by Anita Waller
‘He’s never delivered to me before.’
Jess rescued them.
‘Ah, but did you ever send him a letter asking for anything?’
They had spent the best part of an afternoon composing letters for posting to Father Christmas; Grace had done two, one for her and one for Noah. Jess had helped Olivia with hers.
Grace shook her head.
‘Then he wouldn’t have known where to deliver to, would he? But now he does.’
‘But he does touch children. He touched me in the grotto!’ Grace was getting increasingly distraught.
‘He’s just one of Santa’s helpers. He’s not the real Father Christmas.’ Lauren tried to soothe her anxious daughter.
‘I know.’ Grace was almost screaming. ‘I know he wasn’t real. It was him … It was Ronald! And he touched me. Did he come in the night?’
Olivia was looking at her sister, bewilderment etched into her features. She had never seen Grace so much as raise her voice before and now everything seemed to be going wrong.
‘Why didn’t you say something, Grace?’ Pilot asked. ‘Why didn’t you scream inside that grotto?’
‘Because I didn’t realise until I got outside. He smells strange. I smelt that when he pulled me to him. And then when I opened my present I knew I was right. I didn’t need to say anything after that because you rang Jake and we had lots of visitors, so I didn’t bother. I knew Jake would know what to do.’ Grace was becoming quieter.
Lauren pulled her on to the settee.
‘Okay, here’s everything you need to know. That man in the grotto was Ronald but because we had taken you, you had nothing to fear. We, your Papa and I, didn’t know it was him. He ran away as soon as we left with you. The Father Christmas who came here last night is the real Father Christmas and he brought all these gifts for you, Olivia and Noah. He is a good man, Grace, and would never hurt a child. He loves all children.’
She was now very much calmer and looked up at her mother. ‘Okay. So Ronald didn’t leave that present on my bed, it was the real Father Christmas?’
‘That’s right.’
She now turned to her father. ‘So did you see him? You stayed in my room all night, didn’t you?’
Pilot realised his daughter must have still been awake when he and Josh had started their guard duties.
‘Yes, I did but I had to go for a wee and when I came back the present was there.’
Grace thought that one through, then nodded. ‘Okay. I think I understand. I don’t want to open anymore just now. Can I just watch Olivia and Noah open theirs?’
Lauren breathed a sigh of relief. Who would have thought that a man in a red suit could cause so much trouble?
‘Of course. You can open them anytime you want.’
The rest of the morning was uneventful; Lauren was grateful. She began the mammoth job of cooking the Christmas meal and at around one o’clock the Moorgate visitors arrived. The security people had now been significantly reduced; the dog handlers had disappeared, the armed officers also. The two patrol car officers were ever present and there was just one of Mark’s men on duty at Moorgate and one at Hillside.
Lauren had set the table for twelve and hoped that nine-month-old Noah wouldn’t create too much havoc when his high chair was pushed up to the table. The table itself looked beautiful; a small centrepiece, kept deliberately low so that her guests wouldn’t have to strain to see over the top at the opposite person, small candles the length of the large table, gleaming white table linen, and place cards made by Jess and Grace. She stepped back and checked that everything was perfect.
Ninety minutes later, the table looked as if a bomb had landed on it. It had been a truly successful meal in which the wine had flowed endlessly. Josh had produced a box of party poppers, which had caused major uproar and that the children had loved. The dining room was covered in streamers, the pristine white tablecloth spattered with red, rose and white wine and privately Lauren thought it might take her till Easter to clean it all up, not that she minded as, in spite of the sadness caused by David’s absence, so far Christmas was going very well and the children were really enjoying themselves.
With the exception of Ken, Brenda and Freda who had declined coffee and mints and within five minutes of their escape into the Buckingham wing, had fallen asleep, the rest went into the lounge.
Lauren served up coffee and Josh and Jess sat on the floor with the children, playing with the toys that were scattered around from the mammoth opening session in the morning. There was a small pile of around half a dozen brightly wrapped gifts still underneath the tree for Grace to open.
She sat close to the tree and pulled one of the presents towards her.
‘It’s from Nan Brenda and Granddad Ken.’ She carefully removed the wrapping paper and revealed a Barbie doll. ‘Oh, that’s beautiful.’
She placed it carefully to one side and pulled out another package. ‘This one’s from you, Josh.’
He looked puzzled. ‘Well I know I’m the best uncle ever, but I haven’t a clue what that is. Maybe it’s something I picked up for you while we were still in St. Louis. We brought a couple of things over with us.’
She looked at the label one more time. ‘It definitely says Josh.’
‘Pilot...’ Josh turned to his brother in law.
Pilot understood. Josh would have put Uncle Josh.
‘Grace, I think that one’s a mistake. Just hand it to me and carry on with the rest.’
She didn’t argue, just handed over the package and then turned to pick up another one from under the tree. Pilot and Josh left the room with Pilot handling the parcel carefully. He had no idea what was in it but was taking no chances. They went out of the front door and on to the lawn where Pilot laid it down, carefully.
Iain Dunne walked across to them. He had been on duty for about thirty seconds.
‘Hey, you two,’ he said, ‘what’s this? Socks you didn’t want?’
Pilot stood and pointed at the package.
‘This is a package for Grace. It says on the label To Grace with love from Josh. To all of my children he is Uncle Josh, not Josh. And this isn’t his writing. He didn’t write it, Iain.’ Pilot could hear an edge of panic in his own voice and he swallowed.
‘Contact Dunbar, will you. He’ll know what to do. I don’t think it’s a bomb, it doesn’t feel very heavy, but we all know to our cost that he can make bombs...’
Iain rang Dunbar on his mobile phone and Dunbar immediately called in everyone he considered to be necessary. Pilot and Josh were ushered back into the house by a professional Iain, all first names dispensed with and replaced by sir. The package remained where Pilot had placed it, in the middle of the large lawn so loved by John Thornton.
Lauren was in the lounge trying desperately to lighten the atmosphere and keep the children from guessing there was a problem. Grace had now got to the end of the parcels and Pat was clearing away the paper. ‘And now you just have your birthday presents,’ she joked to the little girl.
‘I’m so tired of parcels, Nan Pat,’ she said.
‘I know. It wasn’t very clever of your Mummy and Daddy to have you on Christmas Day, was it?’
‘Papa.’ Grace looked angry. ‘He’s not Daddy, he’s Papa. Don’t call him Daddy.’
Pat was devastated. This granddaughter was so precious; she would have given everything to take back the words she had used.
‘Grace!’ Lauren intervened and she heard a muttered sorry, Nan Pat before the little girl ran from the room. She stood to follow her but Pat said,
‘Let me go.’
Pat and Grace were both full of smiles when they returned five minutes later and Pat just nodded in Lauren’s direction. Crisis averted.
Chapter 31
Dunbar stared at the parcel that had been left in the middle of the lawn, despair etched on to his face. How the fuck had Treverick managed to get this inside the fortress that was Hillside?
He had called in experts who ha
d stated quite categorically that it wasn’t a bomb and he watched as one of the men pulled on gloves before lifting it and carrying it towards the patio area. Once there, he placed it on a garden table. He carefully peeled off the outer wrapping with the gift card still attached to it and put it in an evidence bag. Revealed underneath was a different gift card. This one said,
Happy Christmas my Angel
Love
Daddy
xxx
It had been sellotaped to the top of a maroon box that looked as though it had come from a jeweller. When the top was removed a silver pendant and chain was revealed. Dunbar stepped forward to look at the box but it had no jewellers name on it, no identification marks at all.
The pendant was a tiny angel.
Following the terse phone call from him, DC Johnson had accompanied his boss and now Dunbar turned to the young constable..
‘Andy, you can go home to that family of yours. I’m sorry to have called you out but if this had been a bomb...’
‘Are you going home, sir?’
‘Not yet.’
‘Then I’ll go when you go. How can this bastard carry on scaring this little lass like this? What do you want me to do?’
‘Come in the house with me. We have to talk to them but we need to get the children out of the way. Some Christmas this has been. Take notes, will you, while I try to get to the bottom of how this can have happened?’
Dunbar put the box and the pendant into another evidence bag and handed it to Andy for him to put with the first bag.
They walked towards the patio doors and Dunbar tapped on the window. He saw Grace’s face light up and she waved at him. He waved back and waited for Pilot to unlock the doors.
‘Okay, we need to talk. Jess, can I ask you...’
She nodded.
‘Come on, mes enfants; let’s take some of these toys upstairs to play with. There are too many big people down here.’
Grace and Olivia giggled and ran for the stairs. Jess scooped up an almost sleeping Noah and carried him up to join his sisters.
The remaining members of the family turned expectant faces towards Dunbar.
‘First of all,’ he said, ‘well done on the way you acted, Pilot. A bit foolhardy, maybe, but you got it away from the house.’
‘Foolhardy?’
‘If it had been a bomb at the very least it would have blown off your hand. Or killed you. Foolhardy.’
Pilot looked down at the floor, resting his elbows on his knees. ‘And just what else could I have done?’ he muttered. ‘Let it kill my children?’
Dunbar smiled at him. ‘You did exactly what I would have done.’
He held up the evidence bags and read out the card that had been hidden by the outer wrapping paper. He heard a strangled sob from Lauren and turned to her.
‘We now have to find out how this appeared under your tree. Is that where Grace got it from?’
‘Yes.’ Lauren paled. ‘Does this mean...?’
‘That he’s been in here? Well, that’s a starting point for us. Have you had anyone in except the close family since you put those gifts there? And where were they before Santa delivered?’
‘They were in the utility room in big black bags. Four black bags.’ Lauren was picturing the sight that had greeted her when she went into the room at nine o’clock on Christmas Eve. ‘I don’t think anything had been disturbed; it seemed to be just as I had left it. I had actually sealed all the bags with sellotape just in case Grace wandered in and none of that tape had been removed. So, even if someone had got in the house, they certainly didn’t tamper with the bags.’
Dunbar nodded, his brain racing.
‘So, you put the presents under the tree around nine o’clock. Tell me exactly what you did, Lauren.’
‘The bag with the gifts from us was sorted first. I went through it and put three piles of parcels, one pile per child. It was a bit confusing; there were a lot of presents. I took out three gifts, one for each of the children, so that Pilot could take them up with him when he went to sit in Grace’s room for the night. After I had done all that, I placed those three piles underneath the tree. Our gifts were nearest to the central stem. Then I emptied the bag from Brenda and Ken. I would say there were about a dozen gifts in that bag and I added them to ours. The next bag was from Pat and...’ she paused and gulped. ‘I’m so sorry, Pat, I was going...’
Pat held up her hand.
‘Say it, Lauren. Don’t leave David out. He was in my head all the time I was shopping for the children. He’s here; you won’t upset me by talking about him.’
‘I know. So, I emptied Pat and David’s bag next and their gifts sort of surrounded the ones I had already done.’
She paused for a moment, looked at the tree and carried on. ‘Just checking I’m remembering properly,’ she said. ‘So, next was the last bag, the one from Freda, Josh and Dawn. This one had loads of presents in it; they’d bought lots of little gifts, crayons, colouring books, paints, books, that sort of thing. They had been wrapped in all different papers and it was a glorious jumble when I took them out. It took ages to sort, and that was the last bag. I’m telling you, Jake; none of those bags had had the tape removed.’
Dunbar turned to Dawn.
‘When did you start buying all these gifts?’
‘As soon as we got here from St.Louis. We brought lots of things with us and then topped it up here.’
‘When did you bring the gifts to Hillside?’
‘Last weekend. I brought them in a massive shopping bag and I helped Lauren transfer them into a black plastic bag so that I could take the shopping bag back with me. I was with her when she sealed it so I know it was secure. She didn’t want inquisitive children spoiling anything about this Christmas.’
‘So how did he do it? How did he get into our house and put that damn present under the tree?’
‘I’m pretty certain you put it under the tree, Lauren. I think he got into Moorgate. I don’t know how yet, but don’t forget what we’re dealing with here. He’s so bloody smart. But he’ll slip up one day.’
Pat reached for Dawn’s hand and they looked at each other. He’d got into Moorgate? With all the security they had?
‘So you think he got in somehow, simply placed the present in with the others and got out again?’
Dunbar nodded. ‘That’s exactly what I think. Was there ever a point when the house was empty since you got back from the States?’
Again Pat and Dawn looked at each other, thinking. It was Josh who answered.
‘We went Christmas shopping. All of us. We took Freda in the wheelchair and went to Truro. We had two of Mark’s men with us, and we left one back at the house. We made it easy for him.’ His tone was flat. ‘But how the hell did he know?’
‘He watches. He thinks as if he were you. He knew at some point you would have to go out. It’s Christmas. He simply waited. And of course, there’s the added bonus being that when you go out the security goes with you. We protect you more than your property. We have no choice in that. He knows that.’
‘So all he had to do was put a label on saying it was from Josh. I can’t bear thinking about Grace opening it and if he had put Uncle Josh that’s exactly what would have happened.’
Dunbar could hear the anger in Lauren’s voice.
‘I’m taking the paper and the gift itself as evidence. This man is getting a great deal of pleasure out of playing with your minds. Don’t let him make you so angry that you slip up. Don’t put yourselves in danger. Keep doing what you have been doing. The protection that is in place is keeping you safe.’
He stood and prepared to leave. DC Johnson put away his notebook and they moved towards the patio doors. Mark Carter arrived as they opened the doors and spoke quietly for five minutes or so with the two policemen before slipping inside.
He looked around for Pilot who held up a hand.
‘Let’s go into my office,’ he said and beckoned to Josh to join them.
Mark was sporting a spectacular Christmas silk tie and Pilot pretended to shade his eyes.
‘I don’t know how John worked with you for all those years without going blind. I’ve seen lots of your ties, Mark, but that one is something else.’
Mark grinned.
‘I’m applying for the job of lead position on the sleigh next year, this will light our way round the rooftops.’
‘So, you’ve heard about our bit of festive excitement?’
‘Yes. Iain rang me. Do you want additional operatives?’
‘Do we need them?’
Mark paused. He had been thinking about the plan for Hillside and Moorgate all the way from Bude.
‘I don’t think so. If Dunbar is right, and I think he is, then Treverick got lucky when you all went out together. How often does this happen? I don’t think we need to increase cover except for occasional one-off days. If, for example, you were all meeting up for something and it meant empty properties, then we would provide additional cover but I still think you have enough men for normal everyday life. You are still taking all the usual precautions like locking doors when you’re inside?’
Pilot nodded. ‘Always.’
‘Mark...’ Josh looked uncomfortable.
Mark turned his head and looked at the young man he had only come to know since John Thornton’s death.
‘Josh? You have a problem?’
‘I don’t know,’ he said. ‘Maybe I just watch too much crime drama on television but he seems to be one step in front of us all the time.’
There was a gentle tap on the door and Ken Buckingham poked his head around.
‘Can I join you?’ he said quietly and came into the room without waiting for an answer.
Mark stood and pulled a chair towards them.
‘Please,’ he said, indicating the chair.
Ken sat down and looked around him.
‘Stop leaving me out,’ was his opening gambit.
‘What?’ Pilot looked shocked.
‘I said, stop leaving me out. I know I’m in my seventies but I’m fit – my God, Pilot, I’ve only retired from a pretty hardworking life in the last six months, so I’m here to help. Lauren is my granddaughter, Grace my great granddaughter and you’re keeping both Brenda and I out of it because you think we’re too old.’