by Fay Sampson
‘You don’t think you’ve made things worse, do you?’ Nick asked. ‘Drawing attention to the fact that she’s been sent away?’
‘She hasn’t,’ Millie objected.
Nick checked himself. ‘No, of course not. That’s just the story the Dawsons are putting about. What I mean is, won’t it start people asking questions?’
‘They should be asking questions,’ Millie said.
‘We needed to know,’ Tom defended himself. ‘Think about it. In real life, the most obvious reason for a girl getting herself in the club is that she’s been having it off with her boyfriend. Or a one-night stand with some boy, anyway.’
‘Tom! I’ll kill you for that! Tamara’s not like that. Do you think I wouldn’t know?’
He held up his hands. ‘Kid, she’s human. It happens. But the only name on the street is Justin, because he’s been talking big about her. I had to check it out. And if it’s not him . . .’ He looked at Millie under lowered brows. ‘If there’s someone else we haven’t heard about, well, maybe if Justin spreads the word I did him over because of her, something else may come out of the woodwork.’
‘You don’t believe it was that Dawson beast?’
Tom shrugged. ‘I’m keeping an open mind. Wouldn’t you rather it was someone her age? Even a nerd like Justin?’
There was silence in the room.
Then Millie said in a small voice, ‘Then why would she run away? Supposing it was him, and he’s lying to us?’
EIGHTEEN
‘I know what you’re thinking.’ Nick lay in the darkness with his back to her.
‘What?’
‘That we ought to follow it up. Pru’s hunch. Get in touch with this author guy. Find out for certain if Tamara’s there.’
‘Would he tell us? She didn’t want even Millie to find her.’
‘It’s worth a try.’
‘Millie tried to get his number. He’s ex-directory.’
‘He’s bound to have a website, isn’t he? They always have a “Contact Me” button.’
‘I tried that last week, remember? It said all enquiries should be directed to his agent.’
‘Well, then. We ring the agent up and ask him for Gamble’s number.’
‘Her. His agent. Josephine something.’
‘Whatever.’
‘If Reynard’s become as cagey as that, she probably won’t give it. He probably gets thousands of fans trying to contact him.’
Nick struggled up on his elbows and turned to look down at her in the thick greyness of the summer night. ‘I thought you wanted to find out about Tamara. Make sure that she’s safe.’
‘I do. But don’t pretend that you don’t too. Why else are you interrogating me in the middle of the night? You’re worried stiff about her, aren’t you?’
He slipped down in bed and put his arms around her. ‘I keep thinking, suppose it was Millie? Running away, and too scared even to tell her mother where she was going. Can you imagine Millie not telling you? And then so frightened he’d find her that she can’t tell her best friend how to contact her.’
‘Lisa Dawson’s bound to have her ex’s number. They must be in touch to arrange Tamara’s visits. But I’m not sure I’d have the nerve to go and ask her, after what happened when Millie showed up there.’
‘I don’t know. Millie’s right. She was just unlucky. Head teachers are busy people. It’ll only be once in a blue moon he gets straight home after school.’
Suzie lay in the cradle of his arms, trying to imagine braving that house again. ‘You were the one who spotted the bruise on her forehead, under her hair. If she’s too terrified to tell the police Tamara’s missing, she’s hardly going to be brave enough to help us find her. Dawson’s obviously ordered her to keep quiet. And we’re the last people he wants her to talk to.’
‘I’d come with you, but after the country club, that might only make things worse. It’ll have to be girl talk.’
‘I’ll ring the agent in the morning. If she won’t give me his number, she might at least pass on a message.’
‘Mm.’ Nick’s hold was relaxing as he drifted back towards sleep. ‘And what message would that be?’
‘That we want to know if Tamara’s with him . . . Ah! I see what you mean. It’s not going to work, is it? He’d keep her secret. Well, how about if I just ask him to contact me? Say it has to do with Tamara’s safety. That might scare him into breaking cover, if he cares about her.’
‘You don’t think we’ll be making things worse for her? Putting her into more danger? More people knowing where she is? Even if it’s us?’
‘I don’t see how. I thought you wanted to find her.’
‘All right, all right. Only, I’m beginning to feel this whole thing is like a keg of dynamite. I don’t know what would be the match that sets it off.’
Suzie walked up the steps of the Record Office with a sense of heightened anticipation. She felt more optimistic than she had for a week. Surely it was more than a happy coincidence that the breakthrough in Pru’s family search had led them directly to identifying Tamara’s hiding place? Equating Johan Clayson with the Joane Clarkson of the bastardy bond, giving the revelation of Adam’s father. And the notelet with Anne Hathaway’s cottage, pointing so plainly to the Stratford area. In the past and the present, the pieces were falling into place.
She and Pru deposited all but the essentials in the lockers and entered the search room.
‘A bastardy bond? Great stuff!’ Enthusiasm lit up the archivist’s face. ‘Yes, you really do need to see the original. We only put the names of the principal characters on A2A. With luck, you should find out a whole lot more.’
As she turned away towards the stockroom, Suzie and Prudence exchanged triumphant grins. They settled down at their table to wait. It was not long before the archivist hurried over with a cardboard folder.
At first sight, the bastardy bond looked not unlike the apprenticeship indenture. Much of it was preprinted in eighteenth-century type. Their eyes were drawn to the handwritten entries which gave the details particular to this case.
‘Here!’ Prudence’s voice was rising in excitement. ‘Michael Atkins the Younger and Michael Atkins the Elder and Robert Clarkson. Bond for Maintaining Michael Atkins the Younger’s Bastard Child. So his father gets in on the act too.’
‘And Robert Clarkson,’ Suzie chimed in. ‘He must be Joane’s father, mustn’t he? Do you think he’s the Robert Clayson whose name we found on that lease? Son of the older Adam Clayson?’
‘Gee. I can see why it gets to you. When the pieces of the puzzle all start to come together.’
‘There’s more. You’ve really struck gold. Mr Michael Atkins the Younger and Michael Atkins the Elder of Corley Helliers and Masons, and Robert Clarkson of the same place Woolcomber. You’ve got all their occupations.’
‘Hellier? What’s that?’
‘A roofer or tiler, I think. Anyway, they’ve all bound themselves to the churchwardens and Overseers of the Poor of Corley for forty pounds, to make sure the baby doesn’t become a charge on the parish. That’ll be so much for the lying-in, and then a weekly payment. And here!’ She gave a cry that turned the heads of other researchers. ‘Do you see where they’ve signed their names at the bottom? The younger Michael Atkins signs his name. All Robert Clarkson can make is a rough letter C. But look at the older Michael’s mark. See those half moons and that triangle? It’s much more elaborate than a single letter. I wouldn’t mind betting that’s his mason’s mark. He’ll have left that on every bit of stonework he built.’
Prudence was only half listening. ‘Will you look at this?’ Her finger was pointing to a long, unpunctuated sentence halfway down the page, which Suzie had skipped over. ‘Say, they didn’t believe in much punctuation, did they? Joane Clarkson of Corley aforesaid single woman did in her life time and by her voluntary examination in writing and upon oath before George Thorne Esquire one of his Majestie’s Justices of the peace declare that she was with child an
d that the said Child was likely to be born a bastard and Chargeable to the said Parish of Corley and that the above bounden Michael Atkins the Younger was the father of the said Child which said Joane was about six weeks since delivered of a male Bastard Infant according to said her Examination which said Male Bastard Child is now living the mother thereof the said Joane Clarkson being since dead.’
Her voice broke off.
Suzie followed her finger. A chill ran through her.
‘Poor soul,’ whispered Prudence. ‘She may have brought little Adam into the world. But she paid the price with her life.’
The thrill of the eighteenth-century drama faded. Suzie saw an illegitimate child. A teenage mother dying in childbirth.
Tamara, pregnant. In the twentieth century, but in fear of her life.
‘And that’s the guy’s father. Adam’s grandfather.’ Prudence was staring down at the mason’s mark. ‘I have the strangest feeling. It’s kind of beautiful, the way he does it. The guy couldn’t even write, but he’s a real craftsman. All over this little town, he’ll be building walls, putting the roofs on. I get a feeling it’s something I should be proud of. And yet his son’s got this girl into trouble, and all he can do is sign his name to say he’s going to pay for the kid. Why doesn’t he marry her, for heaven’s sake?’
‘He might be married already,’ Suzie suggested quietly. ‘We could check it out.’
With a touch of regret, she returned the yellowed document to the folder and left it on the desk. ‘Thanks, that was great.’
They turned back to the Corley registers on microfiche.
‘Déjà vu. This is how we met.’ Suzie smiled at Pru.
‘Was that only last week? It seems like I’ve known you the longest time.’
It did not take long to find what she suspected.
1735 was baptized Thomas son of Michael Atkins 22 August.
1737 was baptized Sarah daughter of Mr Michael Atkins 3 April.
1739 was baptized Alice daughter of Michael Atkins 4 October . . .
‘That last one’s the same year as Adam!’ Prudence exclaimed.
‘There’s your answer. He already has a family.’
Suzie took the microfiche out of the machine with a heavy heart. It was what she had been expecting – the older man exploiting a fresh young girl, even if it wasn’t the local squire. But at the back of her mind she had been hoping for a more optimistic story. A young mason’s apprentice would have been better. Someone closer to Johan’s age. A teenage romance that went too far, and the boy unable to marry until he had finished his indenture.
‘I wonder how it happened? If he’s a mason, I suppose he might have been earning enough to employ a maid. Or he might just have come staggering out of the pub one night and caught her on her way home in the dark.’ She paused. Her head bent closer over her notes. ‘I missed that!’ She slid the microfiche under the glass plate again and found the place in the register. ‘Do you see? Seventeen thirty-seven, daughter of Mr Michael Atkins. Hang on.’ She searched for her transcript of the bastardy bond. ‘There it is again. Mr Michael Atkins the younger.’
Prudence looked at her, baffled.
‘They didn’t call just anyone Mr in those days. You had to be a bit of a gentleman. So your Michael Atkins wasn’t just a horny-handed workman. He was someone with money and status. A substantial businessman. So we’re getting back to something not unlike the squire in the big house abusing a female servant.’
‘You don’t think she was his willing lover?’ Pru asked. ‘She could have been flattered by his attentions.’
For a moment, Suzie didn’t know how to answer. Prudence had been shocked by the idea of premarital relations when they first met. ‘We’ll never know.’
She gathered her notes together. This time, she was the one with a sour taste in her mouth.
She had wanted a different outcome for Tamara too. A love affair with someone her age. It was silly not to be able to shake off the conviction that the two girls were connected.
She braved a smile for Prudence. ‘There. You’ve got your story. The outlines of it, anyway.’
‘Not a pretty one, is it? Whichever way you look at it.’
‘At least you know for certain who the father is. That’s not what usually happens. And it opens up a whole new line. You can trace Michael Atkins back now . . .’ She paused. ‘No. I forgot. The Corley registers only start in 1729. This is nearly as far back as you can go.’
‘I’m running out of time, anyway. I’m due back in the good old US of A the end of the week. I fly out on Sunday.’
‘I can go on hunting for you. See if I can find who he married. It’s so annoying when you get a rector like this one, who doesn’t think it’s worth recording the mother’s name. Unless she was single, of course. There might be other documents about the Atkins family. Like that lease we guessed might be for Johan’s father and grandfather.’
‘Looks like you were right about her father. He could make his initial. That C. The mark of Robert Clarkson. It was a bit shaky, but it kind of touched me.’
‘I wonder how he felt, putting his name to that bond? At least he’d got Atkins to own up to being the father of his grandchild, and to put his hand in his pocket to support him. That must have been some sort of satisfaction.’
On their way out, Prudence stopped at the enquiry desk. ‘Is that really true that an unmarried mother had to parade through the streets in a white sheet?’
‘Oh, that!’ The archivist laughed. ‘What date are we talking about?’
‘Seventeen thirty-nine.’
‘It was going out of fashion in the eighteenth century.’
‘Well, that’s a relief.’ Prudence was turning away when the archivist’s voice called her back.
‘Unless she was a Dissenter. The Establishment would seize on any excuse to stigmatize someone who had stepped out of line.’
Prudence’s face fell. ‘Her child grew up a Dissenter.’
As they made their way back to the locker room, Suzie reflected, ‘So Johan might still have been marked out in the village as a loose woman. Even after she was dead. Her father would have had to live with the shame on his family.’
The same shame the moralizing Leonard Dawson was feeling?
‘I guess that’s why those magistrates made him sign the bond too. So he couldn’t just turn her out of house and home. He had to stay responsible for her.’
Suzie was aware of the double conversation going on. On the surface, they were talking about Johan Clayson in the eighteenth century. But neither of them could get out of their minds Tamara Gamble and the role her stepfather might or might not have played in her pregnancy and her flight from home.
Suzie threw open the door of the house to usher Prudence in. The women almost fell over Millie on the hall phone.
Her pointed face was animated. She was even blushing slightly. She flattened herself against the wall so that they could get past her. As Suzie brushed by, she saw that Millie was cradling the receiver against her face, so that her mother could not hear the conversation.
Suzie was halfway to the kitchen before she realized what was odd. Millie, like any other fourteen-year-old, was perpetually on her mobile. It was not often she used the landline. Yet the expression on her face clearly said that this was a personal conversation.
She’d been blushing. As Suzie ran the water into the kettle, she reflected that it was probably an unexpected call from a boy. Someone who didn’t know her mobile number. A smile twitched at her lips. Some new romance? Someone from an older class, perhaps? If Justin Soames could nurse dreams of the curvaceous Tamara, someone else in his year might surely be stopped in his tracks by this newly-blonde and sophisticated Millie.
Too soon yet to start worrying.
They took their tea into the garden. Suzie was itching for an opportunity to do a little maternal detective work. But Millie was likely to retreat to her bedroom when she had finished the phone call. Curiosity would have to wait.
It was therefore a surprise when her daughter appeared through the patio doors. Her usually pale face was still flushed, and there was a glint of both pride and defiance in her eyes.
‘You’ll never guess who that was.’
‘No,’ Suzie said. ‘But I expect you’re going to tell us.’
‘Only Dan Curtis!’ The unfamiliar name fell into the silence. ‘Oh, come on, Mum. You know. That gorgeous guy at the tennis club? They’ve got a dinner dance there on Saturday night. He found out my real name from Leonard Dawson, in spite of Dad’s daft idea of pretending we were somebody different. He’s invited me to go with him.’ Her face blazed triumph. ‘Just wait till I tell the girls!’
Suzie’s teacup almost crashed on to the table. ‘The coach? The one we thought Tamara might have . . . Millie, for heaven’s sake! Besides, you’re only fourteen. You’re too young to be dating grown men. You don’t even know him.’
Millie tossed her blonde crop. ‘I’ve met him. Even if Dad was giving him the third degree. It’s your fault for taking me there. And he’s drop-dead gorgeous, isn’t he? The girls will be so–o jealous.’
‘You’re not going.’ Fear was coursing through Suzie. ‘We still don’t know whether . . . We may have been jumping to conclusions about Tamara and Mr Dawson. You said yourself, he’s just the sort of young pin-up who could turn any girl’s head. Yours, for instance. You don’t know the first thing about him, but just because he looks like Leonardo de Caprio you want to spend the night with him.’
‘Mum!’
Suzie gasped as she realized what she had said. ‘I’m sorry, love. I didn’t mean it like that. I just meant going out to a dance with that sort of man. Late hours. He’ll offer you wine, probably, even though you’re under age. Romantic music. I know his type.’
‘You don’t! You’re the one who doesn’t know the first thing about him. You’ve only met him once.’
