‘Home,’ Urwin said, his eyes hooded.
Anyone corroborate that?’ Shap said.
‘Adele.’
‘Either of you leave the house at all?’ Shap said.
‘Why?’ Howard Urwin said.
‘Because that’s when someone took a pop at Dr Halliwell, three pops, to be exact,’ Shap said, ‘and you and the good doctor hadn’t exactly parted on friendly terms.’
The man rolled back his shoulders, thought for a minute.
‘Adele nipped out for milk, that’s all,’ Urwin said.
‘When?’
‘About six,’ Urwin said.
‘Where d’you get your milk?’
‘Spar shop on the high street.’
Stonewalled by Adele, Janine went back to the office. Shap had rung in with Urwin’s claim that Adele had gone out for milk. Janine sent Lisa to collect security camera footage from the store, for the time in question. And if it didn’t prove Howard Urwin’s account? If Adele had been elsewhere at that crucial time, perhaps heading for the surgery… Her job was to follow the evidence, Janine knew that, wherever it led. To be objective about it but she hoped to hell that Adele Young hadn’t gone and done something she’d regret for the rest of her life.
Chapter 29
Roy polished his shoes. They really needed re-heeling but they’d have to do. He had hung up his suit and shirt and tie, all ready.
The bed had gone now and the medicines, Peggy’s inhalers too, so the room looked bare, just his chair and the side table there.
He had been up to Cooper’s with the clothes for Peggy: her navy dress – the one with the flowers pattern – and her miraculous medal and rosary beads and her wedding ring all to be buried with her.
The flowers he had chosen were a mix of roses: red, white and yellow with some ferns and gypsophilia. Peggy loved roses, she had grown them in the little garden at the back of the house, different varieties, so there was always something in bloom. She’d spend hours out there, pruning or deadheading, tying in and cutting flowers for the house.
As was the custom, her body would be taken to church that evening in preparation for the requiem mass the following day.
He got out the photograph albums. Peggy had put them together. Three leather-bound books full of the best pictures they had taken of Simon, as a baby, as he grew, holidays, birthday parties, playing on his bike.
Roy didn’t need to open them, all those pictures were vivid in his mind. Simon on his shoulders, in Peggy’s arms, Simon covered in ice cream, in school uniform, with his first skateboard, on his eighteenth birthday. The picture they had used for his funeral.
Roy took the albums outside and got the barbecue lighter fuel, poured it over them and set the lot alight. The flames flashed high, scorching some of the rose bushes then subsided as the books burned to ash.
He wrote a letter then, brief and to the point, and found a stamp for it in the drawer in the kitchen. Second class. That would do. He didn’t feel the need to explain himself but he knew that Peggy would want him to set the record straight. He ought to take responsibility for his actions. If everyone did that, then things would not have got to this state in the first place.
He drew a chit of paper from his pocket, checking that he’d not forgotten anything that had to be done.
Satisfied, he looked outside. It was just beginning to spit so he put his coat on and set off to the post box down the road.
He ached with fatigue, wanted nothing more than to sleep. But it would soon all be over.
Chapter 30
Lisa was running the security film from the Spar shop, the shop floor was visible, the entrance door in the centre. Janine watched as the digital clock on the film clicked up close to six o’clock.
‘She’s a real fighter,’ Janine said to Richard, ‘I can’t believe it’s her.’
‘You can’t deny she was out for Halliwell’s blood,’ he said.
‘Yes, but she’s shouting it from the rooftops, taking it to the highest authority, whipping up debate – that’s not the sort of person who then turns round and performs a vigilante execution.’ Janine gestured to the screen. ‘There she is.’
They watched as Adele got a two litre bottle of milk from the chiller and paid at the counter.
‘But which way does she go now?’ Janine said. She held her breath as Adele exited the shop. Released it when she saw her turn left.
‘Away from the surgery – towards home,’ Lisa said.
Janine was relieved and Richard dipped his head, acknowledged her hunch had been right.
Janine signalled to the ‘grudge’ list on the boards.
‘Right, let’s try and eliminate some more of these names.’
Next on Shap’s list was Mr Neville Pemberton, an address in the pricey part of the area. When Shap reached it he found the smart semi had been adapted. A disabled ramp wound up to the front door where there was an entry phone. Shap pressed the buzzer.
‘Who is it?’
‘DS Shap, Greater Manchester Police. Can I have a word with you Mr Pemberton?’
‘You’re having one, aren’t you?’
Smart arse. ‘In person,’ Shap said.
‘What’s it about?’
‘Serious crime. You’ve heard about Dr Halliwell?’ Shap said.
‘He won’t be doing any more damage, now, will he?’
‘Please can you open the door, sir? Now.’
There was a buzzing noise and Shap pushed the door back in time to see Pemberton in a wheelchair, half-way down the hall by the entry phone unit. He was obviously very frail.
‘You made an official complaint?’ Shap said.
Pemberton made a noise of disgust. ‘Flu,’ he gestured to himself. ‘This look like flu to you? Meningitis and he failed to spot it.’
‘Where were you yesterday evening between six and seven?’ Shap said.
The man burst out laughing. ‘Seriously?’ he said.
‘If you could answer the question?’ Shap did not like being jerked about.
‘Here. Arguing the toss about my disabled living allowance. Then at the pub,’ Pemberton said.
‘Can anyone verify that?’ Shap said.
‘My personal carer might, she’s the poor sod had to get me dressed and into the Ring and Ride. Now, it’s going to take me the best part of fifteen minutes to get back to the computer so unless there’s anything else…’
‘Your carer’s name?’ Shap said.
‘Oh, for fuck’s sake,’ Pemberton said.
Shap waited, pen poised. Pemberton spat out the details and when Shap got through to her, the carer confirmed Pemberton’s alibi.
Chapter 31
It still felt unreal to Norma, impossible to truly believe. The nearest she could come when she attempted to think about it was, who on earth would shoot Don? Perhaps it was a mistake or an accident, Don was just in the wrong place at the wrong time. Nothing else made sense. It was all so random, life – wasn’t it? If she’d not got that puncture, not met Don, if they’d not lost the baby, then everything would have been different. She wouldn’t be here now. He wouldn’t be dead. If the baby had lived…
‘You will have another,’ that’s what people said when you lost a baby, had a miscarriage or a stillbirth. ‘Nature’s way.’ Norma hated that platitude. Nature’s way was brutal and whimsical, cruel. The baby had been perfect. Everyone agreed. Perfect but dead.
She felt as though her heart had been taken from her. Birthed and disposed of, like the stillborn child had been, like the placenta. Taken in a mess of pain and blood and grief. Don at her side, grey faced and stoic, held her hand and rubbed her back and when it came to pushing called her a good girl, just like the midwives did. They’d induced her, so labour came on swift and savage, cresting pains robbing her of breath and sense and the ability to speak. When the baby was born there was only silence in the room.