Down in the Woods

by Gary Philpott

  “What’s the point? Nothing would happen, would it?”

  Harrington thought about delivering a sermon on collective responsibility and the need for communities to work together with the police, but decided doing so would only take the conversation on a downward spiral.

  “I have to say, I see why you like it up here. Is that why you became an accountant and not an engineer, so you could come back home?”

  “Hell no, I might not have got to work down a gold mine as I originally planned, but I would have found employment of some kind around this area. Money was my motivation, and all that goes with it.”

  “Accountants earn more than engineers?”

  “Too right they bloody do. Money controls the world, and who controls the money? It’s not rocket science. You need to be a bit more than a personal tax accountant like. But after a first class honours in engineering from Cambridge, economics and business exams are a walk in the park.”

  “Am I right in thinking your first job was in Peterlee?”

  “Ten out of ten for your homework detective, eleven if you already knew it was my father’s business. He had a small industrial unit down there,”

  “Actually, no, I didn’t know that,” Harrington lied. He needed Schofield to start talking about the past.

  “Well, after my time at Cambridge I needed a bit of cash, so I turned to dad. At first I just dealt with things like chasing up unpaid invoices and the like, while studying at college in the evenings. Within six months I had started an Open University course in Accounting and Finance. The rest is history.”

  “And you now work at the car factory.”

  “Yep. I’m not at the top yet, but I’m getting there.”

  “We’re not talking the accounts department, are we?”

  “No, we’re not. I’m in senior management. Think about it, I have a strong background in engineering and I have business qualifications coming out of my ears. A multi-national car factory is the ideal pond for me to swim in.”

  “Do you mind if I have a croissant?”

  “No, that’s what they are there for. I can grab you some jam, or some cheese, if you want.”

  “Just butter is fine.” He lifted one across to his plate. “Do you still play rugby?”

  “Aaagh, no. I’ve gone back to football. I don’t know why I ever played rugby in the first place. I was never much cop at it.”

  “Well, at least that’s something you and Dr Stanford agree on.” Harrington laughed and then regretted disclosing Stanford’s view of his rugby team.

  “Stanford? Are we talking about Harry Stanford?”

  “That’s the one. He’s a lecturer at Southampton University now.”

  “Oh, give him my regards next time you see him. I liked old Harry. He was always good to me.”

  “He spoke well of you too. As it happens, he wanted to know what happened to the nurse in the attic.”

  Schofield looked at him blankly. “That’s not one of the smutty videos he lent me, is it?”

  “No. He had a vague memory of you dating the nurse that lived in the attic room, in the same house he was in.”

  “Ah, I’m with you now.”

  “And do you know what happened to her?”

  “No, she’s probably shacked up with some woman somewhere.”

  Harrington sat up straighter. “Clarify that statement for me would you?”

  “Well, let’s just say men were not her favourite gender. She didn’t let on until after me and the other guys had spent six months trying to get into her attic. I tell you, between us we shelled out a small fortune on Campari and soda for that particular cutie. And all the time… Why’s Harry so interested in her?”

  “Oh, I think he’s just been reminiscing a bit, trying to sharpen up fading memories.”

  “Well, I had almost forgotten about her.”

  “Where did you buy her these drinks?”

  “She was often in the pub near Harry’s place, or at hospital discos and the like.”

  “Would it be stretching your memory too far if I asked you her name?”

  “Surely if you know where she lived, you know her name.”

  “No, the paper trail dried up. We know who owned the house at the time, but not the name of all the tenants.”

  “Mmm… I see your problem. There was a lot of that going on at the back then.”

  “Reduced rents in exchange for prompt cash payments?”

  “Up-front cash payments more like. I never heard of a landlord who would take a chance on a student doing a runner. To be fair to them, quite a lot of students did run home to mummy after only a month or so.”

  “Back to the original question, do you remember the girl’s name?”

  “Frankie.”

  “Frankie?”

  “Yes, Frankie, it just came to me like that. It was short for Francoise,or something like that.”

  “Was she foreign then?”

  “French I think, maybe Belgian. I do remember that she had a lovely, sexy French accent.”

  Harrington pulled his notebook out of his pocket. “You wouldn’t remember her surname, would you?”

  “Not a clue, I doubt I ever knew it. When you’re chasing a shag, you don’t ask for that much detail, do you?”

  “I guess not.” Harrington perked up inside, at least he had a name he could run through hospital records. He also had a suspicion something unpleasant might have happened to the girl. “How about a name for her lover?”

  “She was a nurse at a large hospital. Even working on the five percent theory, it still leaves a large playing field.”

  “I just thought you might have been introduced.”

  “No, though thinking about it, Studsie did suggest an older woman once. That’s right, he said, ‘you wouldn’t want a threesome if that old cow was involved’.”

  “So, you are suggesting she was older and not particularly attractive?”

  “To be honest, I can’t really remember exactly what he said, but I definitely got an image of someone older and uglier in my mind.”

  “There was a bit of a hoo-hah at the hospital around that time, wasn’t there?”

  “It was just a bit of puff, that’s all. Where they got the idea that the nurses’ quarters there were crack dens, I’ll never know. We were wise enough to steer well clear for a while like.”

  “I was referring to an incident with a nurse, an Indian girl.”

  “Oh, I see. Now that was a sad affair.”

  “Did you know the girl?”

  “Yeah, she liked to attend the socials, but not indulge. Her and a few of her mates would always find a quiet corner, and just chat or tap their feet to the music. As far as we could tell, they always bought soft drinks, never accepted one from a bloke and never danced. For a while there was talk of trying to loosen them up by spiking their drinks, but it was just talk, we never did it. They were harmless, that’s why it was so sad.”

  “You thought it sad that she did not complete her course?”

  Schofield gulped. “There was more to it than that, wasn’t there?”

  “Did you ever have sex with any Asian nurses?”

  “Well, yes, but not her. Studsie claimed…” He stopped speaking.

  “Studsie claimed…?”

  “Oh, you could never take that guy seriously. If you believed half of what he said, you would believe he shagged every nurse at the hospital, and half their mothers come to that. Besides, he soon went sheepish when Bimbo told him not to be such an arse.”

  “Why would Bimbo suggest he was being an arse?”

  “Well, if she was dead, it was disrespectful, wasn’t it?”

  “So he made this claim after the nurse had gone missing?”

  “Oh, for sure. Maybe as much as nine months after.”

  “And who is this Studsie?” Harrington pretended not to know.

  “Phil.”

  “Phil who?”

  “Phil who played in the same rugby team as me. Phil who studied
Land Economy. Phil who shagged more women than the rest of us put together. A posh southerner is how I would describe him.”

  “Hetherington-Jones?”

  “That name rings a bell, but that could have been Thumper’s surname. I guess this all comes across as a bit pathetic.”

  Harrington forced back the urge to nod.

  “It was like a pact thing, a bit of comradeship.”

  “Why Bimbo?”

  “He always homed in on the less intelligent women, the ones doing beauty therapy at the college and the like. Sorry, I’m sounding quite snobby, aren’t I?”

  This time Harrington did not fight back the urge to nod. “And Thumper? Tell me about Thumper.”

  “That’s what I hated most about Cambridge, it was full of bloody snobs, and I was becoming one of them.”

  Harrington repeated the question, “And Thumper?”

  “Oh, Thumper; he had a room on the top floor, the headboard used to thump against the wall. We found out he deliberately loosened the bolts and positioned his bed so it was an inch or so from the wall. And before you ask, his name was Thomas. I met him during fresher’s week and made the mistake of calling him Tom the next time I saw him. I can also tell you he was studying History of some sort. He was quite knowledgeable about what Henry the Eighth got up to, and who with. Always studying old buildings as we walked passed them, saying things like, ‘they’re not the original windows you know,’ or ‘that clock tower must have been added at a later date’. Once when we thought he was getting serious, he took the girl to Warwick Castle for the day. Her mates said he bored the pants off her, so she let him have one last sympathy-shag before they came home, and then blew him out.”

  “No surname though?”

  “Just like you said, his name was Hetherington-Jones.”

  “No, Studsie’s real name is Phillip Hetherington-Jones.”

  “Ah well, you know more than I do. To me Thumper was always, and always will be, Tommy Thumper.”

  “Tommy Thumper,” mused Harrington. “The headboard thing is for real, is it? It wasn’t because he hit women?”

  “Now hang on, perhaps we didn’t show women the respect we should have, but we adored them. None of us would have even sworn at a woman. We were young, horny men, who liked sex, just like every young man. And most of the women come to that.”

  “It takes two to tango, eh?”

  “It does. Perhaps a lot of women were hoping for more long term commitment than they got, but most of them only needed a drop of alcohol to loosen them up. Besides, we catch them up on the commitment front once we mature a bit.”

  “Where did you meet your wife?”

  “That’s a bit personal I’m afraid.”

  “Personal or not, I would still like to know the answer.”

  “Oh well, I guess no harm can come of it. I met her at a lap-dancing club near Heathrow airport. She cost me a few bob, I can tell you.” He smiled like a man thinking about good times. “But she was well worth the initial outlay.”

  Harrington didn’t dare ask which club near Heathrow, but guessed there was a good chance of it being the same one he was in only a few days earlier.

  “How long ago was that?”

  “About six years, we’ve just had our fifth wedding anniversary. And to save you asking, no, the twins are not mine. But that doesn’t stop me loving them to bits.”

  Having established that Mrs Schofield had not met her husband in Cambridge, and therefore would not be able to add anything to, or corroborate anything her husband had to say, Harrington moved on.

  “So, Willy is you, Peter Schofield. Studsie is Phillip Hetherington-Jones, and claims to have had sex with the Indian nurse that went missing. Thumper’s first name is Thomas. How about Bimbo, do you know his name?”

  “No, I couldn’t even tell you what he was studying. When he wasn’t chasing skirt, all he ever talked about was cricket. He sometimes went abroad to watch England play. He would be gone for months at a time.”

  “He played cricket, not rugby?”

  “No, he certainly didn’t play rugby that well. I guess he played cricket better. I don’t know, maybe he did, maybe he didn’t.”

  “So what about the other one then?”

  “The other one?” Schofield bit into a croissant.

  “There were five of you.”

  “Five of us?”

  “Dr Stanford referred to you as a team within a team. There were five of you together in this team photo.” Harrington pulled the photo out of his jacket pocket and placed it on the table. He then finished eating his croissant while Schofield studied the photo.

  “You’re not referring to this guy are you?” He tapped his finger on the man next to Hetherington-Jones.

  “That’s the one, yes.”

  “Well, he didn’t socialise with us very often. Studsie and he used to go out for a midweek drink together. The rest of us had to save our money for the weekend, but they both had cash to burn.”

  “Was he close enough to your group to have a nickname?”

  “Dougie, everyone called him Dougie. So I guess his name was Douglas.”

  “So, he was a friend of Phillip Hetherington-Jones, but not one of the boys as it were.”

  “Yep, that just about sums it up. I guess he had the physique, but he was too shy to chat-up girls. He did hang around with a creepy looking girl a lot though. I assume they shagged, but can’t say for sure.”

  “And you definitely can’t remember the surnames for Thumper or Bimbo?”

  “No, but Studsie will probably know. He used to organise most of our social outings.”

  “He was the more dominant one then?”

  “Well, toffs are like that, aren’t they? It’s like they were born with arrogance in their blood. And in truth, he always got the best looking bird.”

  “What was he like sexually?”

  “Blimey, I never slept with the guy.”

  Harrington laughed. “No, I wasn’t suggesting you did, but you must have had an insight into his likes and dislikes. Did he like sex outdoors? Did he like the girls to dress up in fetish gear? Did he like to be watched? Was he into a bit of light bondage?”

  “Well, yes to all of that, except the being watched bit that is. There were times when we did it in the same room, but out of necessity, not exhibitionism.”

  “To your knowledge, did he ever tie women up?”

  “Yes, but we all did that. I still do that on occasions. Doesn’t everyone?”

  “Nothing out of the ordinary then?”

  “No, I don’t think so.”

  “Okay Mr Schofield, that’s me done. Thank you for your time.”

  “No problem. As I said on the phone, so long as I make a colleague’s annual review meeting at eleven, that’s OK.” He turned his wrist to look at his watch. “I’ve still got plenty of time.”

  Harrington stood up. “Well thanks very much.”

  They were at the front door when Schofield asked, “Was this all about the Indian nurse or the nurse in the attic? You never said.”

  “No, I didn’t say, did I.”

  “No.”

  “Goodbye Mr Schofield.”

  “Goodbye. But…”

  Harrington did not look back as he walked down the drive. At least if Schofield did contact Hetherington-Jones, he would be a bit vague about exactly what aspect of their past was being investigated.

  Chapter 12

  It was a bit cool, but the sun was shining. As a consequence, Shepherd’s Bush road looked a lot better than last time Anna was there. She was standing in exactly the same place, watching Sofia weave her way across the busy road.

  “Sorry I took so long, but they tried to stonewall me at first.”

  “Is he in there?” asked Anna anxiously.

  “No, but I now know where he is.”

  “Where?”

  “Gatwick. I’ve got the address and telephone number here.” She pulled a slip of paper out of her pocket and stared at it.
“Tinsley House. It’s a detention centre.”

  “Gatwick is an airport, yes?”

  “It is, but as Kevin said, they won’t be putting him on a plane just yet. So what we are going to do is go back home to pick up my car, and then we will drive over there.”

  “Do we need to book?”

  “Evidently you don’t need an appointment, so long as you are there by half-eight. The copper in there,” she glanced across the road, “said I should ring in advance, just to be on the safe side. I’ll do that before we set off.”

  “Thank you Sofia, you are so good.”

  “It’s the least I can do. But remember, you won’t be able to come in with me. That’s why I thought it best to go by car. It will take longer, but at least you can sit and listen to the radio while I see Anton.”

  “Yes, that is good.”

  “Come on then, let’s get to it. Hammersmith tube is our best option from here.”

  Anna had spent forty minutes listening to a popular music station, but it was not relaxing her at all. Neither was the pressure building in her bladder. Anxiously consuming two cans of Pepsi had not been the wisest thing to do. She looked around to see what her options were. Basically, the only real option was to walk into the detention centre and ask to use the toilet. But what if there was not one in the public area and they asked for identification before letting her use a toilet? She decided to hold on and hope Sofia would not be too much longer.

  She started to hit each of the six buttons on the radio in turn. When she got to number four, there was a radio play on. Given the circumstances, continuing to try to improve her English had little appeal, but it seemed better than listening to over-cheery DJs and up-tempo pop music.

  Another ten minutes passed, and the large bag of Liquorice Allsorts Sofia had left in a storage box between the seats had been demolished. Anna’s bladder was complaining big-time. Desperate situations call for desperate actions.

  The car was reversed into a space with a hedge separating it from the detention centre building. She removed her knickers and placed them on the driver’s seat. When Anna got out, she left the door open for extra protection and made her way round to the back of the car. As casually as she could, she lifted the back of her dress and rested her bare bottom onto the boot. After one final 360 check, she moved her feet apart, and started to pee. The situation was humiliating, but the relief was exquisite.