“Nice?” she smiles, and pushes her hair behind her ear. “Yeah, you’re right. I don’t tell people that very often, so enjoy it.”
“I’ll make a note.”
“It’ll have to be a voice memo,” says Sumaira, nodding at his hands. Rowan looks away before his expression betrays him. His phone is on the table between them, serving as a decoy. On his thigh, his voice recorder is taking down every word.
“So,” he begins. “I was wondering …,”
“You never called me,” she says, abruptly. She glares at him, eyes wide, seeking explanation or apology. “I thought we got on.”
“We did,” says Rowan. “But I was seeing somebody.”
“So was I,” laughs Sumaira. “I’m not any more. Well, maybe a bit. There’s a thing with my builder that might become something. Maybe not. What about you?”
“I continue to attract women who deserve better,” mutters Rowan, performing mental arithmetic as he tries to decide if he can afford another double whisky. “Roxanne was the girl I was seeing when you and I met. She’s with somebody else now.”
“Love’s a bastard,” says Sumaira, and seems to mean it. “You must have been sweet on her – you never called me back.”
Rowan shrugs. “Maybe I was. I’ve never worked it out. I mean, she was lovely to look at and she knew how to keep me from coming unglued, but if I’m honest, we weren’t a neat fit. She wanted more for me. Or more for her, maybe.”
Sumaira pretends to play a tiny violin. “Tried to fix you, did she?”
Rowan drains his glass and allows himself to consider his latest failed love affair. He sits back in his seat. “It’s nice to have somebody on your side, but she always made it seem like we were a work in progress. Or I was, at least. Like I was a house that needed fixing up but the budget had got out of hand. She kept me right, I guess. Made sure I met my deadlines and went to work and didn’t drink so much that I couldn’t remember the stories I’d wheedled out of people in the pub. At least she made it look as though somebody loved me.” He gestures at himself, bitterly. “I didn’t look like this.”
“You look like you,” says Sumaira, casting a critical eye. “That’s how you’re meant to look, I think. And if I’m honest with you, she wasn’t doing that great a job of keeping you right when I met you. There was a haze of drink coming off you and I don’t think you had a pupil in either eyeball. If you were dating a mother-figure then I reckon you had a case for neglect.”
Rowan finds himself laughing. “I don’t think I was doing that,” he protests. “She was younger than me, anyway. And I didn’t like all that housewife stuff she wanted to do. I paid for a cleaner so she wouldn’t have to pick up after me.”
“You could always have picked up after yourself,” smiles Sumaira, with a grin. “Sounds to me like you don’t know what you want. You’re a Romantic, maybe. See the shine on somebody for a few weeks or months and then you start seeing the rotten wood beneath. I know your type, I reckon. You gave away a lot about yourself in the book. You can tell that it hurts you when bad things happen to good people, but then you identify so strongly with the bad. I reckon you spend most days unsure of whether you’re the best thing since the Rampant Rabbit, or you’re the AntiChrist.”
Rowan chews his lip, biting back a smile. “You should be a copper,” he says, and realises how much he is enjoying her company.
“I think I know what you’re looking into,” says Sumaira, reaching into her bag and pulling out a slim, buff folder: a magician’s puzzle of conjoined rings staining the front. “Truth be told, I’ve been waiting for somebody to ask me about this one but it seems there are even fewer investigative journalists out there than there are decent detectives, so maybe I should just be grateful somebody’s taken an interest. I wouldn’t have had it to hand but I’d already dug it out for a Freedom of Information request – not that it ever went anywhere.”
Rowan angles his leg, raising the dictaphone. “Somebody else is interested?”
There is a clatter as Sumaira’s shoe drops from her toe and lands on the floor between them. She smiles. “Worrying you’ve got a competitor?” she asks. “Don’t be. Private citizen, not rival writer, though apparently she’s got ambitions in that area?”
“Yes?” asks Rowan, aiming for nonchalance. “Are you able to tell me?”
Sumaira shakes her head. “No, of course not. That would be an appalling breach of confidentiality. But it’s a Ms V Sheehan. Requested the information through the correct channels in July of last year. A standard letter was sent back while we performed due diligence on the request. God they’re a pain in the arse. Anyway, the two files were linked.”
“Violet,” says Rowan, quietly. He locks eyes with Sumaira. “Explain it to me like I’m an idiot. Explain like you would to a six-year-old child off his tits on Calpol.”
Sumaira lets out another laugh. “In July last year, an FoI request was made…,” she stops, and adopts a school ma’am tone. “That’s the Freedom of Information Act and the Environmental Information Regulations, under which you have a right to request any recorded information held by a public authority, such as a government department, local council or state school. Or us. While searching out the information on an incident in 1991, we found the files cross-referenced in both hard copy and on the database, with a case that had been put forward for Cold Case Review when I first moved North. As it happened, we took a look and realised there weren’t the resources to take it forward but we intended to keep a watching brief.”
“I know this one,” says Rowan. “A watching brief is where you do bugger all, yes?”
“Precisely,” says Sumaira, brightly. “Now, the case this person was linked to, well, that had a connection to the Silver Birch Academy. I know you know all about that place.”
“Go on,” prompts Rowan, quickly.
“Three teenagers were reported missing on October 28, 1991. They were all pupils at the Silver Birch Academy. Went to Keswick on a shopping trip and didn’t get the bus they were expected on. The dad of one of the girls went looking when they didn’t come home. So did the house master at the accommodation. They couldn’t find them. Eventually, they called us. It didn’t take long to rustle up some witnesses. As it transpired, they’d met a bad-lad – some busker in the subway near the pitch-and-putt. For some nice privately-educated girls he must have been irresistible, don’t you think? Anyway, they went with him. Gone for some heavy duty partying in the woods. We think they got pissed, fooled around, and took what sounds a lot like magic mushrooms. Best couple of days of their life by the sounds of it, though that’s not in the file. Mountain Rescue found them in the end. They were in a bit of a state but that’s hardly surprising. From the file it’s clear there was some concern about sexual assault because they were found wearing not very much in the way of clothing.” She glances at the file, double checking. “Covered in body-paint too. Sounds like they had themselves a proper little festival.”