‘I don’t know any thugs and I’m not the sort to bear grudges against a woman, even one who seems obsessed with me … but if I was the type to take exception to someone I wouldn’t mess about just spraying their car.’
‘Who said it was sprayed?’
‘You said it was vandalised. Round here they would key it or spray it. I assumed it was one or the other.’
‘You’re right though,’ admitted Bradshaw, ‘that’s not really your method. Sickening beatings and the occasional murder are more your style.’
‘I’ve never been convicted of giving anyone a beating. I was arrested once for murder,’ McCree conceded, ‘but the jury knew it was a stitch-up. The judge was very critical of Northumbria Police in his summing-up. He realised they were trying to frame me because they had a long-standing grudge against me.’
‘And why is that, I wonder?’
‘When I was a young man I kept bad company for a while and did some things I shouldn’t have. I was a bit of a tearaway but I’ve changed now and I’m a successful businessman. You lot resent that and you want to put me away for something I never even did. It’s scandalous.’
‘In that case it might be a good idea to avoid harassing a journalist. You might bring the wrong sort of attention to yourself. So lay off her from now on.’
Jimmy McCree folded his huge arms and stared right back at the detective. ‘Or?’
‘You’ll make an enemy of me,’ said Bradshaw, ‘and you wouldn’t want that.’
When the words came they were a low snarl that reminded Ian Bradshaw of a dog that was only kept back by the chain it was fastened to. ‘And I could say the exact same thing back to you, bonny lad. I’ve been threatened before and you’re not the first police officer to do it, but I’m still here and they’re all gone. You should bear that in mind. Now get out of my house before I forget you are a guest in it.’
He rose to show Bradshaw his time in McCree’s home was at an end. Big Jimmy escorted Bradshaw to the front door and saw him through it. Before he closed the door he said, ‘And please give my regards to Miss Norton. Tell her I hope she has a nice day.’
‘Yes?’ The voice was rasping and disembodied, a Dalek speaking from the intercom on the outside wall of the care home.
‘It’s Tom Carney,’ he said, ‘and I brought a woman.’
There was a moment’s pause, followed by a buzzing sound from the intercom and the door clicked open.
Tom and Helen stepped inside and walked down an empty, brightly lit corridor until an unassuming man in his thirties emerged from an office halfway along it and intercepted them. ‘This is Helen Norton,’ explained Tom, ‘a colleague of mine.’
The man nodded. ‘I’m Dean, pleased to meet you. Councillor Jarvis vouched for you, so that’s good enough for me.’ Then he said, ‘Just a quick word with you before you go in, if you don’t mind?’ They followed him to his office.
‘Thanks for bringing your colleague. No male is allowed in here unsupervised without a female unless he is a member of staff. That’s for the girls’ protection. I hope you understand. Usually a female member of staff would accompany you but there have been cuts so we can’t spare anyone today. We didn’t want to delay you, so we’ll let you speak to the girls one at a time in their rooms, as long as you stay together. They know you’re coming.’
‘Fair enough,’ said Tom. ‘How does it work here? Are the girls allowed out on their own?’
‘Of course,’ said Dean, ‘it’s not a prison and the girls here are older but we do operate a curfew. They are expected to be in by nine p.m. We have rules and they lose privileges if they break them.’
‘Right,’ said Tom, ‘we’ll begin then.’
‘Be careful,’ Dean warned, ‘all of these girls have had a very hard start to their lives and as a result they are all quite …’ his eyes narrowed as he searched for the right word ‘… vulnerable.’
‘We’ll try not to upset any of them,’ Helen assured him.
‘It’s not just that,’ he told her. ‘I’m sorry to say this, but you can’t always trust them. Because of their past and their upbringing, it’s in their natures to deceive. Some of them have mothers who are criminals, prostitutes, drug addicts or all three. Many of them never knew their fathers or mothers at all. Some have been in the care system all of their lives and have acquired certain skills along the way.’
‘What kind of skills?’
‘Well I wouldn’t leave any of your belongings lying around if I were you, but it’s not just thieving.’ Dean lowered his voice in a confidential manner. ‘Some of them like to play games. You’re clearly both intelligent people but I would advise you not to allow yourself to be manipulated by them. They are good girls for the most part but a past like theirs is bound to affect anyone.’
‘Thanks for the warning,’ Helen told him. ‘Will you be in the room while we talk to the girls?’
‘Oh no, they are free to speak their minds. We don’t have anything to hide here.’
The girls had their own rooms and each one waited with her door open. The first girl was lounging on her bed, but looked as if she hadn’t slept properly in months. She remembered Sandra Jarvis but didn’t have much to say about her. Sandra had been here for a while then gone, she said, as if that was a helpful observation. Towards the end of an unsatisfactory conversation, Tom asked her if she liked it at Meadowlands. ‘Oh yes,’ she said, ‘I feel safe here.’
The second and third girls both knew Sandra but said they had not really confided in her, nor had she told them anything about her own life or plans for the future. They didn’t know where she lived, who her father was or whether she had a boyfriend.
The fourth girl reiterated the testimony of the previous two but added, quite unprompted by them, that she liked it at Meadowlands.
The fifth girl said she felt safe here.
The sixth refused to speak to them at all, except to say she knew nothing about Sandra Jarvis other than the fact that she had long hair, then she told them to, ‘Leave me alone for fuck’s sake,’ and clammed up.
Girl seven offered very little beyond her assertion that everyone here was well looked-after and she felt safe.
The next room had no one in it.
The last girl in the corridor was slumped on her bed with her head propped up slightly on a pillow and only her eyes moved when they entered the room. Tom guessed she was around fifteen years old but it was hard to tell the exact age of any of the girls. She was wearing faded black jeans and an orange T-shirt with a designer logo, so it was either fake or stolen. The girl had a slim figure and long, dirty blonde hair.
When Helen asked her name she gave it up reluctantly as if it could be used against her: ‘Callie.’
‘Nice name,’ said Tom.
‘S’pose,’ said the girl without either aggression or any obvious enthusiasm.
‘Is it short for Calista?’ asked Helen brightly and Callie looked at her as if she had just stepped out of a flying saucer.
‘Not short for anything,’ observed the girl, ‘just Callie.’
‘Okay, Callie,’ said Tom, ‘I guess you know why we’re here?’
‘You want to know stuff about Sandra,’ answered Callie, ‘cos she’s missing.’
‘That’s right.’
‘How well did you know Sandra?’ asked Helen.
‘I don’t know nothing about her except she used to volunteer. Fuck knows why.’
‘What was your impression of her?’ asked Helen and Callie looked blank so Tom intervened.
‘Did you like her,’ he asked, ‘or was she one of those stuck-up kids who know nowt about the real world?’ He was trying to get some sort of a reaction from Callie, having drawn a blank with all of the other girls.
‘She was alright, I s’pose. She actually gave a shit.’
‘Do the people that run this place not normally?’ asked Tom. ‘Give a shit, I mean?’ and Callie flared.
‘I never said that,’ she hissed, ‘you’re twi
sting what I said.’ She looked anguished.
‘You’re right,’ Tom said, ‘I didn’t mean to. I’m sorry. It seems okay here.’
‘It’s great,’ she assured them ‘We’re well looked-after. I feel safe here and I wouldn’t want to be anywhere else.’
‘That’s good, Callie,’ said Helen, ‘so what was it that Sandra did here, exactly?’
Callie seemed calmer now. ‘All sorts. She’d help out with meals and stuff and if you needed something writing, a letter or a form or summat, she’d give you a hand. If you had a problem you could go to her if you wanted to speak to someone nearer your own age.’
‘Did you ever speak to her with a problem?’ asked Tom, and Callie looked at him suspiciously for a moment as if he was trying to trap her. She must have decided he wasn’t because she eventually answered.
‘Sometimes; the others are mostly guys and it’s easier.’
‘To talk to a woman?’ said Helen.
‘Yeah,’ she said.
Tom had previously thought of Sandra as being little more than a girl when she worked here but to a young lass like Callie, she must have seemed like a grown-up.
‘Did all of the girls talk to her like that?’ asked Helen.
‘Some,’ she said, ‘not all.’
‘Some prefer to keep themselves to themselves?’ questioned Tom.
Callie shrugged and fell back on her usual answer: ‘S’pose.’
‘Was there anyone who was particularly close to Sandra?’ asked Helen.
‘Diane,’ admitted Callie, as if they must have known who she was talking about.
‘Which Diane?’ asked Tom quickly, as if there was more than one. He needed a surname and he didn’t want Callie to be suspicious of his reasons.
‘Diane Turner,’ answered Callie. ‘She’s my best friend but she’s had her problems. She’s had a shit life,’ and then Callie added quickly, ‘before coming here.’
‘But Sandra helped her,’ observed Helen.
Callie nodded. ‘She locked herself in a bathroom, didn’t she? Said she was going to cut herself. The staff tried to get her out but she wouldn’t come. They was gonna call the police and everything, break the door in, but Sandra said she’d talk to her. She persuaded them to back off for a bit and give Diane some space. She sat on the floor outside and spoke to her through the door. After a bit, Diane opened the door but only to let Sandra in. Then she locked it again and they carried on talking.’
‘Do you know what they were talking about?’
‘No,’ said Callie firmly, ‘me and Diane was good mates but she wouldn’t even tell me.’
‘What happened?’ asked Helen,
‘In the end they came out of the bathroom but then they went into Diane’s room and closed the door. We was about to sit down for breakfast when Diane and Sandra finally came out.’
‘So she listened to Diane all night?’
‘Yeah.’
‘Must have been quite a conversation for it to go on that long.’
‘S’pose.’
‘How did they look when they finally came out?’ asked Tom.
‘Knackered,’ she said, ‘how do you think they looked?’
‘Upset? Relieved? Happy? Pissed off? You tell me.’
‘Upset,’ she said.
‘Tearful?’ asked Helen and Callie nodded. ‘Both of them?’ She nodded again. ‘And you’ve no idea what it was all about?’
This time Callie shook her head. ‘I told you I tried asking Diane what they talked about but she wouldn’t tell me, and Sandra wouldn’t be allowed to tell. It’s confidential innit. It was like it was …’
‘Their secret?’ supplied Helen.
‘Yeah.’
‘Must have been a pretty big secret if it took all night to come out?’ said Tom.
That was the signal for the shutters to come down again. ‘S’pose,’ said Callie.
‘Is that Diane’s room next door?’ he asked.
Callie shook her head. ‘Used to be. She left.’
Another brick wall, thought Tom. The one person who might have been able to tell them something about Sandra Jarvis was already gone.
‘Why did she leave?’ asked Helen.
Callie shrugged. ‘Got sick of it, wanted to go to London, get a job, get a flat,’ she said as if all of those things were easy.
‘Did they mind her leaving like that?’ Helen probed.
‘Who?’
‘The people who run this place,’ she said. ‘Dean,’ she offered as an example.
‘Like it or lump it can’t they?’ said Callie. ‘Can’t stop her, can they?’
‘You must have heard from her though,’ said Tom, ‘if she was your best mate?’
‘She sends me postcards.’
‘Postcards?’ asked Helen.
‘From London.’
‘Whereabouts in London?’
‘Well she ain’t gonna write that, is she?’ said Callie. ‘She was underage when she left. If they found her they’d drag her back here.’
‘What does she say on the postcards then? If you don’t mind me asking.’
‘Wotcha babes,’ Callie smiled at the memory, ‘she always starts off like that, calls me babes then she tells me stuff.’
‘What sort of stuff?’
‘What she’s up to, you know, stuff,’ said Callie but she quickly grew impatient with the line of questioning so instead she rolled across the bed, slid open the drawer of her flimsy bedside cabinet then pulled out a handful of postcards.
Tom took them from Callie. One had a big red double-decker bus on it, another showed the statue of Eros in Piccadilly Circus, a third featured a guard dressed in a red tunic with ceremonial bearskin hat and finally there was an image of Buckingham Palace. They all had London postmarks on them so they really had been sent from the capital and the dates showed gaps of between four and six weeks. The messages on the back were very short and etched in spidery capitals by someone who obviously struggled with writing. One just said ‘Miss you babe.’ They were signed ‘Di’ but he supposed they could have been written by anyone.
He turned one of the cards round and asked, ‘This definitely her writing?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘You’re sure they are from Diane?’
‘Yeah, course,’ she sneered at him, ‘who else they gonna be from?’
He ignored the question. ‘She doesn’t say much,’ Tom said gently, ‘about her life down there?’
Callie finally sat up then and took more of an interest in the conversation. ‘She can’t, can she? In case they go looking for her. She’s keeping her head down, but she’s going to get in touch when she can and we’re getting a flat together.’
‘You’re planning on joining her in London?’ asked Helen.
‘Once I’m older,’ said Callie quickly, ‘when it’s allowed.’ Helen guessed she was used to telling figures in authority what they wanted to hear.
‘Has Diane got a job?’
‘Looking for one, isn’t she?’ Her tone was defensive now and Tom immediately changed his line of questioning so as not to antagonise the girl.
‘When did she go down to London?’ he asked.
‘A while back.’
‘Was it around the same time that Sandra Jarvis went missing?’
‘Before that,’ said Callie then she frowned, ‘no, after,’ she thought some more, ‘must have been just after.’
‘There’s no way Diane would have left with Sandra?’
‘Diane … and Sandra … together … like a couple of lezzers?’ And she laughed as if this was the best joke ever.
‘I didn’t mean it like that,’ Tom told her, ‘I mean like you and Diane?’ he said. ‘Friends.’
Callie shook her head. ‘Nah, they weren’t mates like me and her.’
‘Is this Diane?’ asked Helen and Tom realised she had picked up an unframed photograph of Callie and another girl that was propped up on a shelf. They were outdoors somewhere, the local park po
ssibly. Callie was pulling a funny face and her friend was laughing. It must have been a nice moment Callie was determined to keep.
‘Yeah,’ she said, ‘that’s Diane,’ and she went quiet then, as if seeing her friend made Callie feel her absence more acutely.
It looked for a moment as if that was going to be the end of the conversation but then Callie’s eyes seemed to widen and her teeth bared. ‘You bitch,’ she snarled at Helen, ‘you fucking bitch!’ Before the reporter could utter a word in her defence, Callie was up on her feet and lurching towards an alarmed Helen.
Chapter Thirty
Tom tried to grab Callie but she shot past him, barged Helen aside and carried on towards the door. They both saw Callie rush for another young girl, who was standing in the doorway. The teenager was dressed in a brown suede jacket and Callie immediately grabbed it in both hands, slammed the girl against the door frame then snatched a clump of her long dark hair and bashed the other girl’s head viciously against the wood.
‘Callie!’ cried Helen, while the other girl screamed and both Helen and Tom went to separate them. Callie had crashed her opponent’s head twice more against the frame, raked her nails across her face and was now tearing at the girl’s jacket to pull it away from her before Tom managed to grab her.
‘Give me that, you slag!’
With one huge tug the brown suede jacket was torn from the other girl, who fell to the floor swearing and cursing. ‘It’s fucking mine!’ she managed between shrieks.
‘That’s Diane’s, not yours!’
Tom wrapped his arms round Callie from behind so he could wrestle her away from her victim. He managed to pull Callie backwards but she let fly with a kick that caught the other girl right on the chin. Tom had seen violence in his time and been involved in more than one fight himself but he had never seen anything like this. Callie’s casual savagery was shocking. Helen reached the other girl, who was dazed but still spitting and swearing defiantly at Callie from her position on the ground.
‘She fucking stole it!’ Callie screamed. ‘That’s Diane’s jacket, the fucking cow nicked it!’
When the two girls had finally been separated, Dean arrived at the scene. ‘What’s going on?’ he demanded and he was greeted by four voices all trying to explain matters at the same time, two of them hysterically. Dean somehow realised the fight was over the jacket and that Callie maintained it belonged to her friend and not the other girl.
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