No Stone Unturned

by Patricia Robins

Genres: Romance

Synopsis

When a body turns up drowned in the quiet English village of Ashwyck, reporter Bob Rudgely's attempt to the identify the man leads him to discover more about the sleepy village then her ever imagined. As the case unfolds, Bob's loving relationship with the art teacher Sandie White seems to unravel in almost parallel proportions. It looks as if Sandie will even turn to another man who's in love with her - golf pro Bill Wells - for consolation as Bob becomes more and more absorbed in the mystery of Ashwyck.

Release date: January 29, 2015

Publisher: Hodder & Stoughton

Print pages: 192

Sample

The bell rang and the art room exploded into its customary end-of-lesson noise. Paintings were stacked against the walls to dry; brushes put away in the cupboards; easels stacked, paint water thrown down the sink. Girls and boys jostled one another, laughing, chattering in subdued voices. Soon they would be making considerably more noise as they left the big new Comprehensive school building and crowded on to buses or rode their bikes or walked home. For the moment, they were still reasonably controlled.

Sandra White surveyed the groups of departing children with a mixture of relief and affection. It was good to know that another weekend had arrived and there would be freedom for her, too, until Monday morning. Yet she loved her work and as art mistress to the senior pupils, she was in a privileged place. Art was only compulsory in the primary classes. These fourteen, fifteen, sixteen-year olds were voluntarily taking O’ levels and were therefore enthusiastic and very little trouble to manage, despite the fact that she was only five years older than some of her students.

The studio emptied rapidly. Soon only one child was left—a thin, dark-eyed, rather attractive girl called Julia Forbes. For a moment Sandra could not remember if the child was fourteen or fifteen. She was a promising artist and her drawings and paintings were imaginative and sensitive.

The girl approached the dais where Sandra was standing with slow uncertain steps. She liked the young art teacher and to a certain extent, tried to emulate her cool poised manner, her soft attractive voice; even the short and wavy cut of her chestnut brown hair, and the way she made up her eyes. But this Friday afternoon, miserable, frightened and desperate, Julia’s manner was far from poised. She was on the verge of tears as she whispered:

“Can I speak to you, please, Miss White?” Sandra’s blue eyes looked briefly into Julia’s brown ones. She saw at once that the girl was about to cry.

‘Of course, Julia!’ she said gently, stepping down off the platform and putting an arm round the girl’s shoulders. ‘What’s the trouble?’

‘Oh, Miss White …!’ The tears came now—deep convulsive childish sobs. Sandra let her cry for a moment and then said:

‘Come along now, Julia. Nothing can be as bad as all that. Whatever is wrong, I’m sure we can put it right. What is wrong?’

It was not unusual in a huge Comprehensive school such as this one which served Ashwyck and the surrounding villages, for an occasional teenage girl to become pregnant. When Sandra had come to the school a year ago, the headmistress had warned her to expect such events from time to time and, of course, to report such matters to her. Though she was not shocked, therefore, to learn that a mere fifteen-year-old could be in this kind of trouble, Sandra was astonished that it should be young Julia Forbes. The girl was serious, intelligent and, she would have judged, anything but promiscuous. The only child of parents somewhat older than most, Julia had always seemed to take school, her work, her O’ levels and life generally very seriously.

As Julia sobbed, Sandra tried to search her memory for her mental card index on her pupils. As far as she could recall, Julia had a steady relationship with that tall, thin scholarly boy in the upper sixth—Tony Dodd.

‘Julia, is it Tony?’ she asked carefully.

Julia broke into a fresh storm of weeping. Gradually, Sandra elicited the facts. Although Julia and the boy imagined themselves in love, nothing ‘wrong’ had ever taken place. Tony wasn’t like that—he respected her; understood her wish to stay a virgin. No, it wouldn’t be so awful if it had been Tony …

Sandra was shocked now by the pathetic little story which followed. It seemed that Julia and Tony had gone to a rock concert to listen to a new band which went by the name of The Handle. One of the band was an eighteen-year-old boy called Mike Shaw—the lead guitarist. Somehow—Sandra wasn’t quite able to ascertain how—the boy had noticed Julia and asked her to join him in the interval for a drink. Tony Dodd had gone home in a huff because Julia, not unnaturally flattered to be noticed by the Shaw boy, had accepted his invitation. There was, therefore, no Tony to take Julia home at the end of the dance. Mike, who had a car, offered to drive her home. On the way he had stopped on the Common and despite Julia’s protests, had dragged her into a clump of bushes. Julia had been terrified but instead of screaming, had tried to talk the boy into leaving her alone. She had fought against him but he paid no attention to her tearful resistance and it was over in a few minutes.

All this had happened six weeks ago. Julia had tried to forget all about it. The band left Ashwyck next day and she never expected to see the boy again. She hadn’t told anyone—least of all Tony or her parents—what had happened. Now she had to speak of it because she suspected she was pregnant. She knew she could trust Sandra—could Sandra please help.

Sandra did what she could to comfort and reassure the child. She was appalled. From Julia’s account—and she did not doubt the girl’s word—it was a clear case of rape, though whether this could be proved she very much doubted. Obviously there were no witnesses and the boy, Mike Shaw, could easily deny Julia’s story or say she had been a willing participant.

She, Sandra, would have to report the whole story to Mrs. Sinclair, the headmistress. Meanwhile she suggested to Julia that she somehow found the courage to tell her parents. They would have to know.

‘I can’t, Miss, I can’t! You don’t know my dad. He’d kill me. Mum, too. You see, I’m all they’ve got. They’ve been counting on me doing well at school and getting to university. They want me to be a teacher. The disgrace would kill them …’

Sandra sighed. Vaguely she recalled the girl’s parents. Mr Forbes had a large newspaper and sweet shop in the village. Mrs Forbes helped him run it. They were enormously ambitious for their daughter and obviously idolised her. Sandra knew from other members of the staff that there was a certain amount of pressure put on the girl by her father; too much pressure. The girl was nervy and if anything, over-studious.

She sent Julia home, telling her she would think about her problem overnight. Julia could come to her flat next morning for coffee and maybe by then Sandra would have worked something out.

As Sandra walked home the problem of Julia was very much on her mind. Perhaps, she told herself, Rudge would be able to make some helpful suggestions. She was meeting him at six o’clock.

Bob Rudgely was a reporter on the local paper, the Stanfield Observer. He’d only come to Ashwyck six months ago and was living at the Waterman’s Arms, the old Tudor pub in the village. Since meeting him whilst out walking on the golf course soon after his arrival at Ashwyck, Sandra and he had become constant companions.

Rudge was twenty-seven. He was a large, rather untidy young man with fair hair and grey-green eyes which were nearly always full of laughter. He had enormous charm and Sandra, who began by liking him, had now reached the point where she was three parts in love with him. Rudge seemed to be of the same mind about her. Their friendship was ripening into something deeper and more romantic but slowly, pleasantly and without the usual violent repercussions of love-at-first-sight.

Thinking about it, as she so often found herself doing nowadays, Sandra felt that this was the right way—the best way, to fall in love. She felt confident that Rudge would, when he finally made up his mind to settle down, ask her to marry him; knew that she would probably say yes. But for the moment, he wasn’t completely sure he wanted to stay on the Stanfield Observer, or in Ashwyck, for the rest of his life. He’d set his sights on becoming a reporter for a national newspaper and yet he didn’t want to have to live and work in a big city! He was essentially a country lover. He enjoyed all outdoor sports; loved golf, swimming and was a dedicated fisherman. At Ashwyck, he could do all these things. A sizeable river ran eastward through the village, the upper part of which was reserved for fishing. At the west end of the village, where the river widened, it formed a natural swimming pool. He often took Sandra there on warm days.

The golf course was only nine holes but a pretty course and not too crowded. Rudge had become a member and had initiated Sandra into the game. She was now having lessons every week with Bill Wells, the Australian golf pro and had become almost as keen on the game as Rudge himself. Rudge teased her a lot, telling her she had only really become interested since he had introduced her to Bill.

Sandra had smiled, not at all displeased because Rudge was a little jealous of the tall, blond, Australian who, she was well aware, was more than casually interested in her.

Rudge was waiting for her in the lounge of the Waterman’s Arms, a half-finished beer on the table in front of him. He got to his feet and fetched her a shandy without asking her if she wanted it. He was obviously wound up and eager to impart some news to her. She decided to let him talk himself out first before she asked his advice about poor little Julia.

‘Couldn’t wait for you to get here, Sandie!’ he burst out as soon as they were both settled at the table. His grey eyes were bright with excitement. ‘I’m on to something very mysterious—at least, I think I am!’

For some weeks past he had been working on a series of articles entitled Local Beauty Spots. At weekends, Sandra had accompanied him and together they had discovered all sorts of interesting and historical facts about Ashwyck and the surrounding countryside. Rudge wrote easily and simply and his articles were seemingly well received, for his editor, having asked originally for six, decided to let Rudge go ahead and do a further half-dozen.

On the previous Wednesday, Rudge and Sandra had spent a fascinating evening in the local graveyard. Rudge had wanted to find out which was the oldest grave. The church itself dated back to Norman times and he had felt sure there must be amongst the crumbled slanting gravestones, some interesting historical record of the past. Instead, they had discovered a fairly recent grave of an unknown man.

As the sexton was not about, Rudge said he would return another day to enquire about it. He’d been too busy on Thursday, he told Sandra, but today he’d managed to go back to the churchyard. The sexton had told him that the man’s body had been found in Baker’s Pool, part of the river where trout abounded. Foul play had been suspected but never proved and despite extensive enquiries, the body was never identified.

Sandra looked at Rudge’s excited face, her own puzzled.

‘I can’t see what you can make of a story like that,’ she said, as Rudge paused to draw breath and finish his beer. ‘It must have been written up at the time. Who would be interested now, three years later?’

‘But that’s just it!’ Rudge said, leaning forward and covering Sandra’s hand with his own. ‘After I’d heard all this from the sexton, I went back to the office to look up the old records—just out of curiosity—and, Sandie, there wasn’t a single solitary item on the files.’

‘But there must have been!’ Sandra said. ‘The papers at that time were bound to have reported the finding of the body—the inquest—even if they didn’t make a splash of the story.’

‘The records are incomplete!’ Rudge said triumphantly. ‘I went through them all, and there are gaps at the relevant times. Someone has removed copies from the files!’

He looked at Sandra’s startled face and grinned.

‘I told you I was on to something. I distinctly smell a rat, Sandie, and I can’t wait to tackle Newman on Monday. Unfortunately, he’s gone away this weekend so I can’t see him till then.’

Frank Newman was the editor of the Stanfield Observer—a grey-haired portly man of about sixty whom Sandra knew by sight and saw occasionally at the Golf Club. He was usually with his brother, Gerald Newman, the local M.P. and his wife Cilla. Sandra avoided them, not so much because she disliked the two men but because Cilla was the hard, brittle loud-voiced type of woman she had no time for. She was always very smart, dressed in the latest fashions, and in her way, attractive. Sandra guessed she was nearer forty than thirty but it was hard to judge her age accurately. The very blonde hair was obviously dyed, the small pointed face never without carefully applied make-up. Whenever she was in the club, her shrill county-accented voice was raised above everyone else’s.

As their M.P.’s wife, and because she obviously had money and lived in the Manor House, most people in Ashwyck treated Cilla Newman as well as her husband with a certain deference. Cilla Newman obviously expected it. On one occasion she had created a scene in the pro’s room because she had wanted to change the time of her lesson to Sandra’s and Sandra had refused, not so much from any desire to be difficult, but because, as a teacher, she had very little spare time compared with Cilla Newman. From that moment on, the older woman had cut Sandra whenever they saw one another. Not that Sandie minded particularly. Her own life did not in any way cross the Newmans though she did realise that if and when she and Rudge were married, Frank Newman, as Rudge’s employer, would play a certain part in their affairs. It could be possible that she would then come up against Cilla Newman socially … but that was way ahead in the future and certainly did not bother Sandra now.

What was of far greater interest to her was Cilla Newman’s obvious interest in Bill Wells. Sandie often saw them drinking together in the club house. Bill was a nice, simple type of fellow, thirtyish, very Australian, good-looking, easy-going. Sandra herself liked him a great deal and knew he liked her, too. She’d twice gone out with him—once to a golf club dance and once to a New Year’s Eve party but since then, on any occasion he had suggested she accompany him, she was already committed to going with Rudge. At these functions, she had been unable to avoid noticing that Bill was spending his time dancing with Cilla Newman. Even Rudge had noticed and remarked to Sandie:

‘Cilla Newman had best watch her step or the village will start gossiping. She’s obviously keen on Bill and when she’s had a few brandies, she doesn’t trouble to hide her feelings! I wonder that husband of hers doesn’t complain.’

But Gerald did not appear to object to his wife’s flirtation with the golf pro. Nevertheless, Sandra agreed with Rudge that as wife of their M.P., Cilla should be more discreet. The election was coming up soon and it would not do Gerald Newman any good to have the slightest breath of scandal associated with his name.

Sandra brought her thoughts back to the man opposite her. When Rudge was excited, carried away by an idea as he was at this moment, there was something very appealing about him. She could understand why he made a good journalist. He was always curious about people; about life. When he had first arrived in Ashwyck, he had complained to her that the place was too quiet, too uneventful for his taste. He did not plan to stay for long. He thought he might soon become bored with the sleepy little village. But gradually, . . .