The driver nodded and took off in the direction of Tarrant Park.
Henry Tanner hunkered down in the back seat, his body language sending a warning to Stephen of the inadvisability of further attempts at conversation. The chief would have to discuss the matter with him sometime soon, surely, Stephen thought. After all, he needed to get his story straight should the police question him again, which he suspected they would. Stephen hadn’t known what to say when the detective asked if Henry knew about the letter. And he still didn’t know what Henry had told Vogel.
He wiped the sweat from his brow. He could have landed them all in it if he’d been forced to answer Vogel’s last question. He reckoned he’d had a narrow escape from disaster. And he also reckoned that far worse lay ahead.
Meanwhile, back at The Firs, Joyce felt utterly alone, even though the kitchen was still full of people. Nobody had left the house, in spite of most of them having been told they were free to do so.
Joyce was sitting next to Molly by the window in the kitchen, holding her daughter’s hand. She’d taken over from Felicity in trying to comfort the girl. Felicity was at the table with Janet and Mark, who was pale and drawn but trying to hold it all together. Monika continued to busy herself about the place, and Dr Grey was leaning against the worktop, looking as if he wished he were somewhere else.
Joyce could derive no comfort from their presence. Worse, she no longer knew whether she could trust any of them.
Janet had signed the note that had accompanied Charlie’s letter. Felicity, she was certain, knew more than she was telling. Even Mark seemed to have inherited, or been well schooled in, the family art of keeping secrets. He had never, in all the time he had been working with Henry, talked to Joyce about what that work involved. The same had been true of all the men in her life: her grandfather, father, husband — even her late brother.
Joyce had no idea whether any of the secrets that were being kept from her had any bearing on Fred’s disappearance. It could be that all this secretive behaviour was merely an ingrained family habit. But it left her feeling that there was nobody she could turn to. Charlie’s letter had started a ripple effect; she had begun by questioning everything she knew of her father, then moved on to questioning what she knew of Charlie, and now she was wondering whether she even knew her own son. And all the while her youngest son was missing.
She wished now that she’d done as Charlie told her and taken Fred and Molly away. Now it was too late.
She wondered if the letter might have sparked something off. Like Vogel, she had a nasty feeling that both Henry and Stephen Hardcastle had seen and read the letter before it passed into her hands. She’d wondered from the beginning why it had taken six months to reach her. Her experience of the meticulous Janet Porter could only ever lead her to believe that the woman didn’t make clerical errors. And it was Janet who did the filing.
If Henry had seen the letter, once he knew that it had reached Joyce he might fear that Joyce would obey her husband’s instructions.
But that begged the question: why would her powerful and all-controlling father have allowed her to see the letter in the first place?
Joyce squeezed Molly’s hand tightly, more tightly than she had realized.
Molly gave a little yelp. ‘Mum, you’re hurting me!’
‘I’m sorry.’ Joyce slackened her grip, and with her free hand gently touched Molly’s tear-stained cheek.
Her attention was distracted by the sound of a vehicle pulling to a halt by the front door. Joyce knew that it couldn’t be the police again, or any other outsiders, because the gates would have had to be opened from inside The Firs. Someone in the vehicle obviously had a remote control to operate the gates, which meant it had to be either her father or Stephen Hardcastle.
Everyone in the kitchen heard the arrival, but nobody moved. They just waited. There followed the sound of the front door opening, then slamming shut.
Henry Tanner walked into the kitchen first, followed closely by Stephen. At first glance Henry looked his usual self, confident and assertive, but Joyce could see the strain in her father’s eyes. That was both unusual and disconcerting. He was a past master at concealing stress from his family, so for him to betray even the slightest sign of concern brought home the magnitude of the situation they were facing.
Monika was once again making tea nobody wanted. She stopped and, like everyone else, turned to look at Henry.
‘How did you get on?’ Felicity asked, moving towards her husband. ‘What did they want? Why did they take you and Stephen to a police station?’
Henry reached out and touched her lightly on one shoulder.
‘It was fine, my dear. They asked a lot of questions, that’s all. Stephen and I gave them as much assistance as we could. All we can hope is that we helped them in some way. I must admit, I can’t see how we did, but I do know now that there is a huge operation underway to find Fred, and we just have to hope that he is found soon.’
It was practically a speech. And Henry had somehow turned his visit to Lockleaze police station around, as if he had gone there to ensure that the investigation met with his approval. He’d also managed to sound reassuring. Until you analysed what he had said, and realized it amounted to nothing.
‘Oh come on, Dad,’ Joyce remonstrated, standing up and walking towards her father as her mother had done, only her body language indicated anger rather than concern. ‘Why don’t you tell us what the police wanted, why they took you and Stephen in for a formal interview. Go on, tell us. My son is missing. Will you stop playing your bloody stupid games and talk to us for once?’
Henry didn’t flinch. ‘I really don’t know what you mean, dear,’ he murmured, giving her his kindest, most fatherly smile.
He glanced towards Janet and Monika, then at Dr Grey. Even if Henry Tanner were suddenly to become forthcoming, he would never say anything of consequence in front of outsiders.
Joyce wasn’t about to be pushed aside. She could feel the anger tying itself into a nasty knot somewhere in the region of her upper abdomen. Trying not to let it show, she looked her father in the eye. ‘I want you to tell us exactly what the police said to you and exactly what you said to them.’
‘Not now, Joyce,’ replied her father, still in a kindly manner but more firmly than before.
And just as patronizing, in Joyce’s opinion.
‘You’ve got enough to worry about, dear. Let Stephen and I deal with the police. It was a routine interview, that’s all. And as I have said, we gave DI Vogel all the help we could.’
‘Did you?’ Joyce barked the words at her father.
Finally realizing that he was not going to subdue his daughter with platitudes, and that she was intent on berating him in public, Henry tried to usher her towards the door.
‘Look, darling, why don’t you come into the sitting room with me. We clearly do need to have a proper chat. No need to upset everybody else.’
Joyce had no desire for a cosy private chat. She wanted to tell her father that she was no longer prepared to tolerate his culture of secrecy. And that she didn’t give a damn if there were people in the kitchen Henry Tanner regarded as outsiders, people to whom, even in these dreadful circumstances, he was desperate to present a united family front.
But she couldn’t help glancing back at her daughter. Molly’s tear-filled eyes were wide open in disbelief. She now looked confused as well as upset.
Henry had already turned and begun to walk through the door. Typical, thought Joyce. He expected obedience, or at least compliance, whatever the circumstances. Joyce followed him. That glimpse of her daughter’s face had left her with little choice.