Nicci French - Waiting for Wednesday

‘An object,’ she said. ‘I can’t remember. I can’t remember anything except I killed her.’

‘Take us through it,’ said Yvette. ‘We have plenty of time. Start from the beginning.’

‘She’s protecting her sons,’ said Karlsson.

‘So you think one of them did it?’

‘She does, anyway.’

‘And you?’

‘Fuck knows. Maybe everyone joined up together to do it, like in that book.’

‘I thought you believed it was Russell Lennox.’

‘I’m sick of this case. It’s too full of misery. Come on, let’s get a coffee. Then you’re going home. I don’t know when you last had any sleep.’

Frieda phoned Fearby and told him what had happened – or hadn’t happened. There was a pause and then he said he was still in London and he was coming right over. Frieda gave him her address, then tried to tell him it wasn’t necessary, that there was nothing more to say, but he had already rung off. In what seemed like a few minutes, there was a knock at the door and Fearby was sitting opposite her with a glass of whisky. He asked her to tell him exactly what Karlsson had said. Frieda reacted impatiently.

‘It doesn’t matter,’ she said.

‘What do you mean?’

‘They went to Lawrence Dawes’s house. They turned it upside down. They didn’t find anything suspicious at all.’

‘How did Dawes react?’

‘You know what? I didn’t ask. The police appeared out of the blue and searched his house and all but accused him of killing his daughter. I imagine he was shocked and distressed.’ Frieda felt a tiredness that was actually painful. ‘I can’t believe it. I sat in his garden with him and he talked about what he’d been through and I set the police on him. Karlsson is furious with me as well. And rightly so.’

‘So where do we go from here?’ said Fearby.

‘Where do we go? We go nowhere. I’m sorry, but are you incapable of seeing what’s in front of your nose?’

‘Have you stopped trusting your instincts?’

‘It was my instinct that got us into this.’

‘Not just your instinct,’ said Fearby. ‘I’d been following a trail and we found we were on the same trail. Doesn’t that mean anything to you?’

Frieda sat back in her chair and sighed.‘Have you ever been out in the countryside and you were walking on a path and then you realized it wasn’t really a path at all, it just looked like one, and you were lost?’

Fearby smiled and shook his head. ‘I never was much for walking.’

‘For all we know, Sharon Gibbs is somewhere reasonably happy, not wanting to be found. But, whatever the truth, I think we’re done.’

Fearby shook his head again, but he didn’t seem dismayed or angry. ‘I’ve been doing this too long to get put off by something like this. I just need to go over my files again, make some more enquiries. I’m not going to give up now, not after all I’ve done.’

Frieda looked at him with a kind of horror. Was he a bit like her? Was this the way she appeared to other people? ‘What would it take for you to give up?’

‘Nothing,’ said Fearby. ‘Not after all this, after what George Conley suffered, after Hazel Barton’s murder.’

‘But what about what you’ve suffered? Your marriage, your career?’

‘If I give up now, that won’t bring my job back. Or my wife.’

Suddenly Frieda felt as if she was trapped in a disastrous therapy session where she couldn’t find the right thing to say. Should she try to convince Fearby that everything he had sacrificed his life for had been an illusion? Did she even believe it? ‘You’ve already done so much,’ she said. ‘You got George Conley out of prison. That’s enough.’

Fearby’s expression hardened. ‘I need to know the truth. Nothing else matters.’ He caught Frieda’s eye and gave a slightly embarrassed smile. ‘Just think of it as my hobby. It’s what I do instead of having an allotment or playing golf.’

When Fearby got up to go, Frieda felt as if she was someone he had sat next to on a train journey and struck up a conversation with and now they were arriving at the station and would part and never meet again. They shook hands at the door.

‘I’ll let you know how things progress,’ he said. ‘Even if you don’t want me to.’

When Fearby was gone, Frieda leaned against her door for a few minutes. She felt as if she needed to catch her breath but couldn’t, as if her lungs wouldn’t work properly. She forced herself to concentrate and take long, slow breaths.

Then, at last, she went up to her bathroom. She’d been waiting for the right time but there was never a right time. There was always something left to do. She thought of Josef, her shambolic and eager friend, all the work he’d put into this for her. It was his act of friendship. She had good friends, but she hadn’t turned to them, not even to Sandy. She could listen but she couldn’t talk; give help but not ask for it. It was strange that in the last days she had felt closer to Fearby, with his neglected home, his huge filing system and his wreck of a life, than she had to anyone else.

The doorbell rang and for a moment she thought she wouldn’t answer. But then, with a sigh, she turned away from the bath, and went to the front door.

‘Delivery for you,’ said the man, half obscured by a tall cardboard box. ‘Frieda Klein?’

‘Yes.’

‘Sign here, please.’

Frieda signed and took the box into the living room, levering open its top. As she did so, she was hit by a smell whose powerful sweetness reminded her of funeral parlours and hotel lobbies. Carefully, she lifted out an enormous bouquet of white lilies, tied at the bottom with purple ribbon. She had always hated lilies: they were too opulent for her and their fragrance seemed to clog her airways. But who had sent them?

There was a miniature envelope with the flowers and she opened it and slid out the card.

We couldn’t let him get away with it.

The world narrowed, the air cooled around her. We couldn’t let him get away with it.

Bile rose in her throat and her forehead was clammy. She put out one hand to steady herself, made herself breathe deeply. She knew who had sent her these flowers. Dean Reeve. He had sent her daffodils before, telling her it wasn’t her time, and now he had sent her these lush, pulpy lilies. He had set fire to Hal Bradshaw’s house. For her. She pressed her hand hard against her furious heart. What could she do? Where could she turn? Who would believe her, and who would be able to help?

She had a sickening sense that she had to do something, or talk to someone. That was what she believed in, wasn’t it? Talking to people. But who? Once it would have been Reuben. But their relationship wasn’t like that any more. She couldn’t talk to Sandy because he was in America and these weren’t things to be put into words on the phone. What about Sasha? Or even Josef? Wasn’t that what friends were for? No. It wouldn’t work. She couldn’t find the proper explanation, but she felt it would be a betrayal of their friendship. She needed someone outside everything.

Then she remembered someone. She went to the bin outside her house and thrust the flowers into it. Back inside, she rummaged through her shoulder bag but it wasn’t there. She went upstairs to her study. She pulled open one of the drawers of her desk. When she cleared out her bag, she either threw things away or kept them here. She went through the old postcards, receipts, letters, photographs, invitations, and found it. A business card. When Frieda had faced a medical disciplinary panel, she had encountered one kindly face. Thelma Scott was a therapist herself and she had immediately seen something in Frieda that Frieda hadn’t wanted to be seen. She had invited Frieda to come and talk to her any time she felt the need and given Frieda her card. Frieda had been sure that she would never take her up on the offer, almost angry at the suggestion, but still she had kept it. She dialled the number, her hands almost trembling.