The Vanished Child

by M J Lee

  The Vanished Child

  A Jayne Sinclair

  Genealogical Mystery

  M. J. Lee

  About M. J. Lee

  Martin Lee is the author of two different series of historical crime novels; The Jayne Sinclair Genealogical Mysteries and the Inspector Danilov series set in 1930s Shanghai. The Vanished Child is the fourth book featuring genealogical investigator, Jayne Sinclair.

  Also By M. J. Lee

  Jayne Sinclair Series

  The Irish Inheritance

  The Somme Legacy

  The American Candidate

  Inspector Danilov Series

  Death in Shanghai

  City of Shadows

  The Murder Game

  Fiction

  Samuel Pepys and the Stolen Diary

  Writing as Martin Lee

  The Fall

  This book is dedicated to the 130,000 Child Migrants who were taken from their homes all over the British Isles and transported to a foreign country.

  ‘Every Childhood lasts a lifetime.’

  David Hall. Child Migrant.

  Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Chapter Thirty-FIve

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  Chapter Forty

  Chapter Forty-One

  Chapter Forty-Two

  Chapter Forty-Three

  Chapter Forty-Four

  Chapter Forty-Five

  Chapter Forty-Six

  Chapter Forty-Seven

  Chapter Forty-Eight

  Chapter Forty-Nine

  Chapter Fifty

  Chapter Fifty-One

  Chapter Fifty-Two

  Chapter Fifty-Three

  Chapter Fifty-Four

  Chapter Fifty-Five

  Chapter Fifty-Six

  Chapter Fifty-Seven

  Chapter Fifty-Eight

  Chapter Fifty-Nine

  Historical Note

  The Irish Inheritance

  The Somme Legacy

  The American Candidate

  Chapter One

  June 22, 1952.

  St Joseph’s Farm and Trade School, Bindoon, Western Australia

  The backs of his hands were raw and red, arms exhausted and all his strength gone. Harry lifted the stone anyway, resting it against the waistband of his shorts before heaving it up on to his chest. Puffing like an ageing train, he shuffled over from the mound to the waiting wheelbarrow and dropped the rock into the wooden tray.

  What time was it?

  He glanced up, shielding his eyes. The sun was still high in the cornflower-blue sky, not a cloud in sight. He ran his tongue over his parched lips and raised his hand. ‘Water, sir.’

  A sleepy pair of eyes stared straight at him through thick lenses. The shiny leather boots shifted slightly in the sand and the tip of the man’s stick raised itself from the dust, pointing to a barrel next to a stone wall. ‘Make it quick, ye lazy spalpeen.’

  Harry loped over to the barrel before the man changed his mind, scooping up a ladle of warm water and pouring half of it into his open mouth, the rest over his head. The water dripped down his face, off his chin on to the dirty khaki shirt.

  He rested his hands on the barrel and pushed, feeling the ache in his back muscles as he stretched his body. His face and arms were burnt by the sun, so different from a month ago when he had first arrived. His thin legs were bruised and battered, one toenail black where he had dropped a rock on his bare foot yesterday.

  The sun blazed down, creating a haze that distorted the hills in the distance. It was as if the land itself were breathing hot fumes, like a sleeping dragon. A puff of wind arose from nowhere, swirling a cloud of red dust that coated the quarry and all those working there.

  ‘Don’t let Keaney see you. He’s a bit nuts today,’ whispered Slimo as he shuffled past, carrying a red-coated rock and dumping it into the wheelbarrow next to the stone wall.

  Harry stretched upwards again and took a rag from his pocket to wipe the sweat off his brow. ‘He’s nuts every day.’

  ‘Aye, he is, but today he’s more crackers than usual.’ Slimo picked up the wheelbarrow and slowly trundled it across the floor of the quarry to the spoil heap, making sure his bare feet gripped the wooden planks rather than risk the rocky floor.

  ‘I don’t care,’ Harry whispered.

  He took another ladle of warm water. Better enjoy the break while he could; the work would never stop.

  ‘YOU!’ Keaney pointed directly at him with his metal-tipped stick. ‘Stop loafing and get on with it. I want this lot stacked and ready before nightfall.’

  Harry hurried back to his wheelbarrow. The chiselled square of dressed stone lay at his feet. It had been cut from the rock face by another gang, chiselled into a perfect square under the watchful eyes of the Italian mason, and left for him to move one hundred yards, ready to be lifted into place on the frontage of the main building.

  He was tired and thirsty, his body ached and his skin was flaking off where the blisters from the sun had bubbled and burst.

  ‘GET A MOVE ON.’

  Keaney was walking slowly towards him, puffs of red dust rising into the air each time his leather boots hit the ground.

  Harry bent over the stone and wrapped his thin arms around it, feeling the sharp edges dig into soft skin. He jammed his bare feet against the base of the stone, preparing to rock backwards and lift the front edge on to his thighs.

  He took a deep breath and leant backwards.

  The stone didn’t budge.

  ‘Put your back into it.’

  He tried again, gripping the stone tighter, feeling it cut deeper into his skin. Breathe in, grit the teeth, lean back, pull up and... lift.

  The stone stayed where it was.

  He collapsed over it, panting.

  A few of the others had stopped working for a moment, watching him, waiting for the punishment they were sure was about to come.

  Harry heard the tread of Keaney’s boots in the red dust of the quarry floor, getting closer now, louder.

  A shadow loomed over him, blocking the heat of the sun. For a moment he basked in the coolness of the shadow, then he heard the words, a malevolent whisper through gritted teeth.

  ‘You British are a bunch of lazy scum. What are you?’

  Harry didn’t answer.

  Keaney’s voice was slightly louder now so the others could hear. ‘What are you?’ he repeated.

  Still Harry didn’t answer, feeling his chest touch the hard stone as he panted.

  The shadow leant closer. Harry felt the prod of the stick in the small of his back and heard
the voice once more. ‘Pick up the stone, ye lazy bastard, and take it over there.’

  ‘Do it yourself,’ Harry whispered. He didn’t move, tensing his body for the blow he knew was going to come.

  But Keaney was clever.

  Harry waited and waited and waited. Finally, he relaxed – and then he heard the whistle of the stick through the air and the sharp pain on the back of his head. His small body was flung forward across the stone.

  He tried not to cry out but a sharp screech erupted from his mouth.

  Another strike, this time across the back of his legs. He sank to the floor on his knees, body draped over the stone, arms still gripping the edges.

  ‘Pick it up and take it over there,’ Keaney shouted now, an order.

  Harry heard the swoosh of the stick being raised above Keaney’s head, ready to strike down again. He pushed himself up, feeling the pain in his head as he moved. He gripped the stone with his arms once more.

  As he did, a drop of blood flowed from the back of his head across his chin and splashed on to the rough surface of the stone. For a moment it sat there, red and viscous, seeping into the rock, leaving behind just a small stain where it had once been.

  Another boy’s arms joined him. ‘We can do this, Harry. After three let’s lift, okay?’ It was Slimo.

  Harry looked into Slimo’s eggshell-blue eyes. He was twelve years old, or at least that’s what he said. He’d been at Bindoon for a couple of years and already knew the ropes.

  ‘Are you ready?’

  Harry nodded.

  ‘One, two, three. Lift.’

  They both gritted their teeth and pulled. The stone rocked backwards and up, six inches off the floor. Slimo swivelled round, jerking upwards again and resting it on the edge of the wheelbarrow. They both pushed, sliding the stone to join the others sitting comfortably in the centre of the tray.

  Keaney’s stick came down across Harry’s back. ‘Next time, do it on your own. Nobody’s going to help you here. Understand?’

  He strode away, back to this place atop the rocky mound, his black cassock just touching the red dust of the quarry floor, giving the rough fabric a colourful hem.

  Harry watched him go, imagining a knife stabbing again and again between those narrow black shoulders.

  Chapter Two

  June 17, 2017.

  Buxton Residential Home, Derbyshire, England

  Jayne switched off Elbow just as they began another mournful chorus of An Imagined Affair. The drive out to her father’s nursing home from her house in Didsbury had been as difficult as ever. The A6 had been designed by some evil planner to be the worst road on earth; a never-ending obstacle course of roadworks, traffic lights, speed cameras, more roadworks, bypasses, more bypasses, and traffic jams.

  She had tried many times to find a different route to the residential home, but somehow she was always led unfailingly, as if by black magic, back on to the nightmare that was the A6.

  The only rescuing grace was music. She could listen to the bands of her youth; the glory days of Stone Roses, the Mondays, and even Inspiral Carpets, when Manchester had earned the nickname ‘Madchester’. It was still a mad city but the emotion was more anger than excitement these days.

  Her work as a genealogical investigator was quiet at the moment. One of those summer lulls, when everybody was thinking of their holidays rather than their family history. But she welcomed the break; a time to relax and spend time with her dad after a hectic couple of months.

  Her last case had been particular trying and the trial was due to start soon. She had been shot at, chased and forced to go underground, while her father had been kidnapped and threatened with murder. Her police training had come in useful but it was not a time she had enjoyed. Her Jack Reacher days were long gone. There would be no more assignments from potential Presidential candidates. At least, she hoped that was the case.

  For now, she just wanted to rest and spend time with her dad and his new wife, Vera. Being around them made her so happy.

  She stepped out of the BMW and made her way up the steps. As ever, Jenny was sitting behind the reception desk.

  ‘In their usual place?’ Jayne asked.

  The receptionist nodded. ‘The happy couple are in the garden, doing a crossword. I don’t know what they’ve got, but I’d like to bottle it and give a few drops to my old man.’

  ‘Still lovey-dovey?’

  ‘Lovier and dovier. Watching those two is like eating fudge, only twice as sweet.’

  ‘What do you expect? They’ve just come back from honeymoon.’ Jayne had picked them up three days earlier from Manchester Airport after their flight had arrived from Vancouver. Her father, Robert, and his new wife, Vera, had just spent two weeks aboard the Silver Shadow on a cruise to Alaska. In the car on their way back from the airport, her father couldn’t conceal his excitement as he described the highlights of the cruise.

  It was wonderful to see him so animated. It was as if he were a modern-day Rip Van Winkle, just emerged from a long sleep to see the world in all its beauty once again. His early-onset Alzheimer’s was in abeyance. Or at least, that’s what Jayne hoped. She would ask Vera later.

  She touched the silver-mounted bone carving that hung around her neck. A gift from both of them. A symbol of love, they said. A love for each other and for her.

  ‘I’ll just go through.’

  Jenny nodded. ‘But you’d better be quiet. It’s the repeats of the Great British Bake-Off. The residents get awfully upset if somebody disturbs their viewing. You might get a few custard tarts lobbed your way.’

  ‘As long as it isn’t rock cakes.’ She pushed through the fire doors and was confronted by the spacious day room. In front of the television, ten residents – mostly women – were gathered, eyes glued to the flickering eye in the corner. The curtains were drawn behind the television to help viewing, even though it was the middle of a beautiful summer’s day.

  ‘That’s not how you make a Victoria sponge.’

  ‘Look at her, creaming with a whisk. Should be beating the eggs in gently with a wooden spoon. My mother taught me as a little girl. Worked sixty years ago, still works today.’

  ‘What’s the bloody fool done? Can’t have nowt like strawberry jam in’t Victoria. Has to be raspberry, even if the seeds get under me dentures.’

  Jayne crept past the armchair bakers. None of them noticed her, intent as they were on the rising of the sponges. She slipped through the patio doors and saw her father and Vera sitting close together on a wooden bench.

  She tiptoed up behind them and whispered, ‘No hanky-panky, you two.’

  Vera started in surprise. Her father dropped his new wife’s hand like a hot potato.

  ‘You shouldn’t do that. My heart is racing fit to burst.’ Vera mimed panting.

  Jayne bent over the bench and kissed her step mother on the cheek. ‘Sorry, couldn’t resist it, you two seemed so engrossed.’

  ‘Just three clues left. Wish they wouldn’t stick the difficult ones in the corners, it makes ’em hard to solve.’ Her father laid down his crossword book.

  Jayne kissed his cheek too. ‘I’m sure you two will do it... eventually.’

  ‘Aye, this one is like a dog with a bone, gnawing away at the clue till it surrenders.’

  Vera bared her teeth. ‘Had them sharpened last week when we were on the cruise.’

  ‘A vamp or a vampire?’ asked her husband.

  Vera laughed. ‘A bit of both, I suppose. What do you think?’

  ‘Sorry to interrupt, but how’s the jet lag?’ Jayne sat down on the chair opposite them.

  ‘Not bad. Finally fell asleep at three o’clock last night. Feeling tired now, though, not as sprightly as I used to be.’

  Jayne’s father was seventy-four and his new wife an energetic sixty-six, although she looked ten years younger. Good genes and lashings of moisturiser, she always claimed.

  ‘He was wriggling all night, like those salmon we saw in Alaska.’

&
nbsp; ‘Shush, love, don’t tell Jayne everything.’

  They nudged each other, obviously sharing a secret only the two of them knew.

  ‘Now, what are you two planning for the next week? I have a new case starting at the end of June, and until then I’m free. I can drive you around, if you like.’

  Jayne’s father went silent. Then he looked across at Vera and nudged her. ‘Go on, ask her. Now’s as good a time as any.’

  ‘Ask me what?’

  Vera glanced down, suddenly bashful, not like her at all.

  ‘Listen, love, if you don’t ask then I will.’

  Vera continued to look down, discovering a piece of lint on the hem of her dress.

  Robert took a deep breath. ‘It’s like this, Jayne. When we were away, me and Vera, well – we got to talking one night...’

  ‘We were sitting on the veranda of our state room, looking over the sea, and I’d had a glass or two too many,’ she interrupted.

  ‘Well, Vera finally told me...’ His voice trailed off.

  It was as if both wanted to tell the story but neither wanted to say exactly what it was. ‘Well, what is it?’ said Jayne. ‘You’ve got me all ears now.’

  Vera took a deep breath. ‘You know my name is Thompson.’

  ‘Your first husband’s surname, isn’t it?’

  Vera nodded. ‘My maiden name was Atkins and I was born in Saddleworth in 1951.’

  ‘So you weren’t born with a silver spoon in your mouth?’

  Vera laughed again. ‘Far from it. We weren’t exactly poor, though. Dad worked at mill until it closed and then he found a job with the water board. Money was tight but we always had clothes on our backs and food on the table.’ Vera stared off into the distance. ‘You’d have liked my mother, Jayne. A kind woman, but one who didn’t say much. She was the real strength in our home – wore the trousers, she did. Not one for talking about her family or anything.’

  Then it suddenly dawned on Jayne where all this was leading. ‘You want me to research your family tree? Find out where you came from?’