Just south of Reading, I pull into a motorway service centre and park among the long-haul trucks and tourist coaches. Hiking across the parking lot, I enter a brightly lit lobby full of fast-food outlets and shops.
The men’s room is cavernous but I still have to queue for a urinal. The men around me are truckers in plaid shirts or football strips hung over beer guts. One of them hauls up his jeans and saunters off like a man who has marked his territory.
My left hand is trembling. My bladder won’t do as it’s told. I stand and stare at the wall. Someone has scrawled a message in marker pen above the urinal: ‘Express Lane: five beers or less.’
Nothing is happening. The queue is getting longer.
‘Are you gonna piss or just piss me off ?’ says a trucker with a wallet chained to his belt.
‘I’m sorry. I won’t be a moment.’
He grunts and says something to the person next to him. They laugh. It’s not going to happen now. That’s one of the problems with my medication. I used to piss like a racehorse. Now I squirt and dribble.
Outside the restroom I put in a call to Trinity Road Police Station. Ronnie Cray is in a meeting. Monk answers her phone. Certain people don’t match their voices, but Monk’s comes from deep in his chest and seems to rumble down the line as if he’s standing in a tunnel.
‘Danny Gardiner?’
‘What about him?’
‘Did you interview him?’
‘Yes.’
‘Sienna was pregnant.’
I can hear Monk exhale slowly.
‘The boss isn’t here.’
‘Can you take me?’
Monk hesitates momentarily. We’ll meet at Danny Gardiner’s house.
I have the rest of the journey to consider the implications of Sienna’s pregnancy. I think back to the afternoon I collected her and Charlie from school. Sienna had seemed distracted and upset. I thought she was annoyed about the rehearsal and being made to stay behind. Even so, she skipped into her boyfriend’s arms, kissing his lips, sliding her hand down his back.
Danny Gardiner told police that he’d dropped Sienna on a street corner in Bath only thirty minutes later. Where did she go? Three hours are missing from the timeline.
Danny lives with his mother in Twerton on the western outskirts of Bath where most of the older houses are clustered around St Michael’s Parish Church. The newer estates have encroached on to farmland and already I see white pegs marking out more plots of land.
Monk is waiting in an unmarked police car.
‘What did Cray say?’
‘Nothing.’
‘You didn’t tell her.’
‘I’m doing you a favour.’
Nobody answers the door. Monk knocks again. Then we wait. The sky is low and grey, smelling of woodsmoke and rain.
A white hatchback pulls into a parking space ahead of us. A woman in her fifties emerges, dressed in a tour guide’s uniform. She collects a bag of groceries from the boot and walks to the house, cursing as she drops her keys.
‘Mrs Gardiner?’ I ask.
‘Who wants to know?’
The door swings inwards and a long-haired dog that could have a head at either end dances around her stockinged legs, yapping.
She turns, waiting for an answer.
‘We’re looking for Danny.’
‘He’s talked to you lot already.’
‘Not to me.’
Her blue-grey eyes examine me quickly and then settle on Monk, gazing at him as though he’s sprouted from magic beans in her front garden. ‘Lordy, your mother must have gone cross-eyed having you. How tall?’
‘Six-four last time I measured.’
‘I think you’ve grown since then, love. You should have played basketball.’
‘Yes, ma’am.’
She has stepped inside the hallway. The house smells of damp dog, air freshener and dope. Mrs Gardiner lifts her shopping bags over the threshold, using one hand to hold the collar of the dog.
‘I haven’t seen Danny since yesterday.’
‘His car is outside,’ says Monk.
‘Must have taken the bus,’ she replies.
‘That’s too bad. We’ll have to tow the car. Forensic boys want to pull it apart. Tell him we’ll put it back together again . . . best we can.’
Two beats of silence follow before Danny bursts out of a bedroom, barefoot, bare-chested, wearing low-slung jeans. Marijuana smoke wafts in his wake.
‘Not me fucking car! I just finished paying it off.’
Danny reaches the front door and bounces off Monk’s chest.
‘The car’s fine. We just need to ask you a few questions.’
‘I answered your questions.’
‘More of them.’
‘Fuck off!’
Mrs Gardiner clips him around the ear. ‘Mind your language.’
Danny nurses the side of his head where three studs decorate the cartilage above his ear.
‘I suppose you’d better come in then,’ says Mrs Gardiner. ‘Carry them bags, Danny.’
We follow her along a hallway into a tired-looking kitchen, with red-painted cupboards and a fridge that doubles as a noticeboard. She begins unpacking her groceries while Danny pulls a bottle of soft drink from a bag. She tells him to get a glass. He rolls his eyes.
‘What’s he done now?’ she asks Monk.
‘We want to ask him about his girlfriend.’
‘A girl? That’s all he thinks about - girls. You should see the state of his bed sheets.’
Danny gives her a murderous look.
‘Lazy, just like his dad. Spends his time tinkering with cars. Not really a proper job, is it?’ Mrs Gardiner sizes Monk up again. ‘How tall you say you were, Detective?’
‘Six-four.’
‘I’ve got a job for you. Won’t take a minute.’
‘I’m needed here.’
‘Don’t take two of you to talk to Danny. Call it a community service.’
Mrs Gardiner is halfway down the hall, motioning him to follow. Monk glances at me, hoping to be rescued, and then reluctantly accepts his fate.
Danny relaxes now that his mother is no longer orbiting.
‘Do you remember me?’ I ask.
Danny shakes his head.
‘I saw you outside Sienna’s house last Wednesday morning.’
He screws up his face. ‘Wasn’t me.’
‘You legged it when I tried to talk to you. Almost ran me down in that car of yours. That’s one of the problems with having a distinctive-looking car, Danny. You think it makes a bold statement, but it sticks out like a turd in a punchbowl.’
Danny is working his tongue around his cheek as though counting his teeth. His hair sticks up at odd angles and I can see traces of pimple cream dabbed on his forehead. For all his brazen defiance, he doesn’t look particularly tough or aggressive. He has small hands. Delicate features.
‘Tell me about Sienna Hegarty.’
‘What about her?’
‘Is she your girlfriend?’
‘She’s a friend.’
‘She’s underage.’
‘So what?’
‘How old are you, Danny?’
‘Twenty-two.’
‘Don’t you know any horny girls your own age?’
‘I get my share.’
‘So why Sienna?’
‘Listen, I’m not shagging her, OK, and if she says I am then she’s a lying cow. We’re mates.’
‘Mates?’
‘Yeah. We hang out together. I drive her around the place. Drop her off.’
‘And what do you get in return?’
He shrugs.
‘Come on, Danny, I wasn’t born yesterday. You’re trying to tell me that you hang out with a hot-looking fourteen-year-old because she’s a mate.’
‘Yeah, well, I figured one day, you know . . .’
‘One day?’
‘She might pay out, you know. When she’s legal?’
‘You’re lying.’
‘No.’
‘Sienna was pregnant. You knocked her up.’
‘No fucking way!’ His voice grows shrill. ‘I just take her places. Drop her off. I’m not shagging her. Haven’t touched her.’
‘No?’
‘It’s true.’
‘Either tell me the truth, Danny, or Detective Abbott is going to search your room. He’ll find your hash and your porn magazines and whatever else you’re hiding. Then he’ll take you down to the station and put you in a cell downstairs with the drunks and the perverts and the drug addicts. Do you know how long a night lasts in a place like that? By morning you’ll be an old man.’
Sweat pops out on Danny’s forehead and runs down the side of his nose. He’s trying to look like he doesn’t care, but I can see his mind working.
‘I saw you with Sienna last Tuesday. Where did you go?’
‘We drove around for a while, then I dropped her off.’
‘What time was that?’
‘Seven.’
‘Where did you drop her?’
‘In town.’
He names a street corner on Lower Bristol Road.
‘Why did she want to go there?’
Danny shrugs. ‘That’s where she told me to drop her. She had the address on a piece of paper.’
‘And you just drove away?’
‘Yep.’ One of his feet is jiggling up and down.
‘Where did you go?’
‘A mate’s place.’
‘For how long?’
‘I kipped on his sofa. I was there all night.’
‘What’s your mate’s name?’
Danny reacts as though scalded. ‘What difference does that make? He’s just a mate.’
Something about the response borders on panic. Danny’s eyes have clouded over and his hands are pressed to the top of his thighs. There is something slightly effeminate about the pose. In that instant I suddenly see him clearly. I pull my chair closer and tell him to relax.
‘I don’t want to know your friend’s name, Danny. It’s not important.’
He visibly relaxes.
‘Sienna is a pretty girl,’ I say. ‘Did you tell your mates you were doing her?’
Danny doesn’t answer.
‘It’s important to have a girlfriend, isn’t it? Otherwise your mates might think you’re not interested in girls.’
He blinks at me.
‘I mean, it must be tough - being a mechanic. All those girlie calendars in the workshop, the wolf whistles, the banter about Page Three girls; it’s a job for blokes.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Your mates think you’re doing her, don’t they? They’re in awe of you. Lucky bugger, they say, but I think Sienna just pretends to be your girlfriend.’
Excuses clot in the back of Danny’s throat.
‘I think you arrange to pick her up and she’s all over you, putting on a good show for your mates. That’s when you tell them you need some privacy.’
‘I don’t know what you’re on about.’
‘Sure you do. You’re both trying to hide something. You have a boyfriend . . . and so does Sienna.’
Danny leaps to his feet. His chair crashes to the floor. ‘I’M NOT QUEER! IT’S A LIE! YOU TAKE THAT BACK!’
He’s pleading with me, his face twisting in suffering. I pick up the chair and tell him to sit down. He slumps over his knees, staring at the floor.
‘Listen, Danny, I don’t care how many boyfriends you have. Just tell me about Sienna.’
Pressing his lips tightly together, he contemplates what to do. He can hear his mother laughing in the front room. He glances sidelong at the door.
‘She was seeing someone else,’ he mutters.
Who?’
‘I don’t know. I just dropped her off.’
‘Did you always drop her at the same place?’
‘No, it was different each time.’
‘And then what happened?’
‘I drove away.’
‘You’re lying.’
‘Piss off!’
‘You were curious. It’s human nature. You didn’t just leave her. You wanted to know who she was seeing.’
Danny chews the inside of his cheek. ‘Yeah, well, maybe once.’
‘What happened?’
‘I hung around; parked up behind some trees. I saw a car pull up and Sienna got inside.’
‘Who was driving?’
‘An old dude.’
‘Who was he?’
‘Fuck knows!’
‘But you saw him.’
‘Not up close. He was mid-thirties, maybe older.’
Ancient.
‘What sort of car was he driving?’
‘A Ford Focus. The five-door two-litre estate. Silver.’
‘You remember the number?’
‘Yeah, I tattooed it on my foreskin so I wouldn’t forget.’
Danny laughs and decides he’s going to remember the line and use it on his mates in the workshop.
‘Would you recognise the driver again?’
‘I’d recognise the car. I’m good with cars.’
No longer anxious, Danny picks up a butter knife and begins scraping a speck of dirt from beneath his thumbnail. He has a habit of nodding his head as though he’s agreeing with himself.
‘This day you watched and waited, what happened?’
‘The old dude made Sienna duck down. I figured he wanted a blowjob, you know, but they just drove off.’
‘What about last Tuesday - did you see his car?’
‘Nah. I just dropped her.’
‘So you didn’t see the guy who picked her up?’
Danny shakes his head.
‘What were you doing at Sienna’s house next morning?’
Danny hesitates for a beat too long. I don’t give him time to make excuses.
‘Listen very carefully to me, Danny. I’m happy to let your secret life stay secret, but not if you lie to me.’
He looks at me sheepishly.
‘I tried to call Sienna, but she wasn’t answering. I was driving home from my mate’s place and I went by Sienna’s house - hoping I might see her. Place was crawling with coppers.
‘Why did you run?’
His shoulders rise and fall. ‘I didn’t want to get involved.’
The age-old story.
Danny lets out a low, whistling breath. ‘They said her old man had his throat cut. Never seen a dead body - not one like that. What did he look like?’
Outside: darkness. The wind has freshened and a beech tree groans in protest from a corner of the garden where the moon is hiding in the branches.
Monk leans on the car. ‘Get what you wanted?’
‘Sienna was seeing someone else. Somebody older. There must be evidence: emails, text messages, letters . . . we have to search Sienna’s room.’
‘It’s been searched,’ says Monk.
Yes, but her laptop was missing and her mobile was damaged in the river. We’ll need to retrieve her messages from the phone company database and her Internet server.
‘Sienna does some babysitting for her drama teacher, Gordon Ellis. According to Helen Hegarty, Ray saw this teacher kissing Sienna in his car when she was being dropped home. He made a complaint to the school.’
‘When was this?’
‘In the week before the murder. Ellis could be the person Ray Hegarty was arguing with outside his house. You should find out what sort of car he drives.’
Monk scratches his unshaven jaw with his knuckles. ‘The boss is going to say you’re muddying the water.’
Is that what I’m doing?
‘I’m trying to understand what happened.’
‘What if she’s guilty?’
‘What if she’s not?’
Monk seems to think carefully, as though taking a conscience vote. He’s a family man who worries about his own children. He’s also a realist and knows how the truth can be manipulated, ameliorated and negotiated away at every stage of an investigation and trial. That’s the reality of modern policing. Overworked, underpaid and unappreciated, investigators are forced to cut corners and paint over their mistakes. Usually, with a little luck, the facts fall into place and the right person goes down. And even if the system fails, detectives can normally sleep peacefully at night because the defendant was probably guilty of something equally terrible. Truly innocent people very rarely go to jail. That’s the theory. It’s normally the practice. Then someone like Sienna Hegarty comes along.
On the drive home I listen to PM on Radio 4, Eddie Mair analysing the events of the day.
Jury members broke down in tears today as they were shown photographs of a Ukrainian family including three young children who perished in a fire-bomb attack on a Bristol boarding house.
Two of the children, Aneta and Danya Kostin, aged four and six, were found huddled in a second-floor bedroom. Their eleven-year-old sister Vira perished on the first-floor landing, near to where their parents’ bodies were discovered. All were overcome by smoke after petrol was allegedly poured through the letterbox and petrol bombs were thrown through the windows.
Neighbours told Bristol Crown Court of hearing windows breaking and seeing a white Ford transit van leaving the scene moments before flames were spotted on the ground floor of the building. A forensic expert also presented fingerprint evidence linking one of the three accused, Tony Scott, to a petrol container used in the attack . . .
I turn off the radio. Crack the window. The cold air helps me concentrate.
Parking the car outside the terrace, I walk down the hill to the cottage and sit outside on a stone wall in the shadows of low branches. The lights are on downstairs. A TV flickers behind the curtains.
Something pushes me up the path. My finger hovers over the doorbell.
Julianne opens the door a crack. ‘Hello?’
‘Hi.’
‘Is everything OK?’
‘Fine. I just thought I’d drop by. How are you?’
‘I’m good.’
There is a pause that stretches out in my mind, becoming embarrassing.
Julianne opens the door wider. ‘Do you want to come in?’
I step past her and wait for her to close the door. She’s been watching TV, but the sound is now turned down.
‘Where’s Charlie?’ I ask, glancing up the stairs.
‘Babysitting.’
‘Who is she looking after?’
‘A little boy in Emma’s class.’
Julianne curls up in an armchair by the fire. A book lies open on the armrest. A cup of tea is empty on the table next to her.
‘How was your date with Harry?’ I ask.
She holds up her hand and rocks her palm from side to side. ‘So-so. I discovered that he’s rather controlling.’
‘How?’
‘I asked for the dessert menu and he made such a fuss.’
I feel a stab of guilt. ‘That’s very odd.’
Julianne pushes hair back behind her ears. ‘I doubt you came here to talk about Harry.’ She smiles and effortlessly takes repossession of my heart.
‘Sienna was pregnant,’ I say, which is definitely a conversation starter.
Julianne blinks at me. ‘Who?’
‘I don’t know.’
We’re both thinking the same thing. What if it had been Charlie? What would we do?
Julianne grows pensive. ‘I walked past the Hegartys’ house today and I saw the curtains closed and I started thinking about Sienna. She was always here, Joe, staying for dinner, sleeping over, curled up on the sofa with Charlie.’ She takes a deep breath. ‘Then I started thinking about how angry I’ve been at you, and some of the things I said.’
She raises her eyes to mine, filling me with a sense that all her remembered anger, grief and impatience are gone.
‘We haven’t lost someone, Joe. We have two wonderful daughters. We’re very lucky.’
‘I know.’
Her ocean-grey eyes are shining. ‘I don’t know if I should tell you this.’
‘What?’
‘There are nights when I miss you so much I cry myself to sleep and other nights when I realise that loving you took every ounce of energy and more. I didn’t have enough . . . I’ll never have enough.’
‘I understand.’
‘Do you?’
‘Let me come back.’
She shakes her head. ‘I’m not strong enough to live with you, Joe. I’m barely strong enough to live without you.’
‘Why?’
‘Because you’re not always going to be here.’
A stray lock of hair falls from behind her ear. She tucks it back again. For a moment I think she might cry. The last time I saw her tears was two years ago, in her hospital room where rain streaked the windows and it felt as if the clouds were crying for me.
‘I don’t love you any more,’ Julianne told me blankly, coldly. ‘Not in the right way - not how I used to.’
‘There isn’t a right way. There’s just love,’ I said.
What do I know?
Now she’s smiling sadly at me. ‘You’re so good at analysing other people, Joe, but not yourself.’
‘Or you.’
‘I hate it when you analyse me.’
‘I try not to. I prefer you to be a magnificent enigma.’
Julianne laughs properly this time.
‘I’m being serious,’ I say. ‘I don’t want to understand you. I don’t want to know what you’ll do next. I want to spend the rest of my life trying to solve the mystery.’
She sighs and shakes her head. ‘You’re a decent man, Joe, but . . .’
I stop her. No statement that begins that way is ever a harbinger for anything good. What if she’s clearing the decks before telling me that she’s going to marry Harry Veitch?
‘Tell me something honest,’ I say.
Julianne presses her lips into narrow unyielding lines. ‘Are you saying I tell lies?’
‘No, that’s not what I meant. I just want to talk about something important.’
‘This isn’t a necessary conversation, Joe.’
‘I like it when we talk about the girls. It makes me feel like we’re still a family.’
‘We can’t live it over again,’ she whispers sadly.
‘I know.’
‘Do you? Sometimes I wonder.’