Rosie Read online

  Alan cringed back into the car, arms held up to protect his head from the expected blows. His white face was taut with terror and he was quivering.

  ‘Its okay, sonny,’ Headly reassured him. ‘I’m not cross with you and I don’t smack little children. Come on out a minute.’

  Alan moved only slightly, but enough for Headly to see he had a big, dark stain on his grey flannel shorts, and urine was dripping down his skinny legs.

  ‘Don’t worry about your trousers,’ Headly said. ‘We’ll find something for you down at the station. You are a good boy to do what your sister told you. So come on out here and tell me all about it.’

  When Thomas Farley had called in at the police station in Bridgwater almost three weeks earlier and told Headly the story about his sister and her child, the Sergeant’s first reaction was that it wasn’t a police matter, but something social workers could deal with.

  During the war a great many young women had come from the big cities to the area for one reason or another. Some of these women had got themselves into trouble and in a few cases they had vanished leaving the baby behind them. As far as Headly could see the only thing separating Heather from these other women was that she hadn’t abandoned the child in a church, field, or shop, but left him with his father.

  But there was something very upright and straightforward about Farley. He had an exemplary war record. Headly felt he owed the man a full report.

  ‘Let’s slip these off,’ Headly said, unbuttoning the boy’s trousers for him there by the side of the road. ‘I expect your shirt will keep you decent.’

  As Headly removed the wet shorts and underpants, he saw tell-tale marks of an old beating across the boy’s bony buttocks. He lifted Alan’s shirt and saw that his back was criss-crossed with thick brown scars, probably at least a couple of weeks old now and therefore healing over. But whoever gave him the beating had broken the skin at the time.

  ‘Who beat you, Alan?’ Headly tried to keep his voice light, even though he was consumed with a fierce anger.

  ‘My dad.’ Alan’s eyes filled with tears and spilled over. ‘Rosie said I was to tell you so he couldn’t do it again.’

  Headly picked him up and held him tightly to his chest. He looked hard at Nutting who was still sitting in the passenger seat, staring straight ahead. He thought the constable needed a kick up the pants, but this wasn’t the moment. ‘You drive, Constable,’ he said. ‘The boy can sit on my lap.’

  At five that afternoon, Headly once again drove out to Catcott. This time he wasn’t accompanied by PC Nutting, but by Detective Inspector Dunn from CID. Their intention was to inform Cole Parker that Alan was in the care of the local authority and warn him that charges of cruelty to a child were likely to be laid against him. Although Headly was far from happy that a child had to be hurt before he could prevail upon a senior officer to take a more active interest in his investigation into Cole Parker’s activities, he was certainly glad of a good reason to be returning to May Cottage. Detective Inspector Dunn was a hard-headed man, unlikely to be taken in by Parker’s charm. He’d chalked up thirty years with the force and like Headly he followed hunches.

  Alan was now safely and quite happily in the care of Miss Pemberton, the local social worker, and on his way to a temporary foster home in Taunton. He had been very upset at first to find himself the focus of so much attention, and he kept asking when he’d see Rosie again. But by the time he’d been washed and found some dry clothes and given some dinner, and realized that he wasn’t about to be punished in any way, he had become quite talkative.

  To police officers with children of their own who had never done more than give their offspring the odd clout or smack on the leg, it was horrifying to find such a young child totally unaware that all children were not beaten with sticks for merely wetting the bed or dropping an egg. Again and again Alan’s reports on both his brothers’ and father’s behaviour were slanted as if he thought himself entirely bad and therefore deserving of such treatment. When asked if Rosie was beaten too, he admitted that she was sometimes, but not so often as him because she was a girl and anyway she looked after them all.

  ‘Have you ever known a man left alone with a child who didn’t report the mother missing, sir?’ Headly asked some minutes into their journey.

  Dunn shook his head. He was fifty-seven, but looked younger, with cold grey eyes, thin lips and a full head of dark brown hair. His wife had once commented that the reason he stayed looking so young was because he didn’t have any emotion. She was probably right; he didn’t get worked up like other men. He looked at things calmly and logically.

  Since Headly came back this morning with the boy, he’d studied Parker’s record scrupulously. Aside from several fines for poaching and a six-month spell in Shepton Mallet prison for assault, way before the war, Parker had somehow managed to wriggle out of all the many other charges brought against him over the years. He’d been accused of black-marketeering and looting during the war, burglary and innumerable assaults, in many of which the victims were so badly hurt they had needed hospitalization. But all charges had been dropped. All too often the witnesses seemed unable to attend the court, or to make a positive identification, and in two cases the arresting officers backed down from their original statements.

  ‘Parker certainly isn’t the rough diamond PC Nutting took him for,’ Dunn said scathingly. ‘Damn fool! If he knew three women had disappeared from that house, why the hell didn’t he bring our attention to it?’

  Headly thought carefully before speaking. Privately he thought Nutting to be a little dense and extremely unobservant, but at the same time he had a little sympathy for him. It was hard getting anything out of people who lived on the Levels; they were an insular and closed community who did not readily speak out against one of their own.

  ‘I think you might understand why Nutting overlooked it once you’ve met Parker,’ Headly said. ‘He can be a likeable bloke and on the face of it he is devoted to all his kids.’

  ‘I’ll bear that in mind,’ Dunn said. ‘But I’ve got no intention of pussy-footing around with this family. I want the whole lot of them brought in for questioning. The girl included.’

  *

  The ancient pickup truck piled high with Anderson shelters was gone from the grass verge where it had been that morning.

  ‘Looks like we’re out of luck,’ Headly said as he pulled up in front of the cottage. ‘His truck’s gone.’

  ‘Or in luck.’ Dunn raised one eyebrow and grinned sardonically. ‘It gives us a chance to poke around.’

  Headly led Dunn straight round to the back yard. There was absolute silence, aside from the clucking of hens, but the back door was open.

  Headly knocked but when no one came he stepped straight in, stopping in surprise at the mess on the table. A piece of ham lay on a plate, a few flies buzzing round it, and bread, butter, cheese and pots of pickles with the tops off were left there amongst the crumbs. It gave the impression that someone had snatched a meal in haste, before running out. Could they be out looking for Alan?

  ‘Is there anyone home?’ Dunn bellowed out.

  Headly went out again into the back yard and looked thoughtfully at the enamel bowl lying upturned by the gate and the spilt raspberries. He went back inside and pointed it out through the window to Dunn.

  ‘Rosie had that in her hands when we said goodbye this morning,’ he said. ‘I don’t understand why she would just leave them there if she’d spilt them? Unless of course her father whacked it out of her hands, then gave her a beating.’

  He suddenly felt afraid. Not for himself, but for Rosie. She’d organized getting Alan away; it was very likely she’d been punished for it.

  Dunn was infected by the Sergeant’s anxiety and opened the narrow door to the stairs. ‘Anyone up there?’ he yelled.

  Headly pushed past him. The hunch he’d had even before seeing Alan’s scars was growing stronger. He could feel something very wrong here.

  He too
k the stairs two at a time, Dunn followed closely behind him, their heavy boots falling noisily on the bare wood. He glanced in the first bedroom, but it was empty, a double bed neatly made. In the front main bedroom the bed was unmade, but it too was empty. He rushed to the third one at the back and pushed open the closed door.

  His exclamation of horror and that of Dunn, behind him, were simultaneous. Rosie was lying spread-eagled, face down across one of the two unmade beds. Her dress was pulled up over her waist, knickers wrenched down and her small naked buttocks were covered in glistening red weals. The back of her dress was soaked in blood.

  There had been a violent struggle in the room. A camp bed lay in pieces on the floor, a dressing table was overturned. There was also a strong smell of urine, worse than a public urinal on a Saturday night.

  Headly leapt over to Rosie and took her pulse. ‘She’s alive! Rosie! Can you hear me?’ he asked as he gingerly opened the buttons on the back of her dress. The blood was already congealing so that the material was sticking to her wounds. He felt he was to blame for this terrible beating. He hadn’t given a thought as to what might happen to Rosie when her father found out Alan was gone. But he should have! Why hadn’t he taken Alan to safety, then come right back here immediately?

  A low groan proved she was conscious, and her head moved slightly so both men could just glimpse her slit-like eye in a mound of red raw tissue.

  She seemed to recognize Headly. ‘Will you take me away too?’ she croaked.

  Contrary to everything he’d ever learned about first aid, Headly hauled her up enough to get his shoulder beneath her chest in a fireman’s lift, straightened up and made for the stairs.

  ‘We should call an ambulance,’ Dunn said, putting a restraining hand on his shoulder.

  ‘Maybe,’ Headly grunted. ‘But do you want to leave her here another minute?’

  *

  Dr Willis stared down at the lacerated back and buttocks of the young girl in cubicle two of the casualty department in Bridgwater Infirmary and winced. Sister had already cleaned the wounds and he’d seen far worse injuries during the war when he was an intern at Bristol Royal Infirmary, yet the knowledge that a father could inflict such a beating on his daughter made his blood run cold.

  ‘How are you feeling, Rosie?’ he said, patting her bare arm. Sister had already said that the girl hadn’t even whimpered as her dress was eased from her back. She had just lain there face down, hiding her face with her hand.

  ‘A bit better now,’ she whispered.

  ‘It’s going to be sore for a few days,’ he said, wondering how anyone so small and young could be so stoic. ‘But I’m going to put a dressing on your back and give you something for the pain, then we’ll take you up to a ward.’

  ‘It wasn’t my dad that did it,’ she said, lifting her head a little and squinting at him. Both her eyes were buried in puffy flesh; she’d have two shiners by the morning. ‘He hit me so I’d tell him where Alan had gone. But it was Seth who beat me after Dad had gone out.’

  Rosie had been aware that the man who carried her downstairs and out to a car was the policeman with the moustache who’d been with Ernie Nutting that morning, but she hurt so much she couldn’t say anything. It was as if she had a red-hot iron on her back and all she could concentrate on was the hope that soon someone would remove it.

  She didn’t know or care where they were taking her to, it was all a jumble of shooting pain and being jolted around as she lay across the policeman’s lap. But once she was brought in here and the nurse bathed her back, the pain had retreated enough for her to remember clearly what had happened.

  Cole had struck her across the face when she said she didn’t know where Alan had gone. They were still out in the yard and she’d fallen back against the fence with the force of his blow.

  ‘Tell me where he is!’ Cole shouted at her, pulling her up by the shoulders. ‘Don’t play stupid games with me!’

  Something snapped inside Rosie. She didn’t even care if he hit her again. ‘I told him to get in the police car. I told him to tell the police all the things you and the boys do to him so they’ll take him away for good and let him live with his uncle.’

  She had wanted to see him frightened, but his reaction to what she’d said floored her. He just backed away from her and slumped down on to the settle, holding his head in his hands.

  Rosie couldn’t stop then, everything she’d bottled up for years came out in a torrent. ‘Heather was lovely and you made her run away. You made my mother go too and you lied to me when you said she died in London. All I do is work here, cooking and cleaning. I don’t have any nice clothes, books to read and I haven’t any friends, and I’m scared of Seth and Norman in case they do what they did to Heather, to me.’

  He still had his head in his hands but at that last sentence he jerked up quickly. ‘Whass that? What did the boys do to Heather?’

  Something told her then that she’d gone too far, but there was no turning back now. ‘Sexing her,’ she said, not knowing what the right word for it was. ‘I saw them both forcing her. Heather was crying. And Seth scares me most because he’s always touching me here.’ She put her hands on her breast. ‘He says he’s just checking to see if I’m ripe for it yet.’

  Cole got up. Rosie thought he was going to hit her again and she was off out the gate and down the road running as fast as she could.

  But her bare feet stopped her; the stones hurt and when she paused to look back, fully expecting Cole to be just a few feet behind her, there was no sign of him. The lane was deserted. Reason got the better of her: she couldn’t go to the village without shoes, and Cole couldn’t be that angry with her if he hadn’t chased her, so she went back.

  As she crept round the junk she could hear her father shouting, so for safety’s sake she crouched down behind the old tractor and listened.

  ‘Rosie’s lying, Dad. We never did that to Heather.’ Seth’s voice was high and whining. ‘She’s trying to shift blame on to us because she told on you to the police.’

  ‘She ain’t lying,’ Cole roared at him. ‘No one would even think of something like that unless they’d seen it. You fuckin’ animals. And what’s this about you touching Rosie up? She’s your sister, for Christ’s sake!’

  There was a whistling noise and a crack followed by a yelp. Rosie realized the sound was her father’s leather belt and he was laying into both boys with it.

  There was pandemonium up in that room, yells, swearing, thuds and scuffling. She heard something crash, then a part of Alan’s camp bed came hurtling through the window. Rosie had heard enough. She wriggled out of her hiding place and ran for it, down through the junk yard and out on to the moor.

  She dangled her feet in a ditch, and wiped away the tears trickling down her cheeks. She felt so small, so alone and scared. She wasn’t sorry she’d sent Alan away; at least he was safe, but without him to cuddle and care for what had she left? Long, lonely days of washing, cleaning and cooking, no trips to the school to break it up, no one to tell stories to, no one to help her feed the chickens or get them back into the henhouse. No purpose in her life other than trying to appease three men who took everything she did for granted.

  The grass around her was so long now that her eyes were on a level with the feathery fronds on the top. Looking around her it was almost like being in the middle of an ocean, with the wind creating waves and ripples. In the past this sight had pleased her, but today it made her feel as though she was drowning. And there was no one anywhere to hold out a helping hand.

  She guessed by the position of the sun that it was around two when she made for home. There was no point in staying out any longer. She had all the men’s dirty work clothes to wash, she hadn’t even made their beds yet today and they’d only get angrier if she was late starting the evening meal.

  The mess she found in the kitchen cheered her a little. It meant they had all gone out in a hurry, probably to Bristol to dispose of the Anderson shelters. She sighed with
relief; at least she’d have some peace until tea time and if they got a good price for the shelters they might just forgive her about Alan and all she’d said.

  She ran upstairs to collect all the dirty clothes.

  There was nothing to warn her she wasn’t alone in the house. Not a sound from anywhere. But as she walked into the boys’ bedroom the door slammed shut behind her.

  Seth was there. She smelled him even before he spoke.

  ‘So you came back then? You little bitch,’ he snarled.

  He was standing behind the now shut door, wearing only a pair of trousers. His right eye was red and swollen, he had congealed blood on his lip and there were bright red weals on his shoulders and chest from Cole’s belt. In his hands he held the thin stick he always used to terrorize Alan.

  ‘I th-thought you’d g-g-gone out with Dad,’ she stammered. As usual the smell of stale urine was overpowering in the small room.

  ‘How can I go anywhere looking like this?’ he said. ‘And it’s all your fault, so I’m gonna teach you not to tell tales.’

  There was nowhere to run to. She backed away from him over a pile of dirty clothes towards the window where the broken remains of Alan’s camp bed lay and, finding herself trapped, she covered her head with her hands protectively.

  ‘Please don’t hit me, Seth,’ she begged, but such a plea was pointless for Seth was already raising the cane.

  He swiped and swiped at her bare arms, first one, then the other, making her hop with the pain.

  ‘Hurts, don’t it?’ he taunted her, prodding her cheek with the tip, then flicking it back to her side to hit that too. ‘It’s going to get a lot worse before I’ve finished.’

  Seth had always been a bully, but now she saw that inflicting pain actually excited him; he was flushed with it, grinning menacingly.

  Rosie tried to make a run for it as he raised his arm to bring the cane down harder, but as she tried to dodge him she tripped on the pile of clothes on the floor and fell sideways on to Norman’s unmade bed.