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SEVEN

Gina and Jacob left their cars at the end of the road. She quickly finished eating a banana and placed the bagged skin in her handbag. Lunchtime had come and gone and Gina hoped that small offering to her stomach might just stop it rumbling. Parking was tight by Calvin Harris’s mid-terraced house.

‘They might be related,’ Jacob said, as if reading her mind. ‘Maybe John Doe is Calvin Harris’s son.’

Gina stepped from the pavement onto the mossy slabs that led to Mr Harris’s front door. The house had brand-new grey cladding all over the frontage and the front door stood proud from the facade, neatly decorated with a false leafy wreath. She knocked and several minutes later, a teen boy answered. A line of acne led from the crease of his nose to his forehead.

‘Hello, I’m DI Harte and this is DS Driscoll.’ They held their identification up. ‘Are your parents or guardians in?’

‘Er, my mum’s in the bath and my dad’s at work. I’ll call Mum. Come in.’ He stood away from the door and let them into the small but modern lounge. Gina stepped onto the shiny wooden floor as the young man called up the stairs. ‘Mum, the police are here to see you.’

‘Huh,’ the woman upstairs shouted, sounding as if she’d just woken up.

‘The police are here. I’ll make a drink.’ He came into the living room. ‘Do you want to sit?’

‘Thank you,’ Gina said as she and Jacob sat on the leather settee.

‘Can I get you a coffee or tea?’

Gina and Jacob both requested a coffee and the young man went into the kitchen, leaving them alone. Gina could hear footsteps above so she knew the woman wouldn’t be long.

She glanced around the room, taking in the wall of photos next to the television, wondering if she could spot a photo of their dead man, but she couldn’t. Calvin Harris may not even live in the same house any longer, but the occupants might know where he moved to.

The woman hurried down the stairs wearing a fluffy bathrobe, her hair gathered up in a pink towel. The boy came back in and placed two cups of coffee down on the glass table.

‘Thanks,’ Gina and Jacob murmured. ‘Can I take your name, please?’ Gina asked, as Jacob started heading up a page in his notepad.

‘Can you tell me what this is about first?’ She frowned and folded her arms.

‘We found a body this morning, and we need to ask if you know someone called Calvin Harris.’

This time she raised her brows. ‘I’m his daughter, but it can’t have been my dad you found; he’s been dead for nearly a decade.’

‘We know it wasn’t Mr Harris, but the man we found was using your father’s library card. We didn’t know he was dead, though; we were hoping to speak to him. Could I please take your name now?’

‘Josie Pickard.’

‘Do you know how someone could be in possession of your father’s library card after all these years?’

She sat on the armchair closest to the window and remained silent as she thought.

‘I remember Grandad mentioning being burgled years ago, Mum. Could it have been then?’ The boy kneeled on the floor, the other side of the coffee table.

Josie began fiddling with the tassels on a cushion. ‘Maybe.’

‘Could you tell me a little about the incident?’ Gina asked.

‘I know my dad called the police. I think it was… let me think.’ She began counting on her fingers silently. ‘Eighteen, maybe nineteen years ago. He was just a baby.’ She nodded towards her son. ‘I came over here straight away. I grew up in this house and it hurt to see that some pond scum had ransacked it. You should have records.’

Gina made a note to check out the incident. ‘Did they catch anyone?’

Josie shook her head. ‘No. My dad didn’t even know when it happened as he’d been on holiday. He saw the damage when he got back. The burglar came in through the back and took his old phone, a bit of money he kept in a drawer, his camera and the wallet he doesn’t use. My dad always had two wallets. The one he took everywhere, with his current account card and a bit of cash in it. The other one housed the credit cards he barely used and a load of loyalty cards. It is possible that his library card was in that wallet, too. He did cancel his credit cards, but there was no attempt to use them. So, do you think this dead man was the man who burgled my dad?’

‘We don’t know, but it is a possibility.’

‘Actually, I recall that some of his loyalty cards were found nearby. The burglar had ditched them.’

Gina wondered if their dead man had simply found the library card on the path and decided to use it. Maybe he wasn’t actually the burglar. ‘Where were these cards found?’

‘Just outside the back garden.’

‘Can I take a look?’ Gina asked.

‘Of course. If you think it will help, but it was such a long time ago.’ Josie stood and led Jacob and Gina through the narrow-fitted kitchen, out of the bifold doors.

‘What’s behind the gate?’

‘Resident parking spaces – we all have a space allocated to us there. There’s no space on the road. It’s also a courtyard with only one way in, so no one comes here apart from residents and guests of residents. It was the same when my dad lived here.’

Gina walked to the end of the garden and peered over the gate. She wondered if the person who picked up the library card had been a resident. ‘Where exactly were the cards found?’

Josie opened the gate, her slippers slapping on the road with each step. ‘Here, right next to my dad’s parking space. Dad didn’t have a car, he preferred the bus; he liked to chat to people.’

‘Did he have many visitors?’

‘Only one around that time, and police couldn’t find him after the burglary. He used to like playing chess with this man who popped over now and again. Dad used to like him and they sometimes met at the pub.’

‘Do you know his name or anything else about him?’

‘Not really. He lived close by and would park in Dad’s space when he visited. I know he had a daughter, too, and he was always asking dad’s advice as he was struggling to look after her on his own.’

‘Did you ever see him?’

‘Sorry, no. I know he had a Transit van – Dad mentioned this friend had picked up a second-hand bed for him.’

‘Did your dad say how old this man’s daughter was?’

‘No, she was disabled, though, which is why he never brought her out. I know my dad had invited her around with him and he thought it odd that his van wasn’t equipped for a wheelchair user. Oh, Dad mentioned that he home-schooled her, too.’

It sounded like the same man Rona had been describing, but this was years before. ‘Which pub did your dad meet this man at?’

‘Always the Angel Arms. He loved that pub. That’s where the chess club used to meet.’

Gina knew that none of the current staff at the Angel Arms had worked there back then, so there was no point asking them. Then she thought about the group of older men who were always playing dominoes. Maybe they would remember Calvin Harris and this friend who played chess with him.

A flutter of panic filled her chest as she thought about John Doe’s daughter.

Rona mentioned that her daughter, Molly, had seen a picture of a girl in a wheelchair, but Calvin Harris and this man were friends nearly twenty years ago.

Something was terribly off, and Gina knew she had to find this girl – or woman –before it was too late.

The items in John Doe’s boot suggested he should have gone back to her and he hadn’t.

How long would she survive without him?