‘Okay,’ Beth began. ‘I can see how close you are, so have any of you noticed anybody strange hanging around, perhaps targeting you four specifically, or even only one of you? Somebody lurking, or being where you are more than you would expect them to be?’
They looked at each other. ‘I wouldn’t say so,’ Katie said. ‘But with this awful weather you wouldn’t know anyway. Everybody has their hoods up, or an umbrella pulled low to shield their face, and it’s been like that for around three weeks now. As your boss said, the river’s in full spate…’ Katie paused and wiped away a tear.
‘What has the river got to do with it?’ Clare asked, aware she was missing something – nobody had told her how Susie had died.
Katie clutched at her friend’s hand. ‘They found Susie in the river.’ Katie turned to Beth. ‘Did DI Cheetham say the Porter?’
The DS nodded. ‘Yes, the Porter runs quite near to here, in the Ecclesall Road area, but it drops down into the centre and goes underneath the roads until it reaches the railway station. That’s where we found Susie.’
Clare frowned. ‘But how? She was an amazing swimmer.’
‘Clare, I’m so sorry,’ DS Machin said. ‘Susie wouldn’t have had chance to swim, she was dead before she entered the water. We believe whoever killed her hoped she would be carried down the river with the water being so fast, and eventually out to the North Sea. She became trapped, and her body was wedged tightly against some large stones.’
‘You’re sure it’s her?’ Clare was heartbroken.
‘Very sure, and we’re expecting her parents to formally identify her tomorrow.’ Beth opened her briefcase. ‘Let’s get these statements done, and I’ll leave you to think about Susie in your own way.’
4
Frannie heard Erica enter and hang her coat in the small cloakroom. Her work was spread out on the coffee table, and she quickly gathered them up. ‘I’ll put these away, Erica, they can wait until tomorrow. Wine?’
‘Please. I can only have one though. Just in case…’
Frannie looked up from gathering the papers into a tidy pile. ‘In case what?’
‘I have no idea.’ Erica looked and sounded weary. ‘There’s something not right about this. As I said this morning, we have a dead girl who disappeared within a few seconds really, strangled and dumped in a river. The strange thing about this particular river is that it’s normally quite gentle. Locals call it the Porter Brook, rather than its official title of the River Porter, but with all this bloody rain it’s quite frightening. I’m meeting Susie’s parents tomorrow morning for a formal identification, but they might as well have come tonight, because they’re going to get no sleep.’
‘Only child?’
Erica nodded.
‘Shit. My heart goes out to them.’
‘They want to go up and see the girls Susie lived with, after they’ve seen Susie. I think Olivia, her mum, needs that.’
Frannie stood. ‘I’ll get us that wine.’
Erica sat back and thought through everything that had happened, and the awfulness of having to go to that welcoming home and tell them of their daughter’s death. Pictures of Susie were everywhere, and they had given her one so that they could begin to show it around the university campus, trying to track down what had happened between Susie exiting the theatre, and two or three minutes later being followed by Clare. In that short space of time Susie had broken all the rules. Erica looked up and smiled as Frannie returned bearing what appeared to be two buckets of wine.
‘If you’re only having one, make it a big one. Gin glass size.’
Erica took the glass and sipped at the Prosecco. ‘Thank you. Can I bounce stuff off you, or have you got enough on your plate?’ Frannie’s job in child protection with social services was similar to her own in that cases lived with them twenty-four hours a day, and they tried not to bring the stuff running around inside their heads into the home.
‘Of course.’
‘Okay, two girls go to the university’s Drama Studio. You know where it is? Between the children’s hospital and the Royal Hallamshire?’
Frannie nodded. ‘Been to it a couple of times. Carry on.’
‘They watched Macbeth, which is part of the course they’re both taking. They were with a group of people they knew, although they hadn’t arranged to meet up with them, it happened. When the performance ended, Clare needed the loo, so asked Susie to wait outside the theatre, as they had arranged to meet up in the pub with the other two housemates from their student accommodation.’
She paused, and Frannie spoke. ‘Okay, I’ve got the picture so far.’
‘Clare came out two or three minutes after Susie, but couldn’t see her. She had a good look because it was still raining heavily, and everybody had umbrellas or hoods up. She hung around for some time thinking maybe Susie had changed her mind about needing the loo, but she didn’t arrive. By then Clare was feeling pissed off, and walked down to the pub on her own, where she met up with the two housemates, Becky and Katie. Susie wasn’t with them.’
Frannie took another sip of wine. ‘I’m going to presume this is totally out of character.’
‘Absolutely. The girls wanted to contact us immediately, but Becky, who seems to be the mother hen of the group, pointed out that the police wouldn’t do anything, Susie was a student and students are rather scatter-brained. She could have wandered off with some other group, and gone to a party. And she’s right. We didn’t know Susie, and would have said wait twenty-four hours, then come and see us. They arrived this morning, worried out of their heads. Things had taken a turn for the worse, and we had found Susie’s body, although at that stage we didn’t know who she was. What I want to bounce off you is that two or three
