Life Sentence (13 page)

‘You never said a word. When this is all over, Fran, I—’ He lifted a hand, to caress her face before kissing her.

Inevitably her phone burst into ironic sound.

‘At least it doesn’t play “Für Elise”!’ he said resignedly, leaving her to take the call.

It didn’t take long for her to join him in the hall, where he was leafing through his mail. Most of it ended
in a Sainsbury’s carrier, unopened. Recycling, no doubt. He’d retrieved stamps from other envelopes, ordinary British ones.

‘Save the Children,’ he explained, following her gaze. ‘One of Tina’s pet charities.’

She nodded, but did not comment. How would he feel if she started to add to his collection? ‘That was Tom Arkwright on the phone,’ she said. ‘Alan Pitt called. Information that simply couldn’t wait. And he’ll only speak to me personally.’

‘Attention seeking?’

‘Possibly. But it’s like all these things, isn’t it? You can’t dismiss them just in case. But I asked Tom to call him back and explain that important though the Elise case is, at the moment Rebecca must take priority.’

‘Absolutely.’ He held the door for her.

Was that why, she wondered, he worked all weekend too? For the first time since the panic had started, she realised that in the normal scheme of things an incident room was by no means the natural habitat for an assistant chief constable.

Mark seemed happy for her to drive his car to her cottage, so that he could make a series of calls from his mobile. When hers rang again, he held it enquiringly.

‘Who’s it from?’

‘Tom Arkwright.’

‘Why don’t you take it?’ she suggested.

‘How would he react to hearing me on your phone?’

How indeed? One officer taking another’s calls was not unknown. Did Mark fear that it would lead to gossip, that his name would be inextricably linked to hers? Not that it wasn’t. Not after their public kiss. Not when even Henson had managed to pounce on the gossip so soon.

She wouldn’t argue with Mark, not now. In any case, maybe a young man like Tom would doubt that any relationship except the professional was possible between two people of such advanced age as his boss and his boss’s boss. She pulled into a convenient lay-by and took the mobile, interrupting Tom in mid-message.

‘Sorry, Tom.’ She was about to explain that she had been driving when she realised that might worry Mark too. ‘Problem?’

He must have picked up her hesitation. ‘Sorry, guv: did I wake you up?’

‘I’m wide awake now,’ she said dryly. ‘Fire away.’

‘It’s just this Alan Pitt is acting odd, like. Still says he’s got this vital information and still won’t give it to anyone but you. Weird or what? And now he’s saying he’s going away and won’t be around for a bit and hopes you won’t regret it.’

She rubbed her face with her free hand. ‘You know, Tom, I don’t like this.’

‘Nor me, guv. He must know you’re up to your ears in the Rebecca case – if he watches TV or reads the papers, that is.’

She wanted to add the radio into his list of the media
but refrained: another generation thing, no doubt. ‘What’s your take on it?’ she asked, interested.

‘I thought he might be like a naughty kid in a supermarket – you know, throwing itself around because its mum’s got her mind elsewhere. But then, there was something about his voice, guv: something sinister, like, you know?’

‘Sinister?’

‘Well, I didn’t like it myself. So I got on to his mobile company and alerted them. And I want a record of wherever he makes his calls from until further notice.’

‘What about the last couple of days?’

‘Never thought of that. Guv: we are thinking the same thing, aren’t we? Something to do with Rebecca, like?’

‘I don’t know, Tom. It all seems a bit far-fetched to assume a connection… But just on the off-chance, see if he’s got any sort of record at all for anything, will you? And run another check on his DNA.’

‘It’d be nice to rule out anything dodgy, wouldn’t it, guv, even if I am chasing a wild goose.’

‘It would indeed. Good work, Tom.’ As she cut the call, she smiled at Mark, who had been sitting with his eyes closed and breathing suspiciously deeply, come to think of it. ‘You know, when one of these kids has a good idea, it gives me more pleasure than if I’d had it myself.’

‘You’d have made a good mother.’

He said it with such emphasis that she was taken
aback. ‘Good teacher, maybe. But hopeless mother. Unless I’d had an army of back up. I couldn’t have given up the job.’

He gave a short bark of laughter. ‘And if you wouldn’t have given it up for your kids, why even think about it for your parents?’

Mark retired to her sofa and promptly fell asleep again while she was dealing with her own mail. Laughing perhaps dourly to herself, she slipped upstairs to change. Before coming back downstairs to load the washing machine, on impulse she popped into her study to check her emails. Most people contacted her at work, of course, but a small and loyal group of friends were prepared to tolerate the delays incumbent on using her personal address. Friends! When was it she’d last had time for a social life? When she hobnobbed with women or indeed men from work, there was a small but perceptible recognition that she had outstripped and thus out earned them. She’d never had too many friends outside the police, apart from a handful she’d met while she was doing her PhD who reminded her that out there was a world without hierarchies. Some of Ian’s friends kept in touch, whether for kindness to his memory or because they liked her she was never sure.

Today, spam apart, there were only a couple of messages. The first leapt from the screen with such
righteous – perhaps,
self
-righteous – indignation that she knew it came from Hazel, in response to her suggestion to the Aged Ps’ social worker. Was it only this morning that she’d made it? The social worker must have taken her desperate suggestion seriously.

Phone calls from Stornaway were so expensive during the day that Hazel eschewed them. In any case, it seemed to Fran that she much preferred polishing her phrases so that they pierced with maximum pain. Hazel might not be hauling in an indecent salary (was Fran’s indecent? She had an idea that she earned every penny), but working she was, and in the name of the Lord. Had Fran never realised the vital role of the minister’s wife in the kirk community?

Which century was she living in? And then Fran corrected herself: for the twenty-first century woman, wasn’t staying at home the new going out?

So what should she do with the email, of which there was considerably more? Simply delete it? Or she could zing a reply back, pointing out that Hazel was a lady of leisure, those kids of her holy husband well away from the nest now. She had time enough on her hands: let her select a finger and sit and spin!

Hardly.

But perhaps inside that burning ball of her resentment there was a nugget of common sense. Hazel’s work from the manse would no doubt bring her into contact with a lot of crotchety old folk, and with social workers whose sensibilities were all atremble.
Perhaps it genuinely was lack of finance that had kept her away from Devon for the last five years, and Hazel was too stiff-necked to admit it.

The other message was from Elaine, who, but for Ian’s death, would have been her sister-in-law. They’d always got on, and Ian’s death had made them even closer, though neither of them referred to him much these days, and when they did, it was never with the lowered voices of the bereaved. It was as if he were simply a given in their relationship. Elaine, a widow who worked for a major pharmaceutical company, had become the best sort of friend: they might not hear from each other from one month’s end to another, but when they did, it was if they had spoken only yesterday. But now, Elaine was asking if she could come and stay. Fran read the email again. It was just an overnight stop: Elaine was off to France via Eurostar and needed to stay over and travel from Ashford. No problem. Except the first date was tomorrow. Just what she needed, something extra to worry about. Actually, of course, it was what she needed. A mate. Someone not involved in – in anything. Someone to talk to. About everything. Unless, of course, there was another twenty-four hour stint. Explaining briefly, she emailed Elaine to welcome her but warn her that there might be an absentee hostess. She had her own key and the burglar alarm code was still the same.

The machine loaded with her weekend’s clothes chugging into action, she headed for the living room. All she could hear was the sound of deep breathing.

She felt-penned a large notice – GONE TO SHOPS. BACK SOONEST – and set off for the village, sucking
the fresh air into her lungs to replace the
air-conditioned
muck that was all she’d had to inhale since Friday. Corner shop though her target was, it was a veritable cornucopia of good things for lunch. They would have the best picnic she could put together in five minutes.

When she returned, there was no sign of Mark on the sofa, but still the heaviest of breathing. Laying the table in the kitchen for lunch – hardly more than putting the contents of packets on plates – she gave him another five minutes. But they ought to be getting back to work. Putting her head round the living room door, she found him flat on the floor, head on a couple of paperbacks, knees in the air and feet firmly side by side twelve inches apart. His hands lay loosely on his chest.

Should she wake him? He clearly needed his sleep. If so, how?

As she stared down, he opened an eye.

‘I was just about to kiss the sleeping prince,’ she joked. ‘But he might have turned into a frog.’ She held out a hand to heave him up, but he shook his head, rolling over and pressing himself up in a continuous and surprisingly fluid movement.

‘Alexander Technique,’ he explained, accepting just half a glass of wine. ‘But you’re supposed to be aware of your back lengthening and widening, not deep in the land of nod. Part of my self-preservation campaign. Helps the slumping desk-bound back.’

‘I noticed how good you were looking,’ she said, passing the salad bowl. ‘The gym, too?’

‘The in-house one. Twice a week. But I don’t enjoy it. Too repetitive. And I hate the music and the TV. Didn’t you play badminton once? I don’t suppose…?’ He held servers full of greenery while he looked at her with shrewd compassion.

‘Haven’t held a racquet in twelve months.’

‘You’ve been charging down to Devon that long?’ His compassion turned to something like anger. ‘How long have Personnel known? Did they know when they asked you to pick up the extra responsibility? Fran, Fran – it’s a wonder you’ve not had a stroke or a heart attack or crashed that car of yours.’ He replaced the servers, passing the bowl to her. ‘If you couldn’t complain to Personnel, why on earth didn’t you talk to me?’ He shook his head sadly, as if hurt she hadn’t trusted him.

Why indeed? Because she had been afraid of appearing weak when she had always prided herself on her strength? How many times had Ma boasted, ‘Our Fran can open any jar – you should see those wrists of hers! It’s that badminton that did it. Always a tomboy, our Fran. Not one for frilly dresses and make-up. No. A tracksuit, that’s her natural plumage. With her shoulders, she looks more like a young man, doesn’t she?’

Was that why she’d always worn suits tailored more severely than even her uniform? What if she’d worn
gentler outlines, kinder colours? Would her life have been very different? She made a swift and silent resolution: if the invitation to meet Mark’s friends was renewed, this time she’d wear one of those softly draped dresses so many women of her age wore so successfully. If she had time to buy one, that is.

‘Fran?’ he prompted.

‘I’m sorry. I was trying to work it out. Doesn’t make sense, does it?’ She passed the flan, then mounted a spirited search in the salad for an olive.

‘No. Not even with the prevailing ethos that lunch is for wimps.’ He indicated the spread before them with a grin. ‘Unless you’ve been there yourself. I was this far from a breakdown after Tina’s death.’ He held thumb and forefinger a millimetre apart. ‘Fortunately my back was bad – you remember my slipped disc? – which is how I got on to Alexander Technique. The teacher I go to is a very good listener – she actually asks brilliant questions, more like a therapist. I think she saved my life, bless her. She’s a lovely woman.’ He smiled as if reminiscing about tender shared moments.

A shock so fierce it hurt sliced through her. Was it jealousy? Surely not. After all, she had never had any claims where Mark was concerned. Envy? That was more likely. When had anyone thought of her so generously? Trusting herself only to be curt, she nodded and handed him the flan and the bread. ‘Do you want to watch the local news? See what coverage Rebecca’s getting?’

To her amazement he covered with his the hand with which she reached for the zapper. ‘Does it matter? We shall know soon enough. Just eat, Fran. And then you have a zizz while I do the dishes.’

‘I’m fine,’ she insisted brightly. She applied herself to picking at her salad. She could hear nothing but the blood rushing in her ears. She couldn’t see for tears.

After a while, he removed his hand.

Why hadn’t she turned hers to respond to the pressure? Why couldn’t she have turned her hand? Whose response was she afraid of, hers or his? Almost paralysed, she picked on – a radish here, an olive there. An echo of a long forgotten meal rang in her head. Did she wish to listen or keep it at bay? No, no more painful memories now. Enough had been more than enough.

Mark was holding the bottle over her glass. Speechless, she nodded, and swigged down all he poured. And she’d meant to stay entirely sober. She looked up, foolish finger to guilty mouth.

He said nothing. And she wished she was sober enough to read the expression in his eyes.

This time he drove. Although she’d been sure she wouldn’t sleep when she consented to lie on the floor, Alexander-style, he’d had to shake her awake again. This time he’d brought strong coffee.

As he waited at a halt sign, she listened to her latest phone message. It was from Michael Penn: he’d heard on the grapevine that legal moves to cease feeding Elise
would start soon, though she might care to verify it for herself.

‘Talk about Scylla and Charybdis,’ Mark said. ‘Still, that’s what people like – like the Chief are there for: to make decisions.’

‘The Chief and you,’ she corrected him mildly. ‘You’re my immediate boss, after all.’

‘But I’m biased: I like working with you. Like old times, isn’t it, this weekend? Sharing the desk, bickering over whose turn it was to use the phone or make the tea? We were a good team. Always.’

‘You always gave in when I demanded something,’ she agreed, her sleep having apparently freed something up. ‘Which is what a good boss does.’

‘You certainly never did as you were told,’ he said, his voice amused.

‘You rarely told me to do anything. You were a wonderful sounding board, though. Is that the right term? It was great to bounce ideas off you at the end of the day. And not about budgets and policy documents and responses to crazy Home Office directives. Real issues. Is that why you emerged from your ivory tower this weekend to help in the incident room?’

There was a tiny hesitation. ‘More or less. I’m not at the cutting edge of detection any more, Fran, and that’s a fact. But I thought just manning a phone would help. A missing child…’

‘It was certainly good for morale. Everyone appreciated it. Me especially,’ she added, ‘since my
position was tenuous, to say the least.’

‘What a load of balls! And if you don’t believe me, ask the team. It won’t have done Henson’s first week any good, that’s the trouble. In any case, I could hardly have swanned down to Devon to mess round in a boat, could I? But it was you who pulled everything together, Fran.’

‘Nope. I just facilitated. We’ve got a well-oiled system now—’

‘Thanks to you!’

‘—and everyone just knew what they had to do. Pity it didn’t work. God, that poor child. Mark, do you mind if I make a call?’

He shrugged: she could go ahead.

But the call she made was to do with Elise. ‘Tom: any calls on Alan Pitt’s mobile?’

‘Haven’t checked recently, ma’am. It was the next thing on my list, like. Well, next thing but five.’

‘No problem.’ Or was there? ‘Tell you what, get a general call out for his car. Locate and – yes, intercept. If Dr Pitt wants to play games with me, I’ll play games with him. OK? And Tom, have you had a lunch break? No, I thought not. Well, take one. Now. Before you do anything else. That’s an order. And take half a dozen others with you.’ She cut the call, turning to Mark. ‘Only it’s Henson that should have said that, isn’t it? Shit!’

He shrugged. ‘I’d no idea you still thought Pitt was in the frame.’ He must have been as tired as she still was,
despite the caffeine: he was driving like a Sunday crawler. All he needed was a cloth cap.

‘His DNA cleared him. But his refusal to talk to anyone but me really rattled Tom – it’s as if he’s taken it personally.’

‘Not very professional!’

‘Oh, it’s not a vendetta. But I think he’s half on to something – something neither of us knows about yet.’

‘Something you feel in your bunion?’

‘Exactly. Anyway, we shall see. Did I tell you what I did this morning? While you were asleep? I got my sister on to my parents’ case – I think.’ She explained.

‘So you won’t need a lift there this weekend?’