Singled Out (23 page)

Laura parked her car in the lay-by on the right beyond the toll booth. She got out, feeling a new nausea. Surely it wasn't eleven yet. She looked again at her watch. No, just after ten. But still she couldn't lose the sick feeling that she had arrived too late.

As she walked through the low blue metal gate on to the bridge, a car crossing from the Clifton side illuminated her briefly in its headlights. Laura saw the Samaritans' notice on the pier and a new tremor ran through her. She walked on, keeping to the pavement on the toll booth side. The bridge's bright illumination bleached everything to an unearthly pallor. As Laura emerged on to the exposed part of the bridge, the wind scoured her face and plucked at her coat. She was on the rectangular ramparted area that surrounded the tall pier. Another car crossed from Clifton. Still Laura seemed to be the only pedestrian on the bridge.

She moved a little further along the walkway. Now she could feel the wave-like ripple of the huge structure swaying in the wind. The sighing in the suspension rods had grown into a moaning. Through the decorative metalwork of the side wall, she caught the dull glint of reflected light in the water below. Far, far below.

Laura turned round, but still could see no one. Then she walked back and crossed the roadway by the barriers. On the other side was a matching ramparted platform around the foot of the pier. From the wall of that was a sheer drop down to rocks below. Over the wall Laura could see the lights of South Bristol. Her footsteps sounded unnaturally loud against the keening of the wind as she moved cautiously round the pier.

Just as she turned the corner, she was caught in the glare of another passing car. A human outline stepped out between her and the headlights.

‘Laura,' said Michael.

He looked shabbier than ever. The lights shone on his bald head and caught a glint of madness in his eye. Laura backed away as he moved towards her.

‘Well, this is a surprise, isn't it?' said Michael, his voice more incongruously patrician than ever.

Laura felt the stone wall suddenly against her back. Still Michael advanced.

‘Why have you brought me out here? What do you want?'

‘You know what I want, Laura. It's what I've wanted for many years – what I've
needed
for many years.'

He was now close enough for her to smell the sourness of his breath, an amalgam of alcohol and tooth decay.

‘And now you're going to give me what I want, aren't you?' He reached out a hand towards her. Laura felt heavy, incapable of movement, as the hand edged closer.

‘Get away from her!'

There was a shout and a thunder of footsteps. Michael turned in fuddled surprise to see the tank-like bulk of Kent hurtling towards them. The detective's shoulder slammed into Michael's side and sent him sprawling to the ground. Laura felt the blessed relief of her brother's strong hand on her shoulder. ‘It's all right,' he said. ‘I won't let him hurt you.'

Across the platform, Michael was easing himself up against the pier. ‘Watch out!' shouted Kent. ‘He may be armed! Get down!' Laura felt herself hurled across the ground. Her knees were grazed against the stonework, and she lay on her front, winded.

‘Keep away from her, you bastard!' she heard Kent shout. Then there was the sound of a blow thudding into flesh, a grunt, a scraping sound, a scream.

When she managed to pick herself up and turn round, Laura saw only Kent, outlined against the parapet. ‘Michael …?' she asked feebly.

‘He jumped.' Kent was panting heavily as he came forward to help her up. ‘I'm sorry I had to throw you down, Laura. He'd got a gun. Thank God he didn't use it.'

When she was on her feet, instinctively Laura put her arms around her brother's neck. Equally instinctively, Kent removed them. Even at a moment of such emotion, he could not cope with physical affection from her.

‘At least you don't have to worry any more. Michael's dead. The threat to you has gone, Laura.'

‘Yes.' She found herself surprised by tears, tears of relief that the long nightmare was over.

‘You OK to drive back?'

Laura shook her head. ‘Don't think so. I'm very shaken.'

‘I'll drive you. You can pick up your car in the morning.'

Kent had also parked on the Leigh Woods side, a bit further up the hill from Laura's car. As soon as he got in, he was on the car-phone to his colleagues. ‘Another body off the bridge. Get men out here quickly. I've just got to drive someone home – she's in a state of shock.' There was a question from the other end of the line. ‘Well, let's just say I don't think we're going to have to look any further on the Emily Howard case.'

Kent parked outside the house in Charlotte Street South. Laura was still dazed and in shock, so he used his key to let her in. He poured her a large brandy. ‘You going to be all right?'

‘Yes,' she said. ‘Yes. How did you know Michael was going to be there?'

‘I'd been following him. Saw him by chance in the street this evening. I'd got enough to pull him in for questioning, but I thought I'd see what he did next. What he actually did do next surprised me. He broke into an office in Clifton. I waited outside for a while, then went in after him. Found him in the process of sending a fax.'

‘The one I got?'

‘Yes. The one he pretended came from Tom. He ripped it out of the machine when he saw me, then managed to push past and get away. But he'd left the fax, so I knew where he was going. I rang to try and stop you going to the bridge, but you'd already left.'

‘I had to go.'

‘Yes. He was clever. He knew if you thought there was any threat to Tom, you'd be there.' Kent looked at his watch. ‘I must get back to the bridge. You sure you're going to be all right?'

‘Yes. Fine. I'm just shaken. I'll be fine. I'll have a bath and … Oh, I'm just so relieved.' Tears once again prickled at Laura's eyes. ‘Because this means that Tom's off the hook, doesn't it?'

‘Certainly does,' said Kent with one of his rare smiles. He rose from his chair. ‘I'll call you in the morning. If you need anything else from me tonight, I don't know how long I'll be out, but you've got the mobile unit number, haven't you?' Laura nodded. ‘OK. You look after yourself. I'll take the surveillance off your house. You've got nothing to worry about now, Laura.'

‘No.' She smiled, longing to put her arms round her brother and hug him, but knowing that she would never be able to do that. ‘Thank you, Kent.'

She was in the bath, the water rather pleasurably stinging the grazes on her knees. A languor was beginning to take possession of her body when she heard the telephone ring. Laura wrapped a towel around herself, went through into the bedroom and lifted the receiver.

‘It's Philip.'

‘Oh. Hi.' She had no reaction to his voice. She was still too numb from the events of the evening to think about their relationship.

‘I've got some information on Michael.'

‘Sorry?' She couldn't think what he was talking about.

‘Remember, you asked me if I could find out anything about him. I contacted his mother and –'

‘I remember, yes. Well, thanks very much, Philip, but it really doesn't matter now.'

‘Oh.' He sounded disappointed, deprived of his dramatic moment. ‘What do you mean?'

‘Well …' Suddenly the effort of spelling out the details of the evening's events, coping with the appalled reaction, the expressions of solicitude, seemed insuperable. ‘It just doesn't matter.'

‘What, even if it's something to do with Emily Howard's death …?'

‘Emily Howard's death has now been explained. Michael killed her.'

‘No, he didn't,' said Philip.

‘What makes you think that?'

‘Because I've traced Michael Rowntree's movements over the last week. Last Friday he was arrested for being drunk and disorderly in a pub in Ladbroke Grove.'

‘So?'

‘So … he spent Friday and Saturday nights in a police cell in London. There was no way he could have been in Bristol strangling Emily Howard.'

Laura had only just put the phone down after the call from Philip when it rang again. She picked up the receiver. ‘Hello?'

‘I'm coming to see you shortly,' said the voice at the other end. ‘I've got a big surprise for you.' The line went dead.

Laura shuddered uncontrollably. The caller had been Tom.

She immediately called Kent on the mobile unit number. He wasn't there, they said they thought he had gone home. She left a message to say if he did come back, could they ask him to come and see her as soon as possible. She didn't attempt to make it sound like a brave message; it was a naked plea.

Maybe he was at home. She rang his number half a dozen times. The line was continuously busy. But she was too scared to be alone in the house. She had to get away. Drying herself unevenly and throwing on some clothes, Laura stumbled out to her car. Once she was driving she felt a little calmer, though she was still sweaty and gasping for breath.

Kent was the only one who could help her. She had to see Kent. Instinctively, she drove down towards Hotwells. She parked on the steep gradient outside her brother's house. There was no light downstairs, but a little spilled through a crack in the curtains of the first-floor master bedroom. Loud music seemed to be coming from there as well. Laura recognized k.d. lang's ‘Constant Craving'.

She pressed the doorbell, but there was no response. She tried again. Still nothing. The music was probably too loud for the bell to be heard. In desperation Laura reached for her keys and found the one Viv had given her so that she could get in to water the plants. She turned it in the lock.

The hall and the whole downstairs were in darkness. As she entered the house, Laura was aware of an insistent electronic tone coming from the hall table. It took her a moment or two, while her eyes accommodated to the gloom, to identify that the sound emanated from the telephone, which had been left off the hook. That explained the continuous engaged signal.

There was no one on the ground floor, but the music above continued. Laura could have called out, but some instinct told her not to. She moved silently up the stairs. The landing light was not on, but the door to the master bedroom was slightly ajar. Laura glided cautiously towards the line of soft light between door and frame. She brought her face close to the slit and looked into the bedroom. The shock of what she saw made her catch her breath, and she only just restrained herself from exclaiming out loud.

When she got back to Charlotte Street South, Laura went straight to the study. From the recesses of her desk she produced the gun. It was the one she had procured when doing the
Newsviews
feature on illegal firearms all those years before, the one she had pressed against the forehead of Tom's father in the Paddington hotel.

She sat in the sitting room with the gun on the arm of her chair, and waited. The thoughts that went through her head were not pretty. All the old panics about ‘bad blood' recurred. Laura felt powerless, caught up in a cycle of violence which could only end in more violence.

She should not have aspired so high. Kent had been right all along. People with their background were scarred for ever. Sooner or later the bad blood would bubble again to the surface. His course – not to have children – had been the responsible one. Perpetuating the malignancy into another generation was an act of wickedness.

She heard a key in the front door, and the sound of its opening. Laura's hand closed over the butt of the gun as she looked towards the doorway from the hall.

‘This is illegal,' said Kent, weighing the gun in his hand.

‘Come on, I've had it for over twenty years.'

‘Doesn't make it any less illegal. You should hand it in.'

‘Rather hang on to it for the moment.' Laura took the gun from him. ‘I feel more secure when I've got it.'

‘Why're you so frightened? Surely, now you know that Michael killed Emily –'

‘I don't know that. In fact, I know that he didn't kill her.'

‘What?'

Laura gave him the information she'd had from Philip.

At the end, Kent looked thoughtful. ‘I see what you mean. Yes, it doesn't look too good for Tom, does it?'

‘Kent …' Laura began slowly, ‘what evidence did you ever have against Michael?'

‘What?' He waved the question aside. ‘It's very technical. Forensic traces and … A layman wouldn't understand.'

‘No? But you reckoned you had enough to get him in for questioning about Emily's murder … whereas in fact he wasn't even in Bristol when the crime was committed?'

‘We aren't infallible. The police do make mistakes.'

Laura nodded. ‘And no doubt you could find just as much evidence against Tom … if you had to …?'

‘Well, I … What are you talking about, Laura?'

‘I was just wondering … if Michael had nothing to do with Emily's death … then why did he get me to go to the Suspension Bridge?'

Kent shrugged. ‘He probably just wanted to borrow some money.'

‘If that was the case, why the secret rendezvous? Why didn't he come round here? That's what he did last time he wanted money.'

‘Yes, well, who knows what went on in his mind?'

‘But why would he set up all that elaborate business with the fax, apparently meant to come from Tom? Did he even know that Tom was missing?'

‘People in Michael's state aren't very logical.'

‘No,' Laura agreed thoughtfully. Then she said, ‘Last Saturday you rang me to say someone answering Michael's description had been making a disturbance in a Victoria Street pub the night before.'

‘Mm?'