Cold Light

Twenty-eight

The blinds in Skelton’s office were drawn, closing out what was left of the winter light. Skelton’s earlier conversation with the assistant chief had made him sweat. The afternoon editions of the Post had headlined Harry Phelan’s arrest at the police station, featured a photograph of him angrily descending the steps to the street after being released. Another quotable diatribe about police incompetence, sloth. “Only time they put themselves out nowadays, something political or if it’s one of their own.”

“Questions being asked, Jack,” the assistant chief had said. “What in God’s name’s going on on your patch? You used to run such a tight ship, everything battened down. Trouble with a reputation like yours, things start to get out of control, out of hand, people notice. They want to know the reasons why. Oh, and Jack, give my best to Alice, right?”

Resnick had noticed, this past week or so, that the photographs of Alice and Kate, so prominent and exact on Jack Skelton’s desk in the past, had disappeared from sight. He was in Skelton’s office now while Robin Hidden took his statutory break, getting the superintendent up to speed.

“Robin,” Resnick had said, his voice reasonable, soothing, “no one’s accusing you of lying, deliberately lying. We know this has been a difficult time for you, emotionally. What was happening, the rejection, you were bound to be upset. After all, this was somebody you loved and who you thought had loved you. Any of us would find that hard to cope with, hard to handle. And there you’d been, driving round all evening, desperate to see her, going over all the things you wanted to say inside your head. And then, suddenly, there she was.”

Resnick had held his moment; waited until Robin Hidden was looking back into his eyes. “Like I say, we’d any of us, situation like that, we’d find it hard to know how to react. Hard to remember, afterwards, exactly what we did or said.”

Hidden’s head went down. It wasn’t clear whether or not he was crying.

David Welch had leaned forward from the edge of his chair. “I think my client …”

“Not now,” Millington had said quietly.

“My client …”

“Not,” repeated Millington, “now.”

And not for one moment did Resnick allow his gaze to shift away, waiting for Robin Hidden’s head to come back up, blinking at him through a gauze of tears. “She t-told me,” he said, “she thought I was being s-st-stupid, p-p-pathetic. She didn’t want to talk to me. Not ever. S-she wished she’d never had anything to do with m-me, n-never seen me at all.”

Skelton was sitting bolt upright, fingertips touching, forearms resting on the edge of his desk. “And the boy, how did he respond?”

“Admits to getting angry, losing his temper.”

“He did hit her?”

“Not hit exactly, no.”

“Semantics, Charlie?”

Resnick glanced at the floor; from somewhere a splash of brown, dark and drying, had earlier attached itself to the side of his left shoe. “He says that he took a hold of her, both arms. I imagine he’s got quite a grip. Shook her around a bit, trying to get her to change her mind. That’s when she agreed to get into the car.”

Skelton sighed, swiveled his chair sideways, waited.

“They drove down towards the Castle, on into the Park. Stopped by the first roundabout on Lenton Road. What he wanted was to get her to talk about what was going on.” Resnick shifted on his seat, less than comfortable. “What he wanted, of course, was for her to change her mind, agree to keep seeing him. Anything as long as she didn’t carry on with what she was doing. Shutting him right out of her life.”

“I love you,” Robin said. Against her will, he was holding her hand.

Nancy looked through the side window of the car, up along the steadily sloping street, shadows from the gas lamps faint and blurred. Frost along the privet hedge. “I’m sorry, Robin, but I don’t love you.”

“A shame she couldn’t have lied,” Skelton said.

“She pulled her hand away and he did nothing to stop her. Got out of the car and walked back down Lenton Road; turned off right, down towards the Boulevard.”

“And he just sat there?”

“Watching her in the mirror.”

“Nothing more?”

“Never saw her again.”

“He says.”

Resnick nodded.

Skelton was back on his feet, desk to wall, wall to window, window to desk, pacing it out. “She’s gone without trace, Charlie. Good looking young woman. You know what it’s like, cases like this. Spend more time than you can afford checking on sightings by every loony and short-sighted granny from Ilkeston to Arbroath. This time it’s like a desert out there. No bugger’s seen a thing.”

Back by his desk, Skelton picked up his fountain pen and unscrewed the cap, glanced at the nib, replaced the cap, put the pen back down. Resnick shuffled around on his seat, clasped and unclasped his hands.

“Nine times out of ten, Charlie, it’s not some wandering nutter, spends his hours poring over true-life stories of serial killers like they’re the lives of the saints. You know that as well as me. It’s the husbands, boyfriends, the frustrated wives.”

The drawer to which the pictures of Alice had been consigned was close to Skelton’s right hand.

“You’re right to tread careful, Charlie, God knows. But let’s not let him get the upper hand, think he can play with us as he likes, little here, little there. We’ve got him this far, Charlie, let’s not let him slip away.”