A Wreath for my Sister Read online

  She flushed. ‘OK,’ she said. ‘Bring him in in a minute. I want to have a word with you first.’ And she related her thoughts to him.

  ‘And this Leanne’s living with Agnew?’ he asked.

  Joanna nodded.

  Mike’s eyebrows shot up. ‘What a beggar of a little case, Jo,’ he said.

  ‘I’ll call round to Pelham’s home this evening,’ she said. ‘Just ask him a few questions ... see if anything was left out of his original statements.’ She met his eyes. ‘But I admit I’m worried. We know about two – Sharon and Stacey. What if there are more that we just don’t know about?’

  She sat back in her chair. ‘Do you know how many missing women there have been in this area in the last three years?’

  Mike shrugged. ‘Sixty?’ he guessed.

  ‘One hundred and eighty,’ she said. ‘About sixty a year – young women who have disappeared and never turned up again.’

  She paused. ‘Now you know, Mike, most of these leave after family arguments and they’ve simply filtered through to big cities ... London, Manchester ... some of them abroad. Most of the women I’m sure are still alive. But they’re a vulnerable group. Vulnerable and mobile, hard to trace. And if anything had happened to even three a year, who would know? We wouldn’t, and neither would their families. So we don’t know what we’ve got on our hands. A man who’s killed twice – or more? And if more, how many more?’

  He shifted uneasily and she spoke again. ‘Exactly. So we’d better get our fingers out and find who’s responsible.’

  She jerked her thumb towards the door. ‘What about him, Mike?’

  He made a face, shook his head. ‘Fits in some ways,’ he said. ‘A bit pathetic – dominated. But no, I don’t think so, somehow.’

  ‘Why not?’ She looked curiously at him.

  He took a deep breath. ‘I can’t see Sharon Priest even being tempted by a guy like that. She wouldn’t have gone off with him. She would have gone home.’

  Joanna nodded. She moved to the window and stared out. Perhaps it had been bad planning to extend the Police station in such a way that her own office window looked on to nothing but a painted brick wall. It was a little too symbolic. But they weren’t meeting a brick wall in this case. It was more a case of catacombs, long dark tunnels ... too many of them. And only one would eventually lead to the man who had met Sharon that night at the Quiet Woman.

  She gave a heartfelt sigh before turning back to Mike. ‘We’ll use the large interview room,’ she said. ‘Did you say his wife is with him?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Does he want a solicitor?’

  ‘He says not. His wife is the only person he wants to witness what he has to say.’

  She nodded and together she and Mike walked along the corridor to the interview room.

  She looked curiously at the short, balding man with a meek air, dressed in a cheap grey suit and pink tie, and at the square, determined character dressed in ugly woollen clothes who was his wife.

  ‘Mr Donovan?’ she asked, placing the shoe on the desk.

  The man nodded. It was only then that she realized that desperation had made this man come here today. He was trembling and pale. She sat down opposite him and watched him sweat.

  ‘Are you the person in charge of this case?’ His voice squeaked with nervousness. She met his eyes and he flushed. ‘Can I speak to a man officer?’

  She leaned forward. ‘No, Mr Donovan,’ she said. ‘No, you can’t. I am in the middle of a murder investigation. A young woman’s body was found raped and garrotted in the snow a week ago.’ She slammed the shoe down on the desk. ‘I think this was her shoe. I want to know how you acquired it. And I also want to know why you hung on to it when it is evidence.’

  Donovan licked dry lips.

  ‘Pictures of this shoe have appeared in all the major papers.’ She watched him squirm. ‘You take a paper?’

  The hatchet-faced woman spoke, smoothing her billowing skirt towards her ankles. ‘We do,’ she said. ‘He saw it.’

  There was no empathy in her voice. She would not save his head from rolling.

  Joanna paused, then nodded to Mike. ‘Right,’ she said. She flicked on the tape recorder.

  ‘Mr Andrew Donovan, you are being questioned in connection with the rape and murder of Sharon Priest on the twenty-eighth of September nineteen ninety-six. You do not have to say anything. But it may harm your defence if you do not mention when questioned something which you may later rely on in court. Anything you do say may be given in evidence.’ She gave Donovan a hard look. ‘Understand?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘I am Detective Inspector Piercy. Also present is Detective Sergeant Korpanski. You wish to make a statement?’

  Donovan looked around like a mouse when the trap snaps. ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘I do.’

  ‘You understand you have the right to have a solicitor present?’

  Again he nodded. ‘I don’t want one. I just want my wife to hear everything I’ve got to say. The whole bloody lot,’ he said desperately.

  And that was what made Joanna suddenly turn her interest even more intensely on the man. Was he the one? She gave Mike a quick glance and saw he too was startled. Was this case about to be cracked by a confession from a quiet, seedy little man with cheap, flashy clothes and an over-dominant wife?

  Mrs Donovan stood over her husband. ‘Get on with it, Andrew,’ she said, giving Joanna an angry glance. ‘It seems my husband,’ she said through clenched teeth, ‘enjoys masturbating with a tart’s shoe.’

  ‘Be quiet, Mrs Donovan,’ Joanna reacted angrily. ‘Your husband is the one we want the statement from, please, not you.’

  The woman folded her arms and glared at Joanna from her chair in the corner.

  Joanna turned her attention to the man, who was now fingering his collar as though he was about to choke.

  ‘Where did you get the shoe from?’ she asked.

  He blinked. ‘Last week,’ he said timidly. ‘It was a Wednesday.’ He stopped and swallowed and Joanna considered offering him a glass of water. But she hardened her heart. Let him wait.

  ‘It was the morning after the heavy snow,’ he said. ‘I had to cross the moors to Buxton. I had a meeting there.’

  ‘Go on.’

  Already she knew she was to be disappointed. This was to be no confession to major crimes but a sordid little story, of tacky habits and sexual perversion.

  ‘At the top – near the farm – I got stuck in a drift.’ He hesitated and risked a quick glance over his shoulder at his wife. ‘I always take a shovel,’ he said.

  Mike couldn’t risk a quick dig. ‘Very wise, Mr Donovan,’ he said.

  ‘I was digging myself out, and I saw something in the snow.’ Again he paused. ‘Do you think I could have a drink of water?’

  ‘In a minute,’ Joanna said brusquely.

  ‘I think the snowplough must have chucked it up,’ he said. ‘You know – it was sort of sticking half in the bank.’

  ‘And?’

  Donovan winced. ‘I thought it was pretty.’

  Behind him his wife gave a snort.

  ‘I sort of ... I put it in my car, took it home.’

  ‘Why?’

  He looked around the room and found Mike’s eyes – impassive. ‘It reminded me of ... pretty girls,’ he said and stared at the floor.

  ‘I see.’ Joanna moved the shoe towards him. Both were aware of the stains.

  She met his eyes. ‘Did you know,’ Joanna asked quietly, ‘that this shoe belonged to a girl who had been raped? Raped and then a wire cable pulled tight around her neck?’

  Donovan licked his lips and nodded. ‘Yes.’

  ‘Did you see any sign of the girl?’

  Donovan leaned across the interview table. ‘I didn’t see anything,’ he said desperately. ‘I was in a hurry. I was worried about getting through to Buxton.’

  All four of them looked back at the shoe.

  ‘Didn’t you wonder at the ti
me, Mr Donovan, how it had got there?’

  ‘I thought her car must have got stuck – broken down.’

  ‘Did you see a car?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Did you see anything?’

  ‘No ... No, nothing. Only the shoe. That’s all I saw.’

  ‘Why didn’t you bring it in when you’d seen the newspaper reports?’

  ‘It wasn’t going to help you,’ he said desperately. ‘It didn’t have anything to tell you.’

  ‘No? We would have liked to be the ones to judge that for ourselves,’ Joanna said before adding softly, ‘Why today, Mr Donovan?’

  He looked startled. ‘What do you mean? I’ve come forward, haven’t I? No one forced me to come.’ He looked at her with a touch of bravado. ‘You didn’t know I had it. You’d never have known if I hadn’t come forward.’

  ‘No, we wouldn’t have known. But Sharon Priest died a week ago today. We’ve had a lot of men searching everywhere for this shoe. It’s been well publicized.’ Again she asked the same question but this time a touch more aggressively. ‘Why now, Mr Donovan? Why have you come here today?’

  It was the wife who answered. ‘Because I found him doing disgusting things with it. That’s why. He only came here because of what I would think. I thought he might have killed her.’ She looked at him with a fierce hatred. ‘I thought he might be the one. The girl was raped, wasn’t she?’

  ‘Please, be quiet, Lizzie,’ Donovan said. ‘Sit down.’

  Lizzie Donovan gaped at her husband. She flushed. An angry light appeared in her eyes. She pressed her lips together and sat back heavily in her chair.

  Joanna stared at the small, pale man. ‘And you weren’t concerned about the shoe’s owner?’

  He blinked. ‘At first,’ he said. ‘But I thought she must have got stuck and had managed to get free.’ He stopped. ‘All I knew was, she wasn’t up there.’ He looked at her. ‘I called,’ he said. And Joanna had a vivid picture of the man, holding the shoe, calling across the snowy expanse of moors.

  She leaned forward. ‘You were holding the shoe?’

  ‘Yes.’ He stared at her. ‘It reminded me of Cinderella. The glass slipper.’ His eyes rested on the shoe.

  The letter that had tempted Sharon to meet her killer at the Quiet Woman had promised her Prince Charming.

  Joanna looked again at Andrew Donovan. ‘You knew Sharon Priest?’

  He shook his head violently. ‘No. I didn’t know the girl.’

  ‘She had a baby, supposedly by a married man, Mr Donovan.’

  Lizzie Donovan was sitting on the edge of her seat, her head whipping from one to the other.

  ‘Were you that married man, Mr Donovan?’

  ‘No ...’ Again he shook his head. ‘No. I never ever met her.’

  Joanna glanced from the high-heeled black shoe with its diamanté buckle to Lizzie Donovan’s podgy ankles spilling over their brown brogues. And in a flash she knew why the shoe had exerted such influence over Andrew Donovan.

  He was looking defiantly at Joanna now. ‘I knew she couldn’t possibly have walked anywhere, not in these.’ Again he stretched his finger and thumb to the height of the heel. ‘And I wondered what sort of woman would wear this kind of shoe across the moors on a snowy night.’

  ‘Whore!’ spat Lizzie Donovan.

  Mike spluttered. Joanna looked at him sharply.

  It was strange how the shoe sat, high heeled and elegant, in the centre of the desk, dominating the whole interview almost haughtily.

  ‘I just wondered ...’ he said apologetically.

  His eyes were cold, with tiny, pin-pointed pupils. When he looked at her Joanna felt uneasy. She watched him.

  Mike leaned right across the desk. ‘Come on, Donovan,’ he said softly. ‘You must have had some kind of a picture what she was like.’

  Now Donovan looked rattled. He leaned back, away from Mike and blinked unhappily. ‘No, sir,’ he said. ‘I didn’t think.’

  ‘I put it to you that you did,’ Mike said. ‘In fact I think you thought that the girl who wore these shoes was attractive.’ He too put out a hand and touched the shoe, then stared hard at Donovan. ‘In fact you fancied her so much you raped her then stuck the wire round her neck and twisted it. Didn’t you?’

  Now Donovan was terrified. ‘I didn’t,’ he said. ‘I didn’t. I promise you.’

  Lizzie Donovan was looking on pityingly without saying a word. She merely sat, watching impassively.

  ‘Where were you on the Tuesday night that Sharon Priest was killed?’ pressed Joanna.

  Donovan stared at her.

  ‘Mr Donovan,’ she said. ‘I really think you should acquire the services of a solicitor, don’t you?’

  The little man nodded.

  ‘Will I be charged?’

  ‘Yes. Charges relating to concealment of evidence and wasting police time,’ she said. ‘And we’ll be testing samples from the dead girl’s body to see whether they match up with your body samples.’

  Donovan looked pleadingly at Joanna, but she met his eyes with frank dislike.

  Joanna took Mike outside the interview room. ‘Well?’ she said. ‘What do you think? Did he do it?’

  Mike frowned. ‘He could have. He was up there – on the moors at some time. He could have been the one who made the date.’

  ‘You think she met Donovan that night at the Quiet Woman?’ She looked at him dubiously. ‘And he kept her shoe?’

  He shrugged. ‘I’m just saying it’s a possibility, Joanna.’

  ‘And he was the one who killed Stacey?’

  His dark eyes were appealing to her.

  ‘I don’t think it, somehow,’ she said. ‘I don’t think he’s clever enough.’ She stopped and frowned. ‘He doesn’t fit my image of our killer. He seems – pathetic ... seedy. I can’t picture him as a rapist. But we’d better get his car in,’ she said. ‘He denies knowing Sharon at all – Therefore there should be nothing of her in that car. No hair ... nothing. And let’s get the shoe down to the lab.’

  She could not help the feeling of anti-climax.

  ‘In the meantime, I suppose I’d better make that visit to Randall Pelham.’

  The solicitor lived in a smart, Edwardian detached house on the Buxton road. Painted black and white with a pretty verandah, it had an air of genteel elegance.

  She parked her car in the drive behind a black Jaguar and knocked on the stout oak door.

  Elspeth Pelham answered the door. She looked at Joanna resignedly. ‘Every time I see the police,’ she said, ‘I have a feeling of deja-vu, as though Deborah only left yesterday.’ The strain on her face was painful as she looked at Joanna. ‘My husband,’ she said with difficulty, ‘believes she is alive, Inspector.’ Her eyes looked haunted as she spoke. ‘What woman would abandon a child?’

  Joanna shifted uneasily.

  ‘Sebastian is such a sweet little boy,’ Elspeth Pelham continued, then she clutched at Joanna’s arm. ‘Deborah’s dead, isn’t she?’

  Joanna touched the woman’s shoulder. ‘We think she might be,’ she said.

  Mrs Pelham’s eyes filled with tears. ‘Do you have children, Inspector?’

  Joanna shook her head.

  ‘Children are pain,’ she said, ‘with the tiniest amount of pleasure thrown in.’ She turned round then and Joanna followed her into the house.

  The hall was gloomy, panelled in some dark wood. A wide mahogany staircase led up and divided left and right in front of a beautiful stained-glass window depicting two sheep with a lamb.

  Randall Pelham stood in the living-room doorway staring at her. He tightened his lips, stood back and the three of them entered the room.

  The newspaper was casually dropped on the sofa, its headlines glaring: ‘Police question man about Sharon killing.’

  He turned to her. ‘What do you have to tell me?’

  She looked at him helplessly.

  ‘Don’t spare us,’ he said. ‘Please, Inspector ... Nothing could be worse t
han not knowing.’ He stopped. ‘If our daughter is dead we would wish to give her a decent Christian burial. You understand?’

  She nodded. ‘I need to check some facts with you about the circumstances surrounding your daughter’s disappearance,’ she said. She paused. ‘Anything I say to you is confidential – you understand?’

  They both nodded. They were sitting together, on the sofa. An elderly couple whose one daughter had disappeared. And the tragedy clung around them like a fog.

  Joanna pressed on. ‘This girl – Sharon Priest. Have you ever heard her name before?’

  They shook their heads.

  ‘Your daughter never mentioned that name?’

  Again a negative.

  ‘The man who killed Sharon had killed another girl before – another young woman. She was from Macclesfield.’

  The couple’s eyes were fixed on her face.

  ‘That was eighteen months ago,’ she said, then paused again. ‘Does the name Leanne Ferry mean anything to you?’

  This brought recognition. ‘She was a so-called friend of Deborah’s,’ Randall Pelham said gruffly. ‘A feminist – a girl who made Deborah discontented.’ Then he looked at Joanna shrewdly. ‘What’s the connection, Inspector?’

  ‘She now lives with Sharon Priest’s ex-boyfriend.’

  Elspeth Pelham gave a tiny gasp. ‘Oh.’

  ‘These two facts make me a little uneasy about your daughter,’ she said. ‘Frankly, the police originally thought Deborah had walked out on her family – both you and her son.’ She stopped. ‘Obviously this puts things in a different light.’

  The Pelhams were watching her as though hypnotized.

  ‘Is there anything you feel you want to add?’

  Still they sat, clutching each other’s hands.

  ‘Tell me about the day she disappeared.’

  ‘She asked a friend, Sandy Beastall,’ Elspeth told the story in a weary voice, ‘to look after Sebastian. She said she was going shopping. She wanted some new clothes and some underwear. The people at the market saw her. She did buy some things. The friend was meant to be baby-minding anyway that evening, because Deborah had a date.’

  Randall Pelham interrupted his wife. ‘We don’t know who the date was with and we never found out. Sandy said she was very excited. The last sighting was at three o’clock at the outdoor market. She was carrying some shopping bags.’