what Grace said.'
'Did you consider the idea at all?' Wyatt asked mildly.
Roy hesitated. 'I'm not answering that,' he said then, jerking his chin at George. 'I'll have my words twisted if I do.'
'Fair enough. Let me put it another way. Did Louise suggest for the Saturday night what she's now claiming happened on the Monday-that she engineered entry for you, Micky and Colley in order to scare Grace into keeping quiet?'
A tic started working violently at the side of Roy's mouth. 'I'm not answering that either.'
'Grace couldn't have died on the Saturday,' George told him, 'otherwise Cill's fingerprints would have been found.' She saw incomprehension in his eyes. 'No one's saying you killed Grace on the Saturday,' she explained. 'All we're asking is if Louise suggested you go into the house with her.' He didn't answer.
'Should we take that as a yes?' Wyatt asked. 'Presumably you'd be denying it if she hadn't?'
Roy gave a terse nod. 'We didn't go in, though.'
'Because you didn't want Grace to see you?' Another nod.
'But you didn't have a problem if she saw Louise?'
He shrugged. 'It was her idea. She'd have talked her way out of it. We didn't have much of a say except to be waiting in the alley at the back by eight-thirty.'
'But all this was before Cill died,' Wyatt pointed out. 'How did Louise react on the Monday when you said you'd take her down with you if she ever talked about the events of Saturday night.'
'She got uppity and we had a row. I told her not to ring again. I was scared witless the police were going to find out we knew each other.'
'What was the relationship between you?' George asked. 'Was she keen on you?'
'Must have been,' he said. 'She was always on the phone, wanting to talk to me. I didn't feel the same way about her-not then-she was nothing to look at in those days. More of a joke, really.'
'So you dumped her?' said Wyatt.
Roy shrugged. 'It was for her sake as well as ours. She'd been acting pretty damn crazy since the rape-kept accusing us of fancying Cill. It was driving Micky round the bend, and he was never too stable at the best of times.' He paused. 'I'm not saying it's fair, but we all blamed her for what happened. If she hadn't told us where Cill was, we'd never have done it.'
'Weren't you worried she'd take revenge?' Wyatt asked. 'She was disturbed enough.'
Roy shook his head. 'She couldn't-not without getting herself into trouble.'
'Until Grace was murdered,' said George. 'She was the only other person who knew Louise was involved.' There was a short silence.
'Whoever killed Mrs. Jefferies had red hair,' said DS Wyatt. 'It was someone she was willing to open her door to ... and someone who was deeply disturbed.'
Roy flicked a wary glance between the two of them.
'Louise was in a dangerously unstable mood after that weekend,' George said. 'Far more unstable than Howard, for example, who was looking for a job and was given one by Jannerway's Dairy. She was being blamed at school for provoking the fight that led indirectly to Cill running away ... being accused by the Trevelyans of telling lies. She hated her father for what he was doing to her, hated you for abandoning her, and most certainly hated Cill. By the Wednesday, a doctor was prescribing tranquilizers to control her panic attacks.'
'How could she have done it? She was a skinny little kid.'
'Who was wielding a carving knife against a woman who tried to escape upstairs. She was slashing at her legs as she went after her.'
Roy ground his fists into his eyes. 'What was the point? Lou didn't know Cill was dead. The kid could have returned the next day, and the heat would have been off.'
George shook her head. 'She wouldn't have been thinking as rationally as that, but are you sure she didn't know Cill was dead ... or at least guess? If she was watching while you walked away up Bladen Street, she'd have known Cill didn't run away when you left the alley. Perhaps you said something on the Monday that allowed her to put two and two together?'
He stared at her. 'Are you saying she did it after she spoke to me?'
'We think Tuesday's more likely. If she was ostracized for a second day at school-which she was-then it's probable her resentments spilled over in the evening. Everyone was blaming her. Her mother was furious because Jean Trevelyan had screamed at her in the street, and her father was angry because David Trevelyan was souring the atmosphere at work. She may even have gone to Grace's for sympathy and lost her temper when she didn't get it.'
Wyatt offered him another cigarette. 'You described her as 'uppity,' ' he prompted. 'What did she say?'
Roy dredged his memory. 'I know she kept on about me fancying Cill, because that's what got me riled,' he said. 'The kid was already dead but she wouldn't let it drop. Lou was obsessed with her even then. Did I think Cill was prettier? Did I think Cill was sexier? I told her I'd kill her if she didn't shut up.' He fell into a morose, brooding silence.
'She gives a great deal of detail in her statement,' said Wyatt. 'She claims it all came from Micky Hopkinson shortly before he died but it's very accurate for a story that was told her fifteen years after the event. She knew about the handkerchief ... Cill's hands being tied ... Micky holding a knife to her back ... Cill crying the whole way to the waste ground ... burial in one of the test pits ... you getting rid of your clothes in a dustbin on the other side of town.'
Roy lowered his head into his hands. 'She'd have to've followed us to know all that for herself ... and she didn't.
