Lost Summer

by Stuart Harrison

  ‘What kind of ideas?’ Adam asked.

  ‘I don’t know. She and the others were up to something though. It started after she talked to that reporter, didn’t it?’

  Fallow shrugged. ‘I think so.’

  ‘Do you know the reporter’s name? Or the paper?’ Adam asked.

  ‘The Courier I think. It’s a local paper. I can’t remember the reporter’s name, but she was a woman. Youngish. About twenty-three or -four I should think.’

  ‘You don’t know what Jane and this reporter talked about?’

  ‘Not really. Jane did mention one thing, though. It must have been before Forest Havens got planning permission, or around that time anyway. She overheard some people talking in a pub or somewhere. She was pretty worked up about it.’

  ‘Worked up as in angry?’

  ‘Partly. Excited I think as well.’

  ‘But she didn’t say why?’

  ‘No. I definitely got the impression she thought it was important though.’ She shrugged. ‘But obviously it didn’t work out, whatever it was, because she left, didn’t she?’

  ‘But Ben and the others didn’t.’

  ‘No. Not until the camp was attacked anyway.’

  ‘You said you knew Ben a little. Did you know that when he and the others were killed it was Ben who was driving?’

  ‘Yes, his sister told me. She came here one day before the inquest.’

  ‘So, you probably know that she doesn’t believe the police version of what happened. What do you think about that?’

  ‘I don’t know. I remember Jane telling me once that he didn’t drink much because he was taking some sort of medication. I never saw him have more than a can of beer.’

  ‘Did you ever see him drive?’

  Ellie thought for a moment and shook her head. ‘But it could be that I just didn’t notice, you know.’

  ‘Did the police ever question you about it?’

  ‘No.’

  Adam wasn’t really surprised. He asked if there had been any other trouble besides the night they were attacked, but aside from minor harassment and a bit of name-calling there was nothing really.

  ‘Ben’s sister said he’d been threatened,’ Adam said. ‘Do you know anything about that?’

  Both Fallow and Ellie shook their heads. ‘Sorry.’

  He wondered why Ben and perhaps the others had been singled out, but they didn’t have any ideas, unless it had something to do with what they’d been doing. ‘I don’t suppose you know where I can find Jane?’ he asked Ellie finally.

  ‘Not really. She lives in London somewhere, that’s all I know.’

  ‘Okay. Thanks. If you think of anything, let me know.’ He gave her a card with his mobile number on it.

  ‘Okay,’ Ellie promised.

  Before Adam left Fallow asked for his mobile number and added it to a list of other media contacts he had in a notebook. He also gave Adam a badly photocopied flyer meant to educate people to the cause. It was full of exclamation marks and exhortations to action.

  He left them to go back to whatever they were doing, which as far as he could see wasn’t much. As protests went it seemed like a fairly harmless one. A bunch of society’s misfits, full of the idealism of youth, taking the opportunity to camp out in the woods and protect Mother Nature. At least that was probably how some of them viewed what they were doing. Maybe for others it was just a change from sleeping by the canal in some northern city. How bad could it be? Collect the dole, live off donations and spend their days drinking lager and smoking dope. No wonder Jane had thought there was a better way to elicit public support.

  As he went back along the track towards the road Adam tried to imagine what would be left of the wood if the development did go ahead. He remembered walking here when he was young. In the spring, the bluebells came up and made a stunning carpet of colour beneath the trees. There had been the sound of cuckoos in the early morning, and the echoing staccato hammering of woodpeckers. He stopped beneath a massive purple beech, the lower branches of which trailed against the ground in a wide circumference around the trunk. There were trees here that must be hundreds of years old. For generations the wood had been carefully managed. Parts of it were still coppiced and as mature trees were harvested new ones were planted, the mixture grown for timber carefully planned. The flyer claimed it was one of the largest ancient woodland sites left in England. Incredible to think such places weren’t protected, and yet, apparently, they weren’t. But as David had said, without the development the estate would be broken up and local people would lose their jobs. The economy would take yet another battering. There were always two sides to an argument, though rarely did either see the opposing point of view.

  He emerged from the wood by the road. From there, looking towards the town he could follow the edge of the wood towards the river, where the two were separated by a meadow and a copse that grew near the bottom end of the town. In a hollow of the fields the sun flashed on the grey slate roofs of the cottages where Nick had once lived. Drawn by curiosity he started down that way following the perimeter of the wood. The cottages were lost from sight, and didn’t come into view again until he reached the edge of the meadow. It was overgrown with weeds and thistles and the bridleway that cut through it looked little used. The cottages on the other side looked even more dilapidated than he remembered, and the roof of one was partly missing, exposing a gaping black hole and the skeletal rafters underneath. He doubted that anyone lived there any more.

  The last time he’d been here was the day when he’d seen David put something in James Allen’s van. That same night, as he’d later learned from Findlay, the police had found a bracelet belonging to Meg Coucesco. Had David and Nick put it there and then tipped off the police? He’d always thought so. But if they had, then why? Had they known something about James Allen? He supposed that was what he’d thought later. But where did they get the bracelet and what exactly had they known? He supposed nobody would ever have the answers now. Allen was long dead, and Meg too probably. He had wondered often enough what would have happened if he’d told somebody what he’d seen the day Meg had vanished when he’d glimpsed her with somebody in the trees near the sawmill. Perhaps when he’d first heard she was missing she was still alive and if he’d spoken out she wouldn’t have died. It was the guilt he would always carry with him.

  He found he was clenching his fists. When he looked at his hands there were deep marks where his nails had dug into the flesh of his palms. He rubbed them together.

  He would have turned away then, but once again curiosity drew him across the field towards the cottages. When he was twenty yards away he was startled when the door to one of them opened and a young woman came outside. She carried something that looked like kitchen scraps to the edge of the overgrown garden and tossed them into a thicket of nettles and blackberries. As she turned around she saw him and stopped dead. She paled visibly and stifled a gasp.

  He held up his hands in a gesture to show he meant no harm. ‘Sorry, I didn’t mean to startle you. I wasn’t sure anybody lived here.’

  She looked to be in her twenties, or maybe thirty. Her brown hair was dull and pulled back from her face and she wore faded jeans and a shapeless sweatshirt, beneath which he had the impression of a skinny body. The look she’d worn, which he would almost have described as one of terror, changed to one of wariness. It was enough to stop him from going any nearer. She seemed to cower and her eyes darted nervously towards the open door she’d emerged from. He wondered if she was simple-minded. He saw now that the cottage she’d come from was the only one that had glass in the windows and one of the others even lacked a front door.

  The woman continued to watch him, saying nothing. He smiled, trying to put her at ease. ‘I used to know somebody who lived here.’ He heard himself adopt the kind of tone he might have used to speak to a child. There was no response. ‘His name was Nick,’ he added. This time he thought there was a flicker of recognition. ‘Does he still live her
e?’ he asked, surprised.

  She didn’t answer. He waited uncertainly, not sure what to do next, then took half a step closer. She flinched and he stopped, alarmed by the look of fear that sprang into her eyes. He took a step backwards, sure there was something wrong with the woman. He didn’t want to be responsible for frightening her so he raised his hands again and continued to back off.

  ‘Look, I didn’t mean to scare you. I’m going to leave.’ He hesitated. ‘Are you alright? Is everything okay?’ Again she didn’t respond. Slowly he turned and began to walk away. When he’d gone twenty yards he looked back. The woman had vanished and the cottage door was now firmly closed. He stood there for a minute or so, a little bemused by his experience, wondering who she was. Something caught his attention, a movement he glimpsed from the corner of his eye. But when he looked there was only the other empty cottages, and then a crow flapped from a tree behind the roof and he thought that must have been what he’d seen.

  Then there was only silence, and once again the cottages appeared deserted. As he walked back towards the wood he had the feeling he was being watched, but he didn’t turn around.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  The Courier occupied the second floor of a grey stone Georgian building on Hardwick Street. The entrance hall had a high ceiling and a chipped tile floor. There was a single lift, but it had always been slow and noisy so Adam used the staircase. The polished wooden banister was dark and scratched with age, and his steps echoed faintly as he climbed. The building had once housed a tea merchant and would have been impressive when it was built. Now it was faintly seedy and smelt of the disinfectant used to mop the floors.

  The offices hadn’t changed much. A dozen or so desks occupied the main work area beneath the high ceilings with their patterned plaster mouldings. One new feature was the IBM computer terminal on every desk, and thick tangles of cabling that snaked around the edges of the room. A middle-aged man wearing a jacket that was too small for him sat staring morosely at his screen. A young woman with short spiky bleached hair emerged from what had once been the stationery room. She moved with brisk purpose, sat down at a desk and started tapping at her keyboard frowning with concentration. At the back of the room the editor’s glass walled office was still there, where Jim Findlay sat at his desk.

  Adam was more surprised by the fact that Findlay didn’t appear to have changed much than he was to find that he was now the editor. He’d filed a memory of Findlay as being old, but even now he couldn’t have been more than sixty at most. He supposed that at the age of sixteen anyone over twenty-five was practically decrepit.

  He gave the receptionist his name and she picked up her phone and spoke into it briefly. In his office Findlay looked over in surprise. ‘He says to go ahead,’ the receptionist said as she hung up.

  ‘Adam,’ Findlay said, as he emerged shaking his head. One or two people looked up from their work. ‘As I live and breathe. Now what are you doing here?’ He smiled warmly and held out his hand. The smell of cigarette smoke and beer clung to his clothes, along with a whiff of malt whisky.

  ‘I wasn’t sure whether I’d find you here or at the pub on the corner,’ Adam said, as they shook hands.

  Findlay smiled ruefully. ‘Times change, Adam.’ He gestured to his name on the door. ‘The things we give up in the pursuit of power, eh? Sometimes I wonder if it’s worth it.’

  Turning towards the rest of the room he raised his voice and addressed the few people busy at their work. ‘See here, all you lot. This fella here started out on this very paper when he was just a lad at school. Now he’s a big shot journalist all the way from London. He’s worked for all the big papers, isn’t that so, Adam? Just remember that when you’re complaining about covering the next meeting of the Women’s Institute.’

  A number of faces gazed at him with expressions ranging from mild curiosity to bored resentment. He caught the eye of the young woman he’d noticed earlier who looked up from her screen, smiled briefly and went back to her work.

  ‘How do you know so much about me?’ Adam asked when they were sitting in Findlay’s office.

  Findlay lit a cigarette, inhaling deeply. ‘I read a feature in one of the Sunday papers a few years ago. When I saw the name I had a feeling it must be you. I’ve kept an eye out since then.’ Through the haze of cigarette smoke his gaze was shrewd. ‘I’ve always found it interesting, the field you chose to specialize in. What would you call that?’

  ‘Investigative journalism?’

  Findlay smiled. ‘Aye, it is that. But it seems to me a lot of what I’ve seen has some common themes, Adam. Like the story you did about the wee girl that disappeared down in Suffolk a few years ago. I’ve often wondered what started you down that particular path.’

  ‘Who knows?’

  ‘Aye, who indeed?’ Findlay echoed thoughtfully. ‘Anyway, I take it this is no’ a social call. What can I do for you?’

  ‘I’m looking into something,’ Adam said, grateful for the change of subject. ‘To do with the protest at Castleton Wood.’

  ‘I wouldnae’ve thought there was much there to interest you. That kind of thing happens all the time these days.’

  ‘It’s for a human interest feature, bit of a change.’

  Findlay studied him for a second. ‘Is that so?’

  Ignoring the faint scepticism Adam said, ‘I’m trying to track down somebody who was involved in the protest during the summer, and I heard she may have talked to a reporter from the Courier. I was hoping to speak to whoever it was. I imagine you’ve covered what’s been going on over there.’

  ‘We have, though not for a wee while now. I expect we’ll send someone out there when the eviction starts though. I had a lass by the name of Janice Munroe on that one. She’s from Dumfries. Hold on a minute.’ He went to the door and called out to somebody. ‘Janice? Would you come in here?’ Turning back to Adam he said, ‘She’s good this one, Adam. I don’t expect I’ll be able to keep her long.’

  The young woman with bleached hair that Adam had noticed earlier appeared at the door. Findlay did the introductions and they shook hands. She was in her early twenties, with a sharp inquisitive gaze that matched her features.

  ‘Adam here would like to talk to you about the protest over at Castleton Wood.’

  ‘If you can spare me some time?’ Adam added, smiling.

  She looked him over coolly. ‘What is it you want to know?’

  ‘I heard you might have spoken to somebody there called Jane Hanson?’

  ‘Really? And where did you hear that?’

  ‘From a girl at the camp.’

  ‘I see. And what if I did speak to this Jane person?’

  Findlay chuckled. ‘Janice doesnae like to give away her secrets, Adam, as you can see.’

  Janice shot her boss a sour look and stuck her chin out obstinately. ‘Listen, I’ve spent a lot of time on that story. I’m no’ about to just hand it over to some guy from London I never met before.’

  ‘Er, look,’ Adam said, getting the feeling there was something going on that he was missing. ‘All I’m interested in is what you spoke to Jane Hanson about. If you’re worried that I might muscle in on a story you’re working on, you needn’t be.’

  She rolled her eyes. ‘And I’m supposed to just take your word for that am I? Do I really look that gullible?’

  Adam turned to Findlay in an appeal for help, but Findlay held up his hands. ‘Don’t look at me, Adam. She doesnae listen to me.’

  ‘At least let me buy you a drink? So we can talk about it,’ Adam said.

  She thought it over, wondering, it seemed, what advantage there was to her. ‘Alright,’ she said finally. ‘I’ll come, but I can’t do it just now. About an hour? Do you know the pub on the corner?’

  He said that he did. When she had gone, he said to Findlay, ‘What was that all about?’

  ‘Youth, Adam.’ He sighed. ‘Enthusiasm and a burning sense of justice. Qualities that at my age have to be tempered by hard fact
s. I’m too old to risk losing my job, you might try explaining that to her. It’s her story so I’ll leave it to Janice to tell you about it, if she decides to trust you.’

  Findlay showed him to the door. ‘If it turns out that your interest and hers are mutual, you won’t forget her if you make anything of it?’

  ‘Of course not.’

  ‘It was good to see you again, Adam. Come and see me again before you go back to London. We’ll have a drink together.’

  ‘I’ll do that,’ Adam promised. ‘And thanks.’

  Janice Munroe arrived at the pub an hour and thirty-five minutes later. She peered around the mostly empty room and when she saw Adam at a table by the window she came over and sat down.

  ‘Sorry if I’m late,’ she said, though she didn’t sound it. ‘I had to get something finished for tomorrow’s edition.’

  ‘Anything interesting?’

  She pulled a face. ‘Depends if you call a fish and chip shop fire interesting.’

  ‘I get the feeling you don’t.’

  ‘Let’s just say it’s no’ the sort of thing I had in mind when I decided to spend three years at university.’ She grinned then, and her face changed. Suddenly she didn’t seem quite so defensive. ‘The guy that owns it forgot to turn off the fat fryer. At least that was his story. I think he just wants the insurance money so he can leave his wife.’ She shook her head. ‘This woman kept telling me what an idiot her husband was and the poor guy was standing right there beside her. I felt sorry for him. I sort of hope he gets away with it.’

  Adam smiled, not sure if she was kidding. ‘And will he?’

  ‘I doubt it. I talked to the insurance investigator this morning. He said the guy waited until the fire was properly alight before he called the fire brigade. A neighbour said he was standing in the street watching.’ She shook her head again. ‘Mebbe his wife’s right. Mebbe he is an idiot.’

  Adam decided that despite her prickly exterior, he liked Janice Munroe. Her blend of humour and cynicism appealed to him. He asked what she’d like to drink, and went to the bar where he told the barman to make the whisky she’d asked for a large one.