White Nights - Ann Cleeves [75]
‘Excuse me. Police. Have you got a minute?’
He’d startled her. The milk remained where it was. She opened the door a little wider, pulled her dressing gown around her. She was middle-aged but wearing well.
‘Could we have a chat?’ he said. ‘It’ll not take long.’
An animal-feed lorry rolled past, bringing with it a strange yeasty smell. ‘You’d best come in,’ she said. ‘I’m hardly decent for talking in the street.’
Her name was Mandy and she was a library assistant in Huddersfield, divorced, the kids all grown up. Today she wasn’t starting work till midday.
‘What was he like then, the bloke next door?’
Taylor was sitting at the table in the small kitchen. She’d made him tea, very strong, and there was bread in the toaster.
‘Why? What’s happened to him?’ She’d lit a cigarette. ‘The first of the day,’ she said, relishing it. There were times when Taylor wished he still smoked.
‘Didn’t you see his picture in the paper?’
‘I don’t bother with a paper these days.’
‘He’s dead,’ Taylor said. ‘He was found strangled in Shetland.’
‘Where?’ She was curious but she didn’t seem terribly upset that her neighbour had died.
‘The Shetland Islands. Right off the north of Scotland.’
‘Oh.’ She finished the cigarette and stubbed it out in her saucer. ‘I thought I hadn’t seen him lately, but he keeps strange hours. I suppose the house’ll be up for sale. I hope we don’t get a noisy bugger moving in.’
‘Was Mr Booth noisy?’
‘Not really. Occasionally he’d have friends in late. I’d hear them talking, maybe a bit of music, but they weren’t rowdy. Nothing you could complain about.’
‘How long had he lived there?’
‘About five years. He moved in after me.’
‘Was he on his own for the whole of that time? No girlfriends? Boyfriends?’
‘He wasn’t gay,’ she said seriously. ‘At least I don’t think he was. He’d been married once. And he’d had a child. But he left them. Quite suddenly.’
‘How do you know all that?’
‘He told me,’ she said.
‘Close, were you?’
‘No. We lived our own lives. I don’t want the whole village knowing my business and nor did he. But one night he’d locked himself out of his house. He’d left all his keys in the Mill. There was a lass who works for him, lives in Huddersfield, and she had a set, but it took a while to get hold of her so he waited in mine. I’d just opened a bottle of wine and we ended up sharing it. It was the only time we really talked. That was the time he told me about his wife. He regretted just walking out on her, but she didn’t understand his dreams.’ She paused, looked at Taylor. ‘Dreams! You’re all the same, you men. Selfish bastards.’
Taylor wanted to reply that in his experience it was the women who were the dreamy ones, but he made no comment. ‘He didn’t tell you he was going away this time, then?’
‘No. Like I said, we weren’t that sort of neighbours. I just noticed that I’d not seen him around for a few days.’
The toaster popped. She nodded towards it. ‘Do you fancy a piece?’
But Taylor didn’t have anything else to say and couldn’t imagine sitting at her table making polite conversation. That was much more Perez’s style than his. He refused the offer and thanked her. As she showed him out she was already lighting another cigarette.
Back on the street, teenagers were coming out of the houses and wandering towards the bus stop for school. How old would Booth’s child be now? He wondered if Jebson had traced the wife, if she’d even found out that the man had been married. A small train wound along a viaduct crossing the valley. The sun was already hot enough for Taylor to feel warm in his jacket.
Jebson arrived dead on time. He’d gone into a newsagent’s and was sitting in the car trying to concentrate on a paper. She was square with very dark hair and dark eyebrows. He’d have marked her out as CID from a hundred yards, but wasn’t sure why. He got out of his car and joined her on the doorstep of Booth’s house.