Within days of their encounter, Phillipa made good on her promise and sent Leanne the seating plan, or at least she forwarded the information someone else had produced. Leanne had opened the spreadsheet in the office, expecting to find a nice graphic of the theatre’s layout. What she had actually been given was a table of information presented in rows and columns – a simple list of names and seat references. That was it.
It would take time to create a clear picture of who was sitting where, and Leanne couldn’t do that in Mal’s line of sight. He tolerated her continuing investigation, but only just, and the less he knew the better. She accepted all the assignments he could throw at her, which meant she didn’t have a chance to look at Phillipa’s information until her day off on Sunday.
Needing space, she relocated to the café and commandeered a large table. She used two cruet sets to pin down a blown-up graphic of the theatre’s layout, and set about transposing names from the printed spreadsheet.
‘Where do you want me to put this?’ Dianne asked when she appeared with a mug of coffee and a plate of toast.
‘Over there’s fine,’ Leanne said, pointing to the upper left corner of the plan. It didn’t matter if the plate covered seats in the circle, she was only interested in the stalls.
Breathing in the heady scent of dark, roasted coffee, Leanne returned to her spreadsheet, and it took a moment to realise Dianne hadn’t left. Leanne followed her gaze. Joe was heading towards them, edging nervously through the busy café.
‘Do you want me to hang around?’ Dianne asked.
‘It’s OK, I invited him.’
Dianne had never come out and told Leanne she thought it was wrong to keep Joe at arm’s length, but the relief was written all over her rosy cheeks. ‘He’s a good lad.’
‘I know.’
Joe couldn’t get past Dianne without being enveloped in a hug, and the blush was still spreading up his neck and face as he pulled out a chair and sat down opposite Leanne.
‘You look in better shape than you did last week,’ he said, handing over the spare keys he had borrowed.
Leanne eyed him carefully. She was no longer sure if Joe’s flush was embarrassment after all. ‘Is this a bad idea? I forgot about you not liking crowds.’
‘This I can manage.’
Leanne remained unconvinced. Joe wasn’t the man she remembered from a year ago. His broad shoulders had narrowed and he had acquired a frailty that hadn’t registered when she had been too drunk, or too angry to notice. ‘You should eat more. Here, have some toast.’
‘I can’t say I’m hungry,’ he replied, ignoring the plate she had pushed towards him.
‘Are you sure you’re OK?’
‘I’m feeling better than I did last week too,’ he admitted. ‘I needed to take positive action, and speaking to you has been top of my list for a long while. It feels good to have ticked it off.’
‘I’m sorry it took so long,’ she said, bowing her head and making a silent apology to her absent friend for not doing better.
When she looked up, Joe was scrutinising the diagram on the table. So far she had written down the names of all the victims, including Angela Morris and Lena Kowalski. Joe slid a hand across the paper until his fingertip touched another name scrawled in red across two seats. Lois. ‘Is this your way of coping?’
‘I suppose it is,’ Leanne replied. ‘But it’s not about Lois.’
‘Then who?’
‘What did I tell you about Claudia Rothwell the other night?’ asked Leanne. She hadn’t been so drunk that she didn’t remember their last conversation, but it was hazy around the edges.
‘Not much more than I’ve read in the paper. And the fact she has a penchant for corporate merchandise,’ he said with a smile.
‘I saw Amelia the other day, and I think she recognised the Ronson Construction logo. It should all fit. Claudia was involved with the project, so she might have had one, but I can’t see why she would hang on to a crappy key ring when she’s become accustomed to the finer things.’
‘She wasn’t born with a silver spoon in her mouth though, was she?’ Joe remarked. ‘She went to Sedgefield High like the rest of us.’
Leanne’s jaw dropped. ‘Did you know her?’
‘Not really, she was a year above me. It was one of my mates who recognised her. I don’t think I would have made the connection otherwise.’
Leanne recalled the brief conversation she had had with another of Claudia’s school friends. At the time, she had thought Kim was the one with the issues, but maybe it was the other way around. ‘Can you do me a favour? Ask around and see if there’s a story to tell.’
‘Like?’
‘I don’t know. Let’s just say I have some misgivings about what I’ve written.’ She picked up her phone. She would let Joe decide for himself. ‘Here, take a look at this and tell me what you see.’
While Joe watched Frankie’s video, Dianne appeared with a second coffee for the new arrival. Her eyes were glassy as she gave Leanne a wink before leaving.
‘Well?’ Leanne asked after Joe returned her phone.
He picked up his drink and held it an inch from his mouth. Steam billowed in front of his face. ‘She didn’t know about the torch, did she?’
‘It could have been the trauma. Selective memory,’ suggested Leanne, playing devil’s advocate.
‘But you would expect her to know if she’d ever owned a key ring like that.’ He put down his mug and saw things more clearly. ‘You think she’s lying?’
‘When I interviewed Rex – he’s the bloke who carried Amelia out of the theatre – he described someone with bloodied hands and torn fingernails. He was quite graphic about it, and yet the paramedic who treated Claudia says she didn’t have a scratch on her. Even her husband says she lost a couple of false nails, but that was it.’
‘Which means someone else saved Amelia, and Claudia just came along and took the credit. Jesus,’ he said, with a mixture of disbelief and disgust.
‘It would explain why she was so adamant about not meeting Amelia. We had to set up the reunion as a surprise, and now I wish we hadn’t.’
Joe sat back in his seat and looked around the busy café. ‘It’s sickening how much we’ve been hailing her as a hero. I take it you’re writing a piece to expose her?’
‘Oh, I’d love to, but if I’m going to take down Claudia, I need irrefutable proof. Unfortunately, Rex isn’t a reliable witness, and I’m going to have to find someone else who is.’
‘Will this help?’ Joe asked, returning his gaze to the seating plan.
‘Maybe. That’s why I asked you over. I need a second pair of eyes.’
While Leanne explained what she needed, Joe repositioned himself next to her so they could work together transferring the information to the seating plan. By the time Leanne had crossed off the final entry on the spreadsheet, their coffee cups were empty and the plate of toast no more than a puddle of melted butter and a sprinkling of crumbs.
‘Are you two ready for a refill?’ Dianne asked as she cleared the table.
Leanne was surprised to see that they were the only customers left. She turned to Joe. ‘Are you staying?’
‘I’ll have another cup if you’re having one.’
‘Two more coffees, please, Di,’ said Leanne.
When they returned their concentration to the seating plan, Joe asked, ‘What next?’
‘Good question.’
They had been working methodically, and Leanne had avoided getting sidetracked by the emerging picture until the job was done. ‘I need to see who was sitting close to Amelia Parker,’ she said, searching the names that Joe had written down while she called out the seat references. ‘Where is she?’
Joe pointed to the left-hand side of the plan. ‘Row F, seats 9 and 10.’
Leanne examined the other names in that row and was surprised to find Rex Russell’s. It was interesting, but added nothing to her current lines of inquiry. ‘Where’s Claudia?’
‘Row I, seats 8 and 9,’ Joe replied, moving his finger three rows back. She had been sitting almost directly behind Amelia.
‘Shit, it looks like this proves Claudia could have seen—’ Leanne stopped. She had been distracted by another of Joe’s annotations scribbled across the solitary aisle seat next to Claudia’s. ‘What does that say?’
‘C Brody,’ he said, squinting at his own handwriting.
‘Oh, my God, it’s Carole Brody,’ Leanne said. ‘I’ve interviewed her. She went alone because her daughter was heavily pregnant. But, she told me she was in the middle of the auditorium, not on the left.’
Joe shrugged. ‘I suppose she was in one of the middle rows.’
‘She talked about helping a woman who had become hysterical,’ Leanne said. Her eyes widened. ‘It was someone she had been sitting next to.’
‘You think the woman was Claudia?’
Oh, please, God, let it be Claudia, Leanne thought, but her nose wrinkled. ‘Carole said she hadn’t seen Claudia. I suppose it’s possible she was too traumatised to connect the woman she helped to the slick photos of Claudia in the press.’ She rubbed her temples with the tips of her fingers. ‘Damn, even if it was her, I have another witness who saw Claudia go back inside anyway. It doesn’t prove she didn’t save Amelia. This is the problem. There was so much confusion that it’s given Claudia the opportunity to make up what she likes. I practically gifted her the story that set her up as the town’s hero.’
‘There was chaos everywhere,’ Joe agreed. ‘It wasn’t as bad around the side of the theatre, but there was a crowd milling around the fire doors.’
‘You were there? Could you have seen Claudia, or Carole maybe?’ asked Leanne. She grabbed her phone and found an image of Carole on the Courier’s website.
Joe shook his head. ‘It was like sensory overload. My mind registered only what I needed to see to reach my goal, and that was getting back to Lois.’ He closed his eyes as if that would help. ‘I ran around to the side hoping I could get back in. It was possible. Declan Gallagher obviously managed it, but a policeman stopped me. I did try, Leanne, but I couldn’t get to her. I often wonder if it would have made a difference …’
For a brief time, they had been able to concentrate on something other than the loss they shared, but it would always come back to Lois. Losing her had almost broken them, but they were holding on. Leanne could forgive Joe because he had done nothing wrong. One day she hoped to forgive herself too, but that didn’t mean she was ready to stop fighting. Not every injustice had to be accepted.