‘I admire her. Yes. She’s had a difficult life.’
‘And are you attracted to her? Is your interest in any way sexual?’
For the first time, old Reg Courtenay dragged himself out of his shell of silence and tut-tutted Newry. DI Dunne somehow managed to communicate even more disapproval. Banks said nothing.
‘What happened to the girl?’ Newry asked.
‘I don’t know. She must have gone out a different way. I think there was a car out by the side of the building, in what used to be the staff car park. Maybe it was Tadić’s or Keane’s.’ He shrugged. ‘I don’t know.’
‘So she stole a car to make her escape?’
‘If you put it like that.’
‘I don’t know how else I should put it. Did you see this car? Did you know this at the time?’
‘No. I’m just speculating. The CSIs found traces of a vehicle recently parked out there. Oil stains. It makes sense. Otherwise, where did she go?’
‘That’s what we’d all like to know. I was about to ask you the very same question.’
‘I wish I knew,’ said Banks.
‘Why? So you could go and join her?’
Reg Courtenay tut-tutted again.
‘Did you see or hear her drive off?’ Newry went on.
‘Listening for a car was hardly the main thing on my mind. I ran for my life, ended up in the reservoir unconscious again. I might have heard a motor running, but I can’t be sure. The fire itself was noisy enough.’
‘So the girl cut you free, but you just left her there, in the burning building?’
‘It wasn’t like that,’ said Banks. ‘I was still woozy from being hit on the head. She cut my ropes and yelled for me to run. I assumed she’d be running with me, or not far behind. When I realised she wasn’t there, I tried to go back in, but I couldn’t get any further than the entrance. The fire was raging too hard, and there was plenty of smoke by then.’
‘What did you think had happened?’
‘That she’d either got out by some other exit or that she was dead. It all happened so quickly. I wasn’t thinking very clearly.’
‘So you just ran off?’
‘Yes. And I fell in the reservoir, where they found me. Hit my head again. If it hadn’t been for the bed of weeds, I’d probably be dead. What the hell else was I supposed to do? Go back inside the plant and burn to death?’
Newry waved his hand. ‘Sorry. I wasn’t meaning to imply anything.’
‘Like hell you weren’t. The forensic evidence corroborates what I’ve told you.’
‘Up to a point.’
‘Is there anything else?’
‘Not that I can think of. Not at the moment. DI Dunne?’
DI Dunne pursed her lips and shook her head.
Banks stood up. ‘Right then. As I’m still on sick leave, and I’m feeling sicker by the minute, I’ll go home now.’ He nodded farewell to the others in the room and left.
18
Two days passed uneventfully, and Banks whiled away his time reading, gardening, and listening to music — from Mahler’s symphonies to Jon Savage’s sixties compilation CDs. There were moments when he thought that if this was what not having to work was all about, then it wasn’t such a bad thing at all. Other times he felt edgy and restless, longing for some obscure mystery he could sink his teeth into.
The missing persons search for Zelda was effectively over, and now the police wanted to talk to her in connection with the fire at the water treatment plant in which two people had died. Banks trusted that she was far enough away and well enough hidden that they wouldn’t find her. Newry believed that she had killed both men, or that Banks had, but Newry wasn’t on the investigating team. He was IOPC, and his job was over. The Homicide and Major Crimes team from Durham was tackling the case now. Banks had talked to them and told them what he knew, or as much as he wanted them to know, and it was out of his hands now. He was exonerated. Newry could gripe to his heart’s content about the presence of a knife at the scene, a nick on a bone that might possibly indicate a stab wound and the matter of who struck the lighter that started the fire, but it no longer mattered what Newry thought, as what forensic evidence they had supported Banks’s story and none of it implicated him. In addition, Banks’s injuries, including the memory loss, were verified by Dr. Chowdhury and proven to be commensurate with the physical circumstances of his abduction and incarceration.
From the bits and pieces Banks had heard, he got the impression that Zelda wasn’t too high on their list of priorities; they seemed to be concentrating more on the Tadić gang’s criminal concerns and on Keane’s part in them. Gashi, too, was on their radar, his whereabouts unknown, and the disappearance of Goran Tadić was still an issue, albeit a minor one, as he wasn’t regarded as much of a loss.
One interesting piece of information, supplied by Jazz Singh at Banks’s request, was that a comparison between the DNA from the human arm found at the landfill site near Croydon and that from the body found on the upper floor of the burned-out water treatment plant gave a high indication that the two were siblings. Goran and Petar Tadić, Banks guessed, though there was no absolute proof, as neither was in any DNA database. The corpse’s DNA also matched that of the cigarette ends found near Windlee Farm. As they presumably belonged to the man Mick Slater described and Ray Cabbot sketched, the corpse was identified by Superintendent Burgess as Petar Tadić.
But a man can only do so much reading and gardening, and on the second day of his sick leave, Banks made a few phone calls, and on the third, he took an early train from York.
‘This is the second time you’ve had me brought up here,’ Charlotte Westlake complained as Gerry tended to the recording equipment in the interview room and Annie settled down in her chair late that afternoon. ‘I hope you’ve got a damn good reason.’
‘Be careful, or you might get what you hope for,’ said Annie.
‘Wait,’ said Charlotte. ‘As the officer who arrested me and brought me here suggested, I requested my solicitor to meet me, so I would be grateful if you would please wait until she arrives. She won’t be long.’
Annie and Gerry exchanged glances, then they left a young constable on guard and went down to the canteen for a cup of tea while they waited. Coffee at Costa would have been preferable to weak canteen tea, but they didn’t want to leave the station. They had already planned the strategy of the interview, such as it was, the previous evening in the Queen’s Arms. Gerry had uncovered more than enough information from her talk with Charlotte’s mother and the box of letters and postcards Lynne Pollard had been only too happy to share. The rest had come from the General Register and the various databases available to her online. If she was right about some of the conclusions she had reached, based on scraps of information picked up here and there, Gerry was sure that Charlotte would paint herself into a corner from which the only way out was the truth.
As yet, Annie and Gerry didn’t know what that truth was, and the possibilities kept shifting with the information coming in. When all they had was a number of inspired guesses, planning a strategy became that much more difficult. They would have to improvise from time to time. The basis for Charlotte Westlake’s arrest — suspicion of murder — was probably a bit far-fetched, Gerry would be the first to admit, but it was a means of bringing her in and throwing her off guard. It would also allow them to keep her in custody for twenty-four hours if necessary.
Charlotte’s solicitor, Jessica Bowen, turned up twenty minutes later and after a ten-minute huddle with her client, they all settled down in the airless room. Gerry got the recording equipment working and made the introductions.