Henry shook his head in answer. He gestured vaguely and lit a cigarette. I swallowed, trying to contain the craving and thinking pointedly of the nicotine patch on my arm.
“No can do, darling,” he said, breaking into my thoughts. “I’m not just here for a holiday. I have some answers and time’s a-ticking. But…” He took in my hospital outfit – tracksuit bottoms and the old hoodie. “Well, you might want to change first. Smart-casual is fine.”
15
August 1999
THE SECOND WEEK IN Olive’s prison was the same as the one before it. Six nights of secret visits while Olive slept. Sandman was always silent, and no matter how hard she tried to stay awake Olive couldn’t do it. She couldn’t keep her eyes open long enough to catch him. Not that she knew what she would do if she did. She could hardly beg him to let her go again, and as long as she slept he seemed to be happy enough.
But part of her needed to do it. To catch him sneaking in. To prove her growing feeling that he was doing more than being a “parent” and bringing her the things he thought she needed. He reminded her of the boy at Olive’s primary school who the teachers had told off for bugging the girls. He hovered near them, all day. Quietly. And most of the girls had just ignored him. He’d given Olive the creeps.
Sandman was the same. Olive was sure he was watching her at night. Her skin squirmed at the thought that he was doing more than that.
On the seventh day he came to the room in the evening again. This time Olive was eating, a cheese sandwich clutched between two hands. She tried to swallow the dry bread, but her throat was all clogged up and cheese wedged in her cheek so she had to cough.
Sandman’s steps on the stairs outside the room were heavier this time. More threatening. Or at least they seemed that way to Olive’s sensitive ears. His face was like a storm as soon as he came through the door and for a second Olive felt panic burbling inside of her. But she’d been waiting for this, and she couldn’t chicken out now.
Boredom, she thought, was almost as bad as fear. She wasn’t afraid now as much as she was crazy and tired and angry and everything else as well. What use was doing what she was told if she was going to die of boredom anyway?
Before Sandman could say anything, before the butterflies in her stomach could make her explode, she screwed up her face and tried her best Sensible Voice.
“Could I have a book? Or a newspaper?”
Although she knew she’d been polite enough, Olive realised that she’d judged it wrong. All wrong. The words themselves were sharp like little knives and she saw Sandman’s body change. He flew across the room before Olive could claw her words back. He slapped the sandwich from her hands and grabbed her by the shoulders.
His grip was red hot. His thumbs dug into her skin and she yelped. Sandman’s face was centimetres from hers and she could feel his anger as well as see it – in the heat of him, that crazy hotness.
“How dare you.” The calmness of his voice made Olive’s body feel like jelly. “A newspaper? Christ, girl. You’re still news. I knew you’d be like this if I wasn’t careful.”
Olive’s voice was stolen from her throat. Like what?
As if he saw the horror in her face, he stopped. Let go of her. Stepped back as though she’d burned him and not the other way around.
“You kids these days are so rude. It really drives me crazy. Would it kill you to have some manners?”
Olive didn’t miss the way he said kill. As though it was something foreign. Something that didn’t apply to him. Death was not part of the equation. And although Olive thought this should make her feel better, it didn’t. Her body went cold as sweat cooled on her neck.
Sandman went back to the bags he’d dropped by the door and began sorting through the contents. Olive didn’t move. Couldn’t move. She could still feel his thumbprints in her shoulders, like they might be there for ever.
“Okay,” he said eventually. “Laundry time. Strip.”
Oh no. She’d been hoping that was just a one-off. She knew what men did to girls when they took them. She’d heard stories. She wasn’t stupid. When she was nine her mum had told her that if a man tried to hurt her she could kick him in the goolies. But Olive couldn’t do that to him. To Sandman. He wasn’t like other men. He was a monster inside a man.
Olive glanced at the pile of clothes in the corner, her eyes prickling. If she’d known, she might have worn fewer outfits. Made the clothes last. Maybe then he wouldn’t have had to do more washing.
“Now.”
She dragged herself to her feet, turned away from him as she had last time while she unfastened her skirt. He cleared his throat. Wriggling fear and a hot wave of embarrassment flooded her brain.
No…
She half-turned back to him, her fingers shaking so much she could hardly move them. He watched her with his hawk-eyes, and handed her new clothes slowly. With relish. Olive closed her eyes against his glittering stare and tried to think of home. Of summers by the pool back when they’d gone to Spain for holidays. Sun on bare skin, salt-knotted hair… Anything but this.
When she was dressed, he left without another word. A pile of clean bedsheets and clothes and food waiting by the door the evidence of his visit. And she realised that there were worse things than boredom.
16
“I DON’T SEE WHY you always get to drive,” I muttered as Henry drove his car down another unfamiliar – yet identical – country road.
“Because you’re a bloody maniac behind the wheel.” Henry rolled his eyes, and I knew he was only barely restraining himself from mentioning the time in London I’d smashed the back of his car up on a bollard. “Anyway, you don’t know where we’re going.”
“So, are you going to tell me where we’re going?” I pressed. Identical roads aside, I had no idea where we were, and Henry didn’t believe in satnavs.
“I thought you probably wouldn’t want me poking my nose in up here unless I had something to offer,” Henry joked. “So consider this a sort of trade.”
“Go on.”
“I tracked down Cordy Jones’s wife. I called her yesterday, told her you were doing a story on her husband – and I didn’t think it would work, I was just trying to confirm a few things – but she agreed to see us. I think she wants to meet you.”
“You… You found him?” I asked.
“No,” Henry said, regret thickening his voice. “It’s complicated. As far as I can tell, nobody has seen Mr Jones since the end of 1999, not least his wife. He went out for a drink after having a row with the missus, and he never came back.”
“Right.”
I tried to digest this, pushing down the swelling disappointment that threatened to overwhelm me. I gripped my open notebook in one hand, my notes sprawling across the page as I tried to read what I’d written about Cordy Jones.
“So why are we going to see her?”
“Mrs Jones has a theory about what happened – but she wants to tell you in person. I think she wants to talk to somebody.”
We drove the rest of the way in silence. It was unusual, being in a car with Henry. We’d hardly ever driven together when we lived in London. We’d travelled out of the city a few times, but the last time was years ago. This trip was nothing like the one we’d shared to Brighton for a mutual editor’s birthday three or so years before.
“Here we are.”
We pulled out of a small lane and into an open area that was split from the lane by a big wooden gate. Henry parked just outside after a little fussing about his car being so close to the road, and then we got out.
It was like something out of a movie. A small farmhouse, whitewashed and crooked with little windows. We didn’t have far to go before a woman emerged from the front door, wiping her hands on her jeans.
“Mrs Jones?” Henry asked. “I’m Henry Francis. We spoke on the phone?”
“Yes. Come in, come in.” She ushered us inside quickly, her cheeks raw from the cold air of the day and her greying hair straggling out
of her bun.
We followed Mrs Jones into a small sitting room that was crowded with mismatched furniture, and Henry had to move his head quickly downwards to avoid being brained on a low-hanging beam.
“Tea?”
“Sure.”
Mrs Jones ducked out of the room and I turned to Henry. He just shook his head and muttered, “Give her a minute. She seemed all right on the phone.”
Mrs Jones returned with two cups of tea so strong they would have frightened a builder. She handed the drinks over and then immediately began to wring her hands.
Perhaps she was regretting her decision to be forthcoming. After the media circus she must have been exposed to years earlier, I really couldn’t blame her. All I had overheard about Cordy back then could be summed up in my Olive Diary in two sentences: They thought he was guilty. Then everybody stopped speaking about him.
I wondered what Mrs Jones had heard about her husband – and how much of it she had believed. I knew from personal experience that rumours could be devastating.
“We’ll keep it short,” Henry said. “I know you wanted to chat in person, so… This is Cassie. Cassiopeia Warren.”
Mrs Jones twitched at my name.
“I… It was nice of you to come,” she said. “I just wanted to tell you that – that Cordy would have never… I knew your – look, I know you’re looking for him now because of that missing girl. I wondered how long it would be before somebody came here. She’s from Bishop’s Green, so it must have something to do with Cordy because of his history. That’s why you’re here, isn’t it?”
Her forwardness surprised me and I didn’t have time to think up a lie. So I half nodded, half shrugged.
“I wanted to tell you in person that he’s not – he wasn’t like that. Cordy. We had our problems, but he never…” She stopped. Took a deep breath. “It doesn’t matter anyway, because the reason I asked you to come is I think Cordy – I think my husband is dead.”
“What?”
Henry’s eyes widened in genuine shock. So he hadn’t known about this.
“I don’t have any real proof,” Mrs Jones went on, “which is why I never followed it up. I told the police the other day, but I doubt they’ll find any evidence. A reporter in the nineties asked my daughter and me about it – but we’d had enough back then. Do you understand? I don’t want to seem callous. But it was a rough time.” She massaged her neck. “The police said he’d probably run off because of the guilt. I guess that could be true, too, but I don’t know. When he didn’t come home, I started to get suspicious. I asked around.
“And then I started to get these dodgy phone calls, where there wouldn’t be anybody there. They were like threats. Never the same phone number. People in town hounded him, but he seemed afraid of one person in particular – I don’t know who. And then, about six weeks after he left, I found his hat outside my door. Just the hat, no note or anything.”
She paused, as though waiting for the penny to drop. When it didn’t she continued, “I think somebody killed him and left the hat for me to find as a message. I think they thought he hurt – that little girl. They couldn’t run him out of town. Don’t get me wrong, they tried. He wouldn’t leave. So somebody killed him. They thought they were getting justice – for your sister…”
“But why—”
“Why didn’t I go to the police at the time?” Mrs Jones shrugged but without conviction; she had clearly wrestled with this question for a long time. “I guess I kind of hated him then. I was glad he was gone at first. All of that shit with the press. People were much nicer to me after he disappeared. At first I tried to convince myself that I was wrong, that he’d just run away. Later, it was easier this way. People left me and Katie alone.”
To contain the growing feelings of frustration I glanced around the room. Anywhere but at Cordy’s wife. On the crooked mantelpiece there was a photograph that drew my eye. It was a group shot, fairly old and in a faded wooden frame. In the centre stood Cordy Jones. He was wearing a hat, a distinctive baseball cap with a stag on it; presumably this was the hat his wife had mentioned, shading his face from the summer sun. I tried to imagine him leading Olive away, his face dark under the cap. It made my hands shake.
On either side of Cordy in the photograph were several teenagers and younger children. Almost exclusively boys, but there were a couple of young girls there too. All of them were grinning at the camera, their arms linked together. I was about to look away when I noticed a face I thought was familiar.
“Who’s that?” I asked, stepping closer.
“Cordy’s youth group,” she said. Her expression closed off as she spoke. “I don’t know why I keep that photo, but I can’t get rid of it. You know, he did so much good for those kids. And it all went so wrong.”
“Who’s that one, there?” I asked, my voice cracking. “Who’s he?”
But I didn’t have to ask. I already knew. It was a face I’d only seen recently – although he was older now. I knew it was him. It was the man I’d seen outside the school.
Darren Walker.
17
LATER THAT EVENING, BACK at home, I rang Dad. Gran’s accident and seeing that photo of the youth group had shaken me but I didn’t think Marion would like the connections I was drawing between Olive and Grace. Dad was the only person left.
“They’re going to keep her in another night,” I explained once I’d given him the run-down of Gran’s injuries, “but it’s actually a lot less terrible than it looked – thank God.”
I rubbed the bridge of my nose and sank into the empty sofa. The room seemed so bare without Gran, without her rattling around somewhere or humming to herself.
“Did she say what happened?” I could hear Dad fiddling about with something on the other end of the phone – as usual he wasn’t paying full attention to me. I tried to ignore the annoyance that was prickling under my skin, telling myself that Gran wasn’t his mother. The same thing I’d told myself ever since Grandad died and Dad had essentially washed his hands of her.
“No,” I said. “She didn’t have a clue. It was a hit and run, but whoever it was couldn’t have been driving very quickly or else they’d have done more damage.”
I felt my pulse quicken at the thought. I shouldn’t be talking about it. I didn’t want to endanger anybody else. It was paranoid, maybe, but it felt like every move I made was twisting some unseen thread tighter.
“It’s my fault,” I said, so quietly I hoped Dad might not have heard it.
But he did. “Oh, Cass,” he said. “It’s hard. I know you’re trying to make it work with the nurses and the day centre and stuff but maybe it’s time we moved her somewhere a little more secure.”
I heard more rustling, and then I realised what it was. He was eating crisps. I pushed the anger outwards, letting myself lash out.
“Are you eating?” I demanded.
“Well… Yeah.” Was that embarrassment? “I still have to eat, Cassie.”
“Not while you’re on the phone!”
Dad sighed and all I heard was a crackle of air. “Look, you said she’s okay. It could have been worse. You’ve done all you can until they let her come home.”
He didn’t understand. Coming home wasn’t going to be any safer for her. I’d done this to her.
“Gran might be okay – but I’m not.” It came out scarily close to a sob. I clenched my fists trying to calm my racing pulse.
“You know I’ve always been there for you, Cass. Even when you don’t believe it. We’re always here.”
This was just like Dad, to drag up my lack of trust in him. And I’d never liked Carol, especially given that she was a good fifteen years younger than him. Besides, Hailey didn’t need a sister like me.
When I was fifteen I threatened to kill myself if he didn’t leave Carol. She was only seven years older than me – it was disgusting. He’d chosen some student, with no job and rich parents, over me and Mum. I expected Dad to get angry – I wanted him to. I wanted him t
o yell at me so I had the excuse to yell back. But he didn’t. Instead, he told me that he was disappointed that I would joke about something like that.
Less than three years later Mum ended her life.
The silence now was charged and I couldn’t bear it. I swallowed hard and I heard Dad do the same.
“I’m going to go,” I said before he could speak. “I’ll text you about Gran when I know a bit more.”
“All right,” Dad said.
I put the phone down and silenced it.
After a few minutes I realised that what I’d wanted from Dad wasn’t something he could easily give me. Even before Olive was taken we hadn’t been that sort of family. We didn’t talk a lot – especially about our problems. He was the sort of dad who solved things by hugging, something which was hard to do after he moved out.
“I’m not this monster you seem to think I am,” Dad had snapped when I’d once challenged him for leaving. He’d been living in his “hotel” for six weeks, and this was the first time I’d seen him. Mum was pissed out of her head half the time, sleeping on the sofa at Gran’s so she didn’t wake us up when she broke down in fits of tears at two in the morning. But I could hear her, and each sob broke off another piece of me.
“You’re exactly the monster I think you are,” I said coldly, righteous with teenage anger. I wanted somebody to talk to, and all Dad cared about was protesting his innocence. But I’d reached the point where I didn’t give a shit if he thought he was innocent – he’d done enough.
“I didn’t hurt your sister.”
“You hurt me.”
Now, I shook the memory of the grief in Dad’s eyes from my mind. I couldn’t blame him for everything. He was trying his best.
After Henry had dropped me off, and gone to check in at his hotel, I’d spent hours trying to find out everything I could about Darren Walker. But the man was a ghost. He had only the barest social media profiles – a Facebook page with only one photo, a Twitter account I wasn’t even sure was his, the little egg profile picture staring at me and driving me mad. There were about twenty-three million search results for his name and none of them produced anything close to what I was looking for apart from one note on the Arboretum school website that mentioned his so-called “vintage car-boot”.
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