The Valley of Longing 23

‘And just how do you expect to manage that?’ Isobel wanted to know. ‘This sergeant has made it pretty clear he thinks you’re guilty of the murders he’s investigating - if you can call what he’s doing investigating - and whatever else has happened; which is what? You didn’t say when you called, just that you’d been arrested again.’ ‘I didn’t tell you because I don’t know myself,’ Jack told her. ‘All I got was a demand to know where a girl was’ I don’t have a clue what girl they were talking about, let alone what I’m supposed to have done with her.’ Isobel’s sense of outrage over the treatment of her friend increased. ‘Are you trying to tell me that not only were you assaulted, they didn’t tell you why you were being arrested?’ ‘Yes, but let’s not make a fuss about it, all I want is to get this interview done, get home, and take as many painkillers as possible.’ ‘You can’t just let this slide, Jack; that sergeant is a menace, and given how unwilling he is to even consider the possibility that someone else is responsible for the murders, he’s never going to find the real killer until he’s forced to back off from you,’ Isobel said. She couldn’t understand why he wasn’t more interested in punishing the prejudiced sergeant, he was not normally so passive. ‘Not only that, but you need to go to the hospital and get checked out; who knows how bad your injuries are.’ The two of them argued back and forth about what they were going to do for several minutes, before finally coming to an agreement, at which point Isobel called for the sergeant. ‘Are you ready to get this interview started?’ Mitchell asked the moment he entered the interview room. ‘If I had my way, no,’ Isobel said bluntly, seeing no reason to Sugar- coat her words. ‘My client wishes to get the interview over and done with, however. Before we start, though, I wish to make it clear how unhappy I am with the treatment he has received at the hands of you and your officers; it is nothing less than appalling, and I can assure you, I will be registering a complaint at the highest level possible - not only was my client physically assaulted during your ham-fisted arrest of him, he was prevented from making the phone call he is legally permitted for over an hour, he has not been told why he was arrested, and, worst of all, he has not been seen by a doctor. He could be suffering from internal injuries for all we know.’ ‘The doctor is busy,’ Mitchell said sharply, not at all happy with the way he was being spoken to. ‘He is dealing with the family of the girl your client has kidnapped, and most likely murdered. As for the suggestion that your client was assaulted, that’s utter nonsense - he resisted arrest, and my officers had to use force to restrain him.’ ‘In order to resist arrest, he would have had to know that he was being placed under arrest,’ Isobel said. ‘Given that he was hit in the face by his own front door when you and your officers smashed it open, without identifying yourselves…’ ‘He knows who we are, he’s seen us before.’ ‘Even if he had been able to see and recognise you, which is unlikely given he was half - blinded as a result of having his nose broken, you are required to identify yourselves and your reason for being there - you did neither. After the attempt on his life last night; it’s no surprise that my client defended himself when someone, several someones, broke in and assaulted him. I’m certain you would have done the same under the circumstances.’ Isobel took several deep breaths to try and calm herself, which wasn’t easy. ‘If it were up to me - she threw Jack a dirty look - I would insist that my client be taken to hospital immediately to be checked out. However, since my client has made up his mind to get this interview out the way, I will settle for him being examined by the doctor.’ ‘I already told you, the doctor is busy, with the family of the girl your client has kidnapped, which is more important than dealing with the few bumps and bruises he has.’ Mitchell nodded at Jack Wild. ‘I will be making note of your attitude in the letter of complaint I intend writing to the chief constable, sergeant,’ Isobel said. ‘If you don’t want me to insist that this interview is postponed until my client has been thoroughly examined at hospital, and you have been replaced by someone competent to handle this investigation, I suggest you find someone with some level of medical training, who can clean my client up and deal with his cuts, and who can replace the bandage on his arm.’ Melissa had been sitting silently beside Sergeant Mitchell - she didn’t want to believe that her superior had assaulted, or been involved in an assault, on Jack Wild, but as she listened to the sergeant and the lawyer, she realised that Isobel Paterson’s version of events was the more believable; the injuries she could see on Jack Wild seemed too much to be the result of him simply resisting arrest - but now she spoke up. ‘I’ve got my first aid certificate; I can take care of it. I’ll be right back.’ What should have been a simple piece of first aid took longer than any of them anticipated. Cleaning and dealing with the two cuts on Jack’s face, and his bloody lip, took little time; it was the injury on his arm, the cut made by Ollie, that delayed the start of the interview. The cut had bled freely after the stitches were pulled, and the blood had then dried, sticking together the layers of bandage that covered it. Melissa worked as carefully as she could to remove the bandage without adding to Jack’s pain, but it wasn’t easy. It was especially difficult when it came to the final layer, no matter how she tried, it proved impossible to remove the bandage painlessly. After a couple of minutes of trying, she was reluctantly forced to simply yank the bandage off; in doing, so she pulled another of the stitches, and caused a fresh surge of blood to flow from the wound and wash down Jack’s arm onto the table beneath it. There was nothing Melissa could do about the three stitches that had been torn out; she could, however, attempt to stop the blood, clean up the arm, and replace the bandage. Once all of that was done, she cleared away the mess her first aid had created. ‘Can we get on with this interview now?’ Mitchell asked once Melissa was finished, he couldn’t keep his impatience from his voice, and he didn’t try. Reluctantly, Isobel nodded, though she wanted to refuse and insist that Jack be taken to hospital, so his arm could be stitched up again. It took Mitchell a few moments to get the tape machine set up, and then he launched the interview with the question he had been itching to ask for more than half an hour. ‘Where’s Amy Wright?’ It came as a shock to Jack to hear that it was his neighbour - in the broad sense of the word - he was believed to have kidnapped, and it was a short time before he could respond. ‘I have no idea,’ he said, knowing the sergeant was not going to believe him. ‘Are you sure?’ ‘Of course I’m sure, why would I know where Amy is?’ ‘Because you were seen with her; you were seen with her, and you were seen attacking her,’ Mitchell said. It wasn’t what Kerwin Wright had told him, but he hoped that if Wild believed there was a witness, he would confess. ‘Either your witness misunderstood what he or she saw, you misunderstood what you were told, or you’re deliberately trying to make what you were told sound worse, to get me to admit to something that didn’t happen,’ Jack said in as calm a voice as he could manage, realising that Mitchell must have a witness to what occurred between him and Melissa in the yard of the Wright Farm. He had used the same tactic he suspected Mitchell was using when he was a detective. ‘Yes, I was with Amy this afternoon, but I didn’t attack her.’ Mitchell looked at his suspect disbelievingly, ‘What were you doing with Amy?’ ‘I gave her a lift home. I was on my way back to the village after lunch in town with a friend, when Amy flagged me down; she’d missed the bus she was waiting for, though I was her brother, and was after a lift home.’ ‘You expect us to believe that Amy mistook you for her brother, you’re twice his age and look like nothing like him.’ Jack ignored the scepticism in Mitchell’s voice. ‘There are superficial similarities between us,’ he said. ‘Similarities that make it easy to get us confused when seen through the windscreen of a Land Rover travelling at about 60 km’s per hour. Anyway, since I was heading back to the Dorpie, and I didn’t have to go out of my way, I said I’d give her a lift.’ ‘Did you take her straight home?’ ‘Yes. She flagged me down at he bus stop at, I don’t know, about a quarter past three, and I dropped her off at the farm at just before half four. I remember because Amy commented that I got her home with just enough time to get the dinner cooked, which she was glad about, because she had thought she was going to be late after missing the bus, and was afraid of the fuss her father was going to make.’ ‘Did you leave straight away after dropping Amy off?’ Jack nodded. ‘I dropped her off, and then I headed home, which took just about no time.’ ‘Then why do I have a witness who claims to have seen you Kiss Amy, and then attack her?’ Mitchell wanted to know. ‘I wouldn’t have a clue since I don’t know who your witness is,’ Jack said. ‘I do know they’re wrong, either deliberately or otherwise, because I never attacked Amy.’ ‘So you didn’t Kiss Amy?’ The idea of lying and denying the whole incident occurred to Jack for a only a moment, not even that, before he dismissed it. Lying was only going to cause more trouble for him, and he didn’t want that. ‘We kissed,’ he admitted, ignoring the disappointed and dismayed look that was shot his way by Isobel. ‘But I didn’t kiss her, she kissed me. I know you’re not going to believe me,’ he said before Mitchell could say a word, ‘but that’s what happened.’ A heavy silence fell over the interview room, lasting for almost a minute, after that statement. At the end of that time, Mitchell spoke up in a voice so thick with sarcasm and disbelief that it could have been served with a spoon. ‘Let me see if I’ve got this straight, Mr Wild; you were flagged down at a bus stop in town by Amy Wright, who thought you were her brother, you agreed to give her a lift and brought her straight home, where she, for some reason, decided to kiss you - an action which you, of course, had no control over. Following the kiss, you left Amy to make dinner for her family and headed home. Have I got all of that right?’ ‘More of less,’ Jack agreed. ‘I was caught by surprise by Amy’s kiss, and it was a few moments before I could think clearly enough to stop what was happening. Once I could, I told Amy it was wrong and shouldn’t have happened, and won’t be happening again. That was when she went into the house, and I headed home.’ ‘If that is what happened, Mr Wild,’ Mitchell said. ‘How did Amy’s bag come to be at your house? We found it in the cupboard in the passage when we searched you house.’ ‘Amy had it with her in town, and was in such a rush she left it in my car when she headed into the house. I didn’t realise she’d forgotten it until I got home; I put it in the cupboard out of the way, thinking I’d take it back to her later, but, obviously, I never got a chance.’ ‘Is there anyone who can confirm what time you got home?’ Jack almost smiled. ‘As it happens, there is. When I got home my agent was waiting for me, he had some things he needed to talk about, and he wanted to see how the next book is coming along; he was there until about quarter past five, and when he left I called my daughter - I always call her on a Sunday - and we spoke until her mother called her for dinner, which would have been about six o’clock. ‘It wasn’t long after that, that you guys went racing past my house on the way to the Wright farm, and a while later you came bursting through my front door.’ ‘Are you sure you wouldn’t like to change your story and tell us the truth, Mr Wild?’ Mitchell asked. ‘Things will go a lot better for you if you admit what you did, and tell us where we can find Amy, especially if she’s still alive when we find her.’ Jack sighed and shook his head, a move he immediately regretted. ‘I am telling the truth, so I can’t change my story,’ he said. ‘I hope you find Amy, soon, and that she’s alright, but there’s nothing I can do to help you, sorry’ ‘I doubt you’re aware of this, Mr Wild,’ Mitchell decided that it was time to play his trump card, ‘but we received a phone call here at the station this evening; a phone call in which we heard Amy being attacked, by you.’ ‘You must be mistaken, sergeant, since I never attacked Amy. What time did you receive this phone call?’ ‘It was about half past five, wasn’t it, sergeant,’ Melissa said without thinking, something she wished she had done when she saw the angry look directed her way. Jack was about to respond to that when Isobel beat him to it. ‘There must be some misunderstanding on my part,’ she said. ‘But if you received this phone call at around half past five, and you knew that the people you could hear were my client and this girl, Amy Wright, and you knew that what you were hearing was Amy being attacked, why did it take you more than half an hour to get to this girl’s house? If you ask me, sergeant, the answer is one of three things: either you didn’t know who was calling you; the phone call never happened; or you’re guilty of criminal negligence for not responding sooner to a phone call from someone in distress.’ Isobel paused to see if Mitchell was going to respond, and when he didn’t she went on, ‘If the phone call occurred at half - past - five, it couldn’t be my client you heard, because, as he told you, he was on the phone to his daughter. I’m sure if you call his agent and his daughter’s mother, they will confirm what he has told you, then we can end this farce and you can release my client.’ Jack wasn’t about to say as much, but he had his doubts about his ex-wife confirming his story; she was likely to enjoy having the opportunity to cause trouble for him. Fortunately, he didn’t have to rely on his ex-wife and her fickle, and occasionally vindictive, behaviour, his phone and the records from the phone company would confirm what he had told the police. ‘Goddammit!’ Mitchell swore angrily, his hands balled into fists and clenched so tightly his knuckles were white. ‘I can’t believe I’ve got to let him go, again.’ ‘He’s got an alibi,’ Melissa pointed out. ‘He couldn’t have been the one who kidnapped Amy.’ ‘Only if it was Amy we heard being attacked on the phone,’ Mitchell said as he struggled to control his anger. ‘If it wasn’t her, then we don’t know when she was attacked, and Wild’s alibi goes out the window. I still say it’s him. He was seen kissing her, for god’s sake.’ ‘Kissing isn’t attacking,’ Melissa pointed out. She couldn’t quite believe that she was defending the author, especially after he had admitted kissing Amy - how he could have done such a thing when he was more than twice Amy’s age, she didn’t know - but she believed in doing her job right, and didn’t like the thought of the sergeant remaining so focused on making him a suspect when there was no evidence against him whatsoever. ‘And if it wasn’t Amy being attacked, who was it? It’s not like we’re a town or a city where people are attacked all the time - it’s rare enough for one person to be attacked here; the odds of two people, two girls, being attacked on the same day, around the same time, are ridiculously high.’ ‘I don’t know who else it is that could have been attacked, I just know that Wild’s the one that attacked Amy.’ There wasn’t so much as a trace of doubt in Mitchell’s voice. ‘That lawyer of his may have forced me to let him go, again - anger flashed in his eyes as he thought about that - but I’m gonna prove it’s him. I’m gonna prove it’s him, and I’m gonna put him away for the rest of his life. I’d better go and let Cecil and the Inspector know what’s happened.’ He stalked away down the passage to his office. Melissa started after Mitchell, it was unbelievable to her that she couldn’t see a way to make him accept that someone else might be responsible for the disappearance of Amy and the murders of Lynne and Lily. When he disappeared into his office, she pushed aside her concerns, temporarily anyway, and got on with the end of shift chores so she could get out of there and, hopefully, relax for a bit. The chores were done, and Melissa was on her way past Mitchell’s office, when she heard something that made her stop in her tracks. ‘…do anything to him and I’ll have to arrest you,’ Mitchell said in a low voice that was clearly intended not to be heard by anyone other than who he was on the phone with. ‘I know you’re angry he’s been let go. I’m angry too; I didn’t want to let him go, but he’s got an alibi that makes it look as though he couldn’t have taken Amy - his lawyer used that to force me to let him go.’ Based on what her superior was saying, Melissa guessed he was speaking to Cecil Wright, who was so angry that Jack Wild had been released, and ready to make good on the threat he had made at the farm. She hoped that any threats he was making towards Jack Wild were just that, threats; the last thing the village needed, in her opinion, was a revenge attack against the author, especially after Ollie’s attack the night before. ‘I’m telling you, it’s not my fault,’ Mitchell insisted after allowing the person on the other end of the call a chance to speak. ‘If it was up to me, he’d be in a cell, and wouldn’t be getting out.’ There was another pause then, followed by, ‘I have no idea how he managed to fake an alibi, he had plenty of time to set it up, though,’ and then, ‘No, we don’t know where Amy is, I’m sorry, I truly am. What did you expect me to do, beat the truth out of him? I’m in enough trouble as it is for the mess we made of Wild when we arrested him, I could lose my job over it. His lawyer’s talking about writing to the chief constable. It we’d beaten him up any more seriously, he’d have ended up in hospital, then there wouldn’t be any question about it, I’d lose my job.’ Melissa stopped breathing at that point as she made sure she didn’t make a sound. She hadn’t want to be caught listening to her superior’s conversation before then, but now that he had all but admitted that he had taken part in assaulting a suspect, she was certain that getting caught was likely to be very bad for her. ‘Of course I don’t want him to get away with it,’ Mitchell snapped. ‘There’s nothing I can do, though, expect keep looking for Amy, and for evidence that will help me prove he’s the guy doing all of this. The post - mortems should be done tomorrow, and with a bit of luck, we’ll get some of the forensics reports, then I’ll be able to arrest Wild again, and this time I’ll be able to charge him - once I charge him, he’s bound to tell me where Amy is. What make you say that?’ Melissa was torn between walking away before she could be discovered, and staying where she was so that she could hear more, in case sergeant Mitchell was going to say something else that it might be important for her to know. ‘If she is already dead, there’s nothing you can do about it, Cecil,’ Mitchell said, confirming to Melissa, albeit unknowingly, who he was talking to. ‘And nothing you do will bring her back.’ There was a brief pause as he listened to what his friend said. ‘Maybe it will make you feel better, for a short while, but what about after that? You’ll be a murderer, you’ll be in trouble, and so will I, because you’ve told me what you’re planning. I told you what’s happened because I didn’t want you to hear it from someone else; I owe you that. Now go to bed and try not to think too much about what’s happened, it won’t make you feel any better.’ Sensing that her superior’s phone call was coming to an end, Melissa slipped away. She grabbed her things from her locker, and left the station as hastily as he could, before Mitchell saw that she was still around and could have overheard his conversation. Cecil slammed the phone down angrily, not caring that he was in danger of breaking it, and stood there in the darkness of the living room, his mind racing. He was so lost in his thoughts that he didn’t hear the footsteps on the stairs, he had no idea his son was there until he spoke. ‘What’s up?’ Kerwin asked from the doorway of the living room. Having been woken by the ringing of the phone, he had arrived in time to hear part of the call, enough to know that something was up, without knowing what. Cecil scowled as he turned towards the doorway and his son. “That was Venter,’ he said. ‘He’s had to let Wild go, again!’ ‘What the hell! SO, he kills Lynne and Lily and he kidnaps Amy, but he’s still free? What the hell does he have to do before Venter puts him away where he belongs?’ “He said Wild’s got some kind of alibi; he can’t prove it’s fake at the moment, but he will, and when he does he’ll arrest Wild again, which’ll be too late for your sisters. It’s probably too late for her already.’ The expression on his face was a mixture of anger and frustration, and his hands were clenching and unclenching themselves into fists; he looked around the dark room as though searching for something to either throw or smash. Kerwin was reluctant to draw attention to himself, when it was obvious that his father was looking for something on which to vent his feelings, he couldn’t help asking, however. ‘What are you going to do?’ Given the way his father was fidgeting about, Kerwin was sure he was planning on doing something, even if he didn’t quite decided what. ‘I don’t know,’ Cecil admitted. ‘You go on up to bed, though, I’ll be alright, I just want some time to think.’ It was hard to tell the passage of time at night with nothing to provide a frame of reference, but about fifteen minutes later, Kerwin watched from the window of his sister’s bedroom as his father crossed the yard and started down the road. He hadn’t heard the front door either open or close, but he hadn’t needed to, he had already been in Amy’s room, anticipating, and waiting for, his father to leave the house and take matters into his own hands, which the shotgun he appeared to be carrying strongly suggested what he was going to do……