Charlie by Lesley Pearse
Charlie was even more touched by her friend’s show of bravado. She knew perfectly well Rita hadn’t been swayed by the possibility of compensation.
‘Money won’t make up for everyone knowing about you,’ Charlie retorted. She looked right into her friend’s eyes and dared her to claim it would.
Rita laughed. ‘Oh yes it will,’ she said flippantly. ‘Money soothes all hurts.’
Charlie had to smile. She somehow knew Rita would stick with that reason until the bitter end. She had more guts than anyone she’d ever met.
‘It’s a good job I know what you really are, Rita Tutthill,’ she said, wagging a finger at her. ‘If you get any trouble from your parents and son when it all comes out, I shall personally go and visit them and tell them a few home truths about you.’
Rita smiled. ‘I believe you would too. But now I’d better get ready for work.’
Charlie’s eyebrows shot up. ‘Work! You can’t go in, you look exhausted.’
Rita laughed. ‘Exhausted I may be, but apart from the fact the Hag will stop my money if I don’t, work is the best way I know to get through difficult times.’
To Charlie that encapsulated everything she admired about her friend. She didn’t lie down and feel sorry for herself when things were tough, but got on with her life with courage and fortitude. Charlie thought she must take a leaf out of her book.
‘Tell the Hag I’ll be in tomorrow,’ she said. ‘That’s if she hasn’t had the impudence to sack me already.’
‘Charlie, even you couldn’t be that lucky,’ Rita rolled her eyes comically. ‘Now, go easy on poor Andrew today. He’s had a tough time and needs to recover before you start feasting on his emaciated body.’
Charlie laughed. She had a feeling Andrew would have made a complete recovery by the time he woke.
She was right. Rita had hardly closed the front door behind her when Andrew woke and immediately pulled her into his arms. ‘This was what I thought of most of the time I was in the cellar,’ he said. ‘Holding you, loving you. I think if I hadn’t had that I might have flipped.’
He was savage the first time, so rough and forceful that it took her breath away. Yet her own need was as great as his and she responded with equal savagery, clawing at his back and biting his shoulders. To have him in her arms was all that mattered. They had been granted a reprieve.
An hour or so later they made love again, but this time it was slow, tender and loving. They kissed, stroked and licked at every inch of each other, two minds with the same goal, to wipe out the hurt and misery, to begin on a new road.
‘Saying I love you isn’t enough,’ Andrew said, his face pressed deeply into her breasts. ‘I adore you, I worship you, but that sounds like something out of a church service. I wish I could find the right words to explain just how I feel.’
‘ “I love you” is enough for me,’ she whispered, tears of joy flowing down her face. ‘I never want to be parted from you again.’
‘That’s a tall order,’ he laughed, and moved back on to one elbow to look at her. ‘Am I supposed to take you with me to college?’
‘You know what I mean. To spend every night with you. For yours to be the face I wake up to.’
‘We can’t have that straight away,’ he sighed, flicking his hair from his eyes and looking very apprehensive. ‘I’ll have to go home to my parents for a few days. I phoned them last night from the police station, Mum was in a terrible state. Dad said she’d been distraught right from when they first heard I’d gone missing.’
‘I suppose they’ll be against me,’ Charlie said in a small voice. ‘I mean, it’s all my fault, isn’t it?’
‘They aren’t that kind of people,’ Andrew reprimanded her. ‘Mum is Beryl’s sister, remember, and in many ways they are very alike. Aunt Beryl has always spoken so highly of you, Mum feels she knows you already. I just wish I’d taken you to meet them before all this happened though. Still, never mind, I’ll ask if you can come up at the weekend to meet them.’
Charlie didn’t think his mother would welcome her with open arms after what had happened. Would any mother really want a half-Chinese girl with a tainted background for her only son? But she didn’t say this, time would tell if she was right.
‘You’d better phone them now,’ she said instead. ‘And Carol at the pub. We’ll have to arrange to get you some clothes too.’
‘You are a little worry-guts,’ he smiled. ‘Will you promise me that once we’re married you’ll leave all the worrying to me?’
‘Marry you!’ Charlie feigned astonishment. ‘Now, that’s going a bit far!’
‘It’s the only way I know of having you with me for ever,’ he said. ‘Not to mention being able to sleep with you anywhere and everywhere without raising eyebrows.’
‘I might have known sex was at the bottom of it,’ she laughed. ‘You get your degree first, sonny, then we’ll see!’
As Andrew was speaking first to his parents, then to Carol on the telephone, Detective Inspector Hughes and PC Farrow were checking out the queue of cars waiting to board the Harwich ferry.
It was a cold grey morning, with high winds whipping the sea over the harbour wall, and both men were tired and dispirited. A puncture halfway to the port delayed them for almost an hour, so Dexter could have turned off in some new direction for all they knew. But they’d continued to Harwich anyway and arrived here an hour or two ago only to discover that although the dock police had been notified to look out for and apprehend Daphne Dexter, for some reason they hadn’t received details of the car she was travelling in. To find such a major blunder was infuriating, but fortunately all the ferries had been delayed because of high winds, so there was still a chance she might be travelling under an assumed name and that she was in fact still here, trapped in the long line of cars waiting on the dock.
‘There she is!’ Ozzie exclaimed jubilantly as he spotted the red Mercedes tucked in between a grey Rover and a black Ford. ‘Thank fuck!’
‘Should we get some back-up?’ Farrow asked, looking around him nervously. He couldn’t see any dock police anywhere, just a few passengers stretching their legs before boarding.
Ozzie grinned. ‘Back-up! For one woman? She can’t move that car, and where’s she going to run to? She’s a smart cookie, but unless she’s sprouted wings during the night she’s got no chance. Nip through the line of cars now and be ready just in case she tries to get out that side.’
A shiver of expectancy ran down Ozzie’s spine, wiping out his tiredness. As he walked towards the car he could see she was alone and engrossed in putting on lipstick. She clearly thought she was almost home and dry.
Checking first that Farrow was in place, Ozzie tapped on the passenger door. The woman looked startled, then frowned, as if knowing the face looking in at her was familiar, but unable to place it. She opened the window and smiled, but her blue eyes were as cold as the North Sea. ‘Yes?’ she said.
Ozzie leaned his entire weight against the car door. With his right hand he reached in and withdrew her car keys from the ignition, with the left he held out his warrant card. ‘Detective Inspector Hughes. You are under arrest, Miss Dexter, for the abduction of Andrew Blake. You are not obliged to say anything, but anything you do say will be taken down and used in evidence against you.’
‘I beg your pardon,’ she said haughtily, the consummate actress right till the end. ‘My name is Sandra White. You clearly have the wrong person.’
‘Save all that,’ he said, flicking both his warrant card and the keys into his pocket, and bringing out his handcuffs. ‘I’ve had my eye on you for twenty years, right back from when you were a stripper. I probably know more about you than you do yourself.’ Opening the car door he grabbed her right wrist, clicked the handcuff round it, and attached the other to his own. ‘So get out! The game’s up.’
At half past two that same afternoon, six officers from the Sussex police raided a tiny isolated cottage on the South Downs three miles from Seaford and arrested
The address had been passed on to them following Daphne Dexter’s arrest in Harwich. It had been found in her handbag, written on an old envelope, and although she wouldn’t admit what it was, the police had been certain it had earlier contained a set of keys to the property.
Convinced by the speed with which the police had found them that their sister had turned her brothers in to escape justice herself, once Mick was in custody, and separated from his twin, he began talking. He admitted his sister had ordered him to Tittmus Street to collect the unconscious Andrew in his van. He said he had no idea why she wanted the student locked up at The Manse, and that he and his brother had purposely let the boy get away because they wanted no part in whatever she was up to. He admitted that he had caught Charlie in the garden and questioned her, but he claimed there had never been any intention on their part to hurt her.
While searching The Manse, the Kent police found a large quantity of valuable imported goods. Both the twins denied knowing anything about the goods, or that they’d ever met Jin Weish. As for crippling Sylvia Weish, they claimed they didn’t even know where Dartmouth was.
By six that evening, Hughes and Farrow were on their way back to London and home. Hughes was completely exhausted, but elated and triumphant that all three Dexters would be appearing in Sevenoaks court the next morning. He had a strong hunch those goods would be proved to be the property of Jin Weish. Although he was a long way off charging them with the man’s murder, he felt he had enough strong evidence to encourage reluctant witnesses and informers to speak out.
Charlie and Andrew learned of the arrests at nine that night when Detective Inspector Hughes telephoned Charlie.
‘Rest easy tonight,’ he said with laughter in his voice. ‘All three of them are locked up and even the slickest lawyer won’t get them bail tomorrow in court.’
Charlie was eager to hear all the details, but Hughes couldn’t be drawn. ‘I’ll be wanting to see you soon to get statements from each of you,’ he said. ‘But for now I just want to thank you and Andrew and Rita too. But for your courage and persistence there would be no case against these people. I am indebted to you.’
When Charlie arrived at work the next morning, Mrs Haagman called her into her office immediately. ‘Sit down,’ she said, her dark eyes as cold and expressionless as they had been on Charlie’s first day there. She was wearing a charcoal-grey suit which made her look even more forbidding. ‘Before we go any further, I want the whole story about what has been going on. Right from the beginning.’
Charlie wasn’t in the mood for questions or any confrontation. Yesterday’s elation had vanished when she woke up to a hangover today from the previous night’s celebrations. Andrew had left for Oxford to see his parents first thing in the morning and she was feeling flat and sad. Common sense told her she had to pick up the strands of her life, and that was bound to mean explanations to her employer, but she resented being called upon to do it immediately.
‘You can take that surly look off your face,’ the woman snapped at her. ‘I invested good money in sending you on that course, and I have every right to know if you intend to stay here or skip off somewhere else. How can I judge your state of mind when I don’t even understand what exactly happened to you?’
Charlie had to concede this was reasonable, even if the woman had no charm or grace. As simply as possible she related her story right from the beginning. To her utmost surprise Mrs Haagman’s face softened as she listened. When Charlie finished Mrs Haagman sighed, but she didn’t speak immediately.
‘I see now,’ she said eventually. ‘Charlie, I lost both my parents in the Holocaust when I was a child, and I’ve never trusted anyone since. I don’t want your misfortunes to affect you that way. It would be a wicked waste.’
Charlie felt chastened. She sensed Mrs Haagman rarely told anyone such things about herself and as such she felt she had to reciprocate with total honesty.
‘I appreciate your sympathy,’ she said. ‘I also appreciate you sending me on the training course. You do have a right to know if I’ve got other plans for a new job. Well, I haven’t, not right now, everything’s up in the air at the moment and I can’t think straight yet.’
‘That sounds as if you feel you might want to leave?’ the woman said.
Charlie squirmed. ‘To be honest I don’t know that film processing is really my scene, not as a career. But I haven’t got any other plans. I’ll have to be a witness at this trial, Andrew’s about to go back to university for his final year, there’s dozens of ifs and maybes.’
There was a moment or two’s silence while Mrs Haagman looked thoughtfully at her. ‘I think, if you want my opinion,’ she said at length, ‘that in the long term you should consider a business of your own, not a career working for other people. You are a bright girl, Charlie, but you’ve got something which separates you from all the other bright kids who come to work here in their college holidays. You have determination, guts and fire in your belly. Maybe it only comes to those who have had early hardships, I don’t know, but wherever it comes from, use it.’
Charlie could only stare blankly at the woman. If anyone had ever suggested she ought to treat the Hag as a good role model, she would have laughed at them. Yet here she was not only admiring her, but perhaps even liking her a little.
‘I wouldn’t know where or how to start a business,’ she protested, a bit embarrassed.
‘You start off with thinking what your real interests are,’ the woman half smiled. ‘I chose photography after my foster mother gave me a batch of photographs of my family back in Germany and it made me realize how important photography can be. Your interests might be fashion or cooking. It doesn’t matter what they are, as long as you care enough about the subject. You say you don’t know how to start – well, there are night-school classes to teach you such things. But meanwhile you stay and work for me. Yes?’
Charlie thought Mrs Haagman was clever. By offering sympathy, then sound advice, she was now compelled to commit herself to staying here for the time being. ‘Okay,’ she agreed.
Mrs Haagman smiled, the first time Charlie had ever seen her do so. It lit up her entire face, revealing another, warmer side of her.
‘You work all the rest of this week, but if you can arrange it with your young man, you may take next week off as a holiday and spend it with him. When you come back you’ll be refreshed, ready to take over as my manageress, calm enough to cope with that trial and all it will entail. Come and talk to me if you need to.’
At lunchtime Charlie related the gist of the conversation to Rita, who was equally astounded.
‘So she’s human after all,’ Rita sniggered. ‘And so what business are you going to go for then?’
Charlie had been thinking about this all morning as she worked. ‘I don’t know that I will,’ she said thoughtfully. ‘I mean, just because she suggested it doesn’t mean I have to. But I could fancy antiques.’
There were several antique shops in Church Street and Charlie was always drawn by them. From what she’d observed the owners of these shops weren’t experts by any means, they just bought and sold what they liked. It struck her that if they could do it, so could she. After all, she had been brought up with antiques. Furthermore there was her little stash of treasure down in that vault in Exeter, to which she had hardly given a thought since she moved to London, but it could provide the capital to get started.
‘Antiques!’ Rita laughed. ‘Oh, come on! Why not an undies or dress shop? You’d be good at that with your looks.’
Charlie just smiled. There was nothing like someone scoffing to make her more determined.
Chapter Twenty
‘Don’t be scared,’ Andrew said, squeezing Charlie’s hand tightly as they walked up the road to his parents’ house. ‘Dad’s been a bit weird ever since I got home, but Mum’s fine and she’s looking forward to meeting you. If Dad is prickly with you, just ignore it. He’ll soon come round.’
Charlie gripped the bunch of flowers she’d bought for Mrs Blake a little tighter. She was scared. Whatever Andrew said, she felt sure his parents were going to be hostile towards her.
Although it was too dark to get much of an impression of the Cowley housing estate as a whole, there were enough curtains left open to see that Andrew’s neighbours lived much the same way as the people she’d got to know in Mayflower Close back in Dartmouth. It was a solid working-class community, with unimaginative and somewhat cramped homes, yet scrupulously clean and cosy.
Mrs Blake opened the front door as they came in through the wooden gate and in the light from the hall Charlie was heartened by her strong resemblance to her sister. Like Beryl she was short and plump with the same profusion of laughter-lines round her blue eyes; the only real difference was that Mrs Blake was clearly aware she was middle-aged. Her hair was a soft brown sprinkled with grey and she wore a tweed skirt, slippers, a pale pink sweater and an apron round her middle.
‘So this is Charlie,’ she said with a warm, wide smile. ‘It’s so good to meet you at last, dear. Come on in, the supper’s just ready.’
Mr Blake was tall, thin and slightly stooped, his face heavily lined and his thinning hair very grey. He looked older and more severe than she had expected. Charlie’s first thought as he shook her hand without smiling was that he was going to be difficult to win over.
Their home was much as she’d imagined: small rooms, traditional Axminster carpets, a chintzy three-piece suite in the sitting room, and a great many framed photographs of Andrew from babyhood upwards taking up every spare surface. It was only now seeing the Lady with the Green Face print hanging over the fireplace, which Andrew had told her about so long ago, that she saw the irony of it. When the Blakes bought it, they couldn’t possibly have imagined that one day their son would fall in love with a real Chinese girl.