Just What Kind of Mother Are You? (3 page)

‘No they don’t.’

‘Yes they do.’

‘Anyway,’ I say quickly, ‘what’s this I hear about you making people pay to play with you?’

He doesn’t answer. I can’t see his face hidden behind the fur of his hood, and now I’ve got to concentrate because I’m on the main road and it’s not been gritted particularly well. A rush job.

I have a momentary flash of panic as I imagine the taxi driver in charge of the kids’ minibus, taking a bend too fast and sailing off the edge of the road, down to the valley floor below.

I picture the vehicle as it rolls and rolls, coming to a stop by a John Deere hay baler. The windows of the bus are blown out, and my kids sit there motionless like limp crash-test dummies.

I shiver.

Sam says, in answer to my question about pay for play: ‘Pardon?’

‘You heard me.’

Reluctantly, he explains, ‘I don’t make
everyone
pay,’ and I can tell he’s more disappointed than sorry. Probably thought he could go through life making money in this way, and he can sense by my tone that his venture has come to a premature end.

I turn to him. ‘What I don’t get is why these kids are willing to pay you. Why are they giving
you
money when they could just as easily play on their own or with somebody else?’

‘Dunno,’ he says innocently, but then shoots me a mischievous look. One that says,
I know. Are they, like, idiots, or what?

Five minutes later and we pull up outside school. I look to see if Kate’s car is in its usual place by the gate, but she isn’t here yet. I do like her, but it does annoy me how she insists on going into school each day. Because really, there is no reason for it.

Her son, Fergus, is almost eight. He’s more than capable of removing his coat and shoes, changing into his indoor pumps and finding his way to the classroom. The school has only eighty kids. He’s not going to get lost. But Kate’s one of those mothers who enjoys chatting with the teacher. She likes to watch Fergus slowly taking off his shoes, rolling her eyes at the other mothers while clapping her hands together, saying, ‘Come on, chop chop! Quicksticks! Pass Mummy your boots!’ Kate doesn’t have a proper job. She and her husband get a steady stream of income from renting holiday cottages. So all Kate has to do when she gets home is put her washing machine on and write thank-you notes to people she doesn’t really like.

I’m jealous of Kate’s life.

There, I’ve said it.

It’s taken me a while to get to this point. Before, I couldn’t admit it. I used to complain to Joe. Blame him in a roundabout
way for my having to work full-time, blame him for the fact I had to face every day exhausted, and—

My phone is ringing.

I pull it out of my pocket and see that it’s Sally. Perhaps the minibus has not turned up. Maybe the driver’s not been able to start the engine in the cold weather.

‘Hi, Sal, what’s up?’

Sally is crying. Big, choking sobs. She can’t get her words out.

‘Mum?’ I can hear noise in the background, more crying … the sounds of traffic. ‘Mum … something really bad has happened.’

3

D
ETECTIVE
C
ONSTABLE
Joanne Aspinall is almost at the station when she gets the call about the missing girl. Thirteen years old. And not a worldly-wise thirteen either. Joanne wonders if there even is such a thing. I mean, what difference would it make if she were an astute girl? What if
she was
used to being out and about on her own? Would that change anything? Did it make it any less urgent?

Missing’s missing. There shouldn’t be a difference.

But when Joanne sees the photograph, she shudders. It has to be said, this girl
does
look young for her age. Astonishingly young, in fact. And Joanne has to admit, even if it’s only to herself, that the thirteen-year-olds who go gadding about in Wonderbras and tall boots tend to turn up eventually. Usually returning home sorry and sheepish, sad and scared, wishing they’d not put their parents through that anguish. Because all they wanted to do was prove a point.

Joanne had been no different when she was young. Leaving the house, screaming at her mother that she was old enough to take care of herself, desperate to be taken seriously as a grownup. When really,
grown up
was the last thing she was.

Joanne thinks about the strange confidence that seems to come to girls at this age, and decides that this confidence, this intrepidity, comes later in boys. Round about the sixteen mark. That’s when their cockiness is heightened and she starts seeing
boys who’ve never been involved in any kind of trouble before suddenly start making nuisances of themselves.

They’d had a memo in the office just last week. The army was on the lookout for kids whose life could be ‘turned around with the right sort of guidance’.

It said: ‘They could have a lot to offer the British Army,’ and Joanne thought, Yes, I bet they could. The self-preservation instinct is woefully lacking in young lads; they’ll happily walk into battle, happily regard themselves infallible, indestructible. No wonder the bloody army wanted them.

After the quick brief on the missing girl, Joanne makes her way to the address. She knows the house. Years ago it used to be the old vicarage, before the church sold it off. Too big and expensive for the clergy to heat.

The family aren’t known to the police; not many residents of Troutbeck are. It’s not
that
sort of place.

Joanne deals with very few serious criminal offences from within the boundaries of the National Park. It’s one of the safest areas to live in Britain. You see the same people every day, so it’s hard to hide if you do screw up, if you do shaft someone or do something illegal.

People move here wanting a better life, wanting a better life for their children. So generally they keep their heads down. They do their best not to antagonize their neighbours. They feel privileged to live here and they try their hardest to make sure it remains that way.

But it’s not always easy
to
stay here.

House prices are off the scale, and industry is non-existent. So those who move here had better have a good way to earn a living, or else they won’t last. Those who come thinking they’ll open up a twee coffee shop, florist’s or artist’s studio get a rude awakening when they can’t make the mortgage payments.

Joanne’s noticed how newcomers will proudly announce that
they’re ‘local’ after living here for perhaps just a couple of years. As if it’s a badge of honour. Joanne can never quite make sense of that. She is a local. Lived here all her life. She’s not sure it’s something to go on about, though.

Her mother and Auntie Jackie moved to the Lakes from Lancashire back when they were teenagers, to work as chambermaids, and Jackie scoffs at the idea of being accepted as a ‘local’.

‘Local?’ she’ll say derisively. ‘What do I want to be classed as one of them for? No sense of humour …’

Joanne slows the car as she approaches the Rivertys’ driveway.

Their daughter is not the type of girl to disappear. Joanne knows that now. No, Lucinda Riverty is not that type at all.

Joanne adjusts her bra and climbs out, thinking that when she was back in uniform, at least she got the clothes for free. Now, trying to find suitable work clothes took up almost as much time as the paperwork. And since her bra size is a cruel 38GG, it’s hard to find tops that don’t make her look like a barrel.

She zips up her parka, then makes her way up the path, thinking that at least she can ring the doorbell now without being worried about being mistaken for a strippergram.

Not that that was likely to happen here today.

‘Mrs Riverty?’

The woman shakes her head. ‘I’m her sister, Alexa. Come in, they’re all in there.’

Joanne flashes her warrant card, but the woman doesn’t look at it. She doesn’t ask who Joanne is, because nobody bothers at times like this. They get you in quickly, don’t want to lose any time.

They’re already beating themselves up for the minutes they’ve wasted so far. When they knew something was off, something was wrong, when the universe was whispering to them there was trouble.

The woman gestures for Joanne to go along the hallway and to the right. Joanne steps into the vestibule and wipes her feet. She glances ahead of her: muted Farrow & Ball paint colours, seagrass matting on the stairs, a dotting of tasteful black-and-white photos of the kids. Joanne spots a girl of around five dressed as a ballerina holding some tulips and a Dorothy bag, and thinks that this must be Lucinda.

The room is already busy with people, which also happens at times like this. Everyone comes straight over. Every family member, every friend. People turning up to be together, to wait.

Joanne’s used to it. She’s used to the faces – expectant but confused. Who is this woman in the black parka? What is she here for?

‘I’m Detective Constable Aspinall,’ Joanne says.

Always best to give her full title instead of using the ‘DC’. Women, particularly, don’t really know what DC means anyway. Give a member of the public a policewoman in plain clothes and they don’t really know what to do with her.

Is she here to console the family? Make tea? Family liaison – is that it? Is she even a real police officer?

They’re not sure. Best to tell them who she is and what she’s here for right from the get-go.

All eyes move from Joanne to a broken-looking blonde woman sitting in the middle of a sagging, taupe sofa.

This room’s for the kids. It houses the old furniture, the stuff that doesn’t matter any more, the stuff nobody gets cross about if it’s ruined with spilt drinks, with felt-tip pens.

A four-year-old TV is in the corner, and beneath it a stack of game boxes: PlayStation, Wii, Xbox. Joanne knows the names of these things even if she can’t correctly distinguish one from the other, not having any kids of her own.

The blonde goes to stand, but Joanne says, ‘Please, don’t get
up. Are you Mrs Riverty?’, and the woman nods her head, just slightly, spilling the mug of tea she’s holding in the process. She hands her tea to the man seated next to her.

Joanne looks to him: ‘Mr Riverty?’, and he says, ‘Guy,’ attempting to smile, but he can’t make his face work in that way today.

He stands. His eyes are anguished, his face so full of grief. ‘Have you come to help us?’ he asks, and Joanne says, ‘Yes.’

Yes, that’s what she’s come for. Joanne has come to help.

This is the second missing girl. That’s why Joanne was sent straight here. If Lucinda had been the first, these early stages would be covered by a couple of uniforms. But Joanne’s department are working with Lancashire on this one, and after a series of screwed-up abduction cases in the south, everyone’s on high alert.

Two weeks ago, a young girl had gone missing from Silverdale, just over the border from Cumbria into Lancashire.

Molly Rigg. Another one who looked younger than she was. Another girl who
shouldn’t have gone missing
, her boss said.

Molly Rigg turned up at teatime, twenty miles from her home, when she walked into the travel agents in Bowness-on-Windermere.

The November rain was lashing and the place was jam-packed to bursting with people wanting to escape the gloom – perhaps on an all-inclusive to the Dominican Republic. Joanne had seen it advertised in the front window: £355 per person (branded drinks extra).

Molly had been stripped bare from the waist up, and didn’t know where she was. No clue as to what town she was in. She’d chosen the travel agents because she thought the staff in there would be ‘nice’.

They were.

The manager removed everyone from the shop with the minimum of fuss, while the two Dolly Daydreams manning the front desk got Molly covered up in an assortment of their own clothes. By the time Joanne got there they were clinging on to Molly so fiercely, so protectively, that it was hard for Joanne to get them to let go.

One of the two, Danielle Knox, had told of how she’d glanced up from her flight schedules and seen Molly, standing silently, rainwater pouring down her bare shoulders and young chest, her arms crossed around herself, shivering.

She told of how her mouth fell open as Molly asked her quietly and politely, ‘Please can you phone my mum? I need you to get me my mum.’

Molly later said that she had been taken to a bedsit and raped more than once by a man who spoke like the people from
The Darling Buds of May
. Molly’s mum was a fan of the series and watched the reruns on ITV3 on Sunday afternoons while Molly did her homework in front of the fire.

Joanne wonders just how much Kate and Guy Riverty know about the case. Or even how much attention they’d paid to poor Molly before they found themselves in this, the very worst of similar situations, with their now-missing daughter, Lucinda.

Kate Riverty asks Joanne if she thinks it could be the same man responsible for both, and Joanne answers with, ‘Let’s not think that way right now. There’s nothing to suggest it’s the same person at this stage.’

Which of course she doesn’t mean. But Joanne knows that, regardless of the solid performance Mrs Riverty is putting on, no mother is ready to hear such things.

Joanne is also careful not to speculate on whether Lucinda has actually been abducted
or not
.

A child does not return home? Parents assume abduction.

Forget the statistics. Forget the runaways. You go suggesting that their child has not been abducted and you get a meltdown.

Joanne looks around at the frantic faces in the room. She does not want a meltdown.

4

I
’
VE BEEN SITTING
here with my head in my hands for ten minutes? Half an hour? I don’t know how long when there’s a knock on my car window.

‘You okay?’ Jessica’s mum mouths. I don’t know her name, she probably doesn’t know mine, but she’s the mumsy type that will always stop if she sees someone in distress.

I nod my head at her.

‘You’re sure?’ she persists. Her face is clouded with concern. I must look a real mess.