Bold Counsel (The Trials of Sarah Newby) (51 page)

‘I never knew this was here,’ Terry said.

‘No. No one does.’ Jane shook her head. ‘Except the motorcyclists, and they don’t care.’ The hut was out of sight of the nearest farm, and the only other buildings in sight were half a mile away, on the far side of the airfield. The disused runway, Terry knew, was used for motorcycle races at weekends, much to the annoyance of villagers two miles away. No doubt the bikes zoomed past this hut on their circuit, but the lad was right - none would stop or give it a glance. And since he hadn’t known where it was, he doubted any local constables had either. So it hadn’t been searched.

They pushed open the door and stepped inside. The interior was dark, but quite different to the image of ruin conveyed by the outside. The concrete floor was swept clean, and there was a battered wooden table and chair against the wall on the right. On the table was a small camping stove, an old milk carton full of water, an aluminium saucepan, plate and cup, a torch, and several tins of food. Against the opposite wall was a mountain bike. Across the end wall was a camp bed, with a sleeping bag stretched out on it.

There was a small window in the right hand wall of the hut, with a dusty metal grill across it. The glass was too filthy to see in or out, but let in a certain amount of light nonetheless. By the light from the window and the open door they could see the display on the opposite wall. There were two large posters, like the ones in Peter’s bedroom. The one on the right was of a big-breasted fantasy female warrior fighting a losing battle with a giant lizard. The one on the left featured another naked, big-breasted woman who was tied to a tree. In front of her gambolled a group of hellish, dwarf-like monsters, armed with jagged knives and blades, clearly intent on doing her harm. But what really caught Terry’s attention, far more than the lurid sadistic fantasy, was what was around the woman’s neck.

It was an expensive gold necklace.

Not a necklace that was part of the poster. A real gold necklace, that had been pinned on top of the poster. A necklace identical that described by Sally McFee.

On the rest of the walls, pinned up roughly here and there, were a number of newspaper cuttings. They were all from the local newspaper, the
Evening Press
. They were reports of the assaults on the women living near the cyclepath in Bishopthorpe and Naburn. There was a detailed report on the assault on Lizzie Bolan. And there was a front page story of the house in Crockey Hill, where Alison Grey had been murdered. A house, Terry realised from his study of the map on the way here, that was no more than one or two miles at most from this hut.

Peter Barton looked at them, a sort of shy pride on his face.

‘This is it,’ he said. ‘Never would have found me here, would you?’

‘Hi,’ Michael said. ‘I’m in Scarborough. Can you hear the seagulls?’

‘Maybe. Is that what that screeching is?’ Sarah answered. ‘Oh yes, there’s one.’

‘Lots of them. Great big buggers, sitting on the harbour wall and scavenging everything in sight. Including my ice cream if I don’t watch out. Listen, I’ve had a bit of luck.’

‘Oh? What’s that?’

‘I was at the farm development and then I came down to the harbour just as a fishing boat was coming in. So I bought two sea bass fresh off the deck. I thought I could cook them for us tonight. What do you think?’

‘Yes, well, maybe ... I’ve got a lot on today, though ...’

‘You’ve got to time to eat, haven’t you?’

‘At your place, you mean?’

‘In the windmill, of course. I’m heading back there now.’ He paused, waiting for a response. ‘You don’t sound too sure.’

‘No, that’s fine.’ There was no point backing away, Sarah decided. Troubles only pursued you if you did. ‘I’ll look forward to it. What time?’

‘About seven? I’ve got an idea to put to you as well.’

‘Oh? What’s that?’

‘Wait and see. It’s one best approached on a full stomach.’

‘Okay.’ Sarah drew a deep breath. ‘See you there then.’

She clicked off the phone and leaned back in her office chair, thinking. Ever since she’d met Terry Bateson outside the court she’d been in a turmoil about her relationship with Michael. A cocktail of emotions swirled inside her - on one side anxiety, irritation, jealousy, and anger, battling with something like love on the other. No, not love, she told herself firmly - her attraction towards Michael wasn’t passionate enough for that, not yet, anyway - but she did feel warmth, gratitude, strong affection towards this man who had taken her under his wing. He’d not only offered her a house when she was homeless, but far more than that, he’d given her back a sense of herself as a desirable, attractive woman, just when she’d needed it most, during this traumatic period of her divorce. At a time when she could so easily have sunk in self-pity she’d found a new friend. Not just a sexual partner, but someone she could have fun with too.

So at least she told herself in her better moments. Michael wasn’t perfect, she had seen that from the beginning. He’d divorced his wife, for a start, just like Bob, and for a similar reason, that he’d played away, just as her own husband had done. He had unpleasant moods, when he could be abrupt and distant, and others when he could be downright frightening, like that scarey moment on the roof of the windmill when he’d joked about suicide. For a moment she’d feared he might jump, and take her down with him. And try as he might to be pleasant to her son Simon, even employing him to lay a patio outside the windmill, she could tell the young man didn’t like him.

But then Simon had seldom got on with Bob either. People are difficult, Sarah told herself, we all have rough sides as well as smooth. Every day in court she saw how hard human relationships were, how seldom one person meets another’s every need. She herself was no angel. If she’d ever had any fantasies about her own moral perfection, her husband, Bob, had stripped them away long ago. She had a cold self-centred heart, he complained; she was obsessively focussed on her career to the exclusion of husband, family, or anything else which might get in her way. Once he’d even accused her of having no tongue in her mouth but a knife, so sharp and wounding were her arguments.

‘Aren’t you just describing yourself, Bob?’ she’d responded coolly. ‘Seeing me as a mirror for your own failings?’

For in her own eyes, Sarah’s obsession with her career was a virtue, the one thing that had raised her from poverty and kept herself and her children safe in a cruel, uncertain world. Once Bob had admired her for that: he’d called her sharp and hard like a diamond, with qualities to be treasured, not despised. No longer, it seemed.

But now she had Michael instead - a man who could be kind, generous, attentive, even amusing on occasion - what more could she want? However long this new relationship lasted, it was doing her good. Was it to end so soon?

Everything had been going well until she met Terry Bateson outside court. Part of her wished she’d said hello briefly and walked on. But it’s no good building your life on a fantasy, she told herself sternly. Especially if the truth underlying that fantasy is as dangerous as well, murder.

But what if the real fantasy is in Terry Bateson’s mind, and the truth about Michael is entirely innocent? That’s what I want to believe, Sarah thought. That’s what I hope.

After all, Terry’s made plenty of mistakes before. He thought Simon was guilty once; I had to prove that wasn’t true. He’s a decent man but maybe he’s suspicious of Michael because he’s sweet on me. He admitted being jealous after all, the other day. I care for you, he said. That’s nice.

Sarah smiled ruefully, recalling that one time she and Terry had almost made love. If I hadn’t been sick and made an exhibition of myself I would have, too, she thought. I wanted to all right, and so, I’m sure, did he. He’s a decent man - good-looking too. Who knows - perhaps if I’d met
him
on a train that week Bob walked out, instead of Michael, things might have turned out quite differently ...

She shrugged. But they didn’t, so now I have this situation to deal with. Tonight Michael’s going to cook for me and make some kind of proposal - God knows what that can be - and I have to decide what to do about all these suspicions. At the very least I have to ask him about that file I found in his drawer and what his real relationship was with that woman who was murdered - Alison Grey.

They certainly looked like close friends 18 years ago, at that memorial service for Brenda Stokes. Were they lovers then? Possibly, but that doesn’t matter much. It’s none of my business really. But what if Terry’s right, and they were lovers here in York, right up until the time she was murdered? And Michael never mentioned it, not even to me?

That would be a little harder to swallow.

‘So what do you think now?’ Jane asked, queuing in the station canteen for lunch before interviewing Peter again. ‘He’s admitted all that - it’s got to be him who murdered Alison Grey as well, hasn’t it?’

‘It certainly looks that way,’ Terry agreed. ‘But we still need evidence. He would never have admitted assaulting Elizabeth Bolan if you hadn’t confronted him with the fingerprint, and the DNA from the mask.’

‘If only FSS hadn’t lost that scrap of cloth, the halfwits - I could have used that in the same way.’

‘I’ll ring them again before we go in. That’s all I can do, short of mounting a dawn raid on their wretched laboratories.’

Sitting together in a corner to eat, they discussed tactics for the next interrogation. ‘So what do we do now?’ Jane asked. ‘It has to be him, everything points that way. But without evidence he’ll just sit there and deny it.’

‘There may be another way,’ Terry said thoughtfully. ‘You saw how proud he was of that awful shed. In his own mind, he’s a hero. We may have to flatter his ego a bit.’

Jane shoved her sandwich away, a look of disgust on her stolid face. ‘That’s all very well, but he’s a brutal young pervert, this lad. Every time I see him I want to be sick.’

‘Well, keep your mouth shut then,’ Terry smiled. ‘Let me do the talking.’

‘All right. But if had my way I’d cut his balls off and feed ‘em to the pigs.’

‘Leave it to me, will you? You’ve seen how he hates women, poor sap, that’s his problem. So he’s more likely to confide in me, as a man. He thinks I understand his anxieties.’

‘Ok, guv, my lips are sealed.’ Jane rolled her eyes in ironic acceptance. ‘But if you really do understand him, that only goes to show one thing. Which I suspected all along.’

‘What’s that?’

‘You’re all sick bastards. The whole hopeless gender, the lot of you. You could all be replaced by a syringe; that would make this world a better place. That’s what we need - no more perverts, just pure female perfection.’

56. Windmills in Spain

B
Y THE time Sarah got home it was already dark. The Kawasaki followed the beam of its headlight up along the quiet, empty road at the top of the Wolds. Wind blustered around her, the occasional stronger gust cuffing the bike sideways. Dark treetops swayed overhead as she turned off the road into the woods, and dead leaves skittered across her path.

Halfway through the woods she saw headlights coming towards her. She slowed the bike and pulled in to the side to let the vehicle pass. Then, as it came closer she recognised the number plate and raised a gloved hand in greeting. A battered white van slowed to a stop beside her and her son Simon wound down the window.

‘Hi, Mum, how’re you doing?’

Sarah tugged off her helmet, and was immediately assailed by the roaring of the woods all around her, like the surf of the sea. The wind whipped her hair across her face.

She raised her voice to be heard.

‘All right, Simon. Glad to be home. Has this storm been blowing all day?’

‘No, it just blew up in the last hour or so. I could see it coming across the valley before it got dark.’ He grinned. ‘Hell of a place to live.’

‘Yes, but it has its points. How’s the patio going?’

‘Good. I’ve got most of it done now. Another couple of days’ work at the most. I was hoping to finish it tomorrow before this blew up.’

‘It may blow over.’ Sarah smiled. ‘How’s Lorraine?’

‘Great. In fact she looks lovelier than ever. I never knew pregnancy did that to girls. She sort of glows when I look at her.’

‘Lucky her - and you. Well, look after her, Simon - that’s my first grandchild she’s carrying, you know.’

Simon laughed. ‘I’ll do my best, Mum. Why don’t you come round and see us sometime? We’ll have a celebration when I’m paid for this patio.’

‘I’d love to, Simon. Just send me a text.’

She rode the last hundred yards to the mill with a smile on her face. Whatever else had happened in the last few months, her relationship with Simon was improving. His affair with Lorraine, and her pregnancy, seemed to have matured him. Out of his surly, resentful teenage chrysalis was emerging a friendly, trustworthy young man, with shoulders broad enough to bear his new responsibilities.

Or so, at least, Sarah hoped. She wished her husband Bob could have seen it. But then, it was really only since Bob left her that Simon had begun to take up the role of the man of the family.

Coming out of the woods, she had another surprise. Lights were blazing in every room of the windmill. But that wasn’t the surprise - something was moving on the far side of the tower. It was hard to see at first, but whatever it was it was it was huge and powerful. Sarah stopped the bike and stood, peering into the darkness beyond the glare of the lights. What on earth could it be? Above the tower, a quarter moon appeared briefly from behind racing dark clouds, and then, almost immediately, a huge dark shape crossed in front of it, blotting it out for a second. Then another, and another, in a swift steady rhythm, and Sarah understood. Of course - it was the sails! Michael must have released the brake, and in this high wind they were turning, faster than she had ever seen them before. Perhaps that accounted for the unusual glare of lights; they must be generating a phenomenal amount of electricity. But was it safe? Well, he must have studied it. He’d had engineers here most of last week. She hoped he knew what he was doing.