BONE BABY: chilling emotional suspense with a killer ending

by Diane M Dickson

  She called for a taxi to take her back to the station. As the driver wove through the endless traffic heading for the city centre and they passed the end of Lyncombe Hill, she glanced up the steep slope towards the turn into Southcote Place, and knew with absolute certainty that she would never see this place again.

  There was a short wait on the draughty platform. She felt empty of emotion. The only thing left now was to get back to Peter. What a difficult journey it had been. She had not expected to be struggling still with all of this, and it was even now, unfinished business.

  Her physical strength was desperately depleted and without the buzz of adrenaline to push her on, she was exhausted. She felt the end coming, unmistakably, and she felt that she must get back to her home.

  The sky was darkening by the time she slipped her key into the lock and stepped into the hallway of the house in Southsea. Her limbs were heavy, and though she had used the spray, her chest was locked in a steel band. It was difficult to breathe, shadows lurked at the edges of her vision. She was afraid. Though she had known that this was coming and had wished for it and waited for it, now that it was time she was afraid. She wanted to go up to the bathroom and fetch the pills. She wanted to control this, but didn’t have the energy to climb the stairs.

  She picked up her flashlight and, gasping and groaning quietly as the pain intensified, she half fell, clutching at the old wooden banister, down the narrow wooden steps into the basement.

  She sat on the chair, but it was too difficult to be upright, so she lowered to the hard floor. She propped her back against the damp, mouldy wall, turned the flashlight beam to where the baby slept and waited for the end.

  Chapter 55

  Death would not come. Lily tried to give herself over to oblivion. The pain held her, pinned to the world, beating at her in waves and spasms and she couldn’t make herself die.

  Behind the lids of her eyes she saw Charlotte Mary, her hands outstretched. She saw her mother and father smiling, standing in the shadows, wavering and indistinct, but their essence was clear to her.

  There were times when she was unaware, when the pain grew and grew until she cried out, until, in kindness, her failing body rescued her, plunging her deeper into the darkness. It was her goal, it beckoned to her, she wanted to go, to fall into the soft emptiness, but over and over it pushed her back, buoyed up on a wave of agony.

  Charlotte Mary came again, she carried the little bundle with her, just as she had on the day the nightmare began. She held Peter towards her, only to snatch him back with a laugh and then open her arms to allow his tiny form to vanish into the ether.

  Lily woke for an agonising moment, to find that in her stupor she was reaching out, her hands flexing, fingers clutching at the child that wasn’t there. And then she tumbled back into the void.

  It was cold and there was a moment when the pain had eased enough for her to think logically. She imagined climbing back up the stairs, up to her bedroom where she could wrap the warm duvet around her and stop shivering. If she could drag herself into the light, she could find some peace – she wanted, more than anything, to find some peace. She needed the toilet and panicked at the thought that she may well soil herself, and be found in a stinking pool. But then it didn’t matter because the pain came back; it was all there was in the world, and she heard her voice from far away pleading for it to stop.

  “No more, please, no more.”

  She saw the bright light. Didn’t everyone say there was a bright light? Go into the light they said, and she tried, but didn’t know how to do it.

  When Terry spoke, she was confused. He wasn’t part of them, the small phalanx of the dead, how was it that he was there? “Lily, Lily. Oh, bloody hell. Lily.”

  She opened her eyes to see his shape. A dark form behind the white glare of his phone torch. He knelt beside her. She could feel the warmth of him. He took off his jacket and laid it over her upper body. Such bliss, the warmth, the smell of his aftershave, the feel of his hand in hers. She moved her lips, but the sound she wanted to make would not come.

  “Take it easy, Lily. We’ve called an ambulance. Sandra let me in with her key. You’re going to be okay. What the hell are you doing down here? Why didn’t you call for help? Oh shit, never mind about that. Why didn’t you stay for the funeral? I was worried, you looked so ill. What are you doing here?”

  He was gabbling – panicked and distressed. She forced her arm to move, clutched at his hand. She felt him rubbing at the skin, felt it move under his fingers. She raised the other arm and pointed to the corner of the cellar.

  “Peter.”

  “What?”

  “There. Take care of the baby.”

  Terry tried to calm the delirium. “He’s alright, Lily, Peter’s alright. We’re going to take him and put him with his mum. When you’re better. We’ll go together. Don’t worry about him now.”

  She managed to turn her head from side to side. “Letter. Read my letter. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

  The next spasm of pain caused her to cry out and it spiralled, biting and vicious until it filled what there was left of the world.

  “Lily, hang on, please just hang on. The ambulance will be here soon.”

  The warmth and ease was overwhelming, and as Charlotte Mary walked towards her, holding out the small bundle, darkness took her away, and the pain of it all dissipated like dew in the morning sun.

  * * *

  “Lily, aw shit. Lily.” Terry watched the tension leave her body, saw her jaw loosen and fall. He turned to where her torch shone a cone of light into the corner. It lit the wall and on the dark floor there was the glint of glass.

  He heard a siren, faint but growing nearer. The neighbour was calling from the kitchen, “They’re coming. Tell her they’re coming.”

  He called back to Sandra waiting upstairs, in the house, “I think it’s too late, she’s gone.”

  Then there was the clatter of feet along the hallway and down the wooden steps. He was pushed aside by the paramedics, but he knew it was too late. Still, she was old and sick. Probably it was a sort of release. He turned to leave but they asked him to wait.

  When he told them what had happened, he made no reference to her peculiar final words. It would take too long to explain and it didn’t matter anymore. She had kept his secrets and there was no need for them to become common property now.

  After they had gone, and the police had asked their questions, taken his address, and Sandra had gone back to her own house, sniffling and shaking her head, Terry went back into the basement. Lily’s torch still shone against the corner. He walked into the little pool of light. He frowned and bent to pick up the small vase holding a bunch of dying roses. There were a couple of candleholders, with metal night-light containers empty inside them.

  It looked like a grave, or an altar. It made no sense. Perhaps they had buried a pet down here, a dog maybe or no, more likely a cat. Old spinsters, they all had cats – right? But why here, why not in the garden, up in the daylight?

  He had assured Sandra that he would lock up and return the key, but first he’d just take a tour, ensure that everything was safe for the house to be left empty.

  He went into the dining room and pulled open the door to the cabinet. He took out the blue jar. He could take it with him now, he wouldn’t have to bother coming back. There was no point and he could keep his promise without too much trouble.

  A second box stood alongside it. He carried them both to the table. ‘Charlotte Mary’. Her name was on the label. A bit weird keeping all the ashes here in the cupboard. But then she must have had her reasons. Though he knew she had been kind and had tried to help him, he had thought that she was just a little odd.

  The seals on the box were broken so he pried off the lid. There was a plastic bag inside containing a surprisingly small amount of ash. It had been sealed at some stage but someone had cut the top. The whole thing was very peculiar. Perhaps Lily had done something with a quantity of the ashes. Pe
rhaps she had given them to someone. Did people do that?

  He picked up the small blue urn and turned it in his fingers, it was heavy and when he shook it he could tell that it was full. The idea that crept into his mind was absurd.

  Wasn’t it?

  Chapter 56

  It was a bright, blowy day. The air was still warm, though the leaves were beginning to turn. Soon russet and gold would replace tired and dusty green. Their little convoy was alone in the cemetery. The air was alive with birdsong, and drying leaves rustled in a small breeze. Terry didn’t come here often, his relationship with his mum had been such that he hadn’t felt her loss in a way that drew him back, over and over, to be where her body lay. Granny had never been much more than a vague figure in his life. As for Clive, he had been true to his word: he had him cremated and his ashes scattered among many others in a rose garden in a different cemetery. He would never visit that place.

  He had been here once already during the last couple of months though. He had brought flowers and stood for a while after he had laid them on the white pebbles. He hadn’t spoken, there was no need as far as he was concerned. If there was anything of an afterlife with a connection to this one, then surely the dead, if they were still interested, were aware of anything they cared about. The time for conversation with them was long gone.

  He held no grudge against the two women who were here. They had struggled as much as he. But the desperation to leave his past behind had robbed him of much affection for his maternal relatives, and there was no point looking for it here, in this place. He had visited to remind himself what it was like, just where he needed to come so it would be smooth and easy. He went away knowing that it would serve very well. It had been a pilgrimage of sorts, but he wasn’t surprised to find that it left him unmoved. After years of subjugation, it took more than a stone in the ground and a rectangle of pebbles to stir his emotions.

  The documentation had been easily done. He had help from all quarters and with the DNA results and the evidence from Lily’s house, along with the letter she had left with her solicitor, the arrangements had gone surprisingly smoothly.

  For him, the months since Lily had died had been a revelation.

  Much of it was because of timing. There had been huge changes in attitude, and the publicity surrounding other children, other gangs of abusers, had caused a seismic shift in the way such things were handled. Nevertheless, the kindness he had encountered surprised him. The consideration he had been afforded eased the painful journey that he had thought he would never take.

  People had listened to him, they had believed him, and then had offered him help to deal with the trauma of his past. He hadn’t taken the help. He had already dealt with it in his own way. He had, after all, been fighting back since he was a child, on his own terms, and he was stronger every day.

  He had refused all requests from the newspapers and television, for interviews and publicity. That wasn’t for him. He didn’t believe it would serve any purpose and had no desire to be in the spotlight.

  They could do nothing about Clive. He had escaped real justice by dying so unexpectedly. But Andrew Stoner wasn’t going to get away so easily. He had fled abroad, and the cause and circumstance of that sudden escape were still confused – although the reasons behind it were becoming clearer as more and more of his own victims came forward. No-one could understand how he had known that the truth was about to be revealed. There was a tentative connection with the buried child, which the newspapers had dubbed ‘The Bone Baby’ but the timing of his flight was a mystery. There had been online appeals, articles in the newspapers and fingers had pointed in surprising directions. Like a runaway truck, the thing had gathered speed and pace, and now seemed unstoppable. The dreadful coterie of the powerful and the rich had been outed and exposed. Terry had been warned that it could well be a couple of years before the investigations were complete. He was at ease with that.

  When the time came, he would go to court – he would give what evidence there was, though in truth he didn’t believe it was that much. Perhaps Clive had thought he was protecting his own family by keeping them to himself. Perhaps it had just been selfishness. There were others to whom he had not afforded such favour, and they were rising up now that the way was opened to them. Years of bullying and threats against the young and the vulnerable. So-called favours, in place of rental payments, yet more in the face of the threat of eviction.

  The police gave Terry time and assured him that everything was a help and everything was examined. They pieced it together. He told them in detail about his own abuse. That had been the worst of it for him and yet, he had survived. The strongest evidence for his own case had been the DNA results, and in that his brother had been a witness as reliable as any long-suppressed stories of his own.

  He had nothing but vague memories and dim facts about times when he was left in the car, or in downstairs rooms in rented houses. It became more meaningful when added to the other stories that were still being told.

  He didn’t meet the other victims. There was enough pain for him to carry without adding to it with that of strangers. Some of them were in touch with each other, with organisations that could offer care and counsel, but he didn’t want that.

  * * *

  Today wasn’t about himself, it was for his tiny, tragic family. He walked to the car parked behind his own with its rear door already opened.

  The driver gave him an encouraging smile as he bent to lift the tiny white coffin. It wasn’t heavy. He settled it safely in his arms and they walked together across the short grass to where Mum and Gran were waiting.

  The small brass plate had just one name: ‘Peter’. He had told them to leave off the surname, he didn’t know what Lily had intended. The letter hadn’t told them that. It didn’t seem right to give him Clive’s. They had his birthdate from the hospital card, but only an idea of exactly when he had died; again the letter was vague. It rambled about how short the time had been, and how painful it was.

  Terry imagined that Lily had intended a meeting between them, a chance to tell her story in person, to explain why his brother had been in the cellar and why she had lied, why the pantomime with the ashes. In the end, she had tried to put things right. That was enough for him.

  He had opted for nothing, rather than invent a convenient truth. The gravestone would be marked in the same way as this tiny casket, but he had instructed that it also bear the legend, ‘Beloved Child’. It wasn’t much but it seemed to him to be enough, and it was as genuine as anything else.

  They had assured him that Peter’s tiny body had been treated with kindness and respect. He thought Lily would have minded the disturbance, the examination, and felt sorry. But it was done now and the discovery had blown open the lid on secrets that she could never have imagined.

  He hadn’t looked at his brother’s remains, there was no point. He hadn’t known him, the sadness he felt was more for the circumstances than the child, and he felt no guilt either. His past had taught him that life was hard, and the only way through was to keep your eyes forward and to march on. He had come to terms with so much and convinced himself that he had been, always, an innocent victim.

  He handed Peter over and stood silently as he was lowered into the ground. The sun shone on this part of the cemetery for a while each morning, and it was green and well-tended around the graves. As good a place as any to be left.

  The driver of the hearse handed him a small bunch of flowers and he tossed them as gently as possible into the grave, and then he turned and walked away.

  He had considered for a while that maybe he should bring Lily’s ashes here and let her be with him. But she wasn’t his family, so he had left that decision to Charlotte’s cousin. He hadn’t gone when they had taken them, with those of Charlotte Mary’s from the house in Southsea, and scattered them on the waters of the Solent. He had no idea how the two women would have felt about that, but again, he didn’t believe that the dead cared about such thing
s. He had done the best that he could and he was moving on.

  Once the authorities had finished their work in the basement, and ascertained that there were no other graves and that no crime had been committed in that house, except for the one sad, and relatively minor one, he had sold the Southsea property. It was too far away to be convenient and had needed a lot of refurbishment. For a while after he learned that Lily had left him almost everything, he had been unsure what to do. But she had done it freely, so he donated what he thought was a decent amount, in her name, to a children’s charity. Later he was meeting with his accountant and a developer, to discuss the purchase of a new property in Bath city centre. It had promise.

  Parts of Clive’s will were still the subject of legal argument. There were bequests to people who were even now of interest to the police in the ring of criminals who had spoiled so many lives. They had told him, off the record, that it was entirely possible that he would keep the properties. It would be a sort of compensation they said. He hadn’t answered, because he knew that there could be no such thing for a stolen childhood.

  Andrew Stoner was refusing to help, denying knowledge of everything. It was probable they would extradite him from Spain, but it would all take time.

  Many of the others who had been involved had accepted their fate and simply wanted as little fuss and attention as possible. The victims were determined that wouldn’t be the case. It was a mess and would be difficult to sort out, but Terry had time, he had patience, and he had his revenge. As he drove out of the gates of Haycombe Cemetery, he lowered his car window and let the late summer breeze move the air around him.