Playing With Fire

“Well,” said Templeton, “I could always get on to the authorities in Leeds. I’m sure their records go back that far.”

“And what do we do then? Check up on every student who attended Leeds Poly from 1978 to 1981? It’d be like looking for the proverbial needle in a haystack.”

“Can you think of any other way?”

“I’ve got an idea,” said Winsome.

A

“Friends Reunited dot com. I’m a member. I’ve used it before to locate people. I admit it’s a short cut, but it might help narrow things down a bit. Of course, you’ve only got the people who have taken the trouble to register on the site, but there’s a chance one of them might remember McMahon or Gardiner. We can send out an e-mail to everyone on the list who left Leeds Poly in 1981, asking if they knew a Thomas McMahon and a Roland Gardiner, and see what kind of response we get back. Plenty of people are constantly online these days, so if we’re lucky we might even get a speedy reply.”

“It’s worth a try,” said A

The interview room was the same as just about every interview room Banks had ever been in: small, high window covered by a grille, bare bulb similarly covered, metal table bolted to the floor. The institutional green paint looked fresh, though, and Banks fancied he could still smell traces of it in the stale air. Either that or the Scotch he had drunk with Ken Blackstone the previous night was giving him a headache. He massaged his temples.

Frances Aspern sat opposite Banks and DI Gary Bridges, who was not only wearing the same suit as he had last night, but looked as if he’d slept in it, too. Dressed in disposable navy overalls, Frances Aspern seemed listless and distant, and much older than she had when Banks first saw her. The dark circles under her eyes testified that she hadn’t slept, and she was fidgeting with a ring. Not her wedding ring, Banks noticed. That was gone.

“Are you ready to talk to us?” Bridges asked, when he had issued the caution and set the tape machine rolling.

Frances nodded, a faraway look in her eyes.

“Can you speak your answers out loud, please?” Bridges asked.

“Yes,” she said, in a small voice. “Sorry.”

“What happened last night?”

Frances paused so long before answering that Banks was begi

“What happened then?”

“I waited. A long time. I don’t know how long. Then I went downstairs. He was going to hurt the boy. I picked up his gun and shot him, then I cut the boy free and told him to go.”

“What about the fire?” DI Bridges asked.

“Fire cleanses,” she said. “I wanted to purify the house.”

“What did you use to start it?”

“Rubbing alcohol. It was on the table.”

“What happened?”

“The boy came back and put it out. I told him not to, but he didn’t listen. Then he made me sit down and he rang the police. I just felt so tired I didn’t care what happened, but I couldn’t sleep.”

“I’m trying to understand all this, Frances,” Bridges said. “Why did you kill your husband?”

Frances looked at Banks, not at Bridges, her eyes burning with tears now. “Because he was going to hurt the boy.”

“He was going to hurt Mark?” It was DI Bridges who spoke, but Frances continued to look at Banks.

“Yes,” she said. “Patrick is a cruel man. You must know that. He was going to hurt the boy. He was tied to the chair.”

“But why did he want to hurt Mark?” Bridges asked.

Slowly, Frances turned to face him, still fiddling with her ring. “Because of Christine,” she said. “The boy took Christine from him. Patrick couldn’t bear to lose.”

Banks felt a chill ripple up his spine. Bridges turned to him, looking confused. “DCI Banks,” he said, “you’re familiar with the background to this case. Is there anything you’d like to ask?”

Banks turned to Frances Aspern. “You’re saying that your husband was going to harm Mark because Mark lived with Christine on the boat, is that right?”

“Yes.”

“Did Patrick go to the boat last Thursday evening? Did he start the fire?”

Frances looked up sharply, surprised. “No,” she said. “No, we were at home. That much is true.”

“But was your husband sexually abusing Christine?”

The tears spilled over from Frances’s eyes and rolled down her cheeks, but she didn’t sob or wail. “Yes,” she said.

“For how long?”

“Since she was twelve. When she… you know, when she started to develop. He couldn’t stop touching her.”

“Why didn’t she stop him? She must have known what was happening, that it was wrong? She could have gone to the authorities.”

Frances wiped the tears from her eyes and cheeks with the sleeve of her overalls and gave Banks a what-do-you-know look. “He was the only father she had ever known,” she said. “He was strict with her when she was growing up. Always. She was terrified of him. She never dared disobey his demands.”

“And you knew about the sexual abuse from the start?”

“Yes. From very early on, at any rate.”

“How did you find out?”

“It’s not hard to recognize the signs, when you’re around all the time. Besides…”

“It happened with you, too?”

“How do you know?”

“I’m just guessing.”

She looked away. “I tried to tell Daddy, but I couldn’t. He wouldn’t have believed me, anyway, and if he had, it would have broken his heart.”

“So you did nothing about Christine, either?”

“How could I? I was terrified of him.”

“Even so, after your experiences, your own daughter…”

She slapped the table with her palm. “You’ve no idea how cruel Patrick could be. No idea.”

“Why? Did he hit you? Did he hit Christine?”

She shook her head. “No. What he did… it was worse than that, much worse. Cold, calculated.”

“What did he do?”

Frances looked away again, at a spot on the wall above Banks’s head, her eyes unfocused. “He… he knew chemicals.” She gave a harsh laugh. “Of course he did, he was a doctor, after all, wasn’t he?”

“What do you mean, Frances?”

She looked directly at Banks, her expression unfathomable. “Patrick knew drugs. Not illegal drugs. Prescriptions. What made you sleep. What made you stay awake. What made your heart beat like a frightened bird inside your chest. What made you sick. What made you have to go to the toilet all the time. What made your skin burn and your mouth dry.”

Banks understood. And wished he didn’t. He looked at Bridges, who seemed to have turned a shade paler. Just when he thought he’d seen and heard it all, dug about as deep as anyone can into the darkness of the human soul and remained sane, something else came along and knocked all his assumptions out of the window.

“Now you understand,” Frances Aspern said, a note of shrill triumph in her voice. “But even that wasn’t it. I could have stood the pain, the cruelty.”

“What was it, Frances?” Banks asked.

“My father. He worshiped Patrick. You know he did. You’ve talked to him. He rang us after you left. How could I tell him? It was like before, like I told you. Even if I could have made him believe, it would have broken his heart.”

“So for the sake of your father’s trust in Patrick Aspern you let your husband abuse both you and your daughter? Is that what you’re saying?”

“What else could I do? Surely you understand? If it came out what kind of man Patrick was, what he did, it would have destroyed my father. He’s not a strong man.”

He had looked healthy enough the other day, Banks thought, though appearances could be deceptive. But there was no point in pursuing this line of questioning. Whatever her reasons, Frances Aspern knew the enormity of what she had done, and she knew she had to live with the consequences.