TT12 The Bones Beneath Read online

  Nicklin smiled. ‘It’s not about remorse. I won’t insult you by pretending it is. It’s about… tidying up.’ He shrugged. ‘That’s all it is. It’s not complicated.’

  ‘I’m not convinced,’ Thorne said.

  ‘I just made a decision, just thought: Why not? Like you might decide what colour shirt to put on. Like your girlfriend might decide what sandwich to get from the M&S opposite her station, when she goes in there every lunchtime.’

  Thorne said nothing, determined not to give Nicklin the satisfaction of showing him anything.

  ‘Like I might decide whether to use a knife or a gun or a cricket bat. You know me, I’m impulsive.’

  Thorne knew that Nicklin had indeed used each of those things as murder weapons in the past, but there had been nothing rash or reckless about doing so. Plenty of time had been taken to carefully plan and cajole, to bully his partner-in-crime into killing alongside him. Control had been all-important back then and Thorne had every reason to believe that it remained so.

  Nicklin smirked. ‘Well, I’m impulsive sometimes.’

  ‘So, no ulterior motive whatsoever?’

  ‘No, but not out of the goodness of my heart either, because we both know there’s not a lot of it in there.’

  ‘A snap decision then, that’s it.’

  ‘Yeah, just something to do. A change of scenery and a couple of days out for me and Jeff.’

  ‘Yeah,’ Thorne said. ‘That’s the other thing.’

  ‘You know why I brought Jeff along.’

  ‘Right, you’re afraid for your well-being.’

  ‘Can you blame me?’ Nicklin nodded ahead, towards the figures up ahead of them. ‘Look, we both know how fond Sergeant Holland was of Sarah McEvoy, don’t we? Who knows, even the coppers who didn’t shag her might still be harbouring a grudge.’

  ‘It’s rubbish,’ Thorne said. ‘I know it, you know it.’

  ‘There’s some nasty drops off this island,’ Nicklin said. ‘Easy to slip and lose your footing. I might be nervous about the fact that you left Jenks back up there with Batchelor, if it wasn’t for the fact there are so many witnesses around. That nosy old sod with the binoculars…’

  By now, they were only a few minutes’ walk from the dig. The light was starting to go and Thorne could see the camera flashes from what he assumed to be the gravesite.

  ‘I’m glad we found him,’ Nicklin said. ‘Simon. I mean, obviously there’ll be more legal nonsense, a new trial or what have you, but that’s not the end of the world, is it?’

  ‘Gets your name back in the papers as well, doesn’t it?’ Thorne looked at him. ‘You must have missed that.’

  ‘None of it’s going to make any difference to how much time I spend inside, is it? We both know it’s going to be all of it. That I’m going to die in there, unless we get a Home Secretary who’s tired of being popular.’

  ‘How d’you feel about that?’

  Nicklin raised his hands again; rubbed at his scalp through the black beanie hat. ‘You’re not stupid, Tom. You know there’s not very much that would be available to me on the outside that I can’t get in prison. Most of the things I’ve always enjoyed are still there whenever I fancy them. I just need to be a little cleverer about getting them organised, that’s all. The things I can’t do are neither here nor there, really. I won’t be losing too much sleep about missing long walks in the park, sunsets and all that. Evenings curled up by a log fire in a country cottage.’ He looked around. ‘Having said that, this is nice, I won’t pretend it’s not. A bit of outdoors.’

  ‘Make the most of it,’ Thorne said. ‘You’ll be back at Long Lartin by dinner time.’

  ‘Thank God for that,’ Fletcher said, behind them. It was the first time he’d spoken since they’d left the school. ‘This place is doing my head in.’

  As they drew closer to the freshly excavated grave, Thorne saw Barber help Howell up and out of the hole. Karim was sitting on one of the metal equipment cases scribbling in a notebook, while Markham was taking photographs of those bones that had already been removed and laid out neatly on black plastic sheeting a few feet away.

  Fletcher stopped next to Holland and, without anything being said, Howell and Barber took a step or two away from the grave as Thorne and Nicklin walked up to its edge.

  It was odd, almost as though they were family.

  As though the men and women in the mud-spattered overalls and dirty gloves were giving them space to mourn.

  Thorne looked down and saw glimpses of red, white and green through the mud. A tattered strip of what might have been a shirt. A frayed waistband, the loops for a belt. The human remains were tea-coloured where they were not caked with earth and it was shocking to see how much was left of the training shoes, in comparison to the few shreds of flesh that clung to the scattered bones. The sole and tongue, fully intact. Thick laces so much more resilient than veins, than the clotted strands of hair that were pasted here and there to the filthy skull.

  Thorne looked across at Howell.

  ‘Teenage male,’ she said. ‘The age is about right too. Certainly not ancient and I don’t need the trainers to tell me that.’

  Thorne glanced at Nicklin who was staring down, stony-faced. Had he not known him better, he might almost have believed him to be upset. Thorne nodded down at the remains. At a pair of flattened ribs, curling from the mud like speech marks. A glimpse of clawed fingers and one leg bent backwards. The hole in the skull that was clearly visible, even from where they were standing.

  ‘To your knowledge,’ Thorne said, ‘is this the body of Simon Milner?’

  Nicklin nodded.

  ‘And are you responsible for disposing of his body?’

  Another nod.

  ‘A little louder.’

  ‘Yes, I’m responsible.’

  It was getting darker by the minute, and colder. Thorne thought he felt a drop or two of rain, though it might just as easily have been seawater.

  ‘Why did you kill him, Stuart?’

  TWENTY-EIGHT

  Tides House

  There was a head count just before lights out, but everyone knew it was a waste of time, the screws included. They used to joke about it. The one with the straggly beard said he couldn’t count up to twelve anyway. The fact was, a couple of the lads would sneak out at least once a week and everybody knew it.

  Drink and drugs were obviously off limits, however much they might have helped with ‘contemplation’. Ruth had made that clear enough early on. Still, someone on the island must have had some. Maybe one of the painters or the poets had some weed and a bit of spare booze. Maybe they were happy to give some away or there was a pervy one getting wanked off in exchange for a couple of joints or whatever, but either way, boys were getting stuff from somewhere, then going out after dark for a drink and a smoke. Fires were lit and empty cider bottles were found in the fields or down on the beach.

  Funny thing was, whenever the screws found out about it, it was always the ‘environmental impact on the island’ that got everyone hot under the collar. That was what the bollockings got dished out for; fires in the fields and plastic bottles not being disposed of properly. That was all there ever was: bollockings. The guilty party trying their hardest to keep a straight face, while Ruth shook her head and looked sad and talked about how many different people they were letting down, not to mention themselves.

  Simon always remembered that joke about the inflatable kid with the inflatable mum and dad and inflatable school and everything. ‘You’ve let yourself down, you’ve let your family down and worst of all you’ve let your school down…’

  Maybe they were all set to rethink the whole discipline business after what happened to Hunter, toughen things up a bit, but nothing much seemed to have changed when it came to checking on all the comings and goings.

  How piss-easy it was.

  Stuart only told him they were going that morning. It didn’t leave much time, but maybe that was the whole point, Simon though
t. Not too long to get worried about it or chicken out; to get cold feet and do something stupid.

  Yeah, it made sense.

  Not that Simon was about to question Stuart about anything.

  He was thrilled to be asked, to be included in the first place.

  All day long, he was buzzing with it. Looking at the other boys and thinking what a bunch of losers they were. Digging their veggies or making pots or writing some rubbish in their notebooks like goodbye letters to drugs or crime or whatever else Ruth had told them to do. One boy had spat and stuck his chin out and asked Simon what he was looking at and Simon had told him to go and fuck himself.

  His heart was thumping and his mouth was dry for a long time after that, but it was a good feeling. He wasn’t scared, because he knew he wasn’t going to be there for much longer anyway and he knew this boy wasn’t going to do anything, not so soon after what had happened with Hunter.

  Mostly though, he wasn’t scared because of Stuart.

  The two of them smiled at each other all through that last dinner and afterwards, while they were washing up. Simon could feel their shared secret passing back and forth between them. He felt it like a shock whenever their shoulders brushed at the sink or one of them laid a clean, warm plate down on top of the other’s.

  For those last few hours in the lounge, while they were supposed to be reading, Simon was making mental lists: the first ten things he was going to eat; the first five places he was going to go; the three people he was not going to let anywhere near his mum…

  The dealer, obviously.

  The dickhead boyfriend who always made sure she went back on the gear.

  The ‘best friend’ who was more of a hopeless junkie than she was and just wanted his mum to end up the same way, so she could feel better about herself.

  Simon was going to make sure they stayed well away, would hurt them if he needed to. Maybe he could nick a car and sell it for a change, get enough money together so they could move out of London to the countryside or somewhere by the sea. Maybe Stuart would help him. He’d ask him what he thought as soon as they were off the island.

  They went about an hour and a half after lights out. Long enough for the staff to have gone to their own rooms. Simon had thought they might have to climb out of their bedroom window but, in the end, they just marched straight out of the front door. There was a bolt, but it was on the inside!

  How stupid was that? Who the hell was going to be breaking in?

  There was no moon, which was probably a good thing. Simon guessed that Stuart had planned it this way, checked on a calendar or whatever, so it would be harder for anyone to see them. Stuart had stolen a torch from the supply cupboard and some bottles of water and a few chocolate bars for the journey. Then he’d told Simon to steal something too.

  Simon thought it was like a test, or something.

  There wasn’t any money left lying around, nobody was quite that trusting, so in the end he’d grabbed a few of the tiny china animals that were on the mantelpiece in the lounge. He thought it would be wrong to take them all, so he chose quickly and stuffed them into his pocket.

  A cat, a bear, a dog, a monkey.

  It was a warm night and the fields looked black. Stuart was good at leading them safely around the edges, using his torch, keeping it low on the ground ahead of them. There was the odd startled sheep, something scurrying in a hedge, but that was all.

  Stuart had told him that they would have to wade out to the boat that was waiting, that it wouldn’t be able to get close in because of the rocks. That was fine, Simon didn’t mind the water. Stuart told him that his friend would have towels on the boat and maybe a bottle of whisky or something to warm them up.

  It only took them about twenty minutes to get to the right place.

  Stuart told Simon to wait and moved forward on his own, close to where the land fell sharply away. Simon watched Stuart raise the torch and flash it on and off, twice. When he saw a flash come back from out there in the darkness, Simon almost wet himself with excitement.

  Stuart came back, asked Simon if he was ready. Simon started to take his shoes off, but Stuart told him not to be so stupid. There was no way he could make it down to the sea in bare feet without cutting them to pieces on the rocks. He would need to take them off at the last minute, Stuart said, tie the laces together and put them round his neck when they waded out.

  Simon laughed, nervous. Said, ‘Yeah, course…’

  They walked towards the edge, Stuart in front and Simon’s eye fixed on the small beam of light up ahead. Simon could not stop jabbering, shouting to make himself heard above the noise of the sea.

  ‘I was thinking, what I said before about having a spare room? You staying whenever you liked, remember? Well, you could come and stay there permanently if you want. I don’t think my mum would mind and it would be fun to be together a bit more, I reckon.

  ‘Then, when she’s cleaned herself up and maybe I don’t need to be there all the time, you and me could find somewhere on our own, a flat or something. We’d have such a laugh, I reckon. I’ve been thinking about some of the things we could get up to. The terrible twosome! Oh yeah, I’d be happy to do the cooking, by the way. I can make loads of different meals now and I know you’re not really bothered. I mean we’d have chips or a Chinese some of the time, obviously, but I’m just saying I wouldn’t mind cooking us a few things. I could even find a couple of recipes with chocolate in them. Puddings, stuff like that.

  ‘We could go out, we could stay in, wouldn’t matter. Just talking or whatever, watching telly…

  ‘Cheaper too, I reckon, two of us living together and who cares if people might think it’s a bit weird. Doesn’t matter what people think, does it and anyone who wants to say anything needs to be careful or they’ll end up like Hunter.’

  Simon stopped when he heard Stuart shushing.

  At first he’d thought it was the sound of the water against the stones down below.

  He stared into the blackness, thinking about the boat out there waiting for them, wondering how big it was. Thinking about what it would be like when he introduced Stuart to his mum and what she would say, hoping she was straight. He was pretty sure they would get on and Stuart would help him sort out the dealer and the dickhead boyfriend. Maybe they would end up like Hunter, too.

  He thought the water was still whispering and then he realised that Stuart was standing behind him and saying his name. He turned and saw the shape of something in Stuart’s hand.

  Not a torch, not a bag.

  It was like the water was angrier suddenly below them, chucking itself at the shore. It wasn’t quite so warm any more and Simon could feel the spray on the back of his neck. He said, ‘Stu,’ as Stuart raised his hand and then Simon saw what Stuart was holding and knew he’d been really stupid.

  He could not call his mum’s face to mind, not clearly anyway, in those fractions of a second before the rock came down.

  Twenty-five years on, standing in what was almost the same spot, Nicklin looked at Tom Thorne and quietly answered his question.

  ‘Because he was needy.’ He smiled, and turned from his handiwork as though he were suddenly bored with it. ‘And like I said, I’m impulsive sometimes.’

  Thorne watched as Professor Howell – who was now back working in the grave – plucked something from her sieve. She brushed mud away, then held it up between tightly gloved fingers. Thorne leaned down to get a closer look, before the small object was handed over to be given its place as one more piece of evidence on the plastic sheet. To be photographed and catalogued with everything else.

  Left femur (human), right half of pelvic girdle (human), belt buckle…

  ‘It’s ceramic,’ Howell said. ‘My nan used to collect these things, got them with teabags or something.’ She held it up towards Thorne. ‘It’s a dog, I think. No, a bear.’

  TWENTY-NINE

  There was not too much discussion about whether work was going to continue at the crime scene
after dark. Barber was only too delighted to be earning the overtime and, with so much of the work done already, Howell was keen to press on, rather than leave things as they were overnight and come back again in the morning. As CSM and exhibits officer, Markham and Karim were expected to stay on. Markham seemed to have been prepared for such an eventuality and, if Karim looked less than thrilled at the prospect, he didn’t say as much.

  With the light fading fast, Howell and Barber went up to the school and returned with the lights and portable generator. They had it all set up within fifteen minutes. In the gathering dusk, Barber stayed behind to assemble the forensic tent, while everyone else went back to talk through the procedures for those who would be staying on after Thorne and the Long Lartin contingent had left.

  Walking back across the field, Fletcher said, ‘I don’t really see why we need to put the tent up at all. I mean, it’s not like there’s anyone around, is it?’

  Howell turned to him. ‘It’s not about whether there’s anyone around. It’s about respect as much as anything.’

  ‘Just saying, it seems a bit daft.’

  ‘It’s what we do,’ Howell said.

  Thorne had already spoken to Robert Burnham, who was waiting for them when they got back to the school and seemed eager to run through the ad hoc arrangements. Thorne could see that he was someone who was very much at home with a clipboard, but only in the absence of a flip-chart or PowerPoint facilities. He would, Thorne decided, have made a very good chief superintendent.

  ‘I think the Chapel House cottage would be best,’ he said. ‘That one sleeps six, easily. Obviously it’s been shut down for the winter, so there’ll have to be an element of make do and mend, I’m afraid. It’ll be a bit dusty and a few mice might have come in out of the cold, but we’ll do our best to make you comfortable.’

  ‘Close to the chapel is good,’ Howell said. ‘We can leave the remains in there overnight when we’ve finished at the crime scene.’ She nodded towards Sam Karim. ‘Can we get some kind of a bed set up in there for our exhibits officer? An inflatable mattress or something?’