Faraday 02 Network Virus (11 page)

“
She often rings me ‘cause she knows I carry my mobile when I’m out and about.”

“
But she didn’t ring you yesterday?”

“
No.” Nina shook her head firmly.

“
And none of the rest of you heard anything from her?”

There were denials all round. Then one of the girls said, “Of course we wouldn’t know if we didn’t have our phones with us.”

“
Good point,” said Charlotte. “When you get home will you all check your mobiles and your home phones just to make sure she didn’t leave a message for any of you? Before you leave I’ll give you all one of my cards so you can ring me if you have any information.”

“
I checked last night,” said another girl, “and there was nothing on my phone.”

“
Very well. Now - which of you consider you are close friends of Tracey’s?”

Four girls put up their hands. One boy started to do the same but hastily took it down again amid a chorus of giggles.

“
Are you her boyfriend?” asked Charlotte.

He went pink. “Er, well - sort of. I took her out the other week.”

“
What’s your name?”

“
Oliver.”

“
Where did you take her, Oliver?”

“
Only for a walk. We went along the prom and then took the coast path to Paignton. There was a fair in Paignton the week before last.”

“
Was this in the evening?”

“
Yes, miss. But her mum knew about it. And we got back before dark.” He looked a shade uncomfortable. “Before it got properly dark.”

There was a chorus of jeers and other comments and he went even pinker.

“
Was that the only time you took her out?”

“
Yes, but we said we’d do it again, perhaps at the weekend.”

“
Did you kiss her?” asked a voice.

“
Mind your own business.”

Charlotte raised a hand. “Let’s concentrate on where they went. Is that path into Paignton a popular walk?”

“
Yeah. Hundreds do it.”

“
What - in the evenings?”

“
Summer evenings and weekends.”

“
Are there any other similar walks - walks that Tracey would know?”

A list was given and noted down by Bobbie Howell. They provided information on a variety of places where people could perhaps fall and hurt themselves and a few areas where a youngster might get lost. But the general consensus of opinion was that Tracey was pretty sensible and not very adventurous.

“
The next thing I want to ask you,” said Charlotte, “is whether any of you had noticed anything different about Tracey recently. Did she seem worried about anything or excited about something which might be going to happen?”

“
She was worried about the exams,” said one girl. “We were all worried about them.”

“
But they were over two or three weeks ago,” said another.

Nina looked up. “She did seem a bit funny about something that happened on Tuesday. I asked her about it, but she said it was nothing.”

“
You call it ‘funny’. How exactly was it funny?”

“
Well, it was lunch-time. We’re not allowed in the classrooms during the lunch break unless it’s bad weather. Three or four of us were sitting on a seat near the tennis courts and Karen Tilt - a girl from the fourth form - came over and asked her to go somewhere with her. Karen said it was nothing to worry about. So Tracey got up and went with her. She was gone about ten minutes. When she came back I asked what Karen had wanted with her and she just said ‘it was nothing’.”

“
Is that what you thought was funny?”

“
That’s right.” Nina shook her head. “Usually she would tell us about everything that happened like that. But this time she just refused to talk about it. I asked if Karen had been nasty in some way but she just said ‘No’.”

“
Who is this Karen?”

“
Karen Tilt.”

“
Caw,” said one of the boys. “She’s a bit of all right, is Karen Tilt.”

“
Do you like her?”

“
She’s very sexy.” He made a gesture with his hands that suggested she had a curvaceous figure. “She’s got big boobs.”

“
Shut up, Barry,” said one of the girls. “Charlotte doesn’t want to know that.”

“
This Karen Tilt,” asked Charlotte. “Is she a friend of Tracey’s?”

“
Oh no,” everybody agreed.

“
Does she often come and talk to you?”

“
Not likely,” said Barry. “She only talks to the older boys.”

“
Don’t be daft, Barry.”

“
So it was unusual when Karen came over and talked to Tracey?” asked Charlotte.

Nina nodded. “I suppose it was.”

“
How did Tracey react?”

“
When Karen first came over I think she was a bit - I don’t know - a bit worried. I think I would have been.”

“
But Karen put her at her ease.”

“
Yes.”

“
What exactly did she say?”

Nina thought for a moment. “As far as I remember Karen said she wanted to talk to her about something private. And, when Tracey didn’t immediately get up and follow her, she said it was nothing to worry about. It was just something she wanted to ask her.”

“
And when she came back, how did she seem? Was she worried or excited?”

“
Hmm.” Nina thought carefully. “I would say she wasn’t worried. Perhaps she was more excited. But she was - well - she was sort of thoughtful.”

“
But she wouldn’t tell you anything about it.”

“
Actually,” said Nina, “it was as though she wasn’t really listening to me when I asked her about it. You know, as though her thoughts were somewhere else.”

Charlotte was impressed with Nina’s perception. “That’s very interesting, Nina. I think I’ll have to have a chat with this girl, Karen Tilt.”

They continued their talk for another ten minutes but no further useful information came out of the discussion. When she spoke to the other half of the class they were able to provide her with little more detail than she had already picked up from the first fifteen youngsters.

“
But still,” she told Bobbie, “it will all help to give us a fuller picture of Tracey and her typical movements and her usual contacts when we put it on the computer. Now we’d better go back and see the head and ask him about this fourth former, Karen Tilt.”

When they were back in the head’s study and Charlotte asked if she could have a short chat with Karen she was slightly amused to note that the headmaster knew immediately who she was talking about. Obviously Karen Tilt was a girl who got herself noticed.

“
Do you want me to get her for you?” he offered. “It would be convenient for you to talk to her in here. May I suggest that it would be a good idea if I was present, so that her parents couldn’t object if she got emotional later?”

“
I agree that would be a good idea,” said Charlotte.

When he returned five minutes later with the girl, Charlotte saw exactly what the young Barry had meant in his description of her. Despite the fact that she was only fifteen and dressed in the summer uniform of a plain green dress, Karen contrived to look frankly sexy. Her skirt ended several inches above the knees, revealing plenty of shapely leg. She was wearing a broad belt which pulled her waist in so as to accentuate her hour-glass figure. She had on an uplift bra which made the most of her already full breasts. Although the top buttons of her dress were now done up, Charlotte didn’t doubt that at least two of them would be undone when she met any boys who she wanted to impress. The general impression was of a girl very interested in the opposite sex.

“
Sit here, Karen.” The head indicated one of the group of low chairs which occupied a corner of his study and where Charlotte and Bobbie were already sitting.

He introduced the two detectives. “They want to ask you a few questions connected with the disappearance yesterday of Tracey Bostock.”

“
Hello, Karen. Please don’t be worried. It’s only filling a gap in the picture we’re trying to build up of Tracey’s recent movements.”

The girl nodded. In fact Charlotte noted she didn’t seem in the least worried. She was obviously a girl with a lot of self-confidence.

“
I’ve been talking to Tracey’s class-mates and I gather from them that you went to talk to her during lunch-break on Tuesday when she was sitting with some friends near the tennis courts. Is that correct?”

Karen looked from her to the head and back. “What have they been saying?”

Charlotte smiled. “The other girls said you spoke to her and told her not to worry but you wanted to ask her something.”

She replied a simple, “Yes.”

“
And you asked her to go somewhere with you and, according to these friends, it was about ten minutes before Tracey returned to where they were sitting. Is that right?”

“
I suppose so.”

The head intervened. “Is it correct or not, Karen?”

“
I shouldn’t have thought it was as long as ten minutes.”

“
The time isn’t important,” said Charlotte. “Where did you go in those few minutes?”

“
What did those girls say?”

“
They didn’t know. Tracey didn’t tell them.”

“
Oh.” The girl shrugged. “We just went round the corner - somewhere private.”

“
I didn’t know there was anywhere private in those leisure break areas,” said the head. “You must tell me where that is.”

“
I meant somewhere where her friends wouldn’t hear what we were talking about.” Charlotte admired Karen’s self-possession when she was with three senior adults. “I knew if I talked to her in front of them it would soon be all over the school.”

“
And what was it you talked to her about?”

“
Oh.” She looked a little uncomfortable for the first time. “I - I had been told she’d been seen with my boyfriend and I wanted to ask her if this was correct.”

“
And was it correct?”

“
No, it wasn’t - not according to Tracey.” She shook her head firmly.

“
Is that all you talked about?”

“
Yes.”

“
And that took you ten minutes?”

Karen looked a little worried. “It took us a bit longer than me just telling you about it. And then, I said I wasn’t sure we were talking for ten minutes. It might have been less.”

“
I see.” Charlotte nodded. “I suppose you had to tell Tracey who the boy was and when they’d been seen together.”

“
That’s right.”

“
And it took some time for Tracey to convince you and explain why the information you had been given was wrong.”

“
Yes. It did.”

Charlotte was almost sure by now that the girl was lying but she wasn’t sure what she could do about it. Then she suddenly had an idea. But it would take a more roundabout approach than she could take at this moment.

“
OK, Karen. I think that’s all we need to know for now. Thank you for answering my questions so readily.”

The girl was released and Charlotte and Bobbie took their leave of the headmaster after thanking him for his help.

As she returned Bobbie to the station with instructions to enter all the details they had picked up on to the computer, Charlotte kept to herself the fact that she was almost sure Karen Tilt was lying.

Why should she lie and what was it about?

- 13 -

It took a couple of hours for Stafford Paulson to organise the opening moves of the search for Tracey Bostock. He’d been able to borrow three constables from uniform branch to help with the house-to-house enquiries which Gary was co-ordinating. He had held back John Prendergast to help him with publicity in the local press and posters to be put up wherever people were likely to see them.

Finally he felt free to telephone Alfred de Billiere at his office in London. After a wait of several minutes he was finally able to talk directly to the big man.

After he had introduced himself, he began, “I expect you are aware that we have re-opened our enquiry into the death of your first wife, Joanne.”

“
I certainly
wasn’t
aware of that.” De Billiere sounded annoyed. “Why on earth should you want to do that?”

“
In fact no police enquiry was authorised when she died because there were no suspicious injuries discovered during the post mortem.”

“
I should think not. And what has changed? Surely this is an unwarranted waste of police time.”

Paulson kept his temper. “Weren’t you told, Mr de Billiere, that during our enquiry into the death of Cynthia Adams which led to the discovery of her killer, queries were raised as to why Joanne should take your large cruiser out to sea in the evening on her own?”

“
I thought the inquest dealt with that perfectly adequately. If you recall, it was decided that, although she had never done it before, she must have fancied the idea of a trip.” He cleared his throat. “Joanne was a strong-willed woman. If she decided to do something, she was likely to go ahead and do it, without thought of the consequences.”

“
Nevertheless, Mr Billiere, the possibility has been raised that she was not alone on the boat that night.”

“
Really!” His response was almost explosive. “It’s the first I’ve heard of it. Who has suggested that possibility?”

“
Well, since the possibility has been raised, I’m sure you will appreciate that we have to look into it before we discard the idea. And, to help me to decide whether further investigations are necessary, I’d be grateful if you would answer a few questions for me.”