led her past rooms where it seemed various forms of group therapy were taking place. In one, women lay on the floor. Yoga or some form of meditation. Jen liked the idea of yoga, but didn’t have the patience for it. The building was deceptively spacious and light. There were posters on the walls, semi-religious imagery of rainbows and doves, slogans about taking power, and loving the inner you. Here it seemed hope and the possibility of redemption abounded. It made Jen feel like punching someone.
Caroline’s office was in the old school. It might once have been a small classroom, but her desk and the shelves and filing system were bright and new. It looked out over the courtyard and had a view of the trees. Two easy chairs faced a small coffee table on one side of the desk and Caroline sat there and waited for Jen to join her. Jen supposed this was where she talked to her clients, to the desperate suicidal, the ill.
‘You wanted to see me.’ Jen had planned to talk to Caroline anyway, but let her think Jen was doing her a favour by coming to her.
Caroline brought out a Yale key on a ring attached to a plastic bird and set it on the table. ‘We found this yesterday. At least Gaby found it in some laundry Simon had left in the washing machine. I thought it might be important.’
It lay on the table between them. A vindication of Jen’s theory that Walden had a hideaway somewhere. She thought of it as a secret place, because he’d never mentioned it, had he? They’d all thought he’d been homeless, and they’d taken him in as a charity case. But it was worth checking again. ‘You’ve no idea what it might be for? He never mentioned another place?’
Caroline shook her head. ‘This bird. It’s an albatross, isn’t it? Like the tattoo on his neck. It must belong to Simon.’
‘Perhaps it’s to his former home, his wife’s house,’ Jen said, though she didn’t believe for a moment that was true. ‘He could have kept it for sentimental reasons.’
‘I don’t think so.’ Caroline shook her head again. ‘He always said he’d left his old life behind.’
Jen thought they’d get a photo of the key and the ring off to Kate just to check.
‘I was planning to see you,’ Jen said. ‘We need to talk again about Simon Walden.’
‘Sure.’ Caroline blinked behind the big round specs. ‘Of course. Anything I can do to help.’
‘When he turned up at the church that night, drunk, desperate, you had the impression that he was homeless?’
‘Yes.’ Caroline was unsure now, though. Jen could tell. Outside in the corridor, footsteps came and went as somebody paced.
‘Did he tell you he had nowhere to live?’
‘That night he was so confused and distressed that he didn’t say much at all. Nothing that made sense.’ Caroline closed her eyes again as if she were trying to remember. ‘We put him up in St Cuthbert’s because he wasn’t safe to let out on his own. He was so full of self-disgust. He was clearly having suicidal thoughts. He said he’d be better dead.’
‘That was the end of October. Halloween.’
‘As a church, we don’t recognize that as a festival.’ She pulled a face to show her distaste. ‘But yes, I remember there were kids trick or treating in Hope Street before I went out to the meeting.’ A pause. ‘Gaby encouraged them by dressing up as a witch, jumping out at them when they knocked at the door, trying to scare them.’ Another pause. ‘I suppose I assumed that he was homeless. He left the next morning with the worst kind of hangover, but the following week he came here again. He was waiting outside the door when I arrived at nine o’clock. I brought him into my office for an assessment. I needed to get a medical history. He said he hadn’t seen a doctor since he’d left the army.’ She looked up at Jen. ‘That was when I asked for his address. I told him I’d need it for the records.’
‘And what did he say?’
‘He didn’t answer,’ Caroline said. ‘Not really. I thought at the time he was embarrassed because he didn’t have a place of his own. He didn’t look as if he’d been rough sleeping for a long time, but I thought maybe he’d been sofa-surfing. Or he had a certain pride so he’d found somewhere for a shower. Some guys go to the