Little Black Lies (20 page)

He’s a slim guy. Fit enough, I guess, but a few stone lighter than me. Even half drunk, I could flatten him. The fact that I want to is because I’m half drunk. At least, I hope so, because what does it say about me otherwise? It’s not as though I can blame the guy for being an arse with me. I did shag his wife.

What happened between Catrin and me has never been public knowledge, so far as I’m aware, but if rumours exist, there’s a chance he’s heard them. Whatever. In the end, he was the one who walked out.

‘I take it the feed shed where Archie West was kept has been checked.’ I don’t address this to Ben particularly, but I don’t drop my eyes. That would look as though I’m backing down and it’s suddenly very important that I don’t.

‘It was the first place they looked.’ It is Chad who answers. Ben and I are eyeballing each other like a couple of kids with more testosterone than sense.

I still don’t know which child is missing. Not that it matters all that much. I don’t know most of the kids in Stanley.

‘If you know where Catrin is, we’re a bit worried,’ says John. ‘No one’s been able to contact her since this afternoon.’

‘I haven’t seen her since I dropped her off at home this morning,’ I say, which is stretching the truth – it was the early hours when I drove Catrin home – but I’m enjoying winding her ex-husband up. As his eyes narrow still further I decide I’m being a dick. I nod my goodbyes and head out. As I step out into the night, I feel a hand on my shoulder. There is nothing friendly about the way it stops my progress forward. I turn and am not remotely surprised to see that Quinn has followed me out. Well, I guess this day was coming.

‘She blames you, you know. For what happened to the boys.’

I’d been bracing myself for the punch, wondering how hard I’d be justified in hitting him back. I hadn’t expected that.

I shake my head. ‘You’re wrong. She didn’t even know I was involved until a couple of nights ago.’ I wonder if I should tell him I’m sorry for his loss, that they were great kids. I decide if I do that, he’ll land me one for sure.

‘I’m not talking about your big rescue attempt. We all know what a hero you were that day. I’m talking about the fact that, as Catrin sees it, she was screwing around and the boys were killed as a punishment.’

‘That’s bollocks.’

He has a way of blinking heavily, of closing his eyes for a fraction too long. ‘Course it is. But in my ex-wife’s messed-up brain, it makes perfect sense. What she did with you cost her her kids. So if you’re indulging in any sentimental daydreams about happy ever after, I’d forget it.’

I can’t hit him. If I start I’ll never stop. Then she’ll blame me for killing her ex-husband as well.

‘Which kid?’ I say, because I have to move this on and it seems as good a way as any.

‘What?’

‘Which kid is missing? I haven’t been in Stanley all evening. Which kid has been taken?’

He steps back, shaking his head, as though I’m not worth any more of his attention. He tells me though, calling over his shoulder as he heads back into the hall.

‘Peter Grimwood. Her friend Rachel’s youngest.’

DAY FIVE

Friday, 4 November

17

I’m running up the hill. People are staring. They think I know something. I’m being stupid, drawing attention to myself like this, but I have to keep moving or I’ll start thinking. The police station is out. If I could catch Skye on her own, I’d probably get the basic facts out of her, but not in front of her colleagues.

Peter Grimwood. I’ve seen him a couple of times this week. Him and his mother. Couple of days ago he nearly scared me to death with a toy gun. Funny kid. Bit quiet and clingy, I’d thought.

Rachel’s kid, missing? This can’t be good. On any level.

I bang on the door of the news office and open it a second later. I know they’re all still here, I could see them through the window as I ran past. Cathy is leaning against her desk. Mabel, in a pink velour tracksuit, is hovering in the kitchen doorway and Rob stands in the middle of the room. They all three stare at me. A phone is ringing. Everyone ignores it.

‘Rob, mate. What can I do?’

Rob lifts one hand to push imaginary hair out of his eyes. ‘Go home. Check your shed, your peat shed, your garage, under your bushes. Anywhere a small boy could be hiding out. Then be back here at first light to join the search. It’s all anyone can do.’

At that moment, he looks every one of his seventy-plus years.

‘You can take Rob home,’ says Cathy. ‘Or better still, up to Rachel’s. She shouldn’t be on her own.’

‘Where’s Sander?’ Sander is Rachel’s husband. He works in the Secretariat.

‘Away,’ Rob tells me. ‘Flying back tomorrow. And she isn’t on her own. Jan’s with her.’

A look between Mabel and Cathy tells me they don’t think much of Jan’s ability to take care of her daughter in a crisis. I barely know Rachel’s mother, but I’ve heard she has a keen sense of drama.

‘Jan can’t cope with Rachel and both boys,’ says Mabel. ‘And it’s not as though we’re actually answering the phones here.’

On cue, another starts ringing. Rob’s hand reaches out and his mother stops him with a yip. She crosses to a line of hooks and pulls a coat down.

‘You’re not a newsman right now, Robert, you are the news, and you of all people know the mess you’ll get yourself into if you start talking to people who can quote you. Come on.’ She shoves the coat at him. ‘Callum’s going to drive you home. Cathy will take me. The last one turned up safe and sound and Peter will too.’

*   *   *

‘I drove past Rachel’s house earlier,’ I say as we head out of town. ‘What time was Peter missed?’

‘Shortly after four. When everyone was watching the eclipse.’ Suddenly, Rob won’t look at me. ‘Cathy had just dropped the older two home from school. Rachel called the police at half past four after she and the boys had searched the house and garden.’

The email with Catrin’s photograph came through shortly before three in the afternoon. I arrived in Stanley roughly an hour later. It must have been about four when I followed Catrin’s car up the hill.

‘What time were you there?’ he is asking me. ‘Did you see anything of him?’

‘Earlier,’ I lie. ‘I didn’t see anything of Peter,’ I add, grateful to tell him something that’s true.

I head up the same hill that I followed Catrin up just hours earlier. How far in front was she? A couple of minutes? Ten? Easily enough time to reach the driveway of the Greenwood house, as I’m doing now, turn in the soft mud surrounding it and then bomb it back down the hill. I try to remember whether I made it up this far and can’t. So much of this afternoon has been lost to the flashback. But this is the easiest place to turn round, so chances are I did.

I shunt backwards and forwards and wonder if I’m deliberately trying to hide previously made tyre tracks. And, if I am, what the hell I think I’m playing at. Rob jumps out as soon as I pull the brake on. He disappears into the house before I have time to wish him goodnight, leaving me no choice but to follow.

As I make my way inside, I’m thankful for one thing, at least. Rob has just reminded me about yesterday’s eclipse. I knew about it – we all did – I’d just forgotten, given everything else going on. Still, good to know the freaky unscheduled darkness was a natural phenomenon, not a sign of approaching lunacy on my part.

In daylight, this is one of the nicer houses in Stanley, standing high above Surf Bay, in a large, sloping garden. The kitchen smells of instant coffee, oxtail soup and burned toast. Feeling awkward about being inside uninvited, but even more uncomfortable about bailing, I find Rob in the sitting room where his wife, Jan, is huddled under a blanket with Christopher, Rachel’s eldest.

‘Is there news?’ She sees me and her eyes widen.

‘Callum drove past here earlier in the day.’ Rob turns back to me. ‘Have you told Bob Stopford?’

‘What time was it? Were you alone?’

‘Some time before four,’ I tell Jan. ‘Alone. I didn’t see anything of Peter. And I haven’t told Stopford yet. Hi, Chris. How’s your mum doing?’

A few months ago, I gave a talk to the older kids at Chris’s school about the future of information technology and how, one day, household computers will change our lives and the world. Chris had been one of the brightest, the most interested.

His face grows paler. ‘I think she’ll be better when Dad gets home.’

‘Shouldn’t you be in bed?’ his granddad asks him.

‘I can’t sleep. Michael’s in my bed and he sticks his elbows in me.’

I look at my watch. Not far off four in the morning, making it nearly twelve hours that Peter has been missing. Jan tucks the blanket up higher around her shoulders.

‘Why don’t I light a fire?’ I look at the peat burner. It’s been swept and cleaned, there are firelighters and kindling in a basket to one side. It’s ready to go and will give me something to do. ‘Do you know where the matches are, Chris?’

I follow Chris into the kitchen. He’s going to be tall. His dad, Sander, is. So is Rachel, for a woman. Chris was always a couple of inches taller than Ned.

‘When was the last time you saw Peter?’ I ask, when we’re out of earshot of the grown-ups.

‘He was in his cot when I got home from school. His nappy was wet. I changed him.’

‘Then what?’

‘Michael was calling for me. We were going to go down to the beach to watch the eclipse.’

His eyes drift from mine. He thinks he’s in trouble. He ran outside, faster than his toddler brother could follow, and now he’s blaming himself. I pull out a chair and sit on it, so I’m on a level with the kid.

‘Where was your mum?’

‘Lying down. In her bedroom. That’s where she usually is when we get home.’

‘He’s tired, Callum. He needs to be in bed.’ Rob has followed me in from the living room.

‘You found the other little boy, didn’t you?’ Chris says to me. ‘Are you going to look for Peter?’

‘Of course, we all are. Did you bring Peter downstairs?’

‘I carried him,’ Chris tells me. ‘Then I put him down. He’s quite heavy.’

‘He’s a monster,’ chips in Rob. ‘I can barely lift him myself.’

‘What happened then, mate?’

‘I ran down to join Michael. We have a den on the beach. We were playing there. We stayed until we heard Mum shouting for us. That’s when we knew Peter was missing.’

‘Rachel phoned the police at four thirty,’ says Rob.

Chris is looking at me. ‘Will they light fires for Peter? Like they did for that other little boy?’

I stand up. ‘It’s a bit wet for fires tonight. But that other little boy is safe and sound now. You need to remember that.’

Chris stays where he is. ‘Jimmy wasn’t safe, though, was he?’

Rob and I make eye contact. Neither of us has anything to say to that.

‘The police searched the wreck in the bay yesterday.’ Chris is looking defiant now. He knows this isn’t something we want to hear. ‘They were looking for that other little boy. The one from West Falkland. That makes four now.’

‘Bed,’ says Rob, for want of anything else.

‘Will you take me?’ Chris asks me.

‘I’ll take you up, Chris.’ His grandmother has been hovering in the doorway, watching us.

‘I want Callum.’ Exhausted though he is, Chris is determined to get his way.

After Rob nods his permission and Jan gives an exasperated shrug, I pull off my shoes and follow Chris upstairs, not without a few misgivings. I have no experience of young kids.

On the upper floor, I can see four open doors, one closed. Behind the closed one, I imagine, is Rachel. Chris pauses on the threshold of one door before walking past. As I follow him, I see a small form huddled in a single bed. The next room along is Peter’s. I lean in and switch on the light.

Surely this should be sealed off? A crime scene? Resolving to touch nothing, I lean over the cot and catch the faint whiff of piss. Hard to tell in this light but I think I can see a stain where Peter’s nappy leaked earlier. There is a changing mat on the floor, an opened pack of nappies at its head. There are three left in it. A dirty one is in the corner of the room.

I find Chris in the next room along. ‘This is Michael’s room,’ he tells me, explaining the posters and toys that seem too young for a near teenager. ‘You’re going to look for Peter, aren’t you?’

‘Yes. Everyone is.’

‘Where will you look?’

‘I guess we’ll start close to home. If he’s wandered away by himself, he won’t have gone far.’

‘We checked the garden. Michael and I looked everywhere. We went down to the beach too. And the old boathouse down there. He isn’t anywhere near the house.’

‘Chris, if you remember anything, anything at all, you have to tell the police. Or me, if you prefer. Do you promise me?’

He nods and snuggles down. ‘Will Mum be OK?’ he asks, as I leave the room. I can’t remember what I tell him, only that I look back at Rachel’s door and hope that her non-appearance means she’s asleep, that she’s having a few hours’ break from all this.

As I approach the living room, I hear voices that I know are not meant for me.

‘… of all people should be here!’

I push open the door. I still don’t have shoes on and I can move quietly for a big bloke. Both Rob and Jan turn, surprise on their faces and something else too. Something I don’t think is worry about their grandson. Rob has been making half-hearted attempts to light the fire. Ignoring the atmosphere, I edge him out of the way and have it going in a few seconds.

I’ve been in this house before, but years ago. I remember good-quality furniture and decent paintings on the walls. During the evenings, candles glowed softly, the air was scented. There were always flowers. Kids’ clutter was never far away but not more than the odd toy lying around. Tonight, the room looks as though no one’s bothered to tidy it up in weeks and the whole house has a stale smell to it. This is more than a few hours’ neglect by a terrified mother.

‘How’s Rachel doing?’

Jan and Rob exchange a look.

‘In shock, we think,’ says Rob. ‘Shaking. Can barely talk. Trying to hold it together for the older boys but—’

‘Sander knows, I take it?’