Under a Dark Cloud Page 17

  ‘Mrs French?’

  ‘Yes, honey?’

  ‘Do you remember a boy dying? An incident at a Scout camp, maybe around summer 1992?’

  Mrs French’s hands go to her chest. ‘Oh yes, such a tragic accident. Jacob Fraser.’ She pauses. ‘Is that what you’re looking into?’

  ‘Yes,’ Freya confirms. ‘But between you and me, of course. Official police business,’ she adds in a low whisper.

  ‘You’ll need August then.’ Mrs French bends down and selects the right section among the heavy books. ‘The bank holiday weekend. Scout camp was always the last week in August, before the schools went back. Not that that poor boy did, of course.’

  ‘Do you remember how he died?’ Robin asks.

  ‘I…’ She frowns. ‘No, sorry. But I remember his parents moved away soon after. Too many bad memories, poor souls. He was their only child.’

  There is a long pause, and Robin touches the microfiche, keen to get going. Eventually, Mrs French gets the hint.

  ‘I’ll leave you to it, then,’ she says.

  ‘See?’ Freya whispers triumphantly once she’s gone. ‘Locals always know the gossip.’

  ‘That’ll be round the village before the day is out, I guarantee you,’ Robin replies. He sighs, then pulls the first microfiche from the file. ‘Let’s get started.’

  * * *

  Hours later, eyes dry, backs aching, they’re still going. Both of them staring at the screen, speed-reading the headings as they flick by. Freya goes to fetch sandwiches, and they take turns to eat in the middle of the room to make sure bits of tuna mayo don’t end up on the precious microfiche. Robin finishes his, carefully wiping his hands then shuffling his chair back to where Freya’s sitting, head resting on her hands, face barely centimetres from the screen.

  He still feels awful that he hadn’t realised how bad things have got for her. It seems ridiculous to Robin now – of course Freya would have been traumatised. Of course she’d be upset. After everything he’d done in his past, Amy Miller’s death was barely a blip in his numbed, fucked-up brain, but to Freya it must have been a living nightmare.

  She seems better today, though, more her usual self. She’s smiling again, chatting in her normal way. Out of the detective ‘uniform’ (the female version seems to be similar to the men’s, Robin’s noticed: shirts, smart trousers, jackets and the like) she seems more relaxed, wearing a SuperDry hoodie today, jeans and trainers, her hair intricately braided in a French plait.

  And he feels better, too. Away from the stifling heat of the hospital, the feeling of helplessness. The drive and the music of his university days have lifted him, as has Freya’s easy company.

  He leans forward, their shoulders touching. The microfiche scrolls by, page after page, Freya moving the viewer slowly across. Robin grows distracted. Post-carb wooziness. The smell of her shampoo. Weariness from the drive.

  ‘You smell of tuna,’ Freya says quietly, her eyes still fixed on the screen.

  ‘You bought the sandwiches.’ A pause. Eyes forward. ‘Better or worse than the Monster Munch?’

  ‘Are those my only two choices?’

  Freya smiles, glancing towards him. Her face close to his. But—

  ‘Wait! Go back,’ he says.

  He sits up straight, all his attention on the screen. Freya reverses the header into view.

  ‘There. That’s him.’ Robin reads aloud, ‘Fraser, J. Date of birth: January 1981.’

  This is the information they’re after. Freya carefully lines the page up on the screen and presses the print button. The machine whirs and spits out a blurry copy of the article.

  It’s dated September 1992. Silently, they both read the details.

  Jacob Fraser. Age eleven. Died Wednesday 26 August 1992. Cause of death: cardiac and respiratory failure resulting from a severe anaphylactic reaction. Verdict: accidental.

  Freya looks back to Robin. ‘What do you remember about this?’

  ‘He wasn’t in my year,’ Robin says. ‘I was at secondary school by then. I think he was in his last year at primary. I remember the talk around the village.’

  ‘Didn’t you and Finn discuss it?’

  ‘No, we…’ Robin frowns, thinking. Robin was bitter from being forced to miss camp because of his broken leg; he hadn’t wanted to discuss anything. ‘We were boys,’ he replies. ‘Typical males. All we talked about was sport. And science, in Finn’s case.’

  Freya picks up the A4 sheet of fuzzy type from the printer. And she articulates what he’s been thinking.

  ‘If Finn did have something to do with this,’ she says, ‘how?’

  32

  Freya watches Robin out of the window as he talks on the phone. He paces backwards and forwards on the pavement, his head down, mobile clamped to his ear, trying to get the latest on Finn’s case.

  This must be taking its toll on him, she thinks. To come back to the village he grew up in, to be faced with the memories of the family he’s lost. And to be investigating one of his oldest friends for… for what?

  She picks up the report again. The coroner didn’t find anything suspicious. A tragedy, yes, but no blame assigned. The Scout leaders did everything right – administered the EpiPen as quickly as they could, called 999 – so if it hadn’t been their fault, why would Finn be to blame? He was there, but so were forty other teenagers.

  Robin’s still on the call, clearly talking to someone he doesn’t like; she recognises the downturned mouth, the pinched expression. Robin has never been great at hiding his feelings. No airs. No pretence.

  The tiny room is stuffy, the lingering smell of tuna sandwiches unpleasant, so she reaches across and opens the small window in front of her. The fresh breeze is welcome, fluttering the pages of a few books, blowing dust motes into the air.

  She can hear the edge of Robin’s conversation now.

  ‘…and have you found anything on his hard drive?’ A pause. ‘Well, it must have been going somewhere.’ Freya guesses he’s talking to DI Craig and sits back at the microfiche reader.

  As she shuts down the machine, removing the paper from the printer, replacing the dusty cover on the top, she listens to the low murmur of Robin’s voice. She’s noticed his West Country burr is more pronounced, even after just a few hours here. She wonders if Mrs French is still around and willing to share more stories of the young Robin Butler. Ammunition for a gentle piss-take, she thinks. Or maybe to get out of the more boring admin.

  ‘Are we finished?’ Robin says from behind her.

  She jumps slightly, as if he could read her mind. ‘Yeah. What did Craig say?’

  He sighs, a noise of frustration and annoyance. ‘She won’t tell me much, except that they’re going to interview Sophie today. And they’ve got his hard drive from the university.’

  ‘What help would the hard drive be?’ Freya asks.

  ‘Papers he was working on. Motive,’ he says grimly. ‘They found the cameras they were using inside the van. But they weren’t recording internally – streaming live via satellite, so any footage was stored remotely.’ He shrugs. ‘More secure, I guess.’

  ‘So it could show what happened?’

  ‘Maybe. Except they can’t find the file.’ He sighs again. ‘Anyway. Shall we go and check into the hotel, before dinner at Sandra’s tonight?’

  ‘Yes, good idea.’ Freya’s knackered. A cup of tea, a biscuit and a collapse on the bed is what she needs right now. ‘Are you sure you’re okay with me coming?’

  Robin called Sandra earlier, letting her know they were on their way, and she invited them both to dinner. Freya relishes the thought of a home-cooked meal, but feels like she might be intruding on a long-overdue catch-up.

  ‘Of course,’ Robin replies with a smile. ‘You’ll love Sandra. Just don’t let her interrogate you. She’ll want to know everything.’

  They finish tidying and Freya hands Robin the printouts. He puts them in his bag, both repeating their thanks to Mrs French as they leave.

&nb
sp; Freya’s looking forward to meeting Sandra. And she knows that with this interrogation, the information’s going to be flowing both ways. Perhaps there’s still a chance to get that gossip about Robin.

  33

  Sophie regrets agreeing to this police interview. Even more so that she came alone, without a solicitor. It seemed such an overreaction, to bring a legal representative when she hasn’t done anything wrong.

  But this room is so formal – the video running, the detectives stern – that she has misgivings about her decision. They’ve said that she’s free to leave at any time, but they made her sign paperwork and the door’s closed and she doesn’t feel free. Not at all.

  She’s tired and on edge. She can’t sleep. Even her usual yoga and meditation aren’t working.

  She recognises both detectives from the van. The car park they are now calling the ‘crime scene’. She saw Finn that morning, and if anything, he seemed worse. He barely reacted when she entered the room, his features blank. His voice, when he did speak, was flat and deadpan. She told Josie she was coming here this afternoon, and Josie just said, ‘Don’t make things worse.’

  As if she could. As if anything could be worse than this.

  The woman detective in charge, Craig, is showing her a photo of a camera.

  ‘Do you recognise this?’ Craig asks.

  Sophie nods. ‘Kind of. Simon’s team had loads of cameras over this past week. I assume it’s one of those.’

  ‘It’s a Sony FS5,’ Craig says. Sophie has no idea what that means. ‘We recovered it from the van.’

  ‘Isn’t that a good thing?’ Sophie asks. But from the look on Craig’s face, she knows it can’t be. Not for Finn.

  ‘Yes, except the memory card transmitted any footage by satellite. To a networked drive we can’t locate. Do you know where Finn’s laptop is, Sophie?’

  ‘Either at the university or it would have been with him in the van.’

  ‘Is this it?’

  The other detective, Grey, pushes another photo across. Sophie recognises the battered old MacBook, stickers plastered on the top. There’s a stain of something red across it, which Sophie realises must be Simon’s blood.

  ‘Yes, that’s Finn’s.’

  ‘Did he have any other computers?’

  ‘Only the one at the university. You’d have to speak to Ian to get that.’

  Sophie knows full well that Ian’s already sent the copy of the hard drive across and wonders why the detectives are being so deliberately obtuse.

  ‘How would you describe Finn’s relationship with Simon?’

  ‘Colleagues.’

  ‘Not friends?’

  ‘Well, maybe. Finn doesn’t have many close friends.’

  ‘And why’s that?’ Craig leans forward across the table.

  ‘He’s shy. It’s hard to get to know him.’

  ‘You managed it.’

  ‘I persisted.’

  ‘What about his colleagues at the university? His PhD students – would Finn go out for drinks with them?’

  Sophie isn’t sure what Craig is getting at.

  ‘Maybe, sometimes. But Finn said he spent all day with them, so he didn’t always want to spend the evening, too.’

  ‘So, Finn spent a lot of time with his colleagues? Would you say they knew him well?’

  Sophie stops. ‘I don’t want to say anything else,’ she eventually replies and clamps her lips shut.

  ‘Listen, Sophie,’ DI Craig says, sitting back in her chair and putting her arms behind her head. ‘I’ll level with you. Things aren’t looking great for your boyfriend. We’re hearing stories of jealousy, of professional rivalry at the university. That Dr Mason was threatened by Dr Sharp and conflict was escalating.’

  ‘Who said that?’ She knows exactly who. Ian bloody Calloway.

  ‘I can’t say.’ Craig pauses. ‘You’re telling me you never saw any disagreements between Finn and Simon?’

  ‘No!’

  ‘Never?’

  The detective knows Sophie’s lying, she can feel it. Sophie remembers Finn bitching to her about Simon, but it was no more than the usual disagreements that arise between two exceptionally clever men.

  ‘They had different priorities, that’s all,’ Sophie says, trying to explain. ‘Simon was more interested in the entertainment. Finn knew they had to get the tests right, or the results wouldn’t stand up to professional scrutiny. But he would never have hurt Simon.’

  ‘Never?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Not even if Simon was about to take all the credit?’

  So they know about the paper with Sharp’s name on it, she thinks. And they’ve come to the exact same conclusion she had.

  As expected, Grey pushes a document across the table towards her. ‘This is a printout of a paper found on Simon’s laptop. Startlingly similar to one Finn was writing,’ Grey says. ‘But this only has one name on the top – Sharp’s.’

  Sophie looks at the printout. ‘Simon knew the Doppler was nothing without Finn,’ she tries, but she can feel her voice shaking.

  ‘Does it make you angry, Sophie?’ Craig asks.

  ‘Yes, but—’

  ‘So how do you think Finn felt when he found out? We found an email from Justin White to Finn. He sent it to him on Tuesday, the day of the storm. Finn knew full well what Sharp was planning. And he went into the van, ready to kill.’

  Sophie’s hands fly to her mouth. ‘He wouldn’t. Not Finn.’

  Craig’s face softens. ‘Or maybe he didn’t plan it. Perhaps it was a spur of the moment thing, brought on by the stress of testing the equipment and the danger of the storm. Maybe Finn didn’t mean to kill Simon. But the fact of the matter is that Sharp is dead, and Finn was the only one there.’ She pauses. ‘Sophie, look at me.’

  Sophie drags her eyes from the paper in front of her, Simon’s name at the top.

  The detective looks sympathetic. ‘Finn’s best bet right now is a finding by the court for voluntary manslaughter. The fact that he was an alcoholic and probably under the influence at the time could help him: his lawyers could claim the killing was carried out without specific intent.’

  ‘What does that mean?’ Sophie whispers.

  ‘Essentially that he was so drunk he didn’t have the state of mind capable of murder,’ Craig explains. ‘He could plead guilty to manslaughter and his sentence would be much, much less.’

  Sophie shakes her head. He would still go to jail. Her kind, sensitive boyfriend would end up in a prison with hardened criminals. He’d never survive.

  ‘But we need your help,’ the detective continues. ‘You’re uniquely positioned as his girlfriend to paint a picture of what Finn was like in the days leading up to the storm. You could make the difference between Finn getting life and him being out within ten years.’

  Sophie looks the detective right in the eyes. She will have no part in Finn going to jail. Not for five years, not for ten. Not at all.

  ‘I wish to leave now, DI Craig,’ she says clearly. ‘Finn did not kill Simon, and I will have no part in your desperate attempt to prove that he did.’

  Craig sighs and holds her hands up in defence. ‘There’s no desperation here, Sophie,’ she replies. ‘We have more than enough to show he murdered Simon Sharp in cold blood. The threshold test is more than surpassed.’

  Sophie stands up. ‘I’m leaving.’

  ‘So go, please,’ Craig finishes. She gestures to Grey, who stands up to escort Sophie out of the interview room. As he opens the door, Sophie glances back to where Craig is still sitting at the desk. The detective looks relaxed, almost smug.

  Sophie knows the police have all they need for Finn to go to prison for murder. But she’s not beaten yet.

  34

  The Premier Inn is large and purple and simple to find. Freya is silent, looking up at the huge building, and with a horrible stomach drop Robin realises his mistake.

  ‘Oh, Freya. Shit. I’m sorry… I didn’t think.’

 
She shrugs. ‘It’s not like Jonathan died in this one. It’s fine. I can’t avoid every single Premier Inn just because it’s where my boyfriend’s body was found.’

  ‘But—’ He stops himself, then leans forward to start the engine again. ‘We’ll find somewhere else.’

  ‘No, we won’t. Don’t be silly. Besides, I’m knackered.’

  ‘If you’re sure.’

  ‘I’m sure.’

  They head inside. Check-in is swift, two electronic cards handed their way. Third floor, rooms adjacent.

  They head up in the lift and walk along the corridor, following the signs.

  ‘Dinner with Sandra is at half seven. I’ll come and get you at quarter past,’ Robin says and Freya nods. Then, with a beep and a flash of green light, they’re both inside.

  Robin goes in and dumps his bag on the bed. He knows Freya hadn’t seen the crime scene photos when Jonathan Miller was found, strung up behind the door, but he had, and the room looked just like this one. And probably the room next door. And the one next to that.

  He curses himself again for not thinking about it when he booked the hotel. He stands for a moment and listens, but all he can hear is Freya’s TV being turned on.

  He kicks his shoes off and lies on the bed, staring at the ceiling. They haven’t achieved much today; just uncovered more questions and worry. Why was Finn talking about this boy? It was an accident. A horrible one, especially if Finn had been there, but they’d found nothing that linked it to Sharp.

  Next to him, his phone rings. It’s a number he doesn’t know and he hesitates before he answers it.

  ‘Robin? It’s Sophie. Sophie Hall.’

  Her voice is high-pitched and breathless. Robin inwardly sighs.

  ‘Hi, Sophie,’ he says wearily.

  ‘Josie gave me your number. I need to talk to you. I was interviewed by Detective Craig today.’

  ‘And how did that go?’ Robin hopes she didn’t show up stoned, although from the frantic tone he guesses she could do with some weed right now.

  ‘Fine. I mean, I didn’t say anything. But they think Finn did it, Robin. They think he killed Simon.’