Missing Without Trace

by P. F. Ford

  ‘That’s a good start,’ I assured him. ‘He’s the person I need to speak to next.’

  He gave me the address, then we agreed to keep in touch and I left him to carry on with his online research.

  ‘One more thing,’ he added as we were saying goodbye. ‘He’s got a son. He’s followed in his father’s footsteps. He’s the current Detective Inspector Nash, right here in Tinton. Apparently he has a nickname. He’s known among his colleagues as Nasty Nash.’

  The retired Detective Inspector Nash owned a small bungalow in a village about ten miles west of Tinton. He sounded surprised when I asked if I could come and speak to him about the disappearance of Simon Younger, and was rather reticent at first, but when I explained I was writing a series about children who had gone missing he seemed to relax a bit.

  ‘I suppose it’ll be alright then,’ he decided. ’You can come over this afternoon if you like. I shan’t be going anywhere, and there’s not much you can do in the garden this time of year. About two-thirty suit you?’

  I agreed. Two-thirty would indeed suit me.

  Number 22 Ridgeway Gardens was a neat corner plot at the end of a cul-de-sac. Even now, in November, it was obvious the owner was a keen gardener with the greenest of fingers. I couldn’t help but admire the neat and tidy garden as I walked up the path to the front door.

  He must have been watching through the front window. The door opened just as I got to it.

  ‘Mr Nash?’ I asked the obvious question. ‘I’m Alfie Bowman.’ As we shook hands, I figured it would do no harm to start with a compliment. ‘Lovely garden,’ I said. ‘Very neat and tidy.’

  He beamed modestly. ‘Not much else to do at my age. It keeps me active and reasonably fit.’

  He ushered me inside. I’d obviously started him on his favourite subject. Once inside, he pointed through the window at the back garden, which was filled with fruit bushes of varying types and small fruit trees.

  ‘Wow!’ I said, and I meant it. ‘This lot must keep you busy.’

  ‘Oh yes,’ he said proudly. ‘I used to have an allotment down at Tinton as well. But I’m too old to look after both now. I used to grow all my vegetables down there and the fruit up here.’

  He settled me in an armchair and sat down opposite. ‘But you didn’t come out here to ask me about my fruit and vegetables, did you?’

  It was almost as if a physical barrier had suddenly been placed between us, and to emphasise the point he crossed his arms and his chin jutted defiantly.

  I decided to tread carefully and see where it led. ‘I don’t want to upset you, Mr. Nash,’ I began. ‘I’m just trying to get a feel for what happened and what you feel stopped you solving the case.’

  He looked thoughtful for a few moments. ‘It was the worst case of my whole career,’ he said, and as he said it, he seemed to sag in his chair. ‘I knew who’d done it, but we just couldn’t find the evidence to prove it.’

  ‘So you actually knew who had taken the boy?’

  ‘It was that bloody school teacher, Rooke. There was no doubt in my mind at all. He didn’t even have an alibi. Just said he was at home on his own. I knew he was lying. I just couldn’t prove it.’

  ‘Didn’t anyone else come under suspicion?’

  ‘No. Absolutely not. He was the only one. I had a nose for these things.’

  His tone and manner made it clear there was no room for discussion on this. It struck me as a bit odd that no one else had even been considered worthy of suspicion, but I didn’t want to push it too far. And so we continued in the same manner for a few more minutes: me tiptoeing around trying to prise a little more from him, and him quite adamant there was no more to it. The longer it went on, the more hostile he became.

  It became quite clear there had been nothing to suggest the teacher Mr Rooke was guilty apart from former DI Tommy Nash’s ‘nose’. I couldn’t help but think it was no wonder the case had never progressed far, but then what do I know? Maybe I was just being uncharitable in the face of his growing hostility.

  I suppose it was inevitable he would get fed up with me eventually.

  ‘I don’t know why you’re poking your nose in now anyway,’ he said. ‘It was thirty bloody years ago. What makes you think you can do any better than I could with the whole damned police force behind me?’

  ‘I’m not suggesting I can do any better, Mr Nash. It’s just that I met Mrs Younger a few weeks ago, I heard her story, and I saw the pain she still endures. He was just ten years old, her little boy, and here we are thirty years on and she still doesn’t know what happened.’

  ‘Do you think I don’t know all that? You’re way out of order coming here asking me about this. My own son was ten at the time. I could understand exactly how she was feeling and I tried my hardest to prove that man was guilty, but I just couldn’t do it.’

  He was visibly upset now, and I began to feel seriously uncomfortable. Maybe I was out of order. He certainly seemed genuine enough.

  ‘Look, Mr Nash, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to upset you. Maybe I’d better go.’

  ‘Yes. I think you should go. You can see yourself out.’

  Dismissed in such a fashion, I crept guiltily out of the room to the front door. ‘Goodbye,’ I called out, ‘and I’m sorry for upsetting you.’

  ‘Just bugger off,’ he called, bitterly, ‘and don’t come back.’

  As I drove back towards Tinton, I congratulated myself on my brilliant interviewing skills. Well, let’s face it, I had him eating out of my hand, didn’t I? No, you’re right. I didn’t think so either. And he was obviously so looking forward to welcoming me back anytime never.

  I did feel guilty about upsetting him, but at the same time, I felt as though there just might be more to this than first meets the eye. I mean, surely there must have been other people who could have been considered suspects, yet Tommy Nash was adamant there were none. Now, I’m no detective, but it seemed unlikely to me. It was almost as if I was being steered in one particular direction.

  It wasn’t even four o’clock yet, so I headed for DB’s. He was on my way home anyway, and I figured it wouldn’t hurt to give him an update and find out what he’d discovered today.

  As I stepped from my car outside his house, I was delighted to see a familiar car parked a couple of cars down. It was my friend Positive Pete’s car. Pete and I go back quite a long way, having the misfortune to have married two sisters who were totally unsuitable for either of us.

  I had been the luckier one of us, having walked away relatively unscathed from my own marriage, but Pete had been driven into deep depression by his. Nowadays, he was a firm advocate for the power of positive thinking and saw himself as the positive influence that would save me from a similar fate. It wasn’t something I needed, but I knew he would walk across a bed of nails for me, so I was happy to play along.

  Sure enough, it was Pete who answered the door when I knocked. He had a permanently mournful expression, and as a result, people often thought he was miserable, but that was far from the truth. The fact was, he’d been desperately unhappy for so many years his natural expression had become one of abject misery. The man himself was happy enough inside, it was just that his face seemed to have forgotten how to smile.

  DB had been telling Pete all about Daphne’s story and what we were doing, so he was just about up to speed by the time I arrived. I told them both about my meeting with Tommy Nash, and how I had the feeling there was more to this than meets the eye.

  ‘I always thought he was being evasive thirty years ago,’ admitted DB. ‘But I didn’t have anything to go on then.’ He smiled triumphantly. ‘But I just might have stumbled upon someone who can shed a little light on what happened that day.’ He sat back, grinning like a Cheshire Cat.

  ‘Well, come on,’ I said. ‘Don’t keep me in suspense!’

  ‘I’ve been following up on the teachers who were at the school at the time. It was only a small school, with not many staff. Two of them have passed away and
, of course, Mr Rooke, Tommy Nash’s only suspect, took his own life two years after the boy went missing. But I have managed to track down a lady teacher, Miss Goodie. She was quite new to the school at the time and was actually away on the day in question.’

  ‘Well done,’ I said. ‘That’s great work. Do you have an address for her?’

  ‘I have indeed.’ Dry Biro beamed. ‘And a telephone number. I even called her and she said she would be happy to talk to you. All you need to do is call and arrange a time.’

  Chapter Four

  I waited until ten o’clock the next morning before I called Miss Goodie. She was living in a retirement home about an hour away and was happy to see me later that afternoon.

  I had just put the telephone down after my conversation and was thinking about plucking up the courage to go down to the tea shop for some company when my doorbell rang. Then, almost immediately, and before I had time to reach the door, there was a loud pounding on the door and an accompanying shout.

  ‘Come on, open up. We know you’re in there!’

  I opened the door. An Inspector Clouseau lookalike (a la Peter Sellers) stood on my doorstep. He had it all, even down to the mustachio, hat, and coat.

  I managed to suppress the smirk that was threatening to take over my face and waited for him to speak. I knew if he had a funny accent I was going to be in trouble.

  But this man was no bumbling idiot. He flashed a warrant card in front of my face. It was way too close for me to read, but that didn’t seem to matter as he brushed me aside and forced his way in.

  ‘Alfred Bowman? I’m Detective Inspector Nash. And this,’ he said, pointing over his shoulder to indicate his colleague, ‘is Detective Sergeant Slater.’

  Slater looked at me uncomfortably and nodded.

  ‘Why don’t you come in?’ I said to Nash’s back as he walked into my flat. Then I had a thought. Hang on a minute. Who does he think he is barging in like this?

  He marched into my lounge and began to inspect the room.

  ‘Do you have a search warrant?’ I asked.

  ‘Do I need one?’

  ‘I think you do if you’re going to come barging in here poking your nose around.’

  He obviously thought he’d scored the first point and looked pleased with himself.

  ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘It’s funny you should mention poking your nose in. That’s exactly why I’m here.’

  He was wearing a pair of black leather gloves, which he slowly peeled from his fingers. I supposed this was intended to intimidate me, but all it seemed to do was make his colleague, Slater, even more uncomfortable.

  ‘Is this some new quiz show?’ I asked. ‘Do I have to guess what you’re referring to to win the prize.’

  ‘Don’t get smart with me. You know exactly what I’m talking about. You’ve been poking your nose into police business. Now that would be bad enough, but what’s even worse is you’ve been upsetting my dad.’

  Ah right. I’d been wondering what was going on, but now the penny dropped. Of course. This was Tommy Nash’s son, Nasty Nash.

  ‘I was just trying to get some background for a story I’m writing,’ I started to explain.

  ‘It’s an ongoing investigation, and you will keep your nose out. Understand what I’m saying?’

  The ‘understand what I’m saying?’ was a threat, not a question. I looked at Slater, but he looked distinctly embarrassed, as though he would like the ground to swallow him up.

  ‘Is that a personal threat, or an official police threat?’ I asked.

  ‘Perhaps you’d like me to look into a complaint I have against you from a few weeks ago. Let me think, what was it now? Oh yes. Threatening behaviour. Or perhaps it was assault.’

  He was referring to an incident a few weeks ago in which I’d been beaten up by three guys with baseball bats; the local police appeared to have conveniently forgotten about it.

  ‘Ah!’ I said. ‘Was that when I head-butted a baseball bat so hard, I needed twelve stitches in my head, and damaged another one when I broke my arm against it? Is that the incident you mean? The one that you lot didn’t bother to investigate at the time?’

  Nash curled his lips into a sneer. ‘From what I heard, you were drunk and disorderly and started a fight. You were fortunate the gentlemen involved didn’t want to press charges at the time, but that could always change. Understand what I’m saying?’

  Slater was looking at both of us. He obviously didn’t have a clue what we were talking about.

  ‘It looks like this is all news to you, Sergeant,’ I said. ‘Why am I not surprised?’ I turned back to face Nash. ‘Funny you should know all about that, Detective Inspector, don’t you think? After all, someone in your station must have decided a serious assault wasn’t worth investigating. Is that a decision someone in your position would take?’

  ‘What are you suggesting?’

  He might have looked like Peter Sellers playing the part of Clouseau, but sadly he was no actor and his attempt at indignation failed to impress either me or, evidently, Slater.

  ‘If you’d bothered to carry out an investigation, Mr Nash, you would know there is a witness who saw the whole thing.’

  ‘I’ve got three witnesses who say different,’ he spat.

  Now I knew who had beaten me up, and I very much doubted that Nugent and his guys would be interested in getting involved in this development. So I figured Nash was bluffing. As for Slater, he obviously had no idea what was going on.

  I decided I’d had enough of this. ‘Fine,’ I said. ‘You carry on and do whatever you want. Now if there’s nothing else, I suggest this conversation is over. Let me show you out.’

  Nash was turning purple and I wondered what would have happened if Slater hadn’t been present. Nash managed to keep cool enough to leave quietly, but the rage and threat in his eyes were clear enough.

  Phew! I closed the door and leaned back against it. Now wasn’t that interesting? We seemed to have ruffled a few feathers. And Nash knew all about my assault. Now that made it doubly interesting.

  I nearly jumped out of my skin as the doorbell rang again. Surely this couldn’t be Nasty Nash back already. But it wasn’t Nash. It was my gorgeous neighbour, Sophia.

  I’m quite happy living on my own, but even for the most hardened loner, there are times when you need a bit of company. I was fortunate to live above a small tea shop down an alley off the High Street in the centre of Tinton.

  The shop was owned by Sophia, who also owned the two flats above the shop: one of which I lived in, the other was her home. So my neighbour was also my landlady.

  I didn’t really know Sophia well, but I had recently helped reunite her with her long-lost niece Jelena, and that had brought the three of us together, so I think it would be fair to say we were definitely friends.

  Until Jelena’s arrival, the tea shop had been mostly closed, but now the two of them were trying to make a success of the shop and it was open every day. So, if I wanted some company I could always take the short walk from my front door, around the corner, and into the tea shop.

  But there was a problem, and it was Sophia. Well, to be honest, it was my attraction to Sophia. I thought she was the most gorgeous woman I had ever met, but I was also convinced she wouldn’t have time for someone like me. I mean, she appeared to be seriously cool whatever the situation, whereas I seemed to become a bumbling idiot whenever I was around her.

  I thought I’d made a breakthrough when I got her together with Jelena, but then, at the little celebration we had, I made an enormous gaffe. Sophia told me how grateful she was, and asked if there was anything she could do to show her gratitude. For some bizarre reason, I gave her a saucy wink and told her if I thought of anything I would let her know.

  Talk about a mismatch – on one side this gorgeous, sophisticated lady, and on the other side this clumsy idiot doing the nudge, nudge, wink, wink routine. What on earth had I been thinking? Well, of course, the problem was I hadn’t been thinking
, had I? It was one of those moments when the mouth had engaged top gear before the brain had even got out of neutral.

  Sophia had immediately made an excuse about going to the ladies and I’d hardly seen her again that night. Ever since, I’d been so embarrassed, I’d been effectively avoiding her and Jelena. And, of course, the longer you allow that situation to go on, the harder it is to make it right.

  ‘Oh, Sophia! What a surprise!’

  She’d caught me on the hop. I had intended to think about how to apologise before I spoke to her, but here she was looking lovelier than ever. Ahhh! What should I say?

  ‘Hello Alfie,’ she purred. ‘How are you? It’s so long since we saw you.’

  Her voice was like dark chocolate – deep, smooth, with just a slight trace of an accent long gone, which sometimes made an ending ‘g’ sound like a ‘k’. When she spoke, I tended to go weak at the knees.

  ‘Err, erm, I’m fine, how are you?’ I could feel a stupid grin take over my face and I just couldn’t stop it. Oh, no. This was pathetic. It was like being a little boy all over again. I realised she was speaking.

  ‘I still didn’t thank you properly for helping Jelena find me. I wondered if you would like to come to dinner. Let me cook you a meal, it’s the least I can do.’

  ‘Oh wow, yes, please!’ I gushed.

  Oh wow, yes, please? I’m just so sophisticated, aren’t I? Was this really the best I could do?

  ‘Friday evenink then.’ She smiled. ‘Eight o’clock. And don’t be late.’

  She gave me another big, beautiful smile and turned to go. I watched her glide elegantly to the corner of the building. As she turned the corner, she looked back at me, gave me a cheeky grin, and pursed her lips to form a kiss before disappearing round the corner.

  Was she teasing me? I guessed she probably was – she’d have to be blind to not see the effect she had on me: a grown man reduced to a quivering wreck. I realised I was still on the doorstep. I hadn’t even asked her in. You see what I mean?