Buried

Chapter 11

Frances Stanley didn’t recognise Jack when she opened her front door to him; she’d only ever seen him as a small boy, not this impressive-looking young man who stood in front of her now. As she looked at him, not knowing who he was, she thought he dressed younger than his years, but that he carried it off perfectly — he was too smart to be selling something, too casual to be a copper, too young to be a Jehovah’s Witness. Fran simply stared, unable to guess who Jack was or what he wanted.

‘Aunt Fran? It’s Jack.’

He would have liked his Aunt Fran’s face to instinctively relax at this point, to smile and to seem pleased to see him, but that didn’t happen. Instead, Fran’s face tensed, and it was only when she realised she must be coming across as cold and hard that she forced a smile.

‘Jack, lad! Come in. Come in.’ They gave each other an awkward hug as he passed her and entered the hallway. ‘Why didn’t you say you were coming? I’ve not tidied. And, look at me! I’m in my scruffs.’

‘It was a last-minute thing, sorry. I didn’t know I was going to be in the area until it was too late to let you know.’

Fran led the way into the kitchen, where she set about making some tea and searching for biscuits. She had to wash mugs from the overflowing sink as there were no clean ones. She rinsed them under the cold water and rubbed the inside with her fingers until the old tea stains had gone; then she dried them on a dirty, part-burnt tea towel that was obviously also used to take things out of the oven. When Fran opened the fridge to get the milk, a waft of onions filled the room and Jack just knew that the milk would taste of the same smell. He couldn’t take his eyes off Fran. Her hair was dry and brittle from years of perming and bleaching. Her face was weather-worn, leathery, with smoker’s wrinkles round her mouth.

Is this what Trudie would look like now? he wondered. Shit, I hope not!

All the while Jack was staring, Fran was making three mugs of tea and excusing her messy house. The front door opened silently and then loudly slammed shut. Seconds later, a skinny, unshaven black man walked in with the Racing Post under his arm and a cigarette in his mouth. The third mug was obviously for him.

Fran launched into an introduction before the man could ask.

‘Clay, this is my nephew, Jack.’

The men smiled at each other and shook hands. Clay was missing a couple of teeth in his lower jaw, but it didn’t seem to be something he was bothered by. He kissed Fran on the forehead and sat down heavily at the small, sky-blue Formica kitchen set, dropping his paper, cigarettes and lighter on the table. It was only now that Jack noticed there were two dining chairs — which was fine by him, as sitting down in this house didn’t really appeal.

‘The reason I popped in was to chat about Jimmy Nunn,’ Jack started. ‘If you don’t mind, just talk to me, say anything, regardless of how small or insignificant it might seem.’

Fran put the three teas on the table, together with the milk carton and a sugar bowl which had a teaspoon already buried deep. Then she opened the kitchen window and picked up Clay’s cigarettes and lighter. Clay grabbed the teaspoon from the sugar bowl and it lifted a solid lump of wet sugar up with it. He dissolved that into his tea before scooping up another spoonful of sugar. The motion of him stirring made the table rock just enough to create a tiny wave of tea inside each mug, that lapped over the edge with each rotation. He then put the wet teaspoon back into the sugar.

Fran took a couple of drags before she started talking.

‘Your mum came to live with us when you were about eight months old. We’d just had our first and our second was on the way.’

‘Two babies,’ Clay echoed, rolling his eyes. ‘Full house.’

‘Jimmy’d gone without any warning,’ Fran continued. ‘Trudie had nowhere to live and no money. She didn’t even try to sort herself out, instead she just knocked on my door. We did our best, Jack, but...’

Fran dipped the end of her cigarette into a water-filled cereal bowl and then flicked the butt through the open window into the back garden.

‘The babies had the spare bedroom and Trudie was on the sofa,’ Clay added.

Jack was warming to him. Each time Fran made an emotive comment, he repeated it from a practical perspective, as though he was translating into ‘man speak’.

‘Your mum was...’ She looked from Jack to Clay. ‘What’s the word, Clay?’

‘Needy. Not a very confident girl.’

‘Trudie needed to be taken care of and when Jimmy left her, she fell apart. She started drinking too much, going out too much and leaving you here with us too much. It wasn’t fair.’

Clay scraped his chair back and lit one of his cigarettes; he then stood next to Fran and smoked by the window. He was a good foot taller than Fran and half her width; they were an odd-looking couple, but the strength of their relationship was clear.

Clay looked straight into Jack’s eyes as he spoke, making absolutely certain that he understood.

‘Your mum was abusive to my Fran. She was rude, shouting — even hit her once.’ Jack was clearly shocked and Fran bowed her head, as if in shame. ‘He asked, love, so I’m telling him.’ Clay directed his words at Jack again. ‘Your mum’s drinking got out of control and she became depressed. We were looking after three kids under one year old, and Trudie — emotionally and financially.’

Fran took over. ‘Then she got sick. She had a tumour on the brain — you knew that, didn’t you?’ Jack did. Penny had told him when he was old enough to understand. ‘It was over and done with very fast. She didn’t suffer for long. You were ten months old and we had to make a decision. We couldn’t afford to look after everyone.’

Jack smiled. He wasn’t here to make his aunt feel bad.

‘I have great parents, Aunt Fran. You don’t need to worry about me.’

‘I’m so sorry for those first five years of your life, though, Jack.’ Fran spoke with genuine feeling. ‘If we could have kept you and done right by you, we would have. Do you remember it?’

Jack could remember moments from his childhood in unfamiliar places, so he assumed them to be from his time in foster care. Some memories were bad, some were OK. His first pleasant memory certainly had Penny and Charlie in it. He didn’t have memories of anything horrific, although he did recall being hit on several occasions. Mostly he remembered care as being a dull and soulless time — spending most days on his own, dreaming of the exciting things he was going to do when he grew up.

‘Sounds like you did better without your dad,’ Fran suggested. ‘Jimmy Nunn was a lot of hard work for no reward. He was always letting your mum down. I don’t know where he is now, Jack, and, if I did, I’m not sure I’d tell you. My sister loved you with all her heart, she just wasn’t cut out to be a single mum — but Jimmy... Jimmy didn’t love anyone but himself.’

The food at the Dog and Gun was lousy. Ridley had very wisely chosen a ham and cheese toastie with chips, whereas Laura had mistakenly gone for something that needed actual cooking. Her burger was inedible, but fortunately Anik had the constitution of an ox and so finished off hers as well as his own.

‘You eat like a teenager on a growth spurt,’ she said.

‘Well, at least I don’t stink of fags,’ Anik blurted out before he could edit his brain. ‘Sorry, sarge.’

Laura sniffed her top and winced.

At the bar, Ridley watched his pint of Coke being poured while listening to Jack’s answerphone greeting, then the beep.

‘Jack, ask Connie about John Maynard, please. According to him, they had a sexual relationship, maybe as an alternative to cash for work done. That’s it for now. Call me when you get a break.’

The barman and owner, Warren, put Ridley’s pint of Coke down next to the two pints of lime and soda. Warren was an old Londoner who’d moved out to Aylesbury about forty years ago.

‘Dolly Rawlins? First murder we’d had round here in donkey’s years, so too right I milked it. The Grange was only, what, a 20-minute walk away. Tourists would come in here first to get the background story on the murderous gunfight between the notorious “London Madam” and the gangland “husband-killer”. Then they’d go for a wander round the location, then they’d come back here for steak and chips, and a souvenir from the murder scene itself. Forty quid all in, excluding drinks.’

‘A souvenir from the murd—?’

‘Don’t worry, that bit was horse shit. We stuck a piece of old rubble in a food bag. It was like owning a piece of the Great Wall. Or Ayers Rock. Or the Moon. An actual piece of the most depraved whorehouse and bloodiest murder scene this side of the Watford Gap.’

‘And where was the rubble actually from?’

‘My back garden. Law against that, is there?’

‘Not that I can think of, sir, no.’ Ridley manoeuvred the three pint glasses into a triangle, ready to be picked up. ‘You’ve got my card. If you remember anything relevant about the train robbery, I’d be grateful if you’d call me.’

‘Will do, guv. Will do.’

Warren tapped the breast pocket of his shirt, where Ridley’s card was safely tucked away.

By five o’clock, Jack was back sitting on one of the benches outside Connie’s B & B, listening to Ridley’s voicemail. As he put his phone away, Connie’s Fiat Punto pulled up behind him.

Connie opened the car door, gathered her shopping bags and then took a minute or two to actually get out. She had to swing her legs round first, then wriggle to the edge of the driver’s seat until her feet touched the ground; she had to grab the edges of the car door and heave herself out in a rocking one-two-three motion. Jack was so riveted by whether or not she’d make it to vertical that he forgot to offer to help.

As Connie swayed towards her B & B, Jack joined her.

‘Miss Stephens? I’m DC Jack Warr of the Metropolitan Police. May I speak with you about your time at The Grange?’

Connie said nothing. She just handed him her bags and unsteadily led the way indoors.

The hallway to the kitchen ran the depth of the property, which was surprisingly big once inside. Jack couldn’t help but watch Connie’s ample backside sway from side to side as she walked. She still had an intriguing sort of catwalk wiggle and, although several sizes larger than Jack’s personal taste, he could see the appeal.

In the kitchen, she poured two glasses of chilled water, handed one to Jack and then headed back outside to sit on the bench he had vacated a moment earlier.

Once Connie was settled and had glugged most of her water, she said, ‘Why are you interested in that? I don’t think I’ll remember much, but go on.’

Her voice was soft, husky and very sexy, with the slightest hint of a Liverpool accent. Jack recalled the twenty-year-old photo of Connie on the evidence board... That was the woman who suited the voice he was listening to now.

‘I’d like to know what you remember about the train robbery.’

‘Terrible, it was. I couldn’t believe it had actually happened. We didn’t know anything about it until the police hammered on the door in the early hours. I understand why they came to us first but, well, as soon as they walked in, they knew they’d made a mistake. Still searched the place though, inside and out. Dolly said, “You damage it, you pay for it!” — ’cos we’d had trouble before with some coppers taking the door off its hinges. Do you know about that?’

‘I do, yes. The report says they were looking for guns.’

‘Another mistake. It seems that once you’ve got a police record, there’s no leaving it behind.’ Connie finished her water. ‘I love this view. Don’t you?’

‘It’s impressive,’ Jack agreed. Then he got back on track. ‘How did you end up at The Grange?’

‘Ester Freeman invited me. She said Dolly Rawlins was getting released and she had a project she needed help with. She wanted to open a kids’ home. We all knew each other from inside and, well, I suppose Ester thought we all needed an opportunity to be better. That’s what it was, really. An opportunity to start again, give something back, look after troubled kids before they turned into us, you know.’ When Connie smiled, her dimples appeared, and her eyes sparkled. She dipped her gaze and looked up at Jack through her long black eyelashes. He couldn’t help but warm to her. ‘We all got on really well... or at least, I thought we did.’

‘Why do you think Ester shot Dolly?’

‘Money? Maybe even something less important than that. Ester lashed out at all of us at one time or another. Mostly verbal, but she couldn’t half slap hard as well. She called me a whore once, so I said something back and she whacked me. Have you met Ester?’ Jack’s smile told Connie that he had. ‘She’s a strange one, isn’t she? I mean...’ Connie’s face became serious as she thought back to the day Dolly died. ‘Dolly had made mistakes, but she’d paid for them. She was trying to do a good thing with the kids’ home and Ester, because of money or whatever, took that away. Took it away from all of us.’ She reflected for a while and Jack didn’t attempt to fill the pause. ‘You know when... like, something’s the best and worst all at the same time? The Grange was that. For me, anyway, I can’t speak for the others. It was exciting to be literally building our future — which is why it hurt so much when we lost it.’

Jack nodded. ‘Talking of building, tell me about John Maynard.’

Connie blushed slightly, but still chose to look him straight in the eyes as she responded.

‘My, my, you have been doing your homework. I was a 20-something woman stuck in the middle of nowhere with a bunch of other women so, yes, me and John had a bit of a thing. Have you got my mugshot from back then, DC Warr?’ she teased. ‘I was a good catch, don’t you think? Even in a photo taken under your harsh police station strip lights.’ Connie sat up straight and leant towards Jack. ‘When a lady’s got no one to look good for, Jack, this happens. John was nice. Before him, I was with Lennie — he’d beat me senseless, quite randomly. Training, he called it.’ She looked at him with her gentle smile and her dimples, and he could see tears pooling in the bottom lids of her striking, pale blue eyes. ‘What were those dogs called that were trained to think about food every time they heard a bell ring? Have I got that right?’

‘Pavlov’s dogs.’

‘That’s them. Within a couple of months of being with Lennie, he’d stopped hitting me — but every time he walked into the room I’d shake, and sweat, and my heart would beat out of my chest. The memory of the beatings was enough by then, you see. That’s what kept me in my place. The fear.’ A tear rolled down Connie’s cheek. She put her hands flat on her knees and pushed down slightly, as if trying to contain her emotions. ‘That’s why I like being here. Nobody knows I’m weak and nobody wants to take advantage of me — not now I’m past my prime and on the big side. I can just be on my own and be me and I like that.’

As Jack watched Connie’s chubby fingers wipe away the tears from her chubby cheeks, he thought she looked like a little girl. She stared out across the Blackdown Hills and tucked a stray blonde curl behind her ear. Her wet eyelashes glistened in the early evening sun and Jack felt that he should hug her, or put a hand on her shoulder, or something.

‘I’ve not seen John since the day Dolly was shot. I don’t miss him. I don’t miss any of them.’

Jack’s mobile rang; he excused himself and stepped away to answer it.

With his back to her, Connie lifted her hands an inch or two off her knees. Her skirt was damp from where her palms had been, and her hands shook now that they were unsupported. Jack hung up and Connie quickly put her hands back down on her knees to stop the shaking.

‘Thank you for your time, Miss Stephens. My boss is wondering where I am, so I’ll have to go. And thank you for the water.’

‘My pleasure.’ Connie stood and picked up the two glasses. ‘Have you got a car somewhere or do you need a lift?’

‘Actually, I’m going to walk to the edge of the Blackdown Hills and get a cab from there.’

‘That’s a very nice way to end the day, Jack. Bye now.’

With that, Connie waddled back indoors and Jack headed off down the hill towards the memory of teenage walking with his now-dying dad.

Connie put the glasses on the draining board, leant on the edge of the sink and bowed her head to aid getting her breath back. She shakily poured herself a gin, added a pointless splash of tonic and a slice of lemon. Her mind raced. She took out her mobile and looked at the blank screen. She put it away while she silently drank the first of two gins and relived her interview with Jack. Connie took out her mobile again. And dialled.

‘That copper from the Met’s been round. I said exactly what we agreed, don’t worry... I can still act the dumb blonde when I need to. I just wanted you to know that he might be heading your way.’