DS Talith was awkward, fumbling with his words. She sensed his embarrassment even over the phone line. ‘I know this isn’t your case, Mrs Gunn.’ He was hesitant. ‘I’m hoping DI Randall won’t be on gardening leave for too long.Just until we’ve sorted all this out to everyone’s satisfaction,’ he added quickly. ‘I expect he’ll have a lot to do anyway, organizing the funeral and such.’
Her ears pricked up. A funeral? That must mean that David Steadman would soon release the body for burial. Or cremation. So he had made up his mind. She needed to speak to him.
She couldn’t resist prompting the DS. ‘Doctor Sullivan intimated he had unearthed something at Mrs Randall’s post-mortem?’
Talith’s response was typically stolid. ‘We haven’t heard back from him. Not yet. At least not the full report. We’re still waiting but we’re not really investigating DI Randall. There’s no hint he’s done anything wrong.’ And now she felt a traitor. Talith sounded a hundred per cent certain. There was no doubt in his mind, only in hers.
Which was almost a relief, but she was still picking up some doubt.
She couldn’t resist pumping him. ‘It looks like an accident?’
‘Well, no. Not as I understand it. Not exactly anyway. I don’t think that’s what Doctor Sullivan was saying.’
So what then?
‘So …?’ She waited for him to fill in the detail.
But he didn’t. ‘I can’t really say,’ Talith continued even more awkwardly. She sensed he was being selective, deciding what she would want to know and what to hold back – for now. And he was confused, uncertain what to say – and what to leave out.
With the result that his next words came out in a rush. ‘I’ll let you know when we get the full report if you’d like.’
‘Well, thanks for that,’ she said drily. At least, she added silently, Alex is free. Back home, not incarcerated.
But Talith had another reason for ringing. He pinned her down to her proper role. ‘And the two suicides, Mrs Gunn? Are you any nearer completing your investigation?’
‘I’m still gathering evidence,’ she said curtly, and made the decision to keep mum for the moment – or at least until she had spoken to a few more people, one of them Sullivan. But she was getting there. She knew it, inching nearer, and with every move she coloured in a little more of the picture. ‘I think I’m beginning to understand a little more about Patrick Elson. He was victimized.’ For now she left out the photographs, the fact that the boy’s mother had hidden them from the police only to reveal them to her. ‘I have yet to know by whom, Sergeant Talith. But the answer to Gina Marconi’s death is, I sense, a little more involved.’
‘Oh,’ he said, and seemed to wait for the silence to be filled. It wasn’t.
It was she who brought the awkward telephone conversation to an end, keeping it formal. ‘Thank you, Sergeant Talith. I appreciate your ringing.’ She decided to take one small step forward. Step out into the open. ‘And thank you for letting me know about DI Randall. I consider him both a colleague and a friend.’
There was something like relief in Talith’s response. She heard the release of the breath he’d been holding. ‘Yes, of course, Mrs Gunn.’ Followed by, ‘I’ll keep you informed.’