‘Have you contacted the police this evening?’

‘Yes, but the person I saw wasn’t there. They just suggested I ring tomorrow morning.’

‘Not really good enough, is it?’

‘I just don’t understand why they didn’t mention Angela.’

‘So you feel the police are being rather lax?’

‘Not exactly … I mean, we don’t know what’s going on, do we? I want to find out, that’s all. I’m puzzled. I owe it to Angela. She hasn’t got anyone else to fight for her.’

The machine clicked and beeped and Rachel Carr reached down to change the tape over. She was a tall, sharp-faced young woman with oval designer spectacles and an expensive-looking pale suede jacket.

‘I know this is a difficult question to answer, but – what do you think has happened to Angela Randall? You seem quite sure she is not the sort of person to go off alone without telling you or making contact.’

‘She’s the last person to do anything like that. The last person.’

‘Then?’

Carol looked at her own hands. The tapes hissed round and round. She was suddenly reluctant to say what she thought out loud, superstitiously fearing that to speak her worst fears might somehow make them come about.

‘In your heart, you think something has happened to her, don’t you?’

Carol Ashton swallowed. ‘Yes,’ she said. Her voice came out as a whisper. She cleared her throat. ‘I’ve no real reason for saying that, except … as time has gone on, I can’t see what innocent explanation there can be.’

‘I agree with you. And when you read about this other missing girl – Debbie Parker – what was your reaction?’

‘As I told you, I wondered why there was no mention of Angela … another Lafferton woman who has gone missing in what seem like similar circumstances.’

‘Then what did you think?’

‘That there must be a connection between the two.’

She looked at the reporter, whose expression was both grave and expectant.

Then Rachel said, ‘I don’t want to distress you, Mrs Ashton, but after all, you’re not actually a relative of Miss Randall’s so perhaps this isn’t too insensitive. Do you think it likely that by now she may be dead?’

‘It’s what I’m afraid of.’

‘Do you think this other young woman might be dead too?’

‘Dear God, I hope not. It isn’t long, is it, she might have been found by now … it’s only a couple of days, not like Angela.’

The reporter said nothing, just looked at her and waited.

‘It’s too awful to think about … two of them.’

Silence.

‘If there were a connection, it seems …’

Rachel Carr raised her eyebrows slightly but still let Carol speak.

‘It’s too awful to contemplate.’

‘Do you blame the police for the delay in finding anything out about Miss Randall?’

Did she? She wondered if she had already said too much, implied things she was not really sure about. All the same …

‘I’m angry,’ she said, ‘and I’m upset. It’s too long. And now this new case … I’m quite frightened. I think anyone might be, don’t you?’

‘You think other Lafferton women have good reason to be frightened at the moment then?’

Did she? If it came to the worst …

After a moment, Carol Ashton nodded.

Rachel Carr broke the speed limit on her way back to the newspaper office – but then, she always did. That was what her red Mazda MX5 was for. She was also extremely excited. This story had legs, she thought, and she had been waiting for something like it for weeks; she could lead with it, give it some attitude, ask awkward questions of the police, stir up what she regarded as the semi-comatose Lafferton public. She imagined her byline across the front page day after day as she spearheaded a major press campaign.

Don Pilkington, the Echo’s editor, had gone by the time she got back but the news editor, Graham Gant, was still at his desk. Rachel pulled up a chair and began to talk, not pausing for him to interrupt until she had filled him in on everything and outlined her plans.

Looking steamrollered, he reached for a copy of one of the national papers. ‘The police are a step ahead of us. The Commissioner of the Met has just admitted they all got it wrong when they took bobbies off the beat and lost public confidence in them at the same time. People need to feel safe and bobbies patrolling make them do that. They’re recruiting hard and they plan to put foot patrols back.’

‘Yeah, right, like our government plan to put more doctors in hospitals and more teachers in schools … and how many have we seen? Have you been up to Bevham General lately? Lafferton isn’t the Met, things take a long time to filter down, and in any case, the point is not what might be going to happen in the future but what is – or isn’t – happening here and now. I want us to go big on this one, Graham. Two women are missing so why have the police only told us about one? Both were known to go out alone on the Hill, neither was the sort to vanish without notice, there are no traces of them and neither has been in touch … what are the police trying to cover up – their own incompetence? Why isn’t the Hill policed properly – it’s just the sort of place where weirdos hang out, like the towpath where that flasher keeps jumping out on runners. Why haven’t the police caught him? Why –’

Graham Gant held up his hand wearily. ‘Whoa, one thing at a time, Rachel. OK, you can get on to Lafferton and ask about this other missing woman. I think that’s important. Anything else, and certainly anything in the nature of an anti-police campaign, you have to run past the editor.’

‘I’ll ring him at home.’

‘You won’t get him, he’s at a big Masonic dinner in Bevham.’

Rachel snorted.

‘Let’s get the details about this other woman, do everything you can on that, we’ll headline it tomorrow if there’s still no news on either of them – the police want us to keep this other missing girl in the public eye anyway. But wait till you can talk to Don before you start whipping up public anxiety.’

Rachel stormed across the room to her own desk in frustration. It was always the same, the big boys in league with one another, covering up for one another, scratching each other’s backs. Half the police were Freemasons, that was well known, as well as half the lawyers, bankers and big businessmen in both Lafferton and Bevham, big boys playing little boys’ games. But that didn’t matter. When it came to deceiving the public and conspiracies of silence, it bloody well did.

Rachel sat at her desk staring into space for a moment, picturing the campaign she fully intended to get permission to run, one way or another – and she was good at wheedling Don – and then taking her fantasy one step further to the point where her work on the Echo was noticed in Fleet Street and a call came in for her to go and see the editor of the Daily Mail … Rachel Carr did not intend to remain in the backwaters of Lafferton for long.

She picked up the phone and put in a call to the police station, but by now it was nearly ten, no one was in CID, and the duty sergeant could only give her the party line on the missing girl, said there was no recent news and would not comment on any other missing persons.

‘I suggest you ring back in the morning.’

‘And speak to?’

‘DS Graffham.’

‘What time does he wander in?’

‘She. DS Freya Graffham. Any time after nine. If she isn’t available, you could ask to speak to DC Coates. Sorry I can’t be of more help to you tonight, madam.’

Rachel slammed the receiver down. She didn’t relish having to wait until the morning to get permission from the editor, then speak to some poxy woman detective, who would probably give her the stone-wall treatment or make her hang about until there was another press briefing.

An hour later, she had written what she thought was a pretty cutting-edge piece. The story, and her angle on it, were too high-profile to be confined to the Lafferton Echo and, after all, she had tried to speak to the editor, had she not? It was hardly her fault if he was out at a Masonic dinner. She called up her address book and clicked on an entry. [email protected] /* */ [email protected] /* */

I am attaching a piece on the news which broke today on the missing Lafferton woman. I have key info which has not been released. Story has implications of interest for the wider readership of the Bevham Post. I have been unable to contact my own editor but feel the news story is too urgent to leave overnight.

Good wishes,

Rachel Carr

[email protected] /* */

She hesitated for a split second before clicking ‘Send’ and watching the message and its attachment fly off her screen.

Within five minutes, she was heading the Mazda for Hare End and the barn conversion she shared with her lover, county rugby captain Jon Blixen.

Twenty-Seven

DCI Simon Serrailler was not given to shouting. He preferred to make his anger known by speaking softly and icily.

‘Freya, come in here please. Bring Nathan with you.’

The knock came in twenty seconds.

‘Come in.’ He pointed to the newspaper on his desk.

‘I take it you will have seen this morning’s Post?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘Gawd knows where it came from, guv, only not out of here, I can tell you.’

‘Freya?’

‘Categorically not, sir.’

‘So how does this reporter – Rachel Carr – know about the other missing woman, how has she found out her name, her address, where she works? Someone must have talked to her.’

‘No one in the station. To start with, not many people here even know about Angela Randall, she was just another name in the missing persons file. Nathan and I have been the only ones looking into the case in detail and neither of us briefed this reporter.’ There was a sliver of ice in Freya’s own voice.

‘OK, I take your word for it. But these are exactly the sort of headlines I wanted to avoid … look at some of these provocative questions – “Can Lafferton women now feel safe in their own town?” … “Have the Lafferton police failed to keep those enjoying the town’s prime open space, the Hill, safe from a serial killer?” Serial killer, for God’s sake, there isn’t even a body. Right, we’d better anticipate them. I want a press briefing called for twelve noon. I want local radio, regional television, the news agencies, the lot – and get on to it now before they get on to us. I’ve put the search team out on to the Hill again but they’ll have finished by this afternoon. Any joy at Starly?’

‘What? With Dava the Diva! Gawd, what a plonker.’

‘I doubt if he knows anything about Debbie Parker’s disappearance,’ Freya said. ‘She had two appointments with him and he gave us all the New Age psychobabble, but I didn’t get the impression he had anything to hide.’

‘All the same, we’ll keep him in the frame for the time being. Apart from anything else, Debbie seems to have made some new friends up at Starly and her flatmate might not have been told everything about them. It’s a better lead than any other as to where she might have gone.’

‘With the raggle-taggle gypsies, O. I used to fancy being a gypsy when I was a kid –’

‘Thank you, Nathan, save the childhood reminiscences and get on the phone. I want this press briefing to be and to look orderly, organised and hyper-professional. We’re in charge, we’re in control and we have to get that message across. Public confidence is going to take a knock from this rubbish. Oh, and if national press get wind and call up, put them on to me. Say nothing.’

‘Sir.’

Freya looked at Serrailler as she turned away, to see if he would catch her eye with some flicker of intimacy. He did not. She hesitated for a second, letting Nathan go first out of the door.

The telephone rang.

‘Serrailler. Good morning, sir. I have read it, yes.’

Freya fled.

More press came into the conference room for the noon briefing than had attended for a long time. They sensed that a major story might be about to break and they smelled blood. DCI Serrailler walked smartly into the room as the clock struck and took the rostrum with Freya, Nathan and Inspector Black, who was in charge of searching the Hill.

‘Good morning, ladies and gentleman. Thank you all for coming. As you know, an appeal was made to the public yesterday for any information about a local woman, Debbie Parker, who was last seen on the evening of the 31st and who may have left her home early the next morning. She has not been seen or heard from since, she left no message, she has not been in touch with her family or friends and so far as we know she has no reason to go missing of her own accord. She did not take any belongings with her apart from her house keys. Her handbag and all other personal possessions and outdoor clothes were left in her flat.

‘We are becoming increasingly concerned for Debbie Parker’s safety and as well as the broadcast public appeal for information, have had search teams out on the Hill and its surrounding area, where it is thought she may have been out walking.

‘As I am sure you are aware, people go missing for many reasons; they may have a history of depression or other mental health problems, they may have domestic, family or monetary problems. They usually return of their own accord. We always take a missing person report very seriously, but in some cases we have more reason for concern and this is true of the young woman, Debbie Parker.

‘Another Lafferton woman, Angela Randall of 4 Barn Close, was reported missing by her employer at the Four Ways Nursing Home on 18 December last year, but although we took full reports and made an investigation at the time, we had no reason to see Miss Randall’s disappearance as suspicious. However, in the light of the disappearance of Debbie Parker, we are looking at that of Angela Randall again as there are certain links between the two.

‘We have had calls from the public as a result of our broadcast appeal and we are following up a number of leads but so far we have no definite information which may lead us to her. We will be making a similar appeal to the public about the disappearance of Angela Randall. We’ll naturally keep you all closely informed of developments. Meanwhile, I would be grateful if the press would refrain from wild and lurid speculation, which is not only unhelpful, but distressing for the families and friends of the missing women and causes general public alarm.’