—What about at home? Did the two of you notice anything different about her?
There is an odd moment when the Bartons look at each other, puzzled. Harold Barton takes over.
—They’re hard at that age, teenagers. Want nothing to do with you. Want to be shut away with their computers and their phones and everything, don’t they? The times we were here, Elizabeth was busy with her videos and things, wasn’t she? We couldn’t get our heads around all that, but we made sure she had the best of it. The computer, the phone, the lights. Look what came of it: she was making a living from it in the end, wasn’t she? She was forever off in that car of hers, working with the down-and-outs, making her videos. Doing good work, not like some of them.
—So Elizabeth fitted in socially at Ergarth High, is that right?
—Oh yes. She was really very popular. It was like she’d been a little cocoon all this time and was just spreading her wings. Her beautiful new wings.
There’s another look between Mr and Mrs Barton. Mildred nods pointedly at her husband, who sighs and shifts in his chair. I pretend I haven’t noticed and wait for whatever this niggling thing is to come out. Eventually, a red-faced Harold Barton speaks.
—There was something else. Yes. From the start of school. Something Mildred and I just … I mean, we’re not old stick-in-the-muds. We’re not prudes but…
Mildred picks up the tail end of this thread.
—Elizabeth always had a lot of hangers-on, little followers. But in high school, it was different. The other students, you see, they were from all over – there were a lot of different sorts of people at that school. Older people, people Elizabeth didn’t know and they were very eager to … well…
—Are we talking male attention here, boyfriends?
Harold lifts a hand and takes over.
—Truth is, Mr King, our daughter was trusting. Sometimes too much so, and there were people who would take advantage of a beautiful young girl like that. Especially the older ones.
Harold sighs and I can see the pain in his face as he ploughs on, staring down at his slippers. Mildred holds his hand.
—They grow up so fast. In the blink of an eye they’re suddenly so far away from you. You see, we found out Elizabeth had been … she’d been, she’d not been telling us everything.
—What sorts of things hadn’t she told you?
—There’d been boyfriends. More than we knew about. But some had been older, much older. Elizabeth was only young. She was a little girl. How could she have known what to do?
—It’s not like I didn’t try to tell Elizabeth about the birds and the bees and everything. We were both very progressive, I think they call it, about all that. It’s better if these things are out in the open, isn’t it? A mother and her daughter should talk about these things rather than suppressing them? That’s when things go wrong, when things are left unsaid.
—I agree. How did Elizabeth respond when you tried to talk to her?
—She was … cold; that’s a good word for it. She would sit and listen to everything I had to say; not wide-eyed, not shocked, just with a sort of acceptance. Then usually she would just nod and say ‘OK Mam’ and that would be it.
—Did she never have questions? Did she never confide in you?
—No. On both accounts. Never. I would sometimes ask her about boys, expecting her to go red, to try and bat away my questions but … her actual responses were worse somehow.
—How do you mean?
—They would just be so matter-of-fact. She dated them for a little while and then it was over. No more than that. I remember once we were shopping in town for some new school clothes. Making an afternoon of it, coffee and cake and stuff. Elizabeth was so well behaved. She never rolled her eyes or moaned; never coveted new phones or trainers. She just went along with me. We were in JD Sports, looking at trainers, and I saw these lads looking at her. I mean she would only have been about fourteen. Anyhow, you can tell when someone’s staring and they’re pretending not to — and these boys kept shoving each other and giggling. It was quite sweet, really.
—How did Elizabeth react to that?
—It was like she hadn’t even noticed. I never understood it. She had so many of them following her round with their tongues hanging out, but she just seemed … indifferent to them all. If she had noticed, she just didn’t care. I tried to bring it up with her afterwards, but she shrugged it off. It wasn’t like she had low self-esteem … she just didn’t know how to connect her emotions with that sort of thing. I don’t think there was anything wrong; that was just who she was. That summed up her approach.
—Did you ever meet any of Elizabeth’s boyfriends?
—There was only one that Elizabeth ever decided she would share with us.
Harold Barton directs me back to the photo album. He flicks through the pages, past pictures of Elizabeth holding more awards and rosettes. As we work through her school years, I see a girl starting to change even further; the serious look of the year seven on her first day giving way to make-up and fake tan. As fashion changes, Elizabeth keeps up; her clothes, her hair. She grows taller too. Harold stops at a photo that is unlike all the others. This one is a close-up and appears to have been taken candidly. Sunlight shines on Elizabeth Barton’s face. Behind her is a crowd of other children in coats and rucksacks on a cobbled street. I’m guessing she is around fourteen or fifteen. She is laughing, her eyes slits. In one hand she holds a crepe that oozes chocolate sauce. In her other, she holds her phone, in a rubber cat-shaped case. Beside her, mimicking her mirth with an equally joyous expression, is a boy of around the same age. Maybe a little older. Harold sighs.
—I’ll never be able to tell you why, but this one always gets me. I think because she didn’t know it was taken, because that laughter in her, that joy was utterly natural … it came so rarely to her after that time.
—Where was this taken? It looks different from the others.
—Yes, quite. Neither my or my wife’s poor camera work here. No. This was one that came from school. It was a trip to France at the end of year nine. Only those who had got the very top marks and the best attendance in the school were allowed to attend. By all accounts, they had a wonderful time; they visited the war graves, the markets, art galleries. All with others like them. It was a wonderful experience for her. At least that’s what we thought.
—Something went wrong on the trip?
—You know how young people are, especially at that age. Everything matters to them. It wasn’t so much during the trip that anything went wrong, it was afterwards.
—What happened?
—It had something to do with the boy in the photograph – Tommy Fellman. They’d met in France and become … close.
This is the same Tommy Fellman we’ve heard about before – son of Horace Fellman, of Fellman’s pasties fame. The French trip was organised jointly by Ergarth Boys’ Grammar School and Ergarth High.
Mildred Barton re-enters the conversation, one hand on her husband’s arm.
—When Elizabeth came home from France, she seemed different. In a good way. She was bubbly, shiny, more smiley than usual. She kept mentioning the name of this boy and how they’d had such fun … Well, we wondered…
—I just want to say I’m not that kind of father, Mr King. I never had a problem with our daughter having a boyfriend. I’m not an old fuddy-duddy killjoy. I was pleased for her. I hoped that she had found someone worthy of her.
Elizabeth was more open than she had ever been with her parents about anyone before. Tommy Fellman was a boy who was similar in ability, a high achiever. He was a few years above Elizabeth, part of the sixth form at Ergarth Boys’ Grammar School. The Bartons found the gap in age a little troubling, but decided that they’d let it slide; they were simply happy Elizabeth was being so candid with them. They corroborate what Jason told me in the last episode – that Tommy Fellman attended dinner at the Barton household a few times. Harold Barton recalls this.
—H
e was perfectly well-mannered too. Polite. We actually felt a lot better about the whole thing when we met him. He was certainly the sort of boy we hoped Elizabeth would associate with, not like the rubbish who flocked around her at school.
It was a few weeks into this relationship when something went wrong. The Bartons say that Elizabeth never told them what had happened, but they got an inkling all wasn’t well when Elizabeth’s demeanour changed. She had gone from quite jolly to suddenly quiet and brooding. Elizabeth spent a lot of time up in her bedroom or else glued to her phone. Mildred Barton recalls that time:
—We were invited to the school not long after that; all the parents had, to an awards assembly of some kind. Elizabeth was to receive special commendations from the head for her overall performance and behaviour on the French trip. Elizabeth refused to come. We were taken aback, as she would usually jump at another award. Harold and I went dressed in our best and sat with the other parents in the hall. We couldn’t not be seen to be there!
The head began displaying the photographs from the trip on the overhead projector. To our dismay and embarrassment, whenever a photo of Elizabeth appeared, there was a number of…
—Cat-calls, Mr King. Whoops and whistles from the children – it was like a building site. It was hugely humiliating for us and we were very glad that our daughter was not present.
—When that photo of Elizabeth and Tommy Fellman went up, there was a cheer, but like Harold says, not a nice one, it was like a football ground. The head was furious. He apologised to us afterwards but the damage was done. It was horrible. A horrible way to treat a young girl. All the older ones were joining in as well.
—That’s when we started to hear things – gossip and slander about our daughter.
—What did you hear?
—I mean it was ridiculous. Horrible really. Heartless things that people were saying about her. It was all on Facebook apparently. Tommy Fellman was accusing Elizabeth of horrible things. He was calling her a cheat and a liar and worse. Others were joining in too. All sorts of boys were saying disgusting things about her that I will not repeat. They were calling her a cheat as well; calling her a liar. To be honest it was the first time we’d ever seen Elizabeth disappointed. All those years we’d kept such negativity from her, and this Tommy Fellman ruined everything.
This all happened online and to such a degree that Elizabeth’s parents decided to intervene.
—We spoke to the heads of both schools, and they both told us this sort of thing was ‘not acceptable’ and ‘things would be put in place’, but nothing was ever done. By either of them. Our daughter just had to get through it, wait for it all to blow over, which it did. Eventually. No thanks to the schools, I may add.
—But it did eventually stop?
There is a rather awkward pause. The Bartons look at each other with guilty expressions. I think I know what is coming.
Harold Barton clears his throat.
—Yes, it did. Yes.
—Was this after George Meldby burned down Fellman’s factory?
—Yes. And we saw the link just like everyone did; we didn’t bury our heads in the sand. Elizabeth assured us – swore to us – that it was entirely coincidental. And we believed her. We still do. George Meldby burned it down of his own volition. If he was doing it to stand up for Elizabeth – well, that was his choice, not Elizabeth’s. I do know Elizabeth felt sorry for George; she was that kind of girl. You could see that in her charity work. She’d always looked out for him in primary school and, well, he must have taken it the wrong way. He would have done anything for Elizabeth. There were a few like that, she was very, very popular.
This remark corresponds with Amirah Choudhury’s – when she was describing Elizabeth’s fans: her ‘flying monkeys’ as Amirah put it.
There’s something that has been rankling throughout this series and I think this is a good place to try and find the next path, to at least get a balanced view of Elizabeth. You see, I feel like all I’ve ever heard about her so far is negative. Sure, there’s the charity work and the popularity online, but Jason Barton has painted a very unpleasant picture of his older sister, and Amirah Choudhury … well, I’m starting to feel that fear played more of a significant role in her relationship with Elizabeth than I thought. Of course, Elizabeth’s parents are going to have a positive view of their daughter as all parents should. This is why I ask the next question.
—I’m interested in talking to any of Elizabeth’s close friends after this. The people she would have confided in, told things she couldn’t tell either of you. Do you know what I mean?
The Bartons look at each other and shrug. Mildred asks me to clarify.
—I mean proper ‘friends’ — people who were always over at the house, people who she would go and meet.
Mildred Barton gives a laugh and shakes her head.
—Well, it’s all online these days isn’t it? She was never off her phone. I imagine she did it all on there. If she had people over to the house, which I imagine she did, then it wasn’t when we were here.
—You have to let young people do their own thing don’t you? We couldn’t be prying and poking into Elizabeth’s business.
—Like Mildred says, she was always on that phone of hers. So she must have been talking to someone! I mean, what else could she have been doing?
—Did you ever ask her about her friends.
Another of those looks. Harold clears his throat.
—Elizabeth was … let’s just say she made it very clear about her personal … barriers. Her room, her phone. She was an adult and we treated her like one. All that stuff was hers and if we wanted to know anything, that was her decision.
—That was healthy. For her to be headstrong like that.
—Did Elizabeth ever want to move out, or was she happy at home?
—I know she was looking for a place, when the money from her videos started rolling in. Of course, we didn’t want her to leave us with an empty nest, but you can’t stop them can you?
I think of Jason again, leaving Ergarth as soon as he could. I also remember him saying it was Elizabeth who had the power in the Barton household. But is he telling the truth? It’s clear that Jason has his own agenda. Right now, I want to turn my attention to Martin Flynn. Harold Barton’s face clouds over when I ask about him.
—Yes, well, I have to say I never approved of Elizabeth’s association with Martin Flynn. I told her no good would come of it. The boy wasn’t right. He was a nasty thug. He certainly wasn’t a friend. In the month before Elizabeth died, he had taken to hanging around here at night. That was something that troubled me. Prison is the best place for someone like that. And now we see why.
The Bartons tell me about numerous occasions when they looked out of their windows at night to see Martin Flynn skulking around in the area. The Barton House is on the other side of Ergarth from the abattoir and the Flynn family home. Harold tells me they once called the police, but because Martin Flynn wasn’t actually doing anything wrong, there was little they could do about him.
—He technically never ‘harassed’ Elizabeth, never knocked on the door or anything, nothing like that. It was almost as if he was some kind of guard dog. Or an addict. It was certainly not normal. Again, Elizabeth was an adult; she told us she would deal with it. She was up in her room making her videos. She didn’t have time for all this nonsense. She assured us that the Flynn lad was no bother to her and we believed it.
‘Guard dog’ and ‘addict’; these are both interesting terms to use, and I wonder if this is the right moment to ask about Solomon Meer. I don’t want to ruin the rapport we’ve built up. Both Harold and Mildred are opening up about their daughter and I want them to continue.
I turn their attention to the years after school; the years closer to Elizabeth’s encounter with Solomon Meer. Harold is the one who answers my questions.
—When Elizabeth left school, did she want to go into further education?
—No. It always
puzzled us, that one. I’m afraid I got rather caught up in it all – you know, arranging visits to open days, that sort of thing. Elizabeth, bless her, humoured me for a while, came along but never showed a lot of interest.
—So what did she want to do?
—Some of them travel, don’t they? We suggested that too, but that wasn’t Elizabeth either. I think she just didn’t know. She was suddenly rudderless, you see. School had been everything and now she was almost cast adrift.
We bought her a car and driving lessons, to get herself about, to give herself mobility, to make her more employable. She loved that thing, always kept it sparkling clean. And she just went out and got herself jobs. One minute she was at home, the next she was working in a pet shop. We didn’t even know she’d had an interview!
It was this time when Elizabeth’s YouTube channel started becoming popular. Mr and Mrs Barton said they noticed the amount of parcels that were arriving in the post. Make-up, clothes. The Bartons had no idea what to make of it – this was a world totally unfamiliar to them. Mildred smiles as she recalls Elizabeth’s sudden fame.
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