It was three days after her visit to flooded Brackendale before Stella could bring herself to write to Pa and tell him she’d been unable to reach the cottage and retrieve the tea caddy. Three days, and three sleepless nights in which she tossed and turned, trying to work out whether it would be better to write to him about it, or wait until she and Aunt Win could visit him again and she could tell him in person. Trying to decide the best way to word a letter. Whatever was in that tin was so important to him. It would prove his innocence, he’d said. But she’d failed to reach it. When she had managed to sleep at last, she’d dreamed of rising water, of reaching for something that was just beyond her grasp, her father’s face looming over her telling her to reach further, stretch harder, and never mind the water. She’d wake each time just as the water went over her head, panicking, heart pounding, palms sweating. She’d never get the tea caddy now. It had rained almost constantly for the last few days and that, added to the meltwater from the snows, meant the reservoir would be filling up fast. And it would never empty again. The village, their cottage and the tin with it were submerged for ever.
Finally, one cold Sunday afternoon, Stella forced herself to take some writing paper up to her room at Aunt Win’s, and sit down to write the letter. He’d be waiting to hear from her. His future was at stake. It was the hardest letter she had ever written; it took several attempts to get it right, and as she posted it the next day she felt as though she was imposing a death sentence on him.
She had an answer within a few days.
Dear Stella,
Thank you so much for going to Brackendale Green and trying to find the thing I asked for. I have such a wonderful daughter, to do this for me. I really do think that, and appreciate all you have done.
It doesn’t matter that you couldn’t reach it. My case is coming to trial next month and I am sure all will be well, although my barrister says Maggie still insists she saw me that day, on the lake. Why she would say this I don’t know. Truth is, Alexandria Pendleton knows where Jessie is. There was something in the tin that would prove that. I told it all to the police, but Mrs Pendleton it seems is on her way to India with her husband, taking in a tour of South Africa on the way. She never said anything about India to me. She lied to me, by omission. The police say they can’t contact her until she reaches her destination in India. I can only hope she arrives there and they can get in touch with her before my trial. Don’t tell your Aunt Win this. No need for her to worry any more about all this. She’s good to be looking after you. It’s a comfort to know you are safe there with her.
I am keeping well, and look forward to seeing you at your next half term if you are able to come then. Or if the trial is over quickly and I am found innocent, I will see you before then.
Be brave my girl, and it will soon be all over.
Pa
Stella read the letter several times trying to understand it. What did Pa mean that Mrs Pendleton knew where Jessie was? Had Mrs Pendleton taken her? Or, for some unfathomable reason, killed her? None of it made any sense.
It was only a few weeks until Pa’s trial was scheduled. Stella had been pleading with Aunt Win to let her stay off school and attend the trial every day, but Aunt Win said it was no place for a child, and anyway children couldn’t be present, nor must she miss her schoolwork. What would her pa think if she fell behind at school? She owed it to him to attend every lesson, learn as much as she could, and whatever happened in the future, lead a good and useful life.
Could she go and see Maggie, and convince her not to testify against Pa? Stella investigated bus times to Keswick. It was possible. She could go after school, call on Maggie, tell her what she knew from Pa’s letter, plead with her to withdraw her evidence. It was only Maggie’s witness statement that had made the police arrest Pa. If she withdrew it, then surely there was no case against him? Susie had only seen Pa and Jessie walking along the lane; Maggie was the only one who’d seen anything more, or at least said she had. And when the police were able to contact Mrs Pendleton in India, the truth, whatever it was, would come out. It was a plan. A good one. She resolved to put it into practice the very next week. She could tell Aunt Win she was having tea with a friend after school. Aunt Win, if she knew the truth, would be bound to stop her, saying they must let the court do its job.
It was two days later that the accident happened. She was on her way home from school, skipping alongside her friend Ada, when somehow she missed her footing, stepped on the very edge of the kerb, twisted an ankle and fell heavily. A sharp pain shot up from her foot. Ada tried to pull Stella up, away from the road, but Stella could not put any weight at all on her injured foot.
‘Put your arm around my neck, I’ll help you up,’ Ada said, and Stella did so. Somehow they managed to get off the road and across the pavement, and Stella sat down on a garden wall. She looked at her ankle. It was horribly swollen, and the strap of her school shoe was cutting into her foot. She tried to reach down to remove the shoe, but a wave of dizziness washed over her and she almost fell. ‘Hold still,’ Ada said. ‘I’ll sort it out.’
The pain as Ada undid the buckle and gently eased the shoe off her foot was almost unbearable, and Stella had to bite her tongue to stop herself screaming out. Released from the shoe, her foot immediately swelled further.
‘Oh Lord. I think you’ve broken something,’ Ada said. ‘I’ll fetch help. You sit there.’ She went to knock on the door of the house whose garden wall Stella was sitting on. A few moments later she returned, along with a matronly-looking woman wearing an apron.
‘Aw, duckie, let’s have a look at your poor foot, shall we? Can you hop along inside, if your friend helps you?’ With Ada on one side and the woman on the other, Stella managed to get inside the house where the woman made her sit on a chair in the kitchen.
‘Hmm. That looks nasty. You’ll need to go to the hospital. Does your ma have a telephone in her house?’
‘I live with my aunt. No, there’s no telephone there.’
‘Where do you live, duckie? I can send my Alfie round to find your aunt.’
Stella gave Aunt Win’s address, and the woman went to the foot of the stairs and hollered for Alfie, who turned out to be a boy a year or so younger than Stella, wearing school shorts beneath which were a pair of dirty knees. He widened his eyes to see the two girls in the kitchen, then raced off on his errand.
Alfie’s mum made sweet tea for Stella, but she could barely drink it. She was afraid of vomiting, as her ankle was throbbing horribly. The woman had fetched a footstool and a cushion, to try to raise the ankle a little. It was all Stella could do to keep herself upright and stop herself from wailing. If only Pa wasn’t in prison! Oh, to have Pa’s strong arms wrapped around her now, Pa’s shoulder to cry on, Pa’s words of comfort in her ear!
It wasn’t long before Aunt Win arrived, followed shortly afterwards by Herbert in a borrowed motorcar. He drove Stella to the hospital and a few hours later, once the swelling had subsided, a huge plaster cast was put on her leg and she was issued with a pair of wooden crutches. She and Aunt Win were given strict instructions that she must rest; there was to be no school for two weeks, no unnecessary walking on the leg – only what she had to do to get around the house.
It was when Stella returned home with Aunt Win and Herbert that she realised this meant she would not be able to go to plead with Maggie to retract her witness statement. Then, finally, she could no longer hold back the tears, and she sobbed uncontrollably while Aunt Win held her.
Before the two weeks of enforced rest were up, Jed’s trial began. He was being tried for child abduction, as despite searching the lake, the village and the entire valley no body had been found. Herbert attended the trial, and brought back the news that Maggie had indeed testified, saying that she had definitely seen Jed, in a rowing boat on the lake, dumping something overboard on the day Jessie had gone missing. The bundle was wrapped in a blanket. No, she could not say what the bundle was. Yes, it was about the size that a child Jessie’s age wrapped in a blanket would be.
Maggie had been smartly dressed and had spoken clearly and calmly, and the jury had nodded seriously as she gave her account. They’d believed her, Herbert thought. Aunt Win sighed, and turned away to put the kettle on.
Stella hobbled upstairs to her room, cursing her broken leg. Once again, she had failed her father. If only she could have gone to Keswick and talked Maggie out of testifying!
The trial was expected to last a week, and those next few days were some of the longest Stella had ever experienced. Herbert went to the courtroom each day, saying it was the least he could do, to ensure Aunt Win and Stella were kept up to date with what was happening. Aunt Win herself had not wanted to go, and besides, said she needed to look after poor Stella whose leg was healing only very slowly.
And then, three days after the trial began, in the evening after Herbert had called to give them an update on what had happened that day, they were sitting in the front room, reading quietly and drinking cocoa before bedtime, when there was a knock on the door.
Aunt Win got up, smoothed her skirt and patted her hair. ‘Who can that be at this time of night?’ she said, as she went out to the hallway to answer the door.
She was back a moment later, her face ashen white, followed by two police officers. Stella recognised one of them – DI Parkes. He was the one who’d come to Brackendale when Jessie first went missing. It was he who’d arrested Pa and taken him away.
‘Stella, love. The policemen have some bad news for us.’ Aunt Win bade the police sit down, and they chose the sofa, sitting awkwardly side by side.
Stella was still sitting in the armchair by the fire, with her bad leg up on a footstool. Surely the trial couldn’t be over, and Pa found guilty? Herbert had called on his way home, and told them the case for the defence would start the next day, and Pa would get to tell his side of the story at last.
‘What is it?’ She set her mouth into a firm line. Whatever he had come to say to them, nothing could hurt as much as when he had taken Pa away. She steeled herself to be brave.
DI Parkes cleared his throat. He looked extremely uncomfortable. ‘Your father, Mr Jeremiah Walker, has, I am sorry to say, met with a spot of trouble in prison this evening. He was taken back to Preston prison after the proceedings in court today, and was returned to his cell. The trouble happened as the prisoners were on their way to the refectory for their evening meal.’ DI Parkes ran a finger around his collar.
‘What happened?’ If only he would just come out with it. What kind of trouble was Pa in? Had he been hurt?
The detective swallowed, his Adam’s apple bobbing up and down. ‘Word had got out that Mr Walker was being tried for abduction, and that his little daughter was missing, presumed dead. The prisoners, I’m afraid, made up their minds that whatever the outcome of the trial, your father was guilty of murder. Child-killers are not popular in prisons.’
Aunt Win, who had remained standing while the policeman spoke, sat down heavily in the remaining chair in the room, on the opposite side of the fireplace to Stella. She was staring at the floor, and would not raise her eyes to Stella.
‘What are you saying?’ Stella whispered. Not Pa hurt. After everything that had happened already, it could not be that.
‘Half a dozen men, who I must make clear have all been put into solitary confinement, and will all be charged with their crime, set upon Mr Walker. He was very badly beaten and kicked, before the prison staff were able to intervene and stop the attack.’
‘Oh Pa! Is he very badly hurt? Will the trial have to be halted? He was supposed to be giving his defence tomorrow, I think.’
DI Parkes shook his head sadly. ‘The trial will not continue.’ For one brief, glorious moment Stella thought that meant Pa would be released, proclaimed innocent, all charges dropped, and then she saw the look on the policeman’s face. ‘I’m very sorry to have to inform you, Miss Walker, but your father passed away from the injuries sustained in this attack. It was a vicious assault, and although the warders were very quickly able to break it up and remove Mr Walker to the sickbay, he died within minutes, and was . . .’
Stella had stopped listening. Pa, dead? Pa, murdered in prison by other inmates? It couldn’t be! Not her lovely, strong pa, who could always put everything right, whose arms wrapped round her made everything better.
‘Miss Walker? Do you understand what I have told you? I am extremely sorry for your loss . . .’
She nodded numbly. Her tummy felt as though a block of ice had begun forming inside it.
Aunt Win got up and crossed the room to kneel beside her. ‘Stella, dear, you must be strong. This is a terrible, awful thing to happen. I can’t . . . I just can’t believe it.’ She put an arm around Stella and tried to pull her close for a hug, but Stella felt too shocked to respond. It couldn’t have happened. It just couldn’t. Her pa, gone from her – she’d never see him again!
If she had been able to go to Brackendale before the snow came, and reach the tin, its contents would have proved his innocence and he’d have been released. If she had been able to follow up on her plan to go to Maggie, and convince her not to testify, the charge would have been dropped and he’d have been released. It was her fault Pa was dead. She’d had the power to save him, but she’d failed. Twice.
An enormous sob bubbled up inside her. She tried to swallow it down, and made a choking noise as she struggled to her feet, out of the room and up the stairs. Aunt Win called after her but she did not reply. She could hear DI Parkes beginning to discuss practical arrangements regarding undertakers, funerals and moving ‘the body’. He wasn’t a body. He was her pa. She was halfway up the stairs when she heard this, and she turned and made her way back down again, back into the sitting room.
‘I-I want to see him, Aunt Win. Before we b-bury him. I want to see him.’
‘Oh love.’ Aunt Win held out her arms, and Stella hobbled forward and into them, and this time let herself cry, huge heaving sobs. She was vaguely aware of the policemen shuffling awkwardly out of the room behind her, but Aunt Win did not let her go, just held her tight, pressing her head against her breast, her arms holding her tightly.
‘You will always have a home with me, Stella love. You know that, don’t you?’ she whispered. ‘We’ll get through this. Together.’
And Stella realised that Aunt Win was now all the family she had left.