Bones Under The Beach Hut

'Of other people doing things to children?'

'Yes.'

'You mean by watching pornography?' asked Carole in disgust.

'Yes, but don't be so dismissive of it. For me child pornography is a harmless release for—'

'But it's not harmless! The children who feature in that kind of material are being harmed. At the time they're filmed they're being abused by—'

'Listen, Carole. If the existence of that pornography is stopping one person — me — from abusing a child, then surely that's a good thing?'

'Well, it's—'

'All I can say is that it works for me. It controls my urges, it provides a release for me — and it stops me from actually harming a real child!'

There was a silence. Carole recognized that she was never going to see eye to eye with Kelvin Southwest on the subject. But, more importantly, she found she was beginning to believe his protestations that he had had nothing to do with the abduction of Robin Cutter. Her certainties of earlier in the day were melting away. But then again, she told herself, paedophiles were notoriously devious and plausible. As she had pointed out to him, a guilty Kelvin Southwest would say just the same things as an innocent one. She needed to find out more.

'So where do you get this pornography from?' she asked with a shudder. 'Do you download it from the internet? Are you part of some paedophile ring? Or do you have another source?'

'I have another very good source,' he replied almost smugly. 'A very good source indeed.'

'Where do you get it from?'

There was a note of pride in his voice as he said, 'You should know this, Carole, given your background in the Home Office.'

'Oh?' she asked, puzzled.

'Where does child porn go when it's confiscated?'

'Well, obviously it goes to the police.'

'Exactly. So if someone like me had a contact in the police, a contact let us say who owed one a favour . . . that person might be persuaded to access ... to copy that kind of material for one, mightn't they?'

'And are you saying you have that kind of a contact?'

'I do.'

Carole didn't need to ask him for the name. Suddenly the whole shabby set-up was crystal clear to her. 'Curt Holderness,' she said.

Kelvin Southwest nodded, pleased with his own cleverness. 'Yes, and even though he's left the force, he still has a friend there who keeps up the supply.'

'And does Curt Holderness enjoy that kind of material too?'

He chuckled. 'Why do you think he left the force early? Under something of a cloud? He could have been charged with stealing and disseminating the stuff, but the local police bigwigs didn't want the adverse publicity. He was shuffled out unceremoniously but discreetly. And since he was doing a favour for me . . .'

'You organized for him to get the job as security officer for the Smalting Beach Hut Association?'

Kelvin Southwest gave another self-satisfied nod.

Carole Seddon's mind was reeling. Everything she had thought about the case was suddenly turned on its head. Earlier in the day she had contemplated ending her interview with the Fether District Council official by revealing that she wasn't really a police officer, but now no thought could have been further from her mind.

She also felt fairly convinced that Kelvin Southwest had had nothing to do with the abduction and murder of Robin Cutter, but she wasn't about to tell the man that. Let him suffer a bit longer.

And in the meantime she would get back in touch with Curt Holderness.

Chapter Thirty-Five

Unlike Kelvin Southwest, Curt Holderness wasn't under the illusion that Carole Seddon was attached in any way to the police force. Nor, given his career background, did she reckon he'd be fooled for a moment if she claimed she was. But she still didn't reckon he'd argue when she said she'd like to meet and talk.

He didn't. She rang him as soon as a very chastened and nervous Kelvin Southwest had left . . . with many pleas that she would not tell anyone else about what they had discussed. But she wasn't about to let that particular little worm off the hook by giving him any such undertaking.

When she passed on to Curt Holderness what she'd heard from the Fether District Council official, the security officer agreed instantly to a meeting. He asked where she was and said he'd come straight to Smalting. Fowey that morning was becoming a kind of 'Incident Room' and in Carole's view the beach hut served the purpose pretty well. Though there was no one near enough to overhear any conversations conducted there, it was in full public view and therefore safe.

As she had the thought, she remembered that it was in full public view, in a situation that anyone might have thought to be safe, that Robin Cutter had been abducted on that very beach. A little shudder ran through her.

But no feeling of fear could overpower the sense of excitement welling up inside her. She was finally making real progress on the case. And on her own. Jude might live to regret wasting her time at a Past Life Regression Workshop in Brighton.

'Funny, Carole. I hadn't got you down as a blackmailer.'

She looked up to see the stocky figure of Curt Holderness standing between her and the sun. She was sure he had chosen to approach from that angle to emphasize his menace. And he'd succeeded. In spite of the June heat, he was once again wearing his black motorcycle leathers, though he stripped off the blouson as, uninvited, he sat in the chair opposite her. Underneath he had on a Metallica tour T-shirt.

'I'm not a blackmailer,' said Carole, with a calm that she didn't feel.

'Then what is all this about?'

'I am interested in the disappearance of Robin Cutter.'

'You're not alone in that. Everyone on the South Coast has theories on the subject.'

'Yes, but I'm interested in your involvement in it, Curt.'

He shrugged, remarkably insouciant, given the implied accusation in Carole's words. 'All right. I was still on the force then. I worked on the case briefly. Went through some of the foot-slogging, house-to-house inquiry stuff. Didn't come up with anything useful. If you're hoping to get new information out of me, forget it. I don't have any.'

'That wasn't what I meant. Robin Cutter was assumed to have been abducted by a paedophile . . .'

'That was the general view, yes. After another high-profile local case, people were seeing paedophiles everywhere. God, the number of paranoid calls we got at the station round that time.'

'Are you suggesting you think there was another explanation for Robin Cutter's disappearance?'

He shrugged again. 'Not particularly, no.' His answers sounded laid-back, but Carole could sense the tension in him. He was on the alert, waiting to see which direction their interview was taking.

'I said on the phone what Kelvin Southwest had told me . . .'

'Uh-huh.'

'. . . about you supplying him with child pornography.'

'Okay, I'm not denying it. The little creep wanted the stuff, I had access to it, we made a deal. It was a business arrangement.'

'A business arrangement that led to your early retirement from the police force?'

'Yes, all right. I don't deny that either. And if you're planning to blackmail me over it, I don't think you'll find the top brass in the force any keener to bring that out into the open now than they were at the time.'

'No, but the fact that you dealt in child pornography has other ramifications, doesn't it, Curt?'

'Like what? I had access to the stuff. I had the technology to copy it. I saw a way of making a quick buck. Salaries in the police force aren't that generous, you know.'