DS Madeline Shaw
Tuesday 19th February
She is drifting between wake and sleep when there’s a hammering noise, loud and relentless. It jolts her awake, and she starts, reaching out a hand to grab her phone. It’s nearly one a.m. Sleep is elusive at the best of times, but she could do without someone at the front door in the middle of the night.
Madeline takes the stairs two at a time, reaching the door just as the knocking starts up again. She hears a voice: female, crying. Quickly, she yanks the door open.
Rachel Edwards stumbles forwards into the little hallway, her face a mess. Tears are streaking down her cheeks and her hair looks matted, as though she has been running her hands through it over and over again. She’s wearing what looks like a dressing gown underneath a dark purple jacket, its buttons all done up wrong.
Quickly, Madeline steps outside to see if there’s anyone behind her, but the street looks deserted, the street lamps glowing eerily in the light, casting white moon shapes onto the empty pavement. She looks from side to side. The nearest house is owned by the Bishops, a young couple with a four-month-old baby who moved in just before Clare died. They’re probably biding their time until the little one is old enough before moving again. The town can’t have made a great first impression on them, can it? On the other side of Madeline live Donna Phillips and her family: she’s a PTA member, friends with Sandra Davies, Jane Goodwin, Tricia Jenkins and that lot. She doesn’t want anyone seeing Rachel standing outside her door like this, it’ll be round the town in no time, so she makes a split decision: she closes the door behind them both.
Still sobbing a little, Rachel goes ahead of her, walks shakily over to the sofa as Madeline guides her into the house.
Quickly, she runs into the kitchen and fills Rachel a glass of water, places it down on the coffee table in front of her.
‘Are you alright, Mrs Edwards?’ Madeline sits down beside her. It is odd having her here, in her personal space; she ought perhaps to take her to the station, but she senses the other woman is in no fit state to be carted to Chelmsford at this time of night.
‘I can’t sleep for thinking about it,’ Rachel says suddenly, her voice bursting out into the room, louder than Madeline has heard her speak before.
‘For thinking about what?’ she prompts, hoping that this isn’t just a night of insomnia, that this is something more, that this might even be the breakthrough they so desperately need.
Rachel starts pulling at the skin around her fingernails, tearing little white strips of skin away from the bone. Madeline wants to reach out a hand, tell her to stop it, but instead she forces herself to wait. Rachel has come here to say something. If pushed, she might lose her nerve.
‘Rachel, if there’s anything you want to tell me about the night Clare died, please, you’re doing the right thing by coming here,’ Madeline says at last. The other woman doesn’t look at her. She’s afraid. Instead, she hangs her head so that her chin rests against the top of her coat, her hair dangling down with a strange slithering sound as it brushes the material.
‘I shouldn’t be here,’ she whispers, but Madeline shakes her head, feels a sudden desperation grip her. She’s so close to speaking.
‘Is this about Clare?’ Madeline says carefully, watching Rachel closely. Rachel nods her head, straight up and down, like a puppet on a string. Whose string, Madeline wonders.
‘Does this have anything to do with your husband, Mrs Edwards?’ Madeline asks, and at the mention of him she breaks down again, the sobs echoing through the tiny room. Reaching inside the pocket of her coat, she slowly draws out an object – and when Madeline sees what she’s holding, it is clear why she was so afraid to come.
It’s Clare’s mobile phone. An iPhone 6, clad in gold casing, one of the corners slightly dented. They had the parents describe it over and over in the station, did everything they could to try to track the device’s last known movements. But it all stopped dead in Sorrow’s Meadow.
She’s still gripping the phone tightly, as if she doesn’t want to let it go, as if she knows that when she does, there won’t be any going back. Madeline is watching her fingers clutch the hard plastic and her mind is racing with possibilities, combing back through everything in the last fortnight: the false starts, the endless interviews, Clare’s blonde hair fanned out against the dark, muddy ground. There were reports of an argument that morning. An argument between Clare and her mother. Rachel felt guilty, she said that herself on tape. Guilty for being cross with her daughter, for chastising her about her exams.
What, then, is Rachel guilty of now?
‘I found it in his things,’ Rachel says. Her whole body is shaking slightly.
‘Whose things?’ Madeline’s voice is careful, but Rachel just shakes her head, presses a hand to her mouth.
‘You found Clare’s mobile in Ian’s belongings?’ the policewoman asks, wanting to be crystal clear, and Rachel nods, looks up to meet the other woman’s eyes for the first time. Madeline can see how much this is costing her, this admission, can sense the guilt she feels in coming here, the sense of betrayal.
‘Rachel, I’m going to need to ask you to come down to the station to make a statement,’ Madeline says gently. Rachel isn’t going to want to, but if what she’s suggesting is true, it is far too serious to be alleged in this cramped little house.
She begins to shake her head, her body tense.
‘He didn’t do it,’ she whispers, ‘he can’t have done. He loved her.’
Her hands go to her mouth, as though she wants to press the words back inside her.
‘When did you find the phone, Rachel?’ Madeline asks, and she lets out a little moan.
‘Mrs Edwards, you do need to comply with my questions,’ the policewoman tells her firmly. ‘Concealing evidence is a chargeable offence, as I think you might already be aware of.’
Rachel sits up straighter, takes a deep breath. Madeline can see the resolve in her tighten at her words.
‘I found it a couple of hours ago,’ she says. One of her fists is clenching the sofa cushion, her fingers twisting around the patterned material. ‘I was looking for my phone charger, we share a little battery pack one that we take if we go out.’ She takes a deep, shuddery breath. ‘Things have been weird between us since Saturday – we came back from the Valentine’s fair and it – it was horrible, being around everyone, we shouldn’t have gone. We haven’t talked properly since – I don’t know, it feels like there’s this big gap between us.’ She looks at Madeline, almost pleadingly.
‘So this evening, Ian suggested we went out for a drive, anywhere, just anywhere away from here, so that we could talk in the car. We’ve always talked on long drives, you know, something about being in that small space together…’ Her voice breaks, and Madeline thinks briefly about how terrible it must be for her, trapped in Ashdon, surrounded by the memories of her daughter. ‘So I looked for the battery pack,’ Rachel continues shakily. ‘I always want to keep my phone charged in case – in case there’s any news.’ She looks at Madeline. ‘I’m frightened of not being contactable. Ever since Clare.’
‘Go on.’
‘I was looking in his backpack,’ she says, ‘the one he always carries. I wasn’t expecting to find anything, like I said I was just looking for the charger, but I felt the shape of the phone and pulled it out, thinking he’d forgotten his. We all have the same one – had the same one.’ She runs her fingers over the gold casing of Clare’s phone, as though it’s her daughter’s hand.
‘I’ve been going crazy, I couldn’t bring myself to ask him, I just took the phone and hid it in my handbag. Went out for the drive. I tried to work up the courage to ask him about it while we were out but I just – I couldn’t. I’ve been trying to think of a reason, an explanation, but I know she had her phone with her that day because she texted me from it, and Ian was at work. The only way it could be in his bag is if, if…’
Her voice tails off and Madeline steadily gets to her feet, goes to a drawer in the kitchen and pulls out a spare carrier bag, which she places over her right hand. Returning to Rachel, she reaches out a hand, open-palmed, the bag covering her skin. As Rachel places the phone inside it, something seems to change within the small room – a heightening of nerves, a charge.
‘I charged it up just now,’ Rachel says, ‘looked through the messages. The code is her birthday.’ She shakes her head, as though in disbelief. ‘I didn’t even know she had a boyfriend,’ she whispers. ‘What kind of mother am I, Madeline? What kind of person doesn’t know their own daughter?’
The DCI is ecstatic, even when Madeline rings him at two a.m. and tells him to meet her at the station. Using Clare’s code, they unlock the phone, and find it all – the messages from Owen, the calls and texts, intense and often, pages and pages worth.
The texts fly between them on the day of the murder, but the last exchange makes Madeline’s breath catch in her throat.
You know I said I had a surprise for you?
I like surprises.
You’ll love this one. I’m on my way over now. See you soon. I love you.
Call me when you’re outside. Xxx
A surprise for him – she’s hinted at it all day but never says what it is. Rachel shakes her head when they ask if she knows what it is.
‘We never even knew,’ she said. ‘Why would she keep that a secret, Madeline? Why wouldn’t she tell me? I’m her mother.’
‘That’s something we’re hoping to find out,’ Madeline says, and she accompanies Rachel back to her house to collect Ian’s backpack, give her the opportunity to shower and change while Ian is safely on the early train into London. Back to his business, Madeline thinks.
They searched the house directly after Clare was found, but there was nothing. No phone. The SIM card and battery are now intact, but there hasn’t been a reading for it since the night Clare died. Not until tonight, when Rachel charged it up.
‘It’s possible he’s been keeping it on his person, or at work,’ the DCI says. ‘Got sloppy, now that a bit of time’s passed. Thought he was in the clear. It showed up on the system a few hours ago, look, must’ve been when she turned it on. Bloody Ben says he was asleep.’
‘Why would he put the SIM back in?’ Madeline asks. Ian must’ve disconnected the SIM in order for it not to show up on the masts. But from what Rachel says, the phone was complete in his bag. Dead, but not taken apart.
The DCI goes through everything again with Rachel down at the station, recording the whole thing on tape. She looks better now she’s out of her dressing gown but anyone can see she’s terrified – her still-beautiful face is white under the harsh station lights and she’s biting her lips, shredding the skin with her teeth. The station smells as it always does, of stale coffee and body spray. Too many officers without time to go home and shower.
‘I’m going to walk you through what’s going to happen next, Mrs Edwards,’ Rob tells her after she’s told him everything, and she nods quickly, clearly hanging on his every word.
‘We will be bringing your husband back into the station, in light of the new information you have given us. He will be further questioned, in the hope that, for his sake, he can explain his reasons for possessing and concealing your daughter’s mobile phone. If your husband cannot produce a reasonable explanation for this, we may need to arrest him, and if further evidence comes to light, he will then be formally charged.’
A pause. She’s looking down now, at the table top, her eyes hooded. Exhaustion is writ large on her features. She looks so fragile. So alone.
‘Have you ever worried about your husband harming your daughter before, prior to this incident, Mrs Edwards?’ Rob asks, and she blanches, flicks her eyes up at us again.
‘They— they argued, sometimes,’ she says, her voice little more than a whisper, ‘but I don’t know, I don’t think I’m a very good judge. I misread people. I know I do.’
Madeline frowns. ‘What do you mean by that, Rachel?’
She can see Rachel’s pulse beating in her neck, the fragility of her throat as she swallows.
‘I just mean – I don’t trust myself,’ she says, and when she looks up again, her blue eyes are filled with salty tears. Madeline can feel Rob’s impatience beside her; he won’t like this, he’ll just want the facts. Carefully, she stands, fetches Rachel a tissue from the box they keep on the cabinet in the corner.
‘Sorry,’ she says, ‘it’s all just been so much to take in.’
‘Of course it has,’ Rob says, nodding while she dabs the tissue to her eyes, blows her nose, the sound too loud in the small interview room.
‘These arguments,’ he says, ‘were they about anything specific? Did you notice an increase in tensions between them in the run-up to February the fourth?’
‘Your husband told us there’d been an argument the day before Clare died, Mrs Edwards,’ Madeline says bluntly, and she blanches.
‘Yes,’ she says, ‘yes, but it was just about exams. We were too hard on her, I know we were.’ She puts a hand to her forehead, as though tending a sick child. ‘Sorry, I’m trying to think, to remember – they argued a bit about silly things, mostly, her school work, how often she saw her friends. He wanted her to do well – well, we both did. I think it’s partly the army training, you know, he’s very big on discipline. But I never saw him – I never saw him hurt her. He wasn’t like that, I never thought he had a violent bone in his body.’
Rob nods. ‘And prior to you finding your daughter’s phone in his belongings, you had no reason to suspect your husband of involvement in Clare’s death? There was nothing that you noticed – any strange behaviour, perhaps, any feelings of guilt?’
Rachel seems to struggle with this, balling the crumpled tissue up in one hand, her fingers tightening into a fist. ‘I don’t know,’ she says. ‘I didn’t think so, but yes, we both felt guilty. I still do.’ She presses her lips together, as though keeping her words in check. ‘I feel guilty for everything – waiting too long to call the police on the night it happened. For being too strict with her about her exams. For every single argument, every cross word. Every time I let her out of my sight. Every time she lied to me about Owen – why couldn’t she just tell me? Was I really such a terrible mother?’
‘You’re not a terrible mother, Rachel,’ Madeline says. At this, Rachel buries her head in her hands, her voice muffled.
‘I am,’ she says, the words indistinct, ‘I am a terrible mother, detective. You don’t know.’
A loud sob escapes her and Madeline brings the whole box of tissues over to the table. Rachel’s hand shakes as she lifts her head and plucks another from the box, takes a deep breath as if trying to pull herself together.
‘But in terms of thinking he was involved – no, I never thought that, I never would have believed it of him.’ A pause. ‘But like I say – I don’t trust myself, detectives. That’s why I had to tell you. I had to let you know.’
Her hands clasp and unclasp on the table.
‘You have been very helpful in this investigation, Mrs Edwards,’ Rob says, attempting a smile. ‘I am aware that this new information has been a great shock to you, but our job is to protect you and rest assured, you will be protected from your husband.’
At this, a strange flicker crosses her face, there for a second, then gone. When she looks at Rachel Edwards, Madeline can’t help but get the sense that there is something she’s not telling them, some piece of the jigsaw that hasn’t yet fallen into place. I am a terrible mother, detective. You don’t know. What makes her so convinced?
‘I’m frightened, detectives,’ she says suddenly, as though trying to push the attention back onto Ian, ‘I’m frightened of what he might do.’
‘We need more.’
The DCI slams his hand down on the table. Lorna’s out the front with Rachel Edwards, arranging somewhere for her to go for the rest of the day. The best thing for the police would be if she went home, listened up to see if Ian confessed to anything, but they would be putting her in danger, and on top of that, they can’t trust her. Madeline has seen it before – couples helping each other out, right at the last minute, just when you think they’ll do the right thing. That’s the thing about making mistakes early on in your career – you’ll do anything you can to avoid making them twice.
‘The CPS will need more to charge,’ Rob says, running a hand through his hair. ‘A witness, a weapon – anything. We’re so close.’ He starts muttering to himself under his breath.
‘We agreed that the perpetrator may not have had a weapon,’ Madeline reminds him. The wound on the back of Clare’s head looked as though it could have been inflicted by someone slamming her into the ground, into the base of the tree stump where she was discovered. Christina confirmed it. The DCI ignores Madeline.
She hovers, then when the DCI still doesn’t reply, Madeline goes back out into the station, her head throbbing, feeling in her pockets for change for the vending machine in reception. Rachel’s words are still thrumming through her head. Is it just the guilt of a mother who’s lost a child? Or could it be more than that? Frustration eats at her. They are close, she can feel it.
Madeline is about to select a Twix when she sees him. Nathan Warren, standing just outside the glassy front doors, his hands in the pockets of his trousers, no coat even though it’s cold out today. For a moment, he is frozen behind the glass, standing totally still, and the next thing she knows he is inside, three feet away from her. He is paused, alert as though he is about to say something, but something is holding him back.
‘Nathan?’
It is all the prompt he needs. At once, he is speaking so fast that she cannot properly understand what he’s saying, but she hears the word ‘Clare’ and her heart starts to race.
‘Nathan, whoa, whoa, slow down, will you. Slow down.’
The officer on the front desk opens his mouth, about to speak, but she holds up a hand.
‘It’s alright,’ she says, ‘I’ll handle this.’
Nathan’s brown eyes are staring at her, and she puts a hand on his arm, leads him carefully through the double doors into the station. He keeps glancing back over his shoulder, as if he’s worried someone will come after him, as if he’s not alone.
‘Lorna!’ Madeline calls out as they enter the briefing room. ‘Get Rob for me, will you? Something’s come up.’