‘I met them through the church just after my wife died. Mandy was fourteen then and her parents had just told her that she was adopted. She didn’t take it well and went a bit off the rails, denouncing religion and becoming rather difficult. After she tried to run away, Peter and Sally asked if I would speak with her as they knew that I had been an orphan and they hoped I might be able to connect with her.’
‘And did you?’ Anna asked
‘I like to think so, yes. She came to understand that being adopted didn’t mean your real parents hated you. I brokered an agreement with Peter and Sally that when she was sixteen she could look for her birth mother and I would help her.’
‘The file said she went missing just before her sixteenth birthday,’ Anna remarked and he sighed, nodding his head.
‘I don’t know how I can really help you, Don – I’m a stranger in a foreign land and don’t know anything about the case except what’s in the file.’
He cocked his head to one side and frowned. ‘But you’re a good detective and a pair of fresh eyes on the case. The smallest detail may mean something to you and no one else.’
‘I would need to interview people, start afresh-’
For the first time since she had met him, Don interrupted her: ‘All the main statements are in the file and I can ring Peter and Sally Anderson so you can meet them.’
Anna sat back in her chair and thought about what Don was asking her to do.
‘Okay, but I can’t promise you a successful conclusion.’ She sipped her wine and in some ways wished she hadn’t mentioned the case file as the mood of the evening had changed, but she didn’t want to let him down.
‘Thank you, Anna,’ Blane said.
‘From what I’ve read in the initial report, Mandy was last seen leaving the mall to go to choir practice.’
‘A girl who Mandy didn’t like joined their group at the mall. Dewar thought she used choir practice as an excuse to part company with them,’ Don said.
‘Maybe that was just coincidence and she’d already arranged to meet someone else,’ Anna suggested.
‘Then why not tell her friends that?’
‘Because she didn’t want them to know who it was.’
‘So it could have been a man,’ Don remarked.
‘Or someone her age, but the question is, who and why be secretive?’ Anna said.
Don twisted his wine glass by the stem and looked at her.
‘Langton was right, you are the bee’s knees.’
The tension that had built up whilst discussing the case evaporated as she laughed, partly pleased by Langton’s compliments, but also because of the way Don looked at her. It was obvious that he was smitten, which she found she rather liked, but there was no time to respond as suddenly their waitress appeared with their starter.
Chapter Twenty-Six
Anna woke after a very restless night. The Mandy Anderson case kept running through her mind, so much so that she had stayed up until three a.m. reading the parents’ and many other statements in the file. Her evening with Don Blane had been thoroughly enjoyable, especially after they stopped discussing the case. They ate their dinner and chatted about their likes and dislikes in life, and what had made them want to become investigators. It struck Anna how much they actually had in common and she had no qualms about being honest and open with him.
Anna lay in bed thinking about what could have happened to Mandy Anderson. In all the statements, she was described as being almost perfect: athletic, friendly, well-liked, good scholar, and deeply religious – this was repeated over and over again. She’d never had a boyfriend and was popular amongst her small group of friends and the church congregation. Anna sighed, baffled at how on earth Mandy could just disappear without a trace in an area where everyone seemed to know each other and crime was a rarity.
She checked her watch, and as it was just after eight a.m. she decided to get dressed and go to the shopping mall where Mandy was last seen. She wanted to get a feel for the area, meet the Andersons and walk the two routes Mandy was known to use to go home. It would also allow her the opportunity to buy a hairdryer and some other bits and pieces she needed. She checked her mobile and saw that there was a text message from Joan, saying she had uploaded a copy of Barolli’s notes from the interview with Marisha, who was still in a coma. Although she felt some sympathy for the woman she resolutely deleted the text, determined not to be drawn back in. She tried ringing Langton to see how he was getting on but his mobile cut straight to voicemail, so she sent a text message: ‘Take care, hope you get him. Anna x’
That left her with the dilemma of whether to make use of Jessie Dewar’s Mustang or not. ‘Should I or shouldn’t I?’ she briefly thought to herself, before temptation got the better of her. After all, Langton had said it was insured for any driver.
Having put the convertible roof down Anna turned the keys in the ignition as she lightly put her foot on the accelerator. The loud roar from the Mustang’s twin exhausts made her jump and she wondered again if she was doing the right thing in driving Dewar’s treasured car. Slowly, and cautiously, she pulled out of the car park onto the road to the main gate. She was glad no one was watching as each nervous touch of the accelerator made the car lurch forward. Having reached the gate she asked one of the guards for directions to the shopping mall. He told her to take the I-95 to Woodbridge and she couldn’t miss the fifty-foot-high circular sign saying Potomac Mills Mall.
Anna was relieved that it was only a twenty-minute journey, as she found herself nervous behind the wheel of the powerful Mustang. The mall itself was enormous and as it was early, she found a parking space quite easily. Orientating herself with the map from the case file she started on the walk to the Anderson house on Hallard Drive. Anna realized that Mandy’s route was through middle- and upper-class residential areas, apart from a three-minute section along the side of woodland, which could be seen clearly from the main road.
Number fifteen Hallard Drive was a two-storey wood-cladded house in the centre of a winding road. The front porch was a pristine white, with a screened front door, small swing bench and a garage to one side. Anna had not noticed a church and, checking the map, realized she would pass it on the return journey to the mall.
‘Hi, I’m Sally Anderson. Are you Anna Travis?’
Anna looked up and saw a woman coming down the driveway.
‘Yes, I am,’ Anna said, realizing Don must have rung the couple already.
Sally Anderson was a very pretty woman with pale blue eyes and dark hair with streaks of grey. The case file said she was forty-five, but she looked much older and Anna suspected that the stress of Mandy’s disappearance had aged her prematurely.
‘I was so deep in thought and admiring your lovely house I didn’t see you,’ Anna apologized.
‘Please do come in, and don’t worry, we’re used to people stopping and staring. Thankfully things aren’t as bad as they used to be,’ Mrs Anderson said, and Anna presumed she was referring to the press interest their daughter’s case must have brought to the community.
The front door of the house opened directly into the living-come-dining room, which was well furnished and immaculately neat and tidy. The wooden floor, cabinets, table and chairs were all old-style but looked remarkably new and were well polished and shiny. A large wooden crucifix of Jesus on the cross hung above the small log-burning fireplace. The other walls had photographs of Mandy at different ages, and her parents.
Sally explained that her husband Peter was at the supermarket but she was keen to show Anna Mandy’s bedroom and took her upstairs.
‘We have left the room exactly as it was when she went missing. I just dust, vacuum and keep it aired. Please feel free to have a look round while I make a coffee or would you prefer tea?’