The Long Call (Two Rivers #1) - Ann Cleeves Page 0,45

if he was waiting for someone who didn’t show up, though.’

He leaned back against a desk. ‘We’ll continue the enquiries in Braunton and Ilfracombe. Let’s track Walden’s movements from the moment he left the house that morning. How did he get to Braunton? Did he take the bus, or did the person he was meeting there give him a lift? There’s CCTV in Ilfracombe high street and at the bus station and we might find something in Braunton too. But I want to know more about our victim and to do that we need to speak to the people close to him.’ He paused and looked at Jen. ‘How would you be fixed for a trip to Bristol tomorrow? I’d like you to speak to Walden’s wife. And while you’re there, to arrange a meeting with Alan Springer, the chap who left the message on the landline in Hope Street.’

‘Yeah, sure.’ As she answered, she was thinking that it would be another early start and late finish, that the kids would have to get themselves to school again, but there was no hesitation.

‘Take Ross with you,’ Matthew said. ‘It’d be useful to have two perspectives.’

Oh great, she thought. Bloody great.

Chapter Thirteen

MATTHEW WAS IN HIS OFFICE EARLY the next morning. The sun was shining again on the mound of Castle Hill, making the grass look new and impossibly green. He’d woken to a high tide; the sound of the water outside the bedroom window had invaded his dreams. Even on waking, he’d still believed for a moment that he’d been in a boat and had a brief sense of drowning, of disappearing under a black wave, high as a cliff. Then he’d realized where he was and that it was his turn to make the coffee. Jonathan was barely moving and only sat up in bed when Matthew came back into the room with his hands cupped round the mug. Poised in the doorway, Matthew stared at him for a moment: blond-haired, bare-chested. Beautiful.

At his desk, Matthew looked at the contact list Ross had left for him the night before. There were a few people to follow up and he’d pass them on to other members of the team. He looked at the details of the woman who’d seen Walden in the Braunton cafe on the morning of his death. Her name was Angela Bale and there was a mobile number. Matthew phoned it.

‘Hello?’ She sounded suspicious because she didn’t recognize the number.

‘Miss Bale.’

‘Mrs.’

‘This is Matthew Venn. I’m a police officer working on the Simon Walden case. I wonder if you could come into the station to give us a statement. You said you saw the victim on the day he was killed. In a cafe in Braunton.’

‘I can’t come today,’ she said quickly. ‘It’s not convenient. I’m working.’

‘Where do you work?’

‘For the Landmark Trust. In the booking office for the Oldenburg at Ilfracombe Harbour. The season has only just started and we’re very busy.’ The Oldenburg was the Lundy Island ferry. He and Jonathan had spent a few days in a tiny cottage on Lundy in the autumn. It had been wild and rainy. He’d been sick on the boat across but Jonathan had loved the stormy sea. They’d spent most of their stay hiding from the weather, either in bed or in the Marisco Tavern, the island pub. Or arguing to relieve the boredom and then making up.

‘You’ll have a lunch break, though? Perhaps we could speak to you then.’

There was silence at the end of the line. ‘My husband said I shouldn’t have spoken to you, that I might have made a mistake. That I shouldn’t get involved.’

‘What do you think?’ Matthew asked. ‘Do you think you made a mistake?’

Another silence before she spoke. ‘No.’

‘Then it would be very helpful if you’d make a statement.’

‘Would you be the person I’d be speaking to?’

‘If you’d find that easier.’

‘Meet me at work then. Twelve o’clock.’

He felt a moment of joy at having an excuse to leave the office. It occurred to him that he should call into Chivenor on his way to Ilfracombe. The dog-walker who’d found Walden’s body still hadn’t made a formal statement. He’d have to leave soon to allow himself time to speak to her, and thinking of that, he felt as if a weight had lifted from his shoulders. The claustrophobia that overwhelmed him sometimes in the office had become almost pathological. He’d need to deal with it; he couldn’t spend his working life on a