There was an awkward pause after the DCI left the room, the family obviously noting the tension his abrupt departure had created. Maggie punctured the uncomfortable silence by asking if they minded her taking notes as they chatted.
‘This isn’t a formal interview,’ she said. ‘All I want to do at this stage is establish a timeline of Jade’s movements.’ She neglected to add that Jasso had refused to extend their brief beyond that; he was insistent the British police did no more than the very basics, presumably so it didn’t appear as though they were taking charge.
‘Like retracing her steps?’ asked Mason. His voice was reedy and hesitant and at odds with his masculinity. It was evident he put significant time and effort into maintaining his physique: his biceps were thicker than Maggie’s thighs, the veins popping along them like electrical wires snaking down a wall.
‘Exactly that,’ she said, giving him a reassuring smile. ‘So, let’s start at the beginning: when did you fly out to Majorca?’
For the next twenty minutes Jade’s parents gave Maggie chapter and verse on their holiday so far: how they’d set off at four a.m. from their home in Barnet to catch an early flight from Southend airport because it was the cheapest deal to Palma; how a hen party group on the flight had annoyed everyone with their lairy drinking games; how the car-hire concession at Palma airport had upgraded them to a bigger vehicle; how well Clive had taken to driving on the right; and so on. Both were entertaining talkers, furnishing their anecdotes with throwaway lines that made Maggie smile, and she could see that talking about their trip was doing a good job of distracting them from worrying about their daughter, but it didn’t make her job easier. She needed to elicit details that were pertinent to the search for Jade and trying to get Mandy and Clive to focus on facts was a bit like trying to prise open a walnut with a pair of eyebrow tweezers.
Nor did it help that the heat was making them all listless. It seemed another reason the manager had been happy to let them use the suite was because the air con was broken and it couldn’t be let to paying guests. The balcony doors were open and every now and then a gentle breeze lifted the bottom of the delicate voile curtains pulled across them, but for the most part it was baking hot inside.
After a few more minutes, Maggie proposed they take a break.
‘Why don’t I call down to reception and see if that nice manager will bring us some drinks?’ suggested Mandy.
‘And some grub,’ said Clive, reaching for the room service menu.
While Maggie was declining their entreaties that she should order some food too ‘because you may as well while it’s free’, Mason quietly rose from the sofa and slipped outside onto the balcony. Maggie left the parents to their ordering and went after him. She found him leaning against the metal railings, staring down at the walkway below.
‘How are you holding up?’ she asked.
The muscle in his cheek twitched as he ground his teeth together to stop himself from crying.
‘I just need to know she’s okay,’ he eventually managed to say.
‘I understand, I’d be feeling the same. But everything is being done to find her.’ Maggie paused then, realizing that while at home she could say that with confidence, because she knew the protocol for a missing person’s search in the UK, here it might be different.
‘You didn’t say much when I was asking about Jade’s movements since you arrived in Saros. Is there anything you want to add, that her parents might have missed?’
His jaw clenched again.
‘Mason? Is there anything you want to tell me?’
He shook his head, his reluctance weighing heavy on his face. Maggie couldn’t let it slide though.
‘Even if you think it might not be that important, it’s still worth telling me,’ she said. ‘Just in case.’
‘It’s not just to do with Jade though. It was something that happened with both of us.’
‘Since you got here?’
‘Yeah. It was on our fourth night here, when we were out having a drink.’
Maggie did a quick calculation. ‘You mean last Tuesday?’
He nodded. ‘We’d all been out for dinner, then me and Jade decided to go for a drink on our own. It was still really warm, even though it was gone midnight, so we sat at a table outside this bar. That’s when we saw this bloke.’
Maggie stilled. ‘Go on.’
‘There was another bar across the street and he was sat out the front, really knocking them back. He must’ve had about three pints in an hour. Jade finds it funny to make up stories about what strangers are up to – she likes to pretend they’re spies and stuff – so we were coming up with all these mad reasons for why he’d hit the booze. He couldn’t hear us,’ Mason added hastily, ‘so we weren’t being rude. Anyhow, at one point Jade goes off to the toilet and then he comes over to me and starts saying stuff.’
‘Such as?’
‘That I should take care of Jade, because a girl like her was special. I laughed it off at first, thinking he was pissed but harmless, but then he started getting a bit ranty, if you know what I mean, saying I should take him seriously because jealousy makes people do nasty things and I wouldn’t want anything nasty to happen to her.’
‘He knew her name?’ asked Maggie, scribbling fast in her notebook to keep up.
‘No. He kept calling her the blushing bride-to-be. He must’ve clocked her engagement ring.’
‘How did the conversation end?’
‘That was the weird bit. I thought he was leaning over to nick my drink, but instead he puts something on the table next to my glass and tells me I might need it. I thought he was being a bit muggy when I saw what it was, like he was saying my breath was rank or something, so I told him to fuck off or else, and he went after that.’
‘What did he give you?’
‘A piece of chewing gum.’
‘Gum?’
‘Yeah. Like the stick kind, wrapped in paper. Cinnamon flavoured.’
‘Did you see where he went after?’
‘No, Jade came back then and I forgot all about it.’ He gave Maggie a searching look. ‘Do you think it’s important?’
‘I don’t know. Do you think you’d recognize him again?’
‘Maybe. He might’ve gone home by now though.’
Maggie frowned. ‘What makes you say that?’
‘He sounded British, like us.’