Page 79 of Worse Than Murder

‘Right now, I’m not sure. But I’m finding myself asking more and more questions, and I don’t know how to find the answers. This Inspector Bell, is he still alive?’

‘Yes. He still lives in the village. He doesn’t go out much,’ Lynne says. ‘You might want to speak to Gill about it first, though. I’m guessing he’ll have told her all about it.’

‘Why?’

‘Well… Gill is Inspector Bell’s daughter. I thought you knew.’

Did I hear that right? ‘Gill is the daughter of Lionel Bell?’

‘Yes. Sorry. I thought you’d have known. I don’t know why, sorry,’ Lynne says.

‘I asked Gill about Lionel. I asked her if he was still alive, and I recommended she question him. She never said.’

‘Ah. No. She wouldn’t,’ Iain says.

‘Why not?’

‘She’s sort of ashamed.’

‘In what way?’

‘Of the way Lionel left the police force.’

‘How did he leave?’

Iain retakes his seat next to Lynne. ‘He was forced into taking early retirement. Back in the day, there was a much bigger police force here than there is now, and there were two inspectors: Lionel and Inspector Gideon Oliver. Gideon was diagnosed with stomach cancer. It tore through his entire body. Obviously, he had to give up work, but he couldn’t afford not to work. The whole village had a big whip-round. We held all kinds of events to raise money for him. Unfortunately, Gideon died while we were raising it. Next thing, the money is discovered sitting there in Lionel’s bank account. He was forced to retire. He’s been a social pariah around here ever since.’

‘That can’t have been easy for Gill.’

‘No. Why do you think she goes by her mother’s maiden name?’

‘But you said yourself, it’s a small village. Everyone will know who her father is.’

‘They do. But Gill is a good woman. They don’t judge her by what her father did.’

Lynne has been silent while me and Iain have been talking about Gill and her father. She looks up and takes a deep, unsteady breath.

‘Were Jack and Travis abusing my babies?’ Her voice is heavily charged with dark emotion, but it’s quiet, barely more than a whisper.

Iain tightens his hold on his wife.

‘I really don’t know, Lynne. The only people who can tell us that are both missing.’

‘But… now the bodies have been found, they can do tests, can’t they? Postmortems.’

‘They’ve been under water possibly for thirty years. Any trace evidence will have long gone by now.’

‘I’ll never know the truth, will I?’

‘We’ve got them back, Lynne,’ Iain says, hugging her, resting his head on her shoulders. ‘We’ve got them back. That’s all that matters.’

‘Iain’s right.’ I reach across and place a hand on top of hers. ‘You can lay them to rest. You can have a place to go and talk to them.’

Lynne nods. She tries to smile, but it won’t come.

I push my chair back and stand up. ‘I should go. I’m sorry for upsetting you, but I’ve been in this job long enough to know that people can never fully rest until the truth is revealed, no matter how difficult it is to hear.’

‘Sometimes the truth is better left buried,’ Iain says.