Killing You Softly Page 4

  ‘He didn’t know where Alex was, if that’s what you mean.’

  ‘Sure he did,’ she contradicted. ‘I expect he told you to back off, didn’t he? That’s Jayden for you, trying to protect his mate.’

  This was getting more interesting by the second. ‘Why does he have to protect him?’

  ‘Why do you think? Alex is in bits – his girlfriend just died. Jayden knows you’d go in like a bull in a china shop.’

  ‘Well, thanks.’

  ‘No, Jayden likes you – don’t get me wrong. And I know you’re only trying to help. But the bottom line is that Jayden thinks you’re trouble. And you are, Alyssa – you and your photographic memory – you’re a pain.’

  So why was she bothering to talk to me with the wind whipping strands of straw-blonde hair across her cheeks? She was even worse prepared for the weather than me in a lightweight black sweater, thin denim jacket, ballet pumps and leggings. ‘You’re right,’ I agreed. ‘It’s not my business. I don’t know why I’m bothering.’

  ‘It’s the drowning thing, isn’t it?’

  Now I was really hooked into the conversation. I leaned my bike against a street lamp, folded my arms and listened.

  ‘First Lily and now Scarlett. And, yeah, I know they got the right guys for the Lily murder – D’Arblay, Harry Embsay, Guy Simons – little fascist shits. So this new one doesn’t look like it’s connected. It’s just that it got under your skin and wormed its way into your gut – the fact that Scarlett and Lily both drowned.’

  I nodded, said nothing and didn’t mention the ghostly hand scratching at my bedroom window, begging to be allowed in.

  ‘I get where you’re coming from and I’d feel the same if I was you. I knew Scarlett from Ainslee Comp – not as well as you knew Lily, probably, and it’s a while since we hung out together – but well enough to want the bastard caught and for them to throw away the keys.’

  ‘I hear you.’

  ‘Personally, I’m hoping that’s where you might come in, Alyssa – you and your freaky memory.’

  I took this as a rare compliment and gave Ursula a thin smile. ‘You say you knew Scarlett at school?’

  ‘Yeah, before they kicked me out. I did half a term in the Lower Sixth until they caught me in media studies with a pocket full of uppers – my gran’s happy pills that I’d picked up from the chemist’s though no way did they believe me. I was already on a written warning. That was it – they showed me the door.’

  ‘OK. So anyway – Scarlett?’

  ‘Yeah. Really clever but not geeky. Everyone liked her, especially the boys. Alex practically stalked her for a whole term before he found the balls to ask her out. Then, within a week – look what happened.’

  ‘What did happen?’

  ‘You’re the super-sleuth, you tell me.’

  ‘I only know what I read in the Metro and what Tom told me. But you actually knew her. What was she like? Was there an old boyfriend who got jealous when she chucked him and started going out with Alex?’ As I really got into the subject, questions poured out of me. ‘Where’d she been on New Year’s Eve? Was she at a party? Who with? Did she try to walk home alone?’

  Ursula let me run dry before she answered. ‘Scarlett didn’t go out with many guys. There were a couple in our year at school – Sammy Beckett and Matt Brookes were the ones I knew about – then there was one with a foreign name that I can’t remember. She met him on holiday last summer but he lives in Italy so I guess he doesn’t count. And, yes, she was at a New Year’s party in Ainslee, but not with Alex because Alex’s dad made him go to a boring family party instead.’

  ‘You definitely know that?’

  ‘I was there with Jayden, Micky Cooke, Matt and a couple of other mates. Tom would’ve been there except he was in London.’

  ‘So Scarlett was by herself?’

  ‘No – we were all together, a big gang of us getting pissed. I was out of it before midnight, so were most of the rest. We staggered out about one o’clock and called a taxi. It took us bloody ages to find one.’

  ‘What about Scarlett? When did she leave?’

  ‘Yeah, right, that’s the big question.’ Pushing a stray strand of hair behind her heavily pierced ear, Ursula shook her head. ‘I’ve tried to think – when was the last time I saw her and I honestly don’t know the answer. It might have been before twelve … but then … no … I’ve got a definite memory of Scarlett kissing Jayden at midnight and me getting crazy jealous and having a go at her … But then again maybe that was later. And she definitely wasn’t with us in the cab so she must have left before one o’clock – unless she was still in a dark corner somewhere, snogging a stranger … But then no again – Scarlett wouldn’t do that.’

  ‘It’s all a blur really?’

  ‘Yeah. I’m sorry I’m not like you – I haven’t got the perfect memory thing going on.’

  ‘It’s pretty rare,’ I conceded, ‘and most people wouldn’t want it, believe me.’

  She looked at me as if she wasn’t sure about making the next revelation then decided to go ahead. ‘Actually Scarlett had it. That’s weird – right?’

  This rocked me back on my heels. I even thought I’d imagined what she’d said. ‘Say that again.’

  ‘Scarlett was the same as you – she had total recall. I know – it’s a big coincidence.’

  ‘Scarlett Hartley had an eidetic memory?’ I whispered. As the news sank in, it did more than rock me back on my heels – it hit me hard between the ribs, right in my solar plexus. Now I was connected directly with Scarlett’s death and not just through Lily and the drowning link. Scarlett and I were similar in a totally unexpected way. ‘That can’t be right.’

  ‘OK, don’t believe me,’ Ursula sniped back, and her face took on the usual hard expression as she turned and set off back down the hill. ‘I was only trying to help.’

  ‘No, I believe you …’

  Too late, she was gone. And now I saw why. Loping up the hill with that forward hunch and wild-boy glare was Jayden, coming to meet his girlfriend after work, with Bolt trotting obediently behind.

  ‘Translate from English into French,’ Justine Renoir instructed her select little group of students next morning. She asked us to go online to study copies of the morning papers. ‘Work in pairs and choose any article you like. You have thirty minutes to complete the task.’

  It was the first day of term and to be honest I was glad to be back in a classroom overlooking the lake across the hallway from Saint Sam’s office, doing something normal like translating a passage from a newspaper. Since my accidental meeting with Ursula and the revelations about Scarlett, I’d spent more time than I wanted to mopping up after Princess Galina and trying to explain away those fake Facebook photos.

  ‘I cannot stay here!’ Galina had told me a hundred times. ‘St Jude’s is a prison. Why don’t they listen?’

  ‘Maybe “they” want you to spend time studying, out of the media spotlight,’ I’d suggested. ‘I suppose you mean your dad and the rest of your family?’

  ‘My stepmother,’ she’d told me, confirming one of my earlier theories. ‘But it’s not fair! I have business interests – who will take my bags to big fashion shows? I’m face of Radkin Luxury Leather. Without me, it is nothing.’

  ‘You design handbags?’ I’d asked.

  ‘Since I was fifteen,’ she’d confirmed. ‘I give Papa my business plan and he gives me ten thousand pounds for start-up. Small money for him, but enough for me to begin. Now bags are in Paris, Milan, New York …’

  She’d shown me a website with pictures and I’d been impressed.

  ‘For six months last year they make me do Slavic Studies in California, but I already know more than the teachers. I tell them, I don’t want to do this any more. I only want to be designer. So they take me out of class and send me to Monaco, which I love and I have fun with friends. But now they change their minds and make me do this!’

  ‘So did your dad give you an actual r
eason for sending you to St Jude’s?’ I’d enquired.

  Galina had sighed and her beautiful, cushiony bottom lip had trembled. ‘He thinks that here it is safe.’

  ‘But not in Monaco?’

  ‘No. There’s accident in boat, which they say is not accident. Someone died.’

  ‘Oh!’ That explained Mikhail and Sergei. Security was obviously top priority for the Radkins.

  But Galina had shrugged and insisted it was nothing, an accident for sure, then she’d gone on to weep and wail some more. I’d tried to sympathize about her possibly being in danger from God-knows-what Russian mafia gangs, but I’d found it difficult. She wasn’t a person you felt sorry for easily and I still had other things on my mind.

  Call me paranoid, but I’d waited for Galina to leave then carried out a quick search of our room. Russian mafia might mean hidden cameras and other high-tech bugging devices; it might mean a man in a black balaclava shinning up the drainpipe in the middle of the night. Yeah, like I said earlier, a little too 007, but still a possibility.

  ‘Work with me?’ Hooper suggested as Justine set us our translation task for the morning.

  I agreed and we began looking for interesting headlines together. Over the weekend the pound had taken another beating on the stock exchange, and a famous footballer worth sixty million on the transfer market had been banned for six matches for punching a linesman in the face.

  ‘Did you text Jack about those photos?’ Hooper reminded me as I scrolled through various articles.

  ‘I did mention it – yeah.’

  Took nasty pics off my Facebook page I’d texted in one of the gaps between Galina-minding.

  Jack had texted back after a few minutes. Why – what’s going on?

  Someone hacked into my account or else they stole password and posted fake photos.

  Fake?

  Yeah – of me in the Maldives, and you know I’ve never even been there.

  Wow, weird. Were they really bad?

  Sleazy, I’d texted. Felt really embarrassed.

  Poor baby, Jack had written. He sent me lots of smiley faces and kisses.

  But, anyway, the photos were gone and Tuesday was almost here.

  I looked at the photograph of Scarlett on our screen and read that a police inspector in charge of the investigation had called a press conference for later that day. ‘Let’s translate this piece about the girl in the canal,’ I told Hooper, hoping of course that I’d learn more details about Scarlett’s death.

  ‘Maybe something more cheerful?’ Hooper queried. But then he looked at my expression and saw that it wasn’t up for debate.

  So we started with the headline – Police Appeal for Help.

  ‘Appel de la Police a l’Aide,’ Hooper wrote.

  ‘Oxfordshire police are to ask the public for information relating to the death of seventeen-year-old Scarlett Hartley.’

  ‘Wait – slow down!’ he begged. ‘La police Oxfordshire demandera au public d’informations relatives a la mort de Scarlett Hartley, dix-sept ans. How does that sound?’

  ‘Yes, good.’ I read on: ‘The schoolgirl’s body was recently recovered from the Oxford-to-Stratford canal close to West Ainslee lock, and early forensic evidence suggests that she had been killed by a blow to the head.’

  ‘Slow down! Who do you think I am, Will Harrison?’ Hooper said again.

  Across the room. Will was working with Eugenie on their chosen piece of text. At the mention of his name, he glanced across at Hooper and me.

  Hooper sighed and went on with the task. ‘Le corps de l’ecoliere a ete recemment pris de …’

  My heart rate accelerated as I finished reading the article. ‘It says here that so far no witnesses have come forward. The police are hoping that an appeal for information on national TV will jog people’s memories. There’s an Inspector June Ripley leading the investigation. She says the murder was particularly brutal and there are worries that the killer may strike again.’

  ‘Impossible – I can’t translate unless you slow down,’ Hooper complained as Justine stopped by our desk.

  She saw my hand quiver over the mouse. ‘C’est trop horrible, Alyssa. Il fault choisir un autre sujet.’ It’s too horrible, Alyssa. You must choose another topic.

  It was sound advice. I did know that thinking too much about Scarlett Hartley wasn’t good for me. Still, I couldn’t help it as I drifted through afternoon lessons then took a stroll in the school grounds’ past the lake and into the oak woods beyond.

  Scarlett had been going out with Alex Driffield and ended up dead in a canal. She had perfect recall of everything that had ever happened to her. The killer was brutal and might ‘strike again’. Certain facts hammered away inside my head so I was too preoccupied to notice a mountain biker speeding towards me along the rough track.

  Whoa! I only noticed him when his bike hit a tree root on the crest of a small hill’ and bike and rider parted company in mid-air then crashed to the ground. I’d run to help the guy up before I recognized him.

  ‘Alex, are you OK? What are you doing here?’

  ‘It’s a free country,’ he mumbled as he brushed skeletal autumn leaves and dirt from the sleeve and shoulder of his neon-yellow cycling jacket. ‘I can ride where I want.’

  ‘Not in private grounds,’ I reminded him, picking up his bike and handing it back to him. ‘You’re trespassing. Anyway, be honest. You didn’t just happen to be here – you came looking for me.’

  ‘What if I did?’

  ‘Jesus, Alex, we can go round and round in circles for as long as you like.’ I noticed there were streaks of mud down his cheek and caked in his short, dark hair, but I didn’t feel I knew him well enough to point it out.

  ‘OK, now that I’ve run into you …’

  ‘Literally!’

  ‘Don’t worry – I would’ve braked.’

  ‘So, now that you’ve run into me?’

  ‘I guess we could have a conversation,’ he mumbled.

  I nodded. ‘Go ahead.’

  ‘First – I heard you were in the village, sticking your oar in as usual.’

  ‘Who told you – your granddad?’

  ‘No – Jayden.’

  ‘Typical. Anyway, I wasn’t sticking my oar in. I care about what’s happened. I thought maybe it would help to talk.’

  ‘ “Care”?’ he mocked. ‘Like the journalists who showed up on our doorstep? Or like the cops – “Where were you on the night of the thirty-first of January, between the hours of midnight and three a.m.?” ’

  ‘Neither.’

  ‘And why would it help me to talk to you, Alyssa?’ Alex grew more hostile as the conversation developed, as if he couldn’t help blaming me for something, and I couldn’t work out what. ‘Are we back to the same old stuff – teenaged super-sleuth with the amazing memory is on the case; she’ll have it solved before the end of the week?’

  I dropped my gaze and stared at the tyre marks in the mud. Whatever the reason, if Alex Driffield didn’t want to talk, that was up to him. ‘You’re right. I’ll back off.’

  ‘Cool.’

  ‘Is that it?’

  ‘Yeah. Well, no. Second of all, it wasn’t me – I didn’t have anything to do with it.’

  ‘Who said you did? You’d only been going out with Scarlett for about a week. You weren’t even at the party, according to Ursula.’

  ‘Anyway, Scarlett?’ I remembered asking.

  ‘Yeah. Really clever but not geeky.’ Ursula is ready with the low-down on Scarlett, much more open and friendly than I expect. She takes me by surprise. ‘Everyone liked her, especially the boys. Alex practically stalked her for a whole term before he found the balls to ask her out.

  ‘Exactly,’ Alex snapped. ‘I wasn’t even there.’

  ‘But you’d had a thing for Scarlett for ages before you started going out?’

  ‘What if I had? What difference does it make?’

  I sighed and tried to take the tension out of the situation. �
�You’ve got mud on your cheek.’

  Savagely he rubbed the wrong cheek with the back of his hand.

  ‘Other one.’

  He rubbed again.

  ‘You actually knew her,’ I say to Ursula. ‘What was she like? Was there an old boyfriend who got jealous when she chucked him and started going out with Alex? Where’d she been on New Year’s Eve? Was she at the party? Did she try to walk home alone?’

  ‘I’m telling everyone I wasn’t there, but no one will listen!’ Alex repeated, and his voice bounced off the grey oak trunks and fell to the cold, black earth. ‘The first I knew about it was the cops coming knocking at my door, not telling me what it was about, asking when did I last see Scarlett? I say, in Starbucks in the shopping centre at one o’clock on New Year’s Eve – why? They asked me loads more questions and I felt sick to my stomach because I was guessing now what this might be about – Scarlett had gone missing, or she’d had an accident and she was in hospital. But they still didn’t tell me. They asked did we have a fight, how long had we been together, why didn’t I go with her to the party?’

  ‘That must have been really hard to deal with,’ I murmured, knowing that my pathetic comment would bounce right back at me because the words that were pouring out of Alex were like a dam bursting, sweeping everything before them.

  ‘I’m saying’ what’s wrong, what’s wrong? And my dad is in the hallway behind me, dragging me back and telling the cops I was only a kid and they couldn’t throw their weight around like this and why the hell were they asking all these questions? And then they said they were sorry to inform us that Scarlett was dead and it was like I walked off the edge of a cliff and just fell and kept on falling.’

  We stood in silence, listening to the wind in the trees until Alex got hold of his runaway emotions and reined them in. ‘How could she be dead? I’d only talked to her three days before. We had coffee. We went shopping. She was fine.’

  ‘I’m so sorry.’

  ‘You’re sorry; everyone’s sorry. And you know what, Alyssa? I’m sorry too. I should’ve been there and it wouldn’t have ended up like it did. I should’ve gone with Scarlett to the party.’ This last thought brought him to another halt – as if his mind had hit one final bump and gone up in the air like the bike had done. He came crashing down into permanent silence.