“You imagine right,” said Gristhorpe. “Keys aren’t hard to come by. And garages are easy to get into. What make is the car?”
“Make. I don’t see—”
“For our records.”
“Very well. It’s a Toyota. I find the Japanese perfectly reliable when it comes to cars.”
“Of course. And what colour?”
“Dark blue. Look, you can save us both a lot of time if you come and have a look yourself. It’s parked right outside.”
“Fine.” Gristhorpe stood up. “Let’s go.”
Parkinson led. As he walked, he stuck his hands in his pockets and jingled keys and loose change. Outside the station, opposite the market square, Gristhorpe sniffed the air. His experienced dalesman’s nose smelled rain. Already, clouds were blowing in from the northwest. He also smelled pub grub from the Queen’s Arms, steak-and-kidney pie if he was right, and he realized he was getting hungry.
Parkinson’s car was, indeed, a dark blue Toyota, illegally parked right in front of the police station.
“Look at that,” Parkinson said, pointing to scratched paintwork on the bottom of the chassis, just behind the left front wheel. “Careless driving that is. Must have caught against a stone or something. Well? Aren’t you going to have a look inside?”
“The fewer people do that, the better, sir,” said Gristhorpe, looking to see what stones and dirt were trapped in the tread of the tires.
Parkinson frowned. “What on earth do you mean by that?”
Gristhorpe turned to face him. “You say you left last Monday?”
“Yes.”
“What time?”
“I took the eight-thirty flight from Leeds and Bradford.”
“To where?”
“I don’t see as it’s any of your business, but Brussels. EEC business.”
Gristhorpe nodded. They were standing in the middle of the pavement and passers-by had to get around them somehow. A woman with a pram asked Parkinson to step out of the way so she could get by. A teenager with cropped hair and a tattoo on his cheek swore at him. Parkinson was clearly uncomfortable talking in the street. A mark of his middle-class background, Gristhorpe thought. The working classes — both urban and rural — had always felt quite comfortable standing and chatting in the street. But Parkinson hopped from foot to foot, glancing irritably from the corners of his eyes as people brushed and jostled past them to get by. His glasses had slipped down his nose, and a stray lock of hair fell over his right eye.
“How did you get to the airport?” Gristhorpe pressed on.
“A friend drove me. A business colleague. It’s no mystery, Inspector, believe me. Long-term parking at the airport is expensive. My colleague drives a company car, and the company pays. It’s as simple as that.” He pushed his glasses back up to the bridge of his nose. “It’s not that I’m overly concerned about saving money, of course. But why pay when you don’t have to?”
“Indeed. Do you always do it that way?”
“What way?”
“Don’t you ever take it in turns?”
“I told you. He has a company car. Look, I don’t see—”
“Please bear with me. Did nobody notice the car was gone?”
“How could they? It was in the garage, and the garage door was locked.”
“Have you asked if anyone heard anything?”
“That’s your job. That’s why—”
“Where do you live, sir?”
“Bartlett Drive. Just off the Helmthorpe road.”
“I know it.” If Gristhorpe remembered correctly, Bartlett Drive was close to the holiday cottage the Manleys had so suddenly deserted. “And the car was replaced as if it had never been gone?”
“That’s right. Only they didn’t bargain for my record-keeping.”
“Quite. Look, I’ll get someone to drive you home and take a full statement, then—”
“What? You’ll do what?” A couple walking by stopped and stared. Parkinson blushed and lowered his voice. “I’ve already told you I’ve given up enough time already. Now why don’t you—”
Gristhorpe held his hand up, palm out, and his innocent gaze silenced Parkinson just as it had put the fear of God into many a villain. “I can understand your feelings,” Gristhorpe said, “but please listen to me for a minute. There’s a chance, a very good chance, that your car was used to abduct a little girl from her home last Tuesday afternoon. If that’s the case, it’s essential that we get a forensic team to go over the car thoroughly. Do you understand?”
Parkinson nodded, mouth open.
“Now, this may mean some inconvenience to you. You’ll get your car back in the same condition it’s in now, but I can’t say exactly when. Of course, we’ll try to help you in any way we can, but basically, you’re acting like the true public-spirited citizen that you are. You’re generously helping us try to get to the bottom of a particularly nasty bit of business, right?”
“Well,” said Parkinson. “Seeing as you put it that way.” And the first drops of rain fell on their heads.
IV
Banks and Susan stood at the bar in the Queen’s Arms that Monday lunch-time, wedged between two farmers and a family of tourists, and munched cheese-and-onion sandwiches with their drinks. Banks had a pint of Theakston’s bitter, Susan a Slimline Tonic Water. A song about a broken love affair was playing on the jukebox in the background, and somewhere by the door to the toilets, a video game beeped as aliens went down in flames. From what he could overhear, Banks gathered that the farmers were talking about money and the tourists were arguing about whether to go home because of the rain or carry on to the Bowes Museum.
“So you found the girl’s parents?” Banks asked.
“Uh-uh.” Susan put her hand to her mouth and wiped away some crumbs, then swallowed. “Sorry, sir. Yes, they were home. Seems like everyone except the Pakistanis around there is unemployed or retired.”
“Get anything?”
Susan shook her head. Tight blonde curls danced over her ears.
Banks noticed the dangling earrings, stylized, elongated Egyptian cats in light gold. Susan had certainly brightened up her appearance a bit lately. “Dead end,” she said. “Oh, it happened all right. Right charmer Carl Johnson was, from what I can gather. But the girl, Beryl’s her name, she’s been living in America for the past five years.”
“What happened?”
“Just what his folks said. He got her in the family way, then dumped her. She came around to make a fuss, embarrass him like, at his twenty-first birthday party. He was still living at home then, off and on, and his parents invited a few close relatives over. There was a big row and he stormed out. Didn’t even take any of his clothes with him. They never saw him again.”
Banks sipped at his pint and thought for a moment. “So they’ve no idea who he hung around with, or where he went?”
“No.” Susan frowned. “They know he went to London, but that’s all. There was a chap called Robert Naylor. Mrs Johnson saw him as bad influence.”
“Has he got form?”
“Yes, sir. I checked. Just minor vandalism, drunk and disorderly. But he’s dead. Nothing suspicious. He was riding his motorbike too fast. He lost control and skidded into a lorry on the M1.”
“So that’s that.”
“I’m afraid so, sir. From what I can gather, Johnson was the type to fall in with bad company.”
“That’s obvious enough.”
“What I mean, sir, is that both his parents and Beryl’s mother said he looked up to tough guys. He wasn’t much in himself, they said, but he liked to be around dangerous people.”