Ann Cleeves: Too Good to Be True

Perez nodded. ‘Do you know why Sarah King took against Anna Blackwell so strongly?’

‘No,’ Maggie said. ‘That was a complete mystery. Sarah is a parent governor and she’s always worked hard for the school. She helped me interview for the new teacher’s post and Anna Blackwell was her choice as well as mine. We knew that Anna was new to the career, but we decided her great ideas made up for that. We thought she’d bring something fresh to the school.’

‘It must have been rather a shock, then, when Mrs King turned up with a petition demanding that Anna should leave.’

‘It was a nightmare! And honestly I couldn’t see what the parents had to complain about. Anna was a good young teacher. But she took it to heart. All the bitching started making her ill. In the end I could see she was stressed and suggested she went to the doctor. That was when she started taking the antidepressants.’

‘Was she still working in the school when she died, or had she taken time off sick?’ Perez asked.

‘She’d had nearly two months off, but she was back at the time she died. She seemed better, still a bit frail but almost happy.’

Perez thought this tied in with the flowers in the living room and the hopeful tone of the note he’d found on the dressing table. He stood up to leave. ‘Do you think Anna Blackwell committed suicide?’

Maggie answered straightaway. ‘Not in a thousand years. She adored her daughter. There was no way she would have killed herself and left Lucy without a mother.’

‘Did she ever tell you who the father was?’

Maggie shook her head. ‘I never asked and she never told me. It was Anna’s big secret. I’ve never felt the need to pry into the affairs of my staff.’

When Perez walked out into the playground, it was almost dark and the children had stopped singing. He turned to look back at the school and saw the head teacher staring out at him.

Jimmy Perez was hungry. It seemed a long time since he’d eaten the soup in Gail’s farmhouse and he decided to have an early dinner. He made his way back to the hotel along the silent village streets. It was impossible to believe that anything sinister could happen in a place that was as quiet and ordinary as Stonebridge.

As he walked into the hotel, Perez saw three people – two men and a woman – sitting around a table in a corner of the lounge bar. He recognised one of the men as his ex-wife’s husband, Doctor Tom King. The rest of the bar was empty, but Perez couldn’t be seen where he stood in the lobby. He was hidden by a large plant in a copper pot, and he had a good view through a glass door. He stood there, feeling a bit silly. Like a kid playing hide-and-seek. He strained to make out what the people in the lounge were saying.

‘This can’t go on, Tom. Two patients refused to see you today, even though it meant waiting nearly a week to get an appointment with another doctor.’ That was the woman. Her voice was clear, rather shrill, and easy to hear.

Perez thought she was most likely a doctor too. She had the confidence that doctors seem to carry round with them. He assumed that both the strangers were Tom King’s colleagues. They must have come to the hotel to discuss the aftermath of Anna’s death.

‘I’m not sure what you expect me to do.’ Tom King sounded drained, almost desperate. ‘The police have closed the case. I’ve been cleared of any misconduct.’

‘You must put all these rumours to rest, Tom.’ It was the woman again. She sounded like a parent telling off a naughty boy. ‘I don’t care how you do it. Can’t you get Sarah to help? I’ve always seen her as a pillar of the village. Surely she can persuade these gossips to stop?’

‘I don’t think there’s anything anyone can do,’ Tom said. ‘We just have to hope that it all blows over and the village finds another target for its malice.’

Tom stood up, said a sharp goodbye to his colleagues and walked out of the lounge. He passed so close to Perez that the inspector was sure the doctor would see him. But Tom was so upset that he seemed not to notice that Perez was there.

Back in the lounge, the two other doctors continued talking.

‘I think he’s hiding something,’ the woman said.

‘Not murder!’ The man was shocked. He was older, grey-haired. ‘Not Tom! I’ve known him for years.’

‘Perhaps not murder, but there’s something he’s not telling us. You’ll have to sort it out, James. You’re the senior partner. We can’t go on like this.’

The woman got to her feet, grabbed her bag and swept past Perez into the darkness outside. The older man stayed where he was, apparently lost in thought. Perez left his hiding place and took the seat beside him. The chair was old and very comfortable. It was a chair for relaxing in.

‘I was going to order some coffee,’ Perez said. ‘Will you join me?’

The older doctor looked surprised. ‘I’m sorry, but do I know you? You don’t sound as if you come from round here.’

‘I’m a detective based in Shetland. I’ve been asked to look again at the Anna Blackwell case. I couldn’t help overhearing your conversation.’

They were still the only people in the lounge, which was dimly lit and very warm.

‘Ah,’ the doctor said. ‘We’d hoped that was all over. It seems rather a shame to rake over the case again, but I suppose you have your work to do.’ He paused. ‘Yes, if we have to talk, coffee would be splendid, thank you.’

Perez went to the bar to order the drinks. When he came back, balancing cups on a tray, the doctor was almost asleep. Perez set the tray on a low table and the man roused himself and held out his hand.

‘James Given,’ he said. ‘I retire from the surgery next year. I’d rather be leaving without all this scandal.’

‘Did you know the dead woman?’ Perez asked.

‘I only saw her once when she brought her daughter into the health centre with an ear infection.’ He paused. ‘She seemed a kind woman. She cared a lot for the child. That’s why…’ James Given paused mid-sentence.

Perez completed it. ‘That’s why it seems unlikely that Miss Blackwell committed suicide?’

James nodded.

‘Gossip has it that Anna and Tom were having an affair,’ Perez said.

‘I don’t believe that for a second!’ the doctor said. ‘Really, Tom adores Sarah. They’re a perfect couple.’

Perez remembered that he didn’t believe in perfect any more. ‘Is there anything else you can tell me?’ he asked. ‘Anything I should know?’

There was a moment of hesitation.

‘I think Tom might have known Anna before she moved here,’ the doctor said at last. ‘I don’t mean that they were lovers. No, there was nothing like that going on, whatever the gossips might be saying. I think perhaps Tom was a friend of her parents. It was just a sense I had when Anna brought her little girl to the surgery. She’d asked to see Tom but he wasn’t free, and she explained that she’d chosen him first because he was almost like family.’

Perez thought that made sense. It might explain why Anna had moved into the rented house in Stonebridge without having to provide a deposit. He was starting to think that he should drive to Berwick the following day to talk to Anna’s parents.

James Given stood up. ‘The most important thing to tell you is that Tom King is a good man. All this gossip is nonsense, and I hope you can put a stop to it. If it goes on, I’m worried that we’ll drive Tom away from the village, and then Stonebridge will have lost a very fine GP.’

Perez watched Doctor Given walk out of the hotel to his car. It had started to snow again, with large soft flakes that melted as soon as they hit the ground. In the distance a dark figure stood under a street light. He seemed to be staring at the hotel as if he was making up his mind whether or not to come in. Perez didn’t recognise the watcher, though something about him seemed familiar.