Innocent Lies (Reissue) Page 18

  ‘Do you know a boy called Ricky Skeet?’ Mariner asked.

  Pryce was suddenly wary. ‘Is that—?’

  ‘—the boy who we found yesterday afternoon by the reservoir? Yes. He’d been bludgeoned to death. We have the estimated time as sometime on Tuesday afternoon.’ Shaun Pryce looked as if he was about to throw up. ‘Did you know him?’

  Pryce’s voice dropped to a whisper. ‘No.’

  ‘What do you wear when you’re working?’ Mariner asked suddenly.

  ‘What?’

  ‘What do you wear? Your clothes?’

  Pryce splayed his arms. ‘What you see. Jeans, T-shirt, shorts if it’s a hot day.’

  ‘Do you own a brown suit?’

  Pryce sneered. ‘Shit colour, you mean? No thanks.’

  ‘What about overalls?’

  ‘Too restrictive.’

  Glover appeared in the doorway and gave the faintest nod.

  ‘Right,’ said Mariner. ‘That’s all for now. Thanks for your time.’

  ‘What do you mean “for now?”’ said Pryce, uneasily.

  ‘You’ve admitted to being close to the scene of a murder at around the time it was committed. We may have some further questions. Don’t worry, we’ll see ourselves out.’

  As they were leaving, Mariner turned back to Pryce. ‘Where’s the car today?’

  ‘I left it at home. Came on my bike. I do, when I get up early enough. Helps keep me fit.’

  ‘Is that what you did on Tuesday? Were you on your bike then?’

  ‘I might have been,’ said Pryce. ‘I don’t honestly remember.’

  * * *

  Glover and Mariner got reluctantly back into their sweltering car.

  ‘He seems pretty casual,’ Glover observed. ‘He didn’t hesitate about owning up to being at the reservoir on that Tuesday.’

  ‘Which could mean he has nothing to do with this.’ Mariner was disappointed, ‘—or just that he’s good at covering up. He’s an actor after all. As long as he sticks to the timing there’s not much we can do about it. What about his alibi?’

  ‘The other guys are saying that he was back after lunch and then they didn’t knock off until nearly six,’ Glover told him.

  ‘So we may have to accept that Pryce probably wasn’t there when Ricky was killed. If we choose to believe them.’

  ‘The other three have been working on the loft all week while Pryce has been downstairs more or less on his own. Would they even know if he disappeared on his bike for an hour? He could easily get down to the reservoir in that time.’

  ‘I can’t shake off the feeling that he knows something, that there’s something he’s not telling us,’ said Mariner.

  ‘Do you believe the nude sunbathing?’

  ‘It fits with the image.’

  ‘But he denied having a brown suit. Are we going to push him on that?’

  Mariner turned to face Glover. ‘Maybe we’ve seen his suit already, most of it — a light brown suit? It’s this famous all-over tan he keeps bragging about. Wouldn’t have to take that to the dry cleaner’s, would he?’

  CHAPTER 18

  When Mariner got home late that night he realised he still hadn’t contacted his mother. He tried, but the phone just rang on and she had no answering machine or service to catch it. She’d probably got the TV on too loud to hear. He thought about calling one of her neighbours but didn’t want to get anyone out of bed, so he let it go.

  By next morning the analysis of Yasmin’s phone was waiting for Mariner in CID, along with Mike Finlay, the technician who would be able to clarify anything that didn’t make sense. Mariner asked Knox and Millie to sit in on the conversation. Most of the fingerprints on the handset were of the right size to be Yasmin’s and matched with those taken from her room at home. A couple of larger smeared prints were as yet unidentified. ‘But could belong to the parents,’ Finlay said. ‘We’re checking that.’

  A transcript of all her saved messages was attached to Finlay’s report. Mariner had never signed up to the text message culture, continuing to use his own mobile like a traditional telephone, and to his unfamiliar eyes the document read like the Enigma code.

  ‘These are all messages?’ Mariner asked the technician, feeling ignorant.

  ‘It’s been set to a save cycle of about a month,’ Finlay told him. ‘Automatically saving incoming and outgoing messages.’

  ‘So we’ve got everything Yasmin sent and received over the last month?’

  ‘Not quite. Some messages have been deliberately deleted. I’m not surprised either given the content of some of the others.’

  ‘Oh?’

  ‘She didn’t hold back,’ said Finlay, confirming that Yasmin wasn’t quite the innocent they’d first thought her to be. ‘Where we can we’ve linked the numbers to Yasmin’s phone book, so most of the messages, though not all, can be attributed. Messages to and from her parents and sister were easy to identify, especially as there aren’t that many. Some of them also have only an initial or what looks like a nickname to identify them.’

  ‘And the hot ones?’ Tony Knox asked.

  ‘They all appear to be to or from someone known as Lee.’

  Lee. So Amira was right. Yasmin could have been seeing someone after all. The contraceptive pill wasn’t just about trying to be grown up, impressing her friends. She really needed it. But why had none of those girls mentioned Lee?

  ‘The one you’ll be most interested in is this one,’ said Finlay. ‘It’s the last message sent, on Tuesday at around lunchtime: CU @4 things 2 TL U.’

  ‘What does it mean?’ asked Mariner.

  ‘It makes more sense if you read it out loud,’ said Finlay. ‘See you at four. Things to tell you.’

  Something to tell you . . . where had Mariner heard that before? Suddenly he remembered. ‘That’s what she told her friend Suzanne, too. I’d assumed that Lee was the ‘something’. Maybe she was planning on telling him that she was on the pill, so it was all systems go.’

  Finlay nodded sagely. ‘It looks as if Yasmin had arranged to meet this Lee at four o’clock on the day she disappeared. I think you need to speak to him.’

  ‘Do you reckon?’ Knox was straight-faced.

  ‘There’s one other message received after that, in the middle of the afternoon but she’s deleted it,’ said Finlay.

  ‘How can you tell that?’

  ‘It leaves a trace, a bit like the imaging you get on a computer hard drive. Perhaps she deleted it because it was a bit strong for her parents’ eyes.’

  ‘Thanks,’ said Knox. ‘We’ll bear it in mind.’

  ‘Can we be sure from this that Yasmin had her phone right up until Tuesday afternoon?’ Mariner asked.

  ‘Somebody did. The prints would indicate that it was probably her, because those are the clearest. The rest is for you to find out.’

  ‘Thanks,’ said Mariner. ‘That’s been helpful. Okay,’ he said to the other two, when Finlay had left them. ‘At least we now have the boy Yasmin was seeing, and we know it wasn’t Ricky.’

  ‘Unless he was using an alias,’ Millie suggested.

  ‘Let’s not complicate things for the sake of it. We should go and talk to her family about this.’

  ‘I think we’d be better off talking to her friends first, sir,’ Millie suggested. ‘They’re more likely to know who she’s been texting, especially given the content of some of these. It’s not the kind of stuff she’d want to share with her mum and dad.’

  * * *

  On returning to the school Mariner took with him photographs of Akram and Pryce. A cluster of girls were gathered outside the school gates. ‘Isn’t that Suzanne?’ said Millie.

  ‘Yes, let’s get her on her own. She may be more inclined to talk.’

  Millie pulled over to the kerb to let Mariner out of the car.

  ‘Suzanne,’ he called across. ‘Can I have a word?’

  The girl turned and gave her friends a knowing smile before breaking away from them and sas
haying over to Mariner, obviously pleased to have been singled out for special attention. ‘What can I do for you?’ The suggestion in those few words made Mariner’s skin crawl.

  He kept it strictly professional. ‘You’ve probably heard, we’ve found Yasmin’s phone. There are several text messages on it from someone calling himself Lee. Do you know who that might be?

  ‘I might.’ Suzanne shrugged and glanced over at her friends, eliciting a bout of giggling. Another one playing hard to get. Mariner snapped. ‘Suzanne, a boy has been murdered. And not far from where we found his body we also found Yasmin’s phone. You need to tell us everything you know. Loyalty to friends is commendable but it’s not going to help Yasmin. At the very least she may be in serious trouble so we need to find out where she is.’

  His tone seemed, at least, to shock her out of her complacency. ‘Lee is a boy Yasmin knows,’ she pouted. ‘And it’s not really Lee. That’s just his tag.’

  ‘What is his real name?’

  ‘Lewis Everett. He just calls himself Lee.’

  ‘Are you sure about that? Did Yasmin know a boy called Ricky Skeet?’

  ‘Is that the boy who—?’ The veneer of confidence was all but gone now.

  ‘Yes. Did Yasmin know him?’ Mariner asked.

  ‘I don’t think so. I’ve never heard that name before.’

  ‘How well does Yasmin know this Lee?’

  ‘They sort of went out for a while.’

  Finlay had been close to the mark. ‘Why didn’t you tell us about him before?’

  She wrinkled her nose. ‘It’s history. Yaz hasn’t seen him for weeks.’

  Except, thought Mariner, that he was still texting her as recently as the day she disappeared. And Yasmin had recently gone to the doctor’s to go on the pill.

  ‘He goes to the boys’ school up the road,’ Suzanne continued. ‘We met them on a school trip, to London.’ The tickets in Yasmin’s treasure box.

  ‘Them?’

  ‘He’s mates with my boyfriend, Sam. We were all on the same trip. Yaz and Lee started it really. We all went off to see the London Eye, then we couldn’t find our way back to the bus. We got on the wrong underground train. It was wicked. All the teachers were going apeshit because me and Yasmin had gone off with boys. They were worried about what her parents would say.’

  ‘What about your parents?’ asked Mariner.

  ‘Mine don’t give a toss,’ she said. ‘It was Yaz’s they were worried about. Pretty rich coming from them.’

  ‘What do you mean by that?’

  ‘Darrow and Goodway. You should have seen them; they were all over each other. It was disgusting. Mr Goodway’s wife had only left him a couple of weeks before, but she couldn’t keep her hands off him.’

  Was this a further example of teenage fantasy? ‘But surely Mrs Darrow is—’

  ‘Ms actually. She’s divorced.’

  Mariner needed to get her back on track. ‘How did Yasmin’s parents react to what happened on the trip?’

  ‘They never found out. In the end Yaz persuaded them not to tell. She promised that she wouldn’t see Lee again so she had to meet him in secret after school.’

  Mariner was confused. ‘But you said she isn’t seeing him now.’

  ‘She isn’t. It’s over.’

  ‘Who finished it?’

  ‘Lee did.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Yasmin hadn’t got the guts.’

  ‘For what?’

  ‘What do you think? What do any boys want? You’re all the same.’ She looked Mariner up and down with eyes that were experienced beyond her years. ‘Eventually Lee got the message that it wasn’t going anywhere.’

  ‘That Yasmin wouldn’t sleep with him.’

  ‘Yeah. She was “saving herself” for the right man, the one her parents were going to choose for her. Silly cow.’

  ‘When did all this happen?’

  ‘Ages ago.’

  ‘Was Yasmin upset about the split?’

  ‘Yeah. She wanted me to come out in sympathy and finish with Sam, too.’

  ‘And did you?’

  ‘No. It was totally unreasonable.’

  ‘So you’re still seeing Sam?’ asked Mariner.

  ‘Yeah.’ She smiled. ‘He totally rocks.’

  ‘Is that why you and Yasmin haven’t been such good friends lately?’

  ‘We don’t have so much in common any more. Yasmin can be so immature.’

  ‘Do you think Yasmin could be jealous of you and Sam?’ Mariner asked. ‘Did she think she was missing out?’

  ‘It was up to her, wasn’t it? She’d made her choice between her parents and Lee. She chose her parents.’

  He needed to tread carefully here. ‘And do you and Sam have a . . . er?’

  ‘Do you mean sex? Of course we do.’ Treating the question with the disdain it deserved. ‘Sammy’s hot. But I’m not stupid. I’ve been on the pill for months.’

  ‘Did you ever suggest to Yasmin that she should go on the pill?’

  ‘We talked about it, sure, we all know guys don’t like skins, but it was too late for that. Yaz blew it.’

  ‘What would you say if I told you that Yasmin was texting Lee as recently as the day she disappeared,’ said Mariner. ‘And that she’d asked her GP to prescribe the pill?’

  Suzanne’s eyes widened. ‘I’d say fucking good for you, Yaz. She’s finally decided to do it. That must have been what she was going to tell me.’

  ‘That’s what we think, too. But why would Yasmin suddenly change her mind about sleeping with Lee? Has anyone been putting her under pressure?’

  ‘Yaz doesn’t need anyone else to do that. She’s well good at doing it for herself.’

  ‘If Yasmin was going to meet Lee again, where would she have met him?’ asked Mariner.

  Suzanne thought for a moment. ‘When they were going out he sometimes used to meet Yaz from school, or they’d meet down near the station where she gets her train. Lee gets the train home too. He lives in this big posh house in Barnt Green with a pool and everything. There’s a pub down by the station called The Bridge. Yaz used to talk about seeing Lee at The Bridge.’

  . . . Except that Mariner was pretty sure that Yasmin hadn’t meant that bridge. It was beginning to look possible that it was she who had dropped her mobile phone. But was it before or after Ricky had been attacked? And did the two occurrences have anything to do with each other?

  Millie had parked the car and caught up with Mariner outside reception. He reported back on the conversation. ‘So perhaps that’s what it’s all about: Yasmin trying to keep up with her friends. The status of being on the contraceptive pill.’

  ‘Better than the status of being landed with a baby at seventeen,’ said Millie. ‘Like Finlay said; we need to go and talk to Lewis Everett.’

  ‘I’d like to get the official take on what Suzanne told us too. Let’s see if Ms Darrow is around.’

  * * *

  The head teacher was in her office and they were shown in just as Mr Goodway was leaving. Mariner couldn’t help but look at those two in a new light, though it was hard to tell if what Suzanne had said was true. As Ms Darrow herself had said, teenage girls could be prone to overactive imaginations.

  ‘Can you tell us anything about the Year 12 trip to London in the spring?’ Mariner asked, when they were seated.

  ‘Oh. That was months ago,’ said Ms Darrow. ‘Some of the girls went on an art trip to the Tate Modern with some pupils from the boys’ school. Mr Goodway and I took them, along with a teacher from the boys’. We run quite a few joint trips. It cuts down on the expense and also allows the youngsters to mix, which is an important part of their social development.’

  ‘From what I understand, the trip certainly enhanced Yasmin’s social development,’ said Mariner.

  ‘Ah,’ said Ms Darrow. ‘You know about the incident then.’

  ‘We’ve heard one version but would be interested in your account of events.’

 
‘It’s very simple,’ she said, making light of it. ‘When the time came to leave, all the children were accounted for except Yasmin and Suzanne, and two of the boys. They eventually turned up at the coach almost two hours late. People were beginning to get worried.’

  ‘Where had they been?’

  ‘Sightseeing.’ She shrugged. ‘It was all perfectly innocent. They simply got lost and had to get the tube back to the meeting place. London’s a big place, Inspector. I wouldn’t be taken in by any embroidery that might have been added.’

  ‘Did you tell Yasmin’s parents about what happened?’

  The smile went and the defences came down. ‘We didn’t think it necessary.’

  ‘Because you knew how they would react.’

  ‘We didn’t want to jeopardise Yasmin’s education because of one foolish episode.’

  ‘Or jeopardise the generous donations Yasmin’s father was making to the school.’

  ‘That’s a very cynical view, Inspector. The truth is that it was just one of these little crushes girls have: completely normal and harmless, and over before it had begun. It had run its course so there seemed no need to rock the boat.’

  ‘It wasn’t quite over though, was it?’ said Mariner.

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Yasmin was still in contact with the boy in question, Lee, up until last Tuesday. And she had begun taking the contraceptive pill. Her father found all this out shortly before Yasmin disappeared. I wonder how he would feel if he knew that you are responsible for introducing Yasmin to her lover and then allowing things to “run their course?”’

  Under her makeup Ms Darrow seemed to lose some of her colour.

  ‘Thank you, that’s been helpful,’ said Mariner. ‘We will naturally have to discuss this with Yasmin’s parents. You may want to prepare for the fallout.’

  Subdued by these revelations, Ms Darrow showed them out into reception again, where Mariner’s attention was caught anew by the body art sketches. This time though they triggered a recent memory. He’d seen some of those designs somewhere else, only yesterday afternoon.

  Digging it from his inside pocket he thrust the picture of Shaun Pryce in front of Ms Darrow. ‘Has this young man been here, to the school?’

  ‘Sorry?’ She was still distracted. ‘Oh, yes, he’s an actor, or so he says. He came and did some modelling for us about a year ago. We try and include life portraits in the art syllabus where we can. It was a mistake though, really.’