‘Come on, Hailey, I really love you,’ he coaxed, his eyes glazed. ‘It’s you I want. I don’t want Katie. I really love you!’
Shaken, I told him, ‘You love Katie, you don’t love me.’
By now I was in a blind panic about what he was going to do. Looking back, I can see how far he had become detached from reality as he continued his barrage of crazy words.
I had really long, brown hair that hung right down my back like silk, and, as he kept pawing it with his clammy, smelly hand, he spurted a torrent of half-incomprehensible words that had my insides reeling in even more shock. ‘Katie cut her hair off, I wish she hadn’t.’ And he kept saying over and over again, ‘I don’t love Katie, I love you, I love your hair.’
‘No! Please, Ian, don’t!’ I pleaded.
Huntley’s lustful and perverted words were lost on me, they meant nothing to me, but something was about to happen that would haunt me for the rest of my life.
As Huntley pawed me, he said something that sent waves of fear through my body, ‘It won’t hurt.’
And then, as he looked at me with cold, unfeeling eyes, he repeated, ‘I really love you. I don’t love Katie, she’s disgusting, she makes my stomach churn. She’s cut all her hair off, because it was long and permed and then she went and had it cut. I don’t like it. Your hair is beautiful. Keep your hair long for me, won’t you? Oh, it’s fantastic.’ And he just kept going on like this.
All I kept thinking was, I shouldn’t have come here. I knew I shouldn’t have gone out of the street. That is what Mum used to tell me all the time, ‘Don’t go out of the street, don’t go out of the street,’ and I shouldn’t have done, because of what was happening now.
My nerves were in chaos. I didn’t know what his intentions were, what it was all leading to. All I could think was, How can he say he loves me when he’s going out with Katie, my best friend?
As his eyes locked with mine, he held my gaze and angrily spat, ‘Stuff Katie. I don’t love her, you’re the one that I love.’
I was getting even more scared, and pressed him, ‘Can we go home now?’
His eyes had become even more fierce and powerful, and as he held my gaze further he fired at me, ‘No, not until you’ve listened to what I’ve got to say first.’
Then, clearly deciding actions spoke louder than words, he wanted me to undo my tracksuit trousers. The tone of his voice changed to something more disturbing as he demanded in a harsher tone, ‘Undo your toggle on your tracksuit bottoms.’
The crude words that followed were alien to me. ‘I want to finger you.’
‘What’s that?’ I asked, truly confused.
His eyes were now even more ablaze with madness than they had been and his face was hideously contorted when he ordered, ‘Just let me do it.’
‘No, please,’ I cried.
Blind lust was leading him on as he growled, ‘No, just let me do it.’
I begged him not to do something I didn’t know the meaning of, though I knew from his demeanour and the tone of his voice that it was bad. ‘No, I don’t want you to,’ I pleaded.
Repulsed by his foul breath, I pulled back a bit and I felt the coarse, moss-covered bark of the tree pressing against the back of my head. I tried to reason with him, ‘You don’t love me, you have got to love Katie. You’re living with Katie. She loves you and she thinks of you first of all.’
This only set off another torrent of demanding words. He kept pleading, ‘Come on, just let me do it,’ clearly intent on wearing down my resistance verbally.
But then, although he didn’t force himself on me, his hands started to wander over me again and his breathing became deeper and faster. In this secluded place, one that Huntley obviously knew well, I knew I was in a very menacing situation.
The reasons he gave for why I should let him ‘finger’ me were nothing but accelerated cultivation of a victim – exactly as I now suspect he tried with Jessica Chapman and Holly Wells before killing them. I believe that they, like me, resisted their little hearts out before Huntley snapped, carried out his evil deeds and then killed them. All while Maxine Carr was away visiting relatives in Grimsby.
With a new-found smugness to his voice, he kept saying, ‘It won’t hurt. Trust me, it won’t hurt. Just let me do it to you.’
I went on pleading with him, ‘No, no, no.’ I was now crying as I begged, ‘Please, Ian. I’m scared.’
Somehow I managed to extricate myself from his wandering hands and repulsive breath. I sidestepped away from the tree and then backwards. As I edged away from Huntley, I was crying again. In an effort to stop him from groping me, I knelt down in a protective posture. I remember feeling the coldness of the earth, in comparison to the warmth of the sun, seeping into the knees of my tracksuit bottoms as I implored, ‘Please, Ian, no!’
I dropped into the kneeling position because I didn’t want Huntley to undo my tracksuit bottoms, as he was now groping between my legs. I was just a young girl, I didn’t know about the sexual role of the vagina; to me, it was for urinating. Please, I was thinking, don’t make me undo my trousers. If I’m kneeling down, he can’t undo them.
I thought that was fine until he ordered, ‘Stand up and talk to me.’
I just put my head in my hands and started crying uncontrollably and shaking with fear. All the while he was running his hands over my hair.
The only defensive thing I could do was to pull my head away from his hands as I repeated again and again, ‘Please, don’t. I just want to go home, Ian.’
‘No, no, no,’ he shouted at me. ‘You’re fine with me, you’re fine. You’re safe here. Nothing will happen, you’re safe. Just do as I say and you’ll be fine.’
As soon as he said that I thought, What do you mean, as long as I do as you say, I will be fine? Oh, God. I shouldn’t be here, I kept thinking. I knew I shouldn’t be out of the street.
‘Please,’ I cried, trying to be calmer, ‘I’m going to be late home for my tea. Please.’
‘No. No, you can stay with me,’ he insisted, and we went on and on like this, I would say for about an hour.
I was still on my knees, crying torrents and pleading as he continued to paw at my now dishevelled hair. Eventually, I did what he asked and stood up. From where I stood I could see the gate leading out of the orchard and a blue plastic sheet in the shape of an igloo that looked as though tiny kids could crawl underneath it.
I kept this blue shape in view as I tried to inch away from Huntley, and all the time crazy thoughts were running through my head. Should I just run away? No, I can’t, he can run quicker than me, I bet, and I won’t be able to get to the gate. There is no way out.
I remember the stillness being disturbed by the brrrrrr-brrrrrr of pneumatic drills. Workmen were drilling the road right behind me, beyond the back of the orchard. I could hear them shouting. I couldn’t make out what they were saying, but I could hear the noise of their shouts despite the drilling.
We had been there for at least an hour, and all I could think was, I don’t want him to put his hands down my trousers, I just want to go home. If Mum finds out I’ve left the street and I’m not home by about four or five o’clock, I’m going to be in big trouble.
Huntley kept cajoling and badgering me as he growled with lust, ‘You know, just let me put my hands in your trousers and do this to you. It won’t hurt, trust me, it will not hurt.’
‘I just want to go home,’ I kept on begging him.
The faces of those close to me flashed before my eyes as I suddenly realised what being at home was all about. I just kept crying, ‘I’m scared and I want to go home; people will know that I am with you.’
At one point, I thought that being trapped here like this was going to be my life – held prisoner here for ever. I remember the fir trees. I was just staring at them and thinking, I don’t want to look at him because he’s too scary to look at. When I did look, his face had become even more unrecognisable, vile and contorted than ever.
I g
ripped the top of my trousers as if my life depended on it and, looking back to that day, maybe it did. After a while my fingers hurt and, as my strength waned, I thought, God, please!
With tears of utter despair running down my cheeks, I sobbed uncontrollably, ‘It’s going to hurt.’
Huntley snapped, ‘No, it won’t hurt, it won’t hurt,’ and then, as suddenly as it had started, it stopped.
He had become the epitome of what I now understand paedophilia to be all about. He had come of paedophilic age and here he was having his own evil rites of passage by putting his hands down my trousers.
As bizarre as it may sound, my biggest fear of all was still that Mum would tell me off for leaving our street without her permission. This was more of a concern than Huntley actually making his alien demands to ‘finger’ me. I didn’t think he would actually do whatever it was, and then, obviously, I discovered what ‘fingering’ was.
I was still begging Huntley, ‘Please, can I go home.’
My resolve and fortitude were already broken enough by what had happened over that terrible hour. But what now emanated from Huntley’s vile mouth sent a sadness reverberating through me that would have broken the heart of anyone who witnessed my suffering; but there were only the two of us there.
My jaw dropped and my soul seemed to be smashed into a million pieces as Huntley finally cracked and the darker side of him manifested itself as something truly demonic and he spat, ‘Listen, bitch, let me do it again, otherwise I’ll kill you!’
As I searched his eyes for an ounce of compassion, all I could see were a thousand wicked thoughts in the windows of his soul as I implored, ‘Oh no, please!’
This was no longer just about escaping from Huntley to get home to an irate and worried mother: this was now about my life! The sexual appetite that had shadowed him for all his adult life had finally burst out, and he threatened me, ‘Right, we can do it the easy way or the hard way.’
‘What’s the easy way?’ I asked fearfully.
In what to me now was a precursor to the murders of Holly and Jessica, Huntley seethed as he poured out his desire to inflict pain on me. ‘The easy way is for me to press just behind your ears, because I’m a black belt in karate.’
In a burst of dry tears, I blubbered at him, ‘What will that do?’
With an air of chilling menace, Huntley hurriedly spoke his instructions. ‘All you will do, right, is either pass out or black out for five or ten minutes. Let me do what I want to do to you and then you will wake up and you will be fine.’
‘If that’s the easy way,’ I asked, ‘what’s the hard way? Because I might die if you press there. What happens if you don’t mean to kill me but I don’t wake up?’
Huntley seemed to think he was giving me a choice when, in fact, the option was either to succumb to being blacked out or to carry on struggling. Then, after a short time, he rasped, ‘The hard way is, if you don’t fucking let me do it, I will put my fingers there anyway, and I will press real hard there. And if I press so hard, you will die and I will do what I want to do to you anyway!’
On hearing what was likely to happen to me, I unleashed a stream of tears, along with a heart-rending plea, ‘Please, I just want to go home. I don’t want you to do it, please. I just want to go home.’
Little by little, I was backing away from him towards the fence, but he was still only feet away from me. It seemed that, for every step back I took, he inched closer towards me in this continuing bizarre dance of the predator and his prey. As he did so, he leaned forward, stooping over me. He was breaching the invisible barrier around me, the barrier we all have around us. Once more I was feeling very uncomfortable, yet I was powerless to stop him.
Huntley was inches away from me and my skin crawled. I renewed my grip on my tracksuit bottoms. I was becoming increasingly scared because he kept putting his hand near my neck. I was frantically thinking, He’s just going to press it or something and I’m going to drop dead. I didn’t know what happened if someone pressed behind your ears, and he was trying to do that to me.
When you get cold or you see something eerie, the hairs on the back of your neck stand on end. Well, that’s how I would feel for another hour, as I kept up my unrelenting plea to be allowed to go home.
Huntley had gone from feigning putting his hands behind my ears to slowly running his fingers through my hair again, and each time his hand passed my ear I would let out an audible gasp as I thought, He’s going to kill me. At that time I thought someone just had to press the area and you would drop down dead. With every terrifying pass of his hand, I thought I was in the shadow of death. Fear swept through me each time and I would pull my head away from his evil touch. I remember thinking, Don’t touch it there, because I might die. It had stuck in my head when he said I could die if he pressed just a bit too hard.
I remember feeling a bit queasy as I rasped again, ‘Oh, please, Ian, I just want to go home; my mum is going to kill me. I’m going to be late for my tea and she knows that I’m going to be with you. Please, just let me go home.’
And then a determined look came across his face and, without any hesitation, he moved my hands away and did it to me again: he pushed his fingers into my vagina. He actually made contact with it from inside my tracksuit bottoms. He had been gripping the top of my trousers and forcing them into my belly. I didn’t know these invasive procedures were all just so that he could have his moment of glory.
In his state of excitement, he gulped down air and kept growling, ‘Move your hands away, move your hands away.’
All the while I kept on begging him, ‘Oh, please. Please, Ian, don’t. It’s going to hurt. Please, no.’
Without an ounce of compassion he kept going, telling me, ‘No, it’s not going to hurt. Just let me do it.’
I was wailing now, ‘Please, Ian, don’t. I’m going to be late home and I have got to go home for tea.’
If I kept saying that, he might let me go, I thought. I knew what he was trying to do was wrong. I didn’t know what the details of the wrongness of it were, but I knew instinctively that something was wrong about it because nothing like this had ever happened to me before. And I didn’t know when, if or how it was going to end.
By now Huntley’s hand was crawling around inside my knickers and it made contact with my flesh again. In total he did it about four or five times. Every time he inserted his fingers into my private parts, he stopped and pulled away a little bit when I started crying, ‘Please, stop it, it’s hurting me.’
Then his manner became cajoling. ‘Don’t be silly. Don’t be silly.’
I noticed now that, when I started crying, he pulled away and stopped doing it for a while. Then I dried my eyes, tried to gather myself and started hoping and praying that he might let me go home in a minute. No sooner had I thought that then he started the cycle all over again and then I started crying and he pulled away a little bit and he would stop. Each time he fingered my vagina, it went on for up to five minutes. During the attack and afterwards he repeatedly mentioned putting his fingers behind my ears and pressing.
Then, after he had done the same sexual act to me yet again, I managed to stand up on the bottom ledge of the fence and I looked over and started screaming to the men drilling the road, ‘Help me.’
I was waving one arm frantically because Huntley was holding the other. And I was yelling in blind panic, ‘Please, help me. Come over here!’ It was then that I realised my cries were falling on literally deaf ears, as the guys drilling the road were wearing ear defenders. I think they were yellow or red.
I could see lots of workmen, but they couldn’t hear my calls or see my arm waving desperately. That was when Huntley put his hands around my waist and pulled me down out of sight of anyone on the other side of the fence. Then he undid my trousers again and carried out another sexual assault, the same as before. He was still in a state of arousal, although he hadn’t exposed himself to me.
With the clatter of the pneumatic drills, I couldn
’t hear the babble coming out of Huntley’s mouth; I could just see his lips moving. As he drew closer to me, my head was in bits, but I remember the sickly smell of his breath, diluted a little by my own heavy, anxious breathing.
Looking back, the odd thing is that Huntley didn’t expose his penis or fondle himself. What he was doing to me was a perverse thing for his own mental gratification. This was maybe something he would run through his head at another time; perhaps even now when he is behind bars. There was no physical gratification for him, other than the pleasure of abusing me. He was deriving a feeling of power from the control he exerted over me. He was feeding himself what he most needed, that sense of power, and getting off on it.
Not long after that, he finally agreed to let me go home. I don’t know if this was because I told him I had arranged to meet my mum at the pub that we were behind, but, as I look back on it now, I have the feeling that it might have been entirely due to Huntley’s lust having been sated, rather than a response to my constant sobbing and pleading.
When we eventually walked out of the orchard, he threatened me when he raised the subject I was already worried about. ‘Well, you can go home but, if you tell anybody, I’ll kill you.’
I was petrified and barely managed to stammer my reply, ‘No, no. No, I won’t. I won’t tell anyone. I promise.’
Of course, my reasons for not wanting to tell anyone about what Huntley had done to me were entirely different from how he saw it. Obviously, he wanted to avoid being put behind bars. I wanted to avoid my mum finding out that I had disobeyed her strict orders not to leave the street without first letting her know or getting her permission to do so.
I remember with exhausted relief the feeling of liberation that ran through me as I walked out of the orchard. If I can get back home in time, I thought, I won’t have to face a scolding from Mum for leaving the sanctuary of the street. But what if, while Huntley was abusing me, Katie Webber had called at my home to see where I was for our planned visit into town? Mum’s rage didn’t bear thinking about! My head was in pieces, but I was distracted from my thoughts as I noticed how empty the place was; the crowd of drinkers from two hours earlier had dispersed.
Hailey's Story--She Was an Eleven-Year-Old Child. He Was Soham Murderer Ian Huntley. This is the Story of How She Survived Page 7