Facebook and Spotify. But Alex Nield was making him feel old and out of touch. He had no idea what some of this stuff meant.
So how could he make real contact?
Finally, he clicked on Alex’s user name and a message box came up. He wrote: ‘Hi, mate. Can I join your tribe?’ and sent the message.
As soon as he’d sent it, Cooper realized that he probably shouldn’t have included so much punctuation. He’d automatically used capital letters and a full stop. A comma, even. That would give him away as someone outside the age range of Alex and his friends. He ought to have just stuck to lower case and lots of exclamation marks.
Nevertheless, he wondered if he would get accepted into the tribe. It was strange, but acceptance in this fictional world already seemed important to him. Because that was what it was all about — being part of a tribe. You needed support from your tribe mates, from your substitute family. Without their support, you were dead.
And Alex Nield was right. It felt like a lot more than just a game.
He sat back, drank a bottle of beer from the fridge, thought about calling Matt and Kate, and apologizing for his outburst. It had been unforgivable. Now that he’d cooled down, he couldn’t explain to himself why he’d lost his rag over something like that. He cared for Amy a lot. He wanted to help, if he could. But now Matt probably wouldn’t even speak to him about it again.
Then he thought about calling Liz. She would be expecting to hear from him. In fact, she’d been amazingly quiet today with the text messages. But the cat took the opportunity to jump up on his lap, and began purring with instant pleasure. And he found that he couldn’t get up to reach his phone, even if he’d wanted to.
Just before he switched off his laptop for the night, Cooper saw that he already had a reply to his message on War Tribe. Alex Nield was online then, sitting in his bedroom at home in Ashbourne, occupying his fantasy world.
Cooper clicked on the link to see how Alex had responded to his request to join the tribe.
In the message box, the boy had typed just two words: die, nOOb!
16
Thursday
The funeral of Emily Nield was held on a morning of cool mist. The sun had been promising to break through since dawn, but didn’t quite make it until after the soil had been scattered on the coffin.
Crowds of people had streamed through the gothic entrance gates towards the tall central spire of the church. Watching the mourners, Ben Cooper wondered how many of them actually knew the Nields, let alone their eight-year-old daughter. In communities like these, there was a general instinct to turn out to show support and sympathy.
Cooper could see the faces of people closing as he passed. Everyone knew he was a police officer. Perhaps they were aware that he was the officer who’d failed to save Emily Nield’s life. And there was no question that most people would have read the story about the anonymous letter and the police investigation. As yet, no one had any idea who’d written the letter, or who’d leaked it to the paper. The clever money was on it being the same person. Someone with a grievance, and determined to give it a public airing, just in case the police didn’t act.
Considering what everyone would be thinking about him made Cooper feel like turning round and walking back to his car. But that would be cowardice. That would be another failure.
In any case, these were nice, respectable people. No one would say anything. They might ignore him, or give him dark looks behind his back. They might shake their heads in disapproval at his presence. But no one would point a finger at him. They wouldn’t start shouting and screaming. Not here. His reception would be a cold, uncomfortable silence. That was the respectable way.
While Cooper waited, he found himself examining the wreaths. There was always a kind of poignant fascination in reading the message cards and trying to guess who the wreaths were from. Some of the messages were baffling, but no doubt they had some personal meaning — an intimate link between the dead and the bereaved. Take this one at the end of the front row, for instance. A large spray of roses and carnations, with a green ribbon. Cooper bent closer to read the card, and frowned a little.
Remembering 30th June for ever.
But today wasn’t 30th June. Nor was the day that Emily Nield had died. So what was the sender of the wreath remembering for ever?
And there was no name on the message, which was odd. Part of the ritual when someone died was this conspicuous display of grief in the form of giant displays of dead flowers. The bigger the wreath, the more you’d paid — and therefore, the more you cared. Wasn’t that the way it went? Leaving your name off the message card broke with the ritual. It meant the sender wasn’t concerned what other people thought. She’d sent the wreath entirely for her own reasons.
Cooper watched the mourners starting to file back towards their cars. He realized he’d already started to picture the sender of the anonymous wreath as a ‘she’. Well, it seemed a very female thing to do. Could it have been one of these women leaving the church in their black skirts? Or would this particular mourner have stayed away from the funeral altogether, preferring to remain as anonymous as the card on her wreath?
With an exasperated sigh at the way his own mind worked sometimes, Cooper turned away from the flowers. His imagination loved fruitless speculation. The chances were, of course, that the date and the absence of a name on the card had just been a mistake made by the florist.
He saw a woman coming towards him. She was dressed not quite in funeral black, but in a subdued grey suit and white blouse, with blonde hair pulled tight back. A woman in her mid-forties perhaps, with an air of competence and confidence. No shyness about approaching him with this one.
‘You’re the policeman,’ she said. ‘Not in uniform, though. Don’t want to be recognized?’
‘I’m CID,’ said Cooper.
‘Oh, yes. You were in the paper, you know.’
‘I saw it.’
‘I’m sure you did your best. The rest of it — well, it’s not your fault, is it?’
‘Thank you.’ Cooper looked at her more closely. ‘Are you a relative of the Nields?’
‘God, no. Work colleague. You sort of have to come, when he’s the boss.’
‘You work at the supermarket, then? Lodge’s.’
‘I’m checkout supervisor. The name’s Marjorie. Marjorie Evans.’
Cooper kept an eye on the porch of the church for the Nields themselves coming away from their formal examination of the flowers.
‘Is Mr Nield a good boss to work for?’ he asked.
She sniffed. ‘It depends what you mean. He runs the store all right, keeps the profits coming in, from what I hear. Difficult times, but still. And he’s fair with the overtime and that. Not too much favouritism, no matter what the others say.’
She gave him a sly look to judge his reaction. Cooper took the cue.
‘All right. So what do the others say?’
‘I couldn’t possibly pass on gossip. That would be wrong. And at a funeral and all. The poor little child.’
Cooper watched a small party of relatives coming down the path towards them from the church.
‘Marjorie, if there’s something you think I ought to know — ’
She seemed to be about to walk away, as if suddenly nervous about being seen talking with him.
‘I shouldn’t have said anything. Forget it.’
‘If you don’t talk to me now, I could come to the store and talk to you.’
‘You mustn’t do that.’
‘So…?’
‘All right, look. You ought to talk to David — he’s the assistant manager. Or Yvonne, on Customer Service. That’s all I’m saying. I’m not accusing him of anything.’
‘Thank you.’