Silent Graves

by Sally Rigby

  ‘How did you find out?’

  ‘We knew the newsagent, and he contacted us. We promised him it wouldn’t happen again. Jayne was very upset by the whole thing and we thought she’d learnt her lesson.’

  ‘What about at school? Did she work hard? Did she behave?’

  ‘She was a typical sixteen-year-old. More interested in boys and going out with her friends.’

  The door opened and Mr Kennedy walked in followed by Brian carrying a large brown box, which he placed on the floor in front of Mrs Kennedy.

  ‘I haven’t looked in here for years. We didn’t keep everything of Jayne’s, just a few things to remind us of her.’ She hesitated before opening the box and drew in a deep breath. ‘What do you need to do your test?’

  ‘A hairbrush or comb, which would have some of her hairs on it,’ Whitney said, her heart going out to the woman having to go through her daughter’s possessions after so many years, especially in front of strangers.

  Mrs Kennedy rummaged through the box and pulled out a hair tie. She scrutinised it. ‘No brush, but this has her hairs on it. Will that help?’

  ‘Yes, thank you.’ Whitney took it from her and dropped it into an evidence bag. ‘What else is in the box? Did Jayne keep a diary?’

  ‘Yes, there are diaries and notebooks and some of her favourite furry animals.’

  ‘Please may we take the box with us?’ Whitney asked gently. ‘We’ll look after everything and return it once we’ve finished.’

  Mrs Kennedy looked at her husband. He nodded. ‘Yes,’ he said.

  ‘Thank you. Do you have a photo of Jayne we can take with us?’

  Mr Kennedy went over to the oak sideboard running along the back wall. He opened the middle drawer and pulled out a photo.

  ‘This is one of Jayne taken a couple of months before she disappeared. It was at her sister’s birthday party.’ He held the photo out and Whitney took it from him.

  She was a pretty girl, with a happy face and dimples in her cheeks. Whitney’s body tensed. What the hell happened?

  ‘I’ll let you have this back as soon our investigation is completed.’

  ‘Is there anything else we can help you with?’ Mr Kennedy asked.

  ‘Are you sure there was nothing going on at home which would have caused your daughter to run away?’ Brian asked.

  Whitney sucked in a breath. The right question, but definitely not the right time to ask it.

  ‘What do you mean?’ Mr Kennedy asked.

  ‘Fights, arguments. Anything that made her not want to come home.’

  ‘She fought with her sister sometimes, but nothing out of the ordinary and no different from any other sisters.’

  ‘What about with you and Mrs Kennedy? Had you fought with her before she went?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Are you absolutely sure about that?’ Brian pushed.

  ‘Yes,’ he said, voice tight as his mouth formed a flat line. ‘It all happened out of the blue. We had no warning, that’s why we know she didn’t run away.’

  ‘We’ll be going now,’ Whitney said, not wanting the questioning to continue.

  They left the house and returned to the car.

  ‘Next one?’ Brian asked.

  Didn’t he have anything to say about the interview? Wasn’t he affected by it at all? He was an unmarried childless male; was that the reason? Whitney dragged in a breath and nodded.

  ‘Yes. The Baileys live at 349 Wellington Street, Far Cotton. It’s twenty minutes away. They’ve moved since the girls disappeared.’

  ‘Okay, guv.’

  Whitney waited until they were on the road and in traffic before she turned to Brian.

  ‘You don’t seem to have grasped my instructions. Interviews are led by me.’ She kept her voice calm but cold.

  ‘What if I come up with a question that you haven’t asked?’ he said.

  ‘I might not have deemed it the right moment to ask. I like to run interviews in a certain way.’

  ‘We were about to leave, and you hadn’t questioned them about their relationship with their daughter. Surely you must have considered that to be important.’

  ‘I’d been talking to Mrs Kennedy when you were out of the room and we had discussed Jayne’s behaviour. Your attitude put them on the back foot. It was as if you were accusing them of having something to do with the deaths.’

  A slight exaggeration, but he needed to understand that they did things her way.

  ‘They could have done. Murders are often committed by people known to the victims.’

  He was correct, but other factors had to be considered before leaping to conclusions.

  ‘I agree, but when investigating it’s often advisable not to alert potential suspects. They’re elderly people who looked for their daughter for months, pursuing every avenue they could. Is that the behaviour of murderers?’

  ‘They could have done it to put the police off the scent,’ Brian said.

  ‘The police had already gone off the scent. Just leave it to me during the next interview. I’ll do the talking and you listen.’ She drew in a frustrated breath. She’d cut him some slack once, as he wasn’t used to working in this way. But now he knew she didn’t intend to be so accommodating.

  ‘Yes, guv. I’ll try to remember.’

  Try. He’d better do more than that.

  Chapter 7

  They remained silent for the rest of the journey, and soon Brian pulled up outside a 1930s semi-detached pebble-dashed house.

  An older woman, wearing a stained floral apron, opened the door. Her grey hair was pulled off her face and streaks of flour were smeared across her forehead.

  ‘Mrs Bailey?’ Whitney asked.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘I’m Detective Chief Inspector Walker and this is Detective Sergeant Chapman. We’d like to speak to you about your daughter, Anita.’

  Colour leached from her face. ‘Have you found her?’

  ‘Please, may we come in?’ Whitney said, her voice gentle. ‘We don’t really want to talk out here.’

  The woman stepped to the side allowing them space to enter. ‘Of course. I’m in the kitchen baking. It’s my grandson’s tenth birthday in a couple of days and I’m making him a train cake. He’s obsessed by them.’ The words tumbled out of her mouth.

  Nerves?

  ‘Is Mr Bailey here?’

  ‘We divorced a long time ago. I haven’t seen him since he moved to the States in 2005. Come on through to the kitchen I need to keep an eye on my timer.’

  They followed her into the small kitchen, and sat at the round wooden dining table.

  ‘Mrs Bailey.’

  ‘Please, call me Gwen,’ she said.

  ‘We’ve come to see you because two bodies have been found on a building site close to town. The forensic pathologist has informed us they are two sixteen-year-old girls and we’re investigating whether they could be Anita and Jayne.’

  The woman grabbed hold of the table. Her knuckles white. ‘Are you sure? We thought they’d run away, that’s what the police told us.’

  ‘Did you believe that’s what had happened?’

  ‘I wasn’t sure, but it seemed likely.’

  ‘Jayne’s parents didn’t think so.’

  ‘I know, but they didn’t know the half of what the girls got up to. Even before they disappeared, I had the feeling they were planning something.’

  ‘Could you explain?’

  ‘They were out of control, especially Anita. She was in trouble at school and ignored everything we said. It was a hard time for us. If she spoke to us, which was rarely, she was usually rude.’

  ‘Mr and Mrs Kennedy mentioned about some shoplifting at a local newsagent, and that Jayne had promised not to do it again.’

  ‘They were way worse than that. They used to go into town every Saturday, and I’m fairly sure they stole from shops. I’m surprised they didn’t get caught.’

  ‘How did you know what they were doing?’

 
‘I found a stash of expensive, unworn, clothes in Anita’s room, which no way could she have afforded as she didn’t have a job. The only thing I could think of was shoplifting. At least, that’s what I told myself. I couldn’t bear for it to be anything else.’

  ‘Did you question her about it?’

  She shook her head. ‘I didn’t want to risk another blow up, so I turned a blind eye. I know it was wrong, but by that time I was at the end of my tether. Everything the girls did was instigated by Anita. She was the stronger of the two and Jayne went along with it. She was a nice girl, always polite when she was here, despite witnessing the way Anita treated us.’

  ‘I know it’s a long time ago, but could you run through what happened on the day the girls went missing,’ Whitney said.

  ‘Nancy Kennedy phoned wanting to know if Jayne was with us because she’d been expecting her home for tea. I’d just assumed Anita was with them and when we discovered they were missing we went to the police together. They interviewed us but came to the conclusion they’d run away because someone had seen them near the station.’

  ‘The Kennedys put out leaflets and searched for the girls. Did you do the same?’

  ‘I did help them but, to be honest, after the police told us they were spotted at the station, I thought they’d run away. But now you’re telling me they might not have. I just…’ Her voice faded.

  ‘At the moment, we’re trying to identify the bodies. Do you have anything of Anita’s, like an old hairbrush, we could use to take her DNA and compare it to the bodies we have discovered?’

  ‘I didn’t keep anything of Anita’s after moving here twenty years ago, when I split with Toby. All I have now are photos.’

  How different the two families were.

  ‘Would you mind giving us a sample of your DNA? We can check that way,’ Whitney asked.

  ‘Of course. I can’t believe they didn’t run away … that they could have been dead all this time.’ She leant forward and rested her chin in her hand. ‘If only I’d known.’

  ‘We don’t know for definite, it’s early in the investigation.’ Whitney took a DNA testing kit out of her bag and removed the cotton swab. ‘Please could you open your mouth?’ She applied the tip of the swab to the inside of the woman’s mouth and rubbed lightly while turning the swab to make sure the whole of the tip had made contact with the area.

  ‘How long will it take for the results to come back?’ Gwen asked.

  ‘We’ll try to rush it through. How many other children do you have?’

  ‘Two, a son and a daughter. One is older than Anita and the other is younger.’

  ‘How were they during the time when Anita went missing?’

  Gwen coloured. ‘Life was much easier when she wasn’t here. My son, the oldest, was always exceptionally good at school and we had no trouble with him. He’s now a doctor. My younger daughter is easy-going and Anita bullied her. She blossomed once Anita left. I really believed she’d run away. I hate myself for saying this, but when it happened … it was a relief.’

  ‘She was only sixteen and you’re acting like you were pleased she’d run away. You do know how runaways support themselves in places like London, don’t you?’ Brian jumped in.

  ‘I-I …’ Gwen’s eyes pleaded with Whitney for support.

  ‘Mrs Bailey, Gwen. We’re not accusing you of anything,’ Whitney said gently.

  ‘She had money. I thought she’d be okay.’

  ‘How much?’ Whitney asked.

  ‘A few hundred pounds. I found the money in her bedroom a few weeks before she went missing, and it wasn’t there after she’d gone. I loved my daughter, you have to believe me but …’ Tears fell down her cheeks and Whitney picked up a box of tissues from the side and passed it to her.

  ‘Were you concerned when you didn’t hear from Anita at all?’ Whitney asked.

  ‘Initially, I expected her to call. It gradually got easier, the longer it went without her contacting us. You must think me an awful person.’

  ‘Not at all. We all react differently to situations,’ Whitney said, hoping she was reassuring the woman, because in truth she couldn’t comprehend such a reaction.

  ‘If it does turn out to be Anita, I’ll have to get in touch with her father so we can have a funeral. I’m assuming we can have one.’

  ‘Yes, once the coroner releases Anita’s body, after the autopsy has been completed. The coroner’s office will be in contact with you at that time.’

  It was strange calling the skeletal remains a body, but she could hardly say bones.

  ‘Can you tell us a bit more about how Anita was out of control,’ Brian said.

  Whitney froze. The woman had just been given the news her daughter had possibly been dead for decades. There was nothing else they needed at this stage. Their priority was to identify the bodies. There was a niggling doubt at the back of her mind that Anita’s parents could have been involved, if the situation was really that bad at home. But that wouldn’t account for Jayne.

  ‘I’m sure I don’t know all that she got up to, apart from shoplifting and playing truant from school.’

  ‘Did she fight with anyone? Did she get in trouble? Did she take drugs?’ Brian pushed.

  ‘I don’t know. She was out of hand and we couldn’t control her. She’d go out at night and not tell us where she was going. I don’t know about drugs, it was too long ago.’ She sniffed.

  ‘Is there anyone we can contact to be with you?’ Whitney asked.

  ‘I’m fine on my own. I’ve got to finish this birthday cake. You’ve brought up so many memories. You never stop loving your children, whatever the circumstances.’

  ‘But you didn’t try to find her,’ Brian said.

  The woman bowed her head.

  ‘Thank you for your time,’ Whitney said. ‘We’ll be in touch to let you know the results of the test.’

  They left the house and Whitney turned to Brian. ‘I will not tell you again. That poor woman didn’t need grilling, we’re only at the stage of identifying the bodies.’

  ‘If you say so, guv.’

  ‘Yes. I do. In future, you will do as I say, or you won’t be happy with the outcome.’

  Chapter 8

  ‘Would you like to go skiing over Christmas?’ Dr Georgina Cavendish asked her partner Ross, as she sat opposite him at a table in the university café. He’d joined her for lunch as he’d been in the area visiting someone who’d commissioned a sculpture of their dog.

  ‘Skiing? I’m not sure. I’ve only ever been once on a school trip and I spent more time on my arse than standing upright on skis.’

  ‘We can ski on separate slopes and you can have some lessons while we’re there. It would be pleasant to get away over the holidays.’

  ‘This is the first time you’ve suggested going away together. Normally it’s me wanting to make plans.’

  They had only recently begun seeing each other again after six months apart, when he’d proposed and she’d turned him down. She’d ended the relationship and realised, almost immediately, that she’d made a mistake, but hadn’t done anything about it. It wasn’t until she’d seen him at an exhibition he’d held at a local gallery that they’d started seeing each other again.

  He hadn’t broached the topic of marriage or living together again, but if he did, she was beginning to warm to the idea. She might even mention it herself, rather than wait for him.

  ‘Does it matter who suggests it?’ She frowned.

  ‘Not at all, I’d love to go away.’

  ‘Let’s go to Val d’lsère and rent a chalet. It will be perfect skiing weather.’

  Skiing was her favourite pastime, but she rarely had the opportunity to go. She was either busy at the university with her lecturing and research, or helping Whitney and her team solve murder cases. When she was on the slopes, she could switch off and not think of anything other than reaching the bottom of the hill.

  ‘Shall we go there over Christmas itself?’

&nbs
p; ‘I’ve got the family Christmas lunch, remember. I have to see my parents, or they’ll make a huge issue out of it.’

  ‘Surely they won’t mind if you miss it once.’

  ‘It would be nice to not have to sit through it, I must admit.’

  ‘We could visit both families pre-Christmas and hand out the presents. My parents would love to see you again.’

  She’d enjoyed spending time with Ross’s family in the past. They were easy to be with and didn’t pressure her to make small talk. She could sit back and observe them all together.

  ‘I’m not sure it’s appropriate this year. If my father is given a prison sentence after his court case next year, there might not be another of our traditional lunches for a long time.’

  Her father, along with many other high-profile people, had been charged with tax evasion. His court date was expected to be sometime next year.

  ‘I understand. I can come with you, if you like?’

  ‘No, I won’t put you through the torture. Let’s go skiing the day after Boxing Day and spend New Year over there.’

  ‘Will we find anywhere to book with less than two weeks’ notice?’

  ‘It is a long shot, but I know someone with a chalet. I’ll contact them to see if they’re using it this year and, if they’re not, I’m sure we’ll be able to. I’ve been there before, and it’s perfectly situated.’

  ‘Sounds great.’

  Her phone rang, and she glanced down at the screen. ‘It’s Whitney, I’d better answer this.’ She accepted the call. ‘Hello.’

  ‘Hi, George, how are you? We haven’t spoken in ages,’ her friend said.

  ‘I’m with Ross having lunch.’ She glanced across at him. He was leaning back in his chair, smiling in her direction.

  ‘You’re not at work today?’

  ‘Yes, I am. Ross met me here as he was in the city. The students have finished, and I’ve come in to complete my admin and prepare some research for publication next year. Did you want anything in particular? I can phone you later once I’m back in my office.’

  If Whitney wanted to chat, they’d be on the phone for a while and it was rude to ignore Ross as he wouldn’t be staying much longer.