Elizabeth George - Missing Joseph

Did it look like her? Was that her face? Were those her eyes? It was more than ten years old, the copy was bad, it was dark, it was blurry.

“This doesn’t prove a thing. It’s not even clear.”

But the other two men were relentless. A simple confrontation between Kate Gitterman and her sister would tell the tale of identifi cation. And if it didn’t, the body of Joseph Sage could be exhumed and genetic testing could be done upon it to match him to the woman who called herself Juliet Spence. Because if she was indeed Juliet Spence, why would she refuse to be tested, to have Maggie tested, to produce the documents attendant to Maggie’s birth, to do anything possible to clear her name?

He was left with nothing. Nothing to say, no argument to propose, and nothing to reveal. He got to his feet and carried the copied photograph and its accompanying article to the fireplace. He threw them in and watched the fl ames take them, curling the paper at the edges first, then lapping eagerly, then consuming entirely.

Leo watched him, looking up from his bone, whining low in his throat. God, to have everything simple, like a dog. Food and shelter. Warmth against the cold. Loyalty and love that never wavered.

He said, “I’m ready, then.”

Lynley said, “We won’t be needing you, Constable.”

Colin looked up to protest even as he knew he had no right. The doorbell rang.

The dog barked, quieted. Colin said bitterly, “Would you like to answer that yourself, then?” to Lynley. “It’ll be your wopsie.”

It was. But it was more. The female PC had come in uniform, bundled against the cold, her spectacles flecked with moisture. She said, “PC Garrity. Clitheroe CID. Sergeant Hawkins’s already put me in the picture,” while behind her on the porch listened a man in heavy tweeds and boots with a cap pulled low on his head: Frank Ware, Nick’s father. Both of them were backlit by the headlamps of one of their two vehicles which blazed a blinding white light into the steady fall of the snow.

Colin looked at Frank Ware. Ware looked uneasily from the PC to Colin. He stomped the snow off his boots and pulled at his nose. He said, “Sorry to disturb. But there’s a car gone into a ditch out next the reservoir, Colin. I thought I best stop by and tell you. It looks to me like Juliet’s Opel.”

THERE WAS NO CHOICE BUT to take Shepherd with them. He’d grown up in the area. He knew the lay of the land. Lynley wasn’t willing to give him the freedom of his own vehicle, however. He directed him to the front seat of the hired Range Rover, and with Constable Garrity and St. James following in the other, they set out for the reservoir.

The snow flew into the windscreen in constant banners of white, dazzling in the headlamps and blown by the wind. Other vehicles had beaten it down into ruts on the road, but ice ridged the bottom of these and made the going perilous. Even their Range Rover’s four-wheel drive was not suffi cient to negotiate the worst of the curves and acclivities. They slipped and slid, moving at a crawl.

They eased past Winslough’s monument to World War I, the soldier’s bowed head and his rifle now glittering white. They passed the common where the snow blew in a spectral whirlwind that dusted the trees. They crossed the bridge that arched over a tumbling beck. Visibility worsened as the windscreen wipers began to leave a curved trail of ice when they moved on the glass.

“Blast,” Lynley muttered. He made an adjustment to the defroster. It was ineffectual, since the problem was external.

Next to him, Shepherd said nothing beyond giving two-word directions whenever they approached what went for an intersection this deep in the country. Lynley glanced his way when he said, “Left here,” as the head-lamps illuminated a sign for Fork Reservoir. He thought about taking a few minutes’ pleasure from mixing obloquy with castigation — God knew that Shepherd was getting off far too lightly with a request for resignation from his superiors and not a full public hearing — but the blank mask that was the other man’s face dried up the well-spring of Lynley’s need to censure. Colin Shepherd would be reliving the events of the last few days for the rest of his life. And ultimately, when he closed his eyes, Lynley could only hope that it would be Polly Yarkin’s face that haunted him most.

Behind them, Constable Garrity drove her Rover aggressively. Even with the wind blowing and the windows rolled up, they could hear her grinding her way through the gears. The engine of her vehicle roared and complained, but she never dropped more than six yards behind them.

Once they left the outskirts of the village, there were no lights other than those from their vehicles and those that shone from the occasional farmhouse. It was like driving blind, for the falling snow reflected their head-lamps, creating a permeable, milky wall that was ever shifting, ever changing, ever blowing their way.

“She knew you’d gone to London,” Shepherd finally said. “I told her. Put that into the account if you’d like.”

“You just pray we can find her, Constable.” Lynley changed down gears as they rounded a curve. The tyres slid, spun helplessly, then caught again. Behind them, Constable Garrity sounded her horn in congratulations. They lumbered on.

Some four miles from the village, the entrance to Fork Reservoir loomed to their left, offset by a stand of pines. Their branches hung heavily with a weight of wet snow caught in the web of the trees’ stubby needles. The pines lined the road for perhaps a quarter of a mile. Opposite them, a hedge gave way to the open moor.

“There,” Shepherd said as they came to the end of the trees.

Lynley saw it as Shepherd spoke: the shape of a car, its windows along with its roof, bonnet, and boot hidden beneath a crust of snow. The car teetered at a drunken angle just at the point where the road sloped upward. It sat on the verge neither coming nor going, but rather diagonally with its chassis oddly balanced on the ground.

They parked. Shepherd offered his torch. Constable Garrity joined them and beamed hers on the car. Its rear wheels had spun themselves a grave in the snow. They lay deeply imbedded in the side of the ditch.

“My nitwit sister tried this once,” Constable Garrity said, flinging her hand in the upward direction the road was taking. “Tried to make it up a slope and slid backwards. Nearly broke her neck, little fool.”

Lynley brushed the snow from the driver’s door and tried the handle. The car was unlocked. He opened the door, shone the light inside, and said, “Mr. Shepherd?”

Shepherd came to join him. St. James opened the other door. Constable Garrity handed him her torch. Shepherd looked inside at the cases and cartons as St. James went through the glove box, which was gaping open.

“Well?” Lynley said. “Is this her car, Constable?”

It was an Opel like a hundred thousand other Opels, but different in that its rear seat was crammed to the roof with belongings. Shepherd pulled one of the cartons towards him, pulled out a pair of gardening gloves.

Lynley saw his hand close over them tightly. It was affi rmation enough.

St. James said, “Nothing much in here,” and snapped the glove box closed. He picked a piece of dirty towelling off the floor and wrapped round his hand a short length of twine that lay with it. Thoughtfully, he looked out across the moors. Lynley followed his gaze.

The landscape was a study in white and black: It was falling snow and night unredeemed by the moon or stars. There was nothing to break the force of the wind here— neither woodland nor fell disrupted the fl ow of the land — so the frigid air cut keenly and quickly, bringing tears to the eyes.