Remember Me

by D. E. White

  Ava watched her carefully. ‘Yes, I thought so too. Is Paul still asleep?’

  ‘Yes, I just peeked in on him. But what does this mean? You think Paul hurt Rhodri?’ Penny’s voice was shrill.

  ‘Perhaps. What do you think?’ Ava said quietly.

  ‘I don’t know. Surely he wouldn’t…’ She put a fist to her mouth, eyes wide, and cheeks colourless. ‘I can’t deal with this, Ava, I really can’t.’

  No, but she would take this new evidence straight to the police, Ava thought. Penny was shivering now, fiddling with her keys, passing them from hand to hand. ‘Shall we go then?’

  Penny nodded, clearly surprised, but Ava wanted to think. Was Paul capable of all this, or was she looking at two or maybe three perps working together? Paul and Huw as bully boys and Penny, perhaps under duress, as the secret-keeper.

  * * *

  They drove in silence, neither commenting on the scrum of people around East Wood, or the big white tent, which was only just visible among the darkened tree trunks. The snow was lying thickly on the road as they turned up the lane to their destination.

  The residential home was clean and bright. Nothing could disguise the lingering smell of piss and disinfectant, which reminded Ava of the precinct back home, but there were pots of fresh flowers, and big pictures of seascapes dotted around. The two women were shown up to a large, tidy room, with a hospital bed next to one wall. Penny was clearly a welcome visitor, and the predominantly foreign staff seemed friendly and efficient. Before they had got to the lift, Ava caught a glimpse of a living-room area, where various residents were propped on sofas, chairs and wheelchairs. Some gazed blankly into the distance, others were knitting, and one man appeared to be reading a book upside down. The air was hot and fetid, despite a few windows cracked open in the passages.

  ‘Ava, we’ll go in and say hallo, and then if you don’t mind going out whilst I feed him…’

  ‘You have to feed him?’

  Penny smiled, misunderstanding. ‘Of course not, but I like to when I can. It makes it a bit more personal. Even though he doesn’t recognise me, I really hope on some level he does know it is me. Does that sound mad?’

  Ava touched her arm. ‘Of course not.’

  Alf Thomas was sitting in a brown tweed armchair next to the window. The immaculate room was stocked with books, magazines, Lego creations, and a bowl of fruit. Two big framed prints of the valleys hung above the bed.

  ‘Hallo, Uncle Alf. Look who I’ve brought to see you!’ Penny said brightly, leaning down to the shrunken old man and pecking his cheek.

  ‘Hi.’ Ava moved into his sightline and smiled. She was shocked at his frail appearance. It was a far cry from the big, athletic man she remembered yelling down the football field. His shoulders were slumped, eyes rheumy and pink and a line of drool was hanging from the corner of his mouth. The thick brown hair was gone, replaced by a thin layer of greying mouse, and the stubble on his pale cheeks and chin was white.

  Alf Thomas gave no sign he had heard, or even seen, either of them. He stared resolutely into the middle distance. The freezing valley and snowy roofs of Aberdyth stared back, half-hidden by the gusts of snow that fell sideways across the window.

  Penny was bustling around, unpacking the bits she had brought, needlessly tidying the room, plumping the bed pillows and chattering away. Ava walked over to the window, feeling slightly sick. You could see Leo’s house from here, and Ellen’s… She turned to Alf and smiled again, opening her mouth for some mundane pleasantry, but his face had changed. He was looking directly at her, focusing hard.

  He reached out a shaking hand, pointing a bony finger at her, moistening his lips with his tongue. ‘Y – y – you… are Ava.’

  ‘Yes.’

  Penny put an arm around his shoulders, speaking slowly, and carefully. ‘Darling, do you remember Ava? She and Ellen were my best friends at school.’

  His eyes moved to Penny, and the stuttering continued. ‘Y – y – you… and Ellen.’ It was clearly an effort to form the words.

  ‘That’s right.’

  Alf Thomas was looking past Penny now, bewildered, but hanging on to whatever thread of memory had been thrown up by Ava’s appearance. ‘W – w – where is… Ellen?’

  Penny bit her lip and cast a worried glance at Ava. ‘She died, darling. I told you. She died a long time ago.’

  He seemed to accept this, but the agitation increased as his gaze tracked back to Ava. ‘She looks like h – her.’

  ‘Who, Ellen? Well, a little bit I suppose, but only because they both had long dark hair.’

  ‘P – p – pretty. S – s – special.’ Suddenly he sank back in his chair, slumped with apparent exhaustion, eyes almost closed, frail chest heaving.

  Penny held a glass of Lucozade up to his mouth, fitting the straw between his lips. He took it noisily, dribbling some of the liquid out the side of his mouth. ‘That’s so good he recognised you. Some days he doesn’t say a word, or calls me Judy or Sarah or something,’ she said sadly. ‘Do you mind popping downstairs whilst I just give him some of that soup I brought? It’s homemade and his favourite, but he does get so messy when he eats, and he gets a bit agitated if he thinks anyone is watching. I’d rather do it alone.’

  ‘Of course.’ Ava was longing to escape but felt guilty. ‘Lovely to see you, Uncle Alf.’ He had always been ‘Uncle Alf’, and all the kids called him that, even though he was only actually related to Penny. It was tragic that such a larger-than-life man had been reduced to a dribbling shell of humanity. The pleasure and hope she had seen in Penny’s eyes whilst the old man was speaking made her realise how hard it must be to see a loved one like this.

  One of the carers escorted Ava down to a little waiting room, and she checked her phone for messages. A text from Leo that made her smile, and a load of emails, mostly junk. One from Jack acknowledging the photos of Rhodri she had sent him. She probably shouldn’t have done that, but she knew how he was with a case – he would pursue it to the end, and he might come up with something useful. She didn’t have to tell Sophie if it came from him.

  Penny said little on the way home, simply asking where Ava wanted to be dropped off. She jumped out at the B&B, boots crunching in the deepening snow, and turned to watch Penny drive slowly and carefully back down the hill.

  Mrs Birtley was hoovering her living room, and Ava carefully removed her boots on the mat. Standing on one leg, she lost her balance and grabbed at the rack of coats next to the door. Swearing and righting herself, she saw she had pulled out the sleeve of a green Puffa jacket. Surely Alex had been wearing this when he left after her interview?

  Mrs Birtley, alert to the noise of someone trashing her neat hallway, bustled into view, lips pursed. Ava jumped in quickly. ‘Mrs Birtley, wasn’t this Alex Jennington’s coat?’

  The other woman pulled her glasses out and stared at the Puffa. ‘Yes, it was. My goodness, Ava, I thought I gave all his things to the police. I suppose if he hung his coat here it would have got lost among all the others. These coats and the boots are old ones I keep for visitors, so I don’t really take a lot of notice of them.’ She was rattling on, clearly horrified at her blunder.

  Ava cut into the chatter. ‘Don’t worry, I’ll take it to the police myself. I’m on my way there, I just stopped to pick up a few things.’

  Mrs Birtley opened her mouth, and then closed it again, and unusually for her made no comment as Ava picked up the coat and ran upstairs in her socks.

  Obviously, Alex had not been wearing this on that fatal night. Ava, without much hope, began to search the pockets. Nothing but a packet of tissues in one, and a half-eaten tube of Polos in the other. But the smaller, inner zip pocket yielded gold.

  With shaking fingers Ava unscrunched the paper. It looked like a torn page from a notebook, with a list of names. Sara Blackmore, Andrew Menzies, and two she didn’t recognise, had been crossed off, but right at the bottom Coach Thomas was circled firmly in black ink. There was a telephone numbe
r scrawled next to his name.

  Without thinking, she tapped out the mobile number, and waited, heart pounding. The phone rang for ages, until a male voice answered. Without waiting for her to speak, he told her to fuck off.

  ‘I’ve got nothing else for you. That was all a long time ago and I’m different now.’

  Before he could put the phone down, Ava spoke softly. ‘I’m a friend of Alex Jennington’s. I don’t want to get you into trouble…’

  The line went dead. She quickly called back, but the phone was switched off. Fuck. She really hoped she hadn’t just screwed that up.

  Another text made her phone buzz, and she looked quickly at her messages, hoping the man had had second thoughts.

  Cylch o gylch o rhosynau,

  Poced llawn o flodau,

  Atishw, atishw, ac yna syrthiodd i lawr.

  ‘Ring, a ring o’ roses, a pocket full of daisies.

  A-tishoo, a-tishoo and then she fell down.’

  Chapter 31

  Mum came into the living room once when I was trying on a new outfit. It was a white silky fairy outfit – every little girl’s dream. She saw me half-naked, with his hands on me, turned, and walked right out again. The ultimate betrayal. I think I knew then that I would have to kill her.

  Uncle Alf all but ignored her by then. Occasionally he yelled at her to take a bath, or clean up her mess of empty bottles, stale cigarette ends, and crisp packets. Mostly I cleaned up, and as she slipped further into her addiction, I was forced to care for her too.

  I waited… By my eleventh birthday, Uncle Alf was starting to lose interest in touching me, although he still photographed me. He still used me as bait and cover on our trips into town. Who would suspect a man shopping with his cute little niece? I watched and waited. Soon I knew how the drugs worked, and had started to experiment with them myself.

  It seems strange I never thought to kill Uncle Alf, but even then I knew how to pick my opponents. There was no point in starting a game I couldn’t win, and he was simply too strong and powerful.

  Mum progressed from a human being into a fat, yellow, doughy lump. She could barely make it off the sofa. When it was time for her to exit the game, I executed my plan with precision.

  Uncle Alf may have suspected, but as I think back now, his opinion of me was so low, he would never have imagined I could kill anyone. And of course, there was our shared secret. He treated me as a prized business acquisition, but never as anything else. I was there to be used. I suspect that if I hadn’t killed Mum, he would have done it himself in the end.

  Now I see that fate kept him alive for a reason. I’ve enjoyed torturing him, and I’ll carry on doing it right up to his miserable death. Every moment of my childhood that he destroyed, every second of the other children’s torment, he is paying for.

  Under the guise of concerned niece, I can revel in the fear in his eyes as he sees me coming. The terror in his face warms my blood as I force onion soup between his lips. The carers are so impressed when I make him a nice flask of homemade soup. I make sure it is a flavour he hates, and then I make him eat it. A small thing, but a real pleasure.

  I am careful never to leave any marks, but I read up on pressure points and torture techniques – some of my regular customers were very helpful. For him, my regular visits are indeed tortuous, and that is exactly how it should be. I have won. The last dice roll set him on one path, me on another. It gave me back control.

  When Jesse came to me, after he’d decided to tell Ellen’s parents the truth about their daughter, I was so sympathetic that he could never have imagined what was really going through my mind. The trouble with both Jesse and Alex Jennington, was that they had hit on the truth about Alf Thomas. It wasn’t just Ellen’s secrets they wanted to uncover, it was my own.

  Jesse and Rhodri had both been victims of Uncle Alf’s photography studio. They were tough kids from broken homes, and Rhodri had been in and out of care since he was five. My uncle knew how to pick his victims. So Jesse was leaving, and he wanted to come clean about Ellen, but he also wanted to come clean about Uncle Alf. He tried hard to persuade me to help him. I pretended enthusiasm, whilst planning how he would die.

  The PI, Alex, stumbled into my territory accidentally. He managed to find a source in Cardiff who knew my uncle. Maybe it was a fellow trader he had pissed off, or an unsatisfied customer, I don’t know. Anyway, the result was the same. The man was a convicted sex offender, and Alex told me that he thought it was an obvious link for any PI to try, especially with the advancement in technology. He told me he had put pressure on the man to reveal others in the area, and Uncle Alf’s name had come up. Alex wanted me to confirm the rumour from his source that my uncle was ‘interested in young girls’. His English accent annoyed me in the same way Ava’s American one does. Of course, it was a short route from a suspect paedophile living in the same village where a girl disappeared, to Alex deciding he may have been responsible for Ellen’s ‘running away’. He was so eager, excited, his pale eyes bright, and a vestige of personality lighting his colourless face.

  It was a shame, but actually these little annoyances make my life more interesting. It has occurred to me that I’ve probably killed enough people to earn the title of serial killer. This does not sit well with my legacy, so I’ll keep most of them quiet. They might wonder, but they’ll never know.

  ‘Wyt ti’n gofalu, Ava Cole?’

  ‘Do you care, Ava Cole?’

  Chapter 32

  Ava sat in the bleak little interview room at Cadrington police station, a steaming cup of coffee in her hands. Time was running out, and the frustration at being blocked from actively investigating, from joining the team, was tearing her apart. This morning, she had been more confident, happy that her ‘work head’ seemed to have returned, but now, she seemed to be no further forward, and still locked out in the cold. It had been hard going on the roads to get down here, and darkness crept across the valley by half past two. She knew from his text Leo was also at the station, ‘helping with enquiries’, but she resisted the urge to ask. The DS she remembered from Alex Jennington’s murder scene sat on the other side of the table. He grinned at her when she asked if there was any more coffee.

  ‘You’re probably the first person ever to want more of that stuff. The DI will be back any second, so I’ll get you a cup in a bit.’ He flicked through the folder in front of him.

  Sophie walked back into the room, slamming the door, and sitting down opposite on one of the scratched, grubby plastic chairs. ‘Okay, anything at all is going to be useful, so just take me right back to your childhood. We’ll walk through everything. There’s a clue here and we’re not getting it.’

  ‘Do you think Bethan is still alive?’ Ava asked.

  The other woman sighed. ‘Normally after this length of time, I think we would both agree the chances of that would be fairly low. However, in this case, let’s say I hope so…’ She tapped a pen against her teeth, pulling a funnel neck jumper tighter around her body. ‘It’s bloody cold in here. Right, Bethan – yes, I think she is alive. The killer is trying to draw you into finding her. If she was dead already, surely the game would be over.’

  ‘They sent me to a body last time,’ Ava pointed out. ‘What did Paul say about the doodles on their telephone pad?’

  ‘One of my DS’s called it in just now. Paul says they were his wife’s work. Penny swears they were his. He’s obviously in a pretty bad way, mostly self-inflicted after the other night, but we need to go carefully given his condition. The press are out to get us as usual, and me having worked Ellen’s original case is an added stick to the fire.’

  ‘I think, if it is him, he must be threatening Penny. She loves him so much, she’d do anything for him. Even when I was with him, I could see there was something between them. I was a mistake, and she was the real thing.’

  ‘What if the doodles are Penny’s? Let’s just say we’ve been dismissing the obvious. Penny was in the wood that night, killed Ellen, and s
he has had every chance to kill both Jesse and Alex Jennington.’

  Ava was shaking her head. ‘Pen loved Ellen. And are you forgetting she was apparently assaulted?’

  ‘Could have been made to look sexual… Or it could have been Paul and Penny covering for each other, maybe? I’m just throwing it out there.’ Her green eyes were calculating, watchful, searching for any stray thread.

  ‘I don’t know. But you should have seen her with her uncle this afternoon – making him soup, fussing over him. She’s always been like that, so bright and happy. Unless Penny saw Paul attacking Ellen, and as you say, helped him cover up a rape. Besides, I’m not sure she’d have the strength to kill a man, she’s tiny. Actually, what am I saying? Okay, personally I can’t even compute it might be her, but professionally I’d have to say everyone is a maybe. Did you get anything else from Alex’s notes about Uncle Alf?’

  Sophie lit a cigarette. ‘Not really. He was clearly convinced from fairly early on that Ellen’s disappearance was down to foul play, much as I was all those years ago. With the new evidence that you brought forward regarding Ellen’s murder, I am hopeful we might be able to question Mr Thomas, but his condition will make that difficult. We’re tracing that phone number you found too. Pity you had to call it.’

  Ava ignored the reprimand. ‘You think that Uncle Alf, or this other man, might have killed Ellen? That it wasn’t one of us after all?’

  ‘I think there is a strong possibility that this “other man” may prove to be the missing part of the puzzle. If we had known at the time that Ellen had been sexually assaulted and murdered, we would probably have been able to solve the case fairly quickly.’