by Kay Leitch
The witches spent the next hour or so going over Helen's printouts, making suggestions, some of them wise, some of them illegal. There was a lot of laughter coming from their table and after a while Carla couldn't help noticing that Vanessa seemed to be staring over at them with a scowl on her face, maybe they were being too rowdy tonight, although it had never seemed to bother her before.
'Don't all look at once girls,' whispered Carla, 'but Vanessa has got a face on her like a slapped arse, if looks could kill we'd all be dead as dodo's, I wonder what's got into her?'
'Oh my god that's reminded me of something that happened the other evening,' said Maggie with just a hint of a slur. 'I was in here waiting for Charles (remember I told you about him, great shag, stupid side-burns) well he was late, but that's beside the point, Giles was running around like a blue arsed fly, he only had those two teenage girls to help him, no Vanessa. Anyway I asked him where she was and he went into one…she'd gone off earlier…only meant to be going for a short walk…I mean he was furious you could tell…anyway while we were talking she, Vanessa, comes in through the back door and I can hear this whispered argument going on, I couldn't hear what they were saying but Giles sounded pretty pissed off I can tell you.'
'Is there a point to this Maggs?' said Tracy impatiently.
'Yes, yes the thing is that after a few moments she put her head round the door, just for a minute and she looked dreadful, I mean really awful… blotchy face… no makeup, but it wasn't just that really…she looked really ill like she was about to throw up or something. She just stared straight through me, it was like she didn't see me sitting there at all, it was really weird I can tell you. I didn't see her for the rest of the evening so I presume she went to bed, and Giles came back and just carried on as normal…weird,' Maggie said thoughtfully.
'Well she snapped my head off earlier when I told her Giles had said she needed a holiday, I mean really out of character, she was quite rude actually, now I come to think of it,' said Helen indignantly.
'Well maybe she is just exhausted,' said Carla always the voice of reason. 'It must be so draining running this place, I mean she has to oversee the restaurant as well as the pub, seven days a week it must be such hard work And on top of that I hear that she visits her dad at Happy Valley all the time, but I tell you what if she carries on looking at me like I'm something she trod in, I'm going to flaming well say something, we are bloody good customers and we deserve to be treated as such.'
'OOOeeer,' said Maggie laughing, 'oh ignore her, stupid old bag, I'm not going to let her ruin my evening…another drink girls? Helen same again? What's up with you Tracy you look like you've seen a ghost?'
They all looked at Tracy who did indeed seem to be in some kind of shock, Tracy turned to Carla.
'I've just realised who it was…' Carla looked puzzled, 'You know in the woods, I've realised who was running away from me in the woods…it was Vanessa.'
'No... surely not, she doesn't seem the type to be walking in the woods, not unless her wellies were designer and even then she wouldn't want to get them muddy, no I think you've got that wrong Trace,' said Carla laughing.
'Well of course I can't be certain, but the more I think about it… I'm sure it was… I know it doesn't make any sense but then I told you it was weird, that's why I was freaked out by it.'
The other women were looking at Tracy and Carla as if they had just suddenly started talking a foreign language.
'Er...anyone going to fill us in?' said Maggie.
'Well I don't know if I should…' Carla started to say.
'It's like this, a couple of days ago I was walking Buster,' Tracy interrupted and told them the tale in graphic detail, dramatically enhancing everything that happened, 'and anyway when I told Carla, she told me about the earring and of course it all fitted together, and we think that Vanessa may have something to do with the body in the woods,' she ended with a gruesome whisper.
'Oh for goodness sake Tracy, we don't think anything of the sort,' Carla said impatiently, 'it is probably two strange but unconnected incidents, after all I don't actually know who the earring belongs to, it may not even have anything to do with the murderer at all, I just said I thought I recognised it that's all.'
'No you said you had seen it on someone blond, and what colour hair does Vanessa have? Kenley hair studio's finest blond that's what.'
'That proves nothing,' Carla shot back, 'we can't go around thinking Vanessa's a murderer just because she has blond hair and she was a bit upset the other day, maybe something's happened to her dad, I've heard he's very ill, and she's obviously devoted to him.'
'Well that's not what I've heard,' interrupted Maggie. 'Heard the opposite in fact, Jools, you know Jed's latest, works at 'Happy Valley' she says that Vanessa never goes near the place, pays the bills ok, but doesn't even reply to his letters. Apparently he writes to her, he gets Jools to post them for him at least once a week, Jools thinks she's a hard cow, she's never answered even one, and all he's asking for is a visit. From what Jools says no one visits him, or at least they didn't, apparently he had a couple of visits from a granddaughter a while ago, must be one of Vanessa's brothers or sisters children. Mind you he sounds like a nasty piece of work apparently he was awful to the girl, called her dreadful names and refused to see her even though she tried twice, so maybe that's why Vanessa avoids him. Families huh, I can't ever imagine not wanting to see my kids or grandkids.'
'Well whether she is a good daughter or not, we cannot go round accusing her of murder, so put it out if your heads ok,' said Carla in her firm voice.
'Yes Detective Inspector ma’am,' said Maggie saluting, 'now I'm going to get you all another drink, if I'm not back in five minutes, you'll probably find my body in the cellar.'
The evening progressed as it always did with jokes and bad behaviour, but Carla couldn't forget about what she had heard about Vanessa, something was making her skin tingle, but she couldn't quite grasp what it could be.
CHAPTER 18 - March 5th 1993
I am on holidays it is half term so Dad says he's taking me out for a treat because I'm his special girl.
We drove in the car for a long time, Dad bought me some sweets…I have worn my new dress and shoes and Dad put my hair in pigtails, I don't like pigtails they hurt my head but Dad says to stop complaining, I'm lucky to be going on this treat, Faye wasn't allowed to come, she's too little Dad says, maybe next year.
We drive down a long, long road, it's very bumpy and it has trees that hang down and bash the car.
We stop outside a house, it looks old and spooky…I don't like it.
Dad tells me to get out of the car, he just has to meet with someone and then we will go on to the seaside.
There are two men inside the house they seem very pleased to see me.
We go into a room, it has no carpets, there is a big sheet hanging at the window where a curtain should be…I tell Dad I want to go now…I don't like it here, he doesn't hear me.
'I told you she was a pretty one,' Dad says to one of the men.
'She is that Derek me old son, very pretty. Come here sweetheart and let me look at you properly.'
Dad pulls me over to where the man is sitting, I don't want to go, he is ugly and smells of fish, but the man grabs me and puts me on his lap. He is holding me really tightly, I try and pull away, he just laughs, he has nasty yellow teeth. 'She's a bit feisty though,' he says laughing, he pulls my pigtails and my Dad says crossly, 'Stop wriggling you stupid girl, Rory's not going hurt you. Don't you want to go to the seaside? Well you just be a good girl for a little while and then we'll go…ok?'
I am scared; the man called Rory starts feeling me all over, he squeezes my breasts and starts to slip his hands inside my panties, I can feel his heavy breath on my cheek …now I understand.
'Oh you are a very big girl aren't you, I bet you'd like uncle Rory to make you feel nice wouldn't you?' I try to squirm away from his fingers, he holds me firmly,… 'Now now wouldn't you like
some spending money for the seaside… let’s feel those little titties of yours…'
I call to Dad, try to tell him I want to go he turns away, the other man in the room has a camera…
Dad lied…we never did go to the seaside.
CHAPTER 19 - CARLA
Carla drove her Audi slowly down the narrow street, the sat nav was telling her that she had reached her destination and sure enough, there was Ashcombe house on the left. Once they had found out the name of the Glory Wood victim it had not taken long to find out a bit more about her, like where she had been living, which apparently had been in a residential care home in Maidstone, so Carla had spoken to the social worker there and made an appointment to see her today.
The care home was a typical large double fronted Edwardian house set back from the road, it had well tended gardens and a large front door with lots of stickers and posters all over it, one of which said 'for Shirley Weedon please ring the bell', Carla rang the bell and stepped back.
After quite a long time Carla heard footsteps coming towards the door which was flung open and a small red eyed face peered round it, followed by a tiny body dressed in a brightly coloured skirt that looked like something left over from the 60's, Shirley had long greying hair and a face devoid of makeup, she gave Carla a tearful smile.
'Hello you must be Carla,' said the girl holding her hand out. 'Shirley Weedon, I'm the residential social worker here…please excuse the way I look but this has been a terrible shock.'
Carla took her hand.
'Of course, it must have been. When did you realise Louise was missing?' She asked as she followed her down a long hallway into a small office at the rear of the house, she could hear kitchen noises and a few murmured voices but other than that the house seemed surprisingly quiet, Carla had expected it to be full of delinquent children.
Shirley gestured to Carla to sit and offered her tea which she gratefully accepted.
'Actually we weren't expecting her back till this week,' Shirley paused and blew her nose loudly, 'she'd finally got through to her mother you see. Her grandfather had been steadfastly refusing to see her, but he must have passed her details on to his daughter because a couple of weeks ago the mother herself had emailed and said that she would meet with her, she was over the moon of course it had been what she had been waiting for.'
'Excuse me,' said Carla bewildered, 'why was she trying to meet her mother, I'm afraid you'll have to bring me up to speed on all this…I don't know anything about Louise you see, the first time I set eyes on her was after she had been killed and it's only now that I have finally found someone who can tell me about her.'
'I see, I'll have to start from the beginning. It's a very sad story, not that we're not used to sad stories in this place as you can imagine, but my heart has always gone out to Louise, she would have hated me to have said that to her mind. She was as hard as nails or she would have you believe she was, but I knew that she was just a desperate little girl trying to find out why her mother had dumped her outside a hospital A&E dept as soon as she'd given birth to her (after birth and all mind) and never ever tried to find her or make sure she was ok. It consumed her, she thought about nothing else.
'She spent her life being passed from one foster home to another, she was a nightmare, no one, not even our most experienced foster carers could cope with her. Truanting, running away, violence…it's always amazed me that she's never ended up in a young offenders unit…but anyway she finally made it here and she made friends with one of the cooks, Lucy, who's devastated by the way.'
'I may need to speak to her later, would that be possible?' interrupted Carla.
'Oh of course, she's in the kitchen at the moment, shall I call her?' Shirley went to stand up, but Carla stopped her.
'There's no rush, you were saying she arrived here?'
'Yes well it seemed that Lucy was able to give her some clues as to who her mother was. Something to do with a girl that used to lodge with a friend of hers in the 90's. Well from that moment on Louise was a girl possessed, on the computer day and night trying to find someone who might know her mother, until she met someone on line who said that they knew where her grandfather was. Well of course it was all very flimsy, but Louise was determined she was going to meet her grandfather and get the facts from him. So she wrote to him explaining who she was and who she thought her mother was and asking to meet him, but he sent back the most awful reply, calling her the most terrible names and ordering her never to contact him again. As you can imagine she was devastated.'
'What made her think this was her grandfather who had given her his name?'
'Well it was the sister of the girl that her mother had lodged with (or so we think anyway). Louise managed to get hold of her on the internet and she was able to give her a few names and she told her that the father (her grandfather) had moved to Surrey shortly after his wife had died, Redbank I think or somewhere near there, anyway his name was Derek Stiles and the girl that lodged with her sister was his daughter Vanessa.
CHAPTER 20 - Jan 15th 1994
I am gagging I can't breathe, I try and tell him but he is too intent on what he is doing.
It's like he becomes another person, someone awful, like someone is controlling him and he can't stop it.
He is kissing my neck, he has tried to kiss my mouth but I just couldn't let him it was just too weird.
He sucks and pulls at my nipples, making them sore, he really is scaring me this time, he has never gone this far before…he is lying on top of me…I can feel that he is hard he is rubbing himself up and down on my tummy.
Then all of a sudden he is pinning me down, holding my shoulders I can't move…he forces my legs apart with his knees, oh no…oh god…he pushes hard into me, oh god it's hurting me…I scream.
CHAPTER 21 - TRACY
Tracy sat at a table directly opposite the door of The Bull public house. She had made her usual mistake and arrived far too early for her date with Ben, and now she was sitting nursing a lime and soda and looking like some sort of desperate female! Ben's photo had shown a man of medium height with slightly receding blond hair and the aforementioned goatee, so Tracy thought she would have no problem recognising him, unfortunately the camera does lie and so when a shorter than average, bald, clean shaven man came and tapped her on the shoulder, she was taken completely by surprise.
'Are you Tracy by any chance?' said the stranger, at her nod he smiled widely to reveal rather more teeth than could comfortably fit in his mouth, (obviously why in his profile picture he was just wearing an inscrutable Mona Lisa smile).
'I thought you were, I arrived very early I'm afraid, I've been sitting over there,' he pointed to the corner on the other side of the door. Tracy had noticed someone sitting there, but hadn't given it a thought, how mortifying he had been there watching her while she checked out every man that had walked in…why oh why did these things always happen to her!
'I thought I was early, I'm so sorry I didn't spot you there, why don't we start again…Hi Ben I'm Tracy nice to meet you.'
'Nice to meet you too Tracy, can I get you a drink?'
'Oh yes please that would be lovely I'll just have a lime and soda thank you.'
Ben went off to get the drinks and gave Tracy time to have a good look at him, for crying out loud how can a photo be sooo wrong, he looked nothing like his profile picture, definitely not her type…but still the night was young, better not to judge and just make the most of it.
'So Tracy what is it that you do?' asked Ben when they both had their drinks, 'I know you said you worked for the local school, do you teach there?'
'Oh no nothing so grand,' said Tracy, 'I work in the office, which means that I sort of look after the running of the school and of course I help out with the kids as well, you know wiping bums and runny noses,' she quipped.
'What? The teachers or the kids?' joked Ben and then launched into a sort of high pitched braying laugh at his own witty response, a few of the other customers in t
he pub turned round in astonishment at the noise and old Barney Wittle (local drunk and general smelly waster) actually fell off his bar stool.
Tracy winced, this was turning out to be one of her all time worst dates, but she would hold fast to her rules of dating (you stay for at least one drink).
'Tell me about what you do Ben, it sounded fascinating,' she said with an insincere smile, (rule number 2, ask about them and appear interested).
Ben needed no prompting, and soon he was spouting on about interest rates and I.S.A.'s, Tracy felt her eyes glaze over until she became aware of someone watching her, she scanned the pub until she found a pair of dark sparking eyes that were indeed looking straight at her, Mr Simon Bloody Burton was sitting over the other side of the pub watching her every move and thoroughly enjoying himself at her expense.
'Well I'm not going to give him the satisfaction,' she thought, she turned back to Ben and gave him her most seductive smile, Ben, shocked at receiving such a warm smile from her, stopped talking mid-sentence and just sat there with his mouth wide open doing a fair impersonation of a trout out of water.
'How absolutely fascinating Ben, you must be really clever to remember all those facts and figures, I do so admire a man with a brain,' she reached over as she said this and put her hand over Ben's, he let out a sort of squeak and turned bright red.
'Let me get you a drink this time, what'll it be?' Tracy said getting up to go to the bar.
'Oh just half a lager, thanks,' said Ben, 'I need to go to the little boys room,' he said with another rather high pitched nervous laugh whilst adjusting his trousers.
Tracy nodded and went to get the drinks. Simon chose that moment to come to the bar as well.
