Wednesday's Child, page 5
“And you don’t know why?”
“I can only guess. And you mustn’t tell anyone I said this. I think it was her home life.”
“What about it?”
“I think she was neglected. I don’t mean she wasn’t well fed or clothed, or abused in any way. Though she did look a bit … well, shabby … sometimes. You know, she was wearing the same dress and socks day after day. And sometimes I just felt like picking her up and dumping her in a bath. It wasn’t that she smelled or anything. She was just a bit grubby. I don’t think her parents spent enough time with her, encouraging her, that sort of thing. I think that was the root of her loneliness. It happens a lot, and there isn’t much you can do about it. A supportive home environment is perhaps even more important than school for a child’s development, but we can’t be parents as well as teachers, can we? And we can’t tell parents how to bring up their children.”
“You mentioned abuse,” Banks said. “Did you ever notice any signs of physical abuse?”
“Oh, no. I couldn’t … I mean, if I had I would certainly have reported it. We did have a case here a year or so ago. It was dreadful, just dreadful what some parents can sink to.”
“But you saw no signs with Gemma? No bruises, cuts, anything like that?”
“No. Well, there was one time. About a week or so ago, I think it was. It was quite warm, like now. Gemma was wearing a short-sleeved dress and I noticed a bruise on her upper arm, the left one, I think. Naturally, I asked her about it, but she said she’d got it playing games.”
“Did you believe her?”
“Yes. I had no reason to doubt her word.”
“So you didn’t report it?”
“No. I mean, one wouldn’t want to be alarmist. Not after that business with the Cleveland social workers and everything. Look, maybe I should have done something. Lord knows, if I’m in any way responsible … But if you brought in the authorities every time a child had a bruise there’d be no time for anything else, would there?”
“It’s all right,” Banks said. “Nobody’s blaming you. Everybody’s a bit sensitive about things like that these days. I picked up plenty of bruises when I was a lad, believe me, and my mum and dad wouldn’t have appreciated being accused of abusing me. And I got a good hiding when I deserved it, too.”
Peggy smiled at him over her glasses. “As I said,” she went on, “Gemma’s explanation seemed perfectly reasonable to me. Children can play pretty rough sometimes. They’re a lot more resilient than we give them credit for.”
“Was that the only mark you ever saw on her?”
“Oh, yes. I mean, if it had been a regular occurrence I’d have said something for certain. We do have to keep an eye open for these things.”
“And she never seemed in pain of any kind?”
“Not physical pain, no. She just sometimes seemed withdrawn, lost in her own world. But children often create their own imaginary worlds. They can be very complex beings, Chief Inspector. They’re not all the same. Just because a child is quiet, it doesn’t mean there’s anything wrong with her.”
“I understand. Please believe me, I’m not criticizing. I’m just trying to find out something about her.”
“How could it help?”
“I honestly don’t know.”
“You think she’s dead, don’t you?”
“I wouldn’t say that.”
“She’s been gone nearly two days now. That’s what the papers say. Not in so many words, perhaps, but …”
“She could still be alive.”
“Then she might be better off dead,” Peggy Graham whispered. She felt up the sleeve of her cardigan for a tissue, lifted her glasses and wiped her moist eyes. They looked small and shy without the lenses to magnify them. “I’m sorry. It’s just … we’re all so upset.”
“Did you, or anyone else on staff, notice any strangers hanging around the school recently?”
“No. And I’m sure anything like that would have been reported. We have very strict guidelines to follow.”
“Nobody saw a dark blue car? Are you sure?”
She shook her head. “I’m sure.”
“Did you ever see Gemma talking to any strangers nearby? Male or female?”
“No. She always came and left with her friends, the ones from the same street. She didn’t live far away.”
Banks stood up. “Thank you very much,” he said. “If you do remember anything, here’s my card. Please call.”
Peggy Graham took the card. “Of course. But I don’t see how there could be anything else.”
“Just in case.”
“All right.” She got to her feet. “I’ll walk to the door with you.” As they walked, a host of children came out of one of the class rooms. Some were laughing and scrapping, but many of them seemed subdued. Perhaps they were too young to understand the enormity of what had happened, Banks thought, but they were old enough to sense the mood of tension and fear. One little girl with glossy dark curls and brown spaniel eyes tugged at Banks’s sleeve.
“Are you the policeman?” she asked.
“Yes,” he answered, wondering how on earth she knew.
“Are you looking for Gemma?”
“Yes, I am.”
“Please find her,” the little girl said, clutching his sleeve tighter. “Bring her back. She’s my friend.”
“I’ll do my best,” said Banks. He turned to Peggy Graham. She blushed.
“I’m afraid I told them a policeman was coming,” she said. “Sorry.”
“It’s all right. Look, can I talk to this girl?”
“Elizabeth? Well … I suppose so. Though I don’t know what… . Come this way.” And she led both Banks and Elizabeth into the empty classroom.
“Now, Elizabeth,” she said. “The nice policeman wants to talk to you about Gemma, to help him to find her. Just answer his questions. I’ll stay here with you.” She glanced at Banks to ask if he minded, and he nodded his agreement. Elizabeth took hold of Peggy Graham’s hand and stood beside her.
Banks crouched, hearing his knees crack as he did so, and rested his elbows on his thighs. “You know we’re trying to find Gemma,” he said. “Did she ever say anything to you about going away?”
Elizabeth shook her head.
“Or about anyone wanting to take her away?” Another shake.
“Did she have any older friends, big girls or big boys?” “No.”
“Did she ever talk about her mummy and daddy?”
“It wasn’t her daddy.”
“Mr Poole?”
Elizabeth nodded. “She wouldn’t call him Daddy.” “What did she say about him?”
“I don’t know.”
“Did she like him?”
“No.”
“Did he ever hurt Gemma?”
“She cried.”
“Why did she cry?”
“Don’t know.”
“Did he ever hurt her, Elizabeth?”
“I don’t know. She didn’t like him. She said he smelled and he always told her to go away.”
“When did he tell her to go away?”
“He said she was a sp … sp … a spilled cat.”
“A spilled cat? Do you mean ‘spoiled brat’?”
“Yes.”
“When did he say this?”
“He wouldn’t let her have the book.”
“What book?”
“She wanted a book and he wouldn’t let her have it. He threw her other books away.”
“Why?”
“She spilled some paint on his newspaper. It too dirty. He was angry. He threw her books away and he wouldn’t let her have any more.”
“What was too dirty, Elizabeth?”
“No. It too dirty.”
Banks looked at Peggy Graham. “I think she’s trying to say ‘at two-thirty,’” she said, frowning.
“Is that right?” Banks asked Elizabeth. “She spilled paint on his newspaper at two-thirty, so he threw her books away?”
She nodded.
“What were the books?”
“Story books. With pictures. Gemma likes reading. She reads to me. I’m not very good. Please find her.” Elizabeth started crying. Peggy Graham put an arm around her. “It’s all right, dear. The nice policeman will find Gemma. Don’t cry.”
Elizabeth sniffled a few moments longer, then wiped her nose on her sleeve and left the room. Banks sighed.
“What was all that about?” Peggy asked.
“I wish I knew. Thanks for letting me talk to her anyway. I hope she doesn’t stay upset.”
“Don’t worry. Elizabeth’s tough enough.”
Banks walked through the playground full of children. They were skipping, playing hopscotch, running around as usual, but like the ones coming out of the classroom they seemed much quieter, more subdued than children usually are.
He looked at his watch. Close to noon. Time to write up his notes before lunch with Jenny. Not that he had learned much from the teacher that he hadn’t known or suspected already. Gemma kept herself to herself, perhaps suffered neglect at home, but was probably not physically abused. Still, there was the business of the bruise. How had she got it? And what had Elizabeth meant about “at two-thirty” and Gemma’s books? Banks walked past the tower block with JESUS SAVES written in red on the wall and back to the unmarked car he had parked by the mobile unit.
III
Damn it, cursed Jenny Fuller. She had pulled up at the lights just in time and all the essays on the back seat had slid off onto the floor. So few of the students bothered with paper-clips or staples; it would be a hell of a job reshuffling them. If she hadn’t been in such a hurry to meet Banks it would never have happened. She was on the south-eastern edge of Eastvale, coming up to the roundabout by the Red Lion, and she only had five minutes to park and get to Le Bistro. Still, Alan would wait.
The lights changed and the car lurched off again. To hell with the papers. She shouldn’t be teaching until October anyway, and if it hadn’t been for those American students—those American students with odd ideas of academic timetables and thousands of dollars to spend on an English education—then she could have been relaxing on a beach somewhere.
She smiled to herself, imagining Alan Banks sitting at one of Le Bistro’s wobbly little tables, no doubt feeling out of place among the yuppie lunch crowd with their Perriers and portable telephones. He would be far more comfortable in the Queen’s Arms with a pie and a pint in front of him, not at a table covered in a coral cloth with a long-stemmed rose in a vase at its centre. But Jenny had been lecturing to the Americans all morning, and she was damned if she was going to be done out of the shrimp provençale and the glass of white wine she had promised to treat herself.
Jenny remembered her surprise the first time the Eastvale CID had brought her into a case, involving a peeping Tom, three years ago. She had guessed (correctly) that they wanted a visible female presence as a sop to Dorothy Wycombe and the Eastvale feminist contingent, WEEF, Women of Eastvale for Emancipation and Freedom. Still, she had done a good job, and since then her professional field of interests had broadened to include a certain amount of criminal and deviant psychology. She had even attended a series of fascinating lectures on the psychological profiling of serial killers, given by a visiting American from the FBI Behavioral Sciences section.
She had also had a brief fling with the visitor, but she didn’t care to remember that too clearly. Like most of her affairs, it was best forgotten. Still, that was eighteen months ago, when she had been still hurting over her split with Dennis Osmond. Since then she had not been involved with anyone. Instead, she had done a lot of thinking about her lousy relationships, and the reasons for them. She hadn’t come up with any answers yet. Most often she ended up wondering why the hell her professional insights seemed to shed no light at all on her personal life.
The tires screeched as she turned right at the market square and drove down by Castle Hill between the terraced river gardens and the formal gardens. People sat on the terraces and ate packed lunches on one side of the road, while on the other, mothers dragged bored children around the displays of fading flowers.
At last, she crossed the small bridge over the River Swain, turned right and pulled up outside the café.
Le Bistro was one of Eastvale’s newest cafés. Tourism, the dale’s main industry, had increased, and the many Americans drawn to do the “James Herriot” tour wanted a little more than fish and chips and warm beer, quaint as they found such things. In addition, a more sophisticated, cosmopolitan crowd had moved up from London while property in the north was still a good deal cheaper than down south. Many of them commuted from Eastvale to York, Darlington, and even as far as Tyneside, Leeds and Bradford, and they naturally demanded a little more diversity in matters of dining.
Best of all, as far as Jenny was concerned, was that Le Bistro was actually situated in a converted Georgian semi only four houses south of her own. The new owners had, somehow, received planning permission to knock down the wall between the two houses and turn them into a café. For Jenny it was a godsend, as she often couldn’t be bothered to cook after a hard day. The food was good and the prices were relatively reasonable.
She dashed through the door. The place was fairly busy, but she saw Banks immediately. There he was in a dark grey sports jacket, white shirt and tie. As usual, his top button was open and the tie loose and askew. Under close-cropped black hair, his dark blue eyes sparkled as he looked over at her. He was working on a crossword and holding what looked like a glass of mineral water. Jenny couldn’t suppress a giggle as she sat down in a flurry of apologies. Le Bistro didn’t serve pints.
“It’s all right,” said Banks rather glumly, putting his newspaper away in his briefcase. “I’m supposed to be cutting down on the ale anyway.”
“Since when?”
Banks patted his stomach. “Since I turned forty and noticed this beginning to swell.”
“Nonsense. You’re as lean as ever. You’re just suffering from male menopause. Next you’ll be having an affair with a twenty-one-year-old rookie policewoman.”
Banks laughed. “Chance would be a fine thing. But don’t joke about it. You never know. Anyway, how are you?”
Jenny shrugged and tossed back the thick mane of red hair that cascaded over her shoulders. “Okay, I suppose. I’m not sure I like teaching summer school though.”
“Working in summer?” mocked Banks. “Tut-tut, what a terrible thing. What is the world coming to?”
Jenny thumped him on the arm. “It’s supposed to be one of the perks of the job, remember? Teachers get summers off. Not this year, though.”
“Never mind. You’re looking well for it.”
“Why, thank you, kind sir.” Jenny inclined her head graciously.
“And you haven’t changed. Honestly, Alan. You still don’t look a day over thirty-nine. How’s Sandra?”
“Busy.”
“Oh-oh. Feeling all neglected, are we?”
Banks grinned. “Something like that. But we’re not here to talk about me.”
“And how’s Susan Gay?” Jenny had spent some time helping Susan adjust to her CID posting, on a semi-professional basis, and the two had become fairly close. They were different personalities, but Jenny saw something in Susan—a sense of determination, a single-mindedness—that both appealed to her and disturbed her. If she could persuade Susan to relax a little, she felt, then a more balanced and attractive personality might be permitted to emerge.
Banks told her Susan was doing well, though she still seemed a little tense and prickly, and the two chatted about family and mutual friends. “Have you studied the menu yet?” Jenny asked him after a short silence.
“Mm. No sausage and chips, I noticed. How’s the croque monsieur?”
“Good.”
“Then I’ll have that. And by the way, I like the music.”
Jenny cocked an ear. Singing quietly in the background was the unmistakable voice of Edith Piaf. Typical of him to notice that, she thought. Left to herself she would have ignored it as wallpaper music.
“Wine?” she asked.
“Not for me. It makes me sleepy and I’ve a lot of paperwork to do this afternoon.”
“So, it’s about little Gemma Scupham, is it?” Jenny said, unfolding a coral napkin and spreading it over her lap. “That’s why you’ve called me in?”
Banks nodded. “Superintendent Gristhorpe thought you might be able to help.”
“At least I’m not the token feminist this time.”
“No. Seriously, Jenny, can you help?”
“Maybe. What do you want from me?”
“For the moment I’d just like grounding in a few basics. I can understand a lot about things most people don’t even want to think about—robbery, murder, even rape—but I can’t seem to grasp the motivation for something like this.”
Jenny took a deep breath and held it a moment. “All right. I’ll do what I can. Shall we order first, though?” She called over the waitress and gave their orders, asking for a glass of white wine for herself right now, and a coffee for Banks, then she sat back in her chair. “First you’d better tell me the details so far,” she said.
Banks told her. Before he finished, the food arrived, and they both tucked in.
Jenny pushed her plate away and set the half-full wineglass in front of her. Banks ordered another coffee.
“I don’t really know where to start,” she said. “I mean, it’s not really my field.”
“You do know something about sexual deviance, though.”
“Honestly, Alan, you make me sound like a real pervert. Basically, nobody really knows what causes someone to be a paedophile or a rapist or a sadist. They don’t necessarily realize they’re doing anything wrong.”
“Are you telling me that a man who sexually assaults little children doesn’t think he’s doing anything wrong?”
“Depends what you mean by wrong. He would know he’s breaking the law, of course, but … He’s only satisfying desires he can’t help feeling. He never asked to feel them in the first place. And many also feel tremendous guilt and remorse.”
“For doing something they don’t even think is wrong? You make it sound almost legitimate.”
