by Anita Waller
He confirmed everything Emily had said, and agreed to visit a local police station the next day to give a DNA sample.
Tessa didn’t see him thump the wall and wipe away tears. She was already driving away to the next part of the investigation.
Chapter Seven
Doris was reading through her coursework when the shop bell pinged. She looked up to see a man of medium height, with white hair and a thick jacket which proclaimed The North Face on the front of it. It was blue, and matched his eyes exactly.
‘Hello,’ he said. ‘I’m Ewan Barker. I have an appointment…’
‘Welcome, Mr Barker. My name is Doris Lester. I spoke to you on the telephone.’
‘Doris, I’m delighted to meet you. And please call me Ewan.’
Doris smiled. ‘And it’s good to meet you, Ewan. I’ve booked you in with Katerina, although she prefers to be called Kat. Would you like a coffee?’
‘Thank you, I would. It’s freezing out there.’
‘Then let me take you through to Kat’s office, and I’ll get you one from her machine.’ She moved towards Kat’s office door, and Ewan followed her. She knocked and waited until she heard Kat call to come in, then opened the door. Kat stood with a smile.
‘Please come in, Mr Barker. Coffee?’
‘I’ll get it, Kat,’ Doris said, and moved to the side table. She quickly poured it, and handed it to the client who had removed his coat.
‘It may be freezing out there,’ he said, ‘but it’s certainly too toasty for this jacket in here.’
‘Enjoy,’ Doris said, and left him to Kat’s ministrations.
‘Okay, Mr Barker, I need to take some details before we get to the nitty-gritty of everything else.’ She pushed a form across the desk to him, along with a pen, and asked him to complete it.
Two minutes later, he gave it back to her with a smile. ‘All done,’ he said. ‘And it’s Ewan, please.’
‘Thank you, Ewan.’ She opened her top drawer. ‘Do you mind if we record our conversation? It’s so much easier than taking notes, and it ensures I don’t miss anything.’
‘Not at all.’
‘Thank you.’ She switched on the tiny machine and placed it between them. ‘So, start at the beginning, and tell me how we can help. We will require a retainer before we start any work, as you saw on the form, but we don’t stretch anything out, we get on with it and complete as quickly as possible.’
‘I know,’ he said, turning his blue eyes towards her. ‘You come highly recommended.’
He took a moment to think before he started speaking. ‘My son, or so I was told many years ago, is called Michael, and it was mooted during the pregnancy that if it was a boy, he would be Michael Ewan. His mother was Helen Fairfax. Helen was reluctant to discuss getting married, and was pretty upset that it looked as though she would be forced into that situation because of the pregnancy, but I always reassured her we could have the baby, and then decide our futures. She eventually came to accept that. The baby was due November 1968, and in September she left. She was seven months pregnant and simply disappeared. We lived on the outskirts of Sheffield at the time, and she had lots of friends. She worked in one of the department stores, Atkinsons, and there was quite a crowd of them who socialised. When I thought about it later, after she’d gone, I realised it wasn’t the marriage she didn’t want, I think it was the baby. It stopped what she saw as her life.’
He hesitated, gathering his thoughts.
‘How did you find out she’d had him?’
‘I bumped into one of her friends in a pub one night, and she said she wouldn’t tell me where Helen was, but she’d seen the baby and his name was Michael. Carla, the friend, gave me her own name, address and phone number, and I rang her fairly regularly over about a year, but I sensed she was getting a bit fed up with me ringing, so I stopped. I’ve never seen Michael, but I know Carla had a photo of him because she’d held the baby when she went to see Helen. She said he looked like me. Recently I had a triple heart bypass. It focusses your mind when something like that happens, and I really would like to see him. I did marry eventually, but Jean and I never had children. She died five years ago, so I thought it was time I sorted out my life. I’m hoping you can help me, Kat, because I don’t have any sort of idea where to start.’
‘Then let’s start with what we do know. Do you by any chance still have the name of the friend you used to ring?’
He took out his wallet. ‘I do,’ he said and handed over a small piece of card that had clearly started life as a beer mat. ‘But I do need to make it clear it’s not Helen I’m looking for. It’s Michael. Helen is the same age as me, seventy, born in 1948 on the 10th October – we shared a birthday. We actually met on our eighteenth birthdays – we celebrated them in the same pub. We were pretty inseparable until the day she disappeared. She left me a note, which I screwed up and threw away, so I’m sorry I don’t have that to show you. It said something along the lines of she didn’t want commitment, and she would be in touch when the baby was born. That, of course, never happened.’ He delved further into his wallet. ‘This is the only photo I have of Helen. Please take care of it.’
‘I’ll photocopy it, and you can put it back where it belongs in your wallet. I can give no guarantees, Ewan, that we will find him. Sometimes, when people want to disappear, they do it effectively. She may have left the country, taking her son with her, and although we could probably track that, once someone is in a different country they simply vanish well under the radar.’
‘I understand, really I do. But I have to try. I’m not a rich man, Kat, but neither am I poor. Michael should inherit what is rightfully his, but it’s not even about that. I simply want to see him, find out what kind of a man he is. I see him in my head as not too tall – both parents are only average height, and with fair hair. Helen and I were both blonde.’
Kat smiled. ‘Ewan, I promise we’ll give this our best shot. We’ll use Twitter and Facebook to help, if that’s okay with you, but if you say no to social media, we’ll use other means. We won’t use your name, only Helen’s and Michael’s. How do you feel about that?’
‘Kat, I can’t come to you for help with finding Michael, and then put restrictions on it. Do whatever you need to do, I’m confident you’ll be working with my best interests at heart.’
‘We’ll keep you fully informed every step of the way, so if ever you want to call a halt to something, get back to us quickly. This is our business card with the three mobile numbers on it, so that you can reach us any time.’ She slid the small card across the table to him. ‘We will be starting work on this immediately, so please check your emails every day in case we have queries. For anything urgent, we will of course ring you. Will you be paying your retainer by card or cheque?’
‘By card. That okay?’
‘It’s absolutely fine. You’ll need to sort that out with Doris before you go. She keeps us in line with the finances.’ Kat stood. ‘Thank you for your trust in us, Ewan. I hope we can solve this for you, I really do.’ She held out her hand and he stood and shook it.
‘Thank you, Kat. I’ll go and see that lovely lady on reception. She has a beautiful smile.’
Kat laughed. ‘You should see her when she’s doing her karate training. The smile disappears then. But you’re right, she is lovely. And before you go I need to introduce you to Beth, my business partner and Doris’s granddaughter, because she will be working on this case as well, and if she has to ring you, you need to know who she is. Beth and Doris are our technology experts. I’m the thinker, so they say.’
She picked up her phone and spoke to Beth.
Seconds later, Beth and her red nose came through the adjoining door, and shook hands with their new client. ‘Pleased to meet you, Ewan, but don’t come any closer. I was considering going home to bed and staying there for a week until this has passed.’
‘Whisky and lemon,’ Ewan said. ‘Go on, get off home.’
‘Good Lord,’ Beth said.
‘He sounds like my nan.’
‘Beth, go home,’ Kat said. ‘You can’t possibly be working. I’ll bet anything you’re laid back in your chair with your eyes closed, feeling sorry for yourself.’
‘Haven’t done a thing since I arrived,’ she confessed. ‘I’ll be in bed if anybody needs me.’ She turned and went back into her own office.
Kat photocopied the small picture of Helen Fairfax, and handed the original back to Ewan. She took him through to reception, and left him with Doris to pay his retainer.
Doris keyed the relevant information into the machine, and handed it to Ewan to insert his card. With the transaction completed, he smiled at her.
‘I don’t suppose there’s another cup of coffee going, is there?’
‘Of course. And a biscuit,’ she responded with a laugh. She pulled out a chair tucked under her desk at the back of reception, and closed the laptop lid, before pushing the computer to the edge of the table.
‘Please, sit down, Ewan. I’ll get our drinks. Presumably Kat was able to offer you some hope?’
Ewan sat. ‘She offered me an opportunity, which I’ve never felt I had before. It’s the fact that somebody is trying to find my son, it’s a massive thing to me. Even if Helen, the boy’s mother, managed to spirit him away completely, at least I’ll know I tried.’
Doris nodded. She handed him the coffee, and opened up her biscuit box. ‘Help yourself,’ she said, and sat on the other chair. ‘You live in Grindleford, I understand.’
‘I do. Love it there. I used to live in Bradwell, but I found I needed a bigger garden. This was prior to my triple heart bypass,’ he said with a grin. ‘Now I need a smaller one.’
‘I live in Bradwell,’ Doris said.
‘I left in 2000, when my wife was still alive. She didn’t want to leave, she loved our house there, but did recognise its limitations. How long have you lived there? I don’t remember you.’
‘Two days,’ Doris said with another laugh. ‘I’ve bought a little cottage up near the Bowling Green Inn. One small front garden, but a much bigger back one.’
Mouse came out of her office and walked over to Doris’s desk. She bent down and kissed her nan on the top of her head. ‘I’m going to bed. This damn cold is settled in my head, and it needs to be on a pillow. Please don’t disturb me unless there’s a dead body or something exciting.’
Doris stood and hugged her granddaughter. ‘I’ll pop up and see you before I go home. I’ll not wake you if you’re asleep.’
Mouse walked out of the shop, and Ewan stood. ‘Does she need a lift? She looks dreadful.’
‘No, she’s fine. She lives above here. The white door at the side of this shop is her front door. She’ll be in bed in thirty seconds.’
‘Dead body? I assume she’s joking.’
Doris thought for a moment. ‘Not really. We’ve had one or two to deal with as part of past investigations. And Mouse… Beth… was almost one herself.’
‘Mouse? You call her Mouse?’ His smile was infectious.
‘We do. When she was born she was tiny, like a little mouse, and the name has stuck with her throughout her life. Kat has known her a couple of years, and she calls her Mouse too. It suits her.’
‘You’re close?’
‘Very. She lost her parents when she was sixteen and I stepped in. But we’re friends more than anything. I keep her on the straight and narrow, or try to anyway, and she says Oh Nan, repeatedly. It’s a good relationship. And we have Kat. She too calls me Nan, so this business partnership is a lot more than simply that.’
‘How wonderful,’ Ewan said, and reached across for a second garibaldi. ‘I can’t resist these damn biscuits. It’s why I don’t buy them.’
They chatted for a further five minutes and then Ewan stood and put on his coat. ‘Thank you for this, Doris. It’s been lovely spending time with you. Could I take you out for a drink sometime? Maybe the Bowling Green?’
Doris felt her cheeks redden. ‘Oh… erm… yes. Yes, that would be lovely.’
‘Tomorrow night? I can either collect you, or we can meet in the pub.’
Doris felt flustered. ‘We can meet in the pub. It’s only two minutes away. Eight o’clock?’
‘That will be great. I’ll look forward to it. And if anything crops up to prevent it, we have each other’s contact details. I do understand you have an unusual occupation, so plans may have to change. Thank you for today, Doris. This has turned out so much better than I could possibly have imagined.’
Chapter Eight
Marsden was sitting at her desk in Chesterfield when her email pinged. She read through it and then leaned back with a sigh. So there was no connection between the foetus from Orla French’s womb and the accident victim Jacob Thorne.
She spun her chair round to look out of the window, and pushed her hair back. She knew something was wrong about the whole thing with Jacob Thorne; two missing persons, yet only one body had been found. Gut instinct told her that the mud-covered Jacob had been involved in the second one, but no further bodies had shown up in Castleton.
She was aware that her colleagues were already considering it to be two deaths by the same hand, but she wasn’t convinced. If she could place a bet on it, she would say that Orla French’s tragic death was linked to her pregnancy; the second missing person Tessa would say was linked to Jacob Thorne. She hoped that one was a missing person and not a death.
She stood abruptly, deciding it was time to head back out to Castleton. ‘Hannah,’ she called, and DS Granger popped her head around the open door of Marsden’s office.
‘Boss?’
‘Come on, we’re going out. I need to be back in Castleton, and soon. I don’t want Zoe Williamson thinking we’ve given up. And bring some DNA kits. We need to eliminate people from suspicion about this baby.’
Nadine Bond opened the door to Tessa and Hannah, and spoke quietly. ‘They’re both still in bed. They hadn’t gone to bed at three this morning, so I’m leaving them to catch up on some sleep. I think they both need it. Do you want me to wake them?’
Tessa shook her head. ‘No, we’ll go to Zoe Williamson’s first, see how she’s doing. And I don’t think for one minute she’ll be sleeping.’
Zoe felt as though she hadn’t slept for months. Her hair, unbrushed, was hanging loosely around her face, and her eyes were red-rimmed from a combination of constant tears and lack of sleep.
She looked up as Siân Dawson led Tessa and Hannah into the kitchen. She was sitting at the table, her hands wrapped around a mug of tea. She looked at them without hope, as if her mind had already accepted that she wouldn’t see her daughter again.
‘We have no news,’ Marsden said, keeping her voice gentle. ‘I wanted to check in with you, to let you know the search hasn’t slowed down, we’ve simply had to widen it. We have had groups of officers all over Castleton, and have spread out towards the Hope area, and up into the hills around Winnat’s Pass.’
She watched as Zoe’s bottom lip trembled. ‘You think you’ll find her alive?’
‘I don’t know.’ Again Marsden spoke quietly. ‘It’s been so cold during the nights, and she has been missing for two of them…’
She watched as Zoe dipped her head in acknowledgment.
‘You’ve had no further thoughts on who the man was? The one she was meeting?’
‘No, I’m sorry. I’ve been backwards and forwards on this, but Mandy was… is… such a private girl. She wouldn’t have told me until they were practically engaged. She wasn’t the sort to bring friends home from school, or even to talk about anything that had happened at school. She went through her life quietly, organising it to suit her. She wasn’t ambitious, was quite happy to be in Castleton, never yearning for the bright lights of cities, she was a contented child and an accepting adult.’
Zoe stood and walked to the window, as if expecting to see Mandy walking up the back garden path. ‘I miss her, I miss her quietness. It feels so wrong here without her.’ She fished out a ti
ssue that had been tucked up her sleeve, and dabbed at her eyes. She turned.
‘Is it the same man who’s killed Orla? Has he taken my Mandy as well?’
The Williamsons and the Harrisons lived a mere three streets away from each other; grief was palpable in both homes. Marsden drove from Zoe’s home around to Andy and Marnie’s, feeling as if the weight of the universe was on her shoulders.
Andy and Marnie were sitting in the lounge, neither speaking, both staring at the mound of mail that had been sent by caring people wanting to express their sympathy. Their small front garden, edged by a stone wall, was covered in sprays of flowers, with candles flickering gamely in the wind for minutes before being extinguished by a stronger gust of wind.
Andy looked up at Tessa, bleakness etched into the lines on his face.
‘DI Marsden,’ he said. ‘Any news?’
‘Nothing as yet, Andy.’ Tessa turned to Hannah, who handed her a sealed tube. ‘I need a sample of DNA, for exclusion purposes, Andy, please.’
He looked shocked. ‘To exclude me from what? I was in Manchester when Orla… when she was…’ He stopped, as if unable to say the words.
‘I know.’ Again the gentleness was evident in Marsden’s voice. ‘We’re taking samples from as many men in the village as we can get around, or track. Somebody fathered your stepdaughter’s baby, and it’s quite possible that whoever did that, killed her because he didn’t want that pregnancy to progress. Taking DNA samples is always more about exclusion than inclusion. So, if you can open your mouth, sir, we’ll cross you off our list of male residents.’
She gave him no choice, no chance to argue against what they were doing. He opened his mouth, and she scraped cells off the insides of his cheeks before putting the sample stick back into the tube. Hannah wrote his name on the label.