Stone Cold Red Hot

by Cath Staincliffe

  “Go on,” I encouraged her.

  “We’d been in my room, it was early evening but it was still hot. My room was stifling and we decided to go out in the garden. I got a rug and the radio, pop, that sort of thing.” She stroked the baby’s legs and squeezed his feet all the time she was talking. “Jenny was a bit low really, most of the time she was so sparky, tons of energy but she was on edge. I probably did most of the talking. It got late and she was all ready to go. She climbed up the wall and then she came back. I thought she’d forgotten something but she pushed past me and went off down the side. I ran after her, asked what was wrong, she rounded on me, told me to leave her alone, said I’d no idea - something like that. She was crying. I felt awful.” She chewed at her lip. “I tried ringing later but the phone was engaged.”

  “What do you think upset her?”

  “I don’t know, something I’d said, maybe me prattling on when she was so worried? There was I lounging around not a care in the world, and she’s pregnant and confused. Plus she can’t even confide in me because she knows how I feel about abortion. Or maybe it was the thought of going home, maybe she just couldn’t face them.”

  “Had she told her parents she was pregnant?”

  “No, I don’t think so. Lisa said that Jenny wanted to decide what she was going to do before she said anything. So she’d stormed off and I phoned the next day, it was Caroline’s birthday do, we were going to go into town together, but there was no answer. I felt awful. I thought Jenny had not come because she was cross with me. I got horribly drunk. I did try to ring a couple of times after that then when I finally did get through her mother said she’d gone to Keele. I couldn’t believe it. I rang Lisa and she told me it was true.”

  “Why was it hard to believe?”

  “She never said goodbye - not even to Lisa. And she never took her mascot, it was still on her windowsill - that’s why I thought she was still at home. We all had them, little troll things, peculiar really. We took them into exams for good luck. Jenny had kitted hers out in this glam rock outfit and drawn make up on it.”

  I felt an unpleasant undertow of apprehension. It didn’t add up. Jennifer had been a gregarious teenager with a circle of close friends. She’d left without so much as a goodbye. Without her lucky mascot. None of them had ever heard from her. She hadn’t even sent her little brother a birthday card on the day they shared. Had she run away? Had something happened to her that meant she couldn’t keep in touch with her friends?

  My imagination conjured up new pictures, Jennifer on the run. Lost in London. Hurt. Worse. I was being melodramatic, I told myself. There must be a simple explanation. But a seed of suspicion had taken root. I kept coming back to the explanation that fit everything so far. If Jennifer Pickering was dead then it all made sense.

  Chapter thirteen

  I left Frances Delaney, thanking her for her time. It was another balmy autumn day, the warm sunshine and soft air at odds with the gripe in my stomach and the tension in my neck. I needed to unwind a little, think things through before my one o’ clock appointment.

  I cycled home and took refuge in the garden. Several large trees frame the space, their leaves were turning and many were scattered across the grass. I sat in the sun with my pen and paper, a bowl of carrot and red pepper soup. Insects and floating seeds drifted in the air, spider webs glinted on the clematis and across the kitchen windows. I drank my soup and let the snippets of information jostle in my mind for a while, then I wrote down a list of what I knew followed by what I suspected. I had no proof that Jennifer was dead. After all she might have just cut everything and everyone off, started a new life and never looked back. People do. There are hundreds of people who just walk out of their lives into new ones, leaving families to tear themselves apart with worry and pain.

  A squirrel raced along the wall at the bottom of the garden, paused and sat on its haunches, then scampered back up the tree in the corner. Jennifer Pickering had been on the brink of returning home, half-way over the wall, when she’d become upset. Thinking perhaps about her parents and the baby and how everything was going off the rails. The stifling atmosphere that awaited her even before she told them about her pregnancy. Did she run away then, leaving her precious troll behind?

  I’d have to keep on searching for more clues as to what had become of her. Roger might ask me to drop the case then what chance would I have to prove my suspicions either way? I didn’t want to give up. Even with so little to go on I was determined to try everything I could think of to find out what had befallen Jennifer Pickering. My intuition told me that I wouldn’t find Jennifer alive - but I had been wrong before. Maybe I just wouldn’t find her at all.

  I wrote down what further enquiries I could make if Roger Pickering wanted me to carry on. High on the list was a talk with Mrs Pickering. Perhaps she could clear it all up. Had they bundled her off to some far flung relative for the duration? Could she come up with an old address for Jennifer, something she’d kept secret for all these years because her daughter had disgraced them by getting pregnant out of wedlock, by having a mixed-race child? Perhaps. Had she ever heard from her daughter? A car alarm shrieked, shattering the silence. I gathered up my things and got ready.

  The office felt claustrophobic, the sun, low in the sky, streamed in the narrow window, spreading a wide beam in which the dust swirled. After banging a few times on the window frame I managed to open it and let some air circulate. I had my notes all ready, the kettle had boiled. I straightened the rug. I sat down again and stared at the blue abstract that Diane had done for me, letting different patterns and pictures emerge from the shapes of the inks. The bell rang. I went up and greeted Roger Pickering, escorted him down to my office. He didn’t want a drink so I got straight down to business. “First of all, there’s your photo. I’ve had copies made so you can take that with you. Now, I’ve made notes of what I’ve done so far,” I began, “I’ll type them up for you and you’ll have a copy to keep but I thought I should bring you up to date and discuss whether you want me to continue.”

  “You’ve not found her?” He shook his fringe away from his eyes, his voice hesitant. Of course I hadn’t. Did he really think I’d go through all the preamble if I’d successfully traced his sister? It was hope that made him ask, I think, relentless optimism and the need to have his wildest dreams quashed before he could sensibly concentrate on anything else.

  “No. And I’m not any nearer knowing where to look than I was last week. But I have established a few new facts. I heard from Keele University this morning.”

  He glanced up keenly.

  “She never went there, they have no record of her.”

  He looked stupefied, even his mouth was open. “But she was doing English...”

  “I checked with the Faculty. She never attended.”

  “I don’t understand. My mother said...” he trailed off.

  “I need to talk to your mother - she’s the only person who can clear this up.”

  He shook his head, slowly building up to a refusal.

  “Let’s come back to that. I have established a couple of other facts. First of all, Jennifer was pregnant.”

  “Really,” his whole face lit up at the prospect.

  “But she may not have had the child,” I cautioned him. “Her friends say she was very unsure what to do; whether to go ahead or to have an abortion, whether to have the baby adopted or keep it.”

  “You could check that though, couldn’t you? If she had a baby there’d be a record of that, wouldn’t there?”

  “Yes.” And it would probably be easier to find than Jennifer was.

  “I want you to find out,” his eagerness was poignant. I realised with a rush of understanding that Roger was re-inventing himself as an uncle, with nephew or niece to his name. Though they’d be in their mid-twenties by now.

  “I’d have to go to Huddersfield,” I said, “that’s the nearest place with the most up to date national records. I don’t think there’s any
point in going all the way to London. There is an office in Manchester too but they haven’t got such a comprehensive archive.”

  “Try Huddersfield then.”

  “There’s a problem, I’ve had my car stolen, I’ll need to hire a car - for a day, add it to my expenses.”

  “That’s fine,” he said.

  “I also found out who the father was. Someone that Jennifer met at the Bounty, the banqueting hall where she used to waitress. He’s called Jones, Maxwell Jones. He’s black and that probably made it even harder for Jennifer to confide in your parents.”

  He gave me a puzzled look.

  “Your father, in particular, held racist views.”

  “Oh, yes,” he blushed.

  “So not only had Jennifer broken faith with their moral and religious position she’d done so with someone your father could never accept.”

  “Does he know? This man?”

  “No. The relationship was over before Jennifer realised that she was pregnant. Her friends say she never considered marrying him, she knew she’d be on her own.”

  He swallowed and covered his eyes briefly. “It’s a lot to take in.”

  “Yes.” When he looked at me again I continued. “We also know that no-one heard from Jennifer, none of her friends, and that they were surprised at her sudden departure.”

  “But where can she have gone? If it wasn’t Keele?”

  “That’s why I need to talk to your mother.”

  “I don’t think that’s a good idea,” he protested. “Did they know?” he asked quietly, “about the baby, did my parents know?”

  “I haven’t been able to establish whether she told them or not.”

  “What she said, my mother, about Jennifer being a disgrace, that must be what she meant.”

  “Roger, I need to talk to your mother. She was the one who led everyone to believe Jennifer had gone to Keele and then dropped out, that’s what she told Lisa and Mrs Clerkenwell and you. If anyone knows where she really went it’s your mother.”

  “I don’t think she’ll see you,” he stonewalled.

  “Don’t tell her.”

  “What?”

  “She’ll be in this evening?”

  “Yes.”

  “I’ll come round after you’ve eaten, I’ll ask what I have to ask.”

  He looked sick.

  “The worst that can happen is that she’ll throw me out.”

  “And she’ll know that I’ve hired you?”

  “Yes. Look I could invent some mickey mouse story about being an old friend or a school re-union or something but all she’s going to say is that she’s lost touch with Jennifer. I have to challenge her, Roger.”

  “She’s not well.”

  Was his concern for her or for himself? He was thirty one for heaven’s sake, not a child. Wasn’t it about time he stood up for himself? “It’s up to you,” I said tiring of his weakness, “but if you won’t give me a chance to talk to her I’m afraid I’m not prepared to carry on with the case.” I paused.

  He stared at his hands as though they held the correct answer.

  “Maybe she should know; that you’ve hired me, that you’re determined to find your sister.”

  “OK,” he sat back in the chair, “come round about seven. She should still be awake - she has a room downstairs now, it’s easier. Will I need to be there?”

  “No. Just let me in and I’ll see her on my own.”

  A wave of doubt leapt at my conscience. Shouldn’t I leave it all be, leave a dying woman to her secrets, let the mystery remain? I pressed my palms onto my desk to steady myself. I couldn’t walk away from this. I was in too deep and I needed to know whether my intuition was playing me false, or whether Jennifer was dead rather than missing. And if she was dead was her death due to illness or accident or something more sinister? I had to find out and maybe then it would all come clear. It would all be right as rain, I would laugh at the disturbing fears that were multiplying in my imagination and the aching sensation in my stomach would melt away. Maybe.

  A fine autumn evening, there was a fresh wind blowing, encouraging the trees to let go of their first dying leaves. The wind brought a cooler feel with it and I shivered as I pedalled along in spite of the heat generated by my cycling.

  I leant the bike against the garage at the side of the house and locked the back wheel to the frame. It was exactly seven o’ clock. I rang the bell and heard the shrill tone echo inside. Roger answered the door, his dread of my visit written all over his face. He lived with his mother in awe of her. Would he find release once she had gone? Shed his persona of nervous little boy?

  “Come in, she’s in here.”

  The house was the mirror image of Mrs Clerkenwell’s as far as its layout went, the front rooms off to the right of the passageway with the stairs at the left. The hall was dark, lots of deep polished wood, an antique umbrella and hat stand on the left. The floor was brown tiles with geometric border of blue and white triangles, a Victorian style. The kitchen door at the far end of the hall was ajar and through it spilt a ruby wedge of light from the setting sun. Like warmth in the distance. It didn’t stretch the length of the hallway and when it suddenly faded everything was sombre and melancholy again.

  I gestured for Roger to open the door and braced myself. I followed him in.

  “There’s someone to see you,” he said and withdrew.

  She was sitting in a high-backed armchair, a crocheted rug over her legs and one of those v-shaped support pillows behind her. She looked haggard, her skin tone was yellow, she had a mob-cap on with lacy edge and I wondered whether the treatment had caused her hair to fall out. Her features were small, neat, and she wore bi-focals on a chain. I could discern a slight resemblance to Jennifer in the thin nose and the small mouth but not to Roger who presumably took after his father. In her hands she held a little magazine, a puzzle book, full of crosswords and word-searches. She lay it down on her lap.

  “Are you from The Children?”

  “Pardon?”

  “The Children of Christ?”

  “No. Are you expecting someone?”

  “Tomorrow, I think. They’re very good.” Her voice was clear.

  “You’re still involved with the church?”

  She stared at me for a moment. “I am dedicated. The Children are my spiritual family, my one true family, surpassing all others. When all about is corruption...”

  She stopped. I don’t know whether she was quoting something or making a social observation. I was still standing but there was nowhere for me to sit. A dining chair near to Mrs Pickering was covered in clothes and I didn’t want to perch on the bed.

  “No, I’m not from the church,” I said, “I’m a private detective. I’ve come to talk to you about Jennifer.”

  I thought she was going to keel over. Her eyes fluttered and she went even paler. She began to shake her head as though I were a noise she could dislodge.

  “Jennifer has been missing since 1976,” I said. “I’m trying to trace her.”

  “Go away,” she said quickly, her mouth trembling.

  “I’d like your help.”

  “I don’t know where she is, she went to university, after that I don’t know.”

  “She didn’t go to Keele,” I said calmly, “she never got there. That’s what she had been planning to do, that’s what you told people but it wasn’t the truth.”

  “Get out of here. Roger,” her voice rose, quavering.

  I crouched down, better to talk to her at the same level. “I know she was pregnant, did she tell you? It must have been a terrible shock.”

  “Why are you asking me all this?” she cried, anguish in her voice.

  “Roger wants me to find his sister, he wants it desperately enough to go against your wishes.”

  “She went to Keele,” she repeated.

  “She didn’t, they’ve checked the records.”

  “Roger,” she began to scream.

  “Where did she really go?�
�

  She got up and took a few steps still calling, “Roger, Roger, Roger.”

  “Did you ever hear from Jennifer?”

  “Roger!”

  The door flew open and Roger came in.

  I stood up. I know when I’ve overstayed my welcome. “I’ll wait in the kitchen,” I said to him.

  It was quarter of an hour before Roger joined me. I stared at the notice-board with its neat list of names and numbers, clinic appointment cards and money off coupons. I considered ways to get Mrs Pickering to talk to me but couldn’t come up with anything that would get me past her hysteria. Why was she so agitated at the mention of Jennifer? Surely after twenty odd years the reaction to Jennifer’s pregnancy would have softened a little? Jennifer must have told them about the baby, that much seemed evident. Was Mrs Pickering’s illness affecting her emotional state? But according to Roger he’d had the same response a year previously.

  I stared out of the back window to the house opposite where Frances Delaney had grown up and I worked out which had been her room. The stone wall separating the gardens was substantial, about six foot high, darkened by the smoke from the city before the Clean Air Act came in and they sand-blasted everything.

  When Frances talked about Jennifer climbing over the wall and becoming distraught I thought perhaps she’d been imagining what waited for her at home and it had all been too much. I re-considered. Could she have seen something? There was a large garden shed at the bottom of the Pickering’s garden and it would be about the only thing you’d see from the Delaney’s wall. Had she seen something in the shed? I opened the door at the side of the kitchen and walked round to the back garden. It was uninspiring. Roger definitely hadn’t inherited his father’s green fingers. A couple of rhododendron bushes, some lavender and geraniums were all that stocked the borders, weeds were rampant in-between. The rest of the place was lawn, dotted with dandelions. I walked over to the shed and circled it, no windows. I went to the wall which was about four feet from the shed. I easily found foot holds in the stones and hoisted myself up until I was sitting on the top. A startled cat leapt down and shot away into the large trees at the bottom of the garden next-door. From my vantage point the shed obscured any view of the Pickering’s house. I shuffled along to the left and found I could see the upper floors of Mrs Clerkenwell’s. From the other end the house at the right, where the Shuttle’s had lived was screened by a Leylandii hedge which grew above the dividing fencing. There was precious little chance of Jennifer seeing any thing from there.