I Know You Know Read online

  “He was the best friend of the victims.”

  “Exactly.”

  “What did he want?”

  “He’s come back to Bristol to do an investigation of his own into the case.”

  “An investigation of his own?”

  Fletcher shrugs.

  “What did he want from you?” Mary asks.

  “Cooperation. Information.”

  “But you can’t share anything.”

  “I told him that. And I told him what he’s doing is going to upset a lot of people. With consequences, potentially.”

  “Why’s he doing it? Why now?”

  “He wants closure.” Fletcher understands that a longing for closure can become a noose that cannot easily be lifted from the necks of the victims’ families.

  She exhales audibly. “Closure. Wow. Good luck to him. But I think it’s a Pandora’s box. He’s crazy.”

  “He says he’s going to speak to Howard Smail.”

  “Smail won’t talk.”

  “That’s what I told him, but Swift said he’d already approached him and got an encouraging response.”

  “Do you believe him?”

  “No.”

  “Me neither.”

  “But never say never.”

  Mary pauses before she says, “Well, shit.”

  Fletcher doesn’t think he’s heard Mary swear before, but if ever there was a reason to, it’s the possibility that disgraced ex–Detective Superintendent Howard Smail might be spilling the beans in public about this case. Mary is still shaking her head in disbelief as they move out of the lab and into her office next door. “Coffee?” she asks.

  Fletcher accepts because he always does, though when she turns her back on him to prepare it, he grimaces in anticipation of the fact that she won’t add sugar. He didn’t have the courage to ask for it when he first met her, twenty years ago, and now it’s way too late to correct that mistake.

  “Get Detective Inspector Fletcher a coffee, will you, Mary,” the senior forensic pathologist says. She glowers at him and Fletcher badly wants to say, “No, it’s okay, I’m fine, I’ve changed my mind,” but the truth is, he’s asked for a coffee to delay having to enter the room where the autopsies are conducted. He’s witnessed autopsies before, but this time it’s different because the child died in his own arms.

  “Are you asking me because I’m a woman?” Mary replies. She’s already partway into getting gowned up. Lab technicians are moving purposefully around the autopsy room behind them. Through the windows set into the door, Fletcher can see one of them preparing equipment and the other rolling a gurney over to the bank of numbered refrigerators to retrieve the second body. The first lies under a shroud on one of the tables.

  “I’m asking you because you’re the most junior person in the room,” the senior pathologist tells her. He’s devoid of charm and humor and known to be a misogynist. Mary Hayward’s got her work cut out with him as her boss, Fletcher thinks.

  She exudes a quiet fury as she marches down the corridor to a room where a hot water tap dispenses scorching steam into a mug. When it’s full, she dumps two scoops of instant coffee and a teaspoon into it and hands it to him ungraciously. She watches as he blows the liquid cautiously and takes a sip because he feels obliged to show gratitude. It scalds his mouth. He wants to ask her if there’s any sugar, but he doesn’t dare.

  “Drink up,” she says. “We’re about to start. Excuse me, please.”

  He shuffles aside and follows her out of the kitchenette and down the corridor. “Sorry,” he says as he struggles to keep pace with her. “I could have got this myself.”

  “Well, why would you do that when there’s somebody in a skirt to do it for you? I’ll see you in there.”

  He is about to follow her through a set of doors that lead back toward the autopsy room when she points to a sign on the wall that says NO HOT DRINKS. He looks around for somewhere to dump the coffee. A potted plant that seems as if it’s already leading a dismal life does the trick. He empties the liquid out and lodges the mug into the steaming soil before following her through the double doors.

  The mood’s grim in the autopsy room. Sometimes there’s a bit of banter between the pathologists, their assistants, and the technicians, but not today. The bodies of the two murdered boys are laid out on tables set at right angles to each other. Nobody’s expecting any other result than confirmation that the boys died of the brutal beating they received.

  Fletcher volunteered to be here because he wants to be part of every stage of the boys’ journey until whoever did this is brought to justice. The sight of the bodies on the tables stokes the fire that their discovery lit in him yesterday. He’s only a year out of Bramshill—the police training college—and already a detective inspector. He didn’t earn a fast-track promotion by sitting around scratching his ass. He’s known to get results. He doesn’t know the meaning of working hours. He lives the job.

  It feels crowded in the room. It helps him cope. The pathologists and their assistants move methodically around the bodies as they work in a well-rehearsed choreography. They periodically obscure the boys’ bodies from Fletcher’s view. He’s able to breathe relatively normally only when that happens. Otherwise, he’s mostly holding his breath.

  He experiences the autopsies as a collection of unpleasant sensations: the rasp of the pathologist’s scissors as they cut through skin and the more businesslike sound of the clippers that they use to tackle the small rib cages; metal trays and implements clashing and water gushing. There’s blood. One of the taps squeaks as it’s turned on and off. The pathologists record their findings verbally in an incantation of technical jargon that partly alleviates the violence of the examinations, but not enough. Fletcher can’t keep his eyes fixed on anything that’s happening on the tables. He tries to because he doesn’t want to lose face, but his gaze flutters away and settles anywhere else: the drainage channels set into the floor, the stained grouting, the pale white shins of Dr. Mary Howard, reluctant maker of coffee, who’s assisting at the table where they’re working on the boy Fletcher now knows is called Charlie Paige. The boy who died in Fletcher’s arms.

  By the time the pathologist working on Charlie confirms that from an initial inspection the child does appear to have died as a result of his head injuries, Fletcher’s on the point of having to bolt, wondering if the potted plant on the other side of the door will accommodate the contents of his stomach as well as his coffee. He is pathetically grateful when a lab administrator beckons him out of the room.

  In the corridor a man leans against the wall. He’s tall, sinewy, and dapper. Fletcher draws in breath sharply and hopes the intense nausea he’s been feeling doesn’t show on his face. He respects this man.

  Detective Superintendent Howard Smail is talking on a mobile phone. They haven’t been issued at Fletcher’s rank, but the top dogs have them. Smail finishes the call promptly when he sees Fletcher and says, “Take a walk with me.”

  They step outside. It’s only 6:30 A.M. The boys’ autopsies have been fitted in before the scheduled ones. The hot weather broke overnight. Thunder and rain rattled the city during the dark hours, and although the storm has moved on, the air still feels heavy and oppressive. Since Fletcher’s been in the autopsy room, a thin band of light has broken the night’s darkness beyond the hospital car park, but it is feebly pale and only just bright enough to describe the turbulent clouds overhead. Fletcher watches Smail carefully, wondering what he wants. It’s unusual for somebody of his seniority to attend an autopsy.

  “Brutal in there?” Smail asks. His crisp features are tempered by a profusion of deeply pitted acne scars spread across both cheeks.

  Fletcher nods.

  “I’ll be working this case as senior investigating officer,” Smail says.

  Fletcher is not surprised. This is going to be a high-profile case: a Category A murder investigation, the most serious kind. He figures he’s about to be sent on his way, but Smail says, “I’d like
you to join me on the case as my deputy. I’ve heard very good things about your work.”

  Fletcher tries not to let his surprise show. There are officers with years more of service whom you would have put your money on to get the role. His nausea and fatigue vanish instantly, replaced by a feeling of triumph.

  “Thank you, sir. I’m delighted to have the opportunity. It goes without saying that I’ll do my very best. Thank you.” I’ve arrived, he thinks. A drop of rain hits the concrete pathway they’re standing on.

  “The murder of a child is the hardest sort of case,” Smail tells him, as if Fletcher didn’t already know it, as if that child hadn’t died in his arms.

  “I understand, sir,” he says.

  “When a kid gets murdered, it’s never just about one life. It’s about everybody. It hits people at their core. It makes every aspect of life feel unsafe. Until I catch who did this, it’s going to feel as if the bogeyman has moved in with every family on that estate, and probably in the rest of this city, too.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “My investigation will not stop until we find who did this. It will be meticulous; we will leave no stone unturned. All my men are going to live this until we solve it.” Smail has intense blue eyes. Fletcher feels as if he’s being pinned against a wall by the other man’s gaze.

  “Yes, sir!” he agrees, though it bothers him that Smail is referring to the case as my investigation and referring to the team as my men. Most officers use the terms we and us, Fletcher included.

  “Get back to the station and do what you have to do so you can make an immediate start on this. I’ll speak to the pathologist and join you there. I’ll be working on selecting the rest of my team.”

  “What about DC Fryer?”

  “Danny Fryer?”

  “He was with me when we found the bodies. He’s a good detective, sir.”

  “If you say so, that’s enough for me, but everybody on my team must pull their weight. No exceptions.”

  “Understood. Thank you, sir.”

  After they part, Fletcher feels good about getting Danny on the team. He’s always looked out for Danny Fryer. They’ve been friends since school. They have a strong bond. Fletcher plans to have a word with Danny as soon as he gets to the office. He’ll warn Danny that Smail seems to be a stickler and tell him now is the time to put his best foot forward.

  Fletcher finds his car and begins the drive to Southmead Police Station, where the Criminal Investigations Department is based on a small campus of redbrick buildings that are no longer fit for the purpose. As he cuts into the city traffic, still light because of the early hour, his hands tighten around the steering wheel. For the first time in his professional life, he has landed in the arena where the big boys fight, and if he knows one thing, it’s that he’s ready to prove himself.

  It’s Time to Tell

  Episode 2—Home, but Not Home

  “Good morning. It’s seven o’clock on Monday, 19 August. The headlines. Police were called last night to the Glenfrome Estate in Eastville, where two boys, ten-year-old Charlie Paige and eleven-year-old Scott Ashby, have gone missing. The boys were last seen at around eight P.M. walking down Primrose Lane on the estate. Police and residents have been searching through the night to find them. Our reporter, Joshua Ankers, is at the scene.”

  “Good morning. The Glenfrome Estate has had its share of troubles over the years as residents and local police have not always seen eye to eye, but this morning, scenes here tell a story of cooperation. Residents and police have been working together throughout the night to search for missing boys Charlie Paige and Scott Ashby, who we believe were last seen walking down this lane at around eight P.M. yesterday evening. Police are issuing an urgent appeal to the public for anybody who might have seen the boys, or know of their whereabouts, to come forward.”

  My name is Cody Swift. I’m a filmmaker and your host of It’s Time to Tell, a Dishlicker Podcast Production. What you just heard was a clip from the BBC’s local news service on the morning of Monday, 19 August, around seven and a half hours after my friends Charlie and Scott were reported missing.

  I have a question for you: what does going home mean to you? And by that, I don’t mean the home you’ve built for yourself or found yourself in since you’ve become an adult. I mean your childhood home. Was it a refuge? A sweet, safe place where you felt loved? Or was it a place of uncertainty or even fear? Whichever it was, there are doubtless a whole host of complicated memories you have to deal with whenever you return.

  I’m standing in front of a small bungalow in a suburban area of Bristol I’m not very familiar with. Most of the properties on this street are occupied by elderly people. It’s where you might choose to spend your twilight years if you want a manageable property, a driveway to wash your car on, and a patch of lawn to tend out front. It’s peaceful. Under my feet is a green mat swarming with plastic tendrils. It has the word Welcome picked out on it in white. As I wait for the door to be answered, I’m being watched by three small ceramic garden gnomes painted in garish colors. They’re pretty creepy.

  After I went away to college, my parents moved here from the Glenfrome Estate, the place I was born in and grew up in, and where the murders happened. This compact, tidy space is my family home now, even though I’ve never lived here. Even so, whenever I visit, my parents and all of their familiar belongings exert a strange bittersweet pull on me, tugging me back to the past. I’m home, but not home.

  “Come on in, my love. Tea? Coffee? Down, Muffy!”

  That’s my mum talking and it’s Muffy you can hear barking. Muffy is a little white fluffy dog that is about as big as my shoe. She doesn’t like me. Mum settles the dog and makes tea. We sit by a window through which we have a view of an immaculate back garden. There’s a many-tiered fountain constructed out of shiny bowls and smooth pebbles, and flowerbeds packed with shrubs and bulbs. The plot is enclosed by a shoulder-height wooden fence, and the neighbors’ properties are close by.

  My dad, Ted, had a stroke a few years back and my mum is his full-time carer. He’s sitting with us, but he struggles to move and talk.

  I start by asking Mum why they moved away from the estate, to live here, ten years ago.

  “I don’t know why we didn’t do it earlier. The estate was never the same after the murders. Even though they put that Noyce fellow away for it, the place felt different afterward, sort of unhealthy. Before the murders, you felt like it was a place you could raise a family. It wasn’t perfect, I’m not saying that, there were problems, but people did look out for each other. You could have a decent life there.”

  I want to talk to Mum about the murders because she knew most of the people involved as well or much better than I did, and I’m curious to know what she remembers and how she feels about it. This will be the first time we’ve discussed the murders since I’ve become an adult.

  I ask Mum to start by telling me about the day it happened.

  “It was a Sunday, and it was such a hot day. You’ll remember that. Hot enough so as you’d stick to the chair if you sat down for too long and your blood felt like sludge in your veins. Morning time, we had bacon butties for breakfast because your dad got paid on the Friday.”

  My dad’s head shifts slightly. It is the best he can do to nod his acknowledgment of what she’s saying. Mum reaches out to pat his arm before continuing.

  “Scott and Charlie called round after lunchtime, and you went off with them, and I said, ‘If you’re going to wear that T-shirt, don’t go hanging around that playground,’ but of course that’s exactly where you went, trust you. I stayed home, up to my arms in strawberries because your dad brought home a crate from the market the night before. Do you remember, Ted? You got them for a quid because they were on the turn, but it started to rain when you were bringing them home and all that red juice leaked out the bottom of the crate and down your trousers. It looked like blood. You didn’t even notice until you got home. We laughed about that, how it made you
look like a bloody serial killer, but of course it didn’t seem so funny later.”

  Scott and Charlie’s injuries were horrendous. They were so brutal that I won’t be describing them in detail on air. As a kid, I wasn’t aware of this. The adults kept that information from me for as long as possible. Mum continues:

  “I spent the afternoon making jam and thinking that only a fool would be doing that on such a hot day, but the strawberries would have spoiled if I didn’t. Your dad went down the club for a snooker game in the afternoon. You and Charlie and Scott came back to the flat at five after I called you in. I made you some sandwiches . . . Sorry, love, this is hard. Anyway, after you had your tea, I saw that rip in your T-shirt when the three of you were putting your shoes on to go back out. You were trying to hide it, but you weren’t doing a very good job. I felt so cross with you about ripping it, I didn’t let you go back out with Scott and Charlie. I thank God for that every day.”

  These are difficult memories for both me and for Mum. She dabs at her eyes with a lace-edged handkerchief and fingers a small gold cross hanging on a narrow chain around her neck. She’s been a churchgoer all her life, though she struggled to persuade Dad or me to join her. Dad agreed to a church wedding only on condition he never had to set foot in the place again.

  “We watched television that night, do you remember? It was too hot to do anything else. I remember we had the door onto the balcony open and all the windows, but it was still baking inside. I wanted you to help me with my crossword puzzles because you were good with words, but you wouldn’t answer when I read out the clues because you were cross with me for grounding you. I remember the cat was trying to catch flies in the window and there were hot air balloons in the sky because it was the balloon festival that weekend. Your dad got home just after dark—just before ten, I think it was. He sent you to bed and me and him weren’t sat there long before the phone rang. It was Annette.”

  Mum is referring to Annette Ashby, Scott’s mother. Annette was one of Mum’s best friends on the estate. As I was listening to Mum, it occurred to me that memory is a funny thing. I remember some of the things she mentions, but not all of them. I don’t remember the cat or the crossword puzzles. I do remember feeling hard done by because I was stuck inside with her. I remember the estate dogs barking at dusk like they always did and the lights coming on in the building opposite. I remember the sounds of other people’s TVs and the smell of barbecue. I don’t remember the phone call. I fell asleep to a small, noisy fan in my bedroom. It drowned out the noise of the phone.