The Chapel

by S. T. Boston

  “Well we can’t have you letting yourself go already can we,” he said with a smile that seemed false. False because it never reached his eyes.

  “Is something wrong? What did Sue say?” Tara felt a ubiquitous nervousness come over her, but she wasn’t quite sure why.

  “There’s been a development,” Mike said seriously. “I’ll bring you up to date in the car.” She stood and he pulled the chair back for her like a true gentleman. I’ll bring you up to date in the car, she thought to herself. The way he spoke sometimes made her smile, regimented and, well – police like, as if she were his partner in a crime-fighting duo, both part of some gumshoe type detective series like Morse. It was one of the things that made her feel safe, though. Mike was reliable and unlike her past mistakes would never do anything to hurt her either physically or emotionally.

  The Cessna that had pulled off its haphazard take off as they’d enjoyed their meal was now buzzing away on a circular decent above them. It droned around like a fly caught in a room, circling frantically looking for an escape. As she climbed into the passenger seat of Mike's Jeep it buzzed low over the trees at no more than two hundred feet, before banking left and coming in for final approach.

  “Well?” Tara asked feeling anxious. She suddenly felt the need for a cigarette but there was no way she’d crumble, not in front of Mike.

  "It seems there may well be another riddle to solve," he said as he pulled out from the parking space and headed for the C13, the small and often treacherous road that adjoined Blandford to its neighbouring town of Shaftsbury. As they reached the junction Mike swung left out of the partly blind junction and gunned the accelerator to build speed. To their right, the Dorset countryside peeled away from the slopes of Spread Eagle Hill. On a day as clear as this you could almost see all the way to the Jurassic Coast.

  “Riddle?” Tara asked hearing the Jeep’s engine roar and feeling its power push her back into the seat.

  “The Harrison kids are missing,” he said flatly.

  “Missing?”

  “When the Harrisons woke up this morning both kids were gone, that was around ten AM. They thought they’d gone for a walk and got lost, but that was four hours ago and there is still no sign of them. The local villagers are about to help search the surrounding area and apparently the police are there, too.”

  “My God,” Tara said, holding her hand to her mouth. “Those poor people, how old are the kids?”

  “The girl, Ellie, is eighteen and her brother, Henry, is five.”

  “What’s the panic, she’s an adult, probably just took her little bro out.”

  Mike shook his head; he was obviously privy to more information. “That’s what I thought,” he replied, “but there is no note and its completely out of character for her, apparently. Local police will be all over it, if they are lost in the local area it won’t take long to find them. I have no doubt the chopper and drone team will be carrying out searches from the air.”

  “So, what’s the riddle?”

  “When the mother saw that they were missing this morning the place was still all locked up, doors, windows – you name it.”

  Tara frowned not quite getting the point, “So?” she questioned.

  “The doors don’t lock without a key, the family had one set of keys and both keys were inside the property. The front and back doors were also internally deadbolted. Technically they have bloody well vanished.”

  Chapter 19

  By three PM on the Saturday afternoon of the day that Ellie and her brother had gone missing, The Old Chapel had two marked police units sat on the shingle drive forecourt next to the Harrisons’ Peugeot. Just over five hours had passed since Carol had awoken to a deathly silent building, just over five hours since she’d rushed from room to room, her anxiety building with each step and finding nothing but more silence and emptiness. Now, as she sat in a state of semi-vacantness on the sofa upon which she’d awoken, she could see from the internal balcony of the mezzanine level, down to and out of the front door which lay open. There, glinting in the sun and catching her eye was the yellow and blue fluorescent battenburging of the Police Ford Focus estate parked closest to the door. Carol placed her head in her hands as the morning’s events tumbled over and over in her head, a relentless cycle of tortuous thoughts that would not abate.

  The first officers at the scene were an older looking male PC with greying dark brown hair and serious looking brown eyes, he’d looked in his forties and his face wore the lines of a career of shift work. Accompanying him was a younger fresh-faced female PC. To Carol, the female officer looked only a few years older than her daughter and the freshness of her appearance held testimony to the fact that she’d yet to earn the same badge of service as her elder colleague.

  They’d arrived thirty minutes after Rob had placed the call and had spent the first hour going through a laborious and frustrating amount of paperwork, collating everything from Ellie’s phone number to usernames for her social media accounts and even enquiring about which doctor’s surgery she used. A similar bevvy of questions was asked about Henry, too. However, he was obviously too young for many of the things that they believed might help to track his sister down. Carol had noted how the male officer’s eyes had narrowed in what she took as suspicion or disapproval when Rob had explained how they’d woken in the lounge with no memory of having fallen asleep. Rob had assured both officers that neither he nor his wife had been drunk, but she wasn’t quite sure they believed it, the male officer in particular. To be fair she didn’t blame them, she knew little of police work outside of the occasional cops on the front-line type show she sometimes watched when there was nothing else on. Despite the little she knew, she knew enough to know that the lion’s share of their time was taken up dealing with alcohol and drug-related incidents as well as dysfunctional families. Despite the fact she’d done nothing wrong she couldn’t help but feel that they were judging her, drawing conclusions about her own family based on all the bad ones they had to deal with.

  After the seemingly never-ending stream of questions had finally ended and the building searched, two further single crewed units, staffed by two male officers in their thirties had arrived, thus allowing their colleagues to return to the station in Liskeard to process the paperwork.

  “I’m sure they will both be back soon,” the young female PC had said reassuringly. She’d filled out all of the paperwork under the watchful supervision of her older colleague who jumped in once in a while with a question that she’d either forgotten or had failed to get to yet. Carol got the impression that she was still a little green around the gills and likely not long out of whatever training they gave to the boys and girls in blue nowadays.

  With the laborious form complete, the officers had then searched the inside of The Old Chapel. Rob lead them from room to room as Carol had followed behind, feeling as if she were in a dream and observing herself from the outside. But this was no dream and no matter how hard she wished, Carol knew there was no waking up from it, no wash of relief as you rose from sleep and realised that everything was actually alright.

  “What I don’t understand,” Rob had said to the older cop, “is how they got out? I mean, it’s as if they just went and vanished into thin air!”

  “Kids,” the officer had exclaimed, slapping his palms down onto his knees. “They can be quite ingenious at times.” His accent unmistakably local, Cornish and quite broad. “I'm sure when they get found or turn up they'll be able to shed some light on it. I remember we had this one gurl in Liskeard who was always goin' missing. Right little troublemaker she was and getting herself into all kinds of bother. Her mother locked her in the house after six each evening and hid the keys. Wanted to stop her keep getting out and into trouble, see. But she kept right on getting out almost every night. I think I musta run a pen dry the number of times I took missing person reports for that gurl. Turned out that she’d taken an imprint of her mother’s key in her little brother’s play-doh and had gone and
got one of her own cut.” He’d smiled and shook his head in disbelief at his own story. “Like I said they can be ingenious.”

  “No disrespect officer,” Carol had said, hearing how far away her voice sounded in her own head as she’d spoken. “But my Ellie is not a trouble maker, she’s never gone missing before and she’d never do anything to put her brother in danger. She’s a good student, off to Warwick at the end of the summer to study phycology. Now I don’t know how they got out, or if this wretched place has somehow swallowed them up whole, but I do feel that something very wrong has happened to them.”

  The PC had nodded his head as she spoke, encouraged her not to jump to conclusions and like his female colleague he felt sure that they’d both turn up just fine and wondering what all the fuss was about. That was at the start of the search, in the games room. Carol had to hand it to them, they were thorough, no closet was left unchecked and no bed left unlooked under. By the time they’d finished with the lower level even a roach skulking in the darkest corner of a cupboard would have been found.

  On the mezzanine level, they’d worked their way from room to room. As they'd reached Ellie's room there had been a knock at the front door. Carol had excused herself and gone to answer it. Stood pensively inside the front porch, on the stone stoop were Lucinda and Seth turned out in jeans, polo shirts, and sturdy footwear. Accompanying them was a couple who she'd spoken to briefly at the barbeque, Sarah and Bob Robey. Sarah’s enviable long blond hair, that had been down and about as silky as a silk bedsheet was up in a tight bun and the skin of her face, pulled a little tighter by the how tightly her hair was fixed, looked like marble.

  “Lucinda told us the news,” Sarah had said her eyes wide and grey as if in disbelief at the situation. Reaching out she’d taken hold of Carol’s cold hands. “If they’re in the woods we will find them,” she’d reassured. “There are others helping, too. The Piersons are heading in from their place at the other end of the village and Greg and Lucy Wanderson are doing the same. I just wanted to come with Lucinda and see you myself. I can’t even imagine how out of your minds with worry you must be right now.”

  Carol had smiled, an empty smile, the kind you give someone whose intentions are in the right place, but you know can’t possibly understand what you’re feeling. “Thank you,” her distant self had said as if she were on autopilot.

  “Sarah and Bob are going to head in the direction of Culdon, but drift toward my place. Seth and I will head Culdon way as well, but we will deviate more toward the Howgates, they live next cottage down. I tried to call but I think Alf already went back to London for the weekend. He’s some hot-shot banker in the investment world up there. That man’s a workaholic, and Erica - his wife, must be out spending some of that money he seems so good at earning.” Lucinda had smiled warmly at her, "Don't worry, though. Between those of us that are here, we can fan out and cover most of the woods even if it takes all day. You just sit tight here and be ready with the cuddles when they get back." And with that they’d gone, walking off in single file around the lone patrol car and to the back of The Old Chapel. Carol had walked like a zombie to the kitchen and watched as they’d reached the tree line and entered the murky woodland, it swallowed them and within seconds they’d vanished from her sight, like ghostly figures being consumed by mist.

  Back in the entrance lobby, she'd left the door open so anyone turning up wouldn’t feel compelled to knock. By the time she’d reached Ellie's room, the two officers were busy checking through her daughter’s clothes while Rob had watched on, a look of helplessness on his face. A look that said he wanted to do something, anything that might be of use, but what else was there that he could do?

  “Can either of you remember what clothes she had with her?” The female officer had asked opening drawer after drawer and finding them void of clothing. Carol had told her that Ellie had been pretty much living out of her suitcase and then having retrieved it from the walk-in wardrobe proceeded to go through it with her. She couldn’t be sure, but it looked as if there were no clothes missing.

  “As we told you, she was wearing her Ramones t-shirt and black leggings, with red and white rather tatty looking Converse,” Rob had told them a hint of desperation in his voice.

  Despite an extensive search of Ellie’s stuff, they couldn’t locate the clothes she’d worn to the barbeque, nor her favourite Converse trainers. Everything else her daughter would normally carry and never leave behind was there, her phone, purse and favourite Holister canvass handbag. The officers had pawed through her purse with interest and both Carol and Rob had agreed that the inventory of thirty pounds, a National Insurance card, Provisional Driver's Licence, and her newly opened NatWest student bank account card were all it should contain. The female officer had leaned on the oak chest of drawers and taken down her account number and made a note in ridiculously neat handwriting that it appeared neither Ellie nor Henry had any money on them.

  In Ellie’s room, they also found the clothes Henry had been wearing the night before in a pile on the floor. A pair of his PJs were missing, though. Next, in his room, they found that just like Ellie's Converse, his Clarks trainers were missing. Carol could be sure with much more conviction that no more of his clothes had gone as unlike Ellie’s pull along Tripp case, she’d packed his Dino-Trunki the day before they'd left. Seeing his things laid out on the bed that way, his Ben and Holly's Little Kingdom T-shirt, (one of his favourites), his cords that were a year younger in size than his actual age due to him being a little on the short side, made her eyes well up. The image caused her to fight the tears that seemed too eager and willing to fall. She’d wanted to pick them up, hold them to her face and breathe in the soft smell of him that would no doubt be ingrained into the material, but she knew if she did then the tears would fall, and once they started, she wasn’t sure they’d stop. Only hours had passed since she’d discovered them missing but it felt like days, and with each passing minute that they were gone the foreboding within her grew, one intrinsically linked to the other. In the past, she'd seen tearful mothers and fathers on TV press conferences appealing for news of a missing child. Watching them had always made her feel sick, made her feel deep pity for the distraught parents, for you could only hold true empathy for others in a situation like that if you were a parent yourself. If God forbid they didn't come back, if hours turned into days and days turned to weeks she wasn't sure she'd cope. People always said it was the not knowing that got you, that not knowing drove you mad, and they were right.

  “Mrs. Harrison," the male officer had said. “Do you think your daughter would have gone out in the same clothes she wore last night, or is it possible that she left with your son whilst you and your husband were asleep?”

  “Went and left where?” Rob had jumped in, saving her from trying to process the answer. "As we've told you, Ellie doesn't drive. It's heck of a walk to the next village and save for a pub there is nothing there. It’s goodness knows how far to the nearest train station and as you've seen neither of them has any money or means of paying for anything. There is no way in hell that my daughter would have gone anywhere with her brother at night, she dotes on that boy. I can also vouch for the fact that there is no way in the world that she would have gone out this morning without either a shower or change of clothes, or without leaving us a note. Lest we not forget here that no one has yet figured out just how the bloody hell she, – they got out.”

  The officer had let the outburst wash over him, no doubt he’d heard that and much, much worse more times than he’d had hot dinners. “I’m sorry, Mr. Harrison,” he’d said flatly. “These are just questions I need to ask. Thankfully there are no signs of a struggle or disturbance. Now I know it’s no consolation but in a way, you need to be thankful that your daughter is missing with your son. She is an adult in the eyes of the law, and despite what her agenda is I'm sure she is taking care of him. Still, for now, and until I have checked with supervision no one else is to go in the room she was using, or the o
ne your son was staying in, is that clear?”

  “Agenda,” Rob had blurted, his face turning red. “Are you treating my daughter as a suspect?”

  The officer had held up his hands and bit at his lower lip, he took a deep breath and said, “I never said that. For now, they are both being treated as missing. It’s just - we need to look at the most likely possibility, that’s all. Your wife said she argued with your daughter last night, then this morning you both wake up and they have gone."

  “All families argue,” Rob had defended his voice almost a growl.

  Carol could both see and understand the angle the officer was taking. To an outsider looking in the most obvious conclusion to reach was that Ellie had taken Henry, possibly out of spite for the argument. A little payback. But the argument hadn't been that bad, however, they didn't know that, they'd not been there, they had to take whatever she or Rob told them as gospel. And how many times had the officer’s been lied to? A lot she bet, why should they believe them?

  Rob had taken a deep breath and let it out through clenched teeth, it had produced a hissing sound like gas escaping from the cranked cap of a soda bottle. “I know my daughter,” he’d said in a low voice. “And my son for that matter. She would never do a thing like that. Ever.”

  The officer’s face had worn a frown that Carol had taken as one of suspicion, she’d glanced to his younger colleague who’d looked a bit awkward and uncomfortable with the direct line of questioning being undertaken by her more experienced colleague. In fact, she'd looked like she wanted to be just about anywhere else other than stood next to him.

  “I mean no offence by what I say. I just need to cover every eventuality, that’s all.”

  And with that, he'd shut the door to Ellie’s room, produced a small roll of stickers each bearing a sequential reference number from a pocket in his body armour, then proceeded to affix one to the door and frame so that if opened the seal would break. Having secured it he took a copy of the number in a notebook and then moved to Henry’s room where he went through the same routine.