The Sting of Death (12 page)

‘But instead the plan changed and she went away with Miss Pereira, without your knowledge?’ Den was adept at reflecting back at people the unlikeliness of their stories. This one was more unlikely than most.

‘He says he and Justine were planning to go away together, taking Georgia, and this must have been some sort of trial run,’ she explained through gritted teeth.

Den looked at Philip Renton. He had an elbow on the table, his brow leaning on his hand, the picture of a shame-faced husband caught in the act.

Den decided to skip the side issues. ‘So neither of you has heard anything from or about your three-year-old child for six days?’ There was no need to lace his words with reproach; the flat summary was enough.

‘I was certain she was with her grandmother on the Isle of Wight,’ Sheena said loudly. ‘I only found out last night that I was lied to, and that Philip hasn’t any idea where Justine has taken my daughter.’

‘Last night?’ Den queried. ‘You knew last night that she’d gone, and you only phoned the police this morning?’

‘Yes.’ She glared again at her husband. ‘He
persuaded me that it would do no harm to leave it until this morning to call you. But I lay awake all night, worrying.’

‘Right,’ said Den. ‘Mr Renton, where did Miss Pereira say she was going?’

‘She didn’t name an exact place. She took a tent and said they’d find a nice spot for camping, and then she’d phone me in a few days to say how they were getting on. Look, officer—’ he glanced at Sheena, including her in his assurances ‘I’m sure there’s no need to worry. Justine and I … well, we’re very fond of each other. She won’t do anything to hurt Georgia. You know how complicated it can be to get to a phone if there’s no mobile signal. She’ll turn up again any day now.’

Den tapped a fingernail against his teeth. ‘There is, of course, the other matter of Miss Pereira having been reported missing. You told Mr Slocombe on Monday evening that Miss Pereira had gone camping, didn’t you?’

Renton nodded, with a look of self-assurance. ‘That’s right.’

‘But you didn’t say she’d taken your daughter with her?’

‘Why should I? That had nothing to do with it. They weren’t looking for Georgia.’

‘And you were worried that it might get back to your wife?’

Renton flushed faintly and looked again at Sheena. ‘Something like that. At that stage, you see, I was still hoping Justine would come back with Georgia and we could all carry on as normal for a while.’

‘He’s not telling the whole story. You can see he isn’t,’ Sheena burst out.

Renton’s face reassumed its practised blandness at this accusation. Den was reminded of an habitual criminal he’d frequently had cause to interview, who adopted just such an expression under interrogation. It was a knack that many young boys acquired, but generally seemed to lose as they grew up. It shrieked
Liar
!
to those on the receiving end, but frustratingly succeeded in obscuring the truth. There were times when torture seemed the only effective option, Den had often thought, grimly.

‘So what went wrong with your plan?’ he asked, staring hard at the man.

Renton’s composure faltered for a second. ‘N-nothing,’ he said. ‘There wasn’t a plan. Not really. It’s true that we’ve been “having an affair”.’ He mouthed the phrase as if it offended him. ‘Nobody claims to think that this is the perfect marriage, after all.’ An intake of breath made him glance at Sheena, his expression giving the lie to his words. Den thought he glimpsed a yearning pain underneath the studied blandness.
He nodded for the man to go on. ‘But it was all still at the talking stage, as far as taking anything further was concerned. It’s not something to be undertaken lightly.’

‘Not when there’s a little girl involved,’ Den agreed.

‘Oh, she wouldn’t have been a problem,’ Renton said unpleasantly. ‘I don’t suppose she even knows that Sheena’s her mother. She saw much more of Justine and the day nursery women than she ever saw of her own mother.’

A dramatic hiss warned the men that Sheena had had enough. She launched herself at Philip, fingers curved rigidly like claws, and before Den could stop her had raked four long scratches down both of Philip’s cheeks. Immediately, she fell back, Den belatedly clutching her shoulders, and stared at her handiwork. Blood slowly welled through the broken skin, surrounded by white weals. Her victim cautiously put a hand first to one side, then the other. ‘Shit!’ he breathed.

‘You asked for that,’ she panted. ‘It bloody well serves you right.’ Den silently agreed with her, but was duty-bound to react otherwise.

‘Mrs Renton, I must warn you that violence is unlawful. Please give me your assurance that there’ll be no repetition of what just happened,’ he said formally.

After a moment she nodded and muttered,
‘You needn’t worry. It won’t happen again.’

An awkward silence followed, while Den tried to make sense of everything they’d told him. He spoke slowly. ‘It still isn’t altogether clear whether or not we are dealing with a missing child. It doesn’t appear that she was abducted, since her father willingly allowed her to go. There’s no suggestion that she’s been taken abroad or that she’s come to any harm. As far as I can understand it, there was no firm date for her return. Essentially, the only cause for concern is that Miss Strabinski has been worried about her cousin and thinks she left home very abruptly, possibly under some coercion. She doesn’t seem to be aware that the little girl is with Miss Pereira. And when she heard that you’d claimed that her cousin had gone camping, she was very surprised – and somewhat annoyed.’ He eyed them both carefully. ‘Have I missed anything?’

‘Only that I want my daughter back –
now
,’ insisted Sheena.

‘Penn got it wrong,’ Renton added. ‘She’s making a fuss about nothing. It isn’t any of her business, anyway.’

Den was reminded of something Drew Slocombe had observed, about Renton seeming to monitor everything he said before letting the words emerge. It was rather like someone speaking a foreign language, that tiny hesitation
before every phrase. Or someone overcoming a stutter. Maybe, he conceded, that’s all it was. Or just an odd mannerism.

‘But Penn was here on Thursday, too, wasn’t she?’ Sheena remembered. ‘I met her as I was driving out. It was early, just after eight.’

This time, the silence was full of tension. Watched by his wife and the police detective, Renton was obviously at a loss for a reply, for the first time. But he recovered quickly. ‘No,’ he said, bewilderment plain on his face. ‘Or if she was, I never saw her. She must have come and gone again in a couple of minutes.’

Den looked out of the window onto the yard. ‘Would you notice a car going to the cottage?’ he wondered. ‘Where exactly is the track?’

‘They do have to come into our yard for a very short way,’ Renton explained, pointing out the route. ‘In through the gateway where you came in and then sharp left down the track to the cottage. We don’t sit here all day watching out for vehicles. You can’t see the yard from the living room or my office.’

‘And there isn’t a dog,’ Den noted. ‘So Miss Strabinski could have been there for some time and you wouldn’t have known. What time did Justine and the little girl leave?’

Renton shrugged. ‘Mid-morning,’ he offered. ‘I have no idea of the precise time.’

‘You work from here, I take it?’

‘I’m in and out. I have to go to check quality on the ground and attend sales and so forth. But I’m here a fair amount of the time, yes. I was here last Thursday.’

Den made a few lines of notes. ‘One more thing,’ he remembered. ‘Could I possibly have a recent photo of Georgia?’

The couple seemed to forget their differences and stared at each other in dismay. ‘Oh!’ breathed Sheena, ‘Well, I suppose we
must
have one somewhere  …?’ She looked helplessly at Philip.

‘Justine took a few of her, sometime around Easter. I remember there were daffodils.’ He shrugged. ‘I have no idea where they might be. Presumably in the cottage.’

‘Maybe a video, then?’ Den suggested. ‘We could probably have a few stills made, if you could let us have …’

‘No, we haven’t got a video camera,’ Philip cut across him. ‘We don’t really do photography at all, you see.’

‘And you never took her to a professional?’ Den’s disbelief was growing. Surely everybody took pictures of their children? Especially girls, especially the first child. What was the matter with these two that they seem never to have bothered?

‘Oh, I remember!’ Sheena suddenly crowed. ‘Your mother sent us one, didn’t she? Georgia’s nearly three in that. She hasn’t changed much since then. I’ll fetch it.’

The photograph had been slightly bent, pushed carelessly into a drawer. It showed a small girl sitting on a blue carpet, wearing dungarees. Her hair was short and wispy, her eyes very large, her expression serious. Den’s impression was of a child very small for almost three. ‘Thanks,’ he said. ‘It always helps to have a picture.’

‘You’re going to search for her then, are you?’ Sheena persisted.

‘We’ll definitely search for Justine Pereira,’ he told her. ‘Because it seems very likely that we’ll find your little girl with her, don’t you think?’

‘I hope so,’ the woman responded flatly.

‘Now I’m going to have a look around her cottage. One of you would be welcome to accompany me. In fact, that’s the usual procedure.’

Neither of them seemed inclined to act as chaperone. ‘We trust you,’ said Philip casually. ‘The key’s under a big stone to the right of the front door.’

Without further discussion Den walked down the track to the small house, thinking as he did so that he’d had cause to visit numerous such
dwellings during his career. A great many farms had originally included workers’ cottages on their property, and although a lot had been sold off or allowed to fall derelict in recent times, a lot still remained. This one was typical in many ways. Set at some distance from the main farmhouse, allotted its own fair-sized garden, just big enough for a family – and almost completely unmodernised.

He looked into every room, noting the untidiness, the air of having been left abruptly, but with no signs of violence. He found the mobile phone and the toothbrush, as Maggs had described. He left with a feeling of having learnt almost nothing.

Karen had no clear idea of what she would say when she phoned her cousin Penn, except that this was the only person she felt might offer her some sense of being involved in the business of Justine’s disappearance.

‘You only just caught me,’ came the response. ‘I was going out.’

‘Thanks for the nice note you sent,’ Karen began. ‘I hope we can keep in touch, now you’ve made the first move.’

‘Has Drew made any headway in trying to find Justine? I was hoping to hear from him before now.’

‘What? Surely they’ve told you?’ Karen was incredulous. ‘I assumed somebody would have called you right away.’

‘What? What do you mean?’ Penn’s voice was strained, even panicked.

‘They probably just didn’t get around to it. Drew was at Roma’s last night, when Justine walked in. I haven’t heard the whole story, by any means. I was just going to bed when he got home and fell asleep before he could say much. He promised to fill in the details this evening, but I’m not holding my breath. Yo be honest, I thought you could probably tell me all about it.’

‘Are you sure about this?’ Penn seemed to be having trouble breathing. ‘I mean  … did he really say it was Justine?’

‘Of course. Who else would it be? It was all rather exciting, apparently. She hadn’t seen Roma for years, as you obviously know. And Roma wasn’t too happy to see her. Drew’s busy today or I could go and ask him for the rest of the story. He’s got two funerals tomorrow.’

Penn was no more impressed by this boast than Detective Sergeant Cooper had been. ‘Look, Karen, I’ll have to go. I’m catching a train down to the coast and I haven’t got long. Thanks for the call, it was really nice of you. I’ll be in touch when I get back. It’ll only be a few days. Say Hi to Drew for me, okay.’ The haste was almost
indecent and Karen felt the rejection. ‘Go on, then,’ she said curtly. ‘Have a nice time.’

The only response was a snort. Somehow Karen had the impression that Penn did not expect to enjoy herself.

Penn was indeed not optimistic about enjoying herself. Neither did she know what she ought to do next. She was indeed catching a train, as she had told Karen, but not for another hour. As she had fallen into the habit of doing in recent months, she reached for her bag of
rune-stones
. Originally treating them as a novelty when one of her students had given them to her, she had become increasingly impressed by their usefulness. The interpretation of each symbol was a real intellectual challenge at times, and she rationalised her interest as being a topic of serious study. Justine had gently mocked her at first, of course. ‘Look, it isn’t fortune-telling, or anything like that. It’s just a sort of
pointer
. It directs your attention, focuses your thoughts,’ Penn had insisted.

She shook the bag, then stirred the smooth oval shapes with a finger, and withdrew three stones, laying them out from right to left, as the booklet had instructed. The first two were very similar: one showed two triangles joined at one point, making a sort of bowtie. The one to
the right of it was another bowtie, this time on legs – the symbol for The Self. Penn shrieked as she realised the implications of the third stone. Once again, as she had described to Drew on Sunday afternoon, she had drawn Breakthrough followed by the Blank. And this combination meant Death.

She scattered the stones with a violent hand, doing her best to ignore her thumping heart. It was pure coincidence. Those two had been on top of the bag from the last time. The whole thing was stupid anyway. How could it
possibly
mean anything?

But she couldn’t suppress the shaking that had gripped her; the sudden certainty that she was destined for something terrible. Penn Strabinski was, in short, decidedly frightened.