Page 67 of The Mercy Chair

‘She does,’ Poe agreed. ‘And she tells me at least five or six times a day. My point is not only are these gadgets recruiting grounds for paedophiles and stalkers, they stunt childhoods. I’m not suggesting parents go back to handing out hoops and sticks, but the odd Space Hopper wouldn’t go amiss.’

Bradshaw and Alice shrugged at each other. ‘See?’ Bradshaw said. ‘Dinosaur.’

‘Bethany had no toys whatsoever, Sergeant Poe,’ Alice said. ‘While Eve and Aaron were given things to play with, and occasionally they’d be allowed what Grace and Noah Bowman thought were suitable books to read, Bethany wasn’t allowed anything, not even a Bible. When they were older, Eve and Aaron wore new clothes; Bethany wore only what Eve had outgrown. She wasn’t allowed to eat with the family. They basically did the bare minimum to keep her alive. Other than how it reflected on them, they had no interest in her welfare at all. Bethany said to me once that it wasn’t that they were indifferent to her, they actually went out of their way to make her feel unwelcome. Which of course made her behaviour even worse.’

‘She was the youngest of the three, right?’ Poe said.

‘She was.’

Poe thought this through. It wasn’t unheard of for parents to favour one child over another, but outside ofCinderellait was rarely so blatant. If Alice was telling the truth, Grace and Noah Bowman deserved to be in prison.

IfAlice was telling the truth.

Chapter 58

Poe ordered more hot drinks. He did this at the bar rather than at their table. Not because the hovering waiter was incompetent, but because he needed time to think.

‘What’s happening?’ Linus asked.

‘Hard to tell,’ Poe admitted. ‘According to Alice, Noah and Grace Bowman were emotionally abusing Bethany.’

‘And it wasn’t just an ultra-strict upbringing?’

‘Alice believes Bethany was unfairly singled out. According to her, the root cause of all Bethany’s behavioural problems was the way she was treated by her parents.’

‘What’s the problem then? Doesn’t this provide the motivation the case was lacking all those years ago?’

‘The problem, Snoopy, is that Alice is supposed to be Bethany’s friend,’ Poe said. ‘And if this was the sentencing part of a court case, I’d say she was doing a superb job of offering mitigation.’

‘It doesn’t add up?’

‘There’s a contradiction I’m not seeing yet. Why vehemently deny Bethany was capable of doing something while simultaneously providing the missing motivation?’

‘Maybe they aren’t friends.’

‘Maybe,’ Poe conceded. The barman brought a tray over. Fresh coffee for him, green teas for Bradshaw and Alice. Poe picked it up and began walking back to the table. He stopped and returned to Linus. ‘If you want to make yourself useful, Snoopy, you can start by abusing the powers of the state.’

‘What do you want?’

‘Dig out everything you can on Alice Symonds. I want to know if she’s the real deal or if she’s rat poison squared.’

Poe didn’t wait for an answer. Linus either would or he wouldn’t. And even if he refused, an hour of Bradshaw rooting through the life of Alice Symonds was worth a week of the security services doing it anyway. He got back to the table, passed Alice her drink and said, ‘What aren’t you telling me, Alice?’

She blew on her tea and studied his face. ‘The more important question is why are you still focusing on what happened in 2012?’

‘You think Grace, Noah and Aaron Bowman being butchered like pigs isn’t worth focusing on?’

She shook her head. ‘No, I don’t.’

In anyone else that would have been an outrageous statement, but he sensed he was being tested again. ‘Then what is?’

‘The catalyst, Sergeant Poe,’ she said. ‘You say the murders are the most important thing, I say they’re the end result of something that started five years earlier.’

Poe worked backwards. The Bowmans were murdered in 2012. Five years earlier was 2007, the year Aaron attended one of Cornelius Green’s secret courses. But Alice was interested in Bethany, not Aaron.

‘Bethany ran away from home in 2007,’ he said eventually. ‘Although she returned in 2012 to murder her family, 2007 was the last time she was seen. You think the catalyst for what happened in 2012, and for what’s happening now, was what caused Bethany to run away from home in the first place?’

Alice nodded her encouragement.

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