Murder of Innocence Read online

  She talked on and on, about this and that and nothing in particular. His hand grew warm in hers but his eyes never focused.

  For the first time Ellie allowed herself to speculate what would happen to Tod if he didn’t come back to full consciousness. Would he be left so brain-damaged that he’d never walk or talk again?

  Would he ever play with the cat Midge again? Eat all her chocolate biscuits at the kitchen table? Laugh …

  She closed her eyes and prayed a little.

  When she finished, she kissed his forehead, turned up the Walkman a little – but not to screaming pitch – and left.

  Next was Aunt Drusilla.

  Aunt Drusilla was up and about, but using her stick to lean on more than usual. ‘Well, girl? Have you brought me my Bath Oliver biscuits? I told my daily – fool of a woman, but what can you expect – that you’d make me some tea. So what’s the news from the hospital?’

  Ellie sighed and shook her head, unpacking the goodies she’d bought on the way home in the Avenue.

  Aunt Drusilla poked at a box of chocolate biscuits. ‘They’re not the sort I usually have.’

  ‘They were out of stock. I thought you might like to try these instead.’

  ‘They’ll be too hard on the teeth.’

  ‘Dunk them in your tea, then.’

  ‘The idea!’ But the old lady’s lips twitched. ‘Well, what about the boy?’

  ‘They say he’s showing signs of returning consciousness but his eyes are still unfocused.’

  Aunt Drusilla tutted. ‘Taking his time. Have they arrested the man responsible? It was on the local radio, my cleaner said. Or did she hear it from a neighbour? What’s his name? Something stupid. Can’t remember it for the moment but it’ll come back to me. I hear he’s roaming the streets bold as brass. I’m not leaving this house till he’s caught, and that’s flat.’

  ‘They suspect someone from the hostel. I suppose he’ll be easy enough to pick up.’

  ‘I objected when they first wanted to turn that big house into a hostel. Asking for trouble. I said, “We’ll all be murdered in our beds,” and look what’s happened.’

  ‘Surely the people who live there are not let out into the community till they’re safe?’

  ‘They’re cunning enough to play sane till it’s too late and you land up in hospital. The government wants to get the prison population down, so what happens? Paedophiles and murderers roaming our streets. We’re lucky he’s only attacked one boy so far.’

  ‘I suppose paedophiles look just like everyone else. I’ve only met one man from the hostel and he seemed just, well, inadequate. A rather pathetic little man. His mother called him Gustave, of all things. Can you imagine lumbering a child with such an odd name?’

  ‘But that’s the man. Gustave. That’s the one who did it!’

  ‘Nonsense, he couldn’t hurt a fly.’

  Aunt Drusilla banged the floor with her stick. ‘Stupid girl, what do you know about such things? The sooner they get him under lock and key the better.’

  Perhaps I am stupid, thought Ellie, as she walked back home. Perhaps I am naïve and trusting and a little simple, but I really don’t think that poor creature Gustave was responsible for harming Tod.

  He’s too, well, gormless. And frail.

  Of course, Liz said they could be all ages, but …

  Liz believed in my judgement, anyway. She said I was good at ‘reading

  the picture’, and I really think I do have a small talent in that direction. I may not have been to university or be a Brain of Britain, but I’m usually right about people. As far as I’m concerned, Gustave is not in the picture.

  I hope. It would be terrible to be defending someone who had torn a small boy apart and left him to die.

  Oh, I can’t bear it … Tod, Tod … Lord, if it is your will, let him recover.

  She was not someone who went in for anger, much. Anger roiled the contents of your stomach, giving you acid heartburn. But she realized that, for the first time since Tod’s disappearance, she was extremely angry with the man who had abused the boy. If she could lay her hands on him … but of course she couldn’t. She hadn’t a clue who he might be. Well, not Gus, obviously. But when they did catch the person, she wouldn’t mind having five minutes alone with him. That core of anger stayed with her, though she kept pushing it down and telling herself it did no good to be angry with someone you’d never even met.

  She took the pedestrian crossing across the main road and crossed the Green in the shadow of the church. It was getting lighter in the evenings. Forsythia bushes were springing into yellow magnificence, daffodils shone under the trees and bird-song was everywhere, competing with the noise of the traffic.

  Bother the traffic. How lovely it would be to live in the country, gently greening over at this time of year … with primroses to be hunted in the hedgerows and catkins.

  And mud. At this time of year, the countryside was awash with mud. Ellie shook her head at herself. In times of trouble she allowed herself to daydream of living in the country, although she knew perfectly well that she’d be a fish out of water there. One bus a day if you were lucky, not a bank in sight and no shops within walking distance.

  When she reached the alley at the bottom of her garden, she stopped and looked about her.

  Tod would have come this way home on Tuesday afternoon. His swimming club finished about five but for some reason he’d been the last of his group to leave. No one had admitted seeing him go. It was a ten minute walk home from the swimming baths, which were on the far side of the park. It would have been getting dark and he wouldn’t have risked walking through the unlit park. Not in the dusk. There’d been a couple of cases of indecent exposure there recently …

  Oh. Did those who exposed themselves indecently go on to rape and mutilate children? Ouch. She must ask Liz. Well, the police would no doubt be following up that line of enquiry.

  On the whole it wasn’t likely Tod would willingly have gone into the park. To walk round by the streets took much longer, so usually he took the bus home. It was only two stops and he’d be getting hungry after swimming. His lunch would have seemed a long time ago. His mother usually left something out for him to eat, or he’d delve into the freezer. Or come round to see what Ellie had to offer.

  Suppose he’d left the baths about quarter past five and been standing at the bus stop when along came … who? Someone in a car, offering a lift? He’d never get into a stranger’s car. He’d been too well taught for that.

  Or was he walking along home with someone he knew, and then …?

  Well, you couldn’t exactly rape and mutilate a boy in full view of everyone on a busy bus route.

  So, he must have been taken off the roads, somehow.

  And how long would the attack on him have taken? An hour? Possibly two hours? Possibly even more? Really, no one knew how long. Tod might have been kept there all evening, or even all night for all they knew.

  She was standing in the alley by now. The back garden of her own house rose gently in front of her, the skyline blocked by the rooftree. And the builders. They were working by floodlight, fitting doors, singing along to a transistor radio which was blaring out pop music. Armand would be around to complain about the noise in a minute.

  To the right the alley meandered along past Armand and Kate’s house

  – there was a light in their back room, where Armand was no doubt getting down to his nightly task of correcting pupils’ homework – he was a master at the High School. His wife wouldn’t be home yet, because she worked in the City.Their garden was a muddy slope, cleared of its previous cover of weeds and overgrown shrubs. When the builders finished at Ellie’s they were due to start next door, building Armand and Kate an almost identical conservatory. When that was finished, Ellie was to mastermind the creation of a new garden for them. She was looking forward to that.

  It crossed Ellie’s mind that if Tod had been abducted straight from the swimming pool and taken somewhere to b
e abused, it would all have taken time. If he’d come this way home afterwards, the earliest he could have arrived would be, say, about half past six. Armand had taken Ellie to B&Q about a quarter past five, say, and they’d got back home about half past six. Armand would then have got down to marking homework and preparing lessons.

  If Tod had reached the alley at any time after half past six, he’d have seen Armand’s lights on. Armand was not a particularly sympathetic character, though Ellie was getting to like him, the more she knew of him. Tod had never taken to him. Tod wouldn’t have gone to Armand for help.

  Tod had been in a bad way. He’d known his mother would be out till late. Normally he’d have gone straight up the garden path to Ellie. Ellie had been out with Armand from just after five till about half past six. Then she’d been at home from half past six to a quarter to eight, making and eating a light supper for herself and Rose before they went off to the slide show at the church hall. If Tod had seen the lights on in Ellie’s house, he’d have come to her for help. But he hadn’t.

  Which meant either that he hadn’t reached the alley till after Ellie had gone to the slide show … or he’d been too distressed to ask anyone for help. He ought to have gone home and phoned his mother at work. Their house was three along to the left.

  Dark, as usual. As it would have been on Tuesday night.

  Mrs Coppola had gone back to work today, of course. Or, she might be at the hospital. One must be charitable. She might be at the hospital.

  But Tod hadn’t gone home. He’d hidden himself in a dark, safe corner. Curled up in a rug, hidden himself away. To die?

  Ellie shivered. It was getting cold. The builders were knocking off for the day. Ellie saw Diana appear in the conservatory. The builder was showing her something and to judge by her body language, Diana was saying it wasn’t acceptable.

  Ellie felt tired at the very sight of Diana and the problems she represented. The builder closed the outer door to the conservatory, fading out the noise of the transistor.

  Ellie pushed open the gate to her garden and felt Midge the cat brush around her legs. She stooped to stroke him but he bounded away into the dusk, chasing who knew what … a field-mouse? A spider? He was an indiscriminate hunter.

  Ellie plodded up the path to the conservatory and went in. The place smelt of new wood and undercoat and one of those strong man-made glues that you weren’t supposed to use in enclosed spaces. It made her sneeze.

  ‘Mother, there you are! Where have you been? Stewart’s got a couple of days off, remember, so he’ll be here any minute and I thought we’d go out after supper …’

  ‘Missus, do you want to have a look at this?’

  ‘… while you babysit.’

  Baby Frank was wailing. The builder was looking grim – what else could go wrong? The phone was ringing, but nobody was bothering to answer it.

  Stewart appeared in the kitchen doorway. He was a tall, well-built man with an endearing mop of blond hair. He looked harassed.‘Hello, everyone! Hi, darling!’ He kissed his wife, catching her on the side of her jaw.

  Frank began to scream. Stewart dropped an evening paper on the table and as it flopped down, Ellie saw the headline, ‘SEX MANIAC HELD!’

  ‘What’s that? Is that about Tod?’

  The builder nodded. ‘Hadn’t you heard? It’s all round the shops. I hope they chop off the bastard’s whatsit!’

  ‘It’s that nasty dirty old man who was hanging around here the night Tod was attacked,’ said Diana. ‘Really, mother. You can’t be trusted on your own. Fancy employing such a piece of garbage.’

  Ellie thought, This is terrible. They’ve got the wrong man!

  Then her usual lack of confidence kicked in. I’m being stupid. Of course they wouldn’t have arrested the man if he weren’t guilty. I must just be thankful that they’ve got him.

  Four

  One of the messages on the answerphone was from the Gas Board, saying they’d checked out Diana’s flat and there was no trace of a gas leak. The other message was from Liz’s husband, Gilbert. He said Liz had come home in a state, feeling she hadn’t been able to help Ellie at all. Would Ellie please remember that he was always there and wanted to hear from her, any time of the day or night?

  Ellie didn’t return the call, because she had to entertain Diana and Stewart and then babysit for little Frank. Worry mixed with anger was so tiring …

  Gustave was taken in for questioning at the police station. Mrs Dawes gave interviews to the press saying she would never have guessed, she’d never been so taken in, and if he wanted his stuff – not that there was much of it, sniff – he could get someone to collect it from her front lawn.

  The following morning Tod opened his eyes and focused on his surroundings. His first intelligent action was to paw the Walkman off his head.

  In the interregnum since their own vicar, Gilbert Adams, had been promoted to a larger parish on the other side of London, their curate had been enjoying himself. His nickname – not an affectionate one – was Timid Timothy, and the parish was looking forward to the day when he would be superseded in the pulpit by someone more, well, up to the mark. The congregation was not, on the whole, intolerant. But when Timothy preached that Sunday a rather weak sermon about forgiving your enemy, no one was impressed.

  ‘What we wanted today,’ said Aunt Drusilla’s son, Roy, delivering a cup of coffee into Ellie’s hands after the service, ‘was some good, oldfashioned Hellfire and Slaughter condemning the paedophile to outer darkness. Preferably something with boiling oil in it.’

  Ellie sighed. ‘I know I shouldn’t feel so angry and that we ought to forgive our enemies, but I agree with you. When I think of poor Tod …’

  ‘Recovering, I hear,’ said Roy, angling to look down her cleavage.

  She pulled the lapel of her blouse across. She’d wondered if she’d been showing too much when she’d put it on but she’d been in a hurry, what with Diana and Stewart having somehow arranged to stay for the weekend and baby Frank teething. And she really hadn’t thought anyone would want to peep down her cleavage at her age. The very idea! She gave Roy an old-fashioned look.

  Roy waggled his dark eyebrows in appreciation. Silver-haired, silvertongued, six foot of charm and a cousin of her dead husband.You couldn’t get rid of Roy Bartrick with a frown. Anyway, did she really want to?

  She tried to put some frost into her voice. ‘Visiting Aunt Drusilla again today? How does it feel to have a long-lost mother?’

  He grinned. ‘You forgot to add “unmarried mother”. I rather like the old bat, you know. She’s nothing if not gutsy. I wish I’d come looking for her years ago. Yes, I’ll be going round there this afternoon, after she’s had a little nap. She wants me to look at her computer. The email is playing up again.’

  Nothing that Aunt Drusilla undertook ought to have surprised Ellie by now, but this did. Ellie herself was only just beginning to come to terms with the very basic word processing side of her dear husband’s computer, and here was his aunt tackling email? Aunt Drusilla was ancient. Was she really playing around with email at her age? Ellie herself hadn’t dared try it.

  Roy removed a cat hair from Ellie’s blue jacket. ‘Hadn’t you heard that silver surfers are the fastest growing group of people to use the Internet?’

  With an attempt at insouciance Ellie asked, ‘What on earth does she use it for?’

  ‘Checking out her bank accounts? Buying and selling shares? Surfing the net for new tax fiddles? Checking up on your Diana in her work at the flats?’

  Ellie put down her cup with a clatter. Diana had said her new job was a doddle, but Diana was always looking out for the main chance. Once or twice Ellie had suspected Diana’s business methods of being unethical. Did Aunt Drusilla share the same suspicion? ‘Are you trying to tell me something about Diana?’

  ‘Possibly.’ He was serious, staring at the floor. ‘I know she’s your daughter, but …’

  There was a sour taste in Ellie’s mouth.‘She cuts
corners, tries to make a bit extra on the side? Yes. I’ll warn her. Thank you.’

  He shrugged. ‘By the way, I expect you’ll hear soon enough, but my mother has agreed to back me in redeveloping the site opposite the church. The plans come up for approval at the town hall next week and I think they’ll be accepted. It’s a safe investment for her, I assure you.’ Grimly, but amused, ‘My mother’s tied the money up well enough. Even if I come a cropper, she’ll come out of it smelling of roses.’

  Ellie laughed. ‘You’re one as bad as the other, you and her.’

  He flashed a blue glance at her. ‘Yes, but Diana may say … well, you know.’

  ‘That you’ve been fortune-hunting again?’

  He lowered his eyes. ‘She was wrong, about me wanting to marry you just for your money.’

  ‘I know. But I also know that my money helps.’ She buttoned her blue jacket firmly over the too-revealing blouse. ‘Oh dear, it’s started to rain, and I haven’t brought my umbrella. Mrs Dawes is giving me the eye, ready to go. No doubt she wants to tell me all over again how badly she was taken in by Gus, and how she’ll never trust a man again, etcetera.’

  ‘Supper tonight? I’m out and about this afternoon – thinking of applying to join the golf club, but you can get me on my mobile.’

  She shook her head. ‘If you ever gave me the number, I’ve lost it. You’ll have to stand over me while I write it in my telephone book. Anyway, I’ve got the family staying, though I’m not quite sure how that happened. Maybe one night next week?’

  Mrs Dawes usually went back to Ellie’s house for a sherry on her way home from church, and she wasn’t going to make an exception just because Diana and her family were there. Mrs Dawes glared at Stewart because he was occupying the biggest armchair – the one that had been Ellie’s husband’s and which Mrs Dawes considered fitted her bulk best. Stewart had buried himself under a coverlet of Sunday papers and didn’t notice.

  Diana fidgeted, turning her laptop on and off, frowning as Mrs Dawes accepted a refill of sherry. Little Frank was asleep in his buggy in the now waterproof conservatory and the rain was tipping down. Ellie was trying to think what she could feed everyone for lunch, while appearing to be engrossed in Mrs Dawes’ story.