Broadchurch (18 page)

‘And so did Christianity fall.’

‘What about you, then, sir? You religious?’

‘Yes, I pray nightly that you’ll stop asking me questions.’

Coates is waiting for them on the bench at the top of the graveyard, an iPad on his lap. Dog collar aside, he could be dressed for a game of pool in the pub. Hardy can see that Coates gets a kick out of being more modern than people expect him to be, and that he’s longing for them to comment on the iPad, so he makes a point of ignoring it. He isn’t wild about clergy in general but there’s nothing worse than a trendy vicar. He’s probably got an electric guitar mounted on a wall somewhere and synthesisers on the altar.

‘How well d’you know the Latimer family?’

Coates puts down his iPad. ‘I know Liz, his grandmother, better. She’s one of our sidesmen. But I taught the IT club at Danny’s school. He was a quick learner, same as Tom.’ Miller beams. ‘They just get it instinctively. It’s more like me keeping up with them.’

Hardy’s mind whirrs: now that there are no more choirboys, now that all the kids worship at the altars of Apple and Microsoft, what better way to access little boys? ‘Why are you taking the IT club?’ asks Hardy.

Coates folds his arms to reply. ‘I try to connect with the community in whatever way I can. Besides, I got asked. I think the last teacher to really understand computers had a nervous breakdown.’

‘Oh yeah, Mr Broughton!’ says Miller. ‘He used to sit there and laugh to himself.’

‘Yup. I’m one up from the man who sits there giggling to himself.’

‘Where were you on the night of Danny’s death?’ says Hardy to cut through this crap.

‘I did talk to the uniformed officers about this… At home, on my own. I live in the house at the bottom of the hill. I was up late, trying to write a sermon. “Trying” being the operative word. I have terrible insomnia. Have had for about the last six or seven years. Can’t find anything to cure it. I’ve tried everything. So I’m often up, wandering. That’s my best attempt to deal with it.’

Hardy’s gaze wanders as he listens. He notes that from the churchyard he can see the field that backs on to the Latimers’ house. Miller’s, too, come to think of it.

‘But you weren’t up wandering on that Thursday night?’

‘I don’t remember it,’ says Coates. ‘I mean, I could’ve gone outside for some fresh air at some point – I often do. But I don’t remember it.’

When they’re done, Hardy and Miller walk back through the graveyard in glum silence.

‘I
hate
what I’m becoming,’ she says.

‘A good detective?’

‘Hardened.’

She has yet to understand that they are one and the same thing.

The RIB boat that takes tourists out for thrill rides is anchored at the top of the jetty. Susan Wright stands at the mooring, handing out flyers to passers-by.

‘Broadchurch Blaster! Half-hour ride!’ She presses a leaflet into the hand of a strolling mother. ‘Next one in fifteen minutes, here you go, love, best fifteen quid you’ll ever spend. Kids half price, perfectly safe.’

The woman studies Susan’s face and holds her daughter’s hand a little tighter. She lets the paper drop into the first litter bin she passes.

The next person to take a leaflet is Maggie Radcliffe.

‘Looks good,’ she says, holding Susan’s gaze. ‘Maggie. I edit the
Echo
.’

‘Yeah, I saw you at the meeting.’

‘You’re Susan. Or is it Elaine?’ Susan’s stare grows colder as Maggie’s line of enquiry hots up. ‘Only I’ve got a picture of you with the Sea Brigade boys, under a different name.’

Maggie is triumphant but Susan is unruffled.

‘Your people must have wrote it down wrong,’ she counters.

‘If there’s one thing I drill into my team, it’s get the names right and spell them correctly.’

The two women remain locked in stalemate while holidaymakers mill around them.

‘I don’t know what you want, but I’m at work,’ says Susan at last. Maggie says nothing, but backs away across the harbour, flyer scrunched tight in her fist, never breaking eye contact.

28

Karen White climbs carefully over the sack of unopened post that sandbags Beth’s front door. ‘Thanks for saying you’ll talk to me.’

Beth nods. She’s still not sure. It’s Liz who decided they should talk to the press.

‘I’m not here to hassle,’ says Karen, like she knows what Beth is thinking. ‘I’ve been here since day one and I’ve left you alone.’

‘It’s true,’ chimes Chloe. ‘I left Big Chimp at the beach. She brought it back to me, save it getting nicked.’

‘I think this should be getting more coverage,’ Karen says. ‘But it’s a mad summer and there are a lot of stories around right now.’

Beth doesn’t like that word. Pheasant poaching, parking fines and celebrity gossip, those are
stories
. This is life and death stuff.
Story
is an insult. It’s even worse than
case
.

‘So what should we do?’ asks Mark.

At Beth’s gesture, Karen sits on the sofa, right on the edge of the cushions. She pushes her sleeves up her forearms and leans forward. ‘OK, you won’t like hearing this, but part of the reason Danny’s death isn’t getting the attention it deserves is it’s not the right profile. If Danny had been a girl, and blonde, and a few years younger, this place would be crawling with reporters by now.’ She catches Beth’s look of disgust. ‘I’m sorry,’ she says, and she looks like she means it. ‘It’s just how it works. Eleven-year-old boys run away from home all the time. I know it’s brutal, but the papers only ever reflect what the public latch on to. If you really want more focus on this case, it’s down to you, Beth. You tell your story, every mum will respond. If
I could have a picture of you and Danny to go with the article, we’d get two pages out of it.’

Two instincts tussle within Beth: the desire to do whatever it takes to get publicity and the feeling that she might as well let them go through her dirty underwear. What will she achieve, putting herself under the spotlight, spilling her guts to a journalist she’s only just met? Beth searches her family’s faces for guidance but finds her own cluelessness reflected back at her three times. It’s her decision: they are merely waiting for it.

‘It’s the
Herald
, I read the
Herald
,’ says Liz, like the newspaper owe her something for her forty-odd years of loyal readership. Beth doesn’t know much about the media but even she knows it doesn’t work that way. She twists hard at the hem of her dress.

‘What if she shows us what she’s written, before she sends it in?’ asks Chloe.

‘I wouldn’t normally do that, but maybe this time…’

She’s making it sound like she’s doing them the favour. Perhaps she is. ‘Is that what we want to do?’ Beth thinks out loud. ‘Shouldn’t we clear it with the police?’

‘You can absolutely do that,’ says Karen, but her body language – leaning away, arms folded – tells a different story. ‘I will say that they’re very cautious, particularly after Leveson, and DI Hardy especially, because of the Sandbrook connection.’

There’s a cold sinking sensation in Beth’s throat, like she’s swallowed a block of ice. Sandbrook is only famous for one thing. She can see the girls’ faces without even trying.

‘What’s he got to do with Sandbrook?’ asks Mark.

‘Because he… you didn’t know?’ Karen’s composure slips for a second. ‘Alec Hardy was the officer in charge of the investigation. I was there. I profiled him on the case. It’s his fault it all fell apart in court.’

The chill inside Beth reaches her core. That abruptness she took for ruthless efficiency looks very different now. And they have trusted him. They have trusted him with the most important job in the world. Surely he should have been legally bound to declare it or something? She opens her mouth to speak but it is dry as dust. Nothing comes out.

‘How did he get another job?’ asks Mark.

‘I don’t know,’ says Karen. ‘But one of the reasons I’m here is to make sure he doesn’t do it again.’

Something occurs to Beth and she finds her voice. ‘Ellie would’ve told me.’

‘I assumed
someone
had,’ says Karen. ‘I’m sorry. I wouldn’t have blurted it if I’d known.’

The chill spreads to Beth’s skin. How could Ellie keep something like this from her? Whose side is she on?

The room waits for Beth’s answer. She doesn’t trust her own judgement any more, that’s the problem. Look how far off the mark she was with Steve Connolly and Alec Hardy. With
Ellie
, of all people. Who’s to say Karen White will be any different? Then again, what’s the alternative? Send her away, refuse to give the interview? There is a ripping sound and Beth looks down to see that she has torn through her skirt.

Karen puts her head on one side. ‘I realise I’m biased, but now you know, it’s all the more reason to use the press. Because, I’m sorry, Beth, but Alec Hardy isn’t exactly rounding up the suspects on his own, is he? The more coverage we get, the more pressure there is on him.’

Put like that, it’s easy. Beth’s desire to look after Danny has not diminished with his death. If anything, it is stronger now than it has ever been.

There’s a photograph on the windowsill, Beth and Danny at the beach last summer, arms around each other’s necks. As she slides it from the frame, she knows that she can live with herself if this turns out to be the wrong choice. But she will not be able to live with herself if she does nothing.

The late-afternoon sun paints the Sea Brigade hut a buttery yellow. In the yard, an upturned boat is stacked with child-sized life jackets. Jack Marshall is in his leader’s uniform, crested navy tie on a sky-blue shirt, overseeing his little charges erect another shrine to the lost boy. This one has a nautical theme: seashells instead of flowers, laminated drawings. There are photographs of Danny on the beach, Danny in his Sea Brigade uniform, Danny picking litter from sand, Danny holding up a fish, Danny tying knots.

Olly Stevens pauses for a moment in front of these pictures. He shakes his head slowly and rubs at his eyes. Then he clenches his jaw, sets his phone to record and sticks it in his pocket.

‘Hi, Mr Marshall,’ he says brightly.

‘Oliver!’ says Jack. ‘Come to help?’

‘Well, d’you think we could talk inside maybe?’

Jack is on guard. ‘No, we can talk here. Can you not see I’m busy? What is it you want?’

‘I’ve come across some information and…’ Olly guides Jack gently away from the boys. ‘Being as we know each other, I thought I should come to you before it gets out.’ He takes a deep breath. ‘I’m really sorry, there’s no good way of asking this. Is it true you’ve a conviction for underage sex?’

Fear and anger hit Jack’s eyes. ‘You little
bastard
!’

‘I’m not trying to stitch you up —’ begins Olly. He doesn’t get the chance to finish. Jack, with the speed of a man half his age, grabs him by the collar and pushes him against the railings. The Sea Brigade boys back away, young and out of their depth.

‘Who told you?’ snarls Jack. ‘Was it the police? You’re all as bad as each other, gossiping and accusing.’

‘I think you should let go of me!’ Olly says through the stranglehold. Jack does, and suddenly he’s a frail old man again.

‘You’ve known me how long?’ he implores. ‘When did I ever do anything improper with kids?’

‘If we can talk inside…’ pants Olly.

‘So you can trick me into saying something incriminating?’

‘How can I incriminate you if you’re innocent?’

‘Oh, they’ve trained you to be a clever weasel, haven’t they? Get away! Go on!’

Olly knows when he’s beaten. He leaves the Sea Brigade hut at a pace halfway between a walk and a jog. Lost in his thoughts, he doesn’t notice Nige Carter is parked up nearby, eating chips in the cab of his van. With the window down and the wind in his favour, he has heard every word.

29

Hardy arrives for dinner still in his suit. He’s got flowers, a bottle of wine, a box of Matchmakers and the expression of a man facing the gallows.

What the fuck was Ellie thinking, asking him into her home? It’s bad enough she has to put up with him all day at work without actually inviting him into the house voluntarily. She looks daggers at Joe. It’s his bloody fault, telling her to be kind. Look where it’s got them.

‘You can come again!’ says Joe, relieving Hardy of his burdens.

‘I can call you Alec tonight, can’t I?’ Ellie takes his jacket. ‘I can hardly call you “sir”! Here’s your dinner, sir!’ She feels like a dick. This is definitely Joe’s fault.

‘I don’t like Alec,’ says Hardy, following them into the kitchen. ‘Never liked Alec.
Alec
.’ Even his own name is sour in his mouth. ‘Why does everyone have to use first names so much? Like we all work in marketing or something? I mean, if you’re looking at the person, if I’m looking at
you
,’ and he pauses for effect, his eyes boring into Ellie’s soul and out the other side again, ‘you know I’m talking to you, I don’t need to say your name three times, just ’cause I’m congratulating myself on remembering it to create this, what, false intimacy.’

Ellie is grimly satisfied to watch Joe realising that she has not been exaggerating.

‘I’ll show you to the dining room.’

Joe’s done her proud: candles dotted around the room to hide the dust, a spread of the best Mexican food this side of Guadalajara. It goes unremarked upon.

‘How’d you two meet?’ says Hardy, in the same tone he uses in the interview room. He’s right, thinks Ellie, he’s
not
an Alec.

‘Through the job,’ she says. ‘Joe used to be a paramedic.’

‘Not any more?’ he asks and she braces herself for the judgement.

‘Gave it up when Fred came along,’ says Joe. ‘I was getting a bit jaded anyway. Too much red tape, stuff that stopped us being able to help people, masquerading as Health and Safety.’

Joe’s drinking quickly; even if it weren’t for his rapidly emptying glass, Ellie would know by the way his accent comes crawling out of the shadows.

‘Where you from, originally?’ says Hardy.