Cry of the Children

by J M Gregson

  ‘What horror is this?’ Dean spoke flatly, as if convention demanded that he ask the question, when he had no real interest in the answer.

  ‘You haven’t heard?’

  ‘If it’s something round here, I wouldn’t have. I went straight to my work from Ledbury this morning. We’re working on an extension to a house in Breinton, up near Hereford. I spent the morning plastering.’ He lifted his hands a little, then dropped them back to his sides, as if explaining his appearance. Bert Hook wondered if he was aware of the white plaster powder in his sparse hair.

  Sitting beside Hook, Lambert seemed not to be blinking at all, as if he sought to balance the reactions of the man across the table, who was now blinking furiously and unpredictably. He stared grimly at Gibson as he said, ‘A boy a year older than Lucy was taken last night. He was snatched from Church Lane in Oldford when he was on his way back to Bartram House. No doubt you know the place.’

  ‘I know it, yes. Church Lane is not far from where I used to live, when I was still with Anthea.’ It was a relief to confess something so undamaging. He said suddenly, ‘How is Anthea?’

  ‘Our family liaison officer tells me that she is doing as well as can be expected. I understand she stayed with her sister for a few days.’

  The faintest of smiles twisted the bloodless lips for no more than a second. ‘In Gloucester, yes. That would be Lisa. She never liked me, Lisa. She thought Anthea could have done better. I suppose she was right.’

  ‘Forgive me, Mr Gibson, but we need to—’

  ‘Is that man with Anthea? The one who was with Lucy when she went missing. That Matt Boyd?’

  ‘I don’t think so. But we are not here to talk about Mr Boyd, Mr Gibson. Do you know a boy called Raymond Barrington?’

  ‘No. Is that his name – the boy who was taken from Church Lane? It is, isn’t it?’

  ‘That is his name, yes. Where were you last night, Mr Gibson?’

  ‘At home. Or at least in the place I have to call home now, in Ledbury.’

  ‘And is there someone who can confirm that for us?’

  Furious blinking. ‘No. I don’t think there is.’

  ‘What about your landlady in Ledbury?’

  ‘She wouldn’t do that. She’s a right cow who hasn’t any time for me. She’d like to see you arrest me over this boy.’

  ‘Are you saying that she’d tell us lies to get you in trouble? Are you saying that she’d say that you were out last night, even if you were in your room all night?’

  There was such a long silence that it seemed he wasn’t going to respond at all. Then he said wearily, ‘I was out last night.’

  ‘At what time?’

  ‘I can’t be sure of that. I was tired after work. I had a good wash, then lay on the bed for a while. Then I went out for something to eat. I’m not sure what the time was when I went.’

  ‘Where did you go for your food?’

  ‘Fish and chip shop.’

  ‘In Ledbury?’

  ‘Yes. I doubt if they’d remember me. The place was busy. Often is on a Wednesday night, apparently.’ His eyes blinked furiously, but they couldn’t interpret that as a sign of strain or dishonesty; it was plainly a nervous reaction to stress which he could not control.

  ‘So can we presume that you weren’t out for long?’

  ‘I don’t know how long I was out. I sat and ate the fish and chips in the van. I had a Mars bar for afters. But then I sat in a lay-by for a long time. I was thinking about Lucy and Anthea and everything that’s happened.’

  He spoke with such conviction that Lambert was sure that all this had happened at some time. Whether it had happened last night was what concerned him now. And Gibson’s mention of the van provided the cue for questioning, which they had already agreed was to be DS Hook’s concern.

  Hook said quietly, ‘You told us on Monday that you rode a bicycle.’

  ‘Yes. It’s old but it’s reliable. I’ve got lights on it. It’s all quite legal.’ When Hook didn’t respond, he added impetuously, ‘It’s a Raleigh. The gears work well and the change is easy.’ He’d hoped that piling on the detail would make his story more convincing, but he knew as he spoke that it merely sounded ridiculous.

  ‘You told us that you’d ridden this bike to the fair in Oldford on Saturday night. That wasn’t true, was it, Dean?’

  Dean tried to control the welter of eyelid flutterings that now hit him. They were so fierce that they seemed to move his head about. He needed to look and sound convincing, and he couldn’t do that with this damned affliction. He gripped the edge of the table and said, ‘No, that wasn’t correct. I’m sorry. I came in the van.’

  ‘And did you put Lucy in it and take her away?’

  ‘No!’ The tortured monosyllable thundered his pain around the walls of the interview room.

  ‘Then why lie about it? Why did you pretend that you had ridden over from Ledbury on your bike?’

  He stared at the table. ‘The van isn’t mine. It belongs to the man who is at present employing me. I’m allowed to use it for work and to collect supplies from the builders’ merchants. I thought Frank Lewis might be annoyed if he found I was using it for pleasure.’

  ‘Even for a short trip at the weekend to see the daughter you’d had to leave behind enjoying herself at the fairground?’

  Dean clamped his eyes shut. It was surely better to speak with them shut, however odd he might look, than to have them fluttering ridiculously as he tried to convince these two watchful, experienced men. But it was no good. He was blinking again as he said, ‘I haven’t worked for him long and I need the work. He’s a bit – well, a bit unpredictable, Frank Lewis. But he pays well and I can do the work. Frank might take me on as permanent if I can impress him and he thinks I’m reliable. I did a good plastering job for him this morning – there aren’t many casuals as can do good plastering.’

  ‘But isn’t it understood when you’re allowed the use of a van in these circumstances that you’re going to use it in your private life as well? Not to drive to Cornwall or up to Scotland, perhaps, but to run around locally, to see your daughter or go to the chip shop?’

  ‘I suppose so. I suppose Frank Lewis expects that: he’s not daft. But I didn’t want to go telling the police I was using his van like that. Not with the situation I’m in at present. I need the work.’

  He repeated the phrase plaintively. Hook studied him for a moment, then nodded. ‘So we need to amend the statement you signed on Monday. On Saturday night, you came to Oldford in Frank Lewis’s van, not on your Raleigh bicycle. Did you in fact arrive at the fair in time to watch Lucy on the rides, rather than too late to see her, as you told us on Monday?’

  ‘No. I never saw Lucy on Saturday night.’

  Hook went on as if he hadn’t spoken. ‘And did you in fact seize Lucy, on the blind side of the roundabout where Matt Boyd could not see you, and whisk her away into the woods?’

  ‘No! I didn’t see Lucy on Saturday. The last time I saw her was a fortnight ago!’ Dean strove to make it sound convincing, but the words seemed too simple and too bland for his purpose.

  Hook’s voice was quiet, understanding, but relentless. ‘Didn’t you in fact bundle Lucy into the van and take her away from Matt Boyd, the man you resented being in your bed and in your position as Lucy’s parent?’

  Dean felt very weary. He’d hardly slept since the weekend and he had given the plastering all his energy and all his concentration this morning. It felt now that it would be so much easier to agree with this sympathetic, persuasive voice and let these older men have their way. It took an effort for him to say jadedly, ‘No. I didn’t see Lucy at the fair on Saturday. I keep telling you that.’

  ‘You do indeed, Dean. But you kept telling us that you’d come to Oldford on your bike that night, until we forced you to admit otherwise. We’re deeply sorry about Lucy, but if you know anything about her death, you had much better tell us about it here and now.’

  Here and now sounded very
persuasive to the man on the other side of the table and the recorder. But he said doggedly, ‘I don’t know anything about my poor Lucy. I just want you to get to whoever killed her. Can I go now?’

  ‘Not just yet, Dean. You were out in your van last night. At least we’ve agreed on that, this time. Were you in Church Lane in Oldford?’

  ‘No. I didn’t go more than a couple of miles from Ledbury.’

  ‘Do you know Bartram House?’

  ‘Yes. It’s at the end of Church Lane. It’s a home for children who are taken into care. I wish my Lucy had been in care. She’d have been safe then.’

  ‘Perhaps she would, Dean. But Raymond Barrington was in care, and he wasn’t safe, was he? Do you know where Raymond is, Dean?’

  ‘No. I didn’t take him and I don’t know where he is.’

  ‘Did you put him in that little van and take him somewhere secret, Dean? Somewhere you’d taken Lucy, perhaps?’

  ‘No! I didn’t take him and I didn’t take Lucy. Why can’t you believe me?’

  ‘It’s our job to ask these questions, Dean. Sometimes we believe what people say, sometimes we don’t. But we have to go on asking the questions until we are sure about the truth.’

  It sounded very convincing in his exhausted ears. He nodded, his eyes shut, his hands clasped together on the table in front of him.

  Hook said, ‘Did you come here this afternoon in Mr Lewis’s van?’

  Dean nodded again, feeling that if his eyes opened they would see only fear in them, that if his mouth opened they would hear only uncertainty in his words.

  ‘Our forensic team is already on site. I’d like them to have a quick look at that van before you go.’

  Dean Gibson nodded hopelessly, giving the consent he was in no position to withhold.

  Hook glanced at Lambert, received his nod of consent and said, ‘If you come with me, Dean, I’ll get you a large mug of tea and a sandwich from our canteen. You look as if you need them.’

  SEVENTEEN

  It was almost dark when the monster came back. Raymond Barrington woke with a start of fear as he heard the vehicle reversing outside the window.

  There was very little light left in the sky. That meant it must be about seven o’clock, he thought. He scrambled hastily off the bed as he heard the key turn in the lock. Seconds later, the room blazed with light and the monster stood in the doorway, looking at him fiercely. Perhaps it was trying to assess what he had been doing during the long hours in which he had been left. Raymond blinked his eyes, dazzled by the sudden light. He could see only nose and eyes between the scarf the monster had wrapped around its face and the cap above it.

  That nose was now wrinkled in distaste. Raymond glanced at the bucket with the magazine on top, then fearfully back at the monster. ‘I had to use it. I thought that was what it was for. There’s a stink, isn’t there? I’m sorry about that, but I couldn’t help it.’

  He poured the words out rapidly, fearful that he might be punished before he could make his explanation. The monster didn’t speak, didn’t even look at him again. It marched across to the bucket and threw the magazine on the floor. Then it picked up the bucket without even looking at its contents; Raymond was glad about that. Then it marched to the door with the bucket and disappeared.

  Raymond thought for a moment that he might make a dash for it whilst the monster was attending to the contents of the bucket, but even as the thought entered his head he heard the key turn in the lock. There was the sound of a toilet flushing somewhere above his head, then other, more muffled sounds. He tried to follow the directions of the monster’s footsteps, but he couldn’t do that. Then the key turned again in the door and it was back in the room, setting the bucket down at one side of it, taking something out of a new Tesco’s bag and putting it on the square table.

  The monster hadn’t spoken at all yet. That made Raymond more afraid of what it might do to him if he annoyed it. He said, ‘I ate some of the bread you brought. And the margarine and the jam. It tasted very good. Thank you.’

  There was a grunt. The thing didn’t look at him. It stood between him and the table, keeping its back to him. Raymond realized now that it didn’t want to be seen, that it didn’t want him to recognize it. He tried to think of people he had seen before, and whether it might be someone he would know if he saw the complete face. He couldn’t. But the fact that it feared him, just a little and just in this one small thing, made him bolder. He nodded towards the now empty and shining bucket. ‘I had to use it. And I couldn’t wash my hands, when I’d been. I haven’t been able to wash any of me, not since you brought me here. I want to wash myself.’

  He could never remember wishing that in his life before. It wasn’t what you did, when you were a boy. You approached soap and water reluctantly. Adults drove you to it and then checked that you’d washed the bits you might choose to miss, like behind your ears. It wasn’t until he’d been put in the care home that he’d known people washed their hands when they’d been to the lavvies. But he’d got into the habit now, and he remembered all those dire warnings about germs that Mrs Allen had given him. Once he had voiced the thought, he felt an overwhelming need to wash his palms and his fingers, which must surely be teeming with germs.

  He thought at first that the monster was going to ignore him. Then it turned suddenly and nodded. It came swiftly across to him and reached out a hand, so that Raymond cringed instinctively towards the floor and prepared himself for a blow. But the thing didn’t hit him. It took him by the scruff of the neck and pulled him towards the door. But it handled him quite gently. There wasn’t the violence it had used to seize him and fling him into the passenger seat of the van on their first contact. It led him to the door and then out of the room. When he stood uncertainly in the hall, it pushed him up steep, narrow stairs. Raymond saw a small red light, bright in the darkness beside a cupboard.

  Then they were at the door of a room and the monster spoke for the first time on this visit. ‘Wash here. Have a bath or a shower, but don’t take too long. Shout for me when you finish. You don’t try to escape. Deal?’

  ‘Deal!’ Raymond agreed hastily. The monster had asked him for something, rather than giving him orders. Raymond was certain for the first time that he was going to survive this.

  Then he was thrust into the room. It was suddenly ablaze with a clear white light as the door shut behind him. It was a bathroom. There was a bath along one wall and a separate shower beside it. They were new and gleaming, much shinier than the ones at Bartram House. They were so clean and shiny that Raymond didn’t want to soil them. He looked at the door behind him, then turned to it and drew the small bolt there with elaborate care, trying to make sure that it did not even squeak. He was sure the monster wouldn’t like it if it found that he’d drawn the bolt and locked it out.

  Raymond breathed a little more easily when the bolt was drawn without any reaction from the landing outside. He tiptoed across to the lavatory in the corner and peed, making sure that it went against the porcelain, not into the water at the bottom of the bowl; he wanted to be as quiet as possible. The cistern seemed to make a great noise in the silent house as he flushed it. But that seemed to help Raymond to think, as if the noise of flushing water was disguising his thoughts and keeping them from the monster.

  He wasn’t going to have either a bath or a shower, despite what the monster had said. He wasn’t going to take all his clothes off with that thing anywhere near him. He went to the washbasin, turned the hot tap, then stripped off the top half of his clothing. He thought it might be filthy, but the collar of the grey shirt he had put on for cubs was still quite clean. It seemed impossible that it was only a day since he had been at cubs. Was it really only twenty-four hours since the monster had snatched him on his way back to Bartram House? It was, but Raymond went over what had happened several times before he could accept it.

  The water was hot. He realized that the red light they’d passed must be for an immersion heater. They had one with
a similar light at Bartram House, but they weren’t allowed to switch it on, except for emergencies. The monster must have switched this one on earlier to warm the water. It seemed to know its way around this cottage pretty well. Perhaps this is where it lived some of the time. He wondered where it went to when it went away, and how far they were from Oldford and Bartram House. Raymond washed himself quickly, dried himself on the softest towel he’d ever used, then put his shirt and his green cub sweatshirt back on.

  He was glad he’d promised the monster that he wouldn’t try to escape. He wouldn’t have fancied making a bolt for it across country he’d never seen in the dark, not with that thing after him. He slid back the bolt, opened the door and called tremulously, ‘I’ve finished my wash. Thank you.’

  The monster was at his side in seconds. It took his hand this time, not the collar of his shirt, and led him back downstairs. It was so gentle with him that he wondered if it might be female. It would need to be a big woman, though, because it was a strong hand that was clutching his. He realized with that thought that he knew the monster was human, not some creature from a book. He wasn’t sure how good that was. There were some nasty humans about. He’d met some of them, when he’d lived with his mother. And it was something human that had done those things to Lucy Gibson, the girl from his school.

  He was back in the familiar room now, seated obediently at the small square table. The monster brought him cottage pie in a plastic container. It was very hot. Perhaps it had been heated in a microwave. Raymond scarcely remembered his mother now, but he remembered the microwave, which was all they’d had to cook with.

  The monster went back to the room next door, which must be a kitchen, because it brought Raymond a dish of sliced peaches from a tin, a chocolate digestive biscuit and a beaker of hot, sweet tea. Raymond didn’t take sugar, but he sipped the tea obediently and munched the biscuit with it. The tea was much too sweet, but he didn’t dare to leave it. The monster took his dishes away whilst he drank the tea. He heard the sound of them being washed in that other room which he had never seen. It didn’t lock the door on him this time, perhaps because he would have had to pass the door of the next room to get out of the house.