Written In Blood

10-1

10

After leaving Oliver Ryder’s house, Mitchell and Melissa drove out to the Goulding’s house, which was on the edge of the village. Melissa wasn’t sure what they were doing there, but didn’t ask, she was sure she would find out soon enough without doing so.

“Sergeant, constable.”

The strong, Germanic accent of Anna Becker, the Gouldings’ housekeeper, could not entirely mask her concern at finding the two police officers on the doorstep. “Have you found Lucy? I’ve heard about poor Georgina; it’s so terrible, her parents must be devastated. Nothing’s happened to Lucy, has it?”

“Not as far as we know,” Mitchell told her reassuringly. “We haven’t found Lucy, but we don’t have any reason for thinking anything has happened to her. We’re here to talk to you and Mrs Goulding, she is home, isn’t she?”

Anna Becker nodded. “She is. I’ll ask if she will see you.”

Mitchell was not happy to be left to wait on the doorstep, fortunately, he did not have to wait long.

“Mrs Goulding will see you,” Anna said when she returned.

“Good mor...” Mitchell started to say when he was shown into the office, he cut himself off when he saw that Theresa Goulding was on the phone.

“Anna said you wish to speak to me,” Theresa said once she had hung up the phone. “I assume, since you don’t have her with you, that you haven’t yet found Lucy.”

“No, not yet,” Mitchell admitted, not that he could pretend otherwise. “We’re investigating, though, to try and work out where she could have gone.”

“I hope you are having more success than you did when you investigated Georgina Ryder’s disappearance.” Theresa’s voice betrayed her doubts. “I understand that if it was not for Mr Wild, you would still be in the dark as to the whereabouts of that poor girl, and that you have no idea who is responsible for attacking her.”

Mitchell was not surprised that news of the morning’s discovery had reached Theresa, he was sure everyone in the village had heard about it by now.

“Do you know Mr Wild?” he asked, thinking that if she did it would lend weight to the theory that Lucy had returned to the village the previous afternoon to see the author.

“No, we haven’t met, yet,” Theresa dashed his hopes. “Though I have written to him regarding the charity event I am organising for next month. I don’t see that that has any relevance to Lucy’s disappearance, however, unless there’s something you need to tell me.” She fixed Mitchell with a look that would have done an interrogator proud.

“At this stage, we have nothing definite,” Mitchell told her. “But we have spoken to several people already about Lucy and her last known movements. Kelly told us she saw Lucy yesterday lunchtime, leaving school, and that she didn’t return for the afternoon session.”

“I was already aware of that. In fact, I told Inspector Stevens as much when he called to see if Lucy had returned home, as if I wouldn’t have called him straight away if she had. Surely you haven’t come here to tell me what I already know.”

Mitchell shook his head vigorously. “No, of course not, but I assume, when you spoke to Kelly...”

“I didn’t speak to Kelly,” Theresa said quickly. “It was Anna who called Lucy’s friends.”

“Yes, of course, Kelly did say as much, she also told us that as far as she knows, Lucy left school at lunchtime to return here to Oakhurst, so she could meet someone; she couldn’t say who though, Lucy didn’t tell her.”

Theresa responded to that without hesitation. “It must be Oliver Ryder. I can’t tell you how many times her father and I have spoken to her about that hooligan – too many times. I swear, she only goes out with him to annoy us. If Sir Virgil should ever find out the sort of person she is seeing, well, I don’t know how he would react, but he wouldn’t be happy. Have you spoken to him yet?”

“Sir Virgil?” Mitchell couldn’t think why he should speak to the famously tough entrepreneur.

“Oliver Ryder. Why on Earth would you think I meant Sir Virgil?” Theresa gave Mitchell no chance to answer the question. “Surely you realise that Oliver has to be your prime suspect in Georgina’s...her murder,” her voice stumbled for a moment, “and Lucy’s disappearance. You’ve never been the brightest of people, Lewis, but even you must see the connection; first his cousin disappears, after apparently leaving his house, and then Lucy, his - his girlfriend, disappears after leaving school early to come back to the village to see him.”

“We don’t know that it was Oliver Lucy came back to see,” Mitchell said, not reacting to Theresa’s out of character display of emotion. “But we will be asking him about Lucy, and about Georgina, just as soon as we catch up with him. First, though, we have some questions we need to ask you, and we need to take a look around Lucy’s room.”

“What on Earth for?” Theresa asked, startled. “Surely you don’t think you’ll find Lucy there. I can assure you, it was the first place Anna and I looked.”

Mitchell hastened to reassure Theresa. “Of course not, but we do need to search the room for anything that might tell us who Lucy was coming back to see.” He continued hurriedly when he saw that Theresa was about to speak again, “Kelly couldn’t tell us who that was, but Lucy did, apparently, indicate that the person she was meeting was someone who could make her dreams come true. Her dream, as far as Kelly is aware, being writing. Because of that, we believe she may have been intending to meet Mr Wild; we want to see if there’s anything in Lucy’s room that might indicate she knew, or had any connection with, Mr Zack Wild.”

The startled look on Theresa’s face grew. “Writing? Are you talking about Lucy’s scribblings?” She shook her head in disbelief. “You can’t believe she has a dream that has anything to do with writing. The only things Lucy dreams about are money, shopping, and causing problems for her father and me.”

“You may be right,” Mitchell said. “But we still need to check to be sure. And if it isn’t Mr Wild she was coming back to see, we might be able to find out if it was Oliver Ryder, or someone else. We might also be able to find out if there’s anyone we should be talking to that we haven’t previously thought of, anyone that might have a grudge against Lucy.”

Briefly, Theresa looked as though she was going to debate the suggestion that someone could have a grudge against her daughter. “Very well, do whatever you need to,” she said finally.

“Thank you.” Mitchell was about to leave the office when he thought of something. “If you don’t mind, can you tell us where you were yesterday afternoon, from about half one onwards?” He figured that was the earliest Lucy could have made it back to the village.

Theresa looked mortally offended. “Are you trying to suggest that I may have had something to do with Lucy’s disappearance?”

“No, of course not,” Mitchell said hastily. “I didn’t mean that at all. I just want to find out where everyone was, so I can be certain of their movements.”

Theresa did not look mollified, but she did deign to answer him after a brief pause. “I was in town from ten o’clock yesterday morning until a little after five. I was in a meeting with Beth Weald from Action on Homelessness until about midday, and after that I was working with the committee to organise the event we are running next month. If you wish to check, you’ll find that I have more than half a dozen witnesses, including Anna – she was there to help me.”

“Thank you, that saves me asking Anna where she was,” Mitchell remarked. “I’ll try and finish my search of Lucy’s room as quickly as possible so I can get out of your hair”

**