Cambridge Blue - Alison Bruce [39]
Gary didn’t know, but he hadn’t noticed many, that was for sure. ‘It’s mostly houses, isn’t it?’
‘Maybe there’s more, but I can only recall two flats, Lorna’s and the empty one underneath. So when you turn up asking if I know her, what else am I going to think?’
‘Can you tell me when you last saw her?’ Gary asked, wondering whether there was a record for the number of times someone could keep answering a question with another question.
‘Am I making a statement or is this an informal chat?’
Gary decided to level with him, and with no question at the end of it. Letting people talk was a more accurate way of weighing them up than showering them with continual questions. ‘I spotted your name on Lorna’s calendar, where she planned for you to MOT her car back in January. I guessed that there might not be too many Bryns in the area, so I thought I’d check out whether it was you. I’m part of the investigation team, so you will certainly be asked to make a statement, but for now I’m just trying to get some of the groundwork done.’
‘Yeah, well, you always were good at homework.’ Bryn drained the rest of his pint. ‘OK, hang on a minute,’ he added, and headed towards the Gents.
Gary watched him go, deciding nothing about him gave the impression of a man ill at ease, and yet Gary couldn’t help wondering whether Bryn was planning to head out of a back door.
He went to the bar for another couple of pints, and hoped he wouldn’t end up drinking them alone.
Bryn washed his hands, carefully squirting a large pool of liquid soap into his palm and taking time to work it between each of his fingers. Gradually, some of the oil stains began to shift, but he wasn’t fully conscious of what he was doing, most of his thoughts were focusing on Goodhew. Gary Goodhew.
That was a name from the past, and it was true that at first he hadn’t recognized his old classmate. But once the name had connected with the face, memories had rushed into his head. And he’d been surprised, not by the number – so far there had only been a few – but by the clarity.
Suddenly he could picture the whole class. Like the bulk of the kids there, he had gone on to Chesterton Secondary School, but there had been others who had disappeared at the end of that same year. He’d subsequently forgotten they’d ever existed – until now. Suddenly he remembered Karen Jarvis and her frizzy hair, her book bag perforated with holes from a pair of compasses.
Steve ‘Stench’ Manning, who didn’t actually smell, but just looked like he did.
Jon Wu, with the skinny legs and scraped knees, who wasn’t that bright but created masterpieces from papier mâché and poster paint.
And Gary Goodhew.
Goodhew’s desk had stood at right angles to the window. He’d mixed with everyone and no one, friendly enough, but seemed to spend most of his time staring through the glass. Who knew what he had found so absorbing out there in the car park, a few trees and a fence, but even so, he never missed a trick. When Mr Mosley threw him a question, Goodhew never failed to pluck the right answer from thin air and throw it right back.
And if he’d matured into an extension of that junior self, he wouldn’t be missing much now, that was for sure.
Bryn dried his hands and took a deep breath before reaching for the door handle.
For someone who claimed he didn’t like to think too deeply, he currently had a great deal on his mind. He knew that saying nothing wasn’t an option but, then again, he could see that saying too much might be dangerous. Just enough is what he now had to aim for. Precisely enough, at least until he’d had time to think.
Gary didn’t read anything significant into Bryn’s return to their table, but was pleased about it nonetheless. He wanted their conversation to start up pretty much where it had left off, so for that reason, he made sure to speak first. ‘You said you thought you knew Lorna Spence a little. I don’t understand what exactly you meant by that.’
He saw that Bryn had relaxed somewhat: he leant back in his seat, his posture seeming more open and his eye