Child's Play (40 page)
Nona
opened the door of the staff flat very gingerly. Seeing Janet on the threshold, she breathed a huge sigh of relief.
‘
Who else were you expecting?’ Janet asked, puzzled by her pale face and fearful eyes.
‘
Oh, I’m being silly!’ Nona led her to the kitchen, where the kettle was grumbling as it began to boil. ‘It’s this place. It really gets to you. I barely slept a wink.’
‘
Where’s Daisy?’
‘
In bed still. I’m not sure what to do about breakfast. There’s a couple of sandwiches left over from last night, but that’s all.’
Janet
glanced at her watch. ‘It’s after ten. Has no one been over from the school?’
‘
No,’ Nona replied shortly. ‘It’s almost like Daisy was right. She said they’d forget about us and we’d starve.’
‘
Hardly.’ As Nona dropped teabags in two mugs, Janet noticed her hands were trembling. ‘What else did she say? You seem really rattled.’
‘
Believe me, “rattled” is an understatement! I feel positively neurotic.’ Nona busied herself taking milk from the refrigerator, looking rather sheepish. ‘But like I said,’ she went on, ‘it’s this place. The trees sigh and moan all night long. It’s unbelievably eerie. To tell the truth,’ she added, picking up the kettle, ‘I left the telly on so I wouldn’t hear them.’
‘
Did Daisy sleep well?’
‘
It took her ages to get off. I made her some hot chocolate about eleven, but even that didn’t settle her. Still, I’m not surprised. These girls must be scared out of their wits.’
‘
So, apart from winding you up,’ Janet began, ‘has she said anything of consequence?’
Nona
slowly stirred the teabags round and round. ‘I don’t think so. Superintendent McKenna told me to note every word, but she didn’t actually say anything worth writing down, except that she overheard Miss Knight saying Scott would be back when the fuss died down. Oh, and I tried to pump her a bit about Torrance, but she wouldn’t take the bait.’ She yawned, then rubbed her neck with her free hand. ‘What she
did
say was awfully hard to understand because of that horrible lisp. She complained over and again about being bored, said everything on telly was “thit”, then set my hair on end talking about the killer lurking on the other side of this very door, ready to pounce if either of us set foot outside. That’s why she reckoned we’d starve, you see.’
‘
She’s not a very nice young woman,’ Janet remarked.
‘
She isn’t a young woman,’ Nona replied flatly. ‘She just
looks
like one. Oh, and that reminds me,’ she added, still stirring the tea, ‘her period’s due. She says her breasts are very sore.’
Janet
waited until Nona left, then telephoned the school to ask for breakfast to be sent over. Daisy, looking rather drawn, was long about by the time the food arrived. She perched on a stool at the kitchen counter shovelling first cereal, then scrambled egg and toast into her mouth, chattering incessantly and inconsequentially between every mouthful.
Now
and then Janet made the odd response, but most of her attention was fixed on the enigma of what dwelt behind that ever smiling face. Daisy had a strange aura, she decided, that was both cold and overheated. In one way she could almost see her, smiling broadly while she plunged a knife into someone’s heart or battered their head to a pulp, yet she also recognised the dreadful, dispiriting fear that haunted every glance from the girl’s strange eyes.
‘
Why are you looking at me like that?’ Daisy demanded, breaking her train of thought.
‘
Like what?’
‘
Like you did yesterday.’
‘
As I don’t have a mirror stuck in front of my nose day and night, I can’t answer for the way I might look at any given time. Sorry, but there it is.’
Daisy
spluttered with laughter. ‘Charlotte does — well, almost. She’s always gawping at herself. She never makes any proper expressions either, so she won’t get wrinkles and lines.’
‘
She must have heard about Diane de Poitiers.’
‘
Who was she?’
‘
The mistress of a French king, a long time ago.’
‘
Dunno about that,’ Daisy replied, picking up her orange juice. ‘Her mother told her, never frown, never laugh, never cry.’ She wiped a bead of moisture from the rim of the glass.
‘
Well, from what I’ve heard, she was crying her eyes out yesterday at the police station.’
Daisy
’s eyes flicked over Janet and away. ‘I’ll bet Nancy didn’t. She’s hard as nails. You should have put one teeny-weeny spider in a cell, then locked her in with it and she’d have freaked out completely. She’d have gone absolutely
ape
!’
‘
I thought you didn’t know them particularly well?’
‘
Everybody
knows Nancy’s scared of spiders,’ Daisy said dismissively. Then her eyes took on that opaque appearance that made Janet shiver inwardly. ‘Where are they, anyway?’
‘
Back here.’
‘
Are they going to court?’
‘F
or what?’
‘
For whatever you arrested them for.’
‘
They weren’t arrested. They were questioned.’ Janet lit a cigarette. ‘About Sukie.’ Again, Daisy’s eyes flicked over her. ‘Nancy was also questioned about being the school bully. Her antics seem to be common knowledge, but unfortunately, unless someone makes a specific complaint, we can’t do anything about her.’
‘
You couldn’t anyway.’
‘
Bullying isn’t one of your school games!’ Janet snapped. ‘And you don’t win prizes for it. In the real world, bullies get prosecuted for assault. They even get sent to prison.’
‘
So? Why tell me?’
‘
Because you asked.’
‘
Did I?’ Daisy slid off the stool and carried the used dishes to the sink. ‘How long am I going to be here?’
‘
I don’t know. Why?’
‘
It’s boring. I want to go back to school.’
‘
You’re here for your own protection, as you’ve already been told.’
Wide-eyed,
Daisy said, ‘I thought Torrance was still in hospital.’
‘
Oh, stop acting dumb! You know perfectly well we can’t risk your gossiping about her.’
‘
Why didn’t you say that, then? Anyway, I only talk to Alice, but she isn’t here, so I couldn’t.’ She looked at the floor. ‘And even if she
was
here, she wouldn’t be speaking to
me
. You heard what she said yesterday.’
‘
You talk to Grace, too.’
Crossing
the room in three small strides, Daisy said, ‘But not
properly
. I told you, she’s stupid.’ Then, breathing in Janet’s face, she added, ‘To save us
both
getting bored out of our skulls, why don’t you take me for a walk? Everyone will be in chapel, so you needn’t worry about me talking to anyone. There won’t be a soul in sight.’
As
McKenna negotiated one of the crazy turns in the Hermitage drive, a security van suddenly materialised in front of him. Trailing in its wake, he peered right and left, but was no wiser about where it had come from when he reached the forecourt. He parked between two unfamiliar cars and watched the van bump along the track towards the arena.
Small
groups of police officers, wearing an air of boredom, stood about in the lobby. McKenna learned that one of the cars belonged to the Roman Catholic priest who took Sunday morning Mass in the refectory, the other to the Protestant minister who, with the bulk of girls and staff and another group of officers, was in the chapel in the grounds. Until religious observances were completed, it seemed there was little for anyone to do.
He
wandered back to the forecourt, to stand, hands in pockets, gazing at nothing, while the wind whispered through the trees, touching his face with cool fingers as it went on its way. The sky was a chilly blue, criss-crossed with vapour trails and torn cloud.
He
had two hours to kill before the solicitor and social worker arrived to sit in with Daisy while she gave her statement and was interviewed about the sabotaged saddle. Long, empty hours, he thought, strolling across to the mobile incident room, a hiatus in the frenetic activity of the past three days. Torrance would be cautioned and questioned, provided her doctors allowed it, once Daisy’s allegations were down in black and white. Alice was due back at two thirty. Imagining the various kinds of purgatory she would have made her mother suffer since yesterday, he went into the little office and sat down.
When
he called Janet, she asked if she might take Daisy for a walk in the grounds and, seeing no harm in the suggestion, he agreed. Scribbling himself a reminder to obtain Daisy’s consent for her things to be searched for knives, scalpels or suchlike, he next called Dewi, who was at the hospital, waiting to speak to Imogen if she regained consciousness.
‘
She’s still completely out of it, sir,’ Dewi told him. ‘And she’s still pretty sick. One of her kidneys is threatening to pack up.’
‘
How are her parents taking that?’ McKenna asked.
‘
They don’t know yet. They left in the early hours and they haven’t come back.’ Dewi paused. ‘They were giving Vivienne a lot of grief because she wouldn’t go away.’
‘
I hope you told them she saved Imogen’s life?’
‘
Yes, I did. I don’t think it made much of an impression. They’re far more bothered about screwing money out of somebody for negligence. The school’s first in line and us second. They’ve got their solicitor in tow, you see, and she decided it was “only fair” to tell me “which way the wind was blowing”, so I told
her
that as the local weather’s famous for being completely unpredictable, an almighty storm could suddenly blow up from an entirely unsuspected direction.’
‘
Berkshire won’t question them without Imogen’s formal statement.’
‘
Maybe not, sir, but it won’t hurt to give the Olivers something to think about.’
‘
As long as that’s all you say,’ McKenna warned. ‘By the way, keep an eye on Vivienne. Make sure she’s fed and watered at least, and find out when she intends to come back here.’
‘
She doesn’t, except to pack her bags,’ Dewi replied. ‘She’s had the Hermitage, so she said, “up to the gills, and more”.’ After a moment, he added, ‘I couldn’t swear to it, but I’m sure she hasn’t smoked anything apart from ordinary ciggies since she’s been here and not many of those. Let’s hope I’m right, eh?’
Two
new pieces of paper had been put in front of McKenna while he spoke to Dewi, one a fax from the pathology department, the other a photocopied and faxed page from a jeweller’s catalogue.
Eifion
Roberts’s efforts to identify the smudges left by the killer’s fingers on Sukie’s T-shirt had proved fruitless, and as his attempts to extract evidence from the partial footprint on her jeans had been equally futile and disappointing, he intended to send both garments to a laboratory in the Midlands for a last-ditch round of tests.
McKenna
glanced at the other paper before putting it aside for Nona, who would know if the jewel in the rather grainy photograph matched either of the pendants she had found in Imogen’s room. The piece was not priced and McKenna wondered if it were one of those things people could not afford if they had to ask the cost. It looked expensive, but a pear-cut diamond weighing almost a carat was bound to be, he thought. The setting — a starfish-shaped platinum claw — was particularly unusual.
Jack
was at the police station, supervising a thorough cross-check of every single item of information that had come their way since Thursday. He had nothing to report.
Shortly
before eleven, McKenna took himself for a walk, setting off down the tarmac path towards the sprawling complex of swimming pool, sports hall and playing fields. As ever, the trees closed about him within yards and the air was heavy with earth smells. Where the trees cast their deepest shade, the path bloomed with moss, and as it began its downward slope he could see the distant roof line of the sports hall to the right. To the left, embraced on three sides by the woods, was the paddock. Some of the horses were moving about, searching for grass among the bald patches and tracts of mud. Purdey, her coat glistening, stood with her head over the fence, nose to nose with Tonto. Two figures suddenly came into view: Daisy, instantly recognisable, still garbed in black, and Janet, slender and pale-clad. Daisy ran towards the horses, reaching out to Tonto. He threw up his head, reared and, wheeling on his hind legs, took off at the gallop. Purdey followed suit, making the others stampede. Daisy seemed to be laughing.
He
quickened his pace, but lost sight of them when the path veered to the right and they had gone when he neared the paddock. Now in the far corner of the field, the horses tensed as he approached and the skewbald mare advanced, ready to defend her herd. Head extended, neck dished, nostrils flaring, she stopped some ten feet from the gate and he was shocked to find himself afraid. Quietly but hurriedly, he walked away, listening intently for pounding hooves. Preoccupied, disconcerted, his sense of direction went the way of the four winds.