The Smuggler's Daughter

by Kerry Barrett

  ‘She was messaging some filthy little turd,’ he hissed at Stacey and me, his lip curled. ‘I check her phone, of course, and she didn’t even try to hide it.’

  I thought about how innocent the messages were, and how I’d been mildly surprised by their chaste tone, and winced. ‘What did you do then?’

  He lifted his chin up, looking pleased with himself. ‘I said to Molly that she needed to be punished and Molly agreed.’

  Molly, sitting next to him, looked alarmed. ‘We hadn’t agreed on that,’ she said. ‘I felt a bit of a hypocrite. I had boyfriends at her age.’

  ‘And look where you ended up,’ Steve spat at her. ‘Pregnant.’

  Molly stayed quiet after that, as Steve explained how he wanted to teach Ciara a lesson, so he’d taken her to his allotment on Saturday afternoon and left her in the shed.

  ‘It’s freezing,’ Stacey said. ‘And her coat is still here. She must have been so cold.’

  The thought of poor Ciara in the icy shed made me shiver. I shook my head. ‘But we searched the shed,’ I said. ‘And the allotments. She’s not there.’

  ‘I just wanted to give her a scare,’ Steve said. ‘But when I got back to the allotment after church, she wasn’t there.’ He shrugged, not looking remotely worried. ‘She’ll be with that lad,’ he said. ‘Getting up to all sorts.’

  ‘She’s not with him.’ My voice was cold. ‘They never met up.’

  Molly gave a little gasp and he patted her hand. ‘She’ll be fine,’ he said. ‘They’ll find her.’

  We did find her. In the woods, behind the patch of allotments, that skirted the railway line. She’d obviously found her way out of the shed, but in confusion from the cold, she’d curled herself into the roots of a tree, gone to sleep and never woken up. The freezing February weather, and the vest top and thin leggings she’d been wearing made sure of that.

  ‘She wouldn’t have suffered,’ the pathologist reassured me.

  But I kept thinking about how scared she must have been, and how cold, and how if I’d followed my instincts right at the start, we might have found her sooner.

  ‘It’s not your fault,’ DI Blair said over and over, as we watched Steve being put into a police car and Ciara’s mother wailing from inside the house. ‘The only person to blame, is that bugger. This is not your fault.’

  But somehow I felt that it was.

  Chapter 3

  Phoebe

  Three months later

  ‘I’m popping to the shops,’ Mum said, poking her head round the living room door. ‘Why don’t you come with me?’

  ‘I don’t think so.’

  ‘Phoebe …’ Her voice went from being overly perky to concerned. ‘Sweetheart.’

  ‘I’m fine.’ I dragged my eyes away from Homes Under the Hammer. ‘I just want to watch this.’

  Mum raised an eyebrow but she didn’t push me further. ‘I’ll put the kettle on,’ she said.

  ‘I thought you were going out.’ I knew she hadn’t been going anywhere really. She just wanted to get me off the sofa and out into the world. But I didn’t want to go out because I didn’t want to risk bumping into Ciara’s mother. She was thinking of selling up, I’d heard. Moving on. I couldn’t blame her. But for now, I worried I’d see her in the Post Office queue, or at the self-checkout in Sainsbury’s. And I couldn’t deal with her sorrow and her guilt on top of my own, selfish as that sounded.

  Mum gave me a look that suggested this wasn’t over and went off to make tea. I pulled my knees up to my chest and watched the bouncy blonde woman over-enthuse about a chimney breast. I watched a lot of daytime television these days because I had nothing else to do. I’d been signed off from work after it became apparent I wasn’t coping with what had happened. I’d become frozen with indecision at work, incapable of choosing tea or coffee from the canteen, let alone making choices that affected people’s lives. I felt like I couldn’t trust myself. I’d ignored my instincts and Ciara had died. So now I suspected everyone of having some ulterior motive, or of hiding some awful secret, even when they weren’t doing anything wrong. I couldn’t function at work so I had some counselling and the counsellor, Sandra, gently told me I needed some time away to heal. And I was now on sick leave, and I had no idea when I’d go back.

  I couldn’t afford my flat-share on my reduced pay, so I’d slunk home to my parents’ house to hide. It wasn’t the best place for me. My parents lived just a stone’s throw from the allotments where Ciara had died. Where she’d have lived, if I’d been more thorough. If I’d asked the right questions. It had been a miserable few months, no question. Though, I told myself whenever I felt myself descending into self-pity, not as miserable as it must have been for Ciara’s poor mother.

  The doorbell rang, jolting me from my thoughts. I listened to make sure Mum had gone to answer, and turned the volume up on Homes Under the Hammer when I heard voices in the hall.

  ‘What’s this bollocks?’ said a voice. I raised my head to see my oldest friend Liv standing in the doorway.

  ‘This couple think they can do up a house and sell it in six weeks,’ I told her, turning my gaze back to the screen. ‘But Dion Dublin thinks they’re putting too much pressure on themselves.’

  ‘I agree with Dion,’ Liv said. She sat down next to me and finally I looked up at her. ‘You look like shit, Phoebe.’

  ‘I know.’ I shrugged. ‘So?’

  ‘So, it’s my job as your best friend to help you.’

  I rolled my eyes. ‘I’ve got a counsellor.’

  ‘What I can offer you is better than any counsellor.’

  ‘What?’ I sighed. ‘What can you offer me?’

  Liv grinned at me. ‘First, tell me how great I am.’

  ‘No.’ She was great, of course, but I really wasn’t in the mood for Liv’s games.

  She frowned, and then her expression softened. ‘Look, Phoebe, I know how hard it is when things go wrong.’

  I felt guilty. She wasn’t exactly having an easy time of it right now herself. She was still recovering after breaking up with her long-term boyfriend, Niall. What a pair of losers we were.

  ‘But you’re wallowing.’

  ‘I’m not.’ I looked at her. ‘Honestly, Liv, I’m not. I’m just not ready to get back to work.’

  ‘I don’t want you to go back to work.’

  I blinked at her. ‘Really?’

  ‘Really.’

  ‘So what do you want?’

  ‘I want to take you away from all this.’

  She picked up the remote control and turned off the TV. I tried to grab it back but she held it out of my reach.

  ‘I was watching that,’ I complained. Liv ignored me.

  ‘I’ve got a proposition for you,’ she said.

  I sighed. Liv and I had been mates since primary school and I’d had a lifetime experiencing her propositions.

  ‘No,’ I said.

  ‘Hear me out.’ She waved the remote control at me. ‘And then I’ll put your house programme back on.’

  ‘Fine.’

  ‘I’ve been offered a job for the rest of the year,’ she said. I managed to raise a smile. That was good news. Liv was the quintessential rolling stone. She worked for a pub chain, parachuted in to take over. She’d done new openings, brand launches, big events like running the pub in the Olympic Park in 2012. She’d worked in Glasgow and Manchester and all over Wales, and down in Brighton for a while. I always joked she was institutionalised – she never had to find a flat or pay rent or even go to the supermarket. She just lived on site in each pub, ate pub food, drank pub drinks. She’d had a brief stint in head office when she’d moved in with Niall, but I’d never thought she’d been very happy staying in one place.

  Since they’d broken up she’d been back at her mum’s too. She’d not had a proper job for a while and I knew she was beginning to worry about it. I’d enjoyed having her nearby though. It was reassuring to know that while I may have been in my early thirties, single, jobless and
living with my mum, I wasn’t the only one.

  ‘Where is it this time?’ I asked.

  ‘Cornwall.’

  ‘Nice,’ I said.

  ‘Bit remote.’ Liv screwed her nose up. ‘But beautiful location. Right by the beach. Amazing views.’

  I nodded, wisely. ‘A good view can add as much as £10,000 on to the value of a property.’

  ‘No more house shows for you,’ Liv said. She threw the remote control across the room on to the battered old armchair my dad sat in to watch the football. ‘It’s just a temporary manager job. Nothing fancy. So I’ll be bored to tears.’ She paused. ‘Come with me.’

  ‘Where?’

  ‘Cornwall.’

  ‘I can’t go to Cornwall for the rest of the year.’

  ‘You don’t have to stay the whole time. Just come for the summer.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Why not?’

  I thought about it, but actually I couldn’t think of a reason why not. I opened my mouth and then closed it again without speaking and Liv gave me her best gimlet stare.

  ‘It’ll be good for you to get away,’ she said.

  That was true. But I didn’t feel strong enough to start again in a new place, with people I didn’t know. I liked being at home with my mum and Liv round the corner.

  ‘It won’t be like starting again in a new place,’ Liv said, reading my mind. ‘Because I’ll be there the whole time.’

  ‘You’ll be busy,’ I said. I could well imagine how frantic a beachside pub could be at the height of summer.

  ‘I’ll need help.’

  ‘I’m not a barmaid.’

  ‘So you can collect glasses. Or if you don’t want to work, you can sunbathe. Or learn to surf.’

  It was beginning to sound more appealing. Liv sensed weakness. ‘You might meet a new man,’ she said. ‘A posh boy in chino shorts and deck shoes.’

  I wrinkled my nose up.

  ‘Fine, a surfer dude with long hair and a great tan.’

  ‘Better.’

  Liv bounced on her seat. ‘Or that Poldark bloke. With the hair. You could meet someone like him.’

  I smiled despite myself. ‘That would be worth the trip,’ I said. ‘But I don’t know, Liv. I’m not in a good place.’

  ‘That’s why you should come. You can be in your bad place in a great place.’

  Mum came into the lounge carrying two mugs of tea. She gave one to Liv and put the other on the table next to where I sat. ‘Where’s a great place?’ she asked.

  ‘Georgie, tell Phoebe she needs to come to Cornwall with me,’ Liv said. Mum looked at her adoringly. She thought Liv was marvellous and the feeling was mutual. But I didn’t mind, because I thought the same about Liv’s mum, Patsy, and her gran, Jada. Liv had adored my noisy chaotic house growing up, bickering with my two older brothers as though they were her own. And I’d spent hours in the peaceful house Liv called home, helping Jada cook the Jamaican dishes Liv had no interest in, and watching Patsy studying for her degree at the kitchen table.

  Mum sat down on the sofa next to me and beamed at Liv. ‘A holiday in Cornwall is a wonderful idea.’

  ‘It would be for the whole summer,’ Liv said. ‘I’ve got a job down there.’

  Mum looked thrilled and, I thought, a bit relieved. ‘Even better.’

  I made a face. ‘I’m not sure, Mum,’ I said. ‘It just seems a bit much.’

  ‘Rubbish,’ said Mum briskly. ‘It’ll do you the world of good. Get some sun on your skin. Really relax and put all your troubles behind you.’

  ‘And you’ll be doing me a favour,’ Liv said. ‘You know what these remote places are like for people like me.’

  ‘Cornwall’s not remote,’ I pointed out. ‘It’s a couple of hours down the motorway and full of stockbrokers from Surrey.’

  ‘When I took that job at that country inn, someone asked me every single day where I was from,’ Liv said, scowling. ‘And believe me, they didn’t look satisfied when I said Lewisham.’

  ‘That was shit, but I’m sure Cornwall’s not like that,’ I said, not unsympathetic because I’d seen first-hand the casual racism Liv had put up with over the years, but not convinced she really needed me as much as she said she did. Liv was more than capable of standing up for herself.

  ‘Please come,’ Liv pleaded. ‘Please, Phoebe. You can collect glasses and flirt with the Poldarks and arrest all the racists.’

  ‘I can’t arrest anyone in Cornwall,’ I lied, but my arguments were getting weaker.

  ‘I think it’s just what you need,’ said Mum. ‘And in Cornwall you know you won’t have to run the risk of bumping into Ciara’s mother.’

  I shrugged. ‘I think she’ll be moving soon anyway.’

  Mum reached out and took my hand. ‘I wanted to talk to you about that. I walked past the house the other day and saw the for-sale sign had gone so I spoke to Mrs Morrison at the Post Office – you know what she’s like for knowing everything. And it seems the mother has decided to stay.’

  I felt sick. ‘She’s staying?’

  ‘For now. She doesn’t want to leave all her memories behind.’

  ‘Doesn’t want to leave her husband behind, more like,’ I said in disgust. Ciara’s stepfather had pleaded guilty to manslaughter and was serving his sentence at Belmarsh prison – not far from where we lived. Her mother had stood by him, convinced he’d just made a terrible mistake.

  ‘Come with me, Moon Girl,’ Liv said, using the nickname she’d given me when we were kids and we’d found out that Phoebe meant “moon”.

  I thought about spending the summer trapped inside the home where I’d grown up, not venturing out for fear of seeing the woman whose daughter I could have saved. And then I thought about spending the next few months in a seaside town. All the space and the fresh air. I’d be able to breathe properly for the first time in months. I could go running on the beach, I thought. Get my fitness back.

  ‘Fine,’ I said to Liv. ‘I’ll come.’

  She clapped her hands and exchanged a look with Mum that told me her visit and her invitation had been planned, and that today was definitely not the first time Mum had heard about Liv’s new job. Somehow, though, I didn’t mind them colluding behind my back. I quite liked someone else taking responsibility for my life. It stopped me having to make decisions.

  I gave Liv a weak smile. ‘When do you have to be there?’

  ‘Friday.’

  Two days away. I was glad I didn’t have too much time to think about it. With a fair amount of effort, I dragged myself to my feet.

  ‘I suppose I should go and pack,’ I said.

  Chapter 4

  Emily

  Cornwall, Autumn 1799

  The walk into Kirrinporth had never felt longer than it did that day. My legs were weak and my stomach empty, and each step was an effort.

  ‘Keep going,’ Mam said, each time I stumbled. ‘Nearly there.’

  Two seasons had passed since Da was killed, and now autumn was here and the weather was colder, and we were hungry. No one came to the inn now. Mam still got ready each evening, putting on a clean dress, pinching her cheeks to make them pink, and tying her hair up. But she sat there alone every night, drinking until she took herself off to bed.

  I wanted to help. I wanted to comfort her. And most of all, I wanted to tell her what had happened to Da. But each time I tried to speak, I couldn’t get the words out. My throat clenched and I couldn’t talk. I could write a few words – Da had taught me – but Mam couldn’t read well so even if I could have written down what happened, she wouldn’t have been able to make sense of the words. She wouldn’t look at my pictures, and they were just the men’s faces anyway, and the awful sketch of Da’s lifeless eyes with the blood spilled around his head. And always, in my head, was the memory of Da putting his finger to his lips and telling me to stay quiet, and the fear that Morgan might come back for Mam. It was frustrating not to be able to tell Mam the truth, but it was safer.

 
So time went on, and Mam still thought Da had left because of their argument, and every day I saw the hope she carried that he might come home again die a little bit more.

  I spent my days cleaning or sketching because it was all I could do. I drew Mam’s face over and over, then gazed at my pictures of her drooping mouth and sad eyes.

  The only person I could speak to now was my friend Arthur. But it had taken me a long time after Da’s death to even manage that. To begin with, all I could say was ‘Da’s gone’ before my throat tightened and the words stopped coming.

  Arthur never rushed me, and eventually, I managed to talk more with him. But only when it was just the two of us, and only if we talked of things that didn’t matter – the weather, or Arthur’s cat. I never told him what had really happened to Da, and I never told him how bad things were at the inn.

  Because bad they were. Mam and I had been all right at first. But the drinkers soon stopped coming. There were a few travellers who wandered in but not enough to stop Mam worrying over the books or crying as she counted the coins each evening. And eventually they stopped too. I didn’t know if the customers had stopped coming because they didn’t approve of a woman running a pub by herself, or because they thought we were unlucky, or cursed even. I’d heard mutters when I was in Kirrinporth. People shrinking away from me as I walked by.

  ‘That’s the Moon girl,’ they would say. ‘She’s a strange one.’ I’d heard talk of ghosts and spirits. Stories that I’d never heard before Da died. And I remembered Mam warning Da that we would be starved out, and I wondered if her strange prediction had come true.

  Now we were down to our last few coins and our bellies were aching with hunger, and Mam had looked at me that morning, hollow-eyed and so thin that she had to tie a ribbon round her waist to stop her dress trailing on the floor.

  ‘We need help,’ she said. ‘We will go into Kirrinporth and ask Mr Trewin to help us in whatever way he can.’

  I widened my eyes. Did she mean a workhouse? I felt a fluttery, panicky feeling in my chest. The inn was all I’d ever known. What about my drawing? And my bedroom? Would we have to sleep with other people? I didn’t like to be around others.