In Bitter Chill (6 page)

‘Yes, I think she was. Her sense of outrage was exacerbated by the fact that this woman – the woman he was leaving her for – had a ready-made family, two small boys, and Peter Jenkins had apparently been perfectly willing to swap his own family for another. There was never going to be any drawn-out custody battle because Peter Jenkins simply no longer wished to see his daughter.’

‘Thank God those days are over at least.’

Clive snorted into his wine. ‘It’s less common now, admittedly, but once upon a time that sort of thing was the norm. You simply left your children behind.’

‘But you said you were sorting out the financial arrangements.’

‘Just to confirm that Yvonne Jenkins would have sole custody and that Peter Jenkins would be providing maintenance.’

And it had all been checked out, according to Llewellyn. Peter Jenkins had been one of the earliest people interviewed and he had had a perfect alibi. A lecturer at the local tech, he had been seen in the college building at eight thirty a.m. around the time that Sophie and Rachel had been abducted. For the rest of the morning, he had been lecturing to his students. And Yvonne Jenkins had never learned to drive and couldn’t have been the woman, even in disguise from her own child.

‘So you met Yvonne Jenkins and agreed to represent her in her divorce. What were your initial thoughts of her?’

‘She was very attractive. Short dyed blonde hair, good figure. I remember thinking that this divorce wouldn’t be an absolute disaster for her. That she would soon find someone else.’

‘Did you think that there was someone else at the time?’

‘Actually, no. She seemed genuinely upset by the situation, but determined to sort out her own financial and domestic position.’

‘And how long was this before Sophie was abducted?’

‘Eight months. As I said, we were finalising the custody arrangements when Sophie went missing. I had, in effect, finished with her as a client.’

‘What about the rest of your firm? She presumably made a will?’

‘I don’t think so, no. I would almost certainly have advised her to make a will at the time of her divorce, but if she did make one it wasn’t with me – perhaps she went to Daniel Weiss. I never saw her again after her daughter was abducted. I can remember the files lay open for a while, because we didn’t know what to do with them. There was no longer any need to make any financial arrangements for Sophie and he had already signed over the house to Yvonne Jenkins as part of the financial settlement.’

‘The whole house?’

‘Yes, I know it was quite unusual. What usually happened was that the woman kept the house to bring up the children in, and then when they reached eighteen it would be sold and the proceeds divided up.’

‘But that hadn’t been the arrangement?’

‘No. It was my first glimpse of the person behind the mask that Yvonne Jenkins presented to the world. She was adamant that she wanted to keep the house, I think it was a bungalow, and that it was Peter Jenkins’s duty to give it to her.’

‘Presumably he thought differently?’

‘Initially yes, but I think he wanted to marry his new partner and losing half the house was to be the quid pro quo.’

‘And Sophie. It was definitely his decision to cut all ties with her?’

‘According to Mrs Jenkins, yes. And he certainly never made any alternative requests through his solicitor.’

Sadler thought back to Connie’s description of the bungalow. She had stayed in the same house all this time. But even before Sophie had been abducted, her mother had not wanted to leave. Perhaps this seemingly minor detail was a crack widening into something large, something everyone else had missed. Sadler shook his head and brought his thoughts around to the present and back to Clive Mottram sitting across the room from him.

‘OK, so I’ve had your professional opinion. Now tell me about the events in January. You knew Yvonne Jenkins professionally. What were your thoughts when you heard about the missing girls?’

‘Well, the first interesting thing I remember hearing was that there had been no news about the abduction until after Rachel Jones had been discovered. The two girls were supposed to turn up for school and when neither of them arrived it had just been assumed by the school that they were both off sick.’

‘No one called home?’

‘I don’t think that anyone was unduly worried about two friends being off sick. Things were much more relaxed then.’

‘And then Rachel Jones was found in a distressed state about a quarter of a mile away from the school.’ Sadler poured the rest of the bottle into their glasses.

‘It was about midday. Rachel Jones was found, as you say, stumbling around in a dazed state off the Bampton Road. I think that there was something about her missing her shoes and socks, but I can’t really remember now.’

‘I’ll need to check the file – it might be important. And she could remember nothing about her abduction?’

Clive Mottram looked at Sadler with keen eyes. ‘We’re on your territory now, Francis. I remember the papers saying that she had been chloroformed, or something similar. She could remember getting into a car with a female driver, with Sophie, and the next thing she remembered was being in Truscott Woods. And no Sophie.’

The house now felt pleasantly warm. Rachel sat cross-legged on the floor with her back to the hot radiator and looked at her notebook. The writing had become slightly blurred after the sleet of the afternoon and the pages had small ridges in them from the damp. She had files of all the material anyway, in case of accident, and they were sitting in her desk drawer, but she preferred to work from the notebook. There was a reassuring solidity about handwriting, something tangible that computer files couldn’t give her.

She had often returned to these notebooks over the course of her career. She found other people’s family history absorbing but, early on, she’d constructed her own chart, fascinated by the maternal line that was often ignored by traditional history. Her grandmother Nancy had initially been dismissive about her work.

‘What do you want to be getting involved in all that for?’ she’d grumbled, but as Rachel went further and further back into the past, to the farming family in rural Wales, Nancy’s interest had grown and she even asked questions about long-forgotten ancestors.

‘You’re just like my mother,’ she kept repeating. ‘Only interested in the women of the family.’ But when Rachel had questioned her further about this, Nancy refused to say anything else. Suddenly tired, Rachel gently shut the notebook and placed it on top of the radiator so that the pages could dry out completely.

The doorbell of her cottage buzzed and, surprised, Rachel got up to answer it, glancing at the clock. As soon as she opened her door, she realised her mistake. Journalists hadn’t really changed in the last thirty-odd years. The old ones had usually been men and usually very persistent. Now they were both sexes but still with that keen-eyed hunger. This one was a thin-faced woman with a long nose. Immaculately dressed, with a cherry-red trench coat that Rachel coveted immediately.

‘Can I have a word, Ms Jones?’

Rachel went to shut the door and the woman made the mistake of putting her foot out. An old trick. And one the woman must have regretted when she saw the look of fury in Rachel’s eyes. She hurriedly withdrew her suede-clad foot and Rachel slammed the door shut and leaned back against it. Through the closed door she could hear the woman shouting at her. A sum of money was mentioned, more that she had earned last year.

‘Did you know they’re reopening your case? How do you feel about that, Ms Jones?’

Rachel felt her heart pause. Had she heard that correctly? Shaking, she walked over to the phone and pulled out the card Superintendent Llewellyn had given to her yesterday outside the hotel. With trembling hands she dialled the number.

‘Llewellyn here.’ She remembered the younger him now. When he had spoken to her on the steps of the Wilton Hotel, her shock at the news of Mrs Jenkins’s death hadn’t stopped her noticing his familiarity with her but she had been too stunned to comment on it. Now she could marry up the name on the card with her memory of the young policeman in the interview room with his shock of ginger hair carefully brushed to one side. He had been kind, she remembered that. And now he was a superintendent, high up in the echelons of the police force.

‘It’s Rachel. Rachel Jones. They’re here already.’

‘Who? Who’s there?’ The voice was sharp, concerned.

‘The press. A journalist’s just knocked on my door. Trying to get in.’ She sounded calm to her own ears and it cost her an effort.

There was a sigh down the line. ‘I’m sorry, Rachel. It doesn’t take them long to pick up on a story.’

‘But they said that you’re reopening the case. Is that true? Are you?’

There was a silence down the line. ‘I’m getting a team together to look over the case again. It’s been a while since there was a review. Look, Rachel . . .’

‘But I don’t want it reopened. I don’t want people looking at me all over again. I—’

‘It’s time the case was looked at again, especially in the light of Yvonne Jenkins’s death. It’s important to do these things, however painful. I’m sorry.’

He sounded firm but also genuinely sorry.

‘Will they want to speak to me?’

‘They’re going to have to, Rachel. I can send—’

‘I don’t want a policewoman. I’d prefer a man.’

Again, silence.

‘And what should I do about all those journalists outside the door?’

‘
Draw all the curtains and put lights on in a couple of rooms so they can’t work out where you are in the house. Don’t answer the telephone or mobile unless you recognise the number. Add my mobile to your contacts so I can get hold of you. And sit tight for tonight. I’ll send a patrol car past your house a few times to check all is OK. And I’ll be back in touch tomorrow morning. And Rachel . . .’

‘Yes?’ She couldn’t conceal the tremor any longer.

‘Try and get some sleep.’

As usual, Connie woke at five and listened to the birds chatter as they anticipated the cheerless dawn. She switched on her bedside lamp and contemplated her newly painted ceiling. The first thing she had done once her probationary period at Bampton had been concluded was to look for another flat to replace the dank bolt hole taken in haste when she arrived in the town from nearby Matlock. Unfortunately, despite the recession, house prices were still high, people attracted to the market town with its views of the Derbyshire Peaks. The landscape was stunning whatever the weather, from the slate grey hues of the wintry hills overhung with heavy black clouds to the verdant green of a summer’s day. It was a landscape to catch your breath and wonder. So to buy anything had been out of reach of her limited budget. However, instead of rushing to find a replacement for her scruffy apartment, she had taken her time over three months and had eventually found this place.

What had surprised her was that it overlooked the town’s canal. In her old flat, she had hated the fact that the stagnant water ran across the bottom of the garden. She refused to venture near it, but it preyed on her mind, its deep still waters rocking unseen at night. She had nearly not viewed her present flat. Once she saw from the agent’s particulars that it overlooked the canal she’d passed it over. But a month later she was on her way to investigate a burglary in the area and had realised that the ‘To Let’ sign was the same apartment she’d rejected. It hadn’t been an auspicious start. The burglary had taken place in the same block, although the owner cheerfully admitted to having left a window open on the ground floor. After taking the man’s statement she’d wandered up the stairs of the old wharf building and been surprised by the charm of the views. Here the canal was open, with a small life force moving the water along. The only possible blot on an otherwise perfect arrangement was that she had heard that Sadler’s cottage lay about five hundred metres along the same stretch of canal. Fortunately, they had different access roads and Connie was yet to stumble across him outside work.

In Sadler, Connie sensed a tacit approval of her attempts to climb the ranks of the force. He had, after all, supported her application to move from uniform into CID, although the interview had been gruelling enough. Perhaps that was the where her instinctive reserve towards her boss came from. When she had sat in front of the interview panel, Sadler had asked her the one question that she had been dreading. ‘Why do you want to become a detective?’ Of course she’d had a few stock answers ready but one look at his cool blue eyes had frozen the platitudes on her lips. So she’d taken a deep breath and gone for it.

‘Derbyshire CID, from what I can see, is full of southern university graduates looking for nice place to bring up their children. I’d like someone whose family has worked in this place for generations to make their mark.’

She later realised her mistake. Sadler, too, was a local, although the hard edge of the north Derbyshire vowels could only just be heard. But he’d given her the job despite, or perhaps because of, her answer. Her problem was that she had never been able to work out which one it was. He was also physically attractive. Not like Palmer’s compact physicality. Sadler was tall and remote. But she’d seen other women at the station looking at him. She had too much sense to explore what his attractiveness might mean to her, relationships between colleagues were generally discouraged, but, within her, she was drawn to his distant energy.

She’d been warned by Llewellyn not to look at any press coverage of the old case. And if that’s what they had been instructed to do then Sadler would be watching his team to ensure that they bided by the rules. Which was all very well if you’d worked on the investigation first time round but how exactly was she to find out any information? Sadler had scheduled a meeting for that morning but she could hardly turn up and expect to sit and not speak. She bet that at this very moment Palmer was also awake and brushing up on the case, despite his impending nuptials, and she had no intention of being left behind.

She sent him a text.
Are you awake?

The phone beeped a reply.
Sod off Connie. It’s 5 a.m.

Still in bed, she opened up her laptop and started to search under the names of Yvonne and Sophie Jenkins. It was pointless. She had 257,389 results, most of which when she clicked on them were the same reports rehashed in different ways. She opened a few of the links, skim read the contents and then shut them down again. She tried next the name of Rachel Jones and Bampton. Same result, although the first hit was the website for a Rachel Jones, a family historian based in Bampton. It probably wasn’t the same person. Jones was a common surname, although it couldn’t be helpful having a name like that with this case going on.

Connie opened up the site and clicked the ‘About’ tab. There was a photo at the top of the page showing an attractive plump woman in her early forties with a short brown bob that she had tucked behind her ears. She was smiling at the camera and holding a cup of tea in her hands. The tea was presumably to reassure potential customers. She was easily identifiable as an updated version of the schoolgirl whose picture had dominated the news in 1978.

A quick look around the site revealed that, for a fee, Rachel could prepare a family tree for you. Unusually for an Internet site, the fee structure that she charged was on the website – starting with a basic family tree and then an hourly rate. Connie, who had no interest in her ancestors, wondered who would use a genealogist. People with unusual family histories, perhaps, or with an interesting surname.

Next to the ‘About’ tab was another named ‘My Ancestry’. Connie clicked on the button and was taken to an extensive family tree. She looked for the oldest name – someone born in 1780. Connie quickly scanned the chart and then, noticing something, looked again. There wasn’t a single man’s name on the tree. That was a strange omission. Even Connie’s limited knowledge recognised that men were the usual focus of family research. But the chart in front of her held not a single male ancestor. Connie flicked back to the photo and looked again at the photograph. An ordinary woman in her early forties with an extraordinary past and, looking at her family history chart, a skewed slant on the world. Well, that was all right by her. Not everybody was obsessed with the male line. She wasn’t, for a start. That was something in Rachel’s favour.

Four hours later, the three of them were in Sadler’s small office and Connie felt the familiar thrill of satisfaction. The case might be a dead duck as far as Sadler was concerned but at least they had an interesting investigation to work on together.

‘So, Connie,’ said Sadler. ‘Where did you start last night?’

‘This morning,’ muttered Palmer.

Connie flushed and she looked to see if he was smirking at her. He had his eyes down and looked subdued.

‘I did a search on the Internet to see if I could find anything beyond the press stories. And I came across Rachel Jones’s website. She apparently works as a family historian. You know – family trees and all that. She researches people’s history for them. A genealogist. Her website was very well done. Very professional.’

Sadler picked up his pen. ‘That’s what she’s doing now? She was quite professional looking when I saw her outside the hotel, despite the cold and obvious shock she’d had.’

‘What’s interesting is that she’s still recognisable as the schoolgirl who disappeared in 1978. She’s even got a similar hairstyle. And she’s made no effort to hide her identity, same name and everything.’

‘She didn’t have anything to be ashamed of, though, did she?’ pointed out Palmer, his hectoring tone out of place in the small office.

‘Any significance that she’s a family historian in your opinion?’ Sadler asked her.

‘Almost certainly not. And that was as far as I got. There’s probably plenty online rehashing the old news. Most of it a load of rubbish. I avoided those sites.’ She shot a sideways glance at Palmer, who, instead of meeting it with a conspiratorial gaze of his own, kept his eyes to the floor.

‘And you, Palmer?’ said Sadler.

Palmer rubbed his hand over his forehead. ‘Nothing, sir. You said not to look at anything in advance so I didn’t bother.’ He shot Connie a reproachful glance. She looked at him in surprise. Unlike him to miss a trick like that. Now she looked at him more closely she could see he looked a bit pale. It must be all the wedding plans. She’d seen him furtively looking at his mobile while he was sitting at his desk, tapping a text message, presumably to his fiancée, Joanne. It was unlike him not to be totally focused on an investigation. It was both an opportunity and an irritant for her. A chance to shine in Sadler’s eyes, maybe. But she could feel a niggle of abandonment in Palmer’s lack of focus. She would have to corner him later and have it out with him.

Sadler turned in his seat towards them both. ‘If two girls were abducted today and one later turned up alive and apparently unhurt, who would be the first suspect?’

‘The father,’ said Connie. ‘Or other close relative – uncle, cousin, friend.’

‘Of which girl?’ asked Palmer.

Sadler was looking at him with approval, noticed Connie.
So he
’s 
still with us despite his truculence
, she thought quickly.

‘I would say possibly of the girl who was unharmed – Rachel Jones. It’s our first major stumbling block. Why did she survive? This suggests an element of malevolence towards Sophie Jenkins, or possibly protection of Rachel Jones.’

‘Exactly,’ said Sadler. ‘This is going to be our first line of enquiry. Why did one girl come back? Let’s leave that there for the moment, but I want you to keep it in mind all though this investigation.’

‘She escaped,’ pointed out Connie.

‘Agreed, she managed to get out of the car. But according to Rachel, Sophie was already missing from the vehicle.’

Palmer was frowning. ‘Going back to the male relatives, Rachel Jones’s father was dead. He died before she was born. Sophie’s father was estranged from the family.’

‘Yes, but as far as I can tell no one even looked at any other male relatives in Rachel’s life. There must have been uncles, grandfathers and so on.’

I wouldn’t count on it
, thought Connie, thinking of the family tree. ‘I thought we weren’t going to reopen old lines of enquiry. We were going to assume that the initial investigation had proceeded correctly.’

Sadler was looking at her with his cold blue eyes but he smiled at her. ‘I may have made a mistake saying that up front. What I wanted to say was that the team in 1978 weren’t thick. But they may have been fallible. And they missed that. So that’s our first line of enquiry.’

The office fell silent. Connie could see that there was something on Sadler’s mind. She took a deep breath.

‘I’m wondering what all this has got to do with Yvonne Jenkins’s suicide.’ She had hit the spot, she could tell, and it wasn’t the first time she had instinctively known what was troubling Sadler. ‘I think we should also try and find out why Yvonne killed herself now. At this precise moment in time.’

Sadler looked irritated that she had articulated what he was thinking. He clearly had reservations about the investigation that, for the moment, he was keeping to himself. ‘You think there’s a specific reason why she chose to commit suicide in the Wilton Hotel this week? A trigger more than the events of more than thirty years ago?’

Connie nodded and looked at Palmer. He shrugged and looked at the floor. She looked back to Sadler for help. ‘When are we interviewing Rachel Jones? She might be able to give us some pointers.’

Palmer coughed. ‘According to Rachel’s statement, although she was confused at the time she was found, she was adamant that her abductor had been a woman. She also gave quite a good description of the woman. Female, mid-to-late twenties. Long dark hair and sunglasses.’

‘Sunglasses in January. In Derbyshire,’ said Connie. ‘That would have got my suspicions going straight away.’

Now Palmer smirked and Connie was surprised at how glad she was that he was back to his old self. She definitely needed to speak to him later.

‘That’s the other aspect of this case that is particularly puzzling. If Rachel is right, and the detectives working the original investigation believed her, then we need to start looking at motives as to why a woman would kidnap two young girls. I want your minds kept open on this one. No mindless assumptions about childless women and men dressed in drag. These aren’t usually the perpetrators of child abductions. There’s something else that went on here and we need to find it out.’

Sadler nodded at Connie. ‘I think this is one for you.’

She looked at her boss in surprise. ‘Why me in particular?’

‘Because I need your instinct on this. You’re a woman and in this instance it’s going to give you an advantage. Think of scenarios why a woman might abduct not one child but two, and start eliminating those that sound either ridiculous or unfeasible. But consider them anyway. Something must have been missed at the time and we may be able to find it now.’

Connie made a face. ‘Do you think we’re assuming too much by the fact that Rachel wasn’t sexually assaulted? We’ve extrapolated this to conclude that there was no sexual motive whatsoever. For all we know, there may have been a sexual intent directed at Sophie but not Rachel.’

Palmer wrinkled his nose. ‘That doesn’t sound right.’

There was a knock on the door and Connie swivelled round in her seat. Llewellyn was standing in the doorway, his tall frame filling the space. ‘I had a call from Rachel Jones late last night. The press are pestering her already. She’s asked for some police presence, which I’m going to give her. Station a car outside her house for today, which should help for a start. And maybe tomorrow. After that, I’m not sure. I’m going have to juggle some resources to do that much.’

‘We were just discussing when to re-interview Rachel in relation to the 1978 case.’

‘Ahh’. Llewellyn looked at his feet. ‘She’s not happy about being spoken to again but I think I managed to persuade her of the necessity of doing so. But she specifically requested that it wasn’t a woman.’