Endangering Innocents (11 page)

They dispersed with tension. Knowing they would meet confrontation and maybe aggression. The farmers
would
protect their herds. To the death if need be. They had all seen the dreadful cattle pyres, pathetic hooves
sticking up through palls of smoke. It was for most of them brought up in a rural community a terrible vision of destruction, loss of income, obliteration of generations of toil and care.

And it was hampering their search for one small child in acres of farmland.

She and Mike took the shallow valley between Horton and Rudyard, one of the most beautiful and unspoilt areas of Britain. Small green fields, greystone farmhouses, dry stone walls. It spoke of Staffordshire. And yet this valley had a microclimate quite unlike the high moorlands between Leek and Buxton. At this lower level even so early in spring wild flowers already proliferated: rose bay willow herb, cow parsley, campion, dandelions, wild forget-me-nots. But there was a downside in this area marked by rushes hiding treacherous bogs. Not deep and life threatening like Carver Doone’s Dartmoor. Nothing here was as vicious as other parts of the country. This part of Staffordshire was never extreme, this southern side of Leek, containing the villages of Longsden and Rudyard, Horton and Dunwood, Endon and Stanley.

She and Mike tramped silently along the path, their eyes straining for any sign of the missing child, Joanna trying to picture the terrain from a five-year-old’s perspective.

Hours later they were back at the school. Nothing.

Nothing.

The trail had run cold.

Easter Monday.

Should be a day of hope, of optimism, of rebirth, an opportunity for forgiveness, everlasting life. Heaven. But even in the moment that she awoke she felt none of this.

The trail was cold.

She was losing sight of the little girl as though she had vanished round a corner. And however hard she tried to catch up she was always lagging behind. Somewhere locked deep in her mind was the certainty that, whether he was innocent or guilty, Baldwin held the key. If anyone had inched close to Madeline he, in some mysterious way, had. More than her mother. More than her teachers. There had been an undoubted bridge between the two - the disaffected, lonely conjuror and the frightened little girl. Nothing he had said or implied suggested it was in any way a sexual bridge but, as Mike had pointed out, this was the way these people worked.

She lay and stared up at the ceiling and believed the child was dead.

Joanna rolled over in bed and felt Matthew move towards her. Felt his arms slip around her, tightly, as though he would prevent her from rising. She would have stayed. But the child tugged at her conscience.

She nuzzled his shoulder. “When this is over,” she murmured, “we’ll spend some time together. Alone.”

But her suggestion seemed to annoy him. He drew away and folded his arms underneath his head while he stared up at the ceiling. “We don’t have much of a life together, Jo.”

She felt the familiar prick of conscience - of fear - and protested. “We do.”

“You’re always working.”

“Not always. And anyway - so are you.”

Matthew continued staring upwards at the angled corners of the ceiling. His profile was a noble one, straight nose, chiselled, well-shaped mouth. His hair tousled, curly, honey blond. Michelangelo’s David. “Will there ever come a time, do you think, that we really will spend time together?” The strain made his voice gravelly and hostile-sounding. She could feel alienation behind it.

She was disturbed by the discontent in his voice. He had left Jane - and Eloise - for her. For some bright promise of a happy lovenest with his mistress. They had been together for less than a year. Because of his involvement in police work he knew that during major investigations all police worked flat-out. And he would want Madeline found as much as she. He just didn’t want her to be the one to have to do the work.

Without speaking again she got up and stood under the shower, trying to quell the thought that men were inherently selfish, as her mother had always warned her. That basically they wanted their mothers in their wives. Only a younger version. And like many of her generation Matthew’s mother had been home more than she, a part-time worker with his father the main wage-earner. But even Matthew had commented that his parents’ relationship had soured since his father’s retirement and their increased time together.

She dressed and went downstairs, still uncomfortable at the ground being dug up between them. She brought him up a mug of coffee and they sat quietly drinking until Joanna leaned over and fished something out from under the bed.

“Happy Easter,” she said. “And I hope you’ve got me one. Or I’ll scoff half of yours.”

It was the biggest Toblerone Easter egg they had had in the entire shop. Matthew’s absolute favourite. He grinned at her, his sulky grumbles forgotten. But they would return. She could not keep the relationship buoyant all the time.

They munched chocolate until half of the original egg had disappeared and then Joanna rose with a sigh. “Time I was off.”

She slipped some square-heeled short leather boots underneath her black trousers and scarlet fleece. It felt like a day she and Korpanski would be traipsing the moors. She needed practical, comfortable clothes.

Matthew threw his Parthian shot as she was halfway out of the door. “You spend more time with that ruddy Pole than you do with me.”

It was not worthy of a reply.

There are many days like this one in a police investigation. When nothing seems to be bearing fruit. She and Korpanski checked statement after statement, collating the results of the entire investigating force’s interviews. By the end of the day they were no further forward.

Worse - when she rang the hospital she got the unwelcome news that Baldwin had discharged himself which gave her something else to worry about on two counts. Firstly she didn’t quite trust he was innocent. Even though he would have had to trick time itself she couldn’t rid herself of the feeling that he had had something to do with Madeline’s disappearance. And secondly she could not convince herself that Huke’s vengeance was spent.

She put out a ‘locate and observe’ call.

Then she returned home again to a cold, empty house but this time there was no bottle of wine and no friendly note.

Matthew’s accusations were turning out to be true. But a major investigation was hard enough without having to pussyfoot around his emotions at home. She was pretending to be asleep when he came home, and heard him breathing quietly next to her, neither of them sleeping.

Sleep should bring rest and peace. It brought her none of these and she awoke feeling nauseous and apprehensive.

And so the days turned into weeks and still there was no clue what had happened to the child.

Tuesday May 1st.

She cycled in along the Moorlands road, having avoided breakfast. She must have a nervous stomach or else the sandwich she’d eaten the night before had disagreed with her. Somehow her usual bowl of muesli had held no appeal. She’d swigged down her fresh orange juice with little enthusiasm and felt glad to be out in the clean, fresh air. The moment she walked into the station with its encumbent scent of stale fat, yesterday’s chips and cigarette smoke she felt queasy again. And the locker rooms didn’t help. People’s feet encased in sturdy leather footwear day after day acquires a certain fragrance.

She puked up in the sink and sat down, dizzy and faint.

It was all she needed. A bug!

Korpanski handed her a cup of tea. “But I hate the stuff,” she said. “It’s got no taste.”

“Settle your stomach.”

“How did you …?”

“Dawn Critchlow happened to stick her head round the door at a critical moment,” he said, with a sympathetic grin. “Hangover?”

“On one glass of wine drunk with a meal?”

He made the sign of a tilting mug. “Trust me, Jo. It’ll do you good.”

“It better had.”

She sipped it slowly, kept it down, and an hour later felt fine. Korpanski’s medicine had worked.

One of the junior officers had unearthed an interesting witness, so they spent the morning interviewing. Gelda Holmes was Baldwin’s one-time neighbour. Baldwin, in the meantime, was insisting he camped in the burntout shell of his flat. Joanna had tried to persuade him to accept a police house and one was being arranged. But he flatly refused to live in the local B&B - even at their expense. Gelda lived in Rochester Row, in the middle of a 1960s estate of small, box-like houses, some detached, others semis. She had been Joshua Baldwin’s next door neighbour until he had moved to Haig Road four years ago, and Joanna was anxious to fill in a little of his past. Knowing him, understanding him, may well be the key to unlock his Pandora’s box and find Madeline.

It was from Ms Holmes that she heard the full story of Baldwin’s marriage.

She seemed - if anything - fond of her one time neighbour. “He helped me out a couple of times, stopped a leak and fitted a new immersion. Never charged me neither except for the cost of the heater. And he sorted out my central heating boiler when it went on the blink.”

She was a busty lady in huge, tight blue jeans and a
fluffy pink fleece, aged about fortyish - with full, tanned cheeks and bleached blonde hair. And she was anxious to talk. And talk. Like many married couples Baldwin’s divorce had left him the poorer. “I’m divorced and all, you see,” she said, shooting Korpanski a distinctly, come-hither look. “So I know what he was going through. Anyway, he moved out about four years ago - a year after she left with Denise to live in America. She met a guy, you see, while she was on holiday in Florida.”

“With her husband?”

“Well - poor old Joshua.” She gave a long blink of her blued eyelids. “I mean - he never was the luckiest of blokes. No sooner touched down and booked into the airport than he got some sort of food poisoning. Stuck in the hotel bedroom he were all the time while Hilary sunned herself beside the hotel pool. She weren’t a bad-looking woman. And she met this guy. Big bloke he was - from New York I think somewhere. Shewed me all these pictures of him she did. And she’d giggle like a sixteen-year-old. Fooling Joshua. Well - like I said - he weren’t exactly born lucky. And she were a go-getter.”

Joanna nodded. She couldn’t imagine the Baldwin they had met holidaying in Florida. Obviously with the divorce his circumstances had changed - vastly.

“He was fond of his daughter?”

“Fond? When she went he was like an animal who’d lost its young,” Gelda said. “The walls are thin ‘ere. I could hear him at night, crying his heart out. Thumping his pillow. Moaning. That bloody witch of a woman. Fancy taking his little girl away like that. Hairdresser, Hilary was. Went around people’s houses in a flashy car. Did whole families at a time - perms, colouring, cut their hair. She was onto a winner. Lots of people are housebound - or don’t like sitting in a shop window with
people watching them all day. She was busy. She worked hard. Evenings, weekends. Ambitious. It was probably her money that paid for their house. They don’t come cheap you know. This is a good road. Desirable. And then she up and offed. And it wasn’t a great surprise to me.”

“How long did it take Joshua to settle down?”

“Oh. Not for ages. Still bad he was when he moved out of here. He popped over before he went. Gave me his card. Said if I needed any work doing. But he looked awful. Dishevelled. Somehow I didn’t fancy having him come round my house. He changed. He’d gone so strange. I think it was losing Denise that upset him far more than the breakup of the marriage. Used to make my heart bleed. He’d carry her clothes - her little toys - around with him in the car for ages afterwards. Maybe a year.”

Something a little like a hot needle threaded its way into Joanna’s mind, suggesting.

It seemed to burn a mere embryo of a picture. A flash. Imperfect. Incomplete

Madeline’s empty bedroom, almost devoid of toys.

“How long ago did Mrs Baldwin leave her husband?”

“Round about five years ago.”

“And his daughter? How old was she then?”

“Denise?” Gelda Holmes scratched her head. “No more than a little tot. Four maybe - five. Shy little thing. Like a little mouse creeping around the place as though she didn’t want to be noticed. Mind you Hilary had a ghastly temper. More than once I’d hear her shouting at that little tot. Ever wonder she was so shy. Wouldn’t say boo to a goose.”

“Did Denise go to school?”

“Aye - she’d started. Just a couple of months before they went.”

“Which school?”

But she already knew the answer before Gelda Holmes had opened her mouth.

“Horton.”

“How did she travel there?”

“Well - not with Hilary I can tell you. Too busy earning the money, cutting the hair, living the high life. No - it was her dad all right. Adored his little girl. Shame really. I don’t think he’s ever got the time and the cash together to go over to America and see her. Knowing Hilary she’d not have made it easy for him. America’s a big country - isn’t it? And I’ve never seen little Denise back in Leek again.”

Korpanski had been holding back, his attention drifting. Suddenly he stepped forward, startling both Joanna and Gelda so she almost lost her balance. “What did Baldwin’s daughter look like?”

“Oh funny, solemn little thing. Mind you I bet she’s changed. I mean - she’s been livin’ in America all this time. Besides - she’d be ten years old by now. Quite a big girl. I’m sure if I saw her I wouldn’t know her.”

Not in her doting father’s mind.

Like a conjuror producing a card Korpanski whipped Madeline’s photograph from his pocket and flapped it, face up, beneath Gelda Holmes’ nose. “Did she look anything like this?”

Gelda stared at the picture for a few minutes before returning the glance of the detective. “A bit,” she said dubiously. “Similar hair. Different eyes though.”

But Joanna knew Mike was barking up the wrong tree. It had not been so much the physical appearance of the child that had seduced Baldwin into mentally substituting Madeline Wiltshaw for his daughter but something else. The diffidence so obvious in the father,
the head-hanging shyness described by Gelda, that desperate wish to fade into the background. The impossibility of entering into the rumble tumble of the playground. Madeline had been a child apart. It had been that that had triggered Baldwin’s merging of the two children. Not her hair or her eyes. And that was why he had hung around the school. Maybe. Maybe not.

They left Rochester Row with a feeling of having stepped a little closer to the real Joshua Baldwin. But even so the case was feeling tired and stale, like them, jaded - and the missing child elusive. They needed something to envigorate them. To pep them up. To enliven them and bring back that energy that had been present at the beginning of the investigation. Something apart from delving into Baldwin’s sad little past.

He must have known.

The call came in at two o’clock from the front desk from an over-excited desk sergeant. For the first time in almost three weeks she could hear real anticipation in Phil Scott’s voice.

She and Korpanski legged it fast around to the desk. She was glad Scott had had the sense to put some gloves on before he had touched the object on the counter.

The woman who had brought the carrier bag in was in her forties with odd greying hair, peppering dark brown, neatly cut in layers to her chin. She was wearing a sad black work suit.

“We were walking back towards the Council offices,” she said. “We’d had some lunch in Greystones. I don’t know why,” she said. “I wouldn’t normally pick a plastic carrier bag out from a rubbish bin. Only it looked so neat. So - deliberately placed there. It was as though it
was waiting to be found. So I did. I picked it out.” She sounded surprised at her own audacity.

Mike shot a swift, appraising glance at her hands. They’d need her fingerprints.

“And then I saw it was a little girl’s clothes. All neatly folded up. Shoes at the top. Quite new ones they were as well. I just couldn’t understand it. Then I thought …” She swallowed. “I wondered if it could be hers. The little girl who went missing? I seemed to remember something about one of those grey puffer jackets. And that’s one - isn’t it?”

Joanna slipped on some gloves herself. “What exactly did you touch?”

“Only the shoes,” the woman said, vaguely offended. “But you see what I mean -?”

Joanna took the shoes from the top. The puffer jacket was neatly folded underneath, the tights beneath them.

There were procedures to follow now.

Inside this bag was evidence.

And there must now be the question of possible cross-contamination to deal with. Joanna was not going to watch her case tumble in court through poor procedure. On the other hand she did need to examine the clothes herself in case they held a clue as to the child’s whereabouts. Lying right at the bottom of these natural concerns was the depressing knowledge that wherever Madeline Wiltshaw was she had been stripped - and was almost certainly now naked.

With two witnesses and a couple of large, clean forensic bags, herself and Korpanski encased in SOCO paper suits went through the contents, mentally ticking off Carly Wiltshaw’s list.

White knickers (Carly may have not been sure but they had been white)

Pink vest. Not originally pink. Colour washed - possibly - with the red tights.

Grey gymslip.

Red sweater. Acrylic, matt washed.

Lastly she turned her attention back to the grey puffer jacket, and the black shoes - Clarke’s Tiptoes with small heel and a torn strap. And here was the only indication of force. The buckle was still attached to the strap. Threads hung where it had been pulled off.

The bag itself was as common as seagulls circling a rubbish tip. A Safeway’s plastic carrier bag. But excellent for preserving fingerprints. She breathed a swift prayer and dropped it into the forensic bag.

Next she searched the pockets and found a couple of sticky sweets in the coat and some red staining around the gymslip bib. All the clothes would be analysed under the forensic lab’s microscopes but by the vague scent of chemical around the stain at a guess it had leaked from another of Madeline’s felt-tip pens. Scarlet.

Soon everything was bagged up and labelled. Two police were dispatched back to the rubbish bin to search through the remaining contents for anything more that might lead to Madeline but Joanna felt that the clothes had been bagged up too neatly. This was it. There was nothing more to find.
Not yet.

It was the old game of hide and seek. But instead of a giggling child or a frightened little girl hiding, the abductor had substituted himself. He was playing the game now. Madeline had been shoved aside. Cruelty and ruthlessness were the new rules. The stakes were different. The clothes were meant to prove the point.

Joanna read the woman’s anxious eyes and felt queasy again. Not physically - mentally.

Madeline was naked but not feeling the cold. She felt she knew this as though she were a clairvoyant. These were Madeline’s clothes. This would soon be proved. And they were meant to mock her for not finding the child. He was hiding in the dark, throwing an object across the room and chuckling when it landed on the opposite side and she was misled.

She must be vigilant.

Could she not hide her eyes and count to ten? Look again? Find her this time?

When the abductor wanted it - unless she could outwit him.

So they must extend their search. Use heat-seeking devices, fingertips, invade the country. A child’s killer was loose. Other children would be in danger. Like the blindfold of the game, foot and mouth and the restrictions it brought would hamper their search. But not stop it. It was more important to seek. Seek properly. And ye shall find.

Aloud she said, “Let’s get a courier to take this to the lab, Korpanski.”

To the woman she said, “We’ll need all your details. And, I’m afraid, one of your hairs and your fingerprints.”

The woman looked affronted until her eyes flickered across the pathetic pile of clothes landing on the poster of the solemn-faced child.
Have you seen Madeline?

“They are hers, aren’t they?”

“We don’t know until …”