‘Are you on your own? Is Professor Orr not with you?’
Harriet Rutter shook her head abruptly. Kathy noticed that she seemed to be holding herself stiffly upright, like a widow at a funeral. And now she looked more closely, she was almost sure that there was moisture gleaming in the corners of the woman’s eyes.
She really didn’t want to stop and hear the story, whatever it was, but she felt compelled to ask. ‘Is something the matter? Are you all right?’
Mrs Rutter shook her head, speechless, and this seemed so completely out of character that Kathy was taken aback.
She took the other seat at the table. ‘What is it?’
‘Robbie and I… have had a falling out. That’s all.’
‘Oh. I am sorry. Do you know, I think it’s Christmas that does this. Everybody seems to have the same problem.’
The other woman looked at her doubtfully, as if to see if she was making fun of her.
‘It’s got nothing to do with Christmas. It’s my fault. I should have been more patient… more sympathetic.’
‘Oh dear. Do you want to tell me? Is there anything I can do?’
Mrs Rutter’s eyes widened. ‘You!’ she whispered, and turned abruptly away, behaving almost as if it was all Kathy’s fault.
Kathy was puzzled. ‘What do you mean?’
Mrs Rutter slowly turned back to face her, mouth set defiantly. ‘I mean that Robbie was devastated, utterly devastated, by the treatment he got from you people.’ She spoke in an uncharacteristically low tone, almost a whisper, as if she didn’t want anyone else to hear. ‘You have no idea what I’m talking about, have you?’
‘No, no I don’t.’
‘I suppose you deal with hardened criminals all the time, don’t you? And you assume that everyone’s the same. Well I can tell you, by the time you and that Sergeant Lowry had finished with Robbie, the poor man was a wreck. He hasn’t been able to sleep, or eat. And he’s not a weak man…’ The tears were flowing freely now. ‘He was in the army, long ago, and he’s coped with all the usual trials of a long and useful life. But you humiliated him. You made him out to be rubbish. You hurt him.’
Kathy was stunned, and felt herself wilting before the ferocity of the woman’s outrage. ‘Mrs Rutter, Professor Orr seemed quite all right when I last saw him. He didn’t like being questioned, of course, but he was co-operative, and didn’t seem too distressed.’ But that was before Gavin Lowry had had a go, and she remembered how angry Lowry had seemed afterwards.
Mrs Rutter wasn’t interested. She turned away and wiped her eyes and nose with a small handkerchief and recomposed herself. ‘What’s really galling is that that awful man has got away with it. That’s what Robbie can’t abide.’
‘DS Lowry?’ Kathy asked.
‘No! Bruno Verdi!’ She curled her lip as she pronounced the name like an obscenity. ‘He put those things in Robbie’s filing cabinet. Any fool could have worked that out in one minute. Even the police. He’s an evil and spiteful little man… But, I’m afraid.’
‘You’re afraid of Verdi?’
‘Of what Robbie may do. That’s why we quarrelled. I wanted him to put it out of his mind, forget about it, but he can’t. He says he’s going to expose Verdi. He’s become obsessed by the idea.’ She shook her head hopelessly. ‘How can he?’
Kathy had the sudden notion that Orr’s outrage at being accused of possessing a dirty video might just be because it had touched a nerve, and perhaps one that Mrs Rutter might have recognised. Maybe she had had her own suspicions about the great man’s proclivities. Didn’t they used to chat up the young people in the malls together? And then there was the matter of the coins.
Kathy mentally kicked herself; she had forgotten about the coins. What was happening to her memory? Maybe sex and shopping affected the brain.
‘Do you think, if I spoke to him, apologised?’
‘Oh, I really don’t think that would do any good. Not now.’
‘Is he at home?’
‘No, we came here together. That’s when we quarrelled.’
‘He’s here, is he?’
She nodded. ‘I think he’s gone to that hut.’
‘Well, I might call in on him and see if I can calm him down.’
Mrs Rutter looked doubtful, then relief began to soften her face. ‘Would you? It might help.’
As she continued along the mall Kathy passed a deli, and selected one of the small gourmet Christmas puddings they had on offer, and a box of mince pies. She also noticed a sign advertising a delivery service to anywhere in the UK, and with relief ordered a presentation box of delicacies to be sent up to Sheffield, with a hurriedly written card which she backdated to the twentieth. She had a moment of anxiety as the machine scanned her card, but some residual credit still apparently remained, and she emerged from the shop contented.
The icy wind caught her breath as soon as she stepped out of the shelter of the east entrance. She lowered her head, turned up her collar and strode towards the top of the grass bank that separated the upper and lower carparks, where she could see down the bare flank of the centre to the two steel containers in their water-logged compound at the far corner. It occurred to her that Orr couldn’t be in his hut, because they had put a new padlock on the door, one to which only the police had a key. And yet, screwing up her eyes against the wind, Kathy was almost convinced that she could see a glimmer of light reflecting from the puddle at that end of the container. Puzzled, she began the tricky descent down the slippery grass slope and across the muddy ground below.
There was definitely light coming from the bottom edge of the door, and when she reached it she was able to make out the hasp that secured the door dangling loose, and still locked by the padlock to the staple which had been forcibly wrenched from the jamb. Robbie Orr had obviously come prepared.
He literally jumped into the air when she pulled the door open and said hello. Coat flapping, arms flailing, he scrambled to hide whatever he had been examining on the table as he turned to face her.
‘What do you want?’ he barked.
He was certainly the worse for wear, she saw. He looked older, clothes dishevelled and splashed with mud.
‘I bumped into Harriet in the mall. She said you might be down here. Can I come in?’
She stepped in before he could reply, and swung the door to.
‘I’m busy,’ he said angrily, and she caught a whiff of whisky. ‘I don’t want to be disturbed.’
‘What are you doing?’
She stared at the tabletop behind him, and he shuffled sideways to block her view. She was startled to see what looked like copies of the computer plans that Allen Cook had provided for their search. Even more disconcerting was a glimpse of what looked like several fat brass cartridges. He began feeling along the edge of the table with the long, bony fingers of his left hand towards the jemmy he’d presumably used to force open the door. His right hand was plunged deep in his coat pocket, and he seemed reluctant to take it out. The coat was dragged down on that side of his body, as if the pocket contained something heavy.
‘DS Kathy Kolla,’ Kathy suddenly said with a big smile, and stuck out her hand. ‘Remember me?’
He jerked back from her hand, then flushed when he realised she was offering it to shake. ‘Of course I do!’ He flapped his left hand at her, while his right remained firmly in the pocket. ‘Please go away.’
‘I thought maybe we could talk things over. I think we could help each other.’
He leant forward, eyes glittering with anger. ‘Don’t try your soft soap on me, lassie,’ he said. ‘I know why you’ve come.’
‘Do you?’
‘Aye. To save your corrupt friends. To have me take the blame for your bungling. What have you got in your bag, eh? What did you bring to hide in my drawers this time? More filth? Perhaps you’d like me to tell you what an attractive wee girl she was? How she liked to tease old men like me for a pound or two? Is that what you want to hear?’
‘I want to hear the truth, Robbie. Did she tease you?’ Kathy searched his face, trying to read it. Inside the
