by Daisy White
“Unless you had old-fashioned parents and were going to a party,” I tell her, adding milk and sugar to the tray. “Anything else?”
Mary shakes her head, “It is horrible, though. I told her not to take her eyes off Summer.”
I reach out for her hand and give it a quick squeeze. “Nobody would get past Joyce Carpenter. I really do think that she was a spy in the war. That ferry pilot job was just a cover.”
To my relief my friend giggles. “You are an idiot. But she is clever. Did you know she speaks fluent French and German?”
“There you go then, I must be right.” I grin at her and march out with the tea tray.
By the time I’ve painted a total of thirty fingernails in assorted colours (the sugar pink is still a hot favourite), I’ve had plenty of time to pick up and sift through all the gossip. The police may tell me to keep out, but this is what they miss. The ebb and flow of conversation in the salon. People exchanging news. Someone saw the kidnapping on the beach, someone else mentioned a blue Ford Anglia driving away far too fast, shortly after the girl was stopped. A client’s husband works in the bakery near the police station, and he saw the girl being brought in. He also mentioned her old-fashioned dress. An enormous, jolly woman called Fiona Majors said she heard a rumour that Susie Stocker had been ‘going downhill for a year or so, poor soul, and her husband had a woman living with them to nurse her full time.’
I ask a few more questions but she doesn’t really know the family, and said she heard it from her friend who’s a housekeeper in the house next door. She tells me it’s a road of big houses, towards Hove, but she can’t think of the name . . .
And so it goes on, until closing time, when Johnnie sighs with relief and shuts the door on the last client. “Well done, darlings, that was a busy, busy day. I’m off out tonight or I would stay and find out what leads our chief investigator has discovered in amongst the gossip. Rubes, I’ve got some free tickets for a magic show at the Hippodrome if you and Mary fancy coming along? Everyone else is coming, I think, oh, apart from Kenny, he hates magicians . . . It’s on Thursday night. Let me know tomorrow. Got to dash, I’m late for an appointment.”
He lopes off up the street, blonde hair golden in the sunlight, leaving us to finish clearing up.
“I’ll finish up if you like. It won’t take long and Catherine has already washed up,” I say. “Then you lot can get off and collect the kids! Oh, and Mary, don’t forget Ted’s coming round later to see Summer . . .”
I wave as they clatter off gratefully, feeling just slightly odd that Mary, although not much older than me, is now ‘one of the mums’. Catherine and Eve have been so helpful since we told them the truth about Mary’s ex-husband hitting her, and saying the baby wasn’t his. I think before they regarded us as a couple of silly party girls, one of whom had got herself into trouble. But now they know Mary was actually married when she fell pregnant it’s all OK. My mind drifts back to Beverly, and to Laura. They both mentioned that a lot of people didn’t like Beverly because she was an unmarried mum. Ten years ago it must have been even harder to bring up a child on your own.
It takes less than fifteen minutes for me to sweep up, dump the dirty pile of towels in the basket, and put the mugs neatly back on their shelf. I put the milk back in the cool storage box on the steps of the boarded-up cellar. However hot it gets, the brick steps are always cold. Catherine sometimes even keeps a wrap of butter down there for a lunchtime snack of toast. Since there are now five of us working full time, plus a couple of part-timers, Johnnie has invested in a little cooker, and swapped the rusting old sink for a brand new one. The bare boards are now covered in lino and the whole backroom looks more like a proper staff area.
The white brick walls are the same, though, and as I work, I glance over at my paper chart and lists. Finishing up, I push the cupboard door shut and select a pencil from a collection stuffed in an old ginger beer bottle. I draw a neat line from Beverly’s release date to today’s date, and along the line I write down a few quick details of the beach kidnapping. I add the date we found Beach Girl, with a few lines of description. Mary is right — and from their questions, even the police seem to agree, although I’m sure DS Little would rather die rather than admit it. There is something very coincidental about the wrongly convicted mum of a missing girl returning home just in time for the sudden attempted kidnapping of another young girl. Not to mention a dead body in the sea and a lost child on a stormy beach. I rattle that jar of puzzle pieces in my brain.
Chapter Fifteen
Back in the salon, I pick up the telephone. A quick call to the news desk at the Herald draws a blank as Kenny and James are both out, and there is no answer from Kenny’s bedsit.
I head back to my command post, and draw another line from Laura’s name to Beverly’s. Then I scribble the dates of Ella’s initial disappearance, and Beverly’s release. I write ‘Susie Stocker’ carefully in capitals, and at long last it comes back to me why I got that flash of recognition when Inspector Hammond mentioned her name.
Annie on White Oak was talking about a John Stocker who owned houses. Who used to own Beverly’s old house before her uncle bought it. At last I have a connection. Tenuous, but it’s there. Now I just need to find out about this kidnapping . . . There is another thought following quickly along behind, but that would just be too coincidental, and I shove it to the back of my mind. Too many linked events, and all apparently set in motion by Beverly’s release from prison.
I move a step back and stare at my wall charts until a headache nudges at the back of my eyes. My brain refuses to come up with anything helpful, and there are still too many pieces of the jigsaw missing to get anything that might lead us to what really happened ten years ago. Admitting defeat, I lock up the salon before running upstairs to our little bedsit.
Ted and Mary arrive within minutes of each other. He’s brought a big bunch of daisies, some chocolates and a little blue teddy for the baby.
“You didn’t have to do this. It must have cost a fortune!” Mary is delighted with the gifts, and introduces him to a cooing Summer.
Ted shrugs. “I wanted to. I missed you all so much, and now the baby’s so big . . . I remember you as hardly even looking pregnant.” He takes Summer and props her a bit nervously into the crook of his arm. “Am I holding her right? She’s very pretty, isn’t she? Looks like her mum . . .”
I catch Mary’s flush of pleasure and smile at them both.
“So how’s the new investigation going, Ruby?”
I shrug, “Not great.” Quickly, I update him and he says again he can ask around.
“Thanks Ted, anything would be useful. People just don’t want to talk, and I can see why,” Mary says, smoothing Summer’s hair with a gentle hand.
* * *
By Wednesday evening I haven’t made any more progress on the Collins case, and I drag my feet on the way to meet Beverly. Summer, after a few good days, has now started screeching in the evening and most of the night again. Mary is coping but I watch her nervously for signs of a retreat into that blank-eyed indifference.
“Evening, Ruby, I thought we’d just walk along the seafront and chat if that’s alright? Oh, unless you want a cup of tea or some chips?” Beverly is wearing a flower print dress which is a bit big for her, and has added the big hat to shield her from nosy passersby.
She looks so hopeful and pleased to see me, I want to scream with frustration. “Walking is fine.”
We stroll along to an empty spot against the railings, and I smile at her. The pretty girl from the photographs is still there, just, but hidden underneath years of grief. She pushes a curl away from her face in an impatient gesture.
“I tried everyone on the list I got from my friend at the Herald. You were right — most people wouldn’t even talk to me. The person who was really helpful was Annie.”
Beverly smiles. “Annie is always wonderful. Did she give you the envelope?”
“She did.”
“G
ood. Have you heard about that poor woman who drowned on Sunday? It was in the papers, wasn’t it? I remember Susie Stocker. She used to be in the Herald all the time when I was younger. She was a beauty queen from Eastbourne, and she caught John’s eye when she went to work in one of his clubs, I think. She was much younger than him but it was quite the love story when he asked her to marry him.” Beverly makes the money gesture with her fingers and thumb. “Lots of people thought she was after his cash, but I like to think she actually fell in love with him. They were always out and about, opening new clubs in London and going to big events. Of course, he owned a lot of property all over . . . My uncle bought the house in White Oak from him years ago.”
“Annie told me about that. Did you like the Stockers? I mean, did you meet them?”
Beverly laughs. “Bless you, no! They were like royalty around here with all their money and parties. He used to drive her around in a Roller. They wouldn’t have bothered with me. They didn’t have any children, and their parties were the stuff of legends — champagne baths and fancy food for all those famous people they knew, I heard. Lots of actresses used to come down for the weekend and stay with them. There was always a nice picture in the paper of them all in front of their big house, or dancing at one of the clubs.”
“Did your uncle ever mention John Stocker, or talk about buying the house from him?”
She frowns. “Not that I can remember. My aunt always said it was a good buy and that was what Stocker did. He bought houses and flats cheaply and then either sold them on or rented them out. My uncle did that himself, of course, but in a smaller way. I don’t think my uncle really knew him. Why?”
“Just that the name keeps coming up. I also spoke to Laura Grieves . . .”
She’s shocked, her face pale in the harsh sunlight, and she moistens her lips with the tip of her tongue. “Laura? She spoke to you? What did she say?” The words rattle out sharply.
I look away from her, tracking a family walking across the road, choosing my words carefully. The mother is carrying bags and three children have balloons and candyfloss. “She said she was sorry. She said to tell you she was sorry. You probably didn’t know but before your prison sentence ended she went to the police and admitted she lied the day Ella disappeared.”
“She . . . she what? Why now, after all these years? My God, that was one of the worst things. Laura, who I’d known since she was tiny, telling everyone that awful lie. Now she says she’s sorry? She has no idea. And the police never told me.”
“I suppose they wouldn’t. You’d nearly finished your sentence, after all. Can you remember anything about Laura’s family?”
Beverly wrinkles her nose, rubbing her thin pale fingers across her forehead. “Not really. They were a nice family. About six children, I think . . . Oh, I know, her dad was Ron, who was a builder. Now I come to think about it, he worked for John Stocker sometimes too. Funny, I haven’t thought about them all for years, but that’s what it was like then — everyone knew everyone’s business.”
“Yes, they did — which is why someone knows what happened to Ella. Annie mentioned someone called Stan, and he was on the list from my friend. I think you even said he saw Ella the day she went missing? He lives in White Oak. Do you remember anything else about him? Apparently he’s in hospital, but I’ll find out when he comes out.”
Beverly taps her lip thoughtfully. “Stan . . . Yes, he used to love making things for the kids — wooden toys, mainly, and then he used to fix the swings and slides at the playground just because he said he liked seeing them play. Nice man. He worked in all sorts of places but mainly Kennedy’s sheep farm up on the Downs.”
“Did he work for John Stocker?”
“I don’t know. He might have done, but I don’t remember so. Why?”
“No reason at the moment, I’m just trying to understand how it was and who was around that Ella might have known or trusted.” There’s a lot of information to play with, and I still feel like I’m groping through a smoke-filled room with my eyes shut, but I’m getting a clearer picture of Beverly’s life.
“Did Laura say anything else? Nothing about Ella?”
Again I force myself to be cautious. This is the only real lead I’ve managed to pick up, after all, and I really don’t want to get the poor woman’s hopes up. “I asked Laura if she thought it was possible that anyone was blackmailed into giving evidence that maybe didn’t exist.”
“And she said?”
I meet her toffee-brown gaze. “She denied it, turned as white as a sheet and slammed the door in my face.”
Beverly brushes a hand across her forehead. “So you think I was right? But we’re still back to why, aren’t we? Why would someone go to all that trouble to get me into trouble?”
“And enough trouble to get you shut away in prison for ten years,” I tell her soberly. “Are you absolutely sure you never witnessed a crime or saw something you shouldn’t have when you were younger?”
She shrugs. “Not that I can think of . . . I was such a good girl until I met Barry.” She laughs but her eyes are full of pain, suddenly. “Oh, there was something. It’s funny because my aunt and I were turning out some old boxes of my parents’ things yesterday, and it reminded me.”
“Go on.”
“It’s just a bit of family history. Oh, alright . . . The only time I remember getting into big trouble, before I got pregnant of course, was when I found a box of old documents under my parents’ bed.” Beverly gives a wistful little smile. “I was a nosy child, and the cat had run upstairs and into the room. My mum yelled at me to get him back, but when I poked around under the bed and found the box, I looked at that instead.”
“How old were you?”
“Ten or eleven I suppose. No, ten, because it was just before my uncle died. Anyway I got the papers out and started reading them. I remember some old photographs pasted onto cardboard, and my parents in their wedding clothes. My mum had a frilly dress and a big hat . . .”
I’m wondering where this is heading. She seems lost in the past. “So what was in the papers?”
She comes sharply back to the present. “My mum was in Elm Grove before she was married. I wouldn’t remember the date if I hadn’t just been looking at that same box yesterday! She was in Elm Grove in 1923, and the date on the wedding photographs and marriage certificate was 1925. I spent a long time just staring at the papers, and of course as a child I never really understood why Mum was so upset that I had seen them. There was a note from a doctor that said due to her ‘circumstances’ and ‘emotional state’ my mum had been put into Elm Grove until after the birth of her baby.”
I do a swift calculation. “She had another child before she married your dad, then.”
“Of course. How old do you think I am?” Beverly smiles, then sighs. “You don’t know what Elm Grove was, do you?”
“That’s the hospital, isn’t it? But surely if she went in to have a baby a year is . . .”
“No, it wasn’t the hospital then. It was the workhouse.”
I blink at her, shocked. “She had a child in the workhouse? How awful. I mean . . . why was she there?” My knowledge of workhouses is limited. I’ve heard older people speak of them in hushed tones, but I suppose I always assumed it was somewhere you could get help if you found yourself homeless.
Beverly is shaking her head sadly. “She never told me herself. It was my aunt who explained why they were so furious with me for seeing that. I was too young to understand, but of course when I was older I was curious about the baby. It was never spoken about, and I didn’t dare ask again. But when we were talking yesterday my aunt said that one of my mum’s employers at the time ‘took advantage’ of her and she lost her job, then her parents threw her out. She was working as a maid in one of the big houses, so God knows who it was . . . It makes it worse that when I got pregnant, under different circumstances, my mother could never forgive me. Perhaps she was terrified history was repeating itself.”
“D
id your aunt tell you what happened to the baby?” A seagull lands next to my foot, flapping clumsily after a dropped food wrapper. I wave it away and it takes flight again, the wrapper clamped firmly in its pink beak, scattering a crowd of small girls.
“Horrible things, aren’t they, these gulls? Yes, she did tell me. It was given up for adoption. My aunt said that my mother was ‘in no fit state to take care of the baby’, and she showed me some of the other documents from the box.” A frown creases her brow. “My mother was listed as being in the ‘lunatic’ ward. That scared me a bit. I imagine everything had just got too much for her. If she was alive now I’d tell her that I understand why she was the way she was with me and Ella. It was too much of a sharp reminder of everything she had suffered. I tried to talk to them so many times after I got pregnant, tried to tell them Barry and I were happy. And we were for a bit, until he buggered off. Aunt Sarah had rows with my mum about what she called her ‘stubborn pigheadedness’ and even my uncle refused to speak to my dad after it all happened.”
“Did your aunt and uncle have any children of their own?”
“No. Aunt Sarah just said it hadn’t happened for them. She was always wonderful with Ella, though. I did try and trace the baby once, mum’s other baby I mean. It was after I found out I was pregnant and it sort of reminded me. I suppose after Mum and Dad throwing me out I was curious to see if I could find a half brother or sister anywhere. But there was nothing in the records at the Town Hall, or the hospital. It could have been adopted anywhere, and although it was mentioned in the doctor’s notes in that box, there wasn’t a birth certificate or anything. It might even have died.”
It’s such a sad, bleak little story, adding an extra layer of tragedy to Beverly’s life, that I find myself distracted, as she clearly is, by another lost child.
