house.
Cross pulled a camera from his bag and focused.
‘That house’ Cath told him, pointing at the building almost opposite them.
She sat gazing at it, listening to him clicking off shots.
‘Are you sure it’s the same O’Brian family?’ the photographer asked.
‘I double-checked the address with my brother’ she said. ‘The kids go to the school where he teaches.’
‘And they’re the same ones whose kid was dug up in Croydon Cemetery?’ Cross continued.
Cath nodded, her eyes still on the house.
‘I hope that list’s right,’ Cross said, nodding towards the computer print-out.
‘These are the houses that were raided this morning’ she said, flicking the paper with her middle finger. ‘Nicholls got it from a contact of his at the Met.’
‘Off the record, presumably?’ Cross said, changing lenses.
Cath looked at him and raised one eyebrow. ‘What do you think?’
She folded the print-out and pushed it into the glove compartment then opened the driver’s side door and swung herself out.
‘Let’s have a closer look’ she said, pausing beside the car, her gaze fixed on the house opposite. She set off without waiting for Cross who scuttled up alongside her.
The gate at the end of the short path creaked as she pushed it open. As she approached the front door she noticed that the milk was still on the doorstep.
Cath knocked three times and waited.
Cross looked up, trying to spot signs of movement inside the house.
There was no answer.
She tried again.
‘Perhaps they’re out’ Cross offered.
Cath knocked once again then crossed to the front window, cupped one hand over her eyes and tried to see inside.
She could see very little through the curtains, only that she was staring into the sitting room.
Cross imitated her action, squinting through the window on the other side.
‘Cath’ he called. ‘I think there’s someone inside.’
She hurried across to join him.
‘I thought I saw someone moving in there’ he assured her.
She could see nothing.
‘I think they saw me looking in’ Cross continued.
Cath returned to the front door and knocked again. Harder this time.
‘Why don’t you leave them alone?’
The voice came from behind her.
‘You’re reporters, aren’t you?’ the voice said, and now Cath turned to find its source.
The woman standing in the garden of the house next door was in her early thirties, long reddish-brown hair reaching past her shoulders. She had both hands tucked in the pockets of her jeans.
‘I just wanted to speak to Mr and Mrs O’Brian and-‘ Cath began.
‘And what?’ the woman snapped. ‘Stick your fucking nose in where it’s not wanted. Why don’t you just piss off?’
‘Take it easy’ Cross interjected.
‘You want some pictures?’ the woman said, raising two fingers. ‘Take one of that.’
‘How well do you know the O’Brians?’ Cath asked.
‘Don’t expect me to talk to you. I’m not answering any of your fucking questions.’
‘Did you have children taken this morning?’ Cath persisted.
The woman took a step towards the low hedge which separated the two gardens, her expression dark.
‘I told you,’ she hissed, ‘I’m not going to talk to you, I’m not going to help you write your fucking lies.’
I’m just trying to find out the truth’ Cath told her.
‘Jesus. Since when have newspapers been interested in the truth? You couldn’t care less what you write about people, how you hurt them, could you? As long as you get a story. You’re all the same. You’re scum.’
The front door suddenly opened and Cath turned to find herself looking into the haggard features of Doug O’Brian.
‘Fucking reporters, Doug,’ said the red-haired woman, scathingly.
‘What do you want?’ O’Brian said, looking at Cath with red-rimmed eyes.
Cross snapped off a couple of shots of him.
‘Bastard,’ snapped the redhead.
‘My wife’s indoors crying, would you rather get a picture of that?’ O’Brian said, turning his attention to the photographer.
‘I just wanted to speak to you, Mr O’Brian, just a quick word,’ Cath said. ‘I wondered if you knew why your children had been taken away. What reasons could the police and Social Services have for taking them?’
‘Just go, will you?’ said O’Brian, half closing the door.
‘Yeah, piss off,’ shouted the redhead.
‘You’ve got a right to give your side of the story,’ Cath told him.
‘And that’s what you’re here for, is it? To let me have my say?’
‘People will make up their own minds from what they read. You deserve a chance to put your point of view forward.’
‘I don’t know what I hate about you people the most, your lies or your hypocrisy,’ said O’Brian and slammed the door.
‘Just fuck off’ the redhead continued.
Cath shot her a withering glance, then turned and headed back towards the car, Cross close behind her.
As she slid behind the wheel of the Fiat she noticed that the red-haired woman had retreated to her front step. From there she was still shouting, gesturing angrily towards the car, but Cath could barely hear her furious exhortations.
Just before she pulled away, Cath saw a figure peering from behind a curtain in an upstairs room of the O’Brian house.
Watching.
Then, like an apparition, the shape was gone.
Fifty-three
Nikki Parsons was shaking.
As she tried to light the cigarette the twenty-nine-year-old found that she could scarcely keep the tip steady in the flame of the match. She took a heavy drag and blew out a stream of smoke.
Beside her, Janice Hedden, a year younger, merely kept both hands clasped around her mug of coffee and gazed vacantly ahead of her, occasionally glancing at her companions.
Besides herself and Nikki, there were three other women in the room, all seated around a large table. The walls of the room were dotted with a variety of leaflets distributed at various times by Hackney Council and Social Services. Leaflets on giving blood, on how to cope with multiple sclerosis, AIDS, suicide, drugs.
It was their daily routine.
Janice and her companions were used to dealing with suffering.
With pain.
She had wondered if she would ever become immune to it. Able to distance herself from some of the frightful tales of deprivation and suffering which she heard on a daily basis. Like her companions, she walked a fine line between compassion and efficiency, solace and practicality. She, like her colleagues, walked that line every day, rarely touched by what they heard, able to walk away from it at the end of the working day. It was, after all, a job.
Until today.
