‘We know it must be a shock,’ said Yvette. ‘Obviously we need to establish people’s movements on the day that Ruth Lennox died.’
‘You mean my husband? I can’t remember. I’ve looked in the diary but the page is blank. It was just another Wednesday. Paul says he was definitely here at the time but I don’t remember if I came home from work first or if he did. I can’t remember if he was later than usual. If something unusual had happened, I suppose it would have stuck in my mind.’
‘What about your sons?’
She turned her head. Following her gaze, Karlsson and Yvette saw the photograph next to the daffodils of two boys, young men even, both with dark hair and their father’s broad face. One had a scar above his lip that pulled his smile slightly awry.
‘Josh is at university in Cardiff. He hadn’t come back for Easter by then. The other, Ben, he’s eighteen and he takes his A levels this year. He lives at home. He’s a bit vague about dates. And everything else. I haven’t told them yet about the affair. After that I can tell them about the murder. That’ll be fun. How long was it for?’
‘Sorry?’
‘How long had the affair been going on?’
‘Your husband didn’t tell you?’
‘He said it was more than a fling, but he still loved me and he hoped I would forgive him.’
‘Ten years,’ said Yvette, calmly. ‘They met on Wednesday afternoons. They rented a flat.’
Elaine Kerrigan sat up even straighter. Her face seemed to loosen, the skin grow slack. ‘Ten years.’ They could hear her swallow.
‘And you didn’t know?’
‘Ten years, with a flat.’
‘And we will also need to conduct a search here,’ said Yvette.
‘I understand.’ Elaine Kerrigan’s voice was still polite, but it had become faint.
‘Have you noticed nothing unusual in his behaviour?’
‘Over the last ten years?’
‘Over the last few weeks, perhaps.’
‘No.’
‘He hasn’t been upset or distracted?’
‘I don’t think so.’
‘You didn’t know that several hundreds of pounds have been disappearing monthly from your husband’s bank account to pay for the rooms he rented?’
‘No.’
‘You never met her?’
‘The other woman?’ She gave them a tired half-smile. ‘I don’t think so. But she lived near here, didn’t she? Maybe I did.’
‘We would be grateful if you could try to find out exactly what time you and your husband came home on the Wednesday – ask colleagues at work, perhaps.’
‘I’ll do my best.’
‘We’ll see ourselves out.’
‘Yes. Thank you.’
She didn’t stand up as they left, but stayed sitting upright on the sofa, her long face blank.
‘Do you want a drink?’ Yvette asked Karlsson, trying to sound casual – as if she didn’t care one way or the other. She heard her voice grate.
‘I’m taking the rest of the day off and I won’t be in tomorrow so I …’
‘Fine. Just a suggestion. There was something I wanted to mention. Frieda rang me.’
‘What about?’
As Yvette described the details of Frieda’s police interview, Karlsson started to smile but finally he just looked weary.
‘I said she should talk to you about it, but she said you’d probably had enough of her. You know, after that last time with Rundell.’
‘What is it with her?’ said Karlsson. ‘There are nightclub bouncers who get into fewer fights than she does.’
‘She doesn’t always choose them.’
‘Yes, but they seem to happen wherever she goes. Anyway, she rang you. You’d better make a couple of calls.’
‘I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to bother you with it.’
Karlsson hesitated, looking at her flushed face. ‘I didn’t mean to snap. I’m spending the time with my kids,’ he said gently. ‘They’re going away soon.’
‘I didn’t know – how long for?’
He found he couldn’t tell her. ‘Quite a long time,’ was all he could manage. ‘So I want to make the most of this.’
‘Of course.’
Mikey had had his hair cut very short; it was like soft bristle; his scalp showed through and his ears stuck out. Bella’s hair had been cut as well, so it was a mass of loose curls around her face. It made them seem younger and more defenceless. Karlsson felt too tall and solid beside them. His heart swelled in his chest and he stooped down and held them against him. But they squirmed free. They were excited; their bodies throbbed with impatience. They wanted to tell him about the flat they were going to live in, which had balconies on both sides and an orange tree in the courtyard. A fan in every room, because it was very hot in the summer. They’d got new summer clothes, shorts and dresses and flip-flops. It hardly ever rained there – the rain in Spain falls mainly on the plain. There was an outdoor pool a few streets away and at the weekends they could get a train to the coast. They would have to wear a uniform to their new school. They already knew some words. They could say, Puedo tomar un helado por favor? And gracias and mi nombre es Mikey, mi nombre es Bella.
Karlsson smiled and smiled. He wanted them never to leave and he wanted them to be gone already, because waiting to say goodbye was the worst thing of all.
TWENTY-EIGHT
The following morning, when Frieda received Rajit Singh’s call, she arranged to meet him in her rooms, which stood empty for so many hours of the week now, the red armchair abandoned. Later in the day she had to see Joe Franklin, so she could stay on for that, stand for a while at the window that overlooked the deserted and overgrown building site, sifting through the rubble of her thoughts. She walked as swiftly as her injured leg would allow through the narrow streets, the familiar clutter of shops. She had the sensation of following a thread, as thin as a spider’s, through a dark and twisting labyrinth. She didn’t know why she couldn’t let go of the story: it had been a fake tale, crudely obvious, designed to trip her up and make her look foolish and incompetent. She should feel enraged, humiliated, exposed; instead, she felt troubled and compelled. She woke in the night and her thoughts, drifting up from the mud of her dreams, snagged on the story. There was a faint but insistent tug on the thread.
Singh arrived promptly. He was still wearing his thick black jacket – in fact, he seemed to be wearing the same clothes that Frieda had last seen him in. His face sagged with weariness and he sat heavily in the chair opposite her, as if this were indeed a therapy session.
‘Thank you,’ he said.
‘What for?’
‘For seeing me.’
‘I think I was the one who asked you to contact me.’
‘Yeah, but we fucked you over, didn’t we?’
‘Is that how it feels?’
‘I don’t know about the others, but I felt a bit crap about all the coverage.’
‘Because you felt what you did was wrong?’
‘It seemed a good idea at the time. I mean, how can therapists be checked? Teachers have inspectors, but therapists can do whatever damage they want in the privacy of their little rooms and no one’s to know. And if patients don’t like it, then the therapist can just turn it back on them: if you don’t like it, it’s because there’s something wrong with you, not me. It’s a self-justifying system.’
‘That doesn’t sound like you. It sounds like Hal Bradshaw speaking. Which doesn’t mean it’s wrong. There is a problem about checking up on therapists.’
‘Yeah, well, but when it got all that attention, it felt wrong. Everyone found it funny, and then when I met you …’ He stopped.
‘I didn’t seem quite as crazy as Bradshaw said I was?’
Singh shifted in his seat uncomfortably. ‘He said you were a loose cannon. He said you – and people like you – could do a lot of damage.’