by Norma Hanton
His throat tightened, he was unable to say more.
Mandy rose from the bed and went into the bathroom where she filled a tumbler with water. Returning she took two pills from the bottle the hospital had provided him with and held them out to him. After he’d swallowed the painkillers she went on,
“I think you know how wrong you were so I won’t rub it in. You’ve accepted that James is your son and that was all I wanted from you,” she stood up, “We’ll talk again when you’re feeling better,” she said, as she quietly left the room.
Cotton let the tears flow, but under the influence of the pills he soon drifted off to sleep. His last thought was that he’d lost them both, forever.
He was woken once more by Mandy entering the room. This time she was carrying a tray containing one of her mother’s whopping breakfasts. She just placed the tray on his bed and gave a sad smile.
“Remember how much mother hates wasted food,” she said, and then left.
Cotton dutifully cleared his plate and was showered and dressed before Mandy returned. She was carrying James. She lay him down on the bed and sat beside him. Cotton sat down on the other side. He reached out and took the tiny hand in his.
“I still can’t believe how much he looks like me,” his voice was croaky, “Will either of you ever forgive me?” He turned and looked at her.
“We’ll try, Eddie. Won’t we, James?” They both laughed when, as if in reply, James loudly passed wind. They sat silently watching their offspring, neither knowing what to say.
Cotton broke the silence first.
“You will really try to find it in your heart to forgive me, Mandy?” He reached over the bed and covered her hand with his. “Please try. I love you so much.”
Mandy eased her hand away, “We have a lot of talking to do, Eddie, a lot of bridge building. You’ll never know how much you hurt me and I don’t know if we could ever go back to what we had. I’ve lost my trust in you,” her voice dropped to a whisper, “and I don’t know if I could ever you trust again.” She paused. “If there’s no trust there’s nothing left to build on.” Wrapping James in his blanket she stood up. “You’ve a long drive. You’d better go before the rush.”
Cotton stood up and was about to plead with her when his mobile phone rang. It sounded very loud in the room. Mandy looked at him and sighed. Picking up the baby she left him.
Sergeant Lucas pulled the phone away from his ear when Cotton yelled,
“What the bloody hell is it now?”
Lucas waited for a second or two before replying.
“Sorry to disturb you, sir,” the emphasis totally on the ‘sir’, “but DS Broom thought you might want to know that a landlord called about a woman he’s sure was Mitchell.”
“Very well, Lucas, let him know I’m on my way.”
Chapter Twenty Six
Now in a calmer frame of mind Angela sat in a woodland picnic sight making plans for the rest of her trip to Stranraer. She could hire a car and make the trip shorter, but she’d run the risk the chance of road blocks up ahead. Or she could travel by coach and hope for the best. She stood up and walked slowly around the pond. The thought of getting through a police cordon undetected thrilled her. Such a challenge, but she needed to get home. She was in fact desperately yearning for her own home. Now her revenge was satisfied.
How? That was the question. Road, rail or fly? Each one of these options would be being watched, but she could outwit them all. Hadn’t she done that already by throwing them off the scent, sending them running up to Glasgow while she enjoyed a small break in the Ettrick Valley?
The caravan site was small and invisible to the road, and she, it’s only camper till the weekend, so Jason, the owner, informed her.
“Would you like to order a newspaper for tomorrow,” he’d asked.
She’d smiled at him.
“Oh, no thank you, Jason. All that doom and gloom. Murders and mayhem, it only upsets me. So I usually don’t bother. At least there nothing like that here, thank goodness.”
He’d smiled and agreed.
As she crawled into bed in the caravan she’d stuffed a towel against her mouth in case Jason heard her screaming with laughter. Then she settled down in her temporary new home. From here hours would be spent enjoying the walks, animals and birds, even the midges wouldn’t spoil her peace.
Four days later she knew what she would do next to help her on the road to home.
Next morning, as promised, Jason took her into Hawick to do some ‘shopping’. He dropped her outside a butchers shop.
“I’ll meet you back here,” he said, “about three o’clock, if that’s alright?”
“That would be wonderful, Jason, so kind of you,” she smiled warmly.
He said he was going off to some nearby farm, ‘that me father owns’, for lunch.
She slipped into a department store toilet dressed as a happy camper, haversack and all, and left as a smart woman about town. Her natural blonde hair with shiny silver threads had been washed and brushed to perfection the night before in the campsite’s shower block and her nails painted a subtle pink.
She slipped into her new outfit in the toilet cubicle and, stuffing the old one into the now empty carrier bags, Angela walked slowly up the high street.
A passing youth ogled her and was granted the gift of a smile. Her step was light, her mind at rest. All she needed now was a cup of coffee and a spot of lunch and she’d be a very happy woman.
The café she chose was busy, that way they were less likely to look at her closely. A baby screamed while his red faced young mother tried to calm him, another distraction that would suit her until she’d ordered her meal.
“I think I’ll have a ham and cheese roll and a large coffee,” she asked the harassed woman in front of her, but the woman’s eyes kept drifting to the baby, screwing up her face whilst struggling to hear the order.
‘Good’, thought Angela, ‘at this rate she’ll never remember me, the stupid bitch can’t think of anything but that squalling brat’.
She ate the surprisingly tasty roll and was sitting sipping her coffee when suddenly she felt sure someone was staring at her. Her skin crawled as covertly she looked around the room, now positive someone was watching. As the baby was happy now, sucking milk from a bottle, and his mother trying to eat a sandwich, she was sure it wasn’t the mother. Her eyes swept the room as she pretended to be looking at the paintings adorning the walls and there she was, in the corner nearest the counter, a young woman in a rather cheap looking, orange trouser suit. As her gaze met Angela’s she looked quickly away and began to write something in a notebook.
‘That bitch is too clever for her own good,’ Angela thought, barely able to contain her anger. ‘She knows who I am. She’s writing it down before she telephones the police. The bitch!!’ Her hands were gripping the table and her muscles were so taut she couldn’t move her arms. What was it about her that attracted this female’s attention? With the new clothes and glamorous hair she looked nothing like the artist impression she had seen in the papers or on the television.
Little did Angela know that the woman was admiring the new outfit so much that all she was doing was making a drawing of it? The small black dress with matching coat and those wonderful buttons looked something like ‘Coco Chanel’ she was sure of it. As a ‘dedicated follower of fashion’, with very little funds, the woman, Elsie MacDonald, would make paper patterns of items she saw and liked and then run them up on her mother’s sewing machine. Of course they never looked as good as the real thing, mainly because she could not afford the expensive fabrics.
Angela was making plans as she looked around the room for a telephone. There wasn’t one. She relaxed a little. She still had time to disappear before they came. How clever was the trouser suited bitch? Well, she was cleverer, and she’d prove it. The woman was standing near the counter paying her bill when Angela next looked up. She chatted to the girl at the till before saying,
“See you
tomorrow, Babs,” and leaving.
Angela went to pay her own bill and watched from her place at the counter which way the woman turned.
Smiling broadly at ‘Babs’, she paid for her meal and hurried out of the café.
She spotted the trouser suit ahead of her, the owner studying something in a shop window, and was forced to follow her for half an hour before the girl entered a public toilet and Angela was able to show her just how clever she could be.
Elsie stepped from the cubicle still tucking the white blouse into the trousers of her nylon suit. Suddenly she froze as a sinuous arm wrapped round her throat and her screams were silenced by the strong hand on her mouth. Unable to call for help she was dragged back into the cubicle, and finally, unable to breath at all as the strong, ruthless arms broke her neck.
Chapter Twenty Seven
Seamus had taken the lead in Ireland and had discovered that the fish factory was still in production under another title. He also discovered that three of the factory hands had known Moorhead as both Mitchell and Charlton. They remembered her well.
He’d interviewed the witness’s in the firm’s canteen. The youngest had described Mitchell as a ‘sick, depraved, arrogant, brown nosed witch’. He went on to tell them of the time he’d asked for time off to go to the dentist.
“My tooth was killing me. I’d kept putting it off because we had a big order in and it had to be completed quickly, but I couldn’t stand it any longer. When I told her I was going to leave at dinner time to get it seen to she just went berserk. She grabbed me by the hair and slammed me against the wall and said, ‘You won’t need time off if I punch you in the mouth and knock all your teeth out. Now get back to work you lazy scum, and don’t get any ideas about crawling to the boss. Just remember who warms his bed at night. Who do you think he’d believe me or you?’ Well now, what choice did I have? I was young, saving for our wedding, I needed the job and she knew it. So I kept my mouth shut.”
Witness number two had also been threatened by Mitchell, and was obviously still frightened of her.
“I just want to say,” she began, “That Charlton was a very devious, sly, determined, vicious woman. She would stop at nothing to get what she wanted. She tried to get me the sack when I stood up to her one day. She’d came into the ladies toilet block while I was using the toilet and had actually stood on the bowl in the adjacent cubicle and was looking over the top. She said it was to ‘make sure you’re not using the firm’s time for a sly smoke’. I was furious and told her to piss off. She just told me to hurry up and get back to work ‘while you’ve still got a job to go to’.
When I came out of the cubicle I told her I was going straight to Mr Mitchell and complain about her behaviour. She stood there with the usual smirk on her face and said ”well go ahead dear, but who’s he going to believe, I wonder, you or the woman he’s sleeping with?” Then she grinned and gave me a wink and pointed to my place in the line.
I went quietly back to work because, like the others I needed the job; they had already sacked people for stupid, minor things, thanks to HER. There were not too many employment prospects at the time, if you got a job you hung on to it.”
The third witness was a man called Alan Denton. He’d been at the factory since leaving school. He was obviously totally embarrassed but had struggled on to tell them his memory of Mitchell.
“I’d only been working here for about two weeks, straight from school, when a couple of the lads bet me a ten bob note that I would be too chicken to touch her on the bum as I passed her, accidentally of course. Well, there was no way I was going to give up the chance of a quid, so I bided me time for the chance.
One morning she called me into the supervisor’s office to help her move her desk around so that she could ‘keep her eye on the shirkers’. We swung it around until it was facing the work area then she pointed to her chair and told me to move it behind the desk. She was now standing at the desk shuffling paperwork around so I thought I would take the chance to win the bet as I could see the two men watching me. As I passed her by, carrying the chair, I stuck my hand out to touch her arse. I never knew how but next second she had me, out of sight behind a cupboard door, gripping me tightly by the balls, in a grip like a vice. The pain was terrible, unbelievable.” He blushed, “It went through me like a knife. I thought I was going to pass out.” He stopped and took a gulp of coffee. “She was hissing and spitting like an alley cat, whispering in a weird voice, ‘Oh! No you don’t sonny. No one touches me without an invitation and I don’t remember sending you one. I certainly would never send one to a spotty, little wanker like you. I heard you making the bet with your little playmates, you moron, why the hell do you think I asked you in here. I don’t need help from a wimp like you. I could’ve moved the bloody desk quicker on my own’.
I couldn’t see her for the tears running down my face. I was doubled up with pain, unable to move a muscle. Then she let go and I dropped to my knees. She hissed at me in a low voice, ‘Now get back to work you snivelling little arsehole and I’m docking you an hours wages for wasting my time today. Oh! And don’t bother reporting this tete a tete to the boss or I will be forced to tell him you tried to rape me and I had to fight you off’.
Well I just got back to work. My mother would have hit the roof if I lost the job. Not to mention being had up for rape. Guilty or not mud sticks. So I did the only thing I could do. The two men took the piss out of me when I told them that I had chickened out and hadn’t touched her. Later on at break time, I dosed myself with painkillers and carried on. The only person I told this story to was my brother Michael. He nearly fainted when I showed him the bruises, but he promised to keep his mouth shut.
I still can’t believe what that woman done to me. She’s stark staring mad, she wants locking up.” He shook his head, “It still gives me bad dreams. What woman in the world behaves like that? The worst of it was she never did get the sack, she married the boss instead” He laughed nervously. “He owned half the fishing fleet and four factories, not bad, eh!”
When Seamus was about to leave the canteen there was a knock on the door and an elderly woman entered, encouraged and pushed along by Alan Denton.
“Excuse me officers but this lady would like to tell you something about Mitchell. She’s retired now but one of the girls you interviewed is her daughter and she telephoned her mother and told her why you were here.”
After giving the woman one last gentle push, Alan left and closed the door behind him. The woman pulled her coat off and sat down. Introducing herself as Mary O’Doul, she began her story. As the interview went on she became more and more agitated.
“Oh! That woman! May God forgive me but I have wished her dead on many an occasion. Believe me. She has cost me more time in the confessional than any other trouble in my life. I’d come to believe she was actually dead, you know. One lives in hope. Now you go upsetting me by telling me she’s still around. Not your fault I suppose. What is it exactly you want to know?”
“Anything you can tell us about her, no matter how small.” Seamus informed her.
“Well I’ll tell you one thing; she’s evil, totally evil. I watched her throw herself at Mr Mitchell from day one, and herself the laziest worker in the place. Of course, once she had her hooks into him she never looked back. The supervisor’s job came up and nobody bothered to apply for the post because they knew she already had it. So just to annoy her I applied, and she couldn’t wait to show me what she thought of that idea. She dragged me into the store room next door here and, after making sure no one was around, told me what would happen if the application was not withdrawn at once. She knew I’d taken some toilet tissue rolled up in my pocket, being short of it at home, and would make sure I was dismissed for theft. She knew as a widow I couldn’t do without a job, and I knew without a reference I would never find another position. I made an excuse about not being up to the responsibility and withdrew from the one man race.”
Mary stared off into space
as if seeing the incident being re-run in the air.
“To cut a long story short Angela was made supervisor and married the boss two years later. In those two years she made life hell for anyone she could. By picking on those she knew were dependant on the job, she was certain no one would complain to the management. She would treat those people like so much dirt. After her marriage to Mr Mitchell I was made supervisor and when I re-married I left.”
She stood up and smiled, ”I did hear a rumour that three years into their marriage Mr Mitchell was seeing a young girl who gave him a child on his fortieth birthday.” She smiled broadly, “Apparently they even had a secret love nest. I thought at the time that he deserved some happiness, married to that nutcase. I have often thought about the day Angela would find out about their affair. I wouldn’t have liked to be in the girls shoes and that’s a fact. God knows what that woman was capable of, but I’d loved to have been a fly on the wall at the time she discovered he liked someone more than he liked her.”
On that note Mary put on her coat and wished them good day.
“Well! There’s a turn up for the books,” Cotton stared at his friend, “Is it too much to suppose that Louisa Murphy was the name of the girl friend?”
“There is no doubt in my mind that it was, Cotton. If we don’t bring this woman to trial, and soon, I‘ll give up my job and become a hermit.”
Just twelve minutes after the interview with Mary ended in Ireland a well-dressed woman drove away from Harwich in a hired car, and then, fifteen minutes later, the body of Elsie MacDonald was discovered.
Chapter Twenty Eight
“Where’s that bloody map?” Cotton yelled, and Broom, without a word, pointed towards Cotton’s desk.
“Smart arse,” growled Cotton.
“There have been no sightings of her in Glasgow, sir, but it’s a big city with too many people that would hide her if the money was right.”
