Miss Bench sighed. ‘I’m afraid I feel somewhat responsible. With so many girls to look after, it’s a question of priorities and Veronica did seem to be coping, she didn’t become clinically depressed. The only excuse I have for not giving her more attention is that at that time I suddenly found myself with a whole crop of problems to deal with. One of the fifth form girls was found to be pregnant, there was a spate of petty thieving and to cap it all there was an outbreak of german measles which decimated not only pupils but staff, too. I can tell you, by that first Christmas I was beginning to wonder if I was going to survive …
‘Anyway, the point is, that when I emerged from this period of frantic activity I realised that in the interim Charity and Veronica had become friends. Frankly, I didn’t think it would last. I believed that as time went on and Veronica regained her natural ebullience, she would revert to being one of the crowd again, but she never has. And I still don’t understand why the friendship has lasted.’
‘Has Charity any other friends?’
‘Not to my knowledge, no. Before Veronica, she was always a rather solitary creature. Rather pathetic, really.’
‘I wanted to ask you … I believe Dene Road Primary School is in your catchment area.’
‘That’s right, it is.’
‘So you know the present Head?’
‘Mr Hoskins, you mean? Yes.’
‘Do you happen to know how long he’s been there?’
‘I can easily find out.’
Miss Bench’s secretary quickly came up with the information that Mr Hoskins had become Head of Dene Road five years previously, when the former Head had retired, a Miss Foskett.
‘Foskett …’ said Miss Bench thoughtfully. ‘I’m sure I … Ah yes, I remember now. I met a retired Headmistress called Foskett a few months ago, at some local Department of Education function.’
With any luck it would be the same woman. Good. With a relatively unusual name she shouldn’t be too difficult to trace.
Thanet’s thanks were sincere. It had been a useful interview. There was one scrap of information in particular that had given him food for thought.
Outside the sun was still beating relentlessly down and the sky overhead was a very pale, unclouded blue, shading off to a whitish glare at the limits of vision. A blast of stored-up heat gushed out at him as he opened the car door. Thanet took off his jacket, which he had donned for the interview with Miss Bench, and slung it on to the passenger seat.
He wondered how Louise was, and whether Lineham was back from the hospital yet.
9
‘DS Lineham back yet?’
‘Came in about half an hour ago, sir.’
And the news wasn’t good, by the look of it, thought Thanet, as he entered his office. Only a couple of hours had gone by since he had last seen the sergeant, but in the interval the planes of Lineham’s face seemed to have sharpened and there was a taut, stretched look about his eyes.
‘How is she?’
Lineham grimaced, shook his head. ‘She says she’s fine, but I think she’s putting on an act for my benefit. Underneath I think she’s scared to death.’
Thanet sat down, prepared to listen. Joan had had two trouble-free pregnancies, thank God, but each time she’d been in hospital there had been others less fortunate. Thanet had heard enough stories to know that the maternity wards had their own share of tragedy.
‘What’s the trouble, exactly?’
‘High blood pressure. Therefore possible toxaemia.’
‘Which means?’
‘The oxygen supply to the baby diminishes, might be cut off. And of course, if that happens …’
Oh God, thought Thanet. To carry a baby for eight months and then to lose it, at the eleventh hour … ‘So what is happening?’
‘She’s been put on complete bed-rest, suitable medication, to see if they can get her blood pressure down.’
‘And if they don’t succeed?’
‘They’ll induce. Fortunately, as you pointed out earlier, she’s thirty-six weeks already and the baby’d have an excellent chance of survival.’
‘It’s a first-rate maternity unit, Mike. They’ll keep a very close eye on her. They would with any patient, but with one of their own they’ll give just that little edge of special care, I’m sure.’
Until four months ago Louise herself had been a ward sister at Sturrenden General.
‘That’s what I keep telling myself.’
‘Look, would you prefer me to put you off the Pritchard case, give you something less demanding?’
‘You mean, I’ll be no good to you, in this state?’
‘Oh come on, Mike, I hope you know me better than that. If that was what I’d meant, I’d have said so. You know perfectly well that there’s no one I prefer to work with. It’s just that I thought you might prefer to be relatively free for the next day or two.’ But even as he spoke, Thanet knew that it had been a stupid suggestion. With nothing but his anxiety to dwell on, Lineham would be far worse off than he was now.
‘I’d go round the bend. If you don’t mind, I’d really prefer to stay on.’
‘Good. But if at any time you change your mind …’
As if to demonstrate his ability to set his personal worries aside, Lineham picked up some of the papers spread out before him and said, ‘There’ve been one or two interesting developments while you were out.’
‘Oh?’
‘DC Carson’s report …’
‘On his visit to the railway station?’
‘Yes, sir, Apparently the ticket collector on duty last night says that he saw Charity get off the London train.’
‘At what time?’
‘Eight fifty-eight.’
‘Did he, now! How sure is he?’
‘Dead certain, apparently. But here’s the best bit. She was with a man.’
‘With him?’
‘That’s what the ticket collector says. Claims they got off the train together, walked along the platform together, left the station together. He remembers, he says, because that’s a pretty dead time of the evening and there were very few passengers.’
‘Let me see.’
Lineham handed the report over and Thanet read it through quickly and then again, more slowly. ‘Of course, it could just have been someone she knew, someone she met by chance on the train. In which case it would have been quite natural for them to leave the station together. Still, we’ll follow it up, obviously. Quite a good description, isn’t it? Pretty distinctive, too … “Mid-thirties, medium height, fair hair, pebble-lensed glasses, carrying an orange rucksack.” And there’s always the interesting fact that we now know—assuming the ticket collector is right—that she was away from Sturrenden yesterday, at least.’
‘He does sound pretty positive on the identification, don’t you agree, sir?’
‘I do indeed. Good. There was something else, you said?’
‘Yes. While I was waiting for you to get back, I rang the Holiday Home, as you asked.’
‘Ah yes, I tried a couple of times earlier on, but the Principal was out.’
‘Well he was back, and I managed to talk to him.’
‘And?’
Lineham hesitated—deliberately. Thanet recognised that look. He’d seen it before when the sergeant had managed to unearth a particularly intriguing piece of information.
‘Of course, there might be nothing in it …’
‘Mike!’
‘It could just be that both families happened to forget to mention it …’
Thanet sat back, clasped his hands and began to rotate his thumbs around each other in a gesture of mock impatience.
Lineham grinned. ‘Apparently Veronica and Charity did not stay for the entire weekend at Easter. They were called home a day early, by telegram—well, a tele-message, as they’re now called—addressed to Charity. One of her family was ill, apparently.’
‘Is that so?’ Thanet considered. Lineham could, of course, be right. Both the Pritcha
rds and Mrs Hodges might just have happened to forget to mention the fact, the incident having been driven out of their minds by shock, or grief, or both. Or it simply might not have occurred to them to mention it because they did not consider it to be of any significance. He said so. ‘All the same, it is just possible that neither family mentioned it because neither knew about it. In which case …’
‘The girls could have sent the telegram to themselves! Look, sir, I’ve been thinking about it while you were out. They could have been bored stiff, wanted to get away early. Perhaps they originally intended going straight home, perhaps not, but in any case, when they found they had a whole day—and night—of freedom, to do whatever they wanted to without their families knowing … Well, Charity’s parents were pretty strict, weren’t they? The temptation may have been irresistible.’
‘What are you suggesting they did?’
Lineham shrugged. ‘Could have been something perfectly innocuous, like going to the cinema—even that would have been living it up, by the Pritchards’ standards—or, just possibly, they could have decided to be a bit more daring, pick up a couple of boys.’
Thanet remembered that still, childish figure. How attractive to the opposite sex would Charity have been? But then, some men were really turned on by young girls, the younger-seeming the better …
‘They could even,’ concluded Lineham triumphantly, ‘have arranged to meet them again last weekend!’
They could indeed. Thanet remembered Veronica’s apparent ambivalence over returning to Dorset. If Charity had been the ring-leader in all this, if Veronica had not enjoyed the exercise, had dreaded going through it all over again … Yes, Lineham was right. This would certainly have to be followed up.
Lineham was watching him eagerly. ‘What do you think, sir?’
‘You don’t think, Mike, that you’re being a little, well … fanciful?’ Thanet teased.
‘Perhaps it’s catching, sir. Like measles.’ Lineham gave an impish grin.
‘Anyway, yes, you’re right. It’s definitely worth looking into. But don’t raise your hopes too high. There might be a perfectly innocent explanation.’
‘The man she got off the train with. He could be …’
Thanet held up his hand. ‘No, Mike. Let’s take it one step at a time, wait until we’ve established a few more facts.’
‘We’ll go and check with the Pritchards?’
‘Mrs Hodges, I think. I don’t really want to bother the Pritchards any more today, if I can help it.’
‘I’ll go, if you like, sir.’ Lineham was already getting up.
‘Mike! Hold your horses!’ Thanet could understand Lineham’s need to stifle anxiety with action, but had no intention of allowing it to precipitate him into rash behaviour. ‘I think we ought to discuss tactics, first.’
‘I’m not sure I follow you, sir. It’s a fairly straightforward enquiry, surely.’
‘It’s a question of timing. Consider the implications. We have here a piece of information which may be useless. The girls may quite legitimately have been called home a day early. In which case, timing wouldn’t matter. But, if the parents know nothing about that telegram, if the girls were involved in some sort of deception, then that information is potentially valuable, could open up important avenues of exploration. But, and this is the point, only one person could give us access to them.’
‘Veronica.’
‘Exactly. And we have an appointment with her in—let me see—just under four hours from now. Now think. If, meanwhile, we went to see her mother, discovered that she knew nothing about all this …’
‘The first thing she’d do when Veronica got home would be to tackle her about it and we’d not only lose the element of surprise, she’d have time to think up a story, too … Good grief! Did you say just under four hours from now?’ Lineham consulted his watch, leapt out of his chair. ‘It’s a quarter past five, already, and I promised Louise I’d pick one or two things up for her before the shops close this afternoon. Would you mind …?’
Thanet waved a hand. ‘Carry on. There’s nothing urgent, here. You still want to come to the Hodges’ this evening?’
Lineham grinned. ‘Try and stop me.’
‘See you there, at nine, then.’
When Lineham had gone Thanet sat back in his chair and closed his eyes. At once his mind was full of confused images and snatches of conversation from the many interviews he had conducted today. His impressions of Charity were gradually gaining substance; outwardly conformist, abiding faithfully by the rigid rules laid down by her overbearing father, she had lived a life apparently blameless in the extreme. And yet … underneath, there was more to it, he was sure. There had, for instance, been something about her which invariably provoked dislike—antipathy, even. Aunt, Headmistress, friend’s mother, all had felt it in varying degrees, and her one friend had been a friend in name only, it seemed. How had this come about? What had gone wrong in the life of this young girl, to make her incapable of forming good relationships with others?
‘Charity was forever in hot water at school.’
Mrs Hodges remark returned once more to intrigue him. If this were true, what had happened to change the child so radically?
He opened his eyes and reached for the telephone directory. As he had expected, there were very few Fosketts and only two were local. One was a man, the other an E V Foskett. Address, Jasmine Cottage, Nettleton. Nettleton was on his way home …
The voice at the other end of the telephone was brisk, businesslike. E V Foskett it seemed, was indeed the former Head of Dene Road Primary School. Yes, Charity had been one of her pupils and certainly, Inspector Thanet was welcome to call if he thought she could be of any help.
‘I’ll be with you in about fifteen minutes,’ he said with satisfaction.
10
Jasmine Cottage was quite the tiniest cottage Thanet had ever seen. Tucked away in a little lane off the main street of Nettleton village, its minute leaded windows, timbered walls and crooked chimney would have elicited murmurs of admiration from any foreign tourist. The garden was to scale. There was a pocket-handkerchief of a lawn, surrounded by low stone walls topped with cushions of yellow alyssum and a delicately-woven tapestry of aubretia in palest pink, red, purple and mauve. Trained against the house wall was a rare Banksia rose, with its clusters of tiny golden blossoms. Thanet inhaled their scent appreciatively as he waited for the door to open.
After all this miniature beauty Miss Foskett was a surprise. Square and chunky, with iron-grey hair cut in an uncompromising bob, she almost filled the low doorway.
‘Do come in,’ she said with a smile. ‘This is exciting. I’ve never had a policeman on my doorstep before. Though I deplore the circumstances which have brought you here, of course.’
The sitting room displayed the same diminutive charm: low ceiling, spindly occasional tables, a small Persian rug on the floor of polished red brick.
Miss Foskett waved him into a pretty Victorian spoonback armchair and seated herself in the only sizeable piece of furniture in the room, a large wing chair beside the inglenook fireplace. He was disconcerted to find that her eyes were twinkling with amusement.
‘I know what you’re thinking,’ she said. ‘We don’t match.’
I don’t believe it, thought Thanet. Two perceptive witnesses in one afternoon … He smiled back. ‘Well, to be honest …’
‘I can always tell, when someone’s clever enough to spot the discrepancy. It doesn’t happen often, but when it does I always feel I owe them an explanation. The truth is, I inherited it all, lock, stock and barrel, from a truly miniscule aunt who died at the ripe old age of eighty-nine, last year. I was living in a rather dreary bungalow at the time, and frankly, I couldn’t resist. The whole place was so delightful I decided to keep it exactly as it was. Except for this chair,’ and she patted the arm as if it were a dog, ‘my nice roomy bed and a few odds and ends with sentimental associations.’ She frowned and her eyes grew sombre. ‘So
you want to talk to me about Charity Pritchard, poor girl.’
‘Yes.’
‘I don’t see how I can possibly help, but of course I’m willing to try.’
Thanet decided to come straight to the point.
‘I’ve been talking to Mrs Hodges, Veronica’s mother …’
‘Just a moment. Hodges … Ah yes, I remember Veronica. A fluffy, rather silly little girl, as I recall. But I don’t quite see …’
‘She and Charity have been close friends for the last couple of years, by all accounts.’
‘Really? You do surprise me. Chalk and cheese, those two.’
‘According to Mrs Hodges, at one time, while the two girls were pupils at Dene Road, Charity was always in hot water. Veronica was forever coming home with tales of Charity’s escapades. And then, apparently, the stories suddenly stopped. Is this true?’
Miss Foskett sighed. ‘I’m afraid so.’
‘Would you tell me about it?’
‘Certainly. Though I must confess I don’t like dwelling on my failures any more than the next man.’
‘What do you mean, failures? No, sorry, perhaps you could ignore that for the moment. I’d like to hear about Charity’s behaviour, first.’
‘Charity was my failure. Look, are you sure you want me to go into all this? It’s all water under the bridge now, and rather a long story.’
‘It’s why I’ve come.’
She shrugged. ‘If you think it will help …’
Thanet sat back and prepared to listen.
‘It’s difficult to know where to begin, really …’ She caught his eyes, smiled. ‘I know … at the beginning. Very well … Soon after she started school, it became obvious that Charity was going to be a difficult pupil—disobedient, lacking in application and concentration, rebellious, uncooperative, often downright naughty. She was bright, mind, but whatever we did we couldn’t seem to harness her abilities, get her to use them constructively. We tried everything—praise, admonition, condemnation, punishment, but nothing worked. I kept on hoping she would settle down, find her feet, but to no avail.’
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