Endangering Innocents (8 page)

And now Joanna had the feeling that Carly Wiltshaw herself was trying to tell her something but did not quite dare. She must give her the opportunity. She moved around the room, deliberately brushing against the door and as she had planned it swung closed. “He isn’t Madeline’s real …?”

The door was kicked open with sudden, shocking violence. “What are you bleedin’ sayin’?”

Carly went even whiter. Even her lips were drained now. “Nothin’. Honest.”

So Huke was a bully. She could have guessed that. Joanna studied Carly. She was small but muscular. But five feet nothing and somewhere under seven stone was not going to measure up to sixteen stone and over six feet two. Huke could have made mincemeat of Madeline’s mother. He could have broken every bone in her body - if he had wanted to. And the little girl? The swift vision of the plain, wary face, the dead straight hair, the solemn eyes suddenly frightened her. What had Madeline’s home life been like? And what had been the mother-daughter relationship? Had Carly been able to protect her daughter from the worst of Huke’s extremes?

She slipped a latex glove on, picked a hairbrush from the top of the set of drawers. Carly’s eyes flickered across her hands. Correctly read the reason for the detective’s action.

“Do you mind?” Joanna dropped it in a regulation specimen bag.

They all sat quietly around the kitchen table while Carly Wiltshaw drew up a list of the clothes her daughter had last been seen wearing. Huke was sulking, leaning
against the wall, arms akimbo, his eyes boring holes into Carly, the storm clouds clustering.

Carly’s writing was the unpractised, uneducated scrawl of those who habitually write very litte. Half print, half write, pen chewed as she thought. But it was her punctuation that caught both the officers’ eyes. Red tights? White knickers?

Korpanski shrugged.

He waited until they were sitting in the car before he made his comment. “So the little girl dresses herself? She’s five years old and her Mum doesn’t know what she puts on to go to school?”

“Explain.”

“She’s just a little kid, Jo. You wouldn’ know little details like this but mums put their kiddies’ clothes out the night before they go to school.”

“I’m sure mine didn’t.”

“When you were five I bet she did.”

“So what do you read into this, Mike?”

“That little girl was neglected.”

“Oh come on. That’s a bit of a big step to take.”

“Mark my words.”

Peek a Boo.

Fingers through.

See - my - eyes.

But I leave a trail for you to follow. Why can’t you find me?

“Well we didn’t get much there, did we, Mike?” It was already six o’clock. She was tired. But there was far too much to do to even consider going home. Joanna, Mike and the entire rest of the investigating force were only too aware that this was the second night Madeline was missing. And they didn’t know where to look. They had cast their net wide, dragged it in and caught nothing. There was nothing substantial to report. No sighting of the little girl. No sign at all of what had happened. Once she’d left the classroom she had vanished. So they must return to the last known sighting. Back to three fifteen pm on Friday afternoon. Friday the thirteenth, a day of ill omen. Not a good Friday.

The briefing at eight only told them just how little they had to go on. Hesketh-Brown had been shadowing Baldwin for the rest of the day. Which meant merely sitting outside his flat in an unmarked car. At five Baldwin had eyed Hesketh-Brown through the window. “I had the feeling it was me was being watched,” the copper said with a rueful grin. “Didn’t like it much neither. Nearly made me feel guilty. It was the way he stared. Accusing me. As though everything was
my
fault. He’s a weird bloke. That’s all I can say.”

“How weird?” Joanna asked curiously.

Hesketh-Brown shrugged. He was in his early twenties, a fresh-faced, blue-eyed rookie from the Potteries. An innocent amongst a largely cynical police force. His conscience must be as clear as it was possible for a young cop’s to be. Yet he flushed suddenly and brightly. “I
don’t know,” he said ignoring the curious stares of his colleagues. “Probably nothing. It’s just the way he looks at you makes you feel wrong-footed. As though he sees something nasty in you.”

His colleagues, surprisingly, didn’t scoff.

Joanna ventured a smile at Korpanski but underneath she was wondering.

What sort of a man was Baldwin? Behind the label they had stuck on him what was he - really?

As soon as the officers had dispersed, Joanna and Mike holed themselves up in her office back in Leek. And as usual she used Korpanski as a bouncing board for her ideas.

“Correct me if I’m wrong,” she said slowly, her hands flat in front of her. “But if Madeline isn’t in the school and she hasn’t been found in the surrounding fields or farm buildings we only have a few possibilities. a),” she sat and stared at the dark window, “she’s walked a very long way - right out of the search area - and no one’s yet seen her.” She blinked. “And that’s pretty unlikely. So b) she made her own way out of the search area but has been picked up by person or persons unknown who have failed to hand her back to the authorities. Or c) she did leave the school - somehow unseen - and was picked up deliberately by person or persons unknown and taken from the scene - again invisibly - by car.” She frowned. “No one’s seen her since she was in the classroom or even d) she’s still somewhere in the search area and we’ve overlooked her somehow.” Her brain was revving up, mentally exploring the surrounds of Horton School, probing lanes and fields, farms and isolated cottages. Until she reached… She felt her face stiffen. “Mike. Maybe she’s fallen in water…”

“She hasn’t. We’ve gone through the streams and ditches.”

She held him in a frozen stare. “Rudyard Lake.”

Mike’s shoulders sagged slightly. “We can get divers down there tomorrow,” he said. “But, Jo, there were fishermen and people round the lake all day. It was Good Friday. Plenty of people were off work. It was quite fine. If a little cold,” he reminded her. “She would have been seen.
Someone
would have reported a little girl like that, wandering on her own.”

“I was thinking about the top end of the lake? Where the lane peters out? No fishermen go up there, Mike.”

“Someone would have seen her,” he said. “We’ve put enough posters round the lake. It’s been a well publicised case.”

“She
could
have slipped through,” Joanna insisted.

“OK. She could,” Mike conceded. “But there are no reports of Madeline being the wandering type. Why would a little girl suddenly walk out of the school, alone, not even waiting on the pavement. And remember her mum was outside. She would have had to deliberately give her the slip. Why?”

Joanna could think of only one reason. “Huke.”

Mike’s face grew grim. “Yeah - he’s not my favourite person. But even so a little tot like that couldn’t have wandered off without someone spotting her. And no one did.”

Joanna continued to stare out of the blackening window. A worm of an idea was forming. Through the glass nothing was visible. She knew that it overlooked a brick wall. But it was too dark to make out the bricks. And there was no reflected light. To all intents and purposes, even though she hated seeing the brick wall, she missed it when she was deprived of it.

Mike pressed his point home. “There were so many people milling outside Rudyard School that afternoon I don’t believe it’s possible that no one saw her.”

She continued staring out of the window. “What are you saying, Mike?”

“I’m not saying anything except that someone would have spotted her getting into a strange car. However busy you are it’s something parents are programmed to remember. We’ve all got a horror of kids being abducted.”

It was one of the few times she had considered Mike as a parent. She studied his blunt features silently for a few moments and wondered what sort of a father he made. Her own had been a Peter Pan, Huke a bully, Matthew an over-caring, indulgent father too easily manipulated by his teenage daughter. And what about Korpanski?

Intolerant was the word that sprang to mind.

“But you heard what the teachers were saying,” Joanna said slowly. “Everyone was distracted. You know, Mike, like the magician’s trick. Everyone’s looking in the wrong place. At the wrong time. They assume one thing when another is really happening. They believe their eyes when it’s those very eyes that are deceiving them. Maybe everyone was busily looking the other way when Madeline was spirited into a car. It must have happened in the split second that no one was looking her way.”

“There would have been a struggle - surely.”

“Not if -” Joanna said, suddenly assaulted by the vision of the quiet, solemn child who had let herself be pulled along the pavement without putting up a struggle. Madeline had been a compliant child.

Because the price of not being so was too high? 

She jerked herself away from the picture. “Not if Madeline assumed the person was sent by her family. We know a variety of people picked her up from school. Anyway - didn’t Baldwin say something about Huke dragging her into his van? No one’s said anything about that.”

“You’re not starting to use what Baldwin says as evidence?”

Joanna backed down. “Why not? Who do you suggest we believe? Huke?”

“Well - I’d rather trust …” Mike’s voice tailed off.

“Exactly.” Korpanski had pinpointed the very essence of the case. “Madeline wasn’t exactly surrounded by a sealed unit of loving family, was she?”

Korpanski ran his fingers through his hair.

It was eleven o’clock by the time she let herself in. The cottage was in darkness. And it was cold. If Matthew had been home he must have gone out again. Though his car was in the drive no fire was lit. The table lamp in the corner was the sole source of light. She flicked the central heating back on, and went into the kitchen. To smile. Matthew read her like a book. He’d propped a note up against a large bulbous wineglass. “Gone to the pub. Bottle in fridge. Ring me when you get home.” He’d signed his name only with a huge X.

But she didn’t ring him. She poured herself a glass of Chardonnay, kicked her shoes off and settled into the sofa. There was no knowing when Matthew would be back. Certainly she could not expect him home at traditional pub closing time plus the fifteen minutes drinking up time. The local pub had the relaxed habit of “lockins”, largely ignored by the moorland police who saw no real harm in them, and welcomed by the locals - holiday-makers
as well as residents. It provided an excellent night life in the village of Waterfall. But if she joined Matthew at the Red Lion it would put the landlord in a difficult position. A Detective Inspector could hardly join a lock-in. Not without putting an early end to the evening. And even if she rang him the landlord would guess who was on the other end of the telephone. Matthew had made friends with a few of the locals. He made friends easily, enjoyed chatting to them - mainly dismal farming talk these days but he could sympathise and empathise. She, in contrast, wanted, needed to be alone. Particularly tonight. She needed to think. The force were providing plenty of action. They were the footsoldiers. Taking statements, asking questions, carrying out searches, cross referencing on the PNC. But what she needed was concentration. She must orchestrate their movements, help them to direct their energies in the right direction. Madeline’s disappearance was like the Chinese Puzzle with irregular blocks of wood meant to form a perfect globe. It seemed impossible. But Madeline Wiltshaw had disappeared - somehow. She was somewhere. It was not possible for a little girl to vanish. Not in the real world. Only to appear to through the illusions elaborately set up by conjurors and their assistants using complicated equipment. She must look at the indisputable facts.

Baldwin had hung around outside the school. For some unknown but guessable reason. Not good. This was an indisputable fact. And whatever explanation was the truth it must fit round all the facts, however seemingly inexplicable they might seem. Joanna sipped at her wine with a chill feeling of insight. Instinctively she believed that events sat around the issues of innocence and guilt. The child was - surely -
innocent. But Baldwin? Common sense told her he was not innocent.

And who else? Her eyes moved steadily around the room, drifting over the pine fireplace, skirting the door which led to the kitchen, around the few paintings and old, framed photographs which spattered the walls. One of her father, holding her hand when she had been a very little girl. They were both laughing. He straight into the camera, his mouth cavernously wide open. He had had a great sense of fun. She had a ribbon in her straight, dark hair and was wearing an orange dress. She could remember that dress still. It had been of a vaguely woolly material. Scratchy, uncomfortable and over-warm to wear. But her father had liked it. He had swung her round and around, telling her how pretty she looked. And so she had worn it. Frequently. When she stared at the photograph she could almost feel the dress making her back itch unbearably and making a stoical effort not to scratch. She was wearing white knee socks and fake crocodile skin shoes with pointed toes. They too had been uncomfortable. One sock had dropped to her ankle. Her leg looked very thin. Joanna closed her eyes against the feel of her father’s big hand encasing her tiny one. She had felt so safe then. So happy. How old had she been? Somewhere round about five.

She opened her eyes again, deliberately moving them past the photograph. It did her no good to remember these events.

On to the next. Matthew’s choice this one. A balance for her family photo. Him cradling Eloise as a tiny baby. Both Eloise and Matthew loved this picture. Eloise always made a point of standing right in front of it and insisting she remembered “Mummy” taking it. Even though she couldn’t possibly. She was too young. Even
Eloise had not been blessed with cognisance when she had been a babe in arms.

Families were pain.

Joanna moved on.

In the corner of the room stood a glass fronted corner cupboard. Not particularly old - nineteen thirties, mock Georgian, veneered oak with thirteen paned double doors. But it housed her collection of Victorian Staffordshire figures, bequeathed her by an aunt who had realised the young Joanna had an affinity for them. Joanna put her wineglass down abruptly on the occasional table, crossed the room, unlocked the cabinet and fished a figure that hid right at the back because it was so tall.

Gelert.

She’ d known it was there - all along.

One of the most famous stories ever of wronged innocence.

The baby lies safe in the cradle, the dog standing guard at its side. The wolf lies dead at the base. A cherub watches over the scene.

It looks a pleasant figure. But the story behind it is not so pretty. Prince Llewelyn rushes in to his baby son’s nursery. The Prince who had doubted his devoted dog’s motive for refusing to join the hunt that day.

The dog had smelt the wolf.

The prince sees an overturned cradle. Blooodstained. No baby. The dog with bloody jowls approaches him. He assumes the worst and plunges his sword into the dog. The dog dies at his feet.

The prince believes he has read the evidence correctly. He thinks he knows what has happened. He is wrong.

The child is safe. Beneath the crib lies a dead wolf and a now crying baby. The dog protected it from the wolf,
defending his charge to the death. While Llewelyn hunted, Gelert, the dog, guarded and paid with his life.

Llewelyn is ridden with remorse.

Too late for Gelert.

The dog paid with his life for his master’s impetuosity.

Remorse built the mausoleum,
Bedd Gelert
. Whether the story is legend or fact the moral is the same.

Things are not always as they seem. It can be dangerous to jump to conclusions. Joanna remembered the day she had unpacked this particular figure, laughing and dusting it with a Jiffy duster. “Circumstantial evidence,” she had said to Matthew as she put it right at the back of the shelf. “No sign of baby, blood everywhere, dog looking a bit suspicious. Blood all over its chops.”

“So as a policeman would you have waited, Jo?”

“We must,” she had said, serious suddenly. “We must. There was no point in Llewelyn building a dirty great big monument to his faithful dog. Gelert was dead. And he’d killed him because he jumped to the wrong conclusion.”

She had, in the past, used her pottery figures almost as a divining tool. But the Gelert figure was not helping her. She could not read its message except as a warning not to jump to conclusions. That, and the warning that the innocent must remain so until guilt is proven.