Charlie

Synopsis

Can young Charlie find the strength to save her family?

One glorious summer's day, sixteen-year-old Charlie Welsh has her privileged childhood brought to an abrupt and terrifying end when she witnesses her mother being brutally attacked in her own garden by two strangers.

With her father mysteriously away Charlie has to face up to sinister forces that seem intent on shattering her family and even her belief in her parents.

But she is not alone. Charlie meets kind, funny student Andrew, whose love helps her through the hard times and further unexpected tragedy. Together, can they unravel the mysteries of the past that haunt the Welsh family? And will facing up to those mysteries destroy their love for each other or make it stronger?

LESLEY PEARSE

Charlie

PENGUIN BOOKS

Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thriteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fiftteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-one

Chapter Twenty-two

For Jan Miller, my friend, soulmate and the inspiration for the character of Charlie. Special thanks too to George Miller, for his loyal friendship and for not minding when Jan and I prattle on endlessly. I love you both.

And joyful thanks for my first grandchild, Brandon Jay, born 10 July 1998: the little boy I had always hoped for, a treasure beyond compare.

Chapter One

Dartmouth, Devon. July 1970

‘Allison Proctor’s going to enter the Carnival as Lady Godiva, on her horse,’ Charlie remarked to her friend June, licking her ice-cream cornet in what she hoped was a sensual manner. Two boys had just sat down on the next bench, and although they were pimply-faced and weedy, probably no more than seventeen, they were better than no male audience at all.

‘Not in the nude?’ June exclaimed.

‘Near enough,’ Charlie replied, glancing sideways to see if the boys were listening. ‘Just a flesh-coloured body stocking and a cloak.’

‘Trust her! She always was a show-off,’ June said indignantly. ‘I bet she’s only doing it because you’ve been chosen as Carnival Queen.’

It was only two weeks since Charlie had been picked for this role out of dozens of other hopefuls at the Queen’s Hotel. She had thought of little else since, and she was delighted June had brought it up in front of these two boys.

‘I admire Allison for being so daring,’ Charlie replied. ‘Everyone else in Dartmouth is so boring. If I wasn’t going to be the Carnival Queen I’d enter as something really shocking and make everyone sit up and take notice.’

The girls were sixteen. Their convent school had closed for the summer just the day before and although they were dressed almost identically in flared faded jeans and tie-dyed tee-shirts, the similarity ended there.

June Melling was a somewhat timid, blue-eyed English rose, her pale complexion prone to freckles, five foot two, prettily plump, with corn-coloured wavy hair. Charlie Weish was taller, slender, very pretty, and Chinese.

In point of fact she was only half Chinese, on her father’s side, but her appearance was entirely Oriental and quite startling in a small town like Dartmouth where almost all the residents and visitors were of white Anglo-Saxon origin. Her sleek black hair was cut into a fashionable shoulder-length bob, her dark, almond-shaped eyes held all the mystery and fascination of the Orient, and her skin was golden-brown. She had inherited little from her English mother, aside from her long legs and slightly pouting lips. Her father laid claim to her intelligence too; she had taken seven ‘O’ levels just recently and she was expected to get mostly ‘B’s.

Even seen through the somewhat jaded eyes of two teenagers who’d never lived anywhere else, Dartmouth on a hot summer’s day was at its most picturesque and vibrant. Yachts, ferries and fishing boats bobbed on the sparkling blue water of the river Dart, with a stunning backdrop of Kingswear with its pretty houses clinging seemingly precariously to the steep hillside across the water. Behind the girls’ Embankment bench, the abundance of ancient buildings, quaint cobbled streets, the magnificent Naval College and a wealth of historical interest ensured Dartmouth’s place as one of the most visited towns in Devonshire.

Charlie and June made a sport out of poking fun at the hordes of holidaymakers who thronged here each summer. They couldn’t really understand why these people felt compelled to photograph each other outside every old building, take ferry rides to places they considered boring, or why they consumed such enormous quantities of cream teas and Devon fudge.

But this afternoon their minds weren’t on ridiculing visitors, in fact they had been searching amongst them for boys who might brighten up the long holiday ahead. They had already made several slow trawls of all the moored yachts, hoping to spot a couple of bronzed Adonises with sun-bleached hair and fun on their minds. But everyone they’d seen had been either too old or ugly, or already with a girl. With Dartmouth Naval College dominating their town, and scores of young cadets milling around for most of the year, it seemed ludicrous to both girls that they were unable to find anyone even vaguely suitable, but the College had closed for the summer and suddenly there was a dearth of young males.

June had barely noticed the arrival of the two boys on the next bench until her friend began raising her voice and her conversation took on a more daring tone. She glanced across at them and decided that Charlie couldn’t possibly fancy either of them, therefore she must have it in mind to tease them a little. This meant she had to join in. She always followed Charlie’s bold lead.

‘People in Dartmouth are so behind the times,’ she sighed, raising her voice so the boys would hear. ‘I was telling Miranda Hutchings the other day that I’d smoked a joint when I was in London and she said, “I didn’t know you could smoke meat, I thought it was only fish.” ’

Both girls sniggered at this joke they’d recently read in a much-thumbed old copy of
Private Eye
. Neither girl had even seen cannabis, much less had the opportunity to try smoking it.

‘Miranda Hutchings is such a block-head,’ Charlie said, flicking back her hair and casting a flirtatious sideways look at the two boys. Miranda was entirely fictitious, but a useful medium through which the girls could appear cool. ‘I was talking about Woodstock the other day, she said she’d been there. Of course I didn’t believe her and I asked her questions about it. It turned out she meant the Woodstock near Oxford. She’d stayed there with her auntie last summer. She didn’t even know about the rock festival in America.’

June giggled. She thought Charlie was absolutely brilliant at this game, another five minutes and she’d be talking about the three-day rock event as if she’d actually been there. ‘Shall we go down to the record shop and listen to a few sounds?’ she asked. She actually liked the look of the dark-haired boy, even if he was spotty, but she knew Charlie would laugh at her if she admitted it, and what’s more she’d want to back off immediately for fear of getting lumbered with the other one.

‘It’s too hot for that,’ Charlie said with an exaggerated sigh. ‘Besides, they’ll never let us listen to Pink Floyd, they only like putting on “In the Summertime” or “Yellow River” because all the tourists like that rubbish.’

June was tempted to remind Charlie that she’d bought Mungo Jerry’s ‘In the Summertime’ only last Saturday and couldn’t wait to get home to play it. But along with always expecting, and getting, the first pick of boys, Charlie didn’t like it when June pulled her up on a technicality. ’What do
you
want to do then?’ she asked.

‘I fancy going skinny-dipping down by the Castle,’ Charlie said without any hesitation.

June might have gasped if she hadn’t been so well trained by her friend to go along with anything, however outrageous, without showing the slightest alarm.

‘Okay then,’ she said, getting up from the seat. ‘But we’d better get a move on, I’m supposed to be home by five.’

Charlie stood up, linked arms with her friend, and they walked on down the Embankment. She knew without a shadow of a doubt that the two boys would follow in a few minutes.

‘Are you serious?’ June said nervously once they were out of earshot.

‘No, of course not,’ Charlie sniggered. ‘Do you really think I’d let two runts like that see me naked? What we’ll do is get our bikes, then ride off towards the Castle. We can hide in the woods at Warfleet Creek and watch for them to come running past.’

‘That’s a bit cruel,’ June, who was soft-hearted, protested. ‘It’s far enough to the Creek without sending them on a wild goose chase all the way to the Castle.’

‘I like being cruel to boys,’ Charlie grinned impishly. ‘It serves them right for thinking dirty thoughts, and for a couple of creeps like them to imagine they had even half a chance with us two.’

June didn’t protest any further. Her father had often claimed she would jump off a cliff if Charlie told her to.

As the girls were unlocking their bicycles from the railings of the car park, half hidden by a tree, they saw the boys coming along. They were looking this way and that, clearly puzzled by the girls’ disappearance. Seen on the move, they looked almost like Boy Scouts, with their khaki shorts, neat checked short-sleeved shirts and very short hair – they even wore socks with their plimsolls. Even June recognized them as ‘mother’s boys’. No normal boy of their age would be seen dead in any other kind of shorts than cut-down Levis, or with hair cut that short.

‘I bet their normal hobby is train-spotting,’ Charlie giggled. ‘Come on, let’s shoot past them and make them start running.’