Ghost Girl

by Thomson, Lesley

  ‘Can we go outside?’ Marian Williams moved swiftly to the door and held it open. ‘Please!’

  ‘I am not going until I see the Chief Superintendent. No offence, but I won’t be fobbed off with civilian staff this time.’

  Marian Williams was clearly flustered and Stella guessed it was because the scene was being played out in front of the cleaner and because of who she was. For her part she wasn’t keen to meet her newly returned client. She grabbed her cart. ‘I’ll come back,’ she mouthed. The administrator nodded.

  Stella trundled the cart to the stairs and sneaked back to the door. Not one to eavesdrop, she had to know why Mrs Hampson wanted Terry. It might have a bearing on the case, she told herself as she dusted the skirting board.

  ‘Mrs Hampson, DCS Darnell has left us. His replacement is DCS Cashman but he is not here and no one else is authorized to consider this case.’ Although the voices were muffled, Stella could hear.

  Stella didn’t think the last point was true but had little sympathy for Mrs Hampson, what with the business of the tea tree and now her lying about Stella’s dad asking her to return. Terry would not have done that; he hated time-wasters.

  She heard a sliding sound and then a thump, like a body falling, and for a wild moment thought Mrs Hampson had attacked Marian Williams.

  Then the administrator spoke: ‘Leave those, I’ll deal with them.’ She was close to the door. Stella fled up the corridor. Two uniformed officers were coming down the staircase but paid her no attention. The administrator’s door did not open. Stella risked returning to her listening post.

  ‘You’ve been kind.’ Mrs Hampson sounded defeated; she might even be crying. Marian Williams, it seemed, was an excellent gatekeeper. Stella felt a little sorry for the woman who, after all, had lost a husband. She hoped Marian hadn’t said she was DCS Darnell’s daughter.

  Marian Williams was speaking briskly – the equivalent of sweeping up – and in a minute she would have got rid of her. ‘…although I doubt much can be done after all this time.’

  ‘…once I’ve explained it you’ll…’ Mrs Hampson was saying. Stella strained to hear but her words were mumbled as if into a hankie; then she blew her nose. She was leaving. Stella bounded back to her cart and pushed it into the next office.

  When she went back to finish off, Mrs Hampson had gone and Marian was frowning at her computer. She did not acknowledge Stella.

  ‘Thank you for that.’ Stella squirted polish on the shelves. She was running late.

  ‘For what?’

  ‘For not introducing me to Mrs Hamp— to your visitor.’ She’d rather the administrator did not know Mrs Hampson was a Clean Slate client.

  ‘I had to puncture her hopes. It shows how little she knew her husband.’ Williams punctuated this with a stab on her return key. ‘She had just discovered he had passed his advanced driving test and told me this proved his crash could not have been an accident. I had to tell her: police officers pass that test and it doesn’t prevent them having accidents. Rare, I grant you.’ She tapped the keyboard and a printer by the window came to life. Still sitting, she wheeled her chair over and caught the page as it tipped into the tray.

  ‘I see.’ Stella was not surprised Mrs Hampson had not known about the test; many of her clients knew little about their partners.

  Marian Williams had been more patient with Mrs Hampson than Stella would have been if faced with irrational behaviour. Indeed, she had not been patient and it had led to Mrs Hampson cancelling the contract. People like Mrs Hampson must be par for the course at the station. Even if they were grief-stricken and could not accept that an accident was just that, an accident. Terry must have appreciated that his executive officer kept them at bay.

  Marian Williams would take her time passing Mrs Hampson’s message to Martin Cashman and Stella did not blame her. She did not envy Williams her job.

  A young constable knocked on the open door. ‘Hey, Marian, something to make you smile. The Nominal who mowed down the kiddie has only gone and walked into the lobby. He’s given himself up. Paperwork’s on its way. Brace yourself, you’re going to love him!’

  ‘Name?’ The administrator wasn’t smiling; her fingers hovered over the keys.

  ‘Matthew Arsehole Benson.’

  She nodded grimly. ‘Was he sorry?’

  ‘Gutted.’ The young man slapped his palms in a rhythm on the door jamb. He stopped when a frisson of annoyance passed over Marian’s face. ‘Gutted there was a camera above Marks and Spencer’s. He knew we’d get him so he pipped us to it. He’s crying so get your tissue box out.’ With a cheery wave, he was gone.

  Stella folded and refolded her cloth: ‘Just like you said.’

  Mrs Williams did not reply.

  32

  Tuesday, 21 June 1966

  The sand stung her face and a grain got in her eye. She kicked blindly with her feet and sent a spray of damp sand across the play area. When she peered through watery slits she saw the three boys from Michael’s class running away. A train on the bridge above drowned out their shouting.

  Mary’s plimsoll was ripped and both shoes were stained orange from the sand. They were ruined.

  She sat on the tiled lip of the sandpit and wrenched them off without undoing the laces. She pulled her sandals out of her duffel bag, slipped them on and did up the buckles. She picked up the plimsolls by the laces and dropped them into a rubbish bin outside the playground.

  ‘Here’s your tea, Daddy.’ Mary lingered on the step, gripping the heavy mug with both hands. She hoped he would take it off her soon because her fingers were stinging from the hot china. ‘Can I help?’

  ‘Nothing you can do.’ Her dad often said this.

  ‘I made the tea.’ This was a lie. Her mum had made it and said yes when Mary had asked if she could take it to him. It was Monday, so she had been surprised to find him in the garden cleaning Michael’s bike when she got home from school. At their old house, and before Michael went underneath the white Angel, her dad would have ticked her off for being a ‘clever clogs’. Maybe he believed she had made the tea.

  ‘Put it on the wall.’

  ‘Please.’ She wished she hadn’t said it but luckily he hadn’t heard.

  Nuts, cogs, a chain and other bits were laid out on newspaper. Oil splodges had landed on a photograph of policemen in coats and helmets walking in fog. Mary saw the words …it was October 1965 when Saddleworth Moor first became a grisly household name… Stepping around the paper, she balanced her dad’s mug on the mossy wall. In the middle of the garden Michael’s swing looked bigger than ever and she imagined sitting on it. In the sunshine it looked especially colourful.

  Dad will tell you off. Michael was here all the time now.

  ‘Myr— Mary, there you are!’

  Her mum was holding the door as if it would fall off. She held on to things wherever she went: hedges, fences, cars, handles and walls as if she were on a ship in a stormy sea.

  ‘I can’t find your new plimsolls and you need them for PE tomorrow. Please fetch them.’ Her mum did not stand back to make room for Mary to pass. ‘And wash your hands for tea.’

  ‘What are we having?’ Although they had stopped expecting Mary to make it, teatime was now her least favourite part of the day.

  ‘Fish fingers and beans as a treat, but only if you get your plimsolls.’

  This was not a treat. Mary did not like fish fingers; they were Michael’s favourite. She didn’t know how to pluck up the courage to say she had thrown away her new shoes. In the bathroom she assiduously washed her hands to make up for there being no plimsolls. She sat at the kitchen table, her hands folded on her lap, hoping that her mum had forgotten. She had not.

  ‘What did I just say?’

  The back door opened and her dad came in. He stood on the mat drinking his tea.

  Say they got stolen by robbers!

  ‘I lost them,’ she mumbled so he wouldn’t hear.

  ‘What do you mean?’ Her mum whirled
around from the cooker, a plate of food in her hand.

  ‘They were stolen by robbers.’

  ‘Don’t talk nonsense,’ her dad said.

  ‘Do you mean someone has stolen them?’ Her mum was concerned.

  Mary waited for her brother’s help.

  ‘Who took them?’ Her mother put the plate in front of her. The fish fingers were burnt and the beans were stuck together so Mary couldn’t see each bean.

  ‘I had to swap them for Hawthorn, Number Twenty-four, and Sycamore, which is Number Thirteen.’ Mary filled her mouth with a forkful of beans and chopped a fish finger into four pieces like a train for Michael.

  ‘What are you talking about?’ her dad demanded.

  Jean Thornton retied her apron, bringing the ribbon around to her front and tugging it into a knot. ‘It’s cards from the tea leaves.’ She sounded enormously tired.

  Mary kept her eyes on her dad. He put his mug down on the draining board and wiped his feet on the mat, although he had already walked on the lino and his shoes were clean.

  ‘She’s swapped expensive plimsolls for two blinking cards.’ He shook his head.

  He made you do it.

  ‘He made me do it.’ Mary spat out a fish finger by accident. ‘He gave me his swaps though I don’t need them. I’ve got fifty.’ She could not hide her pride.

  ‘How did you manage that? Last thing I knew you… Oh never mind…’ Her mother mopped her face with her apron. ‘Bob, you need to go up to the school and sort this out.’

  ‘Who made you swap?’ her dad asked, swallowing his tea.

  ‘Douglas Ford.’ Mary was prompt. She sat up straight as the facts presented themselves. ‘He steals things. He was going to bash me up if I didn’t give him my plimsolls. He made me have the Sycamore and the Yew even though I didn’t want them.’ She spoke without drawing breath.

  After that the matter was taken out of Mary’s hands. Bob Thornton would see Miss Crane the next day. The kid would be punished and the shoes returned.

  Mary had never gone to school with her dad before. She demonstrated her hopscotch skips on King Street but did not lead him over the grass with the sign: ‘Do Not Walk on the Grass’. She was taking her dad to school and not the other way around. She knew the way and he did not.

  She was triumphant when they passed Michael’s stupid friends. The girls and boys would see how tall and strong Daddy was and wish he was their dad. She hoped they had not seen him tug her across the road, even though she liked holding his hand.

  At the entrance to the Juniors’ he let go of her. ‘Which one is Douglas Ford?’

  At that moment, like magic, Douglas came round from the drinking fountain doing his strange pony walk, his blotched pink knees knobbling over his Cubs socks. He had his duffel bag for football. Mary pictured her brand-new white plimsolls hidden under his football boots.

  ‘That’s him!’

  ‘Go and get your shoes back,’ her dad commanded.

  ‘Aren’t you going to go to Miss Crane?’

  ‘I’m not your daddy. Time you fought your own battles.’

  Mary caught up with Douglas Ford in the cloakroom. ‘Give me back my plimsolls!’ She had not meant to shout; everyone stopped taking off their coats.

  ‘What? I haven’t got them.’ He went red.

  ‘You have and my dad’s come to get them back off of you. Hand them over and it’ll be all right.’

  Douglas appealed to the other children: ‘I don’t have her shoes.’

  He is a scaredy cat.

  ‘I won’t ask again, Scaredy Cat!’

  ‘What’s going on here?’ The real Miss Crane appeared. She stooped to retrieve a cap from the floor, read the label and passed it to a boy who was strait-jacketed half in and half out of his windcheater.

  ‘Douglas stole Mary Thornton’s plimsolls and Michael’s dad is here.’ The voice was echoed by others, keen to relay the available information to the head teacher. Keen to state the facts.

  Clifford Hunt came and stood next to Mary, his arms folded.

  ‘Is this true, Mary?’ Miss Crane was severe but sounded concerned and Mary felt a glow of pleasure.

  ‘He made me give them to him.’ She sniffed. She was truly on a ship with nothing to hold on to and the land was receding. Clifford Hunt smelled of salty sea.

  The morning went faster than any school morning ever had. Mary’s dad went with Miss Crane to her office. Douglas Ford’s mother was called away from work and told of her son’s crime. He no longer had the shoes. He claimed he had never had them and his mother believed him. Bob Thornton said the one thing about his daughter was she never lied. The father of a dead child had the last word. Douglas was given detention and made to shake hands with Mary. He had to say sorry loud enough for all the adults to hear. Mrs Ford – there was no Mr Ford – would pay for new shoes.

  The day ended happily for Mary. Clifford Hunt had stuck up for her and this made the other children nicer to her. Her dad collected her from school and got her Fruit Salad chews from the sweet shop where the woman serving remembered her from when she came in with Michael and asked if she wanted half a pound. Mary gave her a funny look as if she had never seen her before. She kept close to her dad and Michael, wherever he was, kept quiet all the way home.

  After her mum had said goodnight, Mary waited until she was downstairs then jumped out of bed and opened the curtains. The lady that Michael said was painting was in her room. The room was like a lighthouse, the bright window suspended in the dark. The lady was looking out of the window so Mary gave a wave and imagined she waved back.

  Please could I have a chew?

  ‘You are dead.’ Mary climbed back into bed, satisfied it had turned out well in the end. Douglas Ford had stolen her plimsolls. He had made her swap for the Yew and the Sycamore. Mary had the cards to prove it.

  33

  Friday, 27 April 2012

  Kew Bridge was pinkish grey in the evening sunlight. The Thames, choppy from rowing boats skimming under its arches, was a mix of dancing lights and shadows. Above the drone of traffic could be heard the hoarse shouts of a man cycling along the south towpath, holding a megaphone; he kept pace with a boat cutting through the water near the shore.

  Stella paused until the man had passed and then, hurrying along, she spotted David Barlow further up the path. He was gazing down at the fast-flowing current, his hands in the pockets of his leather jacket. Light sleek sunglasses complemented prominent cheekbones. He cut a striking figure. Stella noticed two women in their thirties, jogging side by side towards the bridge, see him and share a glance. Despite herself she was gratified it was she he was waiting for.

  Her phone rang. It was Jack. She didn’t answer it. She wouldn’t abort a second date with David

  ‘You found it,’ David murmured, turning from the river as if he’d known she was there.

  ‘I came here as a kid.’ The memory came out of nowhere. She had cycled behind her dad from the Ram pub, over Hammersmith Bridge, back along to Kew and then past Strand-on-the-Green. Her mum had said it was far too much for a child.

  ‘I often see children with their fathers here.’ He led them away from the bridge. ‘It can make me feel envious.’

  ‘You don’t have children?’ Stella was spiked with heat at her temerity and then at her forgetfulness. David had told her he didn’t.

  ‘Jennifer had a miscarriage soon after we got married and what with one thing and another that was it. I might have liked to be a dad.’ He was briefly wistful.

  ‘Children are a lot of work.’ Stella appreciated the idiocy of the comment, but fortunately David Barlow went on:

  ‘What bad parents we would have been. No child should live with two people quietly at war with each other. My own home was happy until Mum died. I was eighteen and already engaged. What was your childhood like?’

  ‘My parents divorced when I was seven. My mum wanted it, but she complains about my dad as if they’re still married. I think she wanted him to fight it
, but if someone asked him for anything he did it. Mum got her way and has been unhappy ever since.’ This unexpected insight was obvious now she had said it. Stella thought of telling Jack.

  ‘Maybe she wanted him to make her feel loved?’ David was keeping up a fast pace that suited Stella’s long legs. ‘Don’t we all. Oh no!’ He swerved into Stella, holding her shoulders briefly to steady her, then he ran over to the edge of the bank.

  A small dog was making its way along the water’s edge. It was unsteady on its legs and perilously close to the river, which Stella saw was rising. Oblivious to danger, it batted and snouted at an overhanging branch above its head.

  ‘Bloody thing!’ David Barlow flung off his jacket and handed it to Stella.

  ‘Dogs are sure-footed. It’ll be fine.’ With a shock Stella watched David Barlow shuffle and slither down the steep bank, finding foothold in the merest of indentations in the soil. Stella knew nothing about dogs, but she did know people died trying to rescue them while the dog survived. Going by the speed of scum and flotsam racing by, the current was strong.

  ‘It’s a puppy, it has no sense.’ He spoke through clenched teeth as he grasped a clump of groundsel. He anchored his foot in a gap in the concrete ballast.

  Stella was relieved he wasn’t wearing the Italian loafers of her first visit. Grasping another branch, David whistled at the animal. The puppy cocked its ears and looked around.

  Stella cast about either way along the towpath. They were alone. The sun had gone in and a breeze whipped over the water, sending ripples across the grey-blue surface. Deep in conversation and walking fast, they had come a good way and the bridge was out of sight. There was no one to help.

  ‘Here, Bubsy.’ He clicked his tongue. The dog gave a sudden spring into the air and landed facing the other way, its hind leg in the water. To Stella’s horror, a sparrow flew out of nowhere and alighted between the dog and David. The puppy stared at it with liquid brown eyes. It lifted a front paw and held it bent.