‘The local papers will make more of it,’ Agnes said comfortingly while fetching a cup and saucer for Lena’s coffee.
‘I’m going to take a shower and get dressed. I’ll take my coffee upstairs,’ Lena told her, leaving the papers scattered over the table.
Agnes poured herself a mug as Harry Dunn rang the doorbell. He sat with Agnes and looked through the papers as she gave him a coffee and a Penguin biscuit. Eventually he refolded them and slowly tore off the wrapper of his biscuit.
‘What do you think?’ he asked morosely.
‘I don’t know. I mean those articles don’t say much, do they? They sort of underline that she’s missing but you don’t get any details, but if she has just run off then surely she’ll read the papers and make contact. If she doesn’t then God only knows what has happened to her.’
‘Is her passport missing?’ he wondered, crumpling the biscuit paper.
‘I don’t know. Mrs Fulford’s in a right state, she’s usually up by six and in her office upstairs. Not like her to oversleep, unless she doused herself with sleeping tablets – she’d left them out on her beside cabinet yesterday morning. I think her husband was here because there’s two empty bottles of wine and dirty crockery, unless she had some other visitor. She was holed up in the TV room watching videos when I left last night.’
They finished their coffee and Agnes cleared up the kitchen, with Harry still sitting at the table. They both looked anxiously towards the phone as it rang. Agnes let it carry on, expecting Lena to pick it up as the lights showed it was the business line. It stopped as the answer phone clicked in and then it rang again immediately, this time on the house line, and Agnes answered.
‘The Fulford residence,’ she said briskly.
Lena stepped out of the shower in her bathroom and, grabbing a towel, she snatched the receiver from the wall, to hear Agnes telling her there was a reporter wishing to speak to her and she didn’t know whether or not to put him through. Lena had a brief conversation with a journalist from the local newspaper but declined to give an interview. It was by now eight forty, and the home line rang continuously. Somehow the journalists had gained her ex-directory private number and they were persistent and quite aggressive. Added to the barrage of calls on her home line, the business line was ringing literally every minute. Staff from sales, receptionists, deliveries and even clients called to enquire about Amy, even though hardly any had ever met her, and they left message after message. Lena’s mobile was equally active, it never stopped, as her staff unable to get through on the business line reverted to attempting to speak to her via her mobile.
Lena was at her wits’ end; the perpetual ringing felt like a nightmare intrusion. She was afraid that even if Amy had tried to make contact she would not have been able to get through.
A journalist with a photographer approached Reid and Burrows as they drew up in their car and asked if there was news. Reid kept his cool and gave them a brief ‘sadly not as yet’ as he and Burrows hurried to the front door. An anxious-looking Agnes answered and let them both in as the telephones rang. ‘Mrs Fulford’s in the sitting room and she’s really becoming very distressed by all these phone calls,’ she confided.
Reid and Burrows found Lena standing by the sofa, wearing a tracksuit and slippers. Her expression for a moment was so hopeful that Reid quickly had to say there were no developments. He asked if she would allow Barbara Burrows to begin fending the calls and mentioned that a journalist and a photographer were outside the property.
‘I obviously keep on hoping it will be Amy, so I can’t just let it ring.’ Lena’s face reverted to its former anxiety. ‘My business line has also been inundated with calls. I have the answer phone on but I will have to eventually check who has made contact. Right now I just can’t face having conversations with anyone.’ She clasped her hands together. ‘Sorry, what am I thinking of? Would you like something to drink, tea or…?’
‘No, no, it’s fine.’ Reid looked at her steadily. ‘Your housekeeper and driver were seen removing boxes from your garage yesterday afternoon – do you know anything about that?’
She frowned, confused. ‘Boxes?’
‘Yes, we had a report from a neighbour, and I have been instructed to search these premises and that includes the garage. I will be as diplomatic and unobtrusive as possible, but the focus will be on your daughter’s bedroom in the hope we will find some clue to her whereabouts. Do you know what was being removed from your garage?’
‘I have no idea – there must be some mistake.’
‘Both your driver and housekeeper were seen packing the boxes.’
Lena walked to the sitting-room door and opened it. ‘Agnes, can you come in here for a minute please?’
Agnes came to the door, thinking they were going to ask for coffee to be brought in, but Lena looked at her angrily. ‘Did you take anything out of the garage yesterday?’
‘Yes, you told Harry that he could clear some old things out and I took what he didn’t want. Neither of us would take anything without your knowledge or permission, Mrs Fulford.’
Reid held up his hand, and asked if Lena would mind leaving him with the housekeeper so he could talk to her privately. Lena was furious but at the same time confused because she couldn’t really remember giving Harry or Agnes permission. Reid asked if Harry was available, as he would also like to speak to him. Lena agreed to go into the kitchen and call him as he was probably in the garage. Throughout these exchanges the phones could be heard ringing constantly.
Agnes folded her arms. ‘She was looking for the old video player because she wanted to watch some tapes of her daughter. Harry said he’d been told to clear out the old boxes she’d been storing in there.’
Reid couldn’t help but notice how Agnes’s round face glistened with sweat and she kept on clasping and unclasping her hands. He also thought it rather rude that she kept referring to Mrs Fulford as ‘she’.
‘What was in Mrs Fulford’s boxes, Mrs Moors?’
She sighed with agitation. ‘Mostly old bed linen – well, to be honest, she probably thinks of it as old but to me it was very stylish. Couple of table cloths and a few pans and some crockery, that was all I took; whether or not Harry took other stuff I wouldn’t know… because he’d already earmarked a couple of boxes. To be honest, I mean I could be wrong, but I think she didn’t like keeping the sheets and things from when her husband was here.’
She paused, twisting her hair back from her face and hooking it behind her ears. ‘I can bring it back if you want me to, or if she wants it back, but that’s all I took and Harry said she gave him permission. I paid for a taxi to move it.’
‘Were there any of Mrs Fulford’s daughter’s belongings in the boxes?’
‘The boxes have been stacked up in the garage for quite a while, but I don’t recall seeing anything of hers.’
Reid thanked Agnes, and as she opened the door Lena walked in, saying that her driver was coming and that a van with SOCOs had drawn up outside.
‘DC Burrows said they were forensics officers – do I let them in? Or do you want to talk to them?’