That'll Be the Day (2007) (45 page)

‘She might just be visiting someone.’

Belle Garside said, ‘She could’ve done a runner, metaphorically speaking. I know she wasn’t getting on with her ex and joked about poisoning his trifle this Christmas. You might be fond of your father, Lynda, but Betty found it less easy to deal with him.’

‘Don’t I know it, but where would she run to? Champion Street is her home and she has no relatives or other family around, not that I know of.’

‘Happen you don’t know everything, girl. Children don’t.’

Terry visited each stall and small shop, asking everyone to keep an eye out for her, while Lynda knocked on every door. They pointed out that Lynda was afraid she might have fallen somewhere, since she was still unsteady on her feet.

On hearing the news, Big Molly at once put on her hat and coat. ‘Right, I’m coming with you, lass. We have to find the poor cow, she’s me best mate. Come on, our Ossie, wake up and get yoursel’ out of that chair, there’s work to be done. I know that’s an alien concept to you but for once hearken to what I say to thee, lad. You and me is going hunting for our pal Betty.’

And for once Ossie put on his boots and his raincoat, and his flat cap, and willingly followed his wife on a trek that was to last for much of the rest of that day. His dog naturally must come too, perhaps in the hope that he might sniff her out.

All Betty’s friends, the people who were her regular customers: Joyce from the hairdressing salon, Patsy and the Higginson sisters, Amy George, Dena Dobson and the rest, even Winnie Holmes, were equally devastated to hear that Betty was missing.

‘Nay, don’t let’s panic,’ Winnie kept saying, showing her usual stout common sense. ‘She could fall in a midden could our Betty and come out smelling of roses.’

Chris George and Barry Holmes collected together a deputation of men and volunteered to search under the railway arches and down by the canal basin. Winnie couldn’t help but dryly remark upon this. ‘Trust the chaps to offer themselves up for that duty. See you don’t get up to any shenanigans with that Maureen, Barry Holmes, or I’ll have your guts for garters. If she offers you a cup of tea, say no, or you might get more than a custard cream with your Tetley’s.’

Barry simply grinned and then flustered Winnie by kissing her on the cheek right in front of everyone. ‘Why would I want any other woman when I’ve got you to come home to every night, with or without a custard cream?’

‘I wish Mam would come home,’ Lynda groaned. ‘I really don’t understand where she can have got to, or how she comes to be missing at all. I’ve a bad feeling about this, real bad.’

‘Isn’t Ewan missing an’ all?’ Barry asked.

Lynda tossed her head, making her curls dance in a crackling fury. ‘I don’t give a monkey’s about him, it’s Mam what matters. She’s the one on crutches, the one who’s in trouble. I just know it.’

Lynda spotted Constable Nuttall as she was on her way back to the house later that same day. She was in a hurry, wanting to check if Betty had gone quietly home when no one was looking but she paused to wait for him, hoping the policeman might have heard something.
 

Where could she be? Her mother couldn’t simply vanish off the face of the earth. It was all very worrying.

Lynda recalled that, worryingly enough, Jake’s bed hadn’t even looked as if it’d been slept in when she’d left that morning. She should have suspected something was wrong the minute she’d set eyes on him. He’d turned into such a dandy recently Lynda realised that she should also have been suspicious to see him looking so rough.

Perhaps he’d been out and about on Ewan’s nefarious business last night although she hadn’t even knocked on her father’s door to check if he was still in bed. But then she never did. Lynda preferred to steer well clear of Ewan’s room. She was wondering how to knock some sense into her young brother’s head when the policeman approached.

‘Hello love, can we go inside for a minute? I wanted a word.’

Lynda stared at Constable Nuttall, a hollow ache suddenly swelling and expanding inside, threatening to overwhelm her with fresh pain. ‘Oh no, it’s me mam, isn’t it? Where is she? Have you found her? Has she had an accident?’

‘I think we’d best go inside, if you don’t mind.’

Only when Lynda had finally agreed to go inside the house and sit down, did Constable Nuttall finally speak. ‘The truth is, Lynda love, we didn’t even know your mam was missing, but we’re a bit concerned because we’ve found her wheelchair.’

‘What?’

‘Now I know she’s getting back on her feet again, doing them exercises and practising little walks and so on. I’ve seen her once or twice out and about but finding the chair without her in it doesn’t seem quite right, does it?’

‘Oh God! Where did you find it?’

Constable Nuttall paused to clear his throat before he answered with painstaking slowness. ‘I’m sorry to say it was down by the canal basin. We’re arranging to have it dragged, but don’t upset yourself over that, Lynda love, it’s only a matter of form. I’m quite sure your mam wouldn’t be so daft as to fall in.’

The thought that came unbidden into Lynda’s terrified mind was: No, but somebody might have pushed her.

Chapter Forty-Five

Lynda told Constable Nuttall all about how Ewan had done for poor Queenie in retaliation for her continuing to see Terry when he’d told her not to. ‘It’s all about power. He just likes to lord it over us.’

Her hazel eyes were filled with fear but the policeman made no comment. He simply pressed his lips together in thoughtful disapproval and went on listening, clearly used to hearing tales of family squabbles.

‘Fathers can be a bit over-protective when it comes to their daughters. That’s something which will seem a bit odd to you, I expect, not being used to having a father around when you were growing up, but I’m sure I would be just the same with mine, were I fortunate enough to have a family. Only, I will accept that drowning the cat is going a bit far.’

Lynda said, ‘So are you prepared to start listening to me at last?’

Constable Nuttall only shook his head in resignation. ‘That’s ex-cons for you. Different set of morals altogether.’ Then he went on to tell her not to worry, that soon she’d be married with babies of her own and come to understand how you have to watch them every minute of the time.

‘But I’m not a baby, I’m a grown woman, and I can please myself who I go out with. Terry’s a lovely man.’

‘I’m sure he is, Lynda love, but I expect your father’s only concerned about the age difference between you so’s you don’t get hurt, or else for Terry’s reputation for whizzing about on that motor bike of his. Dangerous vehicles they are.’

Abandoning hope of the policeman ever understanding her point of view, Lynda did at least succeed in making him promise that the police would carry on searching the docks and waterfront as well as the canal itself, just in case Betty had wandered too far in her grief and fallen somewhere.

But he wasn’t optimistic. Neither was Lynda. She was deeply afraid something terrible had happened to her mam.

If Ewan had done something to hurt her then she mustn’t let the trembling fear she felt inside overwhelm her. Lynda knew she couldn’t afford to fall into a heap, but neither could she convince the policeman that her mother might have been done in by her own ex-husband, just like the flaming cat. She had no proof, although everyone was aware that the pair were at logger-heads. Somehow she had to make him understand what kind of man Ewan Hemley was.

That’s when the solution came to her.

‘Come with me, Constable, there’s something I want to show you, something which should be brought to your attention.’
 

Lynda led the curious policeman up the stairs to Ewan’s room and flinging open the door stood back to allow him to enter. ‘There you are, what do you think of that?’

Constable Nuttall stepped into the room and looked about him, clearly somewhat perplexed. Lynda sighed with satisfaction. There, she’d proved her point at last and got her own back for all Ewan’s nasty violent outbursts. She’d shopped him to the coppers just as her mam had done all those years ago.

The constable said, ‘Very nice, Lynda love. Exactly the kind of tidy bedroom I’d expect to see in an ex-con. Few possessions and all neatly aligned.’

‘Tidy, what are you talking about? What about all those boxes?’ Lynda stepped into the room after him and gasped. It was empty, not a box in sight. All swept out and neat as a new pin. She ran to her brother’s room, flung open the wardrobe doors, pulled out every drawer but that too was clean. Every single box, every item of stolen goods had vanished. Not even a stray sock out of place.
 

Lynda was horrified. ‘They must have moved the stuff, perhaps sold it on already.’

‘What stuff? You’re not making any sense, Lynda love.’

She glared at the policeman as if this were all his fault, and then all the energy drained out of her and she felt weak, and sick. Ewan had won again. He’d anticipated that she would tell on him following his drowning of the cat, so he’d kept Jake up all night moving the stuff out.

Lynda took a shaky breath. ‘You have to believe me but Ewan Hemley, my father, is acting as a . . . what do you call it . . . a fence for stolen goods. And he’s got our Jake involved . . .’

It instantly flashed into Lynda’s mind that she should be careful not to get her brother into too much trouble, so modified her explanation a little. ‘Only fetching and carrying, mind, but you know how thick he is, he’ll do anything for an easy life. We all have to toe the line where Ewan Hemley is concerned. But can you do something to stop him? Can you find Ewan and arrest him?’

‘Not without proof, Lynda love. We can keep an eye on him, certainly, and I’m quite prepared to believe what you say but there’s nothing I can do without proof. Does he have a lock-up that he might have moved the gear to?’

Lynda put her hands to her mouth in a gesture of despair and shook her head. She was so consumed by anger she could hardly speak. Ewan Hemley, the father she’d always dreamed about and longed for had walked into their lives and destroyed them. She’d never forgive him if he hurt her mam. Never! Lynda fought to regain control, fists clenched, eyes dry and hot.

‘I don’t know, do I? Jake might know. I could go and find him and ask him. He’s working at Smithfield market this morning.’

‘Right, you go and see what you can find out there. We’ll keep searching for your mam. And don’t fret, I’m sure she’ll turn up any minute. She’ll come hobbling down the street large as life and twice as lively.’

‘I hope you’re right. And you’ll keep a look-out for Ewan too?’ Lynda warned. ‘He’s up to something, I know he is.’

Sadly a long day of searching ended in failure. No one had seen a sign of Betty Hemley anywhere since yesterday morning when she was selling flowers on her stall as usual, and Lynda hadn’t the first idea where to look next.

Jake knew nothing about any lock-up, nor had he seen his father that morning.

Lynda groaned. ‘Well, where is he? They can’t both be missing. Have they murdered each other, do you reckon?’

Her brother looked horrified. ‘Don’t even joke about such things, sis, it’s not funny.’

Lynda knew he was right. Something was wrong, badly wrong, and she couldn’t begin to think what it might be. ‘So tell me what you did with all that stuff last night? And don’t try to deny you were involved, I can tell when you’re lying. Where did you stash it?’

Jake fidgeted, shifting his feet about in their huge crepe-soled shoes, then lit himself a cigarette, drew on it hard and began to cough.

‘When did you take up smoking?’

‘I were given a few packets last night for a job well done. So what? Everybody smokes these days.’

‘And if everybody set fire to themselves would you do that as well? Oh, never mind, answer the question. Where did you take the stolen gear?’

Jake sulked, studiously not meeting his sister’s eye. ‘We loaded it on board an Irish ship, if you want to know. I don’t know which one, what it was called or anything. It were dark and I just did the job and cut out, you know?’

‘I do wish you’d cut out that daft lingo. Which dock, which wharf?’

But no matter how closely she interrogated him, Lynda got no decent answers. All she got were excuses, that he was only following orders. The truth was that he hadn’t paid proper attention, but then when did he ever? He’d stacked everything in a van that Ewan had borrowed and drove till he was told to stop then loaded all the boxes on board ship. ‘That’s it. End of story. He gave me a chunk of bread and I was out of there.’

‘A chunk of bread? What were you doing eating bread on the docks in the middle of the night?’

‘Bread. Money. Do you dig me?’

‘Actually, I reckon I should have dug a hole big enough for you an’ all when we buried our Queenie.’ Seeing his shocked face she patted her brother’s cheek. ‘I’m only joking.’

‘Look, I didn’t have no choice. It was a real front burner, hot, you know, unreal, so I didn’t hang around to eyeball what was going on around me. I cut loose before I got a knuckle sandwich from anyone. There were some real bruisers on that boat. Didn’t much care for any of them.’