Ken McClure - Eye of the raven

Steven had never been to Cromer before but he liked what he saw. He had a soft spot for the English seaside resort and Cromer, on a bright spring day, seemed an excellent example. It even had a pier with a theatre on the end of it. It had beach huts and the traditional big hotel on the front — in this case the Hotel De Paris. He smiled and murmured, ‘Let not ambition mock the sons of weary toil.’

He had coffee and a sandwich in a cafe that afforded him a view of the sea and asked the proprietor where he might find Windsor Gardens.

‘ Along to your left when you leave. Up the hill and it’s the second on the right. Nice bungalows, they are.’

Steven found number 37 and rang the bell. An elderly woman with white hair and a fair complexion with rosy cheeks, which gave her a freshly scrubbed appearance, answered it. A bit like Snow White might look in her sixties, thought Steven.

‘ Mrs Grant? I wonder if I might have a word with your daughter, Charlotte Little?’

‘ Grant,’ replied the woman, her initial smile disappearing. ‘Charlotte Grant. Who are you? What do you want?’

Steven showed her his ID and the woman took the card, simultaneously putting on the spectacles that hung on a gold chain round her neck. She held them there, half on, half off.

‘ Sci-Med Inspectorate,’ she read. ‘What’s that all about? What do you lot want with Charlotte?’

‘ I have to ask her some questions. There’s nothing to be alarmed about, I assure you.’

‘ Charlotte’s not here at the moment. She’s walking the dog with my husband.’

‘ Then she’ll be back soon?’ said Steven hopefully.

‘ A look of resignation appeared on the woman’s face. ‘You’d better come in.’

She led the way through the hall, across the lounge and out into a small sunny conservatory with views across the nearby cliffs to the sea. Steven accepted the offer of tea and stood, admiring the view until the woman returned with a tray.

‘ I do hope you are not going to upset Charlotte. She’s had so much to contend with in life. I sometimes wonder how she’s kept her sanity.’

‘ It can’t have been easy for her,’ agreed Steven.

‘ My daughter is a very intelligent girl, Dr Dunbar, but when it comes to picking men…’

‘ She’s hopeless,’ said the petite woman in her late thirties who had just appeared in the doorway of the conservatory. She was wearing a white roll-neck sweater and jeans tucked in to wellington boots. Her dark hair was cut in a fashion that made Steven think of a pixie.

‘ Hello dear, I didn’t hear you come in,’ said her mother.

‘ Dad’s just coming up the hill. I came on ahead to put the kettle on. I didn’t know you had company.’

Introductions were made and Steven noticed a nervous tic begin to play on Charlotte’s left cheek. ‘I’m afraid I have to ask you a few questions, Mrs L… Ms Grant? I shan’t take up much of your time. Promise.’

‘ About David?’

‘ Indirectly.’

‘ I’ll leave you two on your own,’ said Charlotte’s mother, picking up the tea tray and bustling off.

‘ She’s nice,’ said Steven.

‘ I don’t know what I would have done without her and Dad,’ said Charlotte. ‘They’ve always been there to pick up the pieces.’

‘ You’ve lived with them since the trial?’ said Steven.

‘ Not all of the time,’ replied Charlotte, looking down at the floor as if Steven had hit a raw nerve. ‘I met someone else,’ she said. ‘Let’s just say it didn’t work out and I ended up back here.’

‘ I’m sorry,’ said Steven.

‘ How can I help you?’

‘ It’s about the pornographic material that was found on your ex-husband’s computer when he worked at the hospital in Edinburgh,’ Steven began.

‘ God, that all seems a lifetime ago,’ said Charlotte. ‘He swore he knew nothing at all about it,’ she said. ‘He told me it must have been a student prank and I believed him. He was a liar, a rapist, a murderer and I believed him. In fact, I believed everything he said right up until the time they found his… inside that poor girl and then the game was over. I realised just what a fool I’d been and I was so angry. God, I was so angry.’

‘ I’m sure,’ said Steven, giving her a moment or two to compose herself. ‘I understand you were a legal secretary at the time they found the stuff on your husband’s computer?’ he said.

Charlotte finished blowing her nose and nodded, ‘You have been doing your homework. I worked for a firm called Seymour, Nicholson and Verdi. I was Paul Verdi’s secretary.’

‘ This is going to seem like a very strange question but could any computer material from your office ever have found its way on to your husband’s computer?’

‘ From my office?’ exclaimed Charlotte.

‘ Anything at all,’ said Steven. ‘A disk, a file transfer, borrowed software, anything.’

Charlotte shook her head and said, ‘I don’t think so. I just used the office computer for word processing. David used his for all sorts of scientific things. It seemed to be a constant thorn in his side more than a help. Actually…’

‘ Yes?’ prompted Steven, seeing that Charlotte had remembered something.

‘ There was a time when David thought he’d lost some valuable data and he was acting like a bear with a sore head. I mentioned this to Paul because it was getting me down too and he’d noticed that I seemed preoccupied. When I told him about the missing data he said he’d speak to a friend of his who was a computer expert. A couple of days later he gave me a disk to give to David. It was some kind of utilities programme for recovering lost files. Samson Utilities, I think it was called.’

‘ And?’

‘ It worked. David got back his lost data and stopped behaving like a spoilt schoolboy. I remember he bought a bottle of malt whisky for me to give to Paul for his friend.’

‘ Do you know this friend’s name?’ asked Steven.

‘ Paul never said and I didn’t ask.’ After a moment’s thought, Charlotte suddenly became animated. ‘Surely you’re not suggesting that this had anything to do with the filth they found on David’s computer?’ she exclaimed.

‘ I rather think I am,’ admitted Steven.

Charlotte’s eyes opened wide and she seemed dumbstruck for a moment but then it was like a volcano erupting. ‘But why would anyone want to do that?’ she exclaimed. ‘And just what is the point of suggesting something like that after all this time and after all that happened? My husband raped and murdered a little girl, for God’s sake! Have you nothing better to do with your time?’

Charlotte broke down in tears and her mother returned to usher her out of the conservatory.

A tall, erect man with a white moustache and carrying a cup and saucer in his hand entered the room and introduced himself curtly as James Grant. He was annoyed and Steven did his best at being conciliatory. ‘I’m sorry I had to bring back some bad memories for your daughter,’ he said. ‘But I had to ask her some questions.’

‘ Bad memories are something my daughter is not short of,’ said Grant, accepting Steven’s apology and indicating that he should sit back down again. ‘Believe me.’

‘ I understand your daughter has had another unfortunate relationship,’ said Steven.

‘ Unfortunate relationship?’ snorted Grant. ‘That’s a nice way of putting it.

Nightmare more like.’

Steven sensed that the man needed to talk.

‘ Finding out that the man you married, the man whose children you bore is a rapist and a murderer is not something you can ever come to terms with, Dr Dunbar. You really don’t need a second bad experience after that.’