first and last chance to celebrate alone, Anne had done her best to persuade their families that a Boxing Day get-together would be just the ticket. She had failed. As it was, they’d barely escaped George’s sister, his brother-in-law and their three small children.
Still, it had been a wonderful lunch. Anne had been planning and working for weeks ahead to make everything run smoothly. Not even Alison Carter’s disappearance could dent her determination that her first Christmas in her own home would be exemplary. And it had been. Once the presents were opened and he’d made the appropriate expressions of delight over socks, shirts, sweaters and cigarettes, George had had little to do except make sure everyone’s glass was topped up with sherry and Babycham for the women, bottled beer for the men.
As they’d decided in advance, they revealed Anne’s pregnancy after the Queen’s speech. The mothers rivalled each other in their excitement and, using the washing-up as an excuse, soon disappeared into the kitchen to give the mother-to-be the benefit of their counsel. Anne’s father congratulated George gruffly then settled down with a celebratory brandy and cigar to watch TV. George and his father Arthur remained at the dining table. As usual, they were not entirely comfortable with each other, but the news of the baby had bridged some of the distance a university degree had put between George and his train-driver father.
‘You’re looking tired, lad,’ Arthur said.
‘It’s been a hard couple of weeks.’
‘That missing lass, is it?’
George nodded. ‘Alison Carter. We’ve all been putting the hours in, but we’re not a lot further forward than we were the night she went missing.’
‘Did I not read somewhere in the papers that you’d found some of her clothes?’ Arthur asked, sending a perfect smoke ring heading for the light fitting.
‘That’s right. In a disused lead mine. But all that’s really told us is that she definitely didn’t run away. It hasn’t brought us any closer to finding out what really happened or where she is now. Except that we also found a couple of bullets embedded in the limestone,’ he added. ‘One was mangled beyond recognition, but we were lucky with the other one. It went into a crack in the limestone wall, so the forensics boys got it out more or less intact. If we ever find the gun it came from, we’ll be able to make a positive identification.’
His father sipped his brandy and shook his head sadly. ‘Poor lass. She’s not going to be alive when you find her, is she?’
George sighed. ‘You wouldn’t find a bookie to give you odds on it. It’s been keeping me awake nights. Especially with Anne in her condition. It changes things, doesn’t it? I’d never given it much thought before. You know how it is – you reckon you’ll find the right girl, get married, have a family. It’s the way things go if you’re lucky. But I’d never sat down and thought about what it would mean to be a father. But knowing that it’s going to happen, and finding it out in the middle of an investigation like this…Well, you can’t help thinking how you’d be feeling if it was your kid.’
‘Aye.’ His father breathed heavily through his nostrils. ‘You’re right, George. Having a kid makes you realize how many hazards there are in the world. You’d go mad if you let yourself brood on it. You’ve just got to tell yourself that nothing’s going to happen to your own.’ He gave a wry smile. ‘You made it through more or less in one piece.’
It was a cue to swap stories of George’s childhood brushes with danger. But part of him was immune to the shift of subject. Deep inside, Alison Carter was lodged like a crumb in the windpipe. Eventually, George extinguished his cigar and stood up. ‘If you don’t mind, Dad, I’m going to pop out for an hour. My sergeant’s volunteered for Christmas duty, and I thought I’d nip round to the station and wish him a Merry Christmas.’
‘On you go, lad. I’m going to settle down with Anne’s dad and pretend to watch the telly.’ He winked. ‘We’ll try not to snore too loud.’
George pocketed a box of fifty cigarettes he’d been given by an aunt and drove across town to the police station. He found Tommy Clough’s desk vacant, apart from the ballistics file on the bullets from the mining cavern. His jacket was slung over the back of his chair, so he couldn’t be far away, George reasoned. He picked up the familiar file and flicked through it again. One bullet was mashed beyond redemption, but the one that had found a crack in the rock had told a distinct story to the firearms examiner.
‘The exhibit is a round-nose full-metalled-jacket lead bullet,’ he read. ‘The calibre is .38. The bullet reveals seven lands and grooves, the lands narrow and the grooves broad. The grooves demonstrate a right-hand twist. These rifling marks are consistent with a projectile fired from a Webley revolver.’
The door swung open and Tommy Clough walked in, brow furrowed as he read a telex. ‘Merry Christmas, Tommy,’ George said, tossing the box of cigarettes across the room.
‘Cheers, George,’ Clough said, sounding surprised. ‘What brings you in? Family at war?’ He crossed the room and sat down, shoving the telex in the file.
‘I was sitting there with my paper hat on pulling crackers and eating goose and wondering what kind of Christmas they’re having at Scardale Manor.’
Clough ripped the cellophane off the cigarettes. Straightening up in his seat, he pushed the file to one side and offered the open box to George. ‘I’d say that depends on how bright Ruth Hawkin is. And on whether we show her this telex.’
‘Meaning?’
Clough took his time lighting a cigarette. ‘Since we didn’t get anywhere through official channels connecting Hawkin to a Webley, I decided to try coming at it sideways. So I sent out a request for information on any reports of stolen Webleys. Amongst the dross, there was one that looked a bit interesting. From St Albans. Two years ago, a Mr Richard Wells reported a break-in at his home. Among the stolen items was a Webley .38 revolver.’
From his air of expectation, George could tell there was more to come. ‘And?’ he asked.
‘Mr Wells lives two doors away from Philip Hawkin’s mother. The families used to play bridge together once a week. Mr Wells kept his Webley as a souvenir of the war, and he boasted about it often, according to their CID duty man. They never got anyone for the housebreaking, either. The family was away on holiday, so it could have happened at any time that week.’ Clough grinned. ‘Merry Christmas, George.’
‘That’s a better present than a box of fags.’
‘Fancy a run out there? Just to take the air?’
‘Why not?’
They were silent for most of the drive. As they turned into the lane that led to Scardale, George said, ‘Care to elaborate on what you said earlier about their Christmas depending on how bright Mrs Hawkin is?’
‘It’s nothing we haven’t already discussed a dozen times in the last few days,’ Clough said. ‘First off, we’ve got the conflict between what Hawkin told us about his movements on the afternoon Alison went missing and what we heard from Ma Lomas and Charlie. Second, we’ve got the lead mine. Apart from Ma Lomas, everybody in Scardale denies they’d even heard of the old workings, never mind knowing where they were. But the book that details the exact location of the entrance happens to be sitting on a shelf in Philip Hawkin’s library.’
‘And let’s not forget the lab results,’ George said softly. The irresistible
