The Reckoning on Cane Hill: A Novel (31 page)

‘I didn’t know.’

I turned my head to see that the woman was looking up at me. She had seen the poison on the bed too, and the need to disassociate herself from the material transcended whatever pain she was in right now.

‘I didn’t know. I swear I didn’t know.’

I started to say something in reply – I wasn’t even sure what – and that was when I felt the movement in the doorway behind me.

Sean

I know who did it

Sean took a deep breath, unlocked David’s front door and stepped inside.

It felt strange and wrong to be in his friend’s house without him. He’d visited before, of course, so he was familiar with the layout, and over the course of his career he’d done more searches than he could even begin to remember, but this was different. Remembering how beaten down David had looked in the interview room, this felt very much like an invasion. Not to mention that being here like this – in an official capacity, alone – brought it home to him how much trouble David might really be in.

He didn’t do it, though
.

Sean was quite sure that was true. Whatever was actually going on, he knew David, and trusted him. David was a good man. Over the years, Sean had known his partner tell a small handful of harmless lies, and none of them had come close to being convincing; lying just didn’t fit with him. Today, when Sean had asked if he was telling the truth, David had said yes and Sean had believed him. David hadn’t killed Leland and Thompson.

But that didn’t mean he wasn’t in real trouble. At the very least, his career was severely tarnished, and there was a good chance it was over altogether. That worried Sean. Without
Jamie, David’s career was his life. A policeman wasn’t just what he did, but what he
was
.

And that was really only the bare minimum of damage. If David was right that someone was trying to frame him, then that person had done a pretty good job of it so far. There was nothing to say that wouldn’t continue.

Come on then, David
.

Prove yourself right
.

Sean checked the details on the consent-to-search form, then headed through to the front room of the cottage. The phone was where David had said it would be, on the coffee table in the middle of the room, next to his laptop. It was an old model, and a bit battered and scratched, but it still seemed unlikely that a homeless addict like Carl Thompson would have owned it.
Not impossible, though
.

From David’s description of events, someone had persuaded Thompson to pass it on, but only after there had been a test of sorts. David had stepped in to help another passenger, then given Thompson change when he begged for it. David had been a good person, in other words, and the phone was a reward for behaving correctly, doing the right thing.

But why?

Sean’s mind wandered. If that was how it had happened, what did that say about the person who was behind this? They wanted to put David through his paces. Have him prove himself. And yet the more he did that – the more entangled he got – the more in trouble he found himself. If David’s theory that this was another grieving parent was right, and they were angry with him as he’d suggested, maybe they were emphasising the fact that he was good, but not good enough.

Maybe. Still didn’t make much sense, though.

The temptation to turn the phone on and check through it right now was strong, but Sean resisted. It was better to do everything exactly by the book; that way, when it came to it, the evidence would be untainted. And anyway, he was hardly the techie type. The IT team at the department would examine
it carefully, whereas ten to one he’d fuck up and accidentally erase everything. He slapped gloves on and bagged the phone up, placing it in his jacket pocket. According to the search form, David had stored the birthday card upstairs in the bedside table.

Sean made his way up.

As he pushed open the door to the bedroom, whorls of dust danced away across the floor. The bed itself was unmade, and there were clothes tangled up in a pile at the end. A faintly unpleasant aroma in the air. Sean wrinkled his nose, and again felt awkward. The room wasn’t in a
disgusting
state, but David wouldn’t have wanted him to see it like this. On previous searches they’d done together, Sean had always been quick to crack a joke about the hygiene and living standards of the people involved, and right now, he hoped David knew he’d never really meant any of that.

The table was on the far side of the bed. Aside from a single free-standing wardrobe, it was the only other furniture in the room: a small cabinet, really, with a single door and a drawer. There was a lamp on it, and David’s battered bible. Sean didn’t bother with the drawer, but opened the door to reveal a pile of cards and paperwork.

Shit, David
.

Sean picked the pile out and placed it on the bed carefully. There must have been at least twenty letters. How could people be so cruel? he wondered. What was
wrong
with them?

Even more than that, what had driven David to keep it all right here, beside the bed? It seemed like the hate from a collection like this might leach into your dreams if you slept beside it. And yet apparently David had kept them close, the way someone else might keep something of sentimental value – a photo, maybe, or a postcard or letter from a loved one. It was like he’d
valued
the hate in them. As though they were important to him in some way. Sean didn’t understand it.

It was probably worth taking the whole lot. If the guy had written to David once – if it even
was
the guy – then he might have done it before. They could search through the letters for
similarities. Maybe there’d even be some detail that would lead them to him.

He pulled out a larger bag to store them all in, but couldn’t resist looking at the one on top. The birthday card that David had received. The envelope had been torn raggedly open, but the card had been put back inside. Sean looked at the envelope first. There were no delivery details printed over the stamp, but that didn’t necessarily mean it had been hand-delivered; sometimes the post office machines barely left a trace at all. It had been addressed, in clear, characterless black ink, to Jamie Groves.

Bastard
.

Sean took the card out carefully, holding it by the edges. The front showed Winnie-the-Pooh playing in a meadow with his friends. The colours were pastel, giving the picture a faded watercolour effect, as though the characters were gradually disappearing from an old photograph. An image from another age, slowly fading.

He opened the card.

For a second, all he could do was stare at what had been written there, in the same neat black handwriting as the envelope.

I know who did it
.

That was exactly what David had told him would be there. But David hadn’t told him about the lines below that, all clearly written by the same hand.

Their names are Edward Leland, Carl Thompson and Laura Harrison. I’m so sorry for what I’m going to do. I hope you can forgive me. I hope I’ll still be able to remember you smiling at me
.

Sean read the words again and again, trying to find some alternative meaning in them. Something different from what they clearly signified. There was none.

‘Oh David,’ he said.

His hands were shaking slightly as he read the end of the card.

I miss you so much, my beautiful little boy, and I love you more every day
.

Daddy xxxxx

Mark

David Groves

I turned to see Mercer standing in the bedroom doorway.

‘I thought you were going to wait in the car,’ I said.

‘I was worried you might be in trouble.’

But he wasn’t looking at me, or even at the crying woman sitting against the far wall. Instead, his eyes were transfixed on the spiderweb that had been drawn above the bed. The idea that he could have helped me in a physical situation was laughable; I knew full well why he’d come inside. The desire to know. To understand. And I suppose, given everything, I had to allow him that.

‘My,’ he said. ‘That really is the genuine article, isn’t it?’

I didn’t answer. I wondered how it made him feel to see it there for real – a new one, after all this time. The strange thing was that, staring at the design now, absorbed by it, he seemed less fragile than before, almost as though he was drawing energy from it in some way. As though the sight of it had added some power to whatever internal battery was keeping him going.

‘How strange,’ he said. ‘I can’t work out what’s happening here. The 50/50 Killer is dead. And yet this ... this is his work.’

‘Because the man came from somewhere.’ Now that Mercer was in the room, there didn’t seem any point in hiding the evidence on the bed. ‘And there’s more. Look at these.’

He came and stood beside me, clearly reluctant to tear his gaze away from the web on the wall. He scanned the material half-heartedly.

‘I think this might have all belonged to Paul Carlisle,’ I said. ‘That’s clearly what it’s meant to imply anyway. And it would fit with what Charlie told us. Whoever these people are, they punish the guilty. What I can’t work out is why
now?
Why take Charlie for not knowing, but leave Paul Carlisle free for the next two years? If this is true, then he was by far the more guilty of the two, and they would have to have known ... ’

I trailed off, because Mercer wasn’t listening to me. The half-hearted examination of the papers on the bed had stopped, and he was now staring intently at the photographs lined up in the middle. He’d gone pale.

‘John?’

‘I’ve seen these before,’ he said.

‘Where?’

He closed his eyes. ‘Oh God. I think I understand.’

‘John, I need you to tell me.’

‘The ones I saw were found in an abandoned fire station. There was a woman’s body there too.’ With his eyes still closed, Mercer pinched his nose, trying to remember. ‘Laura Harrison. That was her name. We believed she was part of a paedophile gang, and that the photographs were her souvenirs. A number of other people had been murdered in the days beforehand. A man – a policeman who’d lost his son – had been killing them. It was our case. Just a formality, really, given the evidence, but still ours.
Mine
.’

‘John—’

‘David Groves,’ he said. ‘We never found him afterwards.’

Finally Mercer opened his eyes again.

‘He went missing two years ago.’

Part Five

And She told Them this world is a playground for God and the Devil, and that life was a battle between good and evil in the hearts of Men, and that when eternity came to a close, those scores would be tallied and the true nature of Man settled for ever. And She told Them that within the heart of each individual Man the larger battle was present, just as the entirety of the tree resides in the seed. And they asked if, between them, They might therefore settle that nature in Their lifespan, and She told Them this was so
.

Extract from the Cane Hill bible

Mark

A hell of a guy

‘Let me get this straight before we start,’ Detective Sean Robertson told me. ‘I don’t think he did it, and I never have. I won’t help you do anything else to destroy David’s reputation.’

Robertson was sitting on the other side of a desk crowded with paperwork and coffee cups, while I was perched on one of the plastic office chairs that had been backed up against the wall when I’d arrived. I’d had to move it myself. It had been quite clear, when I’d called ahead, that Robertson had no interest in talking to me, and no desire whatsoever to rake over the coals of a situation that had burned him so badly.

I tried to remain implacable.

‘I’m really not here to destroy his reputation.’

‘Yeah, well. It’s a bit late for that anyway, isn’t it? Your man already did that.’

Mercer, he meant. It didn’t matter to Robertson that the investigation into his former partner’s conduct had taken place before my time; it was still my team, and even though he was long gone from it, Mercer remained
our man
. He was the one who’d had David Groves charged and convicted
in absentia
. But then, from a cursory scan of the file on my way over, he’d had good reason to.

‘You’re right,’ I conceded. ‘David Groves’ reputation was
ruined a long time ago. I mean, I’ve seen the file. Three counts of first-degree murder. At first glance, it looks pretty tight to me too. So whatever the damage done to his reputation, maybe your ex-partner did some of it himself?’

Robertson stared back at me for a moment, his beefy arms folded and resting on a stomach that strained at his shirt. His tie was low and off-centre. With his red cheeks and the stubble that hung around his neck under the chin, I thought he looked more like a seedy reporter than a police detective – the kind of guy you’d see at a crime scene, wrapped in an overcoat and eating a burger out of a bag. Appearances could be deceptive, of course. I knew from his file that he was distinguished and capable, and looking back at him now, I could see that his eyes were sharp, even if the rest of him wasn’t.

‘Anyway.’ I patted the file I’d brought with me. ‘I’m actually not here to cause any problems for him. At the time, I can see it looked clear-cut. But things have ... changed. That’s why I’m here.’

‘How have things changed?’

‘You’ll have to trust me on that for now.’

‘Oh, will I now?’

‘Yes.’

I wasn’t just being overcautious about sharing the details of the Matheson investigation. The truth was that I really
didn’t
know how things had changed, only that they had. It was now clear that Mercer was connected to our case in two ways: from the 50/50 Killer, and from the two-year-old tying up of the murders supposedly committed by Detective David Groves. As to the links between the two – the web that connected it all together – I could hardly even begin to guess right now. I was hoping that exploring the Groves case might help me, and to get Robertson on side, I decided I needed to throw him a crumb.