have to wonder any more. If she’s alive, where she’s alive, why she … all of that. It’s done. That’s something, isn’t it?’

‘Yes.’ Simon walked to his car, down the path beside the neat, hedgeless, fenceless, flowerless front garden.

And it was. But how much?

He glanced back as he reversed. Katie Morris had gone in and the tidy crescent of new dolls’ houses
was empty again. No cats, no dogs, no kids. Nothing.

As he reached the turn his phone bleeped. He had switched it off while he was at Katie’s, knowing how a sudden ring could blow away something about to be remembered, or spoken, and then the whole interview was forfeited.

‘
You have one message. Message received today at sixteen eleven
.’

‘Simon.’

His hand tightened on the phone.

‘Sorry, you’re
obviously busy. But … if you still want to … I could. Maybe you can ring back? I could meet somewhere at half six …’ She paused, then said again hurriedly, ‘If you still want to. Oh, and I’m on my mobile – if you call back would you use this number?’

He called back.

‘
Hello. Rachel Wyatt. Please leave me a message. Thank you
.’

He didn’t leave one. He needed to think where they could meet. Not
anywhere in Lafferton. Not any of the country pubs he went to for the occasional lunch – there was always the chance of someone he knew being there.

Where? There had to be the right place. But he had still not thought of it when he turned into the station forecourt. Six thirty.

He checked his messages, looked in on the CID room, which was deserted, returned the files he had brought in and took
out half a dozen more. Left again.

He was home just after five.

It came to him in the shower, a picture of the place clear in his mind. But not the name, not the damned name.

He took out a clean pale blue shirt, the dark blue needlecord jacket. No tie.

Burleigh Hall. It was like a coin dropping into a slot. It was a long time since he had been there.

‘Hello?’

‘It’s Simon.’

‘Oh. Yes.’

‘If you’d still like to meet …’

‘Yes. I would, yes.’

‘That’s good. Do you know Burleigh Hall?’

‘I think so.’

‘About three miles from Starly, going west. You drop down the long hill and after about a mile there’s the sign. Turn left and that’s the long drive up to the hotel.’

‘All right.’

‘There’s a quiet bar on the first floor. Or there was when I was last there. Rachel?’

‘Yes. Sorry.’

‘But if you’d rather not, just say.’

‘No. No, I wouldn’t rather not …’

‘Maybe when you see me you won’t feel the same.’

‘I don’t think so.’

‘No. Nor do I.’ He hesitated. ‘Is it OK?’

‘Yes. It’s good. Good feeling.’

‘I’ll see you soon.’

Good feeling. It was.

OLIVE DRUMMED HER
heels on the floor and when Lenny bent into the van for the third time to try and coax her to get out, Olive spat, first at the windscreen, then at Lenny.

For the past week she had refused to stay in one room but wandered about the cottage like a lost soul, from room to room, upstairs and down, and when Lenny had locked and bolted the front and back doors she had
kicked them.

She would not, or could not, wash herself and, when Lenny tried, she beat her fists. But then, once or twice, she had suddenly gone limp and quiet and crumpled to the floor whimpering and so Lenny had managed to get her clean.

Dressing and undressing were battles, and she had to be fed with a spoon but at the last minute would turn her head sharply or push it away so that food spattered
everywhere.

She followed her. In the end Lenny could no longer stand it. She had shut Olive in the back bedroom which had a lock and key. It gave her half an hour’s respite but then the banging and shouting and crying started up again.

Lenny hardly ate, hardly slept. She looked at herself in the mirror and saw an old, sour-faced, withered woman and hated what Olive had done to her. Hated Olive.

And now she wondered if someone else might have to come and drag her from the van. But then, miraculously, Olive looked at Lenny and stretched out both her hands, meekly, and Lenny
took
them. Olive looked round but without interest or expression on her face. Just looked, holding Lenny’s hand.

‘Miss Mills?’

The woman’s voice made Olive turn, and as she turned, she smiled and dropped Lenny’s hand.

‘I’m Moira Fison, the Sister here. Would you like to come and see the house?’

What was it? The pleasant, warm voice, the gentleness of expression, the way she spoke to Olive as if she was … was not …

Lenny watched.

‘Don’t worry about the bags and so on, someone will bring those.’

It was like arriving at a hotel. A tall young man in an overall was walking towards them and the Sister was indicating
the old van. ‘Miss Mills is in room 4, Andy.’

It smelled of new paint and carpet. The last place had smelled of urine and synthetic air freshener. It was quiet and seemed empty but very soft music played. Lighter Mozart. Lenny wondered if Olive would recognise it. She had come to hate music. When Lenny played the piano she made a droning noise, louder and louder and louder, until she had to stop.

They were going up the wide staircase, treading softly on the new carpet, Olive still holding the Sister’s hand and looking at her occasionally, smiling.

Unfair. Unjust. Unkind. She had loved her and looked after her and helped her for twenty-seven years, and now, she was the one Olive kicked and spat upon and railed against and fought, and this woman she had met two minutes ago was allowed to
hold her hand and lead her up the stairs, this woman was smiled at and trusted.

In the room, the bright, cheerful, comfortable room that smelled of the same new paint, new carpet, and had a window onto the garden, Olive sat on the bed and smiled, but not at Lenny. Smiled at the new woman and held out her hands and the woman took them. Lenny did not understand how this could happen, this instant
trust, how Olive could simply abandon her and turn to a stranger and smile, hold out her hands, become calm.

She went over to the bed and touched Olive on the arm. I’m still here. I’m here. Look at me, look at me.

Olive bent her head swiftly and bit Lenny on the wrist.

The Sister took Lenny downstairs, washed her wrist and sluiced it with disinfectant, covered it with a dressing.

‘This is
what happens,’ Lenny said, still angry, ‘this is what she does. She’ll do it to you too, she isn’t always docile.’

‘I understand. Is that comfortable?’