Hidden Depths by Ann Cleeves Page A

start.’
    From the living room they heard the little girl singing along to a rhyme on the television. Vera didn’t know much about children but thought it must be unusual to get one this undemanding. It was a very different household from the one in Seaton where Luke had grown up. This was calm, ordered. The family lived by routine. Julie needed a bit of drama in her life to get through the day. Vera kept her eyes fixed on the adults, waiting for them to speak.
    ‘Luke could wind you up,’ Armstrong said. ‘He didn’t mean to. He just didn’t understand what you were saying to him. You’d ask him to do something and he’d look at you like you were the daft one for expecting him to catch on. I can imagine that getting him into bother. Some of the people he mixed with, they were used to being treated with respect.’
    ‘Like the Sharps?’
    ‘Maybe.’
    ‘Did the Sharps blame Luke for their son’s death?’
    It seemed Armstrong needed time to think about that. ‘I don’t mix with them,’ he said at last. ‘I wouldn’t know. They’re not famous for their patience, though, are they? And our Luke would have tried the patience of a saint. If one of them had asked him what happened that night Thomas died, Luke wouldn’t have been able to answer. He’d get stressed, flustered. The words wouldn’t come out and he’d just end up staring. Like I said, that would wind you up. Even if you didn’t believe Luke was responsible, it would still make you mad.’
    ‘Not mad enough to go round to his house and strangle him,’ Kath said.
    Armstrong shrugged. ‘I can’t think of anyone else who’d want to kill him.’
    ‘Did Luke ever talk to you about the accident?’
    ‘Not the accident itself,’ Kath said. ‘He came here soon after it happened. He talked about all the flowers that had been thrown into the river afterwards. How pretty they were. He’d gone with Julie and seemed really moved by it. There was a picture on the front page of the Chronicle. He brought it for me to see.’
    Rebecca appeared at the kitchen door. She stood shyly, curious about the stranger.
    ‘Do you mind starting on the tea, Geoff?’ Kath said. ‘I need to get ready for work.’
    She followed Vera towards the front door. In the kitchen Geoff had switched on the radio and he and Rebecca were singing along to a pop song.
    Vera had dozens of questions. She wanted to know how Kath and Geoff had met. What had she seen in him? How had she seen the potential doting father under the loutishness and the anger? But that was probably just prying and none of her business and she contented herself with a single comment. ‘I was told your man had a bit of a temper,’ she said. ‘No sign of that now.’
    Kath paused for a moment, reaching out towards the door handle. ‘He’s happy,’ she said. ‘There’s no reason for him to get angry any more.’
    Vera thought that sounded a bit glib. Too good to be true. But she didn’t push it. She had an appointment, someone else to see.

 
Chapter Eight
     
    Lying in the bath, the window open a crack, the water deep and very hot, Felicity found herself brooding on the past. She wasn’t given much to introspection and wondered what might be the cause of it. Peter’s sixtieth birthday perhaps. Anniversaries occasionally had that effect. Or a menopausal moodiness. Meeting Lily Marsh had unsettled her. She was jealous of the young woman’s youth and vitality, the firm skin and flat stomach, and she had envied her independence.
    Felicity had married too early. She’d met Peter at a party. She was an undergraduate, only six weeks into her degree. Her parents had tried to persuade her to apply to a university a bit further from home, but she’d been daunted enough at the prospect of a hall of residence. She needed the security of the vicarage only an hour away, an escape route. Her father was a priest, mild, relaxed about theology, but strict on kindness. In fact, she’d taken to university life, the