A Question of Despair Read online

  ‘Perhaps we should ask her?’

  ‘And perhaps we won’t. How did you get this address?’

  King smiled. ‘I’m a reporter, remember. It’s my job to find things out.’

  ‘And I’m a senior police officer, and it’s my job to protect the vulnerable. I say you’re not talking to her. She’ll be at a news conference later today at Lloyd House. Until then you won’t even ask as much as her name. Is that clear?’

  King shrugged. ‘What time’s the conference?’

  ‘You’re the reporter.’ She clutched her briefcase under an arm. ‘Find out.’

  It was childish, a cheap jibe, nothing more than point scoring. Yes. Sarah smiled. But, boy, did it feel good. And she had ground to make up. She resisted the urge to wave as she watched King drive past in a black Mercedes sports. Checking the mirror, she pulled away from the kerb, pointed the motor back to base.

  When had the sun come out? She lowered the visor, grabbed her shades. A quick glance at the dashboard clock showed 10.05. The early brief would be history now. If there’d been a major development, someone would have phoned. Yes, right. Recalling her rude awakening, Sarah used the hands-free to check in with the incident room. Woodie supplied a quick rundown: six iffy sightings, three women had reported seeing a ‘weirdo’ hanging round Small Heath park recently, two men on the sex offenders’ register appeared to have gone AWOL. Officers had been tasked, it was all being followed up.

  She asked if anyone had spoken to the old woman in the paper shop. Still no joy, there.

  ‘Give me the house number, Paul.’ She virtually passed the end of the street, may as well swing by on the way back. She made a quick call to Jess first. Told her the press was sniffing round. Just in case.

  EIGHT

  Caroline King sat in the parked Mercedes waiting until she saw Quinn’s motor pass the end of the road. Difference between an amateur and a pro? Forget giving up after the first hurdle, pros persist after the last ditch. Caroline drove back to the flats, parked in the same spot, touched up the lipstick, smoothed the bob and applied the face that said she cared.

  She did. Desperately. To talk to Karen Lowe. The reporter wanted an exclusive interview with the mother, not just a few trite platitudes wheeled out at a free-for-all news conference. Caroline didn’t want a foot in the door; she wanted both Louboutins under the table. If she could forge some sort of relationship with Karen Lowe, depending how things panned out, there could even be a book in it. She’d covered a couple of similar stories in her career, but her intuition was telling her there was more in this one, a lot more. And she wanted it all.

  It was déjà vu with the doorbell. But this time she heard a woman talking inside. The conversation sounded pretty one-sided, could be on the phone, of course. Caroline pressed her ear to the wood, waited until she heard the right noises then rang again.

  The woman hadn’t answered the door to put out the welcome mat. ‘And you are?’ Caroline busked, on the balls of her feet. ‘Hello there. I’m Maggie Fearnley? Social Services? I thought I’d drop by see if Karen needs anything.’

  In her line of work, Jess Parry knew a lot of social workers. Her cocked eyebrow and pursed lips suggested none looked like this. Caroline thought the Armani suit might be a giveaway. It said catwalk not council worker. Jess asked for ID.

  ‘I’m so glad you asked.’ Caroline smiled. ‘Not enough people do. Some of us are too trusting these days, aren’t we?’

  Unsmiling, Jess held out a palm.

  ‘Of course.’ She reached into a taupe leather shoulder bag. Frowning, she dug deeper, careful not to over do it. ‘I’m sorry. I think it must be in my other bag.’

  ‘Course it is. And I’m the pope’s god-daughter.’

  ‘OK, you got me. What do I say now?’ She smiled. ‘It’s a fair cop?’

  ‘That would be particularly stupid, wouldn’t it?’

  She dropped the pretence. The woman was too hostile to be won round. Probably a cop, then. ‘OK, fair dos. I’m not a social worker, I’m a reporter.’

  From Sarah’s description on the phone, it wasn’t hard for Jess to work out who. ‘Yes, and you’ve already been told to clear off once.’

  ‘Come on. I’m only trying to do my job.’

  ‘True. You’re trying. I’m doing. And at the moment that means keeping you and your social work friends away from Karen Lowe.’

  Caroline’s toe was tapping. ‘Go and ask what she wants.’

  Jess made to close the door.

  ‘Are you refusing to pass on my request for an interview to Miss Lowe?’

  ‘Got it in one.’

  ‘You’ve no right . . .’

  ‘Miss Lowe will be at a news conference at police headquarters this afternoon. Until then she’s resting. She’s got enough on her plate without answering stupid questions’

  Caroline was angry now. She wasn’t some run-of-the-mill hack, and she didn’t ask stupid questions. ‘You’re the one being stupid. I’m the one who could actually help that girl get her baby back. I’m the one who—’

  ‘Could stop wasting everyone’s time.’

  It wasn’t the first time a door had been slammed in Caroline’s face. She doubted it would be the last.

  Sarah stepped back from the pristine front door with its shiny brass knocker and looked up at the neat terraced house. Dora Marple was a widow in her early eighties who lived alone. According to Robert White she rarely went out, a daughter did most of the shopping, Dora popped into the newsagent’s now and then, more to pass the time of day than anything. So where was she? And where had she been when officers had called before?

  Sarah took a business card from her pocket, scribbled a few lines, slipped it through the letterbox. She was almost at the car when something made her turn back. She knelt, opened the letterbox, and looked through the gap. It was the smell that hit her first.

  NINE

  Blood and human waste have distinctive odours, impossible to describe but absolutely unmistakeable. Sarah registered both even before her glance took in the body. Dora Marple’s thin frame lay at an unnatural angle at the foot of the stairs. Blood had poured and pooled from a head wound. The dark almost black colour indicated it was a while since it stopped flowing. How long had the body lain there? More to the point, how had it got there? Eyes wide, Sarah gasped. Was that a trick of the light? She refocused. No. Another barley perceptible twitch.

  Grabbing her phone from a jacket pocket she barked instructions while sprinting round to the back of the house. Paramedics would be on the way now, but if she could get in . . . Shielding her eyes from the sun, she gazed up at the property. Windows looked secure, back door was locked.

  ‘Hey, you.’ A man with white hair and beard, brandishing a garden fork watched from next door’s fence. ‘What’s your game?’

  ‘Police. I need to get into the house. Now.’ Tone of voice, urgent air, whatever. It did the trick.

  ‘I’ll get the key. Meet you at the front.’

  He was there in less than a minute. ‘Here y’go love. Look out for each other me and Dorrie do.’ Neighbourhood gnome?

  She turned the key, glanced back. ‘Thanks, Mr . . . ?’

  ‘Trent. Stanley.’

  ‘I’ll manage now. Can you keep an eye out for the ambulance?’

  The smell inside made her gag. The fact it could be a crime scene and she could be compromising evidence was secondary in her thinking, saving life came first.

  Breathing through her mouth, she approached Dora, simultaneously darting glances round the hall. No obvious signs of a struggle, no handy blunt instrument, it was conceivable the old woman had fallen on the stairs, hit her head on the way down. Conceivable. And highly coincidental.

  The left arm was broken, bone protruded through the skin. X-rays could reveal more fractures. No way could Sarah risk moving her, but she could at least talk to her. Squatting at her side, she brought her face close to the old woman’s. ‘Mrs Marple? Can you hear me?’

 
Brittle beige eyelids fluttered, the faintest puff of breath escaped through sepia lips. ‘Help’s on the way, Dora. Hang on in there, sweetheart. We’ll soon have you taken care of.’ Sarah stroked the woman’s hand half afraid of snapping its small twig-like fingers.

  ‘I . . . I . . .’

  ‘What? You, what?’ Sarah had to stop herself shouting. ‘Talk to me, Dora?’

  ‘I . . .’ She rolled her head to the side.

  Don’t stop now for God’s sake. ‘Dora. Dora. Can you tell me what happened here?’

  ‘Back off. Can’t you see she’s in a bad way?’ Trent, the neighbour, had appeared in the hall.

  She brushed him away with an impatient hand. ‘Dora, listen, I’m a police—’

  ‘Leave her alone for pity’s sake.’

  Sarah glared. ‘Look, Mr Trent. She may have been attacked, she might have vital information . . .’

  ‘Carry on like that, lass, and if she was attacked you’ll finish off what the bugger started.’

  She opened her mouth to remonstrate, but held back. Maybe he was right. However Dora Marple had ended up this way, she looked as if she was at death’s door. Sarah had no wish to open it.

  It was academic anyway: a couple of paramedics in green scrubs had appeared behind Trent. Sarah made a couple more phone calls as they worked. A crime scene team arrived as Dora was being stretchered to the ambulance.

  ‘So, did she fall or was she pushed?’ was Baker’s line after Sarah brought him up to speed. It was neither original nor amusing. Perched on the window sill in his office, she rolled her eyes while ceding it was a key point. The bigger question was this: if pushed was it because she’d witnessed Evie’s abduction and could supply a description of the abductor?

  ‘Strikes me as a coincidence too far,’ Sarah said.

  He turned his mouth down, gave a one-shouldered shrug. ‘How would they know where she lives?’

  ‘Kidnapper could be local as well?’ The upward inflection conveyed doubt. Not surprising given the injuries could still be accidental. And they were most likely grasping for straws in the dark. Baker tipped his chair against the wall. The balance looked pretty precarious to Sarah. ‘So,’ Baker said, ‘he – or she – knows the old dear saw—’

  ‘Dora.’ Not old dear. ‘Dora Marple.’

  ‘Yeah, yeah. So they know she saw what was going on and decide to shut her up permanently?’

  Sarah swung an impatient leg. ‘Only they didn’t.’ Which was why she’d ordered a police guard at the hospital.

  ‘And she could still hold the key?’

  ‘Assuming she survives.’ Sarah had had a word with one of the doctors. Dora was clinging on to life by the frailest thread. She’d lost a lot of blood, suffered two cracked ribs as well as the broken arm. At her age, the shock alone could kill her.

  ‘I won’t hold my breath,’ Baker murmured. Christ was he trying to be funny? ‘Anything back from forensics?’ The team was still trawling and tooth-combing the house.

  She shook her head. ‘Not yet.’

  Tipping the chair forward, he sprang to his feet, grabbed his jacket. ‘Bloody good job we’ve got a prime witness then.’ He turned at the door. ‘Come on, Quinn. What you waiting for?’

  One day she’d swing for him. Right now she closed her mouth and followed.

  A thin man with centre-parted short black hair sat straight-backed, hands clutching bony knees, in an upright chair in Interview Room One. The shiny black suit and thin tie added to the Uriah Heep-stroke-undertaker look. Only the face didn’t fit the funereal image, it resembled a strikingly unsuccessful boxer’s. Observing through the spy hole, Sarah reckoned the guy’s nose had been broken at least twice over the years, it had taken squatter’s rights on sunken cheeks and made slanted eyes appear even smaller. Shifty glances at his surroundings were the only discernible movements he made. Not that there was a lot to take in: metal table screwed to tiled floor, shelving unit housing digital recording equipment and a police constable built like the proverbial leaning against the wall, beefy arms folded. The uniform’s bulk and heavy brow would probably make an archangel nervous.

  ‘Who is he and what’s he seen?’ Sarah asked.

  Baker raised an eyebrow. ‘Don’t you recognize him?’

  Peering through the spy hole again, she took a closer look. Her heart sank. The scarlet dreds had been ditched, he’d lost a bunch of weight but underneath the more conventional exterior, Eddie Flint was just about recognizable. He was better known round the nick as Edward. As in the Confessor, a professional time waster and thorn bush in the police side.

  She very nearly stamped a foot. ‘What the hell’s he doing here?’ Like they hadn’t got better things to do than pander to some serial fantasist.

  Baker jabbed a thumb towards the door. ‘He’s helping with inquiries.’

  ‘You are joking.’ It wasn’t a question. Flint wasn’t the only target in her firing line. Talk about raised hopes . . .

  ‘Lighten up, woman.’ He shoved a hand in his pocket.

  ‘Don’t talk—’

  ‘He saw someone with the baby.’

  She narrowed her eyes. ‘Or says he did.’ How could they believe a word the guy came out with when he held his hands up to just about every crime that hit the front page? It was pathetic, she almost felt sorry for him. Almost.

  ‘He’s the closest we’ve got to a witness, Quinn. Don’t knock it yet.’

  She took a step nearer. ‘How close?’

  ‘He’s given a description of two people, male, female, both white, early thirties. She takes Evie, he’s waiting in a motor round the corner. They drive off towards the Coventry Road.’

  ‘And that’s it?’ She paused for more. It didn’t arrive.

  He peeled himself off the wall. ‘Best find out, hadn’t we?’

  ‘Come on, boss. He gets off on this kind of thing. He’ll be making it up. We don’t even know he was there when it happened.’

  Baker lifted a finger. ‘That we do know.’ The hand he took from his pocket now held a small piece of paper. A receipt for a six-pack of Four X, a bottle of Johnnie Walker and five Hamlet cigars. ‘Right place.’ The off-licence was across the road from the newsagent’s. ‘Right time.’

  ‘And if he’s lying?’

  ‘He’ll need a hell of a lot more than a small cigar to feel happy again.’

  ‘Is there anything you’d like to add to what you’ve told us?’ Sarah sat across the table from Flint, playing a pen between her fingers. Baker seated at her right, had left most of the questioning to her. After an hour-long session they now had detailed descriptions of the couple he claimed to have seen taking Evie Lowe. As for the car, he’d said he wouldn’t know a Daimler from a Daewoo, only that it was dark blue with a National Trust sticker in the back window.

  Creasing his eyes, Flint appeared to give the point some thought before shaking his head. ‘No, inspector.’ He clasped his hands in his lap. ‘I’ve given you everything I can.’

  Including a splitting headache. Sarah stroked her right temple. Try as she might, she couldn’t get a handle on the man. In sombre tones, he’d claimed to have seen the light, turned his life round and was eager to make amends for his shady past. Born again Christian? Or another string to his fantasy bow?

  ‘So why not give it a little sooner, Mr Flint?’ The smile was not warm.

  ‘If only I’d realized the significance at the time, inspector. It wasn’t until I bought the newspaper this morning.’ He ran finger and thumb along what could be the start of a moustache. ‘Believe me, it’s a stick I’ll beat myself with for the rest of my life should anything untoward . . .’ The bottom lip quivered, pale green eyes were cast down.

  Sarah tapped the pen on the table. How come when someone said ‘believe me’, it was the last thing she wanted to do? She classed it in the same school of weasel words as ‘with respect’. Either way, given the information Flint had supplied, she and Baker would have to take a decision pretty soon on whether it was worth
getting a police artist in to work on a visual that could be released to the media. The drawback being, if Flint was making this stuff up as he went along, any duff information could hamper the inquiry if not steer it in completely the wrong direction. Sarah stifled a sigh. With so little else in the evidence basket, could they afford not to take the risk?

  She jumped when Baker’s chair rasped against the tiles. ‘OK Mr Flint, you sit tight. DI Quinn will get someone to rustle up some refreshment for you then we’ll see about getting an e-fit together.’

  So much for consultation. Sarah pursed her lips. As for rustling up refreshment, boy was he in risk-taking mode.

  TEN

  ‘Where are you?’ Sarah with mobile in a neck-lock was talking to DC David Harries. The manoeuvre enabled her to juggle printouts, a roast pepper and feta wrap, bottled water and simultaneously close the office door with her backside. Multitasking they called it.

  ‘Small Heath park. Talking to parents.’ It figured given the noises off, primarily what sounded like the tinny tuneless blare from an ice cream van. She offloaded the late lunch on her desk, sank back in the chair and slipped off her shoes. ‘A few of us are here,’ he said. ‘Chasing up the suss per?’ Police speak for suspicious person. God knew why when the full version was easier to say.

  ‘Can you get away any time soon?’ She ran a nail under the cellophane to open the wrap.

  ‘Sure. Why?’

  ‘I need someone to drive by Karen Lowe’s place, bring her in for a news conference. Half three kick-off. How are you fixed?’ Not just anyone. Harries with his boyish charm and empathy might succeed where Sarah had so far signally failed: persuading Karen Lowe to open up, drop her guard. She’d also seen potential in him as a detective and thought it time it was tapped. Truth to tell, John Hunt was turning into a plodder. She sensed the older man’s disapproval at times and in this case she wanted to work closely with someone who’d be fully on side.

  ‘No problem, boss. Want me to try and get her to talk?’

  ‘No, I want you to take her to salsa classes.’ She injected a smile in her voice. Humour wasn’t her strong point. He probably thought she was having a go. ‘Course I do, David. Good thinking.’ What else would I want you to do?