The Missing Girl

by Jenny Quintana

  I minimised the screen. ‘No Wi-Fi at home,’ I said, pre-empting her question.

  ‘I’m not surprised. Esther wasn’t one for computers. Next time, come and use mine.’

  ‘Thanks.’ I gave her a smile.

  ‘How about I check this in and we walk out together?’ She dropped her voice. ‘It’s a week overdue, but I’m hoping he won’t notice.’ She nodded over at the librarian and I looked at the title of her book. Dead Man’s Folly. Still reading crime.

  While she was busy negotiating her fine, I ordered copies of Dad’s birth and death certificates and my parents’ wedding certificate and joined her at the entrance. ‘Which way are you going?’ said Rita.

  I cast about for a destination. ‘The churchyard.’ I hadn’t been there since the funeral. I should go and check the flowers.

  ‘Perfect,’ said Rita, as if she’d been planning the same. ‘I’ll come with you. There’s always something to do in the church.’

  We set off. The rain had stopped, but there was a chill in the air and as we walked I dreamed of a balmy autumn in Athens and wondered when I’d get back there. My return to England had already been far longer than I’d anticipated. What would happen to my job? I’d asked for a leave of absence, but how long would they wait?

  Rita interrupted my thoughts. ‘I’ve been doing my family tree for years,’ she said and gave me a sidelong look. ‘I find it best to focus on one generation at a time.’ There was a pause and when I didn’t respond, ‘What are you looking at first?’

  ‘I’m not sure,’ I said vaguely. ‘I’ve only just started.’

  ‘Well, I don’t know if you’ve considered this, or how important it is to you, but . . .’ She stopped as a woman in a tea-cosy hat approached, smiled at Rita, and glanced curiously at me. Rita waited until she’d gone. ‘As far as I know your mother never applied for a death certificate.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘For . . . Gabriella. She didn’t apply for death in absentia. So, she’s not on the register.’

  Why was she telling me this? I’d guessed that Mum wouldn’t have done that. ‘I didn’t think she was,’ I said.

  Rita nodded and folded her shawl tighter. ‘I thought I’d mention it just in case.’

  We continued in silence although I had the feeling that Rita had more to say. Whatever it was brooded between us until we reached the lychgate where she stopped and straightened her glasses. ‘There’s something else.’

  I said nothing as we stood beneath the entrance to the graveyard, with the grey church looming at the end of the path. The organist was practising, the music reaching a crescendo and fading away. A red kite wheeled overhead.

  We watched the bird as it was joined by another, and the two of them swooped simultaneously in the field beyond. ‘Poor thing,’ I said out loud, thinking of a field mouse being ripped to shreds.

  ‘Carrion,’ said Rita. ‘They eat carrion.’

  There were a few beats while the two of us kept our eyes fixed on the empty sky, both putting off, I supposed, whatever it was Rita wanted to say. I might have helped her out, prompting her to continue, but suddenly I didn’t want to know.

  I had no choice because she began again, speaking in a rush as if she’d been storing her thoughts and had memorised them. ‘Sometimes our parents don’t tell us things for a reason, well-founded, or ill-founded. If we pick through their lives, we have to take the consequences. Be forgiving, Anna. That’s all I’m saying.’ And she looked at me with an intensity I hadn’t seen before.

  What did she mean? What would I need to forgive? What might I discover? It wasn’t as if I was trying to catch my parents out. ‘I don’t understand,’ I said at last. ‘I’m not looking for anything in particular.’

  ‘Aren’t you?’ She fixed her gaze on me and then relaxed. Patting my hand, she said, ‘Don’t worry. It’ll be fine. Mark my words. Come and see me if you need anything – computers, advice, anything.’ She strode towards the church, waving her hand as she went.

  I stared after her, confused by not knowing what she meant and the feeling that I should. Steadying myself, I made my way to a bench on the opposite side of the graveyard beneath a line of beech trees. Here a mass of gravestones spread out before me. So many lost people scattered underneath. Some of the gravestones were broken and cracked; others were elaborate with carvings of angels, some so small they made your heart constrict. After a few moments the church door creaked and Rita reappeared with one of the ladies. They bustled out and disappeared around the side of the building.

  Two minutes more and they returned with a watering can, and this time, Rita gave me a wide wave. I waved back and dwelled again on what she’d said. Had she been talking from experience? Maybe she’d discovered a terrible secret when she’d been searching her own family tree and that was why she’d warned me about mine. But no, it had been more specific, more personal than that. More deliberate. What did she think I’d find?

  Once the church door had slammed, the graveyard fell into silence again. I stood, stamping my feet for warmth, and wandered past the spindly trees and bushes, the unkempt grass and tombs, to a better kept area, where the more recently buried lay. The stone on my parents’ grave had been taken away to add my mother’s name and in the meantime had been replaced by a simple wooden cross. I spent time clearing the dead flowers. I needed to lay down fresh ones. What else did people do to tend a grave?

  I looked around for inspiration. The other graves had bunches of tulips and roses, while a few were covered in heather. Low maintenance for people who couldn’t or wouldn’t visit. That would be me once I disappeared to Greece. I should speak to Rita, ask her to look after my parents’ grave for me.

  I moved on, making my way through the criss-cross of paths and reading the headstones. There were familiar surnames: Henderson. Stock. Sullivan. Past generations – parents and grandparents of children from my school. Here a younger brother, or an older sister. The tragedy of sibling loss.

  Nearby, a grave covered in blue and grey stones caught my eye. Leaning down, I read the name: Edward Lily. Of course his grave would be here. There was no mention of his role as husband or father, only the dates of his life and death.

  In one corner, a group of headstones clustered together. They might have been well looked after once, but now they were choked with nettles and long grass as if there was no one left who cared. Here was a cracked pot, there an upturned metal vase. And all of the stones were engraved with the same family name. Ellis. I peered to look. The family had been in the village for generations. Was there no one left to tend their graves – apart from Martha? Perhaps she didn’t think about it. Some people didn’t. Soon I wouldn’t. Unless Rita agreed to my request, my parents’ graves would be as neglected as these.

  How miserable it was here. A host of forgotten people. Their bodies mouldering, their minds gone. And how morbid I’d become. What had brought me to this place, wandering around graveyards thinking about the dead? Once I’d played hide and seek here with Gabriella while we’d waited for our mother to finish in the church. It had been a happy place. A playground not a graveyard. We hadn’t known that Life transformed into Death, that Loss was a menace that sneaked up without warning.

  One of the graves was damaged. I bent down to examine it more closely and instantly recoiled. The stone bore an inscription I could just about read: Charles Stanley Ellis and Dorothy Maureen Ellis. There were no other words, but it was the state of them that shocked me. Letters half scraped away, as if someone had tried to gouge them out, and the rest of the stone was punctured with holes, like a frenzied stabbing.

  An engine starting made me jump, but it was only a man pushing a mower on the other side of the churchyard. I considered telling him about the grave, or perhaps I should mention it to Rita.

  Nicholas appeared at the lychgate with his motorbike helmet under his arm. I hadn’t seen him since the funeral, although he’d suggested I came for a chat or to a Sunday service any time I was free. S
o far I’d avoided it and now, since he hadn’t seen me, I wouldn’t attract his attention. He’d know about the state of the graves anyway. Vandalism was a common problem. It always had been in this village. In the past.

  The church door cracked open and shut as Nicholas stepped inside. A gloom had settled on the graves. I’d hardly noticed how quickly the afternoon had gone and how fast the temperature was dropping. The cold crawled right through my clothes. I shivered, buttoned my jacket tightly and blew on my hands.

  There was movement at the side of the church. Was it a shadow, a tree shaking in the wind, or Rita, back to collect water, or something else? I shivered again.

  Bored teenagers, I told myself as I walked back to the lychgate. They would have desecrated the grave. And no one had liked the Ellis family. Charlie Ellis was a bully. And a drunk. Mrs Ellis might have been a victim, but she’d been unpleasant too. For a short time, she’d redeemed herself as a witness, but her story had been inaccurate and then it had become nothing more than an archive file. If she’d been alive, I would have found her. I’d have made her tell the story once again. The fact that she was dead like so many others from the village made the whole possibility of truth slip backwards even further.

  Shaking off my thoughts, I passed through the lychgate. Behind me the wind sighed. I looked back. And the light at the side of the church darkened.

  14

  1982

  The last few days of the holiday were made miserable by the threat of moving house. Gabriella refused to discuss it. ‘It’s not going to happen,’ she kept saying. ‘They always say we’ll do things and we don’t.’ I listened but I didn’t agree. In my opinion our parents did the opposite. If they made a decision, it happened. Maybe not this year because of Gabriella’s exams, but next.

  I convinced myself moving was a good idea, listing the things that were bad about the village and imagining instead being in London and finding the grammar school Dad had talked about. I imagined a grand new church for us to go to, like St Paul’s Cathedral. I might even learn to play the organ. I wasn’t sure why London would be able to offer me that, but I liked the idea, so I kept it.

  On the first day of the autumn term, I stepped into the concrete school block and comforted myself with the thought that I’d be leaving soon. I was an alien jostling along with the rest of the reluctant kids, through corridors that already smelled of sweaty PE socks and the fear of first years trying to blend in.

  Lessons were my refuge as I hid between the pages of the textbooks. In English we had a new teacher, a thin woman with dark hair and pale skin who had a passion for Joyce, Shaw and Yeats. Her name was Miss O’Dell and she was as Irish as they come, or so she told us when she’d come into the classroom and found the words IRA scum scrawled across the board. She introduced Shakespeare: ‘Hath not a Jew eyes? Hath not a Jew hands, organs, dimensions?’ she recited, fixing us with her needle stare.

  The following Saturday was the day of the fête and for that I was happy to be in the village. I woke up and ran downstairs to the kitchen. Mum and Rita were packing jam into cardboard boxes ready for Dad to load into the van and transport to the green. There were jars all over the kitchen table: glossy yellow, red and black, each topped with different-coloured chequered hats according to its contents.

  I waited for instruction. Mum seemed harassed. She shoved a packet of Rice Krispies in my direction and told me to sit down and eat. I sat quietly, one eye on the proceedings and the other on the poetry book lent to me by Miss O’Dell. At least Mum had forgotten the rule about no reading at the table. Upstairs, the thud of Gabriella’s music signalled she was awake.

  Mum glanced at the ceiling, but didn’t comment. She closed one of the boxes. ‘Where’s Albert?’ she said. ‘He should be here by now.’

  Jasper made an appearance instead, sliding around the open back door, leaping onto the table and licking his paws. Rita pushed him down. ‘Sorry, puss,’ she said. I narrowed my eyes and finished off my cereal. It was all right for one of us to do that, but Rita? Surprised and disgruntled, Jasper leapt onto my lap. I stroked him, trying to make him stay. Every now and then he made a bid for freedom. I knew Rita would give him another push if he jumped up again, so I clung on hard and coaxed him into submission with quiet words I read from my book. ‘Tread softly because you tread on my dreams,’ I said as Jasper kneaded my thighs.

  They carried on packing the boxes while Mum fussed about the time and Rita told her to stay calm and that getting worked up wouldn’t help. ‘It’s only a local delivery,’ she said.

  ‘If that’s where he’s gone,’ muttered Mum.

  Looking up from my book, I caught the two of them exchanging glances. Where would Dad be if he wasn’t working?

  At last the boxes were sealed and Mum sat at the table with an exaggerated thump. She twisted her wedding ring, taking it off, putting it on again, while Rita tried to distract her, talking about her latest murder mystery evening. ‘You’d never have believed it,’ she said. ‘Stuart Henderson with the lead piping in the library.’ I believed it. Mr Henderson was squat and hefty. If his wife was a vinegar bottle, he was a flagon of beer.

  The front door opened and slammed. Heavy footsteps in the hall. Dad marched into the kitchen, straight to the sink, turned on the tap and stuck one hand under the water.

  ‘What have you done?’ said Mum, rushing forward while Jasper leapt down with a yowl as my hands automatically gripped his fur.

  Dad was breathing heavily, his back rigid as he leaned across the sink. ‘Nothing I shouldn’t have done before,’ he said. His voice was tight as if his mouth was full of things he didn’t want to say. He didn’t sound like Dad. He didn’t look like himself either when he turned to face the room, his eyes sparking anger. My heart thumped. What had happened?

  ‘I told you to stay away,’ hissed Mum as she grabbed his hand and examined the back of it.

  He didn’t answer. I glanced at Rita. She was standing too, her lips pressed closed and her hands clasped. She didn’t speak, and yet, the way she looked, her eyes full of knowledge, I thought she knew exactly what my dad had done. Had he had a fight? Was that possible? Dad was the negotiator, the pacifist. That’s how Mum always described him.

  Now Mum was wrapping his hand in a tea towel. Both of their faces were white and Mum was swallowing, trying not to cry.

  ‘We need to go,’ said Dad abruptly. ‘Anna, fetch Gabriella.’

  I got up, my legs trembling as I walked to the door.

  ‘We should stay at home,’ said Mum. I stopped.

  ‘No, Esther. Damn it, no. Why should we change what we do?’

  ‘We’ve got no choice. We need to speak first.’

  ‘Not yet.’ Dad stopped and looked at me. ‘Anna. I asked you to get Gabriella.’

  I stepped into the hall and, leaning my forehead against the wall, took a breath. They were still talking. Dad’s voice low and insistent. Mum’s uncertain and afraid.

  ‘Nothing’s going to happen,’ said Dad.

  ‘You don’t know that. You don’t know anything. Everything’s changed. We need to speak first.’

  ‘No. Trust me. I’ve sorted it out.’

  ‘With a threat? With violence? How’s that going to help? It will make things worse. Rita, tell him.’

  Rita said something I didn’t catch. Dad ended the conversation. ‘All right. Tonight. Now, we’ll carry on as usual. Please, Esther. One more day.’

  I peered through the gap in the door. Mum nodded briefly before taking off her apron and placing it on the side.

  It was warm for September and the green pulsed with people. Women wandered about in loose print dresses; men in shirtsleeves stood in groups; children weaved amongst the tables and the bunting. The noise intensified as we pushed our way through. People yelled above the jangling of the merry-go-round and the music from the stalls. ‘That’s the way to do it,’ shrieked Punch from the puppet stand.

  I grabbed Gabriella’s arm, afraid she’d slip away. Mum had t
old us to stay close and now, after what had happened, I intended to obey. We talked about the incident with Dad. I described the scene, but I could tell that Gabriella wasn’t taking me seriously.

  ‘Have you ever seen Dad get angry?’ she said. ‘Let alone punch anyone?’

  She was right, it was difficult to believe. And by the time I’d been through all the people in the village he might have had a fight with, the idea was wearing off. Gabriella wasn’t even listening. She was too busy looking around to see if the boy with the drowsy eyes from Our Price had come. I hoped not. There were enough boys hanging around as it was. Not surprising. Gabriella looked amazing, like she should be on an album cover, in her black and yellow polka-dot dress and boots, a slash of red on her lips.

  We arrived at the centre of the fête as the brass band struck up. Men in red uniforms and peak hats marched in formation, playing trumpets and trombones. A group of Gabriella’s friends appeared and tried to call her away, but she shook her head as I clung on. And I was grateful for that.

  The band stopped and was replaced with a troupe of country dancers. We moved to the sweet stall – jars of rhubarb and custards and pear drops and aniseed twists. We chose a selection and crunched our way to where the tug of war was assembling: beefy men rolling up their shirtsleeves, leaning backwards in red-faced unison.

  At around three o’clock, Dad, who’d been walking alone, doing circuits of the green, caught up with us at the jam stall. He was going to the beer tent. Mum gave him a look and opened her mouth as if to protest, but he stopped her. ‘We do the same every year and this year will be no different.’ He turned to us, ‘Stay together, you two.’ As he moved away, Gabriella rolled her eyes.

  It was true that the men, including Dad, always escaped to the beer tent – a few lone stragglers at first, and then crowds of them, piling in. There was shouting and lots of laughter; the occasional argument that slid up the pole of seriousness as the afternoon wore on, like a game of ring the bell.

  Now we bought candyfloss and ate it next to the coconut shy. I’d persuaded Gabriella to go on the merry-go-round when a figure appeared. The sun was behind her, but I knew it was Martha. It was the way she stooped low as if trying not to be seen.