Last Seen Wearing Part 3

'Lewis? Morse here.'

'Ah. Morning, sir.'

'Lewis, do you take the Sunday Times?'

"Fraid not, sir. We have the Sunday Mirror.' He sounded somewhat apologetic about his Sabbath-day reading.

'Oh.'

'I could get you a copy, I suppose.'

'I've got today's. I want the copy for August the twenty-fourth.'

It was Sergeant Lewis's turn to say, 'Oh.'

'I can't really understand an intelligent man like you, Lewis, not taking a decent Sunday newspaper.'

'The sport's pretty good in the Sunday Mirror, sir.'

'Is it? You'd better bring it along with you in the morning, then.'

Lewis brightened. 'I won't forget.'

Morse thanked him and rang off. He had almost said he would swop it for his own copy of the News of the World, but considered it not improper to conceal from his subordinates certain aspects of his own depravity.

He could always get a back copy from the Reference Library. It could wait, he told himself. And yet it couldn't wait. Again he read the letter from the parents of the prodigal daughter. They would be extra-pleased now, with a letter in the newspaper, to boot. Dad would probably cut it out and keep it in his wallet - now that the family unit was functioning once more. We were all so vain.

Cuttings, clippings and that sort of thing. Morse still kept his batting averages somewhere ...

And suddenly it hit him. It all fitted. Four or five weeks ago Ainley had resurrected the Taylor case of his own accord and pursued it in his own spare time. Some reporter had been along to Thames Valley Police and got Ainley to spill the beans on the Taylor girl. Ainley had given him the facts (no fancies with Ainley!) and somehow, as a result of seeing the facts again, he had spotted something that he had missed before. It was just like doing a crossword puzzle. Get stuck. Leave it for ten minutes. Try again - and eureka! It happened to everyone like that. And, he repeated to himself, Ainley had seen something new. That must be it.

As a corollary to this, it occurred to Morse that if Ainley had taken a hand in the article, not only would Valerie Taylor have been one of the missing girls featured, but Ainley himself would almost certainly have kept the printed article - just as surely as Mr J. Richardson would be sticking his own printed letter into his Kidderminster wallet.

He rang Mrs Ainley. 'Eileen?' (Right this time.) 'Morse here. Look, do you happen to have kept that bit of the Sunday Times - you know, that bit about missing girls?'

"You mean the one they saw Richard about?' He had been right.

'That's the one.'

'Yes. I kept it, of course. It mentioned Richard several times.'

'Can I, er, can I come round and have a look at it?'

"You can have it with pleasure. I don't want it any more.'

Some half an hour later, forgetful of his earlier pledge, Morse was seated with a pint of flat beer and a soggy steak-and-mushroom pie. He read the article through with a feeling of anticlimax. Six girls were featured - after the preliminary sociological blurb about the problems of adolescence - with a couple of columns on each of them. But the central slant was on the parents the girls had left behind them. "The light in the hall has been left on every night since she went,' as one of the anguished mothers was reported. It was pathetic and it was distressing. There were pictures, too. First, pictures of the girls, although (of necessity) none of the photographs was of a very recent vintage, and two or three (including that of Valerie herself) were of less than definitive clarity. And thus it was for the first time that Chief Inspector Morse looked down upon the face of Valerie Taylor. Of the six she would certainly be in the running for the beauty crown - though run close by a honey of a girl from Brighton. Attractive face, full mouth, come-hither eyes, nice eyebrows (plucked, thought Morse) and long dark-brown hair. Just the face - no figure to admire.

And then, over the page, the pictures of the parents. Mr and Mrs Taylor seemed an unremarkable pair, seated unnaturally forward on the shabby sofa: Mr wearing a cheap Woolworth tie, with his rolled-up sleeves revealing a large purple tattoo on his broad right forearm; Mrs wearing a plain cotton dress with a cameo brooch somewhat ostentatiously pinned to the collar. And on a low table beside them, carefully brought into the focus of the photograph, a cohort of congratulatory cards for their eighteenth wedding anniversary. It was predictable and posed, and Morse felt that a few tears might well have been nearer the truth.

He ordered another pint and sat down to read the commentary on Valerie's disappearance.

Two years ago, the month of June enjoyed a long, unbroken spell of sunny weather; Tuesday 10 June was a particularly sweltering day at the village of Kidlington in the county of Oxfords.h.i.+re.

Valerie disliked school dinners and had returned home each lunch-time At 12.30 p.m. Valerie Taylor left the Roger Bacon Comprehensive School to walk to her home in Hatfield Way on the council estate nearby, no more than six or seven hundred yards from the school On the day of her daughter's disappearance Valerie's mother, Mrs Grace Taylor, had prepared a ham salad, with blackcurrant tart and custard for sweet, mother and daughter ate the meal at the kitchen table.

Afternoon lessons began again at 1.45, and Valerie usually left the house at about 1.25 Nothing seemed amiss that cloudless Tuesday afternoon as Valerie walked down that path so Like many of her friends Valerie walked down the short front path, turned in the direction of the school, and waved a cheery farewell to her mother. She has never been seen again.

Mr George Taylor, an employee of the Oxford City Corporation, returned from work at 6.10 p.m.

to find his wife in a state of considerable anxiety. It was quite unlike Valerie not to tell her mother if she was likely to be late, yet at that point there seemed little cause for immediate concern. The minutes ticked by; the quarters chimed on the Taylors' grandfather clock, and then the hours. At 8.00 p.m. Mr Taylor got into his car and drove to the school. Only the caretaker was still on the premises and he could be of no help. Mr Taylor then called at the homes of several of Valerie's friends, but they likewise could tell him nothing. None of them could remember seeing Valerie that afternoon, but it had been 'games' and it was nothing unusual for pupils to slip away quietly from the sports field.

When Mr Taylor returned home it was 9.00 p.m. 'There must be some simple explanation,' he told his wife; but if there was, it was not forthcoming, and the time pressed slowly on. 10.00 p.m.

11.00 p.m. Still nothing. George Taylor suggested they should notify the police, but his wife was terrified of taking such a step.

When I interviewed them this week both Mr and Mrs Taylor were reluctant (and understandably so) to talk about the agonies they suffered that night. Throughout the long vigil it was Grace Taylor who feared the worst and suffered the most, for her husband felt sure that Valerie had gone off with some boyfriend and would be back the next morning. At 4.00 a.m. he managed to persuade his wife to take two sleeping tablets and he took her upstairs to bed.

She was sleeping when he left the house at 7.30 a.m., leaving a note saying that he would be back at lunch-time, and that if Valerie still had not returned they would have to call the vital dues thrown to the wind -police. In fact the police were and all because parents think notified earlier than that. Mrs they will be wasting the time of Taylor had awoken at about the police and would seem to nine and, in a distraught state, look foolish if the wayward off-had rung them from a neigh- spring should suddenly turn up hour's telephone.

whilst the police were busy Detective Chief Inspector Ainley of the Thames Valley Police was put in charge of the case, and intensive inquiries were immediately begun. During the course of the next week the whole of the area in the vicinity of Valerie's home and the area of woodland behind the school were searched with painstaking care and patience; the river and the reservoir were dragged ... But no trace was found of Valerie Taylor. Inspector Ainley himself was frankly critical of the delay. At least twelve hours had been lost; fifteen, if the police had been notified as soon as the Taylors'

anxiety had begun to deepen into genuine alarm. Such delay is a common feature of the cases a.s.sembled here.

Vital time lost; perhaps taking statements. It is a common human weakness, and it is only too easy to blame parents like the Taylors. But would we ourselves have acted all that differently? I knew exactly what Mrs Taylor meant when she said to me, 'I felt all the time that if we called the police something dreadful must have happened.' Illogical, you may say, but so very understandable, Mr and Mrs Taylor still live on the council estate in Hatfield Way.

For over two years now they have waited and prayed for their daughter to return, As in the five other cases discussed here, the police files remain open.

'No,' said Inspector Ainley, 'we shan't be closing them until we find her.'

Not bad reporting, thought Morse. There were several things in the article that puzzled him slightly, but he deliberately suppressed the fanciful notions that began to flood his mind. He had been right earlier. When Ainley had got the hard facts down on paper, he had spotted something that for over two years had lurked in the darkness and eluded his grasp. Some clue or other which had monopolized his attention and filled his spare time, and eventually, if indirectly, led to his death.

Just stick to the facts, Morse, stick to the facts! It would be difficult, but he would try. And tomorrow he and Lewis would start on the files wherein lay the facts as Ainley had gleaned them. Anyway, Christine was back in Kidderminster and, like as not, Valerie would be back in Kidlington before the end of the month. The naughty girls were all coming home and would soon be having the same sort of rows they'd had with mum and dad before they left. Life, alas, was like that.

Over his third pint of beer Morse could stem the flood of fancy no longer. He read the article through quickly once again. Yes, there was something wrong here. Only a small thing, but he wondered if it was the same small thing that had set Ainley on a new track ... And the strangest notion began to formulate in the mind so recently dedicated to the pursuit of unembellished fact.

CHAPTER Six.

He certainly has a great deal of fancy, and a very good memory; but, with a perverse ingenuity, he employs these qualities as no other person does.

Richard Brinsley Sheridan As HE KNOCKED at the door of Morse's office Sergeant Lewis, who had thoroughly enjoyed the police routine of the previous week, wondered just what was in store for him now. He had worked with the unpredictable inspector before and got on fairly well with him; but he had his reservations.

Morse was seated in his black leather chair and before him on his untidy desk lay a green box-file.

'Ah. Come in, Lewis. I didn't want to start without you. Wouldn't be fair, would it?' He patted the box-file with a gesture of deep affection. 'It's all there, Lewis, my boy. All the facts. Ainley was a fact man - no daydreaming theorist was Ainley. And we shall follow where the great man trod.

What do you say?' And without giving his sergeant the slightest opportunity to say anything, he emptied the contents of the file face downwards upon the desk. 'Shall we start at the top or the bottom?'

'Might be a good idea to start at the beginning, don't you think, sir?'

'I think we could make out a good case for starting at either end - but we shall do as you say.'

With some difficulty Morse turned the bulky sheaf of papers the right way up.

'What exactly are we going to do?' asked Lewis blankly.

Morse proceeded to recount his interview with Strange, and then pa.s.sed across to Lewis the letter received from Valerie Taylor. 'And we're taking over, Lewis - you happy about that?' Lewis nodded half heartedly. 'Did you remember the Sunday Mirror?'

Lewis dutifully took the paper from his coat pocket and handed it to Morse, who took out his wallet, found his football coupon and with high seriousness began to check his entry. Lewis watched him as his eyes alternately lit up and switched off, before the coupon was comprehensively shredded and hurled in the general direction of the waste-paper basket.

'I shan't be spending next week in the Bahamas, Lewis. What about you?'

'Nor me, sir.'

'Do you ever win anything?'

'Few quid last year, sir. But it's a million to one chance - getting a big win.'

'Like this b.l.o.o.d.y business,' mumbled Morse, distastefully surveying the fruits of Ainley's labours.

For the next two and a half hours they sat over the Taylor doc.u.ments, occasionally conferring over an obscure or an interesting point - but for the most part in silence. It would have been clear to an independent witness of these proceedings that Morse read approximately five times as quickly as his sergeant; but whether he remembered five times as much of what he read would have been a much more questionable inference. For Morse found it difficult to concentrate his mind upon the doc.u.ments before him. As he saw it, the facts, the bare unadulterated facts, boiled down to little more than he had read in the pub the previous day. The statements before him, checked and signed, appeared merely to confirm the bald, simple truth; after leaving home to return to school Valerie Taylor had completely vanished. If Morse wanted a fact, well, he'd got one. Parents, neighbours, teachers, cla.s.smates - all had been questioned at length. And amidst all their well-meaning verbosity they all had the same thing to say - nothing. Next, reports of Ainley's own interviews with Mr and Mrs Taylor, with the headmaster, with Valerie's form tutor, with her games mistress and with two of her boyfriends. (Ainley had clearly liked the headmaster, and equally clearly had disapproved of one of the boyfriends.) All nicely, neatly written in the small, rounded hand dial Morse had already seen. But - nothing. Next, reports of general police inquiries and searches, and reports of the missing girl being spotted in Birmingham, Clacton, London, Reading, Southend, and a remote village in Moray. All wild-goose chases. All false alarms. Next, personal and medical reports on Valerie herself. She did not appear academically gifted in any way; or if she was, she had so far successfully concealed her scholastic potential from her teachers. School reports suggested a failure, except in practical subjects, to make the best of her limited abilities (familiar phrases!), but she seemed a personable enough young lady, well liked (Morse drew his own conclusions) by her fellow pupils of either s.e.x. On the day of her disappearance she was attested by school records to be seventeen years and five months old, and five feet six inches in height. In her previous academic year she had taken four CSE subjects, without signal success, and she was at that time sitting three GCE O level subjects - English, French and Applied Science.

From the medical report it appeared that Valerie was quite remarkably healthy. There were no entries on her National Health medical card for the last three years, and before that only measles and a bad cut on the index finger of her left hand. Next, a report over which Ainley had obviously (and properly) taken considerable pains, on the possibility of any trouble on the domestic front which may have caused friction between Valerie and her parents, and led to her running away from home. On this most important point Ainley had gone to the trouble of writing out two sheets of foolscap in his own fair hand; but the conclusions were negative. On the evidence of Valerie's form tutor (among whose manifold duties something designated 'pastoral care'

appeared a high priority), on the evidence of the parents themselves, of the neighbours and of Valerie's own friends, there seemed little reason to a.s.sume anything but the perfectly normal ups-and-downs in the relations.h.i.+p between the members of the Taylor clan. Rows, of course.

Valerie had been home very late once or twice from dances and discos, and Mrs Taylor could use a sharp tongue. (Who couldn't?) Ainley's own conclusion was that he could find no immediate cause within the, family circle to account for a minor squabble - let alone the inexplicable departure of an only daughter. In short - nothing.

Morse thought of the old Latin proverb. Ex nihilo nihil fit. Out of nothing you'll get nothing. Not that it helped in any way.

Apart from the typed and handwritten doc.u.ments, there were three maps: an ordnance-survey map of the Oxford district showing the areas covered by the search parties; a larger map of the Oxfords.h.i.+re region on which the major road and rail routes were marked with cryptic symbols; and finally a sketch-map of the streets between the Roger Bacon School and the Taylors' house, with Valerie's route to and from her school carefully and neatly drawn in in red biro by the late chief inspector. Whilst Lewis was plodding along, several miles behind his master, the master himself appeared to be finding something of extraordinary interest in this last item: his right hand shaded his forehead and he seemed to Lewis in the throes of the deepest contemplation.

'Found something, sir?'

'Uh? What?' Morse's head jerked back and the idle daydream was over.

'The sketch-map, sir.'

'Ah, yes. The map. Very interesting. Yes.' He looked at it again, decided that he was unable to recapture whatever interest may have previously lain therein and picked up the Sunday Mirror once more. He read his horoscope: 'You're doing better thany ou realize, so there could be a major breakthrough as far as romance is concerned. This week will certainly blossom if you spend it with someone witty and bright.'

He looked glumly across at Lewis, who for the moment at least appeared neither very witty nor very bright 'Well, Lewis. What do you think?'

'I've not quite finished yet, sir.'

'But you must have some ideas, surely.'

'Not yet.'

'Oh, come on. What do you think happened to her?'

Lewis thought hard, and finally gave expression to a conviction which had grown steadily stronger the more he had read. 'I think she got a lift and ended up in London. That's where they all end up.'

"You think she's still alive, then?'

Lewis looked at his chief in some surprise. 'Don't you?'

'Let's go for a drink,' said Morse.

They walked out of the Thames Valley HQ and at the Belisha crossing negotiated the busy main road that linked Oxford with Banbury.

'Where are we going, sir?'

Morse took Ainley's hand-drawn map from his pocket. 'I thought we ought to take a gentle stroll over the ground, Lewis. You never know.'

The council estate was situated off the main road, to their left as they walked away from Oxford, and very soon they stood in Hatfield Way.

'We going to call?'

- 'Got to make a start somewhere, I suppose,' said Morse.

The house was a neat, well-built property, with a circular rose-bed cut into the centre of the well-tended front lawn. Morse rang the bell, and rang again. It seemed that Mrs Taylor was out.

Inquisitively Morse peered through the front window, but could see little more than a large, red settee and a diagonal line of ducks winging their inevitable way towards the ceiling. The two men walked away, carefully closing the gate behind them.

'If I remember rightly, Lewis, there's a pub just around the corner.'

They ordered a cheese cob and a pint apiece and Morse handed to Lewis the Colour Supplement of 24 August.

'Have a quick look at that.'

Ten minutes later, with Morse's gla.s.s empty and Lewis's barely touched, it was clear that the quick look was becoming a rather long look, and Morse replenished his own gla.s.s with some impatience.

'Well? What's troubling you?'

'They haven't got it quite right, though, have they?'

Morse looked at him sharply. 'What's that supposed to mean?'

'Well. It says here that she was never seen again after leaving the house.'

'She wasn't.'