Хилари Боннер - A Kind Of Wild Justice

He entered the call meticulously in the message log. Then he used the radio to contact a constable he knew was not too far from the Phillips farm because he’d recently been despatched in his panda car across the moors to investigate a break-in at a garage near Moretonhampstead. George Jarvis was used to making decisions and issuing instructions. He might be just a civilian desk clerk now, but he was still inclined to behave like the station sergeant he had once been. ‘We’ve got a missing person, Pete,’ he began, as he redirected the constable to Five Tors Farm.

Then he made himself a cup of tea. No point in notifying the top brass yet; see how it pans out, he told himself. But George had an uneasy feeling about this one, even this early on. The Phillips family weren’t ones to panic. They were a pretty solid bunch. More than likely, the girl was of the same stock. And even if she were the daft, irresponsible sort, at seventeen she was highly vulnerable. Best to share the burden, George thought.

He checked his watch. Still not quite nine o’clock. He knew the recently promoted Detective Sergeant Todd Mallett was on duty in CID that day, but being a Sunday with nothing much on so far, he wouldn’t expect Todd in before 9.30 or so. George liked Todd, one of the best of the younger chaps, he thought. He took a couple of sips of tea and considered his options for a moment or two more. Then he called Todd Mallett at his home in Sticklepath, just a few miles out of Okehampton on the Exeter road.

Todd listened just as carefully as George himself had done when Rob Phillips had called in. ‘I think I’ll take a run out there, then, George,’ he said eventually. ‘Not much point in coming in to the station first; it’s quiet enough otherwise, isn’t it? Young Pete Trescothwick could do with some moral support I reckon, if nothing else.’

Typical Mallett, thought George. Taking it calmly, step by step, but finger on the pulse already. There were those who regarded Todd as a bit old-fashioned and overly thorough. But George approved of qualities like that in a policeman.

At the farm, the whole family gathered in Rob’s end of the big old house. They were unimpressed when Rob told them what George Jarvis had asked him to do.

‘But she wouldn’t...’ began his mother.

‘I know, I know. But look, let’s just do it, shall we?’ Rob replied. His voice came out higher-pitched than usual with just a hint of hysteria in it now.

‘I’ll call Jeremy,’ said his mother, still sounding tearful but also as if she were glad to have something to do.

‘And didn’t you say she was chatting to those riding chums of hers last night?’ Mary enquired. ‘I’ll call them, and anyone else I can think of.’

‘Good. And I’m going looking for her.’ Rob’s face was set.

‘Where, where will you begin?’ asked his father, the strain clear in his voice too.

‘I’ll walk the way she should have come home. I ought to have thought of that already. Maybe the policeman is right. Maybe she did fall and hurt herself, maybe she was taken ill, maybe she’s lying in a hedge somewhere...’

Rob tried to sound optimistic. Any of those possibilities was infinitely preferable to the one they were all dreading. But his voice tailed off almost plaintively. He didn’t believe what he was suggesting and the rest of the family knew it. However, it was action of a sort, something to do. Anything was better than sitting around the house waiting. The guilt was like a dull pain nagging away in the pit of his stomach. He had got drunk, played the fool, not bothered to see that his sister got home safely. And now the potential consequences of his completely out-of-character bout of irresponsibility were too dire even to think about.

‘I’ll come with you, boy,’ said his father. ‘Let’s take the Land Rover and walk it in stretches. Then we’ll have a vehicle to bring her back in.’

But Rob didn’t think his father sounded as if he believed he would be bringing Angela back. Nobody had criticised Rob. Not yet. But he knew that would come. He could hardly bear to think about what this would do to his family.

As soon as the men had departed, Lillian Phillips and her daughter-in-law started to telephone people: Jeremy Thomas and any other friends of Angela’s whose homes she could possibly have reached on foot.

Jeremy answered the phone sleepily, as if he had been woken by it, even though it was mid-morning. No, Angela had not been to his house last night, he said. And then, as if the significance of what he was being asked had suddenly dawned on him he exclaimed abruptly, ‘Oh, my God! I’ll be right over.’

‘No, Jeremy,’ said Lillian at once. ‘We couldn’t cope with anybody else here right now. We’ll call you as soon as we have any news.’ Then she hung up before she had to explain or discuss the situation any further.

Her daughter-in-law had given up and Lillian was speaking to the final friend of Angela’s she could think of when Constable Pete Trescothwick’s panda car pulled into the yard. Mary, even more pale and drawn-looking than she had been throughout her troubled pregnancy, opened the door and ushered the constable in.

Pete Trescothwick was young and green. He was bright enough, though, and it didn’t take him long with the two women to begin to fear, as they obviously did, that something very serious had happened to Angela. His instinct was to believe that he was being told the truth and that Angela had indeed never returned home from the dance. Nonetheless there were procedures to go through. ‘Do you mind if I have a look around?’ he asked.

Lillian Phillips appeared slightly bemused. ‘She’s not here, Constable, I told you. Do you think I wouldn’t know if she were here?’

Trescothwick coughed to hide his embarrassment. A search of the home of a missing person or victim of a violent crime was standard procedure. So many crimes were committed within the family set-up. Where there should be the greatest safety there was so often the greatest danger. Everybody in the Devon and Cornwall Constabulary knew about the major hunt for a missing woman over in Plymouth that had gone on for several days and all the time she was in the garage wrapped up in a carpet. There were certain police officers involved in that one whose careers had come to a sudden dramatic halt. Pete Trescothwick had no intention of allowing that to happen to him, despite his gut reaction that the distress of the Phillips family was one hundred per cent genuine. But he did try to be as tactful as he could. ‘Just routine,’ he said in a casual voice.

Not casual enough to fool Lillian Phillips, it seemed. ‘You’re not suggesting that we’ve got her here somewhere, are you?’ she asked sharply. ‘You’re surely not suggesting anyone in this house has hurt our Angela?’

‘Of course not, Mrs Phillips, just routine, like I said. There’s a way we have to go about things.’

But the distraught woman interrupted him and now she sounded close to breaking point. ‘Just go and find her, find my Angela, please,’ she screamed at him, her voice high-pitched, desperate, her tears suddenly flowing freely. ‘Don’t waste your time here. Go and find her. Something terrible has happened to her, I just know it...’

Pete Trescothwick shifted uncomfortably from foot to foot.

Mary Phillips came to his rescue. ‘C’mon, Mum,’ she said soothingly. ‘Let me make you a cup of tea and we’ll let the constable get on. He’s only doing his job...’

‘I don’t want any tea...’ the older woman began, but she fell silent and let Mary lead her over to a chair.

Trescothwick slipped out of the room and began his search. First he went through the bedrooms, looking in the wardrobes and under all the beds. Then he checked all the downstairs rooms before starting on the yard. He did his best to search the big cowshed, the stables and the barn where they kept the feed, all with no result as he had more or less expected. It was now gone 10 a.m. The girl had been missing for almost eleven hours. She was wearing party clothes, a skimpy black dress if Trescothwick had ascertained it correctly. The only money she had was a few pounds in a small handbag. She had no coat. All right, it was the end of July, but nonetheless she was hardly equipped to do a runner. Trescothwick had extremely bad vibes about this and decided he wanted to shift responsibility for it on to broader shoulders as soon as possible.