Without a Trace

  George gritted his teeth at the man’s arrogance and stupidity.

  The ambulance men were getting Molly into the ambulance now and George was ready to follow it on his motorbike. He’d already asked them to pick up Petal as they went past the shop.

  ‘It was as well I did, or she might have been dead before you got here. But you must excuse me, I’m going with her and Petal.’

  ‘You are not. You will come back with me to fill me in on the background,’ DI Pople said briskly. Two other police cars had arrived. The younger woman had been handcuffed and led to one of them, and two policemen were trying to get some sense out of the older, injured woman while waiting for a second ambulance to arrive.

  ‘Sorry, sir, but my duty is to my friend, who is badly hurt, and to the little girl she risked her life to save from these two madwomen,’ George said. ‘I’ll contact you as soon as I know Molly is going to make it.’

  It was midnight before George was finally assured that Molly was out of the woods.

  The doctor at Hastings Hospital who came to tell him was elderly but had bright-blue eyes and a warm smile. ‘She’ll be having a few headaches for a while and she’s not going to be amused by how much hair we had to cut away to stitch her scalp, but she’ll be fine after a nice long sleep. She became unconscious not just because of the head wound but through severe dehydration and lack of food. The poor girl must have been through a terrible ordeal.’

  ‘And Petal?’

  ‘She isn’t speaking at all, but that isn’t unusual for a child after a long and frightening experience, but apparently she wolfed down scrambled eggs and three glasses of milk after she’d had a bath and then threw a tantrum until we let her go in with Miss Heywood.’

  ‘You’ve let her stay with Molly?’ George asked.

  ‘Of course. After what she’s been through, the best place for her is close to someone she trusts. As I understand it, she owes her life to Miss Heywood, so we’ve put a little bed in her room for Petal.’

  ‘But how is she physically?’ George asked.

  The doctor frowned. ‘She’s severely undernourished – her weight’s more appropriate for a four-year-old – she has a rash, possibly an allergy to something she was given in that house, and bruises, which suggest rough handling. But I’m confident that with more food, a good night’s sleep and some loving care, by tomorrow, when she wakes up beside Miss Heywood, she’ll start to open up. Now, where are you staying, young man? I believe you rode up from Somerset on a motorbike?’

  ‘That’s right, sir,’ George said. ‘I’ve been offered a bed for the night at the hotel where Molly works in Rye. Mr and Mrs Bridgenorth are frantic about her, so I’d better get off there now and give them the good news. But I’ll be back tomorrow. When are visiting hours?’

  ‘For you, anytime. She’s in a private room, of course. That makes it easier for Petal to be in there, too.’

  ‘I suppose Petal will have to go into care?’ George asked, his eyes prickled at the memory of those little arms around him earlier in the day. ‘She calls Molly “Auntie” but she isn’t a real aunt unfortunately, just her mother’s closest friend.’

  ‘Let’s not worry about anything just now. First, both of them need to get over their ordeal. You’ve been something of a hero today, too, and I’m sure you are exhausted. I’ll see you tomorrow.’

  George spent the night in Molly’s bed at the hotel.

  He was exhausted, but he forced himself to stay awake long enough to savour the smell of her on the sheets, to note the tidiness and the feminine touches that were so much part of what he loved about her.

  Before he came to bed he had told Mr and Mrs Bridgenorth all he knew, and Mr Bridgenorth had told him that he was going to drive up to find Charley the next morning, as he needed to be told what had happened.

  It was a real blow to hear that Molly had a boyfriend and that she hadn’t told him. But, to save face, he pretended he had known and nodded as Mr Bridgenorth spoke of him.

  ‘We kept hoping he’d ring,’ Mrs Bridgenorth said. ‘We did send him a telegram. Clearly, he isn’t at his home or he would have responded.’

  George went straight to Rye police station as soon as he’d eaten his breakfast. DI Pople hadn’t come in yet, but Sergeant Wayfield, a tall, thin man with a face like a bloodhound, was there to take his statement.

  ‘There isn’t much to it, really,’ said George to the sergeant. ‘I was on my way to Mulberry House when Petal ran out of the lane in distress.’ He went on to explain the rest, ending up with him following Molly’s ambulance to Hastings Hospital.

  ‘So how did Miss Heywood discover the child was being held at Mulberry House? And why didn’t she speak to us before she went off there?’

  George went further back in the story to when Molly had found Petal’s mother dead and the child missing last June. ‘She felt the police didn’t do enough,’ he explained. ‘And I have to agree it looked that way. Anyway, Molly got it into her head that she was going to find Petal, and she didn’t divulge the small pieces of evidence she found to anyone, not even me. As far as I know, a Church Army lady who Molly had stayed with in London helped her get the job at the George, but it looks to me as if Molly must have already discovered that Cassie came from somewhere round here.

  ‘Anyway, a couple of days before Molly disappeared she wrote to me. She said she thought she’d tracked down Cassie’s mother, someone called Christabel Coleman, who had a daughter called Sylvia, who was the same age as Cassie, and it was rumoured she’d had a black baby. She said she was going there in the morning to see her.’

  ‘And how did you discover that Miss Heywood had gone missing?’

  ‘Mrs Bridgenorth phoned me; she found my number in Molly’s address book. She said that no one here at the nick had taken her seriously when she reported that Miss Heywood hadn’t come home, so I think she rang me in desperation. As I was on leave I came straight away, asking my mother to inform you.’

  ‘I sense an implication that you didn’t trust us to act immediately?’

  George looked the sergeant in the eye. ‘Wouldn’t you have done the same if you were in my shoes?’

  The sergeant scratched his head, but didn’t answer the question. ‘Well, it was very high-handed of you. You might have made the situation very much worse, or put yourself in danger. Thankfully, Miss Heywood was very resourceful. We found the cellar room she was kept in, and the child had been imprisoned in an attic room.’

  ‘All the time?’ George asked, horrified at the thought.

  ‘We can’t be sure one way or the other until she’s ready to talk, or one of the women does. There’s an old doctor’s surgery in the house, full of drugs and medicines, so it’s possible they gave the child something to keep her quiet. We found a pair of baby reins in the room, too, so we think they used them to walk her around the garden sometimes. She was fed sporadically but, judging by her weight, not nearly enough. As for bathing her or washing her hair, that appears not to have been done for some weeks.’

  ‘But that woman is her grandmother!’ George said angrily. ‘How could she treat a child that way? And just how long was she intending to keep her like that?’

  The sergeant shook his head. ‘Mrs Coleman was taken straight to an asylum. She’ll be seen by a psychiatrist and, in due course, we might have a better idea of what her intentions were. Miss Gribble may give us some answers; she is, by all accounts, devoted to Mrs Coleman. She’s something of a dragon but, it appears, not insane. Her injuries are superficial and later today she’ll be taken to Holloway Prison, where she’ll be held on remand while we ascertain the full extent of her crimes.’

  ‘Then, if I may, I’ll be off to see Molly and Petal. I’ll be staying another night in Rye. I’ll be at the George if you need me.’

  ‘Before you go, do you have an address for the Church Army lady? We might need to contact her as a character witness.’

  ‘She died back in winter,’ George said. ‘Just as Molly got the
job here. If you need a character witness there are dozens of people back in Sawbridge who’d be happy to tell you what a good, honest person Molly is.’

  ‘Well, thanks for the statement,’ said Sergeant Wayfield. ‘Please pass on to Miss Heywood that we’re all hoping she’ll get well soon.’

  ‘I’ll thank her for doing your job for her, too, shall I?’ George asked, unable to resist making a jibe.

  Wayfield looked him up and down, his mouth bent into a sneer. ‘If she’d come in here with that photo and explained to us that she felt the girl’s mother lived near here, we would have checked it out. As it happens, we’ve already found the child’s birth registration, and her name wasn’t Petal March but Pamela Coleman. It was a home birth and the father’s name is marked as unknown, as the mother wasn’t married.’

  George decided to quit while he was ahead, and said goodbye. The police here seemed to be annoyed with him for muscling in on their territory. It didn’t seem to have occurred to them that, if he hadn’t acted as he did, Molly and Petal might be dead now.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  Ted Bridgenorth arrived at Charley Sanderson’s address in Bethnal Green and winced when he saw how squalid it was. It was a shabby, three-storey terraced house in a row of eight equally run-down ones. The other side of the street had fared even worse for, though the bomb sites between some of the houses had been cleared of rubble, weeds had taken over, and only partially covered the piles of dumped rubbish.

  As it was a pleasant day a great many people were sitting out by their front doors on boxes or chairs, and dozens of children were playing in the street. A gang of children had surrounded the car as he drove into the street and, though they appeared to be admiring it, Ted wished he’d come on a school day instead of a Saturday, as they might just let his tyres down while he was talking to Charley.

  He rapped on the door of number twelve.

  ‘There’s no one in. Who you after?’ a strident female voice called out from the street.

  ‘Charley Sanderson,’ he called back. ‘Do you know him?’

  ‘Well, I do ’is washing, so I ’ope I do.’ A woman with red hair broke away from a group of other women and came towards him. She was in her twenties, an attractive, shapely woman with a look of Rita Hayworth.

  ‘Are you his girlfriend?’ Ted asked. He really hoped Charley hadn’t been playing fast and loose with other women, but he wasn’t the kind to tell tales or to cause trouble for another man.

  ‘No fear,’ she laughed.

  ‘Well, that’s good, as I came to tell him that Molly’s in hospital. I sent him a telegram, but I think he must’ve been away as he didn’t get back to me. Do you know how I can get hold of him?’

  She moved in much closer to him. ‘Is it an emergency?’ she whispered.

  ‘Well, yes, something really nasty has happened to Molly, and she needs him.’ Ted thought the woman was being a bit odd, but then he wasn’t used to London girls of her class.

  ‘Then you’d better go round and knock him up at Balaclava Street,’ she said. ‘’E’ll be at number five, it’s only a couple of streets away. ’E’ll be with ’is mate Alan.’

  She gave him directions and, as he was getting back in the car, she leaned forward to speak to him through the window. ‘Is Molly ’is sister?’

  ‘No, his girlfriend,’ Ted replied.

  To his surprise, the woman spluttered with laughter.

  Ted drove off, a little puzzled by the woman’s attitude, but found Balaclava Street easily. It was almost identical to the first street he’d been to, and equally squalid, except that the houses here were only two storeys.

  He rapped at the door of number five and was just about to rap again when the door was opened by a very attractive young blond man wearing a pair of trousers but with his chest and feet were bare.

  ‘What can I do for you?’ the young man said.

  Ted was taken aback by his effeminate manner, and the way he spoke. If this was Alan, he understood why the red-haired woman had laughed. ‘Are you Alan?’ he asked.

  ‘Yes, who wants to know?’

  ‘I was told that Charley Sanderson is your friend. Is he here?’ Ted asked. ‘I have a message for him.’

  ‘Charley!’ Alan yelled, still looking at Ted. ‘Someone to see you.’

  Ted heard someone’s feet coming down the stairs. When the man got to the hall he was buttoning up his shirt. His feet were bare, too.

  ‘I sent you a telegram,’ Ted said hesitantly, so shocked he wanted to drive off in his car. ‘You didn’t reply.’

  Charley looked puzzled for a moment, and then suddenly apprehensive. ‘Oh, couldn’t place you for a moment,’ he said, then flashed that wide smile of his. ‘It’s Mr Bridgenorth, from the George in Rye. I haven’t been home, so I haven’t seen a telegram. Don’t tell me something has happened to Molly?’

  ‘It has, I’m afraid.’ Ted hastily told him the bare bones of it. ‘We heard this morning she was going to be all right, but I’m sure she’d appreciate a letter, a phone call or visit from you.’

  Charley’s eyes were wide with shock. ‘Of course! I’m just sorry I didn’t get the telegram. I would’ve come straight away. What a terrible business!’

  The young, blond man was standing just back from Charley, his anxiety showing clearly in his face. Ted had met other homosexuals since he’d been in the hotel trade and didn’t have a particularly strong view on homosexuality. His attitude was, each to his own, as long as no one wanted to try anything on with him.

  But this was totally different. Both he and his wife had got the distinct impression that Molly and Charley loved each other. Molly would be destroyed if she knew he preferred men to women.

  ‘I must go now,’ Ted said, unable to get away fast enough. ‘It’s busy at the hotel, and my wife and I had planned to visit Molly this afternoon.’

  He saw Charley glance over at Alan. He couldn’t have looked guiltier if he’d been caught in the act.

  As Ted got into his car Charley shot over to him and leaned in at the window, just as the redheaded woman had.

  ‘I know what you are thinking, but it’s not like that,’ he said.

  ‘Oh, really?’ Ted raised a questioning eyebrow. ‘Do you think I was born yesterday?’

  Charley turned scarlet. ‘Alan and I are just friends, nothing more,’ he insisted in a shrill voice. ‘I love Molly and want to marry her.’

  ‘I don’t doubt you care for her, as my wife and I do, too,’ Ted said. ‘But I saw for myself how it was between you and Alan, and marrying a woman you have no physical desire for is doomed from the start.’

  ‘You don’t know how it is with Molly and me,’ Charley said belligerently. ‘I ought to knock your block off for suggesting I’m homosexual.’

  ‘Charley, stop right there,’ Ted said firmly. ‘I know, and you know, so there’s no point denying anything. I don’t give a damn about your preferences, but I do care about Molly. So you’ve got to be fair to her and let her down gently.’

  He didn’t stop for a reply but drove away quickly, feeling faintly sick. It wasn’t about Charley’s persuasion – the man couldn’t help that – but only that he was trying to cover his tracks and avoid the risk of being prosecuted by being seen to be a happily married man. Such a marriage would be a disaster, especially for someone like Molly.

  The question was, what should he do about it? Tell her, or keep quiet and hope Charley was man enough to do the right thing?

  Evelyn was probably naïve enough to imagine that a good marriage would ‘cure’ Charley, but Ted knew that couldn’t happen. In the days when he was an accountant he’d had two clients who had married, perhaps even fooling themselves they’d be cured. But neither of them was: one was caught by the police and went to prison; the other committed suicide in the end because he was so unhappy. He guessed that their two wives had been through hell.

  Any intelligent, humane person could see that the law against homosexuality ought to be abolished. But
while it was still in place Ted felt that he must protect his employee. She was worth far more than a cowardly man who wanted to hide his dark secret behind a flimsy veil of marriage.

  The irony of it was that Molly already had a man who loved her truly, someone she’d grown up with and knew all about and was ideal for her. Ted felt sure she could love him, too, if he would just make his feelings known.

  ‘Over to you, George,’ he said aloud. ‘Over to you.’

  On Sunday afternoon Molly remarked to the nurse that she was feeling almost like her old self again. Food, drink and lots of sleep had restored her spirits and, even though her head hurt where she’d been hit and probably would for some time, even after the stitches came out, it wasn’t too dreadful. ‘I could almost convince myself I imagined the whole thing. Well, that is, until I look in a mirror and see my bald patch.’

  The nurse laughed. ‘And there’s this little one to remind you,’ she said, nodding towards Petal, who was snuggled up on a small bed beside her.

  Molly smiled. Petal looked so adorable in a pair of red pyjamas someone had donated, and clutching a teddy bear Evelyn and Ted had bought her.

  ‘It’s a funny thing,’ Molly said. ‘Once you aren’t really hungry any more, you can’t quite remember what it was like.’

  ‘I believe childbirth is much the same,’ the nurse joked. ‘I’d avoid that one if I were you. It might make you remember being hungry, too.’

  Molly laughed. She felt she had a dozen reasons to be joyful. She’d finally found Petal, she had Charley, and a job she loved with people who clearly cared about her. Mrs Bridgenorth had left a message at Warwickshire House for Dilys to contact her, and her friend had rung last night just before the Bridgenorths came to visit her. Dilys had sent her love and said she would come down to Rye on Wednesday, her day off. Molly had also had a telegram from her parents, and she was inclined to believe her father was as worried about her as her mother was.

  Petal wasn’t right, of course. What child could be after such a terrible, long ordeal? She didn’t sleep calmly, she woke frequently with bad dreams and was fearful when anyone new came into the room. Sometimes she sat staring into space, and who knew where her mind was going to.