The Calling Read Online Free Page A

she’d opened the door to him. She seemed dazed and vague, and now sat in an odd kind of question-mark position, rocking back and forth with an almost imperceptible motion.
    ‘Yes, fine.’ A pink blotch coloured the bridge of her nose where her glasses had rested earlier. Her eyes were pink too, but not focusing. Her cheeks had faded to the colour of dusty concrete.
    He needed to form a mental picture of Kaye, and Margaret Whiting’s tight-lipped answers clearly weren’t about to provide it.
    ‘Mrs Whiting, this is going to take a little while. So, if it’s OK with you, maybe we could make some tea while we talk about it.’ He stood up and encouraged her towards the kitchen. ‘It won’t slow us up, I promise.’
    She walked ahead of him, along the hall.
    ‘Was the party held here?’
    ‘No, at my mum’s. She lives in Redkin Road, just off the other end of Arbury Road.’ Margaret filled the kettle and continued talking as she assembled the mugs and milk and sugar. ‘The party was a surprise for my mum; she’s a bit difficult at times, so we thought she’d only fuss if we let her know in advance. We all see her at least once a week during the day, so it seemed like a good idea for us to get together for the evening. Do you have milk?’
    Goodhew nodded. ‘No sugar, though, thanks.’
    ‘Well, I turned up with Mike and Steve first – that’s my husband and son. We brought all the food with us, and everyone else was expected around seven-thirty.’ She leant back against the worktop. ‘There were supposed to be eight of us – including my mum.’ She counted them on her fingers. ‘Me, Mum, Mike, Steve, my two daughters – Kaye and Michelle – and my brother Andy, and Michelle’s boyfriend Carl. But neither Andy nor Kaye ever arrived.’
    ‘And no one had heard from Kaye?’
    ‘No, but Michelle and Carl were late too, so at first we thought they were all coming together. Michelle burst in all excited, and made up to the nines, of course.’ Margaret’s face brightened a little as she spoke of her younger daughter. ‘She’s such a bubbly thing, it always seems like a carnival’s rolled in when she turns up. Just as well …’ She turned aside as the kettle clicked off, and poured the boiling water on to the tea bags in two cups. ‘Just as well, because that Carl’s a real misery and he just slouched by the door, and then Michelle says, “Guess what?”’ Margaret stopped abruptly and pursed her lips as she concentrated on squeezing the tea bag.
    Goodhew waited for her to continue but, after a few moments, a tear dripped on to the Formica. He reached across and took his cup of tea from her. ‘Are you all right, Mrs Whiting?’
    ‘My mum whispered, “Bet Michelle’s pregnant,” but I knew she wouldn’t be.’ Margaret wiped her face quickly and turned back to Goodhew.
    ‘And she wasn’t. She’d just booked a holiday, that’s all. You see, I knew it wouldn’t be anything bad, because she’d never let me down. And neither would Kaye, so that’s why I know something dreadful has happened.’
    Margaret Whiting hesitated then, as though she was waiting for him to reassure her. He knew he should say something, but he’d recognized her expression: the phrase halfway between fear and helplessness slipped into his thoughts.
    It felt like an omen. 

CHAPTER 4
SUNDAY, 27 MARCH 2011
    Cambridge has many open areas interspersed among its city-centre streets, with names like Jesus Green and Midsummer Common. They are mostly clean and safe, criss-crossed with paths used by students and mums pushing buggies.
    Parkside police station faces on to one of these: a large rectangular green space known as Parker’s Piece. From time to time, Goodhew wondered who the original Parker had been but he had never bothered to find out.
    Luckily for Goodhew, Parkside Pool lay only yards away from the station, just across the corner of Parker’s Piece. He liked to swim one hundred lengths at least four