‘This house here,’ she says suddenly, swinging round. ‘Fifty-two Clifton Street. That’s one of yours too?’ It’s where Vicky told them she had been living when she claimed she was abducted.
He glances up and nods. ‘Yup.’
‘Can you look that one up for me?’
‘2015 again?’
‘No. The year before. Spring 2014 – before July.’
‘OK,’ he says. Then, ‘Here we go. Who are you interested in?’
‘Is there a Neale on the list?’
The lad nods. ‘Yes.’
So Vicky was telling the truth about that, at least.
But then the lad glances up from the screen. ‘You might want to see this, officer.’
Everett goes round the desk to stand next to him. He points at the computer screen. At the list of the other tenants in 52 Clifton Street when Vicky Neale was there.
Anwar, Bailey, Drajewicz, Kowalczyk.
And Walker.
‘Forget the other ID,’ Everett says quickly. ‘That’s the one I want to see.’
***
‘I had a message to come here.’
The desk sergeant at St Aldate’s looks up to see a woman in a denim jacket and skinny jeans. She has highlighted blonde hair and a strappy handbag with a pale pink monkey charm hanging from it. From the way she’s dressed, she must look no more than twenty from behind. But face on, she’s at least double that.
‘Sorry, madam, you are?’
‘I got a message about my daughter. From a woman, a Detective Constable Everton –’
‘Everett.’
She raises an eyebrow. ‘If you say so. So, can I see her? Vicky? I mean, I assume she’s here.’
The sergeant picks up the phone. ‘Let me ring the incident room and ask someone to come down and collect you. If you could take a seat, Mrs Neale –’
‘It’s Moran these days. If you don’t mind.’
‘Mrs Moran. I’m sure it won’t be long.’
The woman looks him up and down. ‘I should hope not. Because I’ve come all the way from Chester for this.’
Then she turns on her kitten heels, parks herself on the furthest-away seat and gets out her mobile phone.
***
Interview with Pippa Walker, St Aldate’s Police Station, Oxford
10 May 2017, 6.17 p.m.
In attendance, DI A. Fawley, DC C. Gislingham, Mrs T. York (solicitor)
TY: I asked you here, Inspector, to inform you that my client will be making a formal complaint relating to the conduct of Detective Sergeant Gareth Quinn.
AF: That is, of course, her right.
TY: I should also tell you that she has decided not to answer any further questions unless she is given some sort of immunity from prosecution.
AF: Immunity from prosecution for what, exactly? She’s already been charged with attempting to pervert the course of justice. That isn’t going to go away.
TY: My client fears she may be wrongly accused of involvement in the death of Mrs Hannah Gardiner.
AF: What makes her think that?
TY: Miss Walker has information pertinent to that inquiry, but she is not prepared to divulge it without the assurances I have mentioned. I have discussed the advisability of this position with her, and the likelihood of any such immunity being granted, but she is adamant.
AF: Investigations into Mrs Gardiner’s death are still ongoing. We are not yet in a position to prefer charges –
PW: That’s a load of crap. I’m not falling for that –
TY: [restraining her client]
I take it you haven’t found my client’s prints in the Frampton Road house?
AF: [hesitates]
No, we haven’t.
TY: Or any other forensic evidence linking her to the crime?
AF: [hesitates]
Full analysis of the crime scene has not yet been concluded –
TY: Well then.
PW: [pushing the lawyer’s hand away]
You want to know who killed her? Then give me my immunity. Because I’m not saying anything until you do.
***
‘She’s got balls, I’ll give her that,’ says Quinn, when I go back into the incident room. He was watching on the video feed. ‘Did you notice, by the way, how it’s not just the name that’s fake? That upper-middle accent of hers has slid a notch or two as well.’
He’s right. The mask has slipped. It’s the same girl, but another person. White birds by night, black birds by day.
The door swings open behind him and there’s a woman standing there with one of the DCs. Someone I don’t recognize but who seems, all the same, somehow familiar. Someone who walks forward towards me then stops. She stares at the pinboard and then at me.
‘What the hell’s going on? They said on the phone that this was about Vicky.’
The DC steps forward quickly. ‘This is Mrs Moran, sir. Vicky’s mother.’
She looks at him, and then at me. ‘Right,’ she says, walking over to the board and jabbing it with a bright fuchsia nail. ‘I’m Vicky’s mum. So could someone please explain to me what you’re doing with this picture of my Tricia?’
***
‘Tricia,’ says the Asian lad, looking up at Everett. ‘Tricia Walker, that was the tenant’s name. Here you are.’
He pulls up a scan of a passport page. The face, the expression – it’s clearly her, even if the hairstyle is very different. And not just the hair: make-up, expression, everything about her now is sleeker, more precise, more expensive.
‘Is that any use?’ he says.
She grins at him. ‘Absolutely bloody marvellous – can you print that?’
She gets out her phone and calls the incident room.
‘Quinn? It’s me. Everett. Listen, I know Pippa Walker’s real name. It’s Tricia. Her and Vicky, they didn’t meet at Frampton Road like we thought. They knew each other before. They shared a house in 2014. And it’s not just that – they gave the same previous address when they registered with the letting agency. Those two girls, I think they could be –’
‘Sisters. Yeah, Ev. We know.’
***
‘I’m not very happy about this, sir.’
The custody sergeant is looking uneasy; it can’t be very often he gets a DI in here at eight o’clock at night.
‘She should have her lawyer here – it should be taped –’
‘I know, and I’ll tell her all that and if she doesn’t want to speak to me then I’ll back off.’
He still looks unconvinced, but he gets up and collects his keys and we go down the passage to the cell. He opens the observation flap, checks inside, then unlocks the door and pushes it open.
‘I’ll be at the desk,’ he says.
*
She’s sitting on the narrow bed, her knees drawn up to her chest. She looks wan in the inadequate light.
‘What do you want?’ she says, wary.
‘I shouldn’t really be here.’
‘So why are you then?’
‘Because I want to talk to you. But you can have your lawyer here if you want.’
She stares at me for a moment. I can’t tell if she’s intrigued or just too tired to argue. ‘Whatever.’
‘They told me you didn’t want to see your mum.’
Her eyes flicker at that, and I move a little closer.