Chapter Twenty-Three
CATH ARMSTRONG WOKE ON THAT THURSDAY morning feeling drugged and heavy, not sure for a moment where she was.
The room was unfamiliar. The big brown furniture seemed to trap her despite the size of the room.
She was alone in the bed. It was the first proper night’s sleep she’d had since Hannah had died, and she realized now that she had been drugged.
At last, she’d succumbed and taken the sleeping pills prescribed by the doctor Paul had somehow found.
Her husband hadn’t lost his need to fix things, even though he must be grieving too.
His grief expressed itself through a kind of manic activity.
She could hear him now, out on the balcony, talking into his phone.
It would be work. It always was work. She never worried that he might be unfaithful.
He wouldn’t have the time or the head space.
Besides, he’d always be worried that the press would find out.
These days, he knew the importance of discretion.
She lay still for a moment, waiting for her head to clear. Her mouth was dry. She propped herself up and took a sip from the glass of water on the nightstand. Paul must have sensed the movement because he ended the call and came back into the room.
‘How are you feeling?’ He sat beside her on the bed and stroked her hair away from her forehead. She might have been his child, not his wife.
‘Pretty doped.’
‘At least you slept.’ Perhaps he was expecting gratitude because he’d found a doctor and meds to knock her out. Then he gave a little laugh, and his tone changed. ‘You were snoring like a pig!’
‘Ah, I’m sorry.’ She reached out and took his hand. None of this was his fault. She couldn’t imagine being here, coping with it all, without him.
‘That was Elaine on the phone. She’s going back to London. She says all this hanging around is driving her mad. Now they’ve let her see Lottie, what’s the point of being here?’
‘I want to stay,’ Cath said quickly.
They had been allowed into the mortuary after the post-mortem to say goodbye to Hannah.
Hannah hadn’t been there. Cath had seen that immediately.
Her daughter had been sensitive and kind and anxious.
The body was nothing but a doll, a grotesque puppet.
All the same, fleeing back to London while the shell of her was still here, while the investigation continued, would have felt like a betrayal. A dereliction of her duty as a parent.
‘Of course we can stay. There’s no rush.
’ Because parliament was in recess, and he could work quite easily from here.
She marvelled at his ability to compartmentalize.
She knew he wept when he thought nobody was looking – Cath loved him for that – but when he was talking to colleagues, he was clear and focused.
And he slept without the need for medication.
An idea, sudden and sharp, came into her head and she spoke without considering what the reaction might be. ‘Do you think we should tell the police what happened that night? Between the three girls.’
His response was immediate. ‘No! Really, Cath, don’t even think about it. What relevance could it have after all this time?’
There was a moment of silence before he spoke again.
‘Elaine wondered if you’d join her for breakfast on the terrace. I told her you’d call her back when you woke up. Her driver’s not picking her up until eleven, so there’s time.’
‘Oh!’ Cath wasn’t sure what to make of that.
‘Perhaps you should,’ Paul said. ‘She’s so flaky.
We don’t want her talking to the press when she gets back.
There’s too much nonsense already swirling around on social media.
You might be able to talk some sense into her.
Explain that it’s in everybody’s interest to keep a dignified silence.
’ He paused. ‘There’s been no sign of the Kinzalows. ’
She joined the dots. He didn’t need to say anything more. The earlier outburst had been enough.
‘All right. Can you phone her back? Say I’ll meet her in half an hour. You’ll be okay with the boys?’
‘Sure,’ he said. ‘I’ll take them down to the beach. You can join us when you’re done.’
Cath threw off the cover and got out of bed. For a moment she was dizzy, and she stood, steadying herself, before heading for the shower. Paul was already on his mobile to Elaine, his politician’s voice smooth and plausible.
‘Cath would love to join you for breakfast,’ she heard him say. ‘Safe travels back to London. Take care.’
Cath arrived on the terrace a few minutes late, but there was no sign of Elaine.
She asked for a table for two. Below her the valley shimmered.
There was already the beginning of a heat haze.
She was staring down at the town and the water when Elaine appeared.
She must be planning to head straight off because she was pulling a little suitcase behind her.
It was very black and very shiny. She wore one of her film-star dresses, sleeveless, clipped in at the waist, a full skirt.
Pale pink. Dark glasses, although there was an awning to provide shade.
Cath ordered coffee and pastries. She felt she needed caffeine and sugar to wake her up. To face Elaine.
‘Just coffee for me,’ Elaine said. ‘An oat milk latte.’
‘So, you’re heading back to London?’ Cath wondered what Elaine wanted, because it was clear to her now that the woman wanted something. They had never been friends. For Elaine, she thought, every relationship was transactional.
‘Yes. I have a business to run.’ Cath felt the words as a dig. It’s all right for you. You have a husband to keep you. ‘What are your plans?’ The coffee had arrived. Elaine stirred hers relentlessly but didn’t drink any.
‘We’ll stay for a while,’ Cath said, ‘until there are some answers.’
‘What if there are no answers?’ Elaine took off the sunglasses and stared across the table.
‘The local police don’t seem exactly dynamic.
’ A pause. ‘That Inspector Venn, the gay one, went into my office yesterday and gossiped to my PA. Kitty’s very loyal.
Of course she phoned me at once. I’m not sure what he hoped to find out there. ’
‘It’s all background, I suppose.’
‘Have you seen what people are saying on social media?’ At last, Elaine set down her spoon.
‘No,’ Cath said. ‘I don’t want to know. I’m keeping away from it all. Radio, television, the legacy press. I’d find it all toxic.’
‘So many rumours flying around.’ A pause. ‘Lottie had quite a following. People loved her.’ Elaine paused again, a note of pride in her voice. ‘And she’d started making money. An influencer with brains and on her way to Oxford. She was an advertiser’s dream.’
‘I suppose so.’
‘There’ll be a backlash of course. There always is. So far, her fans have been very supportive, but the trolls will come out. The envious and the stupid.’
‘Paul is very keen that we stay away from the media.’
Elaine made a sound that could have been a laugh or a sneer. ‘I’m sure he is.’
Cath pulled a piece from a Danish pastry and was surprised that she found it delicious. She’d never quite believed that she’d enjoy anything again. She tore off another and put it in her mouth. It was fresh and crisp, with the taste of almond and vanilla.
‘We’ll have to hope,’ Elaine said, ‘that the Kinzalows keep their mouths shut.’
Cath didn’t answer. She didn’t want to think about the Kinzalows.
Elaine continued: ‘Do you think they killed the girls? They were there, on that farm. They might have done.’
‘No!’ Cath was certain of very little at the moment, but she was certain about that. ‘Do you think we should tell the police about what happened that night?’ Almost exactly the same question as she’d put to Paul a little while before.
‘Of course not.’ The answer came back almost before Cath had completed the question.
Elaine narrowed her eyes. ‘There are too many reputations at stake, don’t you think?
’ She paused again. ‘So, we’ll take your husband’s advice, shall we, and keep away from the press. We should keep a dignified silence.’
Which was exactly the phrase that Paul had used. Cath wondered if she would have heard him making plans with Elaine if she’d woken up a little earlier. She supposed he would be pleased at the outcome of this encounter, but she felt grubby and uncomfortable.
Elaine’s phone vibrated. She checked it. ‘That’s Steve. The car is at the front, waiting for me.’
She walked away. Her skirt swayed with the movement. Most of the men on the terrace watched her go. Cath was left to sign the bill.
She texted Paul to say she was about to make her way to the beach.
Need anything from the room?
There was no reply. She was pleased and imagined him pottering with the boys, building a sandcastle or pulling creatures out of the rockpools and watching them swim around a plastic bucket before releasing them.
His phone would be on silent and hidden under a towel.
His focus completely on his sons. It was one of his strengths – the ability to give his complete attention to the matter on hand. She was easily distracted.
She walked slowly because the roads through the town were steep, in places cobbled and narrow, and besides, she found this moment of calm restful.
Here among the tourists smelling of sun cream and ice cream, she was anonymous.
She felt the same stab of guilt as when she’d enjoyed the breakfast pastry.
She had no right to these moments of joy when Hannah was dead.
There were steps down to the beach. Her sandals flapped as they hit the stone.
It wasn’t so crammed with holidaymakers that she couldn’t scan the shore for Paul and the children.
Families usually headed for the wide bays with safe swimming – Saunton or Woolacombe.
From this viewpoint, she picked up the red beach towels they’d brought from London almost immediately and remembered how excited the boys had been that evening, packing the car for the overnight drive.
Now, she could see the boys. They were squatting, piling flat, round pebbles into towers. The tide was in and there was little sand. They seemed engrossed. They must have inherited Paul’s focus, she thought. Alex especially could lose himself in a task, blinkered to the rest of the world.
She stopped abruptly on the lowest step, causing a young lad behind her to bump into her, and mutter something rude under his breath.
She couldn’t see her husband. Her eyes flitted backwards and forwards across the beach.
Paul was nowhere near the boys, and he wouldn’t have left them completely alone.
She stepped aside to let the lad behind her go past and then ran towards her children.
She felt light-headed and physically sick with panic, about to throw up.
Her foot twisted on the shingle, but she hardly noticed the pain.
‘Hi, guys!’ Because she didn’t want to distress them. She’d surprised them and they looked up, smiling. They started talking about the game, but she interrupted. ‘Where’s Dad?’
Alex shrugged, unbothered. ‘Dunno. He was here a minute ago.’
She turned away from her sons and scoured the beach down to the water.
Perhaps Paul had decided on a swim. After all, she thought, perhaps he had left them.
He could be ridiculously reckless. Some of the things he’d done in his youth!
In the heat haze it was hard to distinguish between the heads bobbing in the distance.
‘I’m here!’ She felt hands on her shoulders, turned and saw her husband.
‘Oh!’ Her body was flooded with relief, and gratitude. And the sense of how foolish she’d been to overreact in this way. As well as an undercurrent of anger that he’d caused her anxiety by wandering off.
‘I went on the search for ice creams,’ Paul said, ‘but the queue was too long. I thought we could get some on the way back. Maybe stop in that place that does the very best sundaes. What do you think, boys?’
‘Yeah!’ But it was clear that they didn’t want to leave just yet, and they turned their attention back to their game.
Paul turned Cath to face him and held her tight for a moment. They sat together on one of the red towels. There was the background noise of waves on shingle, gulls and children’s voices, all blurred together so she felt as if she were dreaming.
‘They were never out of my sight,’ he said.
‘I’m sorry. I just panicked.’
‘I wasn’t looking for ice cream.’ His voice was low, hardly more than a murmur.
She had to strain to hear him. ‘I saw Karen Kinzalow. She was close to the top of the steps looking down at us at the beach. I think she followed us from the hotel, though it could have been chance, I suppose. I decided to speak to her. I don’t want her haunting us.
Like some kind of ghost. I wanted to find out what she’s doing. You must just have missed us.’
‘And?’
‘She disappeared before I could catch up to her. I suppose she headed back towards the town. I couldn’t leave the boys to follow.’
‘Of course.’ She paused. ‘If they’d killed Hannah, they wouldn’t still be here, would they? They’d have disappeared back to London. Or run away to the States. They’d be quite safe there.’
It took him a long time to answer. ‘I don’t know,’ he said. ‘I can’t make up my mind what to do.’
The admission shocked Cath. Paul always knew the best thing to do. He was certain about everything. She repeated the question she’d asked him early that morning. ‘Should we go to the police? That Inspector Venn? Or the woman with the red hair?’
‘No.’ This time his response was less definite. ‘Not yet.’ A pause. ‘It might not even have been Karen. I could have imagined it.’
Cath shook her head. Paul wasn’t given, ever, to flights of fancy.
Gilbert was getting bored. He stuck out his foot and knocked over Alex’s tower. Alex seemed about to start a fight; he picked up one of the pebbles as if to hurl it at his brother.
‘Time for ice cream.’ Paul gathered Alex into his arms. His voice seemed unnaturally loud, but the boys didn’t notice. ‘I’m going for strawberry with monkey’s blood. What about you?’
‘Chocolate! And sprinkles.’
Cath shook out the towels and rolled them up to stick in the beach bag. They walked back into the town, both adults tense and hyper-vigilant, looking out for anyone in the crowd who looked like the Americans.