ONCE I’VE SETTLED KAI BACK IN BED, I TAKE THE LETTER out from under my top and unfold it.
22 March 2017
Dearest Taisie,
Anna! (I’m finding it impossible to think of you as anything other than Taisie I’m afraid.) Thank you from the bottom of my heart for this afternoon. I will treasure the memory. You are a precious, special young woman and I hope you will always know this.
I have such fond memories of those summers watching you and your siblings growing up. I’m just so terribly sorry it all ended like it did. It was an idyllic time. I sense that you don’t think as well of yourself as I do, so do something for me. Try not to allow past hurts and grudges to fester. Take my advice and talk to your family. They miss you very much. You’ve made the first step now. It’ll be easier to make contact with the others.
I get the feeling I may have put my foot in it, as regards Nick Ritchie. I want you to know that I certainly don’t favour him over you. I would have encouraged any young person who showed a genuine interest and followed it up with such persistence. Send Kai my way when the time comes. I’ll be happy to help in any way I can. He sounds like a wonderful young man.
Yours
Angus
The notepaper is expensive and has Angus’s Kensington address embossed in a black font. He used a fountain pen, and his signature is restrained but confident. I lay the letter on my knees, feeling a little ashamed of myself for prying.
I’ve never been good at thinking things through. My brain can’t always work its way round a maze of information, like some people’s do with such ease, as if they were floating above it. But I try now. Were they lovers? There’s a hint of that, but nothing specific. Maybe he didn’t trust her. I don’t, and I don’t know her as well as he appears to. The letter doesn’t prove that she came after Nick, meaning to disrupt his life, but it’s surely enough to make the police accept that Anna may well be the key to all this.
What else does it tell me?
Anna made that first move towards reconciliation by getting in touch with a close family friend the year before she moved into this area. She didn’t take Angus’s advice and speak to her family, but she did make contact with Nick. She denies being in touch with Alex, but she could have lied. I can imagine a scenario where Alex got in touch with her as part of his recovery, and she spotted an opportunity and persuaded him to put pressure on Nick, having already started the process the evening before.
Why did Anna go to see Angus in the first place? Because she was lonely? I remember my own first impression of Nick’s boss: utterly in control, courteous and charming. I’d guess she contacted him and not his wife because she’s more comfortable with men than she is with women. And the Moodys rather than the Ritchies because of what Tim did to her. He had betrayed her parents’ friendship and made a mockery of her childhood.
As for the women, if Cora and Jess Wells were anything like Cassie and me, they would have been in and out of each other’s houses when the children were tiny. I sigh inwardly. Is any of this even relevant? I should call the police.
This house is so cold. I pull a soft woollen throw from the back of the armchair and wrap it round my shoulders, then go to the door, open it and wander out into the street. I breathe in the heady scent of the wisteria that covers the house next door, its flowers dripping shades of purple. It’s such a tranquil road, but who knows what goes on behind the prettily painted walls?
A siren wails in the distance, and I look up, my stomach flipping. Above the roofs, over in the direction of the Common, a halo of blue lights pulses a grim rhythm. I go back inside, quietly close the door, pick up the phone and take it back upstairs to Anna’s bedroom. From her window, I can see the lights better. It’s definitely the Common. There are problems there from time to time, especially with underage drinkers – groups of teenagers buying booze from the minimart and gathering in the gloom. I tend not to walk Toffee there at night if Nick isn’t around. Once someone was stabbed in the playground. It could be anything. I’m sure this has nothing to do with Anna.
‘I want to report someone missing,’ I say into the phone, my eyes fixed on the lights, and it all starts again.
‘What is your relationship?’
‘She’s a friend.’
‘Does she have health issues?’
The voice could belong to the same female operator. I wait for her to comment on this, to mention the remarkable coincidence of me calling to report a missing person twice in three weeks, to make some light remark about lightning not striking the same place twice, but she doesn’t, and maybe she’s not the same person anyway.
I know what the routine is, that she’s about to tell me to wait until tomorrow. I turn away, and sit down on the end of Anna’s bed, exhausted.
‘I’m really concerned about her,’ I say. ‘She’s left her child—’
There’s a noise, a quiet shuffle, and I turn to find Kai standing in the doorway, his eyes huge. I go to him, put my hand on his shoulder and lead him gently back to his bedroom. He climbs obediently back into bed, but I can tell he’s hyper alert.
‘How old is the child?’ the woman is asking.
The doorbell rings and I sag with relief. Anna must have forgotten her keys. Maybe she’s drunk.
‘It’s OK,’ I say. ‘She’s back. Sorry to waste your time.’
Kai springs up, but I block him. I want to check what kind of state his mother is in before he sees her. He struggles in my arms.
‘I want to see Mummy.’
The doorbell rings again, more insistently this time. I’m torn, but in the end I insist. It’s the right thing to do.
‘She’ll be cross if she finds you up,’ I say urgently. ‘And I’ll get into trouble.’ He looks at me and I can feel him wavering. He’s utterly exhausted, poor child. ‘Shut your eyes and count backwards from a hundred.’ It sometimes works with Lottie.
I close his door behind me and run downstairs, ready with my excuse for being here, my unjudgemental smile firmly in place, but it isn’t Anna standing on her doorstep, looking sheepish. It’s Detective Inspector Marsh. If he’s surprised to find me here, he doesn’t show it. I look behind him, but I only see his car, double-parked. No Anna getting out of it.
‘I’ve just been on the phone to the police,’ I say. ‘Has something happened to Anna?’
He follows me into the kitchen, and I shut the door so that Kai can’t hear. I fill the kettle, but he doesn’t want anything. I want to do something with my hands, but I don’t want to appear nervous, so I lean against the counter and hook my thumbs into my jeans pockets.
‘Why are you here, Ms Trelawney?’ he asks.
‘Her son called me. He was worried because she hasn’t come home.’
‘Why didn’t you alert the police immediately?’
I frown. His question feels like an accusation. ‘I assumed she would be back. I didn’t want to get her into trouble for leaving Kai on his own if she was going to reappear at any moment.’
‘What time did he call you?’
‘Around one o’clock.’
‘So you waited for, what, two hours?’
‘I didn’t want to turn this into something it wasn’t.’
He peers through the glass screen door into the small garden. ‘Where did she tell Kai she was going?’
‘She didn’t. He got up in the night to go to the loo and noticed that she wasn’t in bed. That’s when he called me.’
I’m starting to tremble inside. Of course I should have called. What stopped me? Was it because I’m suspicious of Anna and wanted to spend some time snooping round her house? I glance at Marsh’s face, but it’s impossible to read. He looks tired too.
‘You didn’t think it was odd?’ he says. ‘After going through the same thing yourself so recently?’
‘I didn’t relate the two events. I don’t know why not. I assumed Anna had told him a white lie; that she was meeting someone – a date. She does use online dating sites.’
‘Is she the type to go out without arranging childcare?’
‘I don’t know. I haven’t known her very long. Will you please tell me what’s going on?’
He picks up a sheaf of papers from the table and looks through them. It’s mostly stuff from school: newsletters, sports slips for her to sign. He puts it down.
‘When did you last see Anna Foreman?’
I try and remember but my brain is all over the place. Since Nick left, time has stretched, occasionally snapping back and catapulting me forward, but mostly the days have felt like weeks.
‘I think it was last Monday. Yes, it was. Definitely last Monday.’ That was the afternoon Lottie sneaked out and came round here. ‘Shouldn’t you be looking for her?’
‘We don’t need to.’ He traps me in his gaze. ‘There’s been an incident.’