Rosie Read online

  Thomas never understood why this dream persisted. He’d seen men beaten, whipped and shot by guards, but not beheaded. A psychiatrist at the hospital had said he thought the sword was merely symbolic of everything Thomas feared. Perhaps it had come back tonight after months of respite because of his anxiety about Rosie.

  When he heard a clap of thunder, Thomas smiled to himself. It was just a storm that had prompted his dream and he got out of bed and hopped across the room to watch it from the window, taking deep breaths of air to banish his nightmare for good.

  Lightning flashed and for a second the whole garden was illuminated. He blinked. He thought he’d seen someone running across the lawn with a bundle over their shoulder, but suddenly the garden was in darkness again. For just a second he stood there, swaying a little as he balanced on his one leg, peering out, sure it was a figment of his imagination. But the image didn’t fade from his mind.

  He had no crutches or walking stick. So with his empty pyjama-leg flapping, he hopped his way to Rosie’s room and as he opened the door he saw her empty bed and the wide-open window with the curtains blowing in the wind. He also smelled paraffin.

  There had been many times since his capture by the Japs that he’d felt utterly impotent, but never quite as badly as this. His mind told him to jump out of the window in pursuit, but he knew it was impossible. Instead, all he could do was scream like a banshee to Frank and Norah as he hopped across the landing.

  Donald appeared from his room before Thomas reached his parents’ door.

  ‘Go and telephone the police,’ Thomas yelled at him. ‘Seth Parker’s got Rosie. He’s making his way over the field at the back.’

  He expected Donald to stare at him vacantly, perhaps wasting precious minutes asking questions, but Donald shot along the landing, past Thomas and straight down the stairs, taking them three at a time.

  Frank emerged from his room rubbing his eyes, hastily followed by Norah. Thomas told them what he had seen.

  ‘Check that Donald’s telephoned. I’ll go and put my leg on,’ he said.

  He hadn’t even got to his room when Donald called up the stairs.

  ‘The phone won’t work. It doesn’t even make a funny sound,’ he said with alarm in his voice.

  ‘I’ll get the policeman outside,’ Frank said, running back to his room to grab his dressing-gown.

  Thomas was just finishing strapping on his leg when he heard Norah yell out from the kitchen. He pulled on his trousers over his pyjamas, grabbed his jacket and shoes, and rushed downstairs.

  Norah was standing in the kitchen, wringing her hands, her expression one of utter terror. The doors on to the terrace were wide open. Rain was lashing into the room.

  ‘Donald’s gone after them,’ she cried. ‘Oh Thomas, he’s no match for that man.’

  Thomas comforted her as best he could, but there was little he could say to make her feel better. Donald was strong and fit, and he knew his way about the fields. But the chances were that he would blunder after them like an enraged bull and make the situation even more dangerous.

  Frank came back in as Thomas was making Norah some tea. He was soaked through, rain running down his face, purple with anger.

  ‘Some bloody guard! He wasn’t there. I had to bang them up next door to use their telephone,’ he exploded.

  ‘Are the police coming?’ Thomas asked.

  Frank nodded, adding that he hoped they’d send men a little more competent than the one they’d left outside. ‘Let’s hope they switch their sirens on. It might make that animal dump Rosie and run for it.’

  As Thomas told Frank about Donald, the older man blanched. ‘Damn him,’ he exploded, thumping a fist on the kitchen table. ‘He’ll just complicate things further.’

  ‘He went for all the right reasons,’ Thomas reminded him. ‘If I had two good legs, I’d be out there now too.’

  When the first lot of police arrived some ten minutes later, along with the one who should have been outside, both Frank and Norah had dressed. While two of the men went out into the garden with flashlights, Thomas took the third man, an older officer, upstairs and showed him Rosie’s room. The smell of paraffin was still strong, but there was no sign of any having been spilled. They thought perhaps Seth had got it on his clothes while he was holed up somewhere.

  Thomas demanded to know why the man supposed to be guarding the house had disappeared, and why indeed they hadn’t watched the back of the house too. The officer said he would look into it, and hurriedly left to join his colleagues, who were now over the wall and into the field.

  It had been twenty-five past two when Thomas came down to the kitchen to hear that Donald had gone. He reckoned it must have been about fifteen minutes earlier that Rosie was snatched. Now as they waited in the kitchen, desperate for news or something constructive to do, the minutes seemed like hours.

  For some time after the police had left, they all reassured one another by speaking of the reinforcements the police had said were coming, the road-blocks being set up, and the promises they’d been given that Donald would be found and brought home immediately. But as time went on they all sank deep into their own thoughts.

  Norah silently busied herself by making a pile of sandwiches and a large thermos of coffee. She covered the sandwiches in a damp tea towel, took a pile of small plates from the cupboard and placed them in readiness along with some cups, almost as if she was anticipating a party. But her fear was evident in her jerky movements and her compulsion to constantly wipe down surfaces. Her usually calm, grey-blue eyes were dark with anxiety; her lips trembled as if she was on the verge of breaking down.

  Frank appeared to be in a stupor, his chin embedded in his chest. His customary ruddiness, which had always advertised his good health, now seemed dangerously livid. The veins in his forehead were swollen and throbbed visibly.

  Earlier they had spoken of Michael and Susan and discussed briefly how, even if their phone line hadn’t been cut, it would be unfair to wake them with bad news. Yet Thomas knew they both wished their two older children would suddenly appear at the door.

  Thomas felt deeply for this couple he had come to know so well. Some time ago they had told him about that day years ago when the little girl from their village went missing. He knew they were reliving it now, experiencing the same terror her parents had felt all through that long night as search parties combed the woods and fields.

  Donald might be a man in most people’s eyes, but to them he was still a small boy, who was out there, barefooted in a storm, following a murderer who might very well kill or maim him too. He could almost hear their agonized thoughts. Why hadn’t they sent both Rosie and Donald to their son’s in Tunbridge Wells for safety once they knew Seth Parker was the killer of the two women? And why had they been foolish enough to trust the police to be vigilant?

  But while Thomas acknowledged Frank and Norah’s plight, he felt his own pain was far greater. The war had robbed him of his mother, his youth and his leg. As if that wasn’t enough, his sister had been taken from him too. Then, like a miracle, his friendship with Rosie had wiped out the bitterness inside him. Right from the time that she’d written those first letters when she was with the Bentleys, she’d enriched his life with her courage and endurance.

  Now he might never see her again, and there was so much he wanted to share with her – that he’d finally been brave enough to show his paintings to Paul Brett, an art-gallery owner in Hampstead, just the day before coming down here; that he felt he was on the brink of something wonderful.

  Rosie had inspired him, and yet now she might never see that painting which had impressed Paul Brett so much. He’d painted it from memory: a little curly-haired ragamuffin with defiant eyes peeping from behind a wild rose bush.

  He couldn’t even go outside and join the search for her. One step on uneven and slippery ground and he’d fall over. He was about as much use to the woman he loved as a chocolate fireguard.

  Donald, meanwhile, wasn’t quit
e as incapable of thinking clearly as his parents believed. Though he was angry and upset, he still had the presence of mind to grab a dark mackintosh that had once belonged to Michael from a peg in the hall, slip his feet into his gardening shoes, and take the big torch his father used for looking at his car engine in the dark.

  He also knew from comics that if you wanted to catch someone by surprise, you had to be quiet and stay invisible. The moment he got out in the field he rubbed mud all over his face and hair. He’d seen someone do that in a film.

  Being quick seemed to be the most important thing at first, so he ran like the wind across the field until he reached the stile at the far end, but from there on he flashed the light every now and then to check for tracks. There were clear boot marks in the mud, and imprints of bare toes, which had to be Rosie’s. The bad man was taking her to the woods.

  It was only as Donald approached the woods that he became scared. He’d never been in them before at night and every tree trunk had a nasty, leering face on it. He stopped for a minute, too frightened to go any further, but as he stood there he heard noises above the drumming of the rain on the trees – cracking, rustling noises and not that far ahead of him. Knowing that Rosie was there, even more scared than he was, gave him new courage. His eyes had grown more used to the dark now, and he did know the woods very well. He didn’t dare switch on the torch again, so he tucked it into his pocket and picked up a big stout stick.

  He kept to the well-worn path. The man and Rosie were over to his left and pushing through the undergrowth, but his path gradually wound round towards their direction. If he was quick and quiet he could get in front of them, just like the Wicked Wolf did in Little Red Riding Hood.

  His plan worked. After walking quickly for about twenty minutes he stopped to listen and he heard them coming towards him.

  ‘Move it,’ the man said in a gruff voice, and Donald heard a sound like a cane swishing through the air. It was as if the man had beaten her, but Rosie didn’t cry out; there was just a noise like one of them stumbling over something.

  Donald hid behind the biggest tree trunk. He wished he’d brought his balaclava he wore in winter. He was afraid his blond hair would show up.

  But all at once they stopped moving. Donald strained his ears to listen. He could hear strange sounds but couldn’t identify them. He waited, not knowing what to do now, and then the man spoke again.

  ‘This is as far as you’re going,’ he said.

  Donald was relieved at that. He thought the man was going to leave Rosie there and go on alone. He must know the police would be coming to get him. That made it much easier for Donald: he would just wait till the man had gone, and then take Rosie home.

  But as the minutes ticked by and the man didn’t move in his direction but just stayed there making funny rustling noises, Donald got anxious. He began to creep closer towards them.

  ‘Keep still, you bitch. I can’t get it in,’ the man suddenly exclaimed, and instinctively Donald knew he was trying to do something very bad to her.

  Rosie was beside herself with terror. From the moment Seth had hiked her roughly over the garden wall, then untied her feet so she could walk, she knew he was planning to either kill her or leave her so badly hurt she’d wish she was dead. She couldn’t get away from him. He still had the rope tied tightly around her waist, and if she stopped walking he just dragged her or kicked her along. The cloth in her mouth was making her feel sick, and the one he’d used to keep it in place stank of paraffin. All at once she realized that he’d fooled her back in the house. He hadn’t spilt paraffin, it was just this cloth she’d smelled.

  All the way across the field he kept up a barrage of accusations. She was the reason he’d gone wrong. Right from when she was born she’d caused him trouble. Cole had always cared more for her than for him. She was the reason he had to kill Ruby.

  She had stopped short at that, staring at him in horror. He snarled at her, kicked her to start her walking again, and proceeded to tell her in gory, sickening detail just how he did it and why. Then he moved on to Heather.

  By the time they reached the woods Rosie was in pain. She had stubbed her bare feet on stones several times, she was icy cold, and the rope around her middle was cutting deeper and deeper into her skin. The rain made her pyjamas cling to her and she was certain Seth intended to rape her. Somehow rape was the worst thing she could imagine. She’d rather be beaten half to death.

  Yet above all that was the terrible knowledge her father had been innocent. Hanged for crimes committed by his eldest son, this savage madman. She had always felt guilty that she hadn’t told the police everything she knew about Seth. Now she felt utter desolation because by keeping her counsel she had actually helped put the rope round her father’s neck.

  Praying for rescue was pointless. No one would even know she was missing until the morning, and by then it would be much too late. Tears poured down her face, but she couldn’t even speak to plead with Seth.

  Going through the woods was far worse than the fields. She stumbled on every stick, she was stung by nettles and pricked by thorns. Then he stopped and tied her to the tree with her feet splayed wide apart, and she knew this meant that rape was going to be the start of it. But he teased her first, taking out a long, shining knife from his belt and running it under her nostrils and down her cheeks, digging the point in just a little way to show what he intended to do.

  ‘That will be last,’ he whispered. ‘I’m going to cut your face to ribbons, then poke out your eyes. No man will ever want you again, you won’t even be able to see how ugly you are or look at your precious flowers. But first you’re going to get my big, hard cock.’

  Even above the overpowering smell of paraffin, she could still smell his foul breath and the stink of sweat, and she gagged again. Then he unzipped his trousers and displayed his penis to her, jerking her head this way and that each time she tried to look away.

  Ripping the pants of her pyjamas away with one hand, he masturbated with the other. Then when it was hard, he tried to force his penis into her. She tightened every muscle. Whatever he did to her, she wasn’t going to let him have this. She had wanted to save herself for Gareth on their wedding night. He didn’t want her now, but she’d be damned if her brother was going to take her virginity.

  He punched her in the face when he couldn’t get it in, but she was beyond caring. He was an animal, a cruel sadistic monster, who had allowed their father to be hanged for killing two women he loved. Her virginity was all she had left and she would fight to keep it.

  Suddenly there was a roaring, bellowing sound. For a moment she thought it was Seth, but as she jerked her head round she saw a figure hurtling towards them like a wild bull.

  Seth backed away, taken by surprise. He scrabbled for the shotgun that was still slung across his back. But he wasn’t fast enough. The figure leapt at him, sending him flying backwards on to the ground, threw himself on top of him and began beating at his head and face with a heavy stick.

  It wasn’t until her rescuer sobbed that Rosie realized it was Donald.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Pandemonium broke out in the woods. Shouting male voices, feet thundering through the undergrowth and dancing lights came from every direction to vie with the thunder, lightning and drumming rain. Rosie tried to scream to direct them to her, but the sound was only in her head and she choked again and again as the rag in her mouth was sucked deeper into her throat.

  But Donald was yelling for her. In a flash of lightning Rosie saw him clearly. He was sitting astride Seth, head thrown back, roaring like a wounded lion.

  All at once uniformed men appeared. She saw the glint of silver buttons, faces ghostly-white in the light of their torches, and the trees seemed to spin before her eyes.

  ‘You’re safe now,’ a gruff voice said, and his hands felt warm against her cold, wet cheeks as he untied the rag around her head and mouth. As he pulled the second rag from her mouth, the screams she’d stored up burst o
ut.

  ‘Steady now,’ the policeman said. ‘I’m going to untie you.’

  ‘Donald,’ she yelled. Her line of vision was obscured by the policeman’s big shoulders, and now she was safe she had to make sure Donald was too.

  ‘He’s fine,’ the policeman said, glancing over his shoulder to where his colleagues surrounded Donald and Seth. ‘Don’t you worry about a thing. It’s all over now.’

  Those words ‘It’s all over now’ kept repeating in her head as she was wrapped in someone’s coat and lifted up by strong arms. Her father had often said them when he woke her from a nightmare as a small child. Sergeant Headly had said them as he carried her into Bridgwater Infirmary. Miss Pemberton and Thomas had both uttered them after her ordeal at Carrington Hall. But was it really over this time? Or was there more to come?

  ‘You’re the bravest man I ever met,’ Thomas said as he washed Donald’s hair for him in the bath. It was dawn now: the storm was over and a fresh wind was driving away the last of the cloud. Thomas wished he could wipe out the terrible images which the police, Donald and Rosie herself had imprinted on his mind in the last hour or two, as easily as he could rinse away the mud from this boy’s hair.

  Donald’s eyes shone and his grin stretched from ear to ear. ‘I had to stop that bad man,’ he said. ‘He was hurting Rosie.’

  Thomas gulped and turned away so Donald wouldn’t see his tears.

  When the police had come back to the house, one of them carrying Rosie in his arms, for one split second he had thought she was dead. Reason immediately prevailed, however: policemen didn’t carry dead bodies into anyone’s house. But she looked like a rag doll wrapped in a coat, her hideously scratched, mud-daubed legs dangling lifelessly over the man’s arms.