by Frank Smith
He’d finally won her over, but it had turned out to be a hollow victory.
Things might have worked out if Michael had been a ‘normal’ child. But the boy was blind. And, as if that were not enough, they were told by the surgeon that Michael had no vocal cords to speak of. ‘They’re completely malformed,’ the man explained, ‘so while the boy will be able to make sounds, they could range anywhere from a harsh whisper to something like a growl, he will never be able to form words or speak properly.’
After suffering through a long and debilitating pregnancy, the shock had been too much for Julia, and she’d spent a month in the psychiatric ward before she’d even seen her son … and she’d rejected him out of hand.
Lorrimer stared out of the window. The road ahead was dry, but every so often a few drops of rain would spatter the windscreen, and the sky looked dark and threatening ahead.
Michael had been a good baby, sleeping through most of the night and taking his food easily. Bottle-fed, of course; Julia was incapable of nursing him.
They’d engaged a nanny – in fact, they’d engaged a series of nannies, none of whom seemed to be able to get close to Michael, until last year when the agency in Birmingham sent them Justine Delgado. ‘She’s twenty-eight years old,’ the woman at the agency told Lorrimer. ‘She is a registered nurse, trained to deal with children with special needs, including those who are visually impaired. The salary she is asking is higher than that of the nannies you have had before, but I think you will find she is worth it. She comes highly recommended, and she has excellent references.’
They agreed on a three-month trial period, but Justine Delgado had been there less than a month when both Stephen and Julia declared themselves satisfied. Stephen was happy because he could see the way Michael and Justine had taken to each other, and Julia was happy to be relieved of any responsibility for the boy.
Justine and Michael had bonded almost from the very first day. In fact, thought Lorrimer, it was a pleasure to see the two of them together. To all intents and purposes, Justine could have been Michael’s mother … and therein lay the problem, because Julia no longer felt any responsibility for her son. She would, if it were absolutely necessary, see to Michael’s basic needs when Justine wasn’t there, but more in the way one might give a helping hand to a stranger or to the child of a friend, and it was clear that Michael felt no connection to his birth mother. Why would he when Justine was taking care of all his needs? Lorrimer, on the other hand, adored his son, and looked forward to spending as much time as possible with him every time he was home. Michael had grown into a handsome boy. Now five years old, he was looking more like his father every day. Like his father, Michael would never be tall, although he had the same sturdy build. But it was the way the boy greeted him every time he came home that tugged at Lorrimer’s heart and brought tears to his eyes. Whether in his own room or at his studies at the end of the hall, the boy would recognize his father’s footsteps on the hallway’s wooden floor and come running. To anyone else, Michael’s guttural whoops of delight would have been disconcerting, but Lorrimer didn’t mind them in the least.
They drove in silence for a while, but the question he had wanted to ask from the moment they’d left the station couldn’t be contained any longer. ‘And Justine?’ he asked as casually as he could. ‘Are the two of them still getting along all right?’
In other words, is she still doing the job I should be doing? Julia thought. She could feel the muscles tightening in her face. ‘They’re fine,’ she said stiffly.
‘Justine Delgado is Michael’s nanny,’ Lorrimer explained for Terry’s benefit. ‘She’s from the Philippines. She’s been very good with Michael.’
‘Really?’ said Terry. ‘I spent a couple of months in the Philippines in my gap year. Which part does she come from?’
‘Manila,’ Lorrimer said cryptically, anxious to leave the subject.
But Terry was interested now. ‘That’s where I spent most of my time when I was there,’ he said. ‘It’s a fascinating place. I look forward to meeting Miss Delgado. Do you know if she speaks Tagalog? I learned a few key phrases while I was there, and I wouldn’t mind trying them out again. And speaking of Manila …’
Lorrimer tried to turn the conversation to other things, but Manila had struck a chord with Terry, and he was keen to share his experiences, and perhaps show off a little.
Julia tuned him out. Justine! Wonder-woman Justine, who was so bloody good with Michael. And she was good with him, so why did she resent her so much? The question, as always, was rhetorical, because she knew the answer. Guilt! Plain and simple, because she, Julia Lorrimer, who prided herself on being able to handle almost any situation calmly and logically, could hardly bear to be in the same room as her own small son!
Stone-faced, she drove the rest of the way in silence.
TWO
Tuesday, 3 April
Detective Chief Inspector Paget was feeling particularly happy as he drove to work on the Tuesday following the Easter weekend. For the first time in months, he and Grace had managed to arrange three whole days off together, and they had spent them in Beddgelert, North Wales. The weather was cold and blustery, but that hadn’t stopped them from walking the hills each morning, following the path through the Aberglaslyn Pass, stopping every now and again as much to admire the magnificent views as to catch their breath before continuing on. The air was clean and fresh – extremely fresh first thing in the morning – but exhilarating, and it had felt good to be alive. A well-earned rest out of the wind at the halfway point; a mug of hot coffee from the thermos, and a relatively leisurely walk via the old copper mine to the town. A pub lunch and a pint by the fire, albeit an electric one with quite realistic flames, but the principle was the same.
Later, they’d wandered hand in hand beside the river, popping in and out of shops along the way until it was time for tea. Grace had to practically drag Neil away from the woodcraft shop, fascinated as he was with everything from carved wooden wind chimes to birds and doorstops and fearsome dragons.
‘Yes, they are amazingly well done, Neil,’ Grace had agreed, ‘but I really don’t think we need a dragon on the mantelpiece, especially one that looks like that. Perhaps the wind chimes …’
Paget smiled to himself. Grace was right; they didn’t need a dragon on the mantelpiece, and he probably wouldn’t have bought it anyway, but the wind chimes were hanging outside their door when he’d left this morning.
They’d stayed in a B&B run by a retired couple from Manchester, who had owned a small but apparently lucrative painting and decorating business, and the B&B was their way of staying active in retirement. The house itself was as solid as the rock on which it was built, and their room was comfortable, once he and Grace had stuffed strips of newspaper into the gaps around the wooden window frames to stop the moaning of the wind. The bed was extra large, the mattress deep and soft, and they’d had no trouble whatsoever keeping warm.
Pleasant as they were, the memories were beginning to fade as he drove into Charter Lane and parked the car. A brisk wind tugged at his coat as he mounted the steps and went inside, almost colliding with a woman coming out. He stood aside and held the door to let her pass, but she stopped. ‘Chief Inspector Paget?’ she said hesitantly. ‘It is Chief Inspector Paget, isn’t it? Julia Lorrimer,’ she continued. ‘We met at my husband’s open house at Christmas?’
Recognition clicked in. ‘Of course, Mrs Lorrimer,’ he said, wondering what the local MP’s wife was doing there at such an early hour. He was about to ask, but she spoke first.
‘I’m so glad I’ve run into you,’ she said breathlessly. ‘I’m sure the young man I spoke to just now is quite capable, but I didn’t get the feeling that he was as concerned as I am about the disappearance of our son’s nanny. It’s been two full days now, and she’s never done anything like this before. She has a phone. She would have called. She would never go off and leave Michael alone like that without—’
‘I t
hink you’d better come back inside and tell me what this is about from the beginning,’ said Paget. This wasn’t the way he’d expected to start his day, but Julia Lorrimer didn’t strike him as a woman who would panic easily. Yet here she was, at ten minutes to eight in the morning, clearly agitated about an employee who had been missing for two days. The fact that the woman was the wife of his member of parliament shouldn’t make any difference to the way the report was treated, but this was the real world, and MPs and MPs’ wives could make life difficult if they chose. He led the way to an interview room. ‘Just take a seat while I get a copy of the report,’ he told her. ‘Do you recall the name of the officer you spoke to?’
‘Constable Mercer, I believe he said his name was. A young man with gingery-coloured hair.’
‘Right. I’ll be back in a minute. Would you like a cup of tea or coffee?’
Julia Lorrimer shook her head. ‘No, thank you,’ she said. ‘But thank you for taking the trouble. I really am worried about Justine.’
Justine Delgado, Paget learned as he skimmed through missing person report on his way back to the interview room, was twenty-nine years old. Employed in May of the previous year, dedicated to her job, she had never done anything like this before.
‘It’s so unlike her,’ Mrs Lorrimer burst out as he sat down to face her across the table. ‘As I told the constable, Justine goes off to mass every Sunday morning. She usually goes to the nine o’clock, but because it was Easter Sunday she thought it best to go to the early service at eight. She had asked if it would be all right if she spent the rest of the day with a friend – another girl from the Philippines by the name of Maria Navarro, a nurse at the hospital – so I said yes, of course it would. We were having Stephen’s brother and his wife and family over for dinner on Sunday, but I had that in hand, so it was no problem. Justine is devoted to Michael, and she’s rarely away from the house for more than a few hours at a time, so I could hardly refuse her.’ Julia looked down at her hands. ‘And that’s the last I saw of her,’ she ended softly. ‘I’ve tried and tried calling her on her mobile, but it must be switched off.’
Paget glanced at the paper in his hand. ‘And this friend, Maria Navarro, claims there were no plans to meet that day? She was working at the hospital in A and E?’
‘That’s what she told me when I spoke to her yesterday. In fact, she said she’d been at work all day on Sunday.’
‘Did she offer any suggestions as to where Justine might have gone?’
Julia shook her head. ‘She seemed to be as puzzled as we were.’
‘Could there have been some mistake? Did Justine mention her friend by name? Could she have been talking about another friend?’
‘No, I’m sure there was no mistake, Chief Inspector. She was talking about Maria Navarro.’
‘So Justine lied about where she was going that day?’
Julia flinched at the word. ‘I suppose it does look that way,’ she said slowly, ‘but I find it very hard to believe. There has to be some other explanation. And if she did lie, she must have had a very good reason.’
‘I see you’ve been into her room – checked to see what she took with her.’
‘As best I could,’ Julia said, ‘Everything is there as far as I can tell, apart from what she was wearing when she left the house, of course, and I gave that information to the constable, as you will see.’ She indicated the open folder on the table.
‘Blue-grey three-quarter-length jacket with detachable hood,’ Paget read out. ‘Navy blue skirt, black tights, black leather shoes, low heels …’ He shot a quizzical look at Mrs Lorrimer. ‘This is remarkably detailed,’ he observed. ‘Was there any particular reason you noticed what Miss Delgado was wearing that day?’
The woman smiled. ‘Justine was wearing what she always wears when she goes to church,’ she told him. ‘She doesn’t have a lot of clothes. What she does have are of good quality, so they last, but her wardrobe is quite limited.’
‘Do you remember if she was carrying anything – a handbag, perhaps?’
‘Oh, yes, of course. Sorry, I forgot to mention that. She was carrying her umbrella – one of those little fold-up ones – and a shoulder bag: a black, half-moon-shaped bag made to look like soft leather – you know the sort of thing. It’s really much too big for her. She’s quite short, you know.’
Paget glanced at the report. ‘And you saw her as she was leaving the house at approximately twenty minutes to eight on Sunday morning?’
‘That’s right. I was in the kitchen when she came in to tell me that she was off, and Michael was still sleeping. Oh, yes, and she said she might be a bit late back, so would we mind seeing Michael off to bed, and she was sorry she would be missing the children’s Easter egg hunt. It’s something we’d planned to do after dinner for the children,’ she explained. ‘We usually go to Stephen’s brother’s place in the country at Easter, but this year we invited them to have dinner with us. Richard and his wife, Eloise, have two girls, Loren and Chelsea, and the Easter egg hunt is a sort of tradition in their house. We didn’t want to disappoint the girls when they came to our place, so we decided to do it too. And Michael was able to join in as well. ‘He’s blind, you see – well, not completely blind – but the girls are very good with him, and they lead him to some of the eggs.’
‘He’s how old?
‘Five. He’ll be six in September.’
‘Presumably, you have asked him if his nanny had said anything to him about where she might be going at the weekend?’
Julia gave a dismissive shake of the head. ‘We have tried,’ she said, ‘but you have to understand that Michael is not only blind; he can’t speak. Justine has taught him to respond electronically by typing answers to questions, but I’m sure he knows no more than we do, and he’s extremely upset because she’s not there.’
‘Does Miss Delgado have any medical problems that you know of? Anything that might affect her memory or her ability to communicate?’
‘No. Justine is very healthy. She takes very good care of herself.’
‘Is there any doubt about her legal status in this country?’
‘Absolutely not!’ Julia Lorrimer all but bristled at the suggestion. ‘Justine came to us through a reputable agency. As a matter of fact …’ She paused to rummage around in her handbag before taking out a passport and handing it to Paget. ‘Justine asked me to keep it in our safe for her, and I thought it might help if I brought it with me. The young man I saw before you came in wanted to keep it, but I told him Justine gave it to me for safekeeping, and I couldn’t let him do that. So he photocopied it instead.’
Paget opened it. Genuine, as far as he could tell. Justine Francesca Delgado. Strong features. Dark hair, dark eyes, plumpish face. ‘Has there been any trouble recently?’ he asked as he handed the passport back. ‘Any arguments or concerns about her work? Has she seemed worried or upset?’
Julia Lorrimer was shaking her head, ‘As I said, Justine is devoted to Michael, and we’ve been very pleased with her work. She’s become part of the family.’ She raised her hands in a gesture of helplessness. ‘I’m sorry, Chief Inspector, but I don’t know what else I can tell you.’
‘Was there a particular time you would normally expect her to be in by?’
‘You mean like a curfew? No. As I said, Justine is like a member of the family. She has her own key and she can come and go as she pleases.’
‘But you didn’t report her missing until this morning,’ Paget pointed out. ‘Why was that, Mrs Lorrimer?’
‘Actually, we did ring the police yesterday when we were calling round, trying to find out where Justine might be. We asked if there had been any accidents involving a young woman, but they said there’d been nothing reported. We rang the police in Ludlow, and the hospital there as well as here – in fact, we rang several hospitals farther afield simply because we didn’t know what else to do. We even rang Father Leonard to ask if Justine had been at mass that morning, but he didn’t remember seei
ng her.’
Julia Lorrimer shrugged guiltily. ‘I realize now that we should have come in yesterday, but we couldn’t bring ourselves to believe that Justine was actually missing in the truest sense of the word. And then, of course, we’d spent a good part of the night – that is, Sunday night – and the early hours of Monday morning at the hospital with Michael, and we were dead tired, so we probably weren’t thinking as clearly as we should have been. Michael suffers from croup,’ she explained, ‘and sometimes it gets out of hand and we have to take him over to the hospital to get him settled down. Normally, Justine would have taken him – it’s happened several times before – so we left a note telling her not to worry, and Stephen and I took him over to the hospital ourselves. It was all that running around with the girls during the Easter egg hunt that brought it on, I expect, but Michael is all right now.’
‘Were you not concerned that Justine still hadn’t returned by the time you got home from the hospital?’ asked Paget.
Mrs Lorrimer shook her head. ‘We thought she had returned and gone to bed. Stephen had said in the note that he would keep Michael with him in his room for the rest of the night when we got back, so that she wouldn’t worry.’
‘Where did you leave the note?’
‘On the kitchen table, and we left the light on.’
‘Was it still there when you got back?’
Mrs Lorrimer thought for a moment. ‘To tell you the truth, I’m not sure,’ she said. ‘But then we were all very tired and just wanted to get to bed.’ Frowning worriedly, she looked directly at Paget. ‘I know it must sound silly now,’ she said, ‘but I suppose the reason we kept putting off reporting Justine missing was because we didn’t want to embarrass her if she turned up with a perfectly logical explanation for her absence.’