Outside Susan’s inexplicably expensive house, Jack got out his mobile. Within minutes, the HOLMES database confirmed his hunch: Angela Dunn was named in an arrest report from September 1985. She was arrested on suspicion of solicitation during a raid at The Grange. Released without charge.
If Susan’s story was true, Angela Dunn had been Mike Withey’s mistress.
Back home, Jack leapt up his stairs, two at a time... and then stopped dead. He checked his watch — 10.30. Shit! He was desperate to tell Maggie about his day, but that would have to wait till morning now. He sneaked into the bedroom — the bed was still neatly made and Maggie wasn’t there. He quickly ran through her calendar in his head, certain she wasn’t at work.
In the kitchen, Maggie nursed a glass of red and stared at her laptop screen. She looked at him like a stern mum catching her teenager sneaking in late.
‘What’s up, love?’ Jack asked.
Maggie spun the laptop round so that he could see the screen, got up and poured a glass of red wine for him. On the screen was a photo of Charlie and Penny on the balcony of their cabin. The selfie caught half of Penny’s face and all of Charlie, but it was mostly sea and sky. In the bottom left corner of the image was half of a bright orange pilot boat that had come into the deeper waters to take them ashore for a day trip.
Jack smiled. His mum was terrible at taking photos! He flicked through image after image — dozens of new memories desperately made in such a short space of time. His dad was starting to look ill and Jack was so far away.
Maggie put Jack’s wine on the table.
‘You missed their Skype call.’
Jack’s face drained and his skin went cold. His eyes began to fill and he gulped to stop himself from crying. He felt so ashamed. Maggie had reminded him in the morning before he left, and he’d promised not to forget.
What am I doing? he asked himself. He looked up at Maggie.
‘Was he OK, Mags? Does he sound OK? He looks pale, doesn’t he?’
Maggie knew she didn’t need to say anything more and just rubbed his back as he flicked through more terribly framed selfies.
‘He’s having a wonderful time, Jack. He said he feels fine — gets tired more quickly, but they slow down after lunch and Penny plans each day to include a nap, so they don’t miss out on any of the evening cabaret shows.’
‘I should have been here.’ Jack thumped the table. ‘Was Mum angry? I bet she was. I’m going to stop looking for Jimmy Nunn, Mags. It’s making me miss the here and now and I can’t get any of this back. I can’t get that Skype call back.’ He slumped down into the chair. ‘Tell me what they said again.’
Maggie put Penny’s photos on ‘slide show’ and then relayed the Skype call, word for word. When she’d finished, she said, ‘I’ll go on up to bed. You come up when you’re ready.’
As she left the room, she looked back to see him staring intently at the screen as the slide show went round and round.
Chapter 18
By morning, Jack’s guilt had been replaced by an irrepressible sense of excitement at discovering a possible connection between Ester Freeman, Angela Dunn and Mike Withey. If they were linked, then the decades were linked — which suggested that the crimes could also be linked. The fact that he could now trace Ester and Angela’s relationship back as far as the 1980s wasn’t particularly relevant to their current investigation; but if Angela knew Mike — that was a game-changer. It might even put them in the same place at the time of the train robbery.
When Angela Dunn opened the door, she looked startled.
‘Oh!’ she said. ‘You!’ She recovered herself. ‘Come in.’
It took her twice as long to make the tea as it had the last time, as if she was giving herself time to think.
‘I’m making a dress today,’ she said as she led the way back into her sitting room.
She held it up for Jack to admire. It was stunning, if on the large side. For some reason he thought of Connie; she’d look fabulous in it.
‘What can I do for you?’ Angela asked, as she poured the tea.
‘Further enquiries have raised a few more questions, if you don’t mind, Mrs Dunn.’
Angela smiled and waved a hand. ‘Such as?’
Jack jumped in. ‘Do you know Mike Withey?’
‘No.’
The answer was so quick and confident that, for a moment, Jack thought he’d got it all wrong. But then it was odd she hadn’t asked who Mike Withey was. Jack decided to trust his newly developed ‘gut’.
‘I think you might know him, Mrs Dunn — although maybe you’ve forgotten? It was a long time ago. Do you recall working for Ester Freeman at The Grange?’
‘I wasn’t a prostitute!’ Angela snapped. ‘Is that what you’ve come here to ask me?’
‘Not at all.’ Jack widened his eyes. ‘I know you were a maid. But I know that, on one occasion, you were arrested along with everyone else and I know that PC Withey, as he was back then... looked after you.’
Angela’s face softened. ‘PC Withey... ah, yes. I’d forgotten the name, sorry. He was very good to me.’
‘You know,’ Jack went on, ‘ “hero worship” is a common reaction in victims who are rescued from abusive environments. It’s natural — it wouldn’t have been your fault — but affairs are often the final outcome.’
‘I was fifteen! And he was married, I think. I did cling to him for a bit, I remember that, but he was always very professional. There was nothing unsavoury about it, DC Warr, if that’s what you’re implying.’
Angela was cool, all right. Every inch of Jack tingled as her words washed over him. Something wasn’t right with her manner, her words, her tone; she was lying and he knew it.
‘Whose baby did you lose?’ he asked abruptly. ‘You previously told me that you put flowers on Dolly’s grave because you let her down. You said you’d made a mistake and you lost a baby. This was back around 1995, when you were all living at The Grange?’
Angela glanced up at the high shelf, far out of reach of sticky young fingers, at the two lone toys in pride of place — the teddy bear and the teething ring. Jack followed her gaze. He needed to be more careful. This loss was still raw.
‘It must have been awful. I’m very sorry.’ He paused. ‘Did Mike know?’ he asked gently.
She rounded on him. ‘PC Withey was not the mistake I mentioned. If you insist on prying, I was attacked. I’d call it rape if I’d been sober enough to remember it actually happening. Five weeks later, I was pregnant. And I didn’t lose the baby, DC Warr, I drank bleach and I killed it. My body simply couldn’t keep us both alive. That’s how I let Dolly Rawlins down. She bought the bear and teether — she loved me and, by default, she loved my baby. I took both from her that day.’
Angela stared at him, strong and defiant, as if willing him to question her further.
Jack got to his feet. Even though he was certain she was telling the truth, he sensed there was something she was holding back. Nothing he could do about it for now.
‘Thank you for your time, Mrs Dunn,’ he said, and left.
Angela stood on the balcony, staring down as Jack Warr got into his car. As soon as he’d driven off, she went inside and picked up her mobile.