46
DC Lisa Carmichael knocked at the door and waited. There was music coming from inside the flat, Snow Patrol: ‘Chasing Cars’. Great choice. She had the album herself and liked it a lot. The door was opened by a thin wiry man, mid twenties, dressed casually in combats and a faded T-shirt. His hair was wet and he smelled of good aftershave.
‘David Hedley?’ Carmichael showed ID.
The man nodded. ‘This about the accident?’
‘Yes, I need to ask you a few questions, if it’s convenient.’
‘OK.’ Hedley opened the door a little wider but not quite wide enough for her to squeeze through. ‘If it’s not a daft question, what’s a murder detective got to do with a car crash?’
Carmichael was impressed. Not many folks bothered to look closely at police identification, despite repeated warnings in the press to do so. They just saw the shiny badge and assumed it was genuine. Most had never heard of the offence of impersonating a police officer.
She pointed into the flat. ‘Can we talk inside?’
Hedley took a step backwards, allowing her in this time, killing his iPod as he followed her into the living room. Carmichael was immediately drawn to the window. She walked towards it and looked down at the A1 trunk road. It was busy in both directions, cars nose to tail on the northbound carriageway, the route to the best beaches in the country in the opinion of anyone who’d ever seen the Northumberland coast. Mile after mile of golden, empty sand, the county’s – possibly even the country’s – best-kept secret.
Carmichael wished she was joining them.
On both sides of the road were POLICE ACCIDENT signs, asking witnesses to come forward. More or less routine after a fatal. On the grass verge, there were some wilted bouquets, and on the southern carriageway someone had placed a makeshift cross. It was sticking out of the ground, waiting to impale the next poor motorcyclist unlucky enough to come off their bike there.
Did people ever stop to think?
‘I told the accident investigators everything I could remember,’ Hedley said as he came and stood alongside her, sighing loudly, staring down at the traffic below. ‘What is it you want to know?’
Carmichael hesitated long enough to put him on edge. ‘Your statement—’
He glanced sideways. ‘What about it?’
‘You were first to arrive at the scene. Is that right?’
Hedley nodded, his left eye twitching.
‘How long did it take for the emergency services to arrive?’
Staring off into the distance, a sad expression crossed Hedley’s face as he searched for an answer, reliving a memory she suspected he’d rather forget. It took him some time to speak. ‘Five minutes maybe. Felt like hours . . .’ When he looked back at her, his eyes were misted up. ‘It was mayhem on both sides of the road. I didn’t know what to do.’
‘I understand,’ Carmichael said gently.
‘Do you? I don’t think so. It’s different for you. You’ve had training and stuff.’ He dropped his gaze, fighting to hide his feelings. ‘I felt so helpless. I don’t suppose I’ll ever repeat the experience, but I’ve signed up for a first-aid course in case. I never want to feel like that again.’
Carmichael allowed him a moment to compose himself.
‘What do you do for a living, Mr Hedley?’ she said eventually.
Hedley pulled himself out of his trance. ‘I work for the local authority Parks Department. Boring administration, but someone has to do it. That’s why I took up astronomy.’ He pointed to a large telescope aimed at the sky through the picture window. ‘There’s nowt new on the box these days and it’s a fascinating subject. Keeps me occupied, anyway. Means getting up in the middle of the night but I don’t mind that. I’ve always been a light sleeper and this recent heat-wave hasn’t helped. There was nowt to see Wednesday night . . .’ He lifted his eyes to the sky. ‘Up there, I mean. I was on my way back to bed when I heard a loud bang. Now I can’t sleep at all.’
‘Isn’t it too light here to get a good look at the stars?’ Carmichael asked.
Hedley suddenly perked up, pleased that his visitor was taking an interest. ‘Are you an enthusiast, yourself?’
Carmichael shook her head. ‘Not personally, but I do know a little about it.’
‘Figures . . .’ For the first time since Carmichael arrived, Hedley managed a smile. ‘The subject bores the pants off most people. When I talk about it to colleagues at work I can see their eyes glazing over. Doesn’t bother me though. They don’t know what they’re missing.’
Carmichael smiled back. ‘I have an uncle who’s really into it. Has been for years. He lives in the sticks, near Kielder.’
‘Lucky man.’ Hedley paused. ‘Did you know it’s the darkest place in Europe? There’s an observatory up there, open to the public. You should check it out. It’s absolutely magic. Unfortunately I don’t have the means to move and commute fifty miles a day to indulge my hobby. Who does these days?’
The person who stole an old lady’s lottery ticket might. Carmichael forced another smile. She scanned the living room; a man’s taste, she thought. ‘Do you live here alone?’
Hedley nodded, his enthusiasm fading.
‘No girlfriend round that night?’
‘No girlfriend, period.’
‘Any recording facilities – for the stargazing, I mean?’
‘No, why?’
‘No reason . . . I know this must be difficult for you when all you want to do is forget, but I’d like you to cast your mind back. I’m interested in one car in particular: a Honda Jazz with an elderly driver and front-seat passenger. Can you recall seeing that vehicle?’
Hedley shook his head. ‘Doesn’t ring any bells.’
‘Maybe I can help you.’ Carmichael pulled a diagram from her bag. Unravelling it, she took it to Hedley’s dining table and flattened it out, holding the ends down with her car keys and phone. ‘Your flat is here, with a good view of the carriageway obviously.’ She pointed to one particular spot. ‘Front door is here. How did you make your way to the roadside?’
‘That way –’ Hedley indicated the north side of the building. ‘Out the front door, across the mound here. I scaled the fence. There’s no other way. It has to be blocked off in case the little kids run on to the road.’
‘And that’s when you dialled 999?’ She watched him closely for a reaction.
‘No, I did that from here. Soon as I could. Then I grabbed some clothes and legged it. I’m afraid to say I froze when I got there.’
Hedley’s expression darkened as he relived the nightmare again in all its gory detail: the blood, the despair, the terrible injuries sustained by the casualties. Carmichael knew that some of them had been horrendous, even in the opinion of the most hardened of professionals. It had only been a few days since the accident but she’d heard on the grapevine that one fire officer had gone sick with post-traumatic stress. Emergency services personnel who’d attended the scene were still talking about it. Gormley, on the other hand, wouldn’t. And she couldn’t fathom why.
‘I’m sorry . . .’ Hedley said, regaining her attention. ‘I’m absolutely useless with blood. Always was. I saw this bloke with an arm missing, staggering along the road, a stream of blood gushing, squirting from . . .’ He shuddered and closed his eyes – a genuine reaction, she thought. ‘I’m sorry, after that I hardly remember a thing.’
Carmichael nodded. It must’ve been a hell of a thing to see in the middle of the night. She imagined Hedley in his pyjamas, looking down on the scene from the window, maybe not hearing their screams but seeing their pain, sharing their shock.
‘The man you saw did survive,’ she reassured him. ‘And that’s probably down to you.’
Carmichael knew that the badly injured man’s car was one of the first vehicles Hedley would’ve come across if he joined the road at the point he described. And Ivy’s car was metres away. Was he telling her the truth? Daniels had alluded to a conviction for deception. But did Hedley have the capacity for violence? Did he have it in him to whack an old lady over the head for a lottery ticket?
In all honesty, she couldn’t say.
She decided to leave it there for now.