by K Leitch
Although Hilda Clegg had regained consciousness, she was still very dozy because of the painkillers she’d been given and hadn’t been able to tell Mandy very much about her attacker other than the fact that he had been very big. She had a fractured cheek bone from a punch in the face but the rest of her injuries seemed to have been caused by some sort of thin cane. She was very emotional though when Mandy asked her if she had any idea why she’d been attacked, saying that he had said she deserved her punishment for not showing any respect.
‘What does he mean no respect,’ she said between sobs, ‘I’m always respectful, you ask anyone.’
So Mandy had left her to it and tried to get more sense out of her daughter.
‘She hasn’t fallen out with anybody in the last couple of weeks that you know of?’ Mandy tried again.
Kimberly blew her nose and looked up at her, ‘I don’t fink so, but then I don’t live at ‘ome anymore. Me and my Joe moved into our own flat a few weeks ago, we’re ‘aving a baby see, so we needed our own space.’
Mandy nodded, ‘When’s the baby due?’
Kimberly smiled and patted her stomach, ‘Oh I’ve got a couple of months yet, I just ‘ope my old mum’s home to meet her first grandchild. Why would someone do this eh? To an old lady…I just can’t believe it’s ‘appening…I just can’t.’
‘Does your mum live on her own Kimberly, or do you have other brothers and sisters?’
‘Yeh, there’s my bruva Boyd and my little sister Chanel, they still live at ‘ome, they should be ‘ere any minute actually, I said I would meet them ‘ere.’
‘And they both still live with your mum? Were they home the night your mum was attacked?
‘Nah,’ Kimberley said pulling a face, ‘they don’t stay at ‘ome much those two. Boyd’s always at ‘is mates ‘ouse and Chanel was staying over at her boyfriend’s weren’t she.’
‘What about your dad, is he still around?’ Mandy asked
‘Oh ‘e buggered off ages ago,’ Kimberly said matter of factly, ‘we don’t see ‘im no more, wouldn’t want to neither, nasty bastard.’
‘And what’s his name? Had he been in contact with your mum at all, do you know? Had they fallen out maybe?’
‘Nah…she hasn’t spoken to ‘im for years. He went back up to Glasgow far as we know, that’s where he came from, ‘es still got some family up there. Dougie he’s called, Dougie Goggins. He never married me mum, we took ‘er name like.’
Kimberly broke off then as an anxious looking couple came through the double doors and over to her. The likeness to Kimberly was unmistakable this had to be Boyd and Chanel Clegg.
‘Any change?’ Boyd asked after flashing Mandy a cursory look.
‘Nah,’ Kimberly said pulling her bags off the chairs to make room for them.
‘Who’s this then?’ Boyd said staring at Mandy.
She smiled and introduced herself, ‘I was just asking Kimberly if she could think of anyone that your mum might have fallen out with lately, your dad maybe?’
Boyd and Chanel looked at each other shaking their heads, ‘I can’t fink of no one,’ Chanel said, ‘and it certainly wasn’t me dad ‘cus he’s in the nick at the moment…’
‘What…he’s in prison,’ Mandy asked in surprise. ‘I thought you had nothing to do with him, how do you know he’s inside?’
‘Well that’s what me gran told me anyway,’ Chanel said defensively, ‘torched some blokes car ‘e did, got six months…that’s what I ‘eard anyhows.’
Mandy sighed, mentally crossing Dougie Goggins off the list of suspects. She turned to Kimberly again, ‘Had your mum noticed anyone hanging around, someone acting strangely maybe…?’
All three Cleggs looked blankly at her and shook their heads. Mandy sighed she was getting nowhere fast, she could only hope that Hilda’s head would clear soon and she’d be able to give them something more to go on.
‘Oh wait,’ Chanel said suddenly remembering something. ‘She did have that bust up in the supermarket.’
‘Oh that was nothing,’ Kimberly butted in shaking her head. ‘That’s got nothing to do with this, stupid,’ she looked at her younger sister scornfully.
‘What bust up?’ Mandy asked.
‘Oh it wasn’t even really a bust up, she just got into an argument with old Metcalf…it was nothing they was just shouting the odds like,’ Kimberly said.
‘All the same,’ Mandy persisted, ‘when was this Chanel?’
‘A few days ago…last week sometime I fink…oh I know, it was Wednesday, because I was trying to watch that “Bake off” program.’ She turned to Mandy, ‘You know the one with that old bird and that grey haired bloke…where they make cakes and stuff, I love that, me.’
‘So what did your mum tell you Chanel?’ Mandy said nodding at her.
‘Oh yeh…anyway I was watching me program and she comes in all flustered like. Said she’d been round at me auntie Jeans all afternoon because she’d ‘ad a fight wiv some old woman in the supermarket. Effing and blinding she was, how the old cow ‘ad said stuff about Kimmy not being able to read and stuff.’
‘Who said that!’ interrupted Kimberly infuriated. ‘I could read if I wanted to…I just don’t see the point.’
‘Anyhow,’ Chanel went on after giving her sister a filthy look. ‘It turned out it was only old Metcalf, she used to teach us at Riddlestone. Right old bag she was, got the sack in the end for hitting Leslie Twee round the head wiv a ruler. She hated Kimmy…hated mum too come to fink of it…but it couldn’t ‘ave been ‘er,’ she added turning back to Mandy, ‘the assault I mean, it couldn’t ‘ave been old Metcalf she must be eighty if she’s a day, and she can barely walk.’
Mandy sighed, another dead end…all the same they still needed to speak to Ms Metcalf, so far no one had managed to find her in. She made a note of all that Chanel had told her and then called it a day. It didn’t look like Hilda Clegg was going to be able to give her anymore, not today anyway.
CHAPTER 39
Obie looked again at the white board in front of him. It was covered with pictures of Lola and Lewis Twee, their parents, a map of the Buttercup estate and a smaller aerial photograph of Fernley Crescent and the surrounding area. A photo of an Adidas sports bag that could have been similar to the one Lewis was seen carrying and a description of the clothes that they were last seen wearing. That was all they had, and it added up to a big fat nothing. It had been over three weeks now since they had been reported missing and Obie’s hopes of finding the kids alive were fading fast. His only real hope was that they had run off together for some reason, may be that was why Lewis had been carrying a bag. Herbert and Jane Twee however, were adamant that although the bag was definitely Lewis’s, none of their clothes were missing and more significantly, they had left behind their treasured gaming tablets, which Jane was certain they would never do.
As time went on, the pressure on Obie and his team to get a result was increasing, not only from the press but from DCI Tavener who was making his presence constantly felt, with almost hourly requests for updates. Obie needed a breakthrough and had called his team together again this morning in the hope that something might have come to light.
He turned back towards the small group who had been talking together in hushed voices waiting for him to begin.
‘I am becoming increasingly convinced that we should be concentrating our search around the area leading to Fernley Crescent, to include Rapier Drive and the area of waste ground between those houses and Fernley Lodge (the retirement home).’
‘On that point sir,’ Frank said standing and coming to the front of the room, ‘I spoke to another of Lewis’s school friends yesterday.’ He consulted his notes, ‘Jack Wheal, he was in his dad's car, coming back from a football match when he says he saw Lewis crossing the road ahead of them and he appeared to be heading off in the direction of Fernley Crescent.’
‘What time was this Frank?’ Obie asked as he made a note of the boy’s name on the white board.
>
‘About 9.45pm he thinks, his five-a-side match had finished at 9.30pm and his dad had picked him up soon after that…um from the sports centre which is only a couple of miles from Rapier Drive where he said he saw Lewis.’
‘Okay good, so once again we have Lewis placed near Fernley Crescent. So the questions we have to ask are
1/ Why was he there? And where was he going?
2/ Where was Lola? Nobody seems to have seen her with Lewis, which in itself is unusual I understand, I get the impression they are very much in each other’s company.’
‘Oh God yeah,’ Sam piped up, ‘the terrible twosome. Although it was obvious that Lewis was always the driving force behind them…Lola just seemed to tag along with her big brother.’
‘Yes, but didn’t Josh Glump say that they had left his house together and they were both heading off towards Fernley Crescent,’ Mandy said. ‘So why do we keep getting sightings of Lewis going back in that direction on his own? Where was Lola by this time…we know she hadn’t gone home?’
‘Excuse me sir,’ a hesitant voice piped up from the back of the room and WPC Amber Graves stepped forward.
‘Yes,’ Obie squinted at her, ‘WPC Graves isn’t it?’
‘Yes sir,’ Amber said moving forward, ‘I don’t know if this has any bearing on this case sir but I spent a day last week going door to door on Fernley Crescent, asking about the Twees you know, and I spoke to a Ms Flora Metcalf.’
‘Poor you,’ Sheila White said with a shake of her head, ‘cantankerous old bat.’
Amber smiled, ‘Yeh well, she is that alright but she was the one that had been complaining about some kids terrorising her in her own home. Anyway she gave me the diary she’d kept…of all the nasty stuff these kids had done.’
‘Did she recognise who they were?’ Mandy asked, I remember Carla talking about it. I think she asked uniform to keep an eye out.’
Amber shook her head, ‘No she doesn’t mention any names, but what I found interesting sir,’ she said addressing Obie again, ‘was that the bullying seems to stop at around the same time that Lola and Lewis go missing…see.’ She handed over the little diary to Obie. ‘The last entry is on the 22nd of May two days before they were reported missing,’ she finished with a shy smile.
Obie read through some of the entries in the diary. ‘Bloody hell,’ he said shaking his head, ‘why wasn’t there anything we could have done to stop this. That poor woman, this had been going on for weeks. Listen to this…BRICK THROUGH KITCHEN WINDOW WITH NOTE ATTACHED…she’s even kept the note look.’ Obie used his handkerchief to cover his fingers as he gently unclipped the note from where it had been secured between the pages of the diary.
‘DON’T CLOSE YOUR EYES YOU INTERFERING OLD BITCH,’ he read, shaking his head once more. ‘Mandy can you get this to forensics you never know we might be able to get some prints or something from it,’ he added slipping the note carefully into an evidence envelope.
‘Yes sir will do,’ said Mandy, ‘um…I don’t know if it’s at all relevant sir,’ she went on, ‘but Kimberly Clegg told me something the other day when I was at the hospital trying to interview her mother. She said Flora Metcalf had been sacked from her job as a teacher at Riddlestone High because she’d hit Leslie Twee round the head with a ruler.’
‘Leslie Twee? Which one is she?’ Obie asked.
‘She was the elder sister sir,’ Sheila white piped up. ‘She died…Leukaemia a few years back.’
Obie turned back to Amber, frowning thoughtfully, ‘You said that you spoke to this Ms Metcalf, was she able to shed any light on the whereabouts of the Twee kids, had she seen them about, did she recognise them?’
‘Oh yes she knew who they were sir,’ Amber said nodding, ‘said they were nasty little thugs, but she didn’t say she’d seen them in the area. I think if they were the ones that were doing all this stuff to her, she didn’t have a clue. She was just relieved that it had stopped I think.’
‘Ok Amber thank you…very good work,’ Obie said with a smile and Amber, embarrassed, slunk back to the rear of the room again.
‘Well if it was the Twees, and given this new information it seems more and more likely that it was, then that gives them a reason for being on Fernley Crescent at that time,’ Frank said, ‘I mean if you look at the entries in this diary all the attacks seem to take place at roughly the same time…look 25th April 9.40…14th April 9.27 they all seem to be around the 9.30-40 time, apart from that brick incident which was during the day…maybe they were just trying to keep her on her toes,’ he mused.
‘Well whatever, we definitely need to speak to Flora Metcalf again and soon I think. Even if she doesn’t know it, she may be able to give us something to go on…what is it Shelia?’ Obie finished looking at WPC Shelia White who had her hand in the air and had obviously just thought of something.
‘Oh I don’t know sir,’ Shelia said blushing, ‘it may be nothing but I have just been flicking through the diary and something triggered a memory, something one of Flora Metcalf’s neighbours told me when we were door knocking the other day. It was her next door neighbour actually, not Mr Pickles obviously poor man, the other side a Mrs Susan Gladwin. She seemed a bit batty though so it was hard to make any sense of what she was saying, but she did go on about some foxes that had woken her up. She kept repeating that the foxes were screaming…it had obviously bothered her and I didn’t think anything of it at the time, but….’
‘What if it wasn’t foxes she’d heard, yes I see.’ Obie thought for a moment, ‘Okay well Frank you and I will pay a visit to Ms Metcalf and while we’re there we’ll have a chat with this Mrs Gladwin as well. Midge can you and Sam tackle the Twee’s friends again, see if you can get any of them to tell us what Lola and Lewis were up to, surely if they were terrorising this old woman they would have wanted to boast about it. Some body knows something I’m sure of it.’
Midge rolled his eyes, ‘Yeh well if they do, they are they are keeping schtum, probably scared stiff in case Herbert hears they’ve been talking.’
‘Well bring them in if necessary Midge,’ Obie said before turning back to the room in general. ‘Thank you all, it seems at last we’ve got some sort of direction to follow. Let's push this now and push it hard until someone cracks and tells us what’s happened to these two kids.’
CHAPTER 40 - CAULDRON MEETING
The Bull public house which had sat on the green in Kenley village for the past four hundred years looked particularly lovely this evening, Helen thought as she parked her car in the small car park. It was a perfect summer’s evening, with blue skies and a gentle breeze and from here Helen could see that Duncan had taken advantage of the fine weather and put a few tables with umbrellas in the pretty gardens to the rear of the pub. They were an obvious success, as each one was filled with girls in flimsy, brightly coloured summer dresses and men in cool khaki shorts and T-shirts enjoying jugs of iced Pimms heavily laden with fruit. The whole thing presented an inviting picture and lifted Helen's spirits as she made her way through the tables, towards the one in the corner where she had spotted Maggie and Tracy with their heads together.
‘Oh Helen darling you are just in time to settle an argument,’ Maggie said getting up and giving her a hug.
‘Oh no you don’t Maggs,’ Tracy said patting the chair next to her invitingly. ‘Don’t you try and influence her, we’ll just ask the question and see what she says okay?’
‘Oh my God…no pressure then,’ Helen said laughing as she sat.
‘Right, who in your opinion was the sexiest James Bond, not the best actor or who played him the most…we’re just talking who was the one that made you think “oooh yes, I so would”,’ Tracy said looking at Helen expectantly.
Helen burst out laughing, ‘Bloody hell I thought it was going to be something serious like “what was your opinion on the war in Iraq?” or “do you think nurses should be paid more money” in which case I would have said “catastrophic” and “too bloody right” but Ja
mes Bonds…really?’
Maggie and Tracy both looked at her and nodded.
‘Oh alright then give me a minute,’ Helen said taking a sip from her drink, ‘Um you do realise I’m a lesbian don’t you?’ she asked after a moment, both girls nodded again.
‘Okay…I’d have to say on the whole Sean Connery was the sexiest, with Daniel Craig a very close second. But Connery had the humour you see, which just pips Craig to the post in my book.’
‘Ha!’ said Maggie triumphantly, ‘that’s two to one Tracy and if Carla were here she’d have said Connery as well so you’d have still been beaten.’
‘You don’t know that, anyway no one’s come close to Timothy Dalton, no matter what you two losers think,’ Tracy said sulkily taking another sip from her drink.
Maggie just smirked and then turned to Helen, ‘I’m sorry I missed your call today, I was driving back from a meeting in Leatherhead. Was it anything important?’
Helen shook her head, ‘It didn’t matter ‘cus I knew I’d see you tonight,’ she said. ‘I had a call from Carla this morning.’
Maggie’s eyes widened but she said nothing, waiting for Helen to continue.
‘Oh my God Helen was she rude to you again?’ Tracy said, over the last couple of weeks each of the girls had taken the brunt of Carla’s abuse. She’d taken to phoning them, usually when she was completely out of it and telling them what she thought of them in the most cutting and upsetting way. Only to phone again an hour or so later, sobbing down the phone and begging for forgiveness. The witches had been determined not to be insulted by any of the nasty things that she’d hurled at them but it was getting harder and harder to overlook some of her more bitter insults. This time however, it seemed it had not been a drunken call.
‘She actually seemed sober, she said that she knew she needed help and did I know how she could get some,’ Helen said her eyes filling with tears, ‘can you believe it?’