‘No, no.’ It sounded as if the woman was horrified by the thought and Holly understood. Alicia was close to tears and wanted to sit on the empty platform and cry in peace.
Back in the police station in Kimmerston, Holly tried to track down Rebecca Brown, Patrick’s ex-girlfriend. The number that Alicia had given them over dinner was unavailable. She was about to call the university in Exeter when Vera wandered up to her desk. ‘Can you sort out a media release, Hol? I’d like to get it out for the lunchtime news. If there was a stranger in the valley, somebody must have seen him, and the canvassers have come up with bugger-all so far. Let’s appeal to all the nosy stay-at-homes in the surrounding villages and the people who were walking on the hills or along the burn. We need details of any unfamiliar cars or people. I’ve still got teams out there, but we need a wider hit.’
Holly nodded and replaced the phone. The call to the university would have to wait.
‘How was Alicia Randle?’ Vera leaned against the desk. The fat on her backside spread inside her Crimplene skirt, made it bulge. Holly found herself fascinated by it.
‘Very brave,’ Holly replied. ‘She said it was easier to grieve for Patrick than for her first son. Less complicated. He couldn’t be in any way to blame.’
‘Let’s hope that’s true.’ Vera slid away from the desk, leaving Holly to wonder exactly what she meant.
Later, when the media release had been sent to the press office for approval, Holly tried again to track down Patrick’s former girlfriend. The woman at the end of the phone in Exeter University’s school of medicine was cautious. ‘Give me your number and I’ll call you back. You could be the press.’
The phone rang half an hour later and the university admin officer had all the information Holly needed. ‘Rebecca Brown’s at home with her parents in County Durham.’ She read out the address. ‘It’s still the Easter holidays and she won’t be back at the university until the middle of next week. This is her mobile number.’ She finished the call without asking any questions. Holly couldn’t tell if she was very busy or very discreet.
A male voice answered Rebecca’s mobile. ‘Who is it?’ Then, without waiting for an answer, ‘Becky’s not up to talking now.’ He sounded angry.
Holly supposed this meant that Rebecca had seen the news about Patrick’s death and had been upset by it. She introduced herself. ‘And who are you?’ Keeping the question polite.
‘I’m her brother. The press have tracked her down. So-called friends must have told them she knew Patrick. It’s been a nightmare. We’re worried that if someone doesn’t answer her phone, they’ll just turn up on the doorstep.’
‘We’ll need to talk to her, I’m afraid. Can I come there?’
There was a pause and Holly heard a muffled conversation in the background. ‘When do you want to come?’
‘Now,’ she said. ‘If that’s all right.’ She thought again that she’d be glad to escape the office and Kimmerston.
The young protector at the end of the phone agreed and gave directions.
The Browns lived in a small market town on the edge of the Durham moors. Once it must have been prosperous. There were grand Georgian houses and an impressive town hall stood on the market square. Now, though, many of the shops in the main street had been closed and were boarded up, and even in the sunshine it had an air of desolation. The Browns lived in one of the big merchants’ houses close to the square. By the time Holly arrived it was late afternoon. The market was closing down, the stallholders folding tarpaulins and clearing tables. Cauliflower leaves and overripe tomatoes littered the cobbles. There was no sign that the press had tracked down Rebecca’s address, and the street outside the house was quiet.
The door was opened by a young man who must have been close to Patrick Randle in age and a little older than his own sister. ‘I’m George. Mum and Dad are out. Dad’s a GP and he’s still at the surgery. Mum’s just gone into town to visit a friend. Becky’s in here.’
It was a big family kitchen looking out over an untidy garden, and a young woman sat in the window-seat looking out. She was big-boned, tall and blonde. When she saw Holly she stood up. Her eyes were red from crying, but she managed a smile. ‘Sorry I’m in such a state. I can tell George thinks I’m being a bit of a drama-queen. It sounds like something out of a women’s mag, but Patrick really was the love of my life. I can’t believe he’s dead.’ A pause. ‘That someone killed him.’ She sat back down, but now she faced into the room.
‘Had you heard from him recently?’ Holly took a kitchen chair. The room looked as if it had been furnished by individual purchases from auctions. Lots of beautiful pieces, but nothing coordinated. Holly thought she wouldn’t have been able to stand the clash of colours and the clutter. It would bring on a migraine. She’d need to clear the place and start from the beginning.
‘There was a cryptic text a week ago.’ Becky pulled out her phone. ‘I’ve saved it, of course. It says: Nearly fit to be your friend again. If you can forgive me.’
‘What did you take that to mean?’
‘That whatever project had taken up the whole of his head for nearly a year was complete.’ Becky looked up at her. ‘That he was planning to come back to me.’
‘And you’d have had him back?’ Holly wouldn’t have considered returning to a failed relationship. It would never work and anyway she had too much pride.
‘Of course. I’ve told you he was the love of my life. But I couldn’t be with him as he was. Semi-detached. Obsessed with strange conspiracy theories.’
‘What sort of theories?’
Becky shrugged. ‘At first I thought it was about his work. Some scientists are haunted by the thought that another researcher will publish before them or steal their data. And Pat’s stuff was quite topical. There are still climate-change deniers, and his findings would have made their position seem even more ludicrous. He was always passionate about his work.’
It seemed unlikely to Holly that research into the habits of flying insects could provide a motive for murder, but she kept quiet.
Becky continued, ‘Then I thought it was something entirely different that was eating away at him. Something to do with his family. It seemed to start when his mother took up with another bloke, but the timing could have been coincidental. Or perhaps that triggered his desire to know more about his close relatives. Anyway all his spare time was taken up digging away in old newspaper reports and family-history sites online. And his attitude to his mother changed too. They’d always been very close, but suddenly he was cold when he spoke about her. It was as if visits home were just a drag. I hated the way he was with her. It wasn’t the Patrick I’d known and loved.’
‘He’d discovered something about Alicia? Something he disapproved of?’
‘I don’t know what he’d found out, because he wouldn’t talk to me about it. That was why I broke off with him. He seemed to be going faintly loopy, but I didn’t split up with him because I thought he was losing his mind. If I’m going to be a GP, I’ll have to deal with that and I knew he wasn’t really mad. And it wasn’t because I thought he was totally crazy to give up the chance of an immediate research post, when that was what he wanted since he was about twelve. I dumped him because he was being so bloody secretive. I only know that his family had anything to do with his obsession because I caught him digging into past copies of his local newspaper online. He seemed to be brooding over his father’s obituary. And even then he wouldn’t talk to me. He said he’d tell me the whole story when he knew it himself.’
‘What’s the name of the newspaper?’ Holly thought it was a long shot, but Vera Stanhope liked detail.
‘The Hereford Times.’
‘So you were the one to end the relationship?’ Holly was trying to make sense of this. The boss would love it. She enjoyed complication, stories of past feuds and tensions. In Holly’s experience, murder was usually much simpler.