Phil followed his boss into the hallway. It had the same institutional smell that every police station had. Phil had often thought there must be a spray somewhere, sitting in boxes in some store cupboard in the Home Office. Eau de Nick.
‘Are you OK?’ said Fenwick.
‘Fine.’ Phil’s eyes, face, gave nothing away.
‘Really? Because I saw you in there with that suspect and I’m not so sure.’
Phil said nothing. Fenwick continued.
‘You’re the best interviewer in the station, Phil. You know that. I’ve seen you get inside that room, get to work on someone and get them to confess while they still think you’re their best mate. I’ve seen you demolish villains that no one else could crack. But in there…’
Phil’s defences were up. ‘What about in there?’
‘You’re off your game. You’re going for him hard, why? Because she says so?’
‘No. Because… because… because it’s my job…’
Fenwick shook his head. ‘Phil…’
‘Look, Ben. If he’s guilty, he’ll crack. If he’s not he won’t. Simple as that.’
From the look on Fenwick’s face, he had realised he would get no further with Phil. ‘Fine. Do it your own way.’
‘I will.’
And Phil went back in the room.
‘So you didn’t do it,’ said Phil, looking at the top of Howe’s head, resting on the table.
The head moved slowly, side to side.
‘But you admit to stalking Suzanne.’
He nodded.
‘Good. That’s progress. We’re getting somewhere.’
Howe looked up. ‘We were in a relationship… She ended it and… and… I couldn’t bear it… I wanted to see her, talk to her… that’s all, just to talk to her, tell her I… I…’ His voice trailed off once more. He sighed. ‘She phoned me yesterday, yes. And I didn’t call her back.’
‘Why not?’
‘Because she would have… shouted at me…’
‘And you don’t like being shouted at?’
He shook his head.
‘Right,’ said Phil. ‘What about Julie Miller?’
He shook his head.
‘Adele Harrison?’
Another shake of the head, eyes tightly closed.
Phil’s voice was rising. ‘Zoe Herriot. Why’d you kill her? Was she in the way? Was she a barrier to you being with Suzanne again? Is that it? Would she have shouted at you?’
No response.
‘Is that it?’
Howe started to cry again.
Phil sat back, stared at him. And a moment of self-doubt crept into his heart. A thought took shape:
Was Howe guilty? Phil realised he didn’t know. And he didn’t know why he didn’t know. He should have been on top of it, looking for the signs, interpreting them, basing his next set of questions on those interpretations. Instead he had gone in shouting, breaking the man before him and still not knowing whether he was guilty or innocent.
He thought once again of Marina. Wished she was with him.
And that was it. He knew it. The reason he couldn’t operate.
He stood up. ‘Interview terminated.’
Howe looked up, hope daring to dance at the corners of his eyes. ‘That’s it? I can go home?’
Phil looked down at the broken man sprawled across the table and didn’t know the answer.
‘No,’ he said. ‘I’m going to charge you with the abduction of Suzanne Perry and we’re going to keep you here overnight. We’ll talk again in the morning.’
Howe recoiled as if he’d been hit. ‘No… no, you can’t… please…’
Phil gestured to the uniform by the door to take over, turned away from him.
‘Please, you can’t… I can’t go in a cell, please…’
Phil said nothing.
‘I’m… I’m claustrophobic, please… please…’ And then shouting. ‘I’m scared…’
Phil left the room. Hands shaking, unfocused.
He had a phone call to make.
55
Phil sat on Marina’s side of the bed for the second night in a row. Staring ahead, seeing nothing, eyes focused inwards not outwards.
Thoughts focused once more on his partner and daughter.
He shook his head, lifted the beer bottle to his mouth. Empty. He couldn’t remember drinking it. He sighed. His head wasn’t where it should be. He should have been in the case, right in the thick of it, on top of it, surfing it like a wave, but he wasn’t. He just couldn’t bring himself to concentrate on it. And that both worried and scared him.
Anthony Howe. Innocent or guilty?
Julie Miller/Adele Harrison.
Suzanne Perry/Zoe Herriot.
And Fiona Welch. Why did he dislike her so? Why was he listening to what she said? Why were any of them?
There was something he was missing. Something he couldn’t see. Like there was fog all around, inside and out. Something…
The phone was in his hands. He didn’t remember putting it there. He looked at the floor. Must have let the empty beer bottle slip to the floor.
He dialled a number he knew off by heart.
Waited. Not breathing.
Marina saw the phone light up, vibrate. It was on the bed next to her. She had carried it with her all day, in her hands all night. She just looked at it. Let it ring.
Josephina was asleep in the travel cot at the side of the bed. The TV was playing softly in the corner of the hotel room. From the window in her bedroom she could see the night. It seemed barely dark, the lights of Bury St Edmunds twinkling and shining. Safe and enticing.
She sighed.
The phone kept flashing, vibrating.
Josephina stirred.
She had told herself she would answer it when he rang. Talk to him. Explain.
Because she would have made up her mind by then. She would know what she was going to do.
But she didn’t. She hadn’t made up her mind. In fact she was no further forward. So she couldn’t talk to him. Didn’t trust herself.
The phone kept flashing, vibrating.
Her fingers were right next to it. Reaching…
It would be so easy, just pick it up, talk to him…
So easy…
