Presumed Dead

by Shirley Wells

  Dylan hadn’t meant to insult her by mentioning money.

  He supposed he should be flattered by her faith in him, but if—and it was a huge if—he took this job, how the hell would he feel taking money from someone who dressed in stuff from Oxfam?

  “Tell me about your mother,” he said.

  She peered out the window at the leaden January sky. “Let’s walk while we talk. It’ll be lovely on the beach.”

  “Walk?” It wasn’t raining—yet—but the wind was strong enough to rock her home on occasion.

  “Don’t you walk?” She sounded concerned for his health.

  “It has been known,” he said, resigned to battling with the elements.

  “Do you have a coat?”

  Of course he had a coat. When you drove a 1956 Morgan with seventy-eight thousand miles on the clock, you accepted that you were likely to spend a large portion of time hanging around waiting for breakdown vehicles. “In the car.”

  She pulled on a thick blue coat, courtesy of Oxfam he assumed, and, much to his relief, slipped off those shoes and exchanged them for walking boots. Once outside, Dylan dashed to his car and grabbed his overcoat from the passenger seat.

  “Lead on,” he said when he’d locked his car.

  She strode out toward a grassy bank. Dylan followed and was breathing heavily by the time they reached the top. He really should think about taking up running again.

  “There.” She spoke with satisfaction and Dylan could see why.

  Below them was the beach. As far as the eye could see, from east to west, a pebbly beach had its edge lapped by a wind-whipped grey sea.

  “Very nice,” he said.

  A couple were walking with their arms linked and a scruffy black dog running at their heels, three kids were kicking a football around, unsuccessfully because it was blowing everywhere but where they wanted it to go, but, other than that and a few dozen gulls trying to make themselves heard over the roar of the wind, it was deserted.

  “I think of this as my garden,” she said.

  “Easy maintenance.”

  “Very easy.” She laughed.

  Walking on the small pebbles was hard work, but Holly Champion didn’t seem to notice.

  “My mother liked a good time.” She kept her hands deep in her coat pockets, and raised her voice to compete with the wind. “We lived in Dawson’s Clough, Lancashire, above the hairdresser’s where she worked. One Saturday night, thirteen years ago, she went out, as she did every Saturday night, and never came back.”

  She bent to pick up a pebble. “It was the twenty-ninth of November, 1997, and she was thirty years old. I was eleven at the time and I was taken in by her sister, Aunt Joyce. The police were called but—” She pulled a face. “They weren’t interested. They believed she’d gone off with someone and left me to my own devices.”

  “What made them think that?”

  “The fact that she used to stay out overnight, I suppose.”

  “When you were eleven?”

  “From when I was about eight.” She gave him a rueful smile. “But she wouldn’t have gone off like that. No way. If she’d been going anywhere for longer than a night or two, she would have taken me with her.”

  Better to believe that, Dylan supposed, than accept you were an unwanted tie. “I’ll need to think about it before I decide whether or not I can help, but take me through the day she went missing. Everything you can remember.”

  “Okay. As I said, she worked in the hairdresser’s below our flat in Dawson’s Clough. She was working that Saturday, and she was busy. I know because I was there. I used to help out on Saturdays—sweeping up, making the tea and coffee, putting the towels in the washer or dryer, stuff like that.”

  “Shit!” Dylan missed his footing and went over on his ankle. “Sorry. Carry on.”

  “The shop closed at five-thirty and it would have been about six o’clock, maybe six-thirty when we got upstairs to the flat.” She smiled at a memory. “She gave me two pounds for helping out. I suppose she’d been given a lot of tips. It wasn’t long till Christmas, you see, and customers would have been going to office parties and suchlike.”

  “She didn’t own the shop?”

  “Oh, no. Sandra Butler owned it. Mum was paid a wage and was allowed to keep her tips. Just the two of them worked there.”

  “Okay. So when you got back to your flat?”

  “Mum went straight in the bath and I made us beans on toast. Funny how you remember the small things, isn’t it?” she said. “Anyway, when we’d eaten and washed up, Mum went to her bedroom to get ready for her night out.”

  “What did you do?”

  “I went with her.” She spoke as if it were the most natural thing in the world. “I always tried on her shoes or her jewellery while she put on her makeup. She was beautiful.

  “I’ll show you photos,” she went on, as if she needed to prove that last comment. “On that particular night, she wore her hair up. Hair like mine, she had. She was wearing a calf-length red dress with high-heeled red shoes. As always, she wore lots of beads and bracelets. Her jewellery was just cheap stuff, but she loved it. Her one weakness was jewellery, and mine’s shoes.

  “She left the flat at about eight o’clock. A hug, a kiss, a warning not to open the door to strangers, a whiff of perfume, and she was gone.” She took a breath and stopped to gaze out to sea. “I never saw her again.”

  Dylan, too, gazed at the horizon.

  “Do you know where she went?” he asked at last.

  “Yes. She met up with three friends. They went to a pub near the salon, then on to a club. They split up and she—she just disappeared.”

  “I see.”

  They walked on in silence until a few spots of rain fell.

  “We’d better head back,” she said.

  She walked tall with her head held high. A proud young woman, she’d find it difficult, if not impossible, to accept that she’d been abandoned.

  “Right,” Dylan said when they were back at the caravan park, “I’ll go and check into a hotel and—”

  “Oh, no. I’m paying and a hotel is—well, it’s a dreadful waste of money when I have a spare room. It’s all ready for you.”

  Dylan shook his head. “I’ll stump up for a hotel.” One with a decent bar. “I need to give this some thought and I think better alone. I’ll call back in the morning to let you know what I decide. You need to think, too. If I decide to work on this, it’s going to cost you a lot of money.”

  “I realise that.” She proffered her hand. “I’ll see you tomorrow morning then, Mr. Scott. And thank you.”

  He shook her wind-chilled, slender hand. “It’s Dylan.”

  “Holly.”

  “About eleven o’clock? Or is that too early for a Sunday?”

  She seemed to find that amusing. “Eleven’s fine.”

  In his hotel room, with a good meal and a half bottle of fine red wine inside him, Dylan lay back on the bed, hands behind his head, and went through the pros and cons of working for Holly Champion.

  There were a few pros. He needed the cash. It would pass the time until Bev welcomed him back to the marital home. He wouldn’t have to share the smallest flat in the land with his mother.

  There were plenty more cons, though. He didn’t like the idea of taking money from Holly Champion, and he didn’t fancy a trip to the arse-end of Lancashire. A missing-person case had to be one of the most mind-numbing jobs imaginable. Holly had too much faith in him when it was extremely unlikely that, after thirteen years, he would discover anything new. The police had looked into it and, if they hadn’t come up with any answers, it was unlikely Dylan would. In short, the job simply didn’t excite him.

  He’d tell her he wouldn’t do it.

  And do what? Drive back to his mother? To the smallest flat in the land? To a pile of laundry and a mountain of bills?

  Pleased that he’d had the foresight to stop off at the off-licence on the way to the hotel and buy himself half
a bottle of brandy, he took a glass from the bathroom and poured a small measure.

  If it wasn’t for his mother, he’d go straight home. The laundry and the bills he could cope with. But his mother—

  He loved her dearly, but only when she was in her home in Birmingham. Thanks to caller display, he could ignore ninety-five percent of her phone calls, just as he’d ignored three while walking on the beach with Holly, but he always felt guilty.

  Life would be a damn sight easier if he had half a dozen siblings or if he had a father to shoulder some of the responsibility. But there were no siblings and no father.

  Vicky Scott had drifted through the sixties wearing bells around her neck and flowers in her hair, chanting “Love and peace,” so Dylan supposed it was little wonder she didn’t know the identity of his father.

  She’d named him after Bob Dylan. She still idolised the singer, but her life had changed. With her old hippy friends settled and enjoying children and grandchildren, she was becoming a reluctant recluse.

  On arrival at his flat, she’d tried to persuade Dylan to take a holiday with her.

  “Everyone’s so boring these days,” she’d said. “Let’s go and paint Athens red.”

  Convincing her that the Greeks might not want their town decorated hadn’t been easy. It had involved hours of her expressing her amazement at having produced such a boring son and then, much worse, her amazement that, given the nightmare of actually giving birth, she’d managed to survive producing a son at all. There was nothing new in that. Long before his own son was born, Dylan could have got a degree in gynaecology.

  If he went home now, she’d blame the lack of lentils or spinach or whatever her latest food fad was for making him staid, old before his time or any one of a variety of insults she had for him.

  Going home before she was bored enough to return to Birmingham wasn’t an option. It really wasn’t.

  Which meant that, given the crock of shit that called itself his life, he had little choice about taking this job.

  Chapter Two

  Sitting opposite Holly Champion the following morning, on those wooden stools crammed into that tiny kitchen, Dylan noticed the dark circles around her eyes. It hadn’t dawned on him that she might have a sleepless night waiting for his decision. He should have been flattered, but he felt like a thief. In all likelihood, he would steal her hope and reduce her bank balance to nothing.

  Again, she was dressed casually in jeans and a purple sweater. Her shoes, however, were far from casual. This morning they were lime green. Still ankle-breakers, though.

  “Before I say anything,” he began, “I need you to understand a few things. First, it’s quite probable that I won’t learn anything.”

  “I realise that.”

  “Second, if a miracle occurs and I do find out what happened to her, it’s not going to be good news. Nothing I tell you will be good news. Either she’ll be dead or she’ll have abandoned you. Do you understand that? You will be paying for bad news.”

  “She may have had an accident. Amnesia or something.”

  “No.” Dylan shook his head. “You’ve seen too many films. It doesn’t happen in real life.”

  “Okay. I’m prepared for bad news.”

  Dylan doubted that. “Either she got a better offer—I don’t know, some bloke who didn’t like kids offered to take her away from it all—or she got blind drunk and fell in the sea—”

  “In Dawson’s Clough?”

  “All I know is that it won’t be good news.”

  “But it could be news. It could be the end of my not knowing.”

  Dylan couldn’t argue with that. “Third, it’s going to cost you money that you don’t have for this bad news. I charge—” Damn it. “I charge a hundred pounds a day plus expenses.”

  “Really?” To his amazement, her face brightened at that. “I was expecting more.”

  Shit, shit and sodding shit.

  “The expenses will be crippling,” he said. “There will be hotel bills, food bills when I’m away from home, probably paying for information, mileage charges—”

  “Yes, yes, I realise that.”

  “Think of the mileage, though. You’ll be paying me to drive from London to Dawson’s Clough. It would be far cheaper to employ someone local.”

  “I realise that, but I want you to do it.”

  “Right, you’re sure you still want to go ahead?”

  “Wouldn’t you, if it was your mother?”

  “No. I’d console myself with a vision of her happily shearing sheep in Australia and thank my lucky stars.”

  She laughed at that. “You would not!”

  “You don’t know my mother.”

  “What’s wrong with her?”

  “What’s wrong with her is that she’s currently living with me. And whereas most mothers would be cleaning, washing, cooking and stuff like that, mine will be smoking a joint and looking through brochures for adventure holidays.”

  She spluttered with laughter. “She sounds wonderful!”

  “I’ll let you borrow her for a couple of years. Now, enough about my mother. I need to know about yours. You said you could give me photos?”

  “Yes, I’ve sorted out a lot of stuff. Come with me.”

  Dylan followed her through a tiny sitting room that housed a sofa, a TV, a large painting of horses galloping along the shoreline, and very little else into a bedroom that made his spare look palatial. On top of the single bed was a stack of paperwork.

  “Photos.” She handed him about thirty old snaps. “They’re not brilliant, I’m afraid, but you never assume you’ll need one for…this.”

  Dylan sat on the edge of the bed and glanced through them. Each one showed a beautiful, laughing young woman who enjoyed posing for the camera.

  “You’re right. She’s beautiful.”

  “Yes.”

  Stunningly beautiful, Dylan thought, gazing at the photos in turn. Long fair hair and very dark eyes. Tall and slim. High cheekbones. Small nose. Wide, sexy mouth. The longest legs he’d ever seen. Always laughing.

  He looked through them again. He was right. In every snap, even when the camera had caught her unawares, she was laughing.

  One photo in particular claimed his attention. In it, Anita Champion was holding a young toddler, presumably her daughter, in her arms. On her face was an expression of pure joy that you seldom saw.

  “That’s an old one,” Holly said, “taken when I was about eighteen months old, but I like it.”

  Dylan could see why.

  “The most recent one was taken a few weeks before she vanished.” Holly hunted through another pile of stuff. “The photographer from the local paper was at a charity dinner in Dawson’s Clough and I liked it so much, I bought a copy out of my pocket money. It shows her—ah, here it is.”

  “Good God!” For the first time, Dylan felt the stirrings of interest.

  The photo showed Anita Champion in whispered conversation with none other than Terry Armstrong.

  “Do you know him?” Holly asked.

  “I know of him.” As would most coppers or ex-coppers. “When did you say it was taken?”

  “About a month before Mum vanished. There was a big dinner dance in Dawson’s Clough. I’ve no idea what it was for or even how Mum came to be invited, but I remember her excitement. A reporter from the local paper was there and, although this was never published, they had a display in the office window with about fifty pictures of the event. I liked this one.”

  “Did your mother know Terry Armstrong?”

  “I don’t know. Why? Who is he?”

  Dylan gazed at the photograph. It looked as if the couple were sneaking two minutes together. Perhaps two minutes to arrange a rendezvous. Or two minutes for Anita Champion to end their affair. Or blackmail him…

  Dylan couldn’t be described as an expert on relationships, but they looked close.

  “Terry Armstrong.” His mind was racing. “A Londoner. East End villain. It’s sai
d he has several members of the police force on his payroll.” It was also said that he was a cold-blooded killer, but Dylan kept that to himself.

  “Are you sure?”

  “I’m sure. His face will be familiar to one hell of a lot of coppers.”

  What had taken Armstrong to Dawson’s Clough? And what was the connection between him and Anita Champion?

  “What happened to your father?”

  “He walked out on us when I was three years old,” Holly said in a matter-of-fact way. “Mum said it was no surprise. Said it was a relief really. They’d both been kids when they got married. And they only married because Mum was expecting me.”

  “You don’t keep in touch?”

  “I don’t remember him. I haven’t seen or heard from him since I was three.”

  She didn’t seem bothered about that. Perhaps this obsession she had for discovering the truth about her mother pushed out everything else.

  “My mother’s birth certificate. Hairdressing qualifications—” she handed over the certificates, “—medical card, dental appointment that, of course, she never kept. Cards she sent on my birthday and suchlike—oh, I know you don’t want those but I thought her handwriting—”

  “Yes. Thanks.”

  “Her diary for that year. There’s not much in it—mainly birthdays, working days, reminders to pay the rent—that sort of thing.”

  She left the room for a moment and came back with a sheet of paper. “Here are names of everyone I can think of who knew her back then. I know it’s a long time ago, but—”

  “It is.” He looked at the list of names. Holly was nothing if not thorough. Against every name was a physical description, relationship to her mother—usually acquaintance—and approximate age. “You do realise that you could do all this yourself? You could see these people and ask them about your mother.”