Michael Fowler - Secret of the Dead

“Bloody hell, just look at what I’ve found!”

Hunter turned.

Grace was waving in the air a wad of yellowing newspaper cuttings.

* * * * *

By the time DCs Tony Bullars and Carol Ragen left the police station, the wind and the rain had subsided. Tony chose to drive the slightly longer route, across the Strines, to Bakewell, and he made good time because he met very little traffic and was able to put his foot down. As he approached Bakewell, Tony was forced to ease off the accelerator as he joined the line of slow moving traffic negotiating the narrow bridge over the River Wye into the bustling market town.

At the first roundabout, following Carol’s instructions, he aimed the car in the direction of where they needed to be. Less than quarter of an hour later, Tony turned into the lane where Lucy’s parents lived.

Richard and Margaret Hall’s home was a pretty cottage built of Derbyshire stone and slate with rolling hillsides as a backdrop. Today, the tops of the hills couldn’t be seen. A thick bank of low cloud covered them, and the damp atmosphere which pervaded made everything look grey and cold.

Richard Hall had the front door open before they had stepped through the garden gate.

Tony saw that he was a big man who carried some weight, especially round the middle.

He greeted them with a warm smile and a soft handshake and then stepped to one side to let them enter.

“Nice place,” said Tony, lowering his head to pass beneath the low-lintel front door and into the sitting room.

“It is now,” Richard Hall replied, shutting the door behind them. “But it wasn’t always like this. We’ve had to do a fair bit of work to get it like it is now.”

Tony studied the room. This is what a cottage should be like , he thought, as he admired the log burning fire set inside a stone inglenook fireplace. A low beamed ceiling, cream painted walls and soft furnishings completed the warm and inviting look.

Two small sofas, arranged in a broken L shape were the only seats in the room. Margaret Hall was already sat in one. Slightly hunched forward, she had her hands clasped loosely together, resting in her lap. She had a bob of soft greying hair, which framed a well rounded, cheery face.

Richard offered Tony and Carol the other sofa and then lowered himself into the space beside his wife.

“Can I get you a drink?” Margaret offered.

Tony declined. “I’m awash with tea, thank you,” he said. “I’ll be going to the toilet for the rest of the day if I have any more,” he smiled.

Carol shook her head, “Me too.”

“You said on the phone that you’re re-investigating Lucy’s murder?” Richard said, shuffling into a more comfortable position, leaning into the arm of the sofa.

“Yes, that’s right.” Tony flipped open his folder, revealing photocopies of the original witness statements made by the Halls back in 1983, together with a bundle of blank witness forms in case they provided new information. “Our boss went on TV last night and made an appeal. Did you see it?”

“No sorry, we don’t get Yorkshire’s news down here.”

“Does that mean Danny Weaver is innocent after all?” Margaret asked.

“I don’t want to use those words, Mrs Hall. And not wishing to be impolite but I don’t want to elaborate or give anything away about the investigation at this stage. But it would be fair to say that we do have evidence which casts doubt on what was presented at Weaver’s original trial.”

Richard glanced sideways at his wife. They exchanged searching looks. Then he returned his gaze to Tony. “Have you found Lucy’s body?”

“I’m sorry to say but no, we haven’t. It is one of our lines of enquiry — carrying out another search. We’re going back over every part of the original investigation to see if anything was missed first time round. And of course forensics, and search techniques have moved on so much since then, so hopefully that’s something we can resolve this time around. What will happen from now on is that every time something new comes in you will be kept up-to-date. You will be the first to know if we find Lucy. I promise you that.”

Carol met Margaret’s eyes. “I picked up on the question you asked about Danny Weaver. It was the way you said it which intrigued me. It was as if you were expecting this. Do you know something about Weaver that you didn’t tell the police during the original enquiry?”

“Ooh no. It’s just after all these years of thinking about what happened and dwelling on things. To be honest, I was really surprised all those years ago when those detectives told me that Danny had confessed to killing her and that they’d charged him. You see, I told those two detectives at the time that Lucy seemed to be so happy, especially those few days before she disappeared.”

Tony had been separating their witness statements for them to read. At this comment, he looked up from his folder. “Did you see and talk with her regularly then before she went missing?”

“Oh yes. I saw Lucy and Jessica, that’s our granddaughter, at least three times a week. She’d come up to the house or we’d go into Barnwell shopping.”

“What, she’d come all this way?”

“No, no. We haven’t always lived here. We used to live in Wortley. That’s where Lucy was brought up. We lived on Constable Row, just behind the church. We came here a couple of years after the trial. We couldn’t bear staying in the same village any more. We came here with Jessica.”

“Tell them the truth Margaret!” Richard butted in. “We couldn’t abide to be anywhere near that supercilious husband of hers.” He switched his look between Tony and Carol. “We found stuff out about him that never came out in the trial. It was no wonder she was unhappy.”

Tony said, “Now you’ve lost me. Margaret, you said Lucy was happy just before she disappeared and Richard, you’ve just said she was unhappy.”

“Lucy never told us anything,” Richard replied. “We’ve found out stuff about Peter from Amanda, Lucy’s best friend from school. We never realised the half of it.” He shot a quick sideways glance at his wife again. “It was heartbreaking for us.” He shook his head as if attempting to dislodge his unhappy thoughts. Then he said, “Have you spoken to Amanda? She’s in your job. She’s a Sergeant up in Cumbria. Married with a daughter herself now. She’s still kept in touch with us over the years. I mean it’s not as much now. The calls have dropped off, but her and Margaret still have the odd chat from time to time. In fact, we rang her last night when we knew you were coming.”

“I wished we’d have known you were still in touch with her. It could have saved us a lot of time. You wouldn’t believe the effort we’ve put in to track everyone down from the original enquiry. Someone has spoken to her on the phone and we’ve made arrangements to see her in the next day or so.”

“Well, she’ll be able to tell you a lot more about Lucy and what went off. We’ve found out little bits from her over the years that have shocked us, I can tell you, but we don’t think she’s told us everything, because she didn’t want to upset us any further.”

“We’ve still got to speak with Amanda, but if you could just tell us what you know that’s relevant about Lucy’s disappearance, it would help us immensely.”

“Where do you want me to begin?” He dabbed at the corner of his eyes with the knuckle of a thumb.

Tony opened up his notebook ready to scribble down notes. “Shall we start where she met Peter, and I’ll nudge you from time to time if I need you to elaborate on anything.”

Richard stroked his chin and narrowed his eyes before he began. Clearing his throat, he said, “Lucy met Peter just before her seventeenth birthday. He was older than her, early twenties, but to be honest that didn’t bother us, especially when we first met him. He was well turned out, polite and acted a lot more mature than some of the other boys Lucy was friends with. We’d never met him before, he lived at Thurgoland with his gran, but used to come to The Wortley Arms drinking. That’s where he met Lucy. She was under-age to drink but it’s such a small village, as you know, so the landlord used to let her and a few mates go in there and just have soft drinks. When she first introduced him to us he was working as a mechanic, but as a sideline he bought and sold his own cars. He was a good worker and always seemed to have plenty of money. Lucy was certainly happy with him back then. Then we heard one or two whispers about him.”