Chasing Innocence (40 page)

She contemplated Andrea’s locked door then carefully climbed the steep steps and emerged onto the main deck and the open night air. The change was glorious. She breathed deep the sea air and welcomed its embrace of her body and face, looking out across a wide expanse of water to a distant container vessel amid busy cranes and varied bright lights.

Simon directed her through an outside bar with a covered sofa and a mounted TV in a clear plastic case. Glass stretched almost the whole width of the wide deck with sliding glass doors in the middle. She could see a high tower brightly reflected in the glass as Simon rattled keys. She turned to look. The tower was beside the dock entrance, which looked like an enormous version of a canal lock.

‘This is huge,’ she said with more than a degree of natural wonder.

He slid open one of the doors and wordlessly directed her into a sumptuous living area with thick carpet underfoot, curving white leather sofas facing each other from both sides of the space, the carpet giving way to marble set in an abstract mosaic and a gleaming dining table surrounded by chairs. The sound of keys again as he locked the glass door then walked her through to more steep steps that went up and also down to a lower level.

She had a brief moment to look around. She was high up, as if looking from a second floor window through floor to ceiling glass, the glass stretching all around her to a curve at the front. Outside to the left she could see a floodlit quay, at the right the expanse of shimmering water. Simon directed her down the steps.

They descended to a passageway walled in polished wood. Simon followed her along the corridor to a narrow door and into a large bedroom, bigger than the main bedroom in her flat and more luxurious than any hotel she had ever stayed in. A low king-size bed sat directly in front of her. All the surfaces were the same polished wood or mirrored, all the colours were tones of burgundy red or complementing contrasts, the time marked by an old-fashioned brass clock, the second hand busy tripping around.

She sensed Simon had not followed her into the room, turning to see his body framed by the door.

‘There’s an en suite everything through there,’ he said. ‘Including a glass-sided shower that looks out over the water, which you will find much more appealing when we’re in the Mediterranean. I’ll be back soon. The guy doing the loading must be on an hourly rate.’

‘You can’t touch her.’

‘I won’t,’ he said and swept the door closed. She listened to the keys turn, wondering at the logic of locks on a boat. Immediately she began a very thorough investigation of her new environment, beginning with confirmation the door was locked. When she was sure there was no way he could see her, she pulled two blades from the back pocket of her jeans. The blades were wrapped in a strip of material from the red blanket. She had taken them in the hope of an unexpected opportunity, and was very glad she had.

Her problems remained though. She had repeatedly drawn a blank on effective methods of attack, even trying them in her mouth. They did balance on her tongue but were too big, the edges cutting into the roof of her mouth when she swallowed or tried to speak. She wrapped them in the red material and pushed them back into her jeans.

SEVENTY-FIVE

Getting to the dry dock took Adam from suburbia into an industrial estate, over a level crossing and past endless giant warehouses interspersed by whole tracts of land given to row upon row of cars. His destination was a colossal wall of concrete. It ran a long street’s worth either side of him and up to a plateau way above his head, a row of sheds the size of houses butted to the edge. He had not known what to expect, imagining all kinds of security. Even requesting the dry dock as a destination seemed improbable. The driver had simply nodded his head.

He walked to the end of the wall, the night air full of sea and the busy sounds of industry, of lorries reversing above all others. He came to a narrow road on the right, a three-storey building on the opposite corner with the top floor illuminated. He continued around the concrete structure, realising it was a giant wedge. Parallel tracks ran from the sheds, descending at a gradual gradient, down through silt near the base. At the far side a boat was silhouetted, mounted on scaffolding. Although small, from where he stood it seemed like some distant beached behemoth. A trawler with long winch arms protruding like insect antennae.

Adam’s stomach fluttered. He was contemplating whether to walk back around or across the sloping concrete, when a door opened from the building behind. A man in a luminous jacket and hard hat emerged. Adam’s anxiety turned to relief at the sound of a friendly voice.

‘You OK there pal? You’re looking lost.’ The man was at least sixty, a face that looked like rock shaped by weather.

‘I am, I was looking for the
Cutting Blue
?’

‘You found her right enough.’ The man gave him an appraising look and nodded at the distant trawler. ‘And I’ll admit we do sometimes get the odd visitor that’s interested in her history.’ He gave Adam another up-and-down look. ‘And I gotta say you don’t look like any of them.’ He had a smile on his face.

‘Well, I was actually looking for Simon Thompson. I don’t suppose you’ve heard of him?’

The man laughed. It was genuine and told of a lifetime of smoking. ‘Now would I know Simon Thompson? Well, like a lot of guys here I crewed with Conley a lot of years, many of them on that very boat. Knew Conley’s boy too, I crewed with him sometimes as well. He’s all grown up now and spends his summers working on that boat, and damn glad of his company I can tell you.’ He nodded across at the boat. ‘Does all the work himself. How he managed to sail her back from Singapore is the stuff of legend around here.’

Adam nodded cautiously. The man had come alive, as if recounting an all-time favourite story. The man caught his breath and continued.

‘Although if you’re looking for Simon this night, you’re skulking around the wrong boat.’ He turned and pointed beyond the building. ‘Simon cleared customs an hour ago. He’s waiting over there for the dock gates.’

Adam squinted but only saw the top half of an illuminated tower distant. ‘Where’s there?’ he asked.

‘Over there lad! You can’t miss the bloody thing. Bigger than a damn house, not even a yacht to my mind but impressive there’s no doubt.’ He ushered Adam back to the road. ‘Head along there till you come to the warehouses on your right. You can wend through them, don’t mind the noise, that’s just the generators, or carry on till you get to the road then follow that to the right. Either way you’ll find yourself on the Royal Dock.
Passing Dream
is birthed at the far end.’ He looked back at Adam. ‘You got that?’

‘Think so. Warehouses, big boat, far end.’

The man smiled. ‘You got it.’ A thought occurred to him. ‘How’d you say you know Simon?’

‘I don’t,’ Adam answered, thinking quickly. ‘My wife wants to charter a yacht next summer. Simon was recommended although he’s been hard to find.’

The man looked at him with amused eyes. ‘Your wife often get these sudden impulses in the middle of the night?’

Adam laughed to buy himself a few seconds. ‘Well, she asked me to do this last year. Now I’m on an ultimatum and left it to the last minute, and the clock’s ticking.’ He shrugged and grinned at the man. ‘Wouldn’t be here now if he wasn’t so bloody hard to track down, he doesn’t advertise at all.’

Nodding knowingly the man winked at him and walked past. ‘Doesn’t need to. And don’t let the look of him put you off either, that lad’s only got eyes for the ocean.’

Adam watched the man head across the concrete towards the shadowed trawler, stepping over the first set of rails. He started jogging along the road.

SEVENTY-SIX

Simon had been right about the shower. It was the size of a bedroom. The floors were a warm brown slate and the walls gleaming black tiles. Three giant shower heads faced a wall of glass that overlooked the dock. There were shutters that whirred down at the press of a button, although when she realised she opened them immediately. After days in a tiny room the wide expanse of the dock was a luxury. She stood beneath the warm water in the dark, looking out in awe at a luminous halo of light over the distant container vessel, the kaleidoscope of colours shimmering across the water.

Sarah was not idly wasting time. She was ready. Having ferreted through the space of the bedroom she had not found one thing that might aid her. The drawers contained his neatly folded clothes and brochures for ports of the world and their facilities. In the one used wardrobe Simon’s two suitcases were stacked with books beside and on top, the bedside table also home to his books. There was not even a roll of tape that might be useful to her. Even if there had been, hiding anything in plain sight was impossible because of the mirrors.

So she worked through the different scenarios, imagining them both in the room and how she might leverage the space to her advantage. The bed was where her options began and ended. She had laid and sat and knelt at every angle, increasingly aware of the time and a need to place the blades. She tried the ledge inside the bed’s frame, but found she could not relocate the blades with the repeated ease she needed.

So she decided the foot of the bed was her best option, one blade either side of the left bed post, resting on the ledge. Almost each time she rocked forward she was able to thumb the right blade up against the frame. No matter how often she practised, the act of moving for the second blade threw her off balance. She eventually consigned the spare to backup, thinking how she might use it as she stripped for the shower.

SEVENTY-SEVEN

Ferreira let the cold water run across her hands and splashed it up over her face. She knew her problem of course, she empathised too much. This family were not her kind of Christian, but at least they had faith. She heard Boer chuckle to himself behind her. The sound was so distinct she almost turned to check. Instead she reached across and pressed a towel to her face, squeezing shut her eyes and breathing out. She needed to get a grip.
But where to start?
Of course Boer had told her that as well, she just had to do it. She had read through the stepfather’s interview. He was close to Andrea, that was evident from the dialogue. Boer had seen more.

On the landing she stopped and checked herself in a full-length mirror, sighing inwardly. She was about to start down the stairs when she sensed she was being watched. She turned to see the older of the two girls, standing in a bedroom doorway, with big inquisitive eyes and a shy smile.

In the dining room a cup steamed beside her empty notepad. She nodded her thanks to the stepfather and scooted her chair forward, picking up her pen and pulling closer the pad.

She looked across the table at the mother. ‘So Beth, for the record. You said you have no knowledge at all of what Andrea does while with her father?’

There was a slight pause. ‘Well, I…not the detail. She takes swimming kit which comes back wet. She takes books that I know she reads because she tells me all about them, pencils and a drawing book that come back with more pictures. I know she watches DVDs because she will tell me about those as well, in the smallest detail.’

Ferreira’s pen busily scribbled, her posture indicating that every word was the most important.

‘But apart from that.’ She paused. ‘No, I honestly do not.’

Ferreira finished her shorthand, took her time with the punctuation and looked at the stepfather. ‘And what about you, Kevin? Do you know anything about her weekends? Maybe she would confide in you where she might not her mother?’

‘Are you trying…?’ the mother cut in.

Ferreira quickly turned to her. ‘I am not saying anything, Beth. Children’s minds are wondrous thing, as you will know. They have a lot to tell and that is not always to one person.’

‘And how would you know, Detective?’ she asked imperiously.

Ferreira looked back at her matter of factly. ‘The force expects detectives to be degree educated. I did psychology and enjoyed it. I have a diploma in child psychology as well.’ She focused back on the stepfather. His eyes were kind, bright in a square face that was soft around the jaw.

‘Does Andrea confide in you, Kevin?’

He shifted, uncomfortable at suddenly being the centre of attention. ‘Well, I…not much.’

Ferreira looked down at her pen poised and then back at him, waiting.

‘Well Andrea and I are close, there’s no doubt. And I have to say I do forget she’s not my daughter, although she’s very loyal to her father, in fact she idolises him.’ He stopped and Ferreira thought about asking if that ever made him jealous, but let him continue.

‘So yes of course she tells me things she wouldn’t tell her mother. But I always pass the information on.’ He looked sideways in need of confirmation. ‘Don’t I?’

The mother nodded. ‘We have an agreement. If she tells Kevin, he tells me. As much as it often infuriates me, I don’t act on it, at least directly.’ They both joined hands again and the liaison officer shifted in her seat.

For just a moment Ferreira was sure guilt had flared in his eyes. ‘So what you’re saying, Kevin, is that Andrea does confide in you. But there has been nothing about her time with her father. Because of course, if she did, by proxy Beth would also know and therefore so would I.’

He nodded tentatively and then fell silent, moving uneasily. He looked away from Ferreira’s stare and then the mother realised.

‘What?’ She turned on him. ‘Spit it out Kevin.’ She let go of his hand, her elbow on the table to face him. He moved his hand to his lap and took a deep breath and held it. He looked at his wife and then at Ferreira and breathed out. ‘I guess there’s no point holding on to secrets now, if any of them can help.’

The shocked silence in the room was broken by the mother, half caught between standing and sitting. She sat down. ‘Secrets? Kevin, what on earth are you on about?’

He tripped on his words. ‘I can’t, I can’t see how it can help you.’ He directed this at Ferreira. ‘I guess it’s not up to us now to decide what might be helpful.’