The Runaway. Ali Harper

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      ‘It was. Used by mole-catchers – but you had to be a licensed pest controller to get hold of it. Police never found where she got it from, least not that they told me.’

      ‘You don’t think it was suicide?’

      ‘She was found in the communal garden of a block of flats, overlooking Roundhay Park.’

      I’d never been to Roundhay Park, but I’d heard of it. It was out to the north of the city, only about four miles away; but we’ve got Hyde Park right on our doorstep, so why travel?

      ‘She killed herself outside?’ asked Jo and I knew by the tone of her voice that she didn’t believe it. I could see where she was coming from – when you think of suicide, especially women, you think of pills in the bath, head in the oven. But then there were the jumpers, I thought. Beachy Head and that bridge near Hull. They were outdoors.

      ‘Perhaps she didn’t want a relative to find her,’ I said. ‘I mean, if it was suicide, and she’d killed herself in her own flat, chances are it would have been someone she knew who discovered her. Perhaps that’s why she went to the garden – she wanted a stranger to find her.’ Which, I thought, although I didn’t say aloud, made her more thoughtful than your average suicide. I don’t know how the tube drivers ever recover from what they must see when someone decides they can’t go on.

      ‘She didn’t live in the flats,’ said Martin.

      ‘Oh.’ I considered this for a moment. It didn’t make sense. ‘Why would you kill yourself in someone else’s garden?’

      ‘Where did she live?’ asked Jo.

      Martin shrugged. ‘That’s the trouble. We don’t know. No one knows who she is. No ID on her; all they found was a train ticket from Nottingham. Like she’d travelled all the way from Nottingham to kill herself in the garden of this particular block of flats.’

      ‘She must have known someone in the flats,’ I said.

      ‘She’d tied herself to a statue. Right in the middle of the grass.’

      ‘If they didn’t know who she was, how did they know she was a sex worker?’ asked Jo.

      Martin shrugged again. ‘Don’t know. And I’ve got to tell you here, after …’ He paused, looked at Jo again. ‘After last time. I want to put my cards right out there on the table, so you know what you’re getting into. I didn’t like the way the investigation was handled, if you catch my drift.’

      ‘Come on, Martin,’ I said. I banged my drink down on the table harder than I expected and caused the table to wobble and Jo’s pint to slop. I lowered my voice. ‘You can’t put your cards on the table and then ask us to catch your drift. What do you mean?’

      Jo mopped at the spillage with a beer mat.

      ‘The policeman in charge. I had my doubts. That’s all. Nothing concrete, just a feeling that perhaps he wasn’t as committed as he could have been.’

      ‘Wasn’t committed or was bent? Massive difference.’

      ‘Lee,’ Jo said. She put a hand on my arm. ‘We’ve got to come to each case blank, you know that. Empty.’

      I reminded myself to breathe. Martin looked at me and then at Jo, like he was watching a tennis match.

      ‘I don’t know why he decided she was a sex worker. That’s all. Maybe she was known to the police, or him; maybe he was working from the fact that no one ever claimed her, the bus driver’s impression … I don’t know. It might not be important. Anyway, to me it felt like she was trying to tell someone something. She was naked. Did I say that?’

      ‘She committed suicide naked?’

      ‘Bollocks,’ said Jo.

      ‘The report said she was naked as the day she was born except for a necklace,’ said Martin.

      ‘If she was naked, where was her train ticket?’

      ‘All her clothes were folded neatly next to the body. The train ticket was found in bushes less than three metres away.’

      ‘Might not be hers then?’ Jo said.

      ‘It had her fingerprints on it. And they found a bus driver who thought he remembered her getting the bus from the station.’

      ‘Did they check the CCTV?’

      Martin nodded. ‘Nothing.’

      ‘Not a lot to go on,’ I said.

      ‘I looked into the residents. Posh flats, owned by the well-to-do. Rob Hamilton was one of the residents.’

      Even I’ve heard of Rob Hamilton and I don’t watch TV.

      ‘If in doubt, deal,’ said Jo.

      I frowned at her.

      ‘That’s his catchphrase,’ she said.

      ‘And Jimmy McFly lived there too – the celebrity chef. Before he got done for drunk driving.’

      ‘Didn’t he go out with Gabby Fairweather?’ asked Jo. She pointed a finger at me. ‘She left him when he went to prison. Before she met that singer from that boy band.’

      I was totally lost.

      ‘The Wranglers. God, what was his name? Chris somebody.’

      For a radical feminist socialist, Jo is surprisingly well-informed on celebrity culture.

      I turned to Martin. ‘Anyone with any links to the body?’ I said, my voice a little pointed.

      ‘I’ve got the full list here.’ Martin bent to pick his briefcase from the floor, opened it and took out a reporter’s spiral bound notebook.

      I read the neatly written label on the front. Jane Doe; 29 August and the year. I did the maths. Almost seven years ago.

      ‘There were a couple of people of interest. One resident who’d been prosecuted for tax evasion.’ He flicked through the pages of the notebook. ‘There.’ He pointed to a name that had been highlighted. ‘And Blake Jeffries – the whisper was he’d made his money on the club scene … and not just through door entry charges, if you know what I mean.’

      Jo grabbed for the notebook before I could get there and settled herself to read its contents.

      ‘You mean drugs?’ I said.

      ‘According to a source. I looked into it but nothing provable.’

      ‘We’re a missing persons’ bureau,’ I said. I folded my arms. ‘She’s like the opposite of missing. She’s found. I mean, all right, she’s dead, but she’s not—’

      Martin opened his mouth to say something but Jo got there before him. ‘Somewhere she’s missing,’ she said. ‘That’s the thing. These women, they’ve been isolated—’

      ‘What СКАЧАТЬ