The Sleeping and the Dead Read online

  Porteous found that he could concentrate again on the detail. The dreadful restlessness seemed to have left him. ‘I don’t think that’s likely, do you? He wasn’t the sort of lad I imagined at first. I don’t see him disappearing for months, moving from one squat to another, spending time inside. He was bright. He had a lot to lose. I think he was killed soon after he was missed at school.’

  Outside, the congregation had dispersed. The grandmothers were banging pots in the kitchen to show they wanted to lock up.

  Stout stood up. ‘What now?’

  ‘Back to the station to organize a press conference. It’s time we went public. The school gave me a photo, a cutting from the local rag, but it could be anyone. Let’s see if the paper still has the original. I know it happened nearly thirty years ago, but people round here have good memories. There’ll be friends still living in the town. And enemies. Come on, Eddie. Let’s make you a star.’

  In fact Porteous took the press conference early the following evening. There was all the media interest he could have wished for. The body had been discovered because of the drought and the drought was a big story, so the national press was there. He had wanted to hold the conference in the high-school hall. The only certainty he had in the case was that Michael Grey had been a pupil at Cranford Grammar. He thought it might jog a few memories. But the head teacher wasn’t keen. He seemed to think that even after all those years murder would be bad for the school’s image. He used as an excuse the fact that the hall had already been hired out for an event in the evening. Nothing Porteous said could make him change his mind.

  Instead they used the community centre next to Stout’s church. It still smelled of the lunch that had been provided for the pensioners’ club which had met earlier in the day – steamed fish and cabbage. Porteous sat on the stage behind a trestle table hidden by a white cloth. His answers to the press emphasized his ignorance. He didn’t have an exact date of death. He hadn’t traced the boy’s relatives. That was why he needed their help. All he had was a body that looked like a lump of lard – this he phrased more delicately – and an old photo of a white-haired boy with a knife.

  There was one moment of excitement. In the second row sat a big woman who worked for the town’s free paper. When the photo was passed round Porteous could have sworn that she recognized the face. But when he looked for her later she had rushed away.

  PART TWO

  Chapter Six

  It was hot again. The local news was all about the weather. A magistrate had been prosecuted for using a sprinkler at midnight. Tankers were driving the region’s water south. The lake at Cranford was so low that flooded buildings were starting to emerge from the sludge and a body, trapped under a pier for years, had been found by a canoeist.

  Hannah switched off the radio and parked her car. There was a new officer on the gate so she had to show her pass. The photograph was two years old and she saw him look at it then back at her, squinting, unsure at first that it was the same person. He pushed it back under the glass screen and Hannah stared at it too. It didn’t look like her. The woman in the photograph was younger. She was smiling. Not relaxed exactly – Hannah had never been that – there was a tension around the mouth. But content, complacent even. It was taken while she was still part of a family. Before Rosie hated her. Before Jonathan left with a twenty-five-year-old PE teacher, to set up home all over again.

  She had to wait for a moment in the gate room for two officers to come in through the outer door. The inner door wouldn’t open until the outer was locked. Then she stood back to let them go ahead to collect their keys. She was in no hurry, early as usual. Punctuality had been a curse since childhood. She threw her tag into the chute and waited for the new man to find her keys. Ahead of her the officers were talking very loudly. She recognized them but they were too engrossed in conversation to acknowledge her. She gathered there’d been some trouble on the wing the night before. Nothing serious. She thought it had probably been caused by the heat. Those huts must be insufferable in this weather. The men walked off before she could hear any more, the heels of their highly polished shoes reflecting the sunlight. They were still talking. Every other word, she knew, would be a blasphemy.

  Hannah followed them from the gatehouse and thought that generally, in the prison, the officers were less polite than the inmates. They were usually courteous, grovelling even, like the child in a class who is always bullied. Especially if they wanted something – to use the library on an unscheduled day, for example, or to be let off a fine for a lost or damaged book. ‘Please, miss, it’s not my fault. Honest,miss.’

  Of course, they weren’t all like that. Neither were the officers all boors. Today she was feeling particularly jaundiced, because the photograph had reminded her of a time of certainty, and because she’d had a row with Rosie last night. Rosie. Named by her parents Rosalind, she’d changed her name with her personality in adolescence. She was Hannah’s only child. The night before, Rosie had come in drunk again with a gang of friends. It was midnight. Hannah’s room was over the kitchen and she’d heard the freezer door open and the banging of a cooker shelf, and she knew that when she got up in the morning there’d be plates everywhere and half-eaten pizza ground into the carpet. And probably a body snoring on the sofa in the dining-room and two more in the spare bed. So she’d gone down and made a fuss. Rosie had stared at her in apparent horror and amazement, actually enjoying every minute of the drama.

  ‘Get a life, Mum,’ she’d said. ‘Make some friends and get a life.’

  Then she’d stormed off to spend the night in someone else’s spare room.

  Jonathan had never minded the late nights, the loud music, strange kids in the house. At first Hannah had been surprised by his tolerance. Then she’d been jealous of his ability to get on with Rosie’s friends.

  ‘We’ve all been young,’ he’d say. ‘Even you, Hannah.’

  He’d take them to the pub at the end of the street, buying them drinks even before they were eighteen, talking music, reminiscing about bands he’d seen and festivals he’d attended. That side of his life had been new to Hannah. Perhaps he hadn’t wanted to admit to a vaguely hippy past until the sixties became fashionable again. Perhaps he’d made it all up to impress the stunning sixth-form women who sat around the beaten copper tables in the Grey Horse, downing their pints of Stella as if they were glasses of lemonade. Perhaps, stirred by their admiration, that was when he recognized there were other possibilities in his life and he turned his attention to the lycra-clad Eve.

  Not Eve the temptress, he had said earnestly when he explained that he was leaving. She was shy. She hadn’t wanted it to happen. She’d be the last person ever to want to break up a family. They’d both fought it.

  When Hannah failed to respond he had gone on more petulantly, ‘At least we waited until Rosie finished her A levels before making it public.’ As if that had deserved a prize. As if it hadn’t been more about embarrassment, because Jonathan and Eve both taught in Rosie’s school. As deputy head, Jonathan was Eve’s boss.

  Before leaving the gatehouse Hannah clipped the keys on to her belt and tucked them into the leather pouch which was designed to keep them hidden from view. The pouch was hardly an attractive garment but she always wore it. It was a rule and she’d never had any problems with rules. Perhaps that was why she’d settled without too much difficulty into the routine of the prison. There was a comforting hierarchy: governors of different grades, prisoners with different privileges, a system and a structure. Rosie’s life seemed to have no order and that was why Hannah was alarmed for her. She had personal knowledge of how unsettling disorder could be.

  The prison was category C, medium security, taking men who had been dispersed from local jails and lifers nearing the end of their sentences. It had once been an RAF base. There was still an enormous hangar which housed the workshops. The lads slept in billets where once conscripts spat on boots and folded blankets. Hannah had slipped into the way of calling the
m lads, though some of them were older than her. That showed, she thought, that she had become institutionalized into prison life.

  The library was in a hut of its own, attached at the back by a brick corridor to the education department. The site of the prison was vast. Now, at the beginning of July, it was a pleasant if sticky walk from the gate. There were flowers everywhere. Huge circular beds had been planted in formation as in a municipal park. The grass was closely cropped. The prison regularly won prizes for its gardens. In the winter it was a different matter. Then she came to work dressed for an expedition to the Arctic. The wind blew straight from Scandinavia. Horizontal rain and sleet seemed to last for days. Men who’d grown up in cities further south spoke of their sentence as if they’d been sent to a Siberian work camp. They called it the Gulag. The nearest railway was twenty miles away.

  Hannah’s orderly, Marty, was waiting outside for her, leaning against the door where the week before she had stuck a poster saying: NO SHORTS PLEASE. Since the beginning of the heatwave the men had started to dress as if for the beach. The exposed flesh and muscular thighs had seemed inappropriate for a library and, with the Governor’s authority, she’d put a stop to it. As Hannah approached she realized the phone was ringing inside. Marty must have heard it, but he hadn’t called or waved to hurry her along. By the time she’d unlocked the door it had stopped. Automatically she wondered if it had been her daughter. Anxiety about Rosie stayed with her constantly, eating away at her. She knew it was a silly habit, like checking the gas was switched off before leaving the house and always being early, but she couldn’t help it. Knowing the history of the habit didn’t help at all.

  ‘You can’t be on her back all the time,’ Jonathan would say. ‘Relax. What’s wrong with you? Hormones, I suppose.’ And if Rosie was there too they would snigger together. After all, what was more amusing than a middle-aged, menopausal woman scared to death that her reckless daughter would get into trouble? Because Rosie was reckless in an overreachingly confident way that left Hannah breathless.

  Of course, she hadn’t come in that morning before Hannah left for work and Hannah didn’t know which friend she’d imposed on for a bed for the night. When she’d heard the phone it had occurred to her briefly that Rosie had called to apologize, but she dismissed the thought as ridiculous. Some chance. She picked up her bag, let Marty through ahead of her and locked the door behind them.

  Marty was new to the job, different from any other orderlies she’d been given. It was a cushy number and the other men she’d worked with were eager to please, desperate to make themselves indispensable so she wouldn’t find it easy to sack them before the end of their stint. They were only allowed six months in the job. It was a security concern. Supervisors and prisoners shouldn’t have the chance to get too close. Marty was self-contained, efficient. He didn’t tell her about his family or try to impress by talking about the books he’d read. He didn’t say anything much unless it was about the library. Hannah thought he was probably in his thirties but he had one of those pale-skinned, freckled faces which always look boyish. She watched him lift a pile of newspapers on to a table and begin to sort them.

  ‘Why don’t you put the kettle on, Marty?’

  He looked up, surprised, then nodded. Usually they had a cup of tea just before opening for the first session and today business didn’t start until the period of lunchtime association at eleven thirty. But it wouldn’t have occurred to him to comment.

  For the first time she wondered what crime he had committed. Her friends – because she did have friends, despite Rosie’s jibe – always asked about that.

  ‘But what are they in for, Hannah?’ they’d say with the disapproving curiosity of a Telegraph reader sneaking a look at the Sun. ‘Who do you have to mix with in there? Rapists? Muggers of little old ladies?’

  They were surprised when Hannah said she didn’t know. She was never sure that they quite believed her. It was etiquette, this lack of interest. She wouldn’t have enquired of the borrowers in the community library where she’d previously worked if they’d ever been prosecuted for speeding or tax evasion. Besides, it was irrelevant. It didn’t matter. The prison was separate from the outside world. So long as the men fitted into the system and caused no bother, nobody much cared what had happened to bring them there. Except perhaps Arthur, her colleague. It seemed to matter to him very much.

  Looking at Marty filling the kettle at the small sink in her office, she thought suddenly: it must have been an offence of violence. It was a revelation and she wondered why she hadn’t realized it before. He was angry. Continually angry. He controlled it well and kept it hidden but now that it was obvious to Hannah she thought it explained a lot about him. That was why he kept himself to himself. It was the only way he could keep his anger in check.

  She phoned home. There was no reply. Of course. Rosie would still be in a bed in a strange house, sleeping off the excesses of the night before. Not that she’d wake with a hangover. The young never seemed to have hangovers. Then, with the same sense of startling revelation she’d had when looking at Marty, it occurred to her that Rosie might not be on her own in bed. They never discussed her relationships with men. If ever Hannah broached the subject, talking elliptically perhaps about safe sex, she’d roll her eyes towards the ceiling and say, ‘Oh Mum. Please!’

  Hannah thought there was a boy. Joseph. He phoned and when Rosie was out she took messages. If she was in they talked for hours and she’d hear Rosie laughing. But when he came to the house it was always as part of a crowd and often he had his arm round another girl. If Rosie was hurt by that she didn’t show it. Hannah hoped Rosie did have a love. She wanted something magic and gut-wrenching for her daughter. Don’t wait, she wanted to tell her. Do it now. Soon you’ll have responsibilities. You’ll be too old. Trust me. I know what I’m talking about.

  While Marty squatted by the tray on the floor, squeezing tea bags in the tasteful National Trust mugs she’d brought from home, Hannah started opening her mail. There wasn’t much. A memo from her boss in the Central Library about budgets. An agenda for the prison librarians’ summer school. A plain white envelope with a handwritten address which she recognized immediately. Something similar came every year. Before she could open it the phone rang again. It was Rosie, bristling with righteous indignation.

  ‘Well,’ she said, ‘I hope you’re ready to apologize.’

  It caught Hannah on the hop. She didn’t know whether to snap back a sarcastic answer or make an attempt to be conciliatory. She knew why that was. She was afraid Rosie would up sticks and move in with Jonathan and Eve if she upset her too much. Rosie had never mentioned it, hadn’t used it as a threat, but Hannah was always aware of the possibility. In the end she wasn’t given a chance to respond.

  ‘Look,’ Rosie said. ‘I’m sorry. It must be a difficult time at the minute.’

  Hannah could have fainted with shock. ‘And for you. Waiting for your results . . .’

  ‘Oh, sod the A levels.’ She paused. ‘I’m working this afternoon but I’ll be home by six. You can take me to the Grey Horse. Buy me a pint.’

  Hannah bit back a lecture. She was always telling Rosie she drank too much. ‘OK,’ she said. ‘Why not? That would be great.’

  When she replaced the phone Marty was standing looking at her, a mug in each hand.

  ‘Trouble?’ he asked, in an offhand sort of way to show that he wasn’t prying.

  ‘No. Not really. You know what kids are like.’

  ‘I know what I was like when I was a kid.’

  ‘Trouble?’

  ‘All the time.’ They smiled. He went back to sorting newspapers.

  Dave the prison officer attached to the library came in, jangling his keys, demanding tea. Hannah opened her letter. Inside there was a printed invitation and a handwritten note. She read the note first. The handwriting was scrawled but familiar. She recognized it from way back. It had been dashed off in a hurry and there was a stain which could have been co
ffee on the back.

  Hannah

  Hope this reaches you in time.

  You can always stay with me.

  Do try and make it this year.

  She didn’t need to look at the signature. It was from Sally. At school Sally had been her best friend. She hadn’t seen her for years but they kept in touch, spoke occasionally, sent Christmas cards. The card was an invitation to a school reunion. Cranford Grammar. Sally tried the same tactic every time something similar was arranged. Recently the invitations were always sent to the prison. Perhaps she thought it was Jonathan who prevented Hannah’s attending.

  Hannah threw the card on to the desk where she sat to stamp the books, then picked it up again to look at the date of the party. It was only a couple of days away, one of her late shifts. She thought it was typical of Sally to allow her so little time to come to a decision and arrange her affairs. For the first time she was tempted to go to the reunion, to see Sally and her other friends again. It was only pride which had kept her away. She propped the card between her mug and a box of library cards.

  Hannah was never sure how the argument started. Perhaps she’d done something to provoke it, but she didn’t think so. Rosie’s phone call had made her more mellow. Later she remembered the conversation she’d heard on her way in about a disturbance on the wing. Apparently there’d been rumours of an early lock-up because of a Prison Officers’ Association meeting and the whole place was still tense. There’d been no sense of that though when she’d let the men in.

  In the first group there was a lad she didn’t recognize as one of her regulars. He was young, squat, muscular. A tattoo of a snake twisted from his wrist to his shoulder. His hair was cropped so short that pink skin showed through the stubble. He mooched around the shelves for a bit, but Hannah didn’t have the impression that he was looking seriously for anything. She noticed that Marty was keeping an eye on him too. She wondered if he was new, though he hadn’t been at the last reception talk she’d given.