by Anna King
Somehow, in the busy traffic, her carriage had overtaken the one Kenneth and the child were travelling in. So it was that she arrived at the destination five minutes before the second hackney cab. Ordering the driver to stop before the carriage reached the house, Agnes had quickly alighted, paid the fare, and scurried into the woods, intending to watch Kenneth arrive and make sure he was safely inside the house before raising the alarm. She’d already decided not to carry out her original plan of trying to rescue the little girl herself. It had been a comforting thought and one she had relished, herself hailed as a heroine, her picture in the papers, the exoneration of her blackened name, but most important of all, the safety of the child Kenneth now had in his clutches. But she had reluctantly realised that such an act was beyond her capabilities, and one only found in the penny novels she was so fond of reading. No! The safest and most realistic course of action was to wait until he was home and feeling safe, then raise the alarm at one of the nearby houses.
She couldn’t believe her eyes when Kenneth, clutching a silent, fair-haired girl by the hand, had waited until the cab had departed, then, looking left and right, he had scooped the girl up into his arms and headed for the forest. He had passed within feet of her, and Agnes hadn’t realised she had stopped breathing until a loud burst of air was expelled from her lungs. It hadn’t been just the fear of Kenneth spotting her that had left her breathless, it had been the sheer audacity of him. It was true the area was sparsely populated – she had counted only eight houses – but still, somebody could have seen him enter the forest with the girl.
And for the next few minutes she had braced herself for a shout from one of the householders, challenging him, but no such sound came, and Agnes realised that it was down to her to save the Masters girl. For if she left to seek help, Kenneth could vanish deep into the forest, a place he seemed familiar with judging by the ease and confidence he displayed. He appeared to know exactly where he was going.
It was a good half hour before she had seen the hut, and she would never have found it on her own. Neither would anyone else.
Kenneth had chosen his hiding place well.
The hut was situated amidst a clump of trees far away from the dozens of paths and open spaces used by the public. She’d watched as he’d unlocked the padlock, opened the door, and pushed the girl inside, but not before Agnes had caught a glimpse of terror in the child’s eyes. Not once had she uttered a sound until Kenneth prodded her in the back, then had come a soft moan, a pitiful sound that had wrenched at Agnes’ heart.
She had experienced a rush of anger, a quick burst of courage, but the feelings were short-lived, much to her shame. And so she had waited and done nothing, telling herself that if she heard the girl cry out or scream then she would put her own safety to one side and start screaming herself. But the child had remained silent, and Agnes had stayed where she was, trying to work out what to do for the best. Her life had been uneventful until she had met Kenneth, so she had never had the opportunity to test her courage. Like most people she had daydreamed about performing an heroic act, like pushing a child out of the way of a runaway carriage, thus saving it from the hooves of wild horses, unheeding of her own safety. She had also fantasised about running into a burning building to help people trapped inside, and the subsequent adulation that followed any act of heroism. She had truly believed that in the right circumstances she would forget her own fears and jump in to help without stopping to think of her own safety.
Now that time had come and she had found herself wanting. She had been forced to examine what she was really made of, and that knowledge brought her head low; the sense of guilt and shame was overwhelming. But not even the deepest sense of self-loathing could spark her into action. The minutes had ticked away while she struggled with her inner self, trying to dredge up some courage to do something, anything, rather than just stand here helpless while God only knew what horrors that evil bastard was inflicting on a helpless child.
Then had come salvation in the form of the search party.
Before she knew it the forest was crawling with coppers and volunteers. Her first instinct was one of relief. She had been on the verge of calling attention to herself when instinct stopped her as she realised what it would look like if she was found here, only feet away from the place Kenneth had the child hidden. They would think she was in it with Kenneth; they already thought it. Nobody would believe the truth, and looking at the whole sordid business from their view she couldn’t say she blamed them. So she had stayed where she was, frightened to move for fear of attracting attention. Then those two men had stumbled on the hut and raised the alarm, and she had slipped away, hiding among the trees, hoping no one would see her, all the while sending up a prayer of thanks that Kenneth Wells, as she knew him, would at last be caught, and the Masters girl freed from her terrifying experience.
She couldn’t believe her eyes when the hut door had been broken down and there was no sign of Kenneth or the child. Her mouth agape, she had stood rooted to the spot, thinking she was going out of her mind.
Long after the men had left she had remained hidden. With the light fading rapidly the men had searched on until it was too dark to continue. But they would be back. She had heard John Smith’s voice, and had been tempted to call out to him. He alone would have believed her, she trusted him, but again she had hesitated too long. For the next voice she recognised had been that of Ted Parker, and she knew only too well what he thought of her. It had been fortunate that all eyes had been focused on the hut, for if not then surely someone would have spotted her, even in the fading light. It was at that moment she had realised what her options were. If she called out the volunteers might see her first and turn on her; and from what she’d seen and heard, those men far outnumbered the police. But if she stayed quiet she would be left alone in the forest all night, and the very notion of that prospect terrified her. She was still trying to summon up the courage to call out to John for help when she’d heard him tell Ted the news about the Knight woman and her unborn baby. But it wasn’t the shocking news of the murder of the pregnant woman that had stilled her tongue, it was the tone in John’s voice, a tone deep with anger and hate – it could have been a stranger talking, for if she hadn’t known for sure it was John, she wouldn’t have recognised his voice. And for the first time her faith in the kindly policeman faltered. Maybe now he too would turn against her, and she was startled to find how deeply hurtful that idea was. So she had stayed quiet.
Now she was stranded until morning, afraid to close her eyes in case some animal crept up on her in the dark. Afraid too of dreaming, for surely in her dreams she would see the child, hear her silent screams for help.
She didn’t know she was crying until she felt the salty water trickle over her dry lips.
Then a light had come on in the hut.
* * *
Kenneth Stokes was elated. At last he had Molly Masters just where he wanted her, locked away from the outside world where no one could disturb them. Never had he wanted a child as badly as he had wanted Molly, and the more obstacles that had been placed in his way, the more he had wanted her, not least because he had got one over on everyone who had tried to stand in his way. Especially that smug bastard John Smith. After such a long, frustrating wait, he was in no great hurry to put his mark on the golden-haired girl. Instead he savoured the moment, alternating between taunting the child and whispering vile words of what he intended to do with her. Mercifully she was so traumatised by the unexpected abduction and seeing Mrs Knight lying covered in blood, his words had disintegrated into mere, unintelligible sounds that floated over her dulled senses.
However, his initial euphoria was short-lived.
At first he thought his mind was playing tricks on him, until he’d peered out of the window. He didn’t know how he had been tracked down so fast, but he had prepared for such an emergency. Scooping Molly out of the chair, he leant down, pulled back a strip of carpet, inserted his finger into a hole in t
he wooden floor beneath and yanked open a trap door. Within minutes he was safely hidden in the basement below, the carpet-covered trap door shut tight. He had no worries of being discovered, for who would think of looking for a basement under an old hut in the forest?
After being released from his last imprisonment he had thought long and hard about the time he had spent behind bars. The experience hadn’t been a pleasant one, for even amongst thieves and murderers, men like him were treated as the lowest form of life. He had endured countless beatings, often within sight of the so-called prison guards, supposedly there to guard against such incidents, who had turned a blind eye to his sufferings, often delivering a blow or punch themselves. Even now, years later, he could still remember the degradation, the pain, suffering and fear he had been forced to endure. There had even been times he had genuinely been afraid for his life.
One thing he knew: he would never, ever go back into prison again. But nor had he considered giving up his pursuit of children for his own depraved purposes. There then had remained the problem of where he could take his victims without fear of discovery. Then, one afternoon, when he had been out walking aimlessly in the forest he had stumbled, quite by accident, upon the hut. On closer inspection he had found the two-room hut deserted, and by the squalor and disarray of the place it was obvious it had been unoccupied for some time. He could only assume that the dilapidated hut had once been home to a gamekeeper. And in the owner’s absence it seemed that numerous tramps had availed themselves of the opportunity of having a roof over their heads.
During the time it had lain empty the door had been broken down, the windows smashed, and the wooden floor littered with empty beer bottles. But far worse, above the stale smell of beer, tobacco and rotting food, was the overpowering stench of human waste. Whoever had occupied the hut had obviously used it as a toilet. Kenneth, fastidious by nature, had been appalled at the way some people lived. Even animals didn’t live in their own filth. Then he had heard a scurrying noise and jumped as two large rats emerged from the fire grate, their wicked black eyes staring at him fearlessly. He had retreated from the hut, a linen handkerchief covering his face.
He had hurried away, fearful of catching something, and returned to the hotel he had been staying at. Yet the memory of his find wouldn’t go away. It hadn’t taken him long to see the possibilities of the abandoned hut. Because of its location, the likelihood of someone chancing on it was almost negligible. Take him for example. He’d been walking in the forest for years, usually on the look-out for unsupervised children, and he had never seen the hut until that day. As the germ of the idea grew in Kenneth’s mind, so did his excitement.
He did not relish the task of cleaning the hut, although he knew he had no choice but to undertake the unpleasant task himself. He had enough money to hire builders and cleaners, but he couldn’t take the risk of anybody knowing about the hut. The first thing he had done was to padlock the door and board up the window to prevent any passing tramp from entering what he now looked upon as his private property. Once the hut had been made secure, he’d had to start on the interior. On the first three visits to his new hideaway he had flinched at its appalling state and returned to his comfortable hotel, unable to tackle the gruesome task. Again he’d been strongly tempted to find someone willing to do the job for him, which wouldn’t have been hard, providing the pay was good enough.
Weeks came and went, during which time he couldn’t get his mind off the hut, his thoughts alternating between being eager to put his plans into motion to make the hut habitable, and repelled by the filthy conditions he would have to tackle to make it so. The longer he put it off the more anxious he became that someone else might chance on the hut, see the new padlock, find it empty, and become curious enough to make enquiries. That thought had been enough to galvanise him into action. Once he had taken up residence he would soon find some plausible reason for his being there, if anyone should stumble upon his new home and ask questions. Not that he was worried. If he’d been a tramp it would be a different matter, but not many people questioned a man of obvious wealth and refinement.
For someone as fastidious as himself the task of cleaning up other people’s mess had been a living nightmare. On two occasions he had been physically sick, then, as the days passed he had stayed longer on each visit until he had become desensitised to the squalor. One blessing was that the previous legal owner had taken his furniture with him, leaving only a stained, flea-ridden mattress, a table and two hard-backed chairs, all the worse for wear, but easy enough to get rid of. It would have been difficult if he’d had to dispose of two fully furnished rooms.
The table and chairs had been chopped up and distributed in the forest, the mattress, which could have crawled out of its own accord, he had dumped as far away from the hut as possible. Then he had brought in furniture to replace the items he’d destroyed. The procedure had been simple enough. He’d hired a horse and carriage, loaded the furniture into the covered vehicle and ridden into the forest. No one had taken any notice of him, for gentlemen riding in the forest weren’t an uncommon sight. Still, he’d kept a watchful eye out before entering the denser part of the forest.
The clean up of the hut had taken him the best part of a fortnight as he couldn’t bear to be inside for more than a couple of hours at a time. He had left the floors until last, intending to scrub the wooden floor before laying some remnants of carpet. Because, he had told himself, if he planned to spend some considerable time in this place, he might as well have some creature comforts. It was then he had made the startling discovery. Hidden under a thick, hessian mat was a brass handle set in a square section of the floor. His heart beating with growing excitement he had pulled on the brass ring, lifting it up with bated breath. Bracing himself for what he might find, and with a gas lamp held in a shaking hand he had descended the rungs of the ladder, some of which were badly rotten causing him to stumble several times. Safely jumping off the last step he had swept the lamp around the basement, hardly daring to believe his luck. Like the two rooms above, the basement needed a good clean, but elated by his find, he didn’t even flinch at the prospect of further work.
It had taken another few weeks to transport more furniture, for he didn’t want to arouse any suspicion if by chance someone noticed his frequent trips into the forest, but it had been worth it. Every minute he had spent getting the hut habitable, every piece of filth he’d had to handle, had all been worth it.
He had been just thinking about his good fortune when he’d heard the commotion in the wood. Glancing at Molly he had seen a spark of life creep into her eyes and he had grinned.
‘Don’t go getting your hopes up, my sweet Molly, dear. They’re not going to find you; no one’s ever going to find you.’
Grabbing her he put a hand over her mouth, just in case she plucked up the courage to scream, and ran with her into the second room. Within a few minutes he had the trap door open, clambered down the repaired ladder and thrown her unceremoniously onto a mattress before scrambling back up the ladder to secure the trap door. It was an exercise he had practised countless times. He had replaced the brass ring with a hole he had drilled into the wooden floor, blocking it with the plug of wood he had removed from the same place. All he had to do when he wanted to use the basement was lift the carpet, push the plug out, and with his finger pull up the door. Once inside he simply put the plug back in place to fill the hole. He had also nailed a piece of carpet to the edges of the trap door so that when he closed it from below, the carpet concealed any sign of the trap door. It was highly unlikely anyone would ever even think of looking for a trap door in the simple hut, but Kenneth had learned never to take any unnecessary chances. He had no idea who had built the basement, or for what purpose, nor did he care.
Bound and now gagged, Molly could only listen to the sound of heavy footsteps and men’s voices, her tormented mind flitting from hope to despair. Then there was silence, and the last remnant of hope died. When he was sure the last
of the men had left, and safe in the knowledge that Molly was helpless, Kenneth had taken the opportunity of a couple of hours’ sleep; it had been a long, fraught day, and his hand was stinging from where that old slag had used a knife on him. When he had woken he had listened intently, still cautious. When he was satisfied it was all clear he had advanced on the sleeping child, an evil smile curving his lips. But he recoiled in disgust at the stench of urine and faeces emanating from the still form. Maddened with rage he viciously kicked the chair, knocking both child and chair backwards. Molly awoke seconds before she landed on the floor with a sickening thud.
‘You bitch, you filthy bitch.’ The nasty man was glaring down at her, his face twisted with anger. ‘You did it on purpose, didn’t you? Thought you were being clever, didn’t you? Well you’re not getting off that easily.’ Wrinkling his nose he ripped the gag from her mouth, untied the rope holding her to the chair and snarled, ‘You stink like a sewer, you…’
Eyes wide with fear Molly whimpered, ‘I’m sorry, Mister, I couldn’t ’elp it. I… I tried ter… ter ’old it, honest, I did but… but I could… couldn’t…’
‘Shut up, just shut your mouth and do as you’re told.’
Terrified into silence Molly did as she was bid, her small heart beating inside her breast like a trapped bird.
‘Get up that ladder, and be quick. Go on, do as you’re told, or by God you’ll pay dearly. And take the lamp, I’ve got my hands full.’
Her legs stiff from being bound so long, Molly stumbled then quickly regained her balance, her fear outweighing her pain.
Keeping his distance Kenneth followed her up the ladder, the handkerchief still held to his nose. In his other hand he carried a suitcase. Once upstairs he pointed towards a small chest of drawers hissing, ‘There’s a bowl of water and soap on there. Get yourself cleaned up, then wash those filthy clothes, and be quick about it.’ Opening the suitcase he took out a long, white nightdress and threw it at her feet. ‘When you’re finished put that on… Well! Get moving.’
