Hilary Bonner - When the Dead Cry Out

Meanwhile, now that the DNA results had dealt their irrevocable blow to everything the police and the CPS had tried to achieve, Karen did her best to concentrate on the case as a whole, and to endeavour to think of ways in which they could come up with something, anything else in order to block the appeal. It was going to be an uphill struggle, she reckoned. In a vain attempt to keep her team’s spirits up, she did not allow them a moment’s respite in which to dwell on the consequences of the potentially disastrous new developments. Instead she threw work at them. She insisted that all the old records be studied and dissected yet again, every witness, however peripheral, re-interviewed, every jot of evidence scrutinized for the umpteenth time.

It turned out to be true that a schoolmate of Marshall’s had been killed in a playground accident, but the coroner’s verdict at the time had been accidental death and the new enquiries shed no further light on the affair. But fifty odd years later, that was not really surprising, Karen reflected. However, almost thirty years ago, when Marshall was first arrested, a similar investigation may well have produced very different results, just as Jennifer had suggested.

Karen even got on to Interpol and had Marshall’s former lover Esther Hunter re-interviewed in Canada where, having a Canadian father and therefore dual nationality, she had gone to live when she and Marshall had split up about five years after the disappearance of Clara and the girls. Esther, while being another of Marshall’s women who apparently believed totally in his innocence, had also always claimed that she knew absolutely nothing about anything, which was why she had not been called to give evidence at Marshall’s original trial. And she proved no more able or inclined to help now than she had been at any previous stage. Nonetheless, it all kept the troops busy.

She also made herself go to the Bell occasionally after work, particularly if there was a special reason, like PC Brownlow being promoted to sergeant. She knew that most of her team would be there that night. Brownlow was a popular young officer, and she felt it was important for morale and solidarity that she joined the troops, all of whom were feeling pretty beleaguered.

Phil Cooper was already there when she arrived, but he didn’t look capable of joining in any kind of celebrations. Instead he was sitting morosely alone in a far corner beyond the pool table, a pint of bitter and a whisky chaser in front of him. When he saw Karen walk into the bar he got up at once and made his way across the room to her.

She was mildly surprised. After all, not only had he made it perfectly clear that he wanted no more to do with her personally following their night together, he had also, since she had blown him out publicly over the Jennifer Roth thing, avoided all direct contact with her as much as possible. He had got on with his job, but also tried to keep his distance. She really didn’t expect him to come near her ever again, and was still trying to get her head around a way of dealing with their working relationship at least. She certainly didn’t want any sort of confrontation with him in the pub, and she began to push her way through the crowd in order to both get to the bar and to avoid the detective sergeant.

He was too quick for her. He cut her off easily, even though just as he approached her he bumped into a chair and slopped beer down his shirt, narrowly avoiding spilling it over Karen too. He stumbled quite heavily as he recovered himself and it was then that Karen realized that, in spite of the speed with which he had moved, Cooper was already a bit drunk. His face was flushed and he was sweating.

“I just wanted to say I was sorry, boss,” he muttered, swaying gently as he stood before her. His words were very slightly slurred.

“What about?” she asked briskly.

He looked slightly uneasy then, but continued nonetheless.

“About Jennifer Roth, of course,” he said.

“Of course?” she queried obliquely.

His unease seemed to develop into full-blown bewilderment then. That was all right. Karen had no wish to discuss the other matter in the station pub, if indeed there was any point in ever discussing it at all.

“Ah yes, Jennifer Roth,” she went on, causing Cooper to look all the more flustered.

“Don’t worry about it, Phil,” she said, her voice heavy with sarcasm. “Any fool could have done it.”

She brushed past him, knocking against him as she did so. She hadn’t actually meant to have another go at him, certainly not in the pub, but she hadn’t been able to stop herself. She told herself he deserved it. The whole case, the case they all cared so much about, was up in the air again. She knew it wasn’t all Phil Cooper’s fault, but she was looking for a scapegoat, someone she could blame as well as herself. And, of course, although she tried not to think about it, Cooper had hurt her, really hurt her, by backing off in the way he had following what really did seem to have turned out to be just a sordid one-night stand.

She strode past him to the bar, ignoring everybody else who spoke to her, although she was well aware of their curious stares, and ordered a double Scotch. Then another one.

An hour or so later Cooper approached her again, by which time she suspected she might be a little drunk herself, too. She was talking to a uniformed sergeant nearing retirement age who was being particularly gloomy about his bitter disappointment at the prospect of this man they had all wanted behind bars for so long winning his appeal. Cooper pushed his way between them.

“I just wanted to say I’m sorry about the other thing, too, boss,” he said.

Karen shot him a withering look. “I was having a private conversation, Cooper.”

The uniformed sergeant, however, no doubt picking up on the atmosphere between the two detectives, backed away at once leaving them more or less alone in the crowd.

“Look, I just wanted to say sorry, boss,” Cooper repeated.

“Sorry for what exactly?”

“You know boss, w-what happened... you know, what happened between you and me...and everything...” Cooper seemed unable to get the words out. Whether this was caused by embarrassment or alcohol, Karen did not know.

“Don’t worry about that either, Phil. I was beginning to think you weren’t aware that anything had happened at all, and that’s probably the best way to keep it. I’m sure you’ve been quite right to do so.”

Phil’s alcoholic flush began to turn into a proper blush then. Karen hadn’t realized until recently that Cooper was inclined to blush when he was embarrassed, much as she did. The first time she had seen it had been, of course, when she admonished him on the day that Jennifer Roth had revealed her true identity.

The DS moved closer to her, looking anxiously around to make sure nobody else was listening. Even though she had been drinking heavily since she entered the bar, she was quite overwhelmed by the sour smell of beer and whisky on his breath.

“Look, Karen, I’m really really sorry—” he began in little more than a whisper.

“So am I,” she interrupted, but he wasn’t to be put off.

“Look, Karen, I just couldn’t carry on with it. I’m married, it’s my wife, you see, and the kids, and you’re the governor, it’s all too much—”

“Really, Phil.” Karen treated him to her most withering look. “And that’s all new, is it?”

“Sorry, boss?”

Cooper was obviously not at his quickest on the uptake. The alcohol had thoroughly dumbed him down, it seemed.

“I mean, your situation is new, is it? You have only acquired a wife and family since you spent half the night fucking me, have you? Because quite obviously you wouldn’t have done so had you already been a husband and father, would you?”