Ann Cleeves - The Sleeping and the Dead

‘Despite the gap in time these two have a lot in common. Not just their age. The Gillespies are wealthy. They’re both prominent business people, often in the news. Theo’s dad was an MP. Melanie was bright and articulate. Her teachers say she could be moody but she was often charming. She wasn’t into art and acting like Theo, but she was a skilled musician. So they had similar backgrounds. Now, let’s look at the differences. Most obvious, of course, is gender…’

The cocky DC raised a hand, languidly, as if it were hardly worth the effort. ‘Is that important?’

Porteous wanted to yell: Don’t be fatuous. Everything’s important. Two young people have been killed.

‘We don’t know at this stage. There was no indication of sexual assault on Melanie Gillespie, according to Carver.’

He turned his back on the audience as he regained control, wrote DIFFERENCES on the flip chart, added GENDER, then AGE with a question mark. ‘Theo was a year older than Melanie, though as they were both in their A-level year, that hardly seems important.’

‘Could we be looking for a teacher?’ Claire Wright asked.

‘Possible, isn’t it? I’d be very interested to know if anyone who taught Theo at Cranford Grammar went on to work at Melanie’s school. Can you take responsibility for checking that out?’

She nodded.

‘Then there are the temperaments,’ he went on. ‘Not so easy to pin down, but we seem to have a difference here. Theo is described as organized and conscientious but he doesn’t seem to have been over-stressed by exams. He still felt able to take part in the school play. One witness says he told stories, you couldn’t believe what he said, but she was his girlfriend and he betrayed her. I’m not sure we can rely on her objectivity. There was no record of any emotional problems, nothing more than you’d expect in any adolescent. On the other hand Melanie was moody, given to bouts of anger and depression. For the past two years she’d been seeing a psychiatrist for an eating disorder.’

Porteous looked out at his team. Some were scribbling notes. He thought that soon they’d have no need for that. Soon they’d know these teenagers as well as they knew their own families.

‘So,’ he said. ‘Two victims. The big question is – Are there any more? Would a killer keep a knife for nearly thirty years, resisting the temptation to use it, then murder again, out of the blue? We need to check the old files and make sure this isn’t a part of a wider pattern. Pull up all the post-mortem reports for stabbings when the victim was a teenager. I don’t want the search restricted to the local area – I’m sure we’d have picked that up. But the killer might have been working away.’

He stopped again, abruptly, and seemed lost in thought for a moment. A fan on one of the desks in a corner hummed. Someone coughed uncertainly. His audience didn’t know him well enough to tell whether or not he’d finished the briefing. He let them sit in an awkward silence for a few minutes longer before continuing slowly.

‘So that’s one theory. We’ve got an undetected serial killer. We’ll find other crimes that fit the pattern – teenage murders and that particular knife. At least it’s something we can check. Carver’s happy to work with us on it.’ More than happy, Porteous thought. The pathologist had almost begged to be involved. He’d seen the chance for fame, mentions in influential journals and the opportunity to star as an expert witness in an important court case.

‘The other theory is that the second murder came about as a result, somehow, of the discovery of Theo Randle’s body, that there was a causal link between the incidents. If that’s the case it won’t be an obvious connection. Melanie hadn’t been born at the time of Theo’s death.’

‘Couldn’t we be talking a random nutter?’ The contribution came from Charlie Luke, who’d been sitting in the front row, his brow furrowed with concentration throughout the presentation. He had the build and squashed features of a boxer. Approaching middle-age he was still a constable and would remain one. No one was quite sure how he’d slipped through the assessment process to get into the service. Claire dismissed him as having the IQ of a gnat, but Porteous didn’t care and rather liked him. He was dogged and did what he was told. He didn’t let the job get under his skin. Beer and sport would always be more important.

‘Nothing’s ever completely random, is it, Luke? The killer must have met these young people somewhere. Their paths crossed even if he only came across them opportunistically, if he had no other motive than the thrill of killing. It should be possible to learn something about the pattern of his life from theirs.’

Luke seemed bewildered by the concept but he nodded enthusiastically.

‘Of course,’ Porteous went on, ‘we’ve already discovered one connection between Theo Randle and Melanie Gillespie…’ He turned towards Stout who was already rising to his feet. ‘Eddie, perhaps you’d like to tell us that part of the story.’

‘Hannah Morton,’ Stout said. ‘Maiden name Hannah Meek. She works as a librarian in Stavely nick. She’s recently separated from Jonathan, who’s deputy head of a high school on the coast, the high school where Melanie Gillespie was a student. There’s one daughter, Rosalind, aged eighteen, still living at home and waiting to go to university. On the surface you couldn’t find anyone more respectable than Mrs Morton. Anyone less likely to commit murder. But she did know both victims.

‘We were already interested in Mrs Morton before the Gillespie murder. She was Theo’s girlfriend, the love, she thought, of his life. She caught him…’ Stout hesitated, seemed to be searching for an appropriate euphemism.

‘Shagging?’ Luke suggested helpfully.

‘Quite.’ Still Stout couldn’t bring himself to say the word: ‘… the young actress who played Lady Macbeth. They were together by Cranford Water after an end-of-performance party. That’s the last record we have of the boy alive. Mrs Morton claims he phoned her the following day but after all this time it’s impossible to check.’

Stout paused. ‘She has a surprisingly clear recollection of all the details. That, in itself, raises suspicion. She didn’t tell us about Theo two-timing her until she knew we’d find out anyway. She was stage manager for the school play so she’d have access to the dagger which could well have been the murder weapon. She had motive and opportunity. There’s no one else in the frame.’ He rocked back on his heels. ‘But I don’t see it. I don’t see her as the sort of person who’d stab the boy she was in love with, tie an anchor round his body and hoy him in the lake. I certainly don’t see her living with herself for thirty years afterwards-’

‘Unless she’d repressed the memory,’ Luke interrupted. He looked round as if he expected congratulation from his colleagues for the contribution. When none came he added defensively, ‘Well, it happens. I saw this programme on the telly… And when the boy’s body was dredged up from the lake perhaps it all came back.’ He looked at Porteous for help.

‘You’d have to ask a psychiatrist,’ Porteous said. ‘Not my field.’ Recognizing the irony of the words as he spoke.

‘Unless she repressed the memory,’ Stout said impatiently. ‘But then why kill Melanie Gillespie? She had a motive for killing Randle, but none at all for murdering the girl. Melanie couldn’t have been a witness to the first murder. She couldn’t be any threat.’

‘How did Mrs Morton know Melanie?’ Claire Wright asked.

‘Melanie and Rosalind Morton were best friends. They went to the same school. Hannah met Melanie when Rosalind had friends to the house.’