‘I’m so sorry for keeping you, Mrs Kelly.’ Lottie pulled out a chair and sat facing Bernie Kelly, who was sitting with her arms folded. She looked to be mid-forties, a thick layer of foundation obscuring her natural colour and eyebrows pencilled in. Her lips were pale. Lipstick forgotten or by design? Lottie didn’t know, but she knew an attack was imminent.

‘Do you think I’ve nothing to do and nowhere to be? Thirty-five minutes I’ve been sat here.’

Received, over and out. Her strawberry-blonde hair was matted to her scalp and her mac-type jacket was still dark from the rain.

‘Please accept my apologies, but we’re at the beginning of a murder investigation. It’s a bit chaotic. I’m sure you can understand.’ Smile in place, Lottie switched on the recording equipment.

‘What’s with all that stuff?’ Bernie nodded toward the machine. ‘I’m not a suspect, am I? Do I need a solicitor? I only came in because you asked.’

‘And I appreciate you taking time out of your busy schedule.’ See how that sits, Lottie thought. ‘Now, what can you tell me about Marian Russell?’

‘There’s not much to tell.’ Bernie shrugged her shoulders, a shadow of indifference falling over her green eyes.

Lottie eyed Boyd from the corner of her eye. Not one of those interviews, she hoped, where she had to extract a statement word by word.

‘What can you tell me?’

‘Like I said last night, I don’t think Marian has been too well.’

‘In what way?’

‘You know.’ Bernie pointed to her temple. ‘Up here.’

‘What makes you say that?’

Bernie sighed and lowered her eyes. ‘She became reclusive. Wouldn’t go out any more. At one time we used go to the pub for a drink on Friday and Saturday nights. The only place she goes now is work. When she’s not there, she stays at home. Won’t even answer the phone to me any more.’

‘What does Emma have to say about her mother?’

‘Emma is a bit harsh at times. I don’t think she gets that Marian could be depressed. She’s always been a daddy’s girl. She blames her mother for the trouble at home, not her father.’

‘What kind of trouble?’

‘I’m sure you can access the court files. Marian took Arthur to court and got him barred from the house.’

‘We will get the files, but it would help if you could tell me what you know.’

Bernie leaned over the desk conspiratorially. ‘Beat her black and blue. Saw the bruises with my own eyes.’

‘How did you see them?’

‘Emma came crying into my house one evening, saying her mammy had made her daddy mad and she thought he was going to kill her. That’s the only time I’ve heard her speak ill of her father.’

‘What did you do?’

‘Got my phone and ran to their house. The door was wide open. Marian was curled up in a ball beside the cooker and Arthur was marching around the kitchen with a poker in his hand.’

‘Had he hit her with the poker?’

‘I don’t know what he hit her with, but she was fierce frightened. I said to him, “Arthur Russell, you get out of this house. I’ve called the guards.” I hadn’t, but maybe I should have.’

‘What happened then?’

‘He turned round and glared at me like a wild bear – not that I’ve ever seen a wild bear – then dropped the poker and ran out the back door. I got Marian to a chair. She wasn’t bleeding, just badly bruised. Said she didn’t want a doctor or the guards. Asked me to keep Emma at mine for the night and to call her mother.’

‘And what did you do?’

‘I did as she asked.’

‘And you didn’t report the incident?’

‘Marian told me not to.’

‘You said you thought Marian was depressed. What way did you notice that, besides her not going out for a drink with you?’ If Marian was in fear of an abusive husband, it was understandable that she might retreat into herself, but it didn’t mean she had to be depressed.

‘I’m not sure I should speak ill of the dead…’

‘We have no evidence to suggest Marian is dead.’

‘I mean her mother. Tessa Ball.’

‘What about her?’

‘She was a right nag when she wanted to be. Didn’t agree with the barring order. One of those old-fashioned biddies who believed in “for better, for worse” even when the worse was so bad you had to lock your husband out.’

‘So she was nagging Marian over Arthur?’

Bernie nodded.

‘But she was the person Marian wanted the night she was assaulted?’ Boyd said.

‘I wondered about that. I think Marian had to show her mother just how brutal Arthur could be.’

‘Makes a kind of sense,’ Boyd said, scrunching his eyebrows together.

‘Any other instances of domestic violence in the Russell home that you can recall?’ Lottie asked.

Bernie sighed and looked down at her clasped hands.

‘Is there something you have to share with us?’ Boyd urged. ‘Rest assured everything is confidential.’

‘Yeah, right. Until I read it in the newspaper or online.’

‘You’re here to help us. We need to find Marian,’ he said. ‘To make sure she is safe. Something you say may help us locate her.’

With another sigh, Bernie said, ‘I think Tessa Ball beat Marian too.’

Lottie exchanged a glance with Boyd. ‘Why do you say that?’ she asked.

‘It’s just something Emma told Natasha once. About how it was such an injustice the way the courts treated her dad, when he was like a puppy compared to her granny.’

‘But you have no eyewitness account of Mrs Ball beating Marian?’

‘No. But after what happened last night, I think I can believe it.’

‘You think Marian attacked her mother and left her dead on the kitchen floor?’ Lottie asked.

‘It seems like it from where I’m sitting.’

‘Is there anything else you’d like to add?’ Boyd asked.

‘No. I want to go home now.’ Bernie Kelly picked up an umbrella from the floor and shook it.

‘Of course,’ Lottie said. ‘I’m sending a family liaison officer to stay with you until we find somewhere for Emma.’

Bernie’s cheeks flared red. ‘I’ve told you we don’t need a babysitter.’

‘Emma needs protection until we find her mother.’

‘She says she wants to go home.’

‘That’s not possible. Not at the moment.’

‘She can stay with me as long as she wants. And I don’t want any guards in my house.’

‘And I’ve to do my job. Thanks for coming in.’ Lottie stood up to complete the interview protocol. ‘I’m sorry for leaving you waiting earlier.’

Bernie Kelly stood too. ‘I’d nowhere else to be anyway. Except being at home watching the girls.’