Cry of the Children (29 page)

Julie didn't know how to say no. She didn't want the tea, but she didn't know how to handle the situation. So she was polite. That was what they had taught her in the home twenty years and more ago, and in most situations it served her well. She said, ‘Thank you, sir,' as meekly as a Victorian maidservant, installed twenty tins of mushroom soup on the appropriate shelf, then went into Mr Burton's office to sit on the chair he had set out beside his desk.

He left the door wide open, so that they could see the few members of the public who were shopping at this hour. That was so that she wouldn't think he was going to assault her, Julie thought. And so that she couldn't accuse him of anything afterwards. Julie knew these things, when everyone seemed to think that she knew nothing. She knew because other girls who worked here had told her them. Sometimes, she thought one or two of them would quite like Mr Burton to do these unspeakable things with them. She planted her broad rear carefully on the edge of the chair he had set out for her and sipped her tea dutifully.

They chatted, mostly about work, because they hadn't anything else in common. Mr Burton had a photograph of his two young children in pride of place upon his small desk. Julie Foster was suddenly jealous of the life he lived, of the part played in it by the wife who was not in the picture, who she was quite sure was very beautiful. She said, ‘Your kids are very pretty.' Everyone called them kids nowadays; that must surely be all right for her.

Burton looked at them as if they were a part of the fittings he had forgotten about. ‘That was taken two or three years ago. They're growing up now. Nothing like as angelic as they look there!'

‘Like Raymond Barrington,' said Julie. She didn't know why she'd thought of the boy at that particular moment. It wasn't the right thing to have said; she felt Mr Burton looking at her curiously. She wished again that she hadn't had to come in here. She was never going to be able to make conversation with people like Mr Burton. She didn't know how and she didn't get any practice. She was glad when the tea cooled enough for her to drink it and get back to work.

Half an hour later, she was suddenly conscious of Mr Burton behind her. He said, ‘Your time's up, Julie. You should get off home now.'

She said awkwardly, ‘I had my cup of tea with you, Mr Burton. I should put in some extra time.'

Burton checked the big square face to make sure she was not taking the mick. But in the same instant he knew that Big Julie wouldn't do that, wouldn't know how to do it. He said rather sadly, ‘That was just my little treat for a good worker. You don't have to work any extra time.'

‘Thank you, sir. I'll just bring some more tomato soups and then I'll go. They always move quickly, don't they?'

‘They do, yes, but we're closing now. You should get off home.'

‘I just want to buy a few things. I've got visitors coming tomorrow. I want some cereals and some soup and some of our meals for one. Lasagne and cottage pie, I thought.'

‘Better get whatever you want quickly, then. Don't forget your staff discount!'

Twenty minutes later, Jason Burton went out wearily to his car. It had been a long day. He wondered as he drove home what visitors Big Julie Foster might have. He was pleased but surprised that anyone came to see her.

It was half past eight when Matt Boyd rang the bell beside Anthea Gibson's door. ‘I don't know why I'm here,' he said.

It wasn't the best of openings. Anthea stared at him for a moment, her blue eyes looking almost black with the light from the hall behind her. ‘I suppose you'd better come in,' she said, unwillingly, it seemed.

‘I brought a bottle,' he said apologetically. He realized now that it had been a mistake. You did that when you were invited for a meal, not when you were inviting yourself into a house where you might not be welcome. ‘I can take it away again if you don't want it. Or I can just leave it here. I don't have to stay.'

She gave him a brief smile, which disappeared as quickly as it had arrived. The dark roots of her blonde hair were more noticeable than he had ever known them before. She had always looked and acted younger than her twenty-nine years. Anthea had had something girlish about her and she had cultivated it. Now, for the first time since he had known her, she looked older than her years. But what else should he expect, after what had happened in the last five days?

She asked him reluctantly, ‘Have you eaten?'

‘No. I've been rather busy. But I don't need anything.'

She wondered what he'd been busy with, because he wasn't working. But it wasn't her place to ask him that. Not any more. She'd been quite close to him, until last Saturday night. But now she wasn't. Not any more. She said reluctantly, ‘That's silly. Of course you need something. I've got bacon and eggs. Will that do?'

‘Bacon and eggs would be good. But there really isn't any need.'

His protest must have been feeble, because she was leaving the room, moving away to the familiar kitchen, where he and she and Lucy had so often eaten in the past. He wondered whether he should follow her, should stand behind her and slip his arms round her waist whilst she cooked, as he had often done previously. Even as the thought came into his mind, he knew that he wouldn't do it. He stayed where he was and looked round the sitting room, registering familiar objects but feeling as if he was seeing them for the first time, in a strange house.

She called him through, nodded towards the two glasses she had set on the table, turned back to the grill. He opened his bottle of Merlot and filled both glasses almost to the top, sensing that they were going to need the wine to loosen tongues and emotions. She clattered the plates noisily upon the melamine-topped table, threw cutlery beside them, turned to get salt and pepper from the cupboard behind her. Almost like a resentful wife, Matt thought, as he set knives and forks beside the plates. He said, ‘I shouldn't have descended upon you like this, without any warning. I'd lost track of the time.'

‘You and me both, then. I hadn't eaten myself.' It was the first conciliatory thing Anthea had said. She took a large mouthful of her wine, shut her eyes, rolled it round her mouth and swallowed it slowly. ‘That tastes good.' She gave him her first genuine smile, and he thought how much better her small, pretty face looked when she was happy. Matt drank half his own glass of wine in quick time and felt the better for it. He downed bacon, egg and tomato and wholesome quantities of the brown bread and butter Anthea had set between them. He hadn't realized until now how hungry he was.

He complimented her on the food, made ridiculous remarks about the weather, wondered where on earth he was to go with the conversation if he was not to stray on to dangerous ground. He wanted to let his hand steal across the table and fall gently upon the back of her smaller one, as it had done in happier times. But he sensed that he should not make physical contact. He said awkwardly, ‘How are you getting on, Anthea?'

The first use of her name, the first acknowledgement that they had once been intimates. Both of them noticed it; neither was sure whether it was welcome. He poured more wine and she said, ‘You'll have to be content with tinned fruit for afters. Do you want ice cream with it?'

Matt felt very stupid as he said, ‘We should drink the wine before that. The red won't go with the dessert.' They sipped their way through it in silence. He wondered if she was as conscious as he was of the vacant place where a lively, talkative girl had so often sat beside them.

She said suddenly, ‘They haven't found that boy yet. It must be the same person who took Lucy, surely.'

‘Yes. I suppose it must.'

‘He'll be dead, then, like Lucy.'

‘I've a feeling he's still alive.' Matt didn't know why he'd said that. Much better to get off the topic altogether. But he didn't want to deceive her, so he said, ‘They questioned me about it. Because of Lucy, I suppose. It isn't pleasant to feel you're still a suspect, when you haven't done anything.'

He wanted her to sympathize, to say it must be awful for him, to take his hands in hers and say that she'd never ever suspected him. There was a long pause. Then she said, ‘Go back to the sitting room, Matt. I'll bring some coffee through. It will only be instant.'

It always had been instant. But it felt as though she was distancing herself from him when she said that. He sat uncomfortably and waited for her. She brought a tray in with cups and saucers, served him as formally as if it had been his first time here. They made desultory, difficult conversation, resolutely avoiding anything that would take them back to Lucy and to Raymond Barrington. In the old days, they would have put the television on and she would have leant comfortably against him on the sofa whilst he put his arm round her. They would have made trivial comments on the programmes and grown closer to each other. Now they were carefully detached from each other. And careful, always careful.

After one of their longer pauses, she said abruptly, ‘I don't want you to stay the night.'

‘That's all right.' It was a relief, he realized. He'd almost said he didn't want to stay either, but realized just in time that it would be ungallant. Now he only wanted to get out, and he sensed that she wanted that too. He wished he hadn't come. And yet he was glad that he had kept up some kind of contact with her. It was a consolation that she was as uncertain as he was about whether she wanted to get together again.

Anthea went with him to the door, less than ten minutes later. He walked away into the darkness. He hadn't brought his car, because it wasn't far and he'd wanted to make sure that he wasn't being followed. She stood at the door until he disappeared, then went slowly back into the house and stared at the seat where he had been sitting.

John Lambert had been right about Matt Boyd being the most elusive of their suspects. Even the woman who had been nearest to him found that there was a part of Matt that was closed to her.

Gerry Clancey, alias Rory Burns, knew exactly what he was going to do on that Thursday night.

He came into his digs in Oldford at seven forty, leaving his car outside. The bathroom at the end of the corridor was empty – they didn't run to en suites in the lodgings Clancey used. He had a quick shower, washing away the rest of his day and the places he had been, and then lay on the bed for a while, staring at the ceiling. Not many people would have taken him for a man given to introspection, he thought with a grim smile. Well, he'd put it across those English pigs, even when they thought they had him taped.

He put on his oldest pair of jeans, the ones he was planning to discard after they'd erected the fair for the weekend in Stroud on the morrow. His shirt was clean but worn, almost invisible when he put on the navy anorak and the navy cap he used for these occasions. He snatched a quick look at himself in the mirror of his wardrobe door. It was like the old days of the troubles in Ireland, which he scarcely remembered. He felt as if he'd donned an unofficial uniform and must check the details before going on parade. He nodded at himself, then crammed the wad of banknotes into the front pocket of his jeans, beneath the anorak. He'd need to think about a money-belt if things continued to go well.

The Peugeot started first time: the engine was still warm from when he had parked it three-quarters of an hour earlier. He kept his eye on the road behind him as he drove along the winding B road towards Gloucester. He wasn't being followed; there was no sign of any police tail. Perhaps he wasn't the number-one suspect, as he'd decided he was after they'd talked to him.

He'd been watching out for surveillance all day, but he'd seen no sign of it. Perhaps the overtime budget didn't run to it in rural areas like this. Or perhaps they'd got someone else in the frame. The pigs never told you about other suspects when they questioned you. They always wanted you to think that you were the only one and they had you banged to rights. Well, sod the lot of them!

He was running into Gloucester now. It was time to concentrate on this evening's events. The people he was dealing with tonight were far more dangerous than pigs, if you got on the wrong side of them.

He turned away from the centre of Gloucester and drove towards the industrial estate in the north-east of the city. Some of the newer and bigger buildings here were still lit and busy, even at this time of night. But Gerry Clancey turned away from these, driving through narrower streets until he was in an older, run-down industrial area, where there were no houses and almost every building was in darkness. He stopped close to the door of the tallest of them, paused for a moment to gather his resources and then slipped out of the old Peugeot and locked it.

The front of the building rose like a black cliff above him, so close and so sheer that he could barely see the top of it against the night sky. He went not to the huge door at the front, which was wide enough to allow heavy lorries to pass through, but to a small door in the side of the building which he would not have found in the darkness had he not been here before. He had a torch, but he took pride in proceeding without its use. When concealment was necessary, you used as little light as possible.

It was a minute before nine o'clock. He was right on time. The man he was here to meet must surely appreciate that. The door opened readily to his touch and he went forward to a small room within the disused warehouse, with a light that was invisible from the outside of the building. The naked bulb seemed quite dazzling after the darkness through which he had passed. There was an old one-bar electric fire at the side of the small room, which seemed unpleasantly hot after the coolness outside.

Gerry Clancey thought that the folded forearms of the man behind the table were the most powerful he had ever seen. There was very little neck beneath the broad head. The dark glasses seemed to Clancey an affectation, but no one was ever going to tell this man that. And the glasses had a disconcerting effect: Gerry was certain that the man was studying him closely now, but he could see nothing of the eyes behind the glasses and divine nothing of what the man was thinking about him.