Disordered Minds

reason, then I bet there's more to it than meets the eye.'

I approached Robert in the canteen at approximately one o'clock in the morning. He was unwilling to talk to me, claiming the school's punishment showed that Cill was at fault, not Louise. I pointed out that Louise's version of events was very convenient, since she knew how worried we and Miss Brett had been about Cill's truanting. He asked me if I was accusing his daughter of lying, and when I said it was a possibility, he became abusive and a fight broke out. I did not do this to draw attention to myself and create an alibi or to disguise any bruises from a previous encounter with Cill. It happened as a result of my deep concern and anxiety for my daughter's welfare, which boiled over when Robert Burton referred to her as 'a cheap little tart who deserved what she got.'

I have no idea why he made this remark unless Louise had already told him about the alleged rape. If so, he had a responsibility to pass that information to myself and my wife.

In conclusion, I have accounted for my movements during the night of Friday, May 29, and Saturday, May 30, 1970. Also, my fifty-minute drive on the morning of Saturday, May 30, when I went to Branksome Station and Bournemouth Central in the hope of finding my daughter. I confirm that I know nothing about Cill's disappearance and that I am ignorant of her current whereabouts.

David Trevelyan

By the time Billy had finished reading and laid the pages on the coffee table, his hands were shaking. 'God!' he said with feeling. 'Do you think Mr. Trevelyan's right? Do you think my folks did know about the rape?'

Assuming he was addressing her, Sasha Spencer demurred. 'David's never been convinced the rape happened,' she said. 'He thinks your sister was lying to shift attention away from her part in Cill's suspension. Jean believes it, though, and she beats herself up regularly for being a lousy mother. It's a very sad situation. Rightly or wrongly-and for different reasons-they each hold themselves responsible.'

Billy lowered his face into his hands. 'It certainly happened,' he muttered. 'I was there, I saw it. They took it in turns ... kept kicking her ... she had blood all down her legs. It makes me sick just thinking about it.'

Rachel saw the distaste on Sasha's face. 'He was ten years old and they'd filled him with vodka,' she said, leaping to Billy's defense, 'so he didn't understand what was going on. He thought it was a fight. If the police had included him in the questioning, it would have been different, but no one knew he'd been with Cill and Louise that day.'

'Cill was that scared of her dad, she said she'd kill us if we ever breathed a word,' Billy went on unhappily, 'so I never did. And it wasn't until a bloke at school told me his mum had read it in the newspapers that I found out Louise had told the police ... I didn't even know what rape meant-he had to explain it to me ... and that was a good two months after Cill vanished. It wasn't mentioned in our house. Nothing was.' He dropped a hand to David Trevelyan's statement. 'I didn't know Mr. Trevelyan cared about his kid that much ... I didn't know my dad and him had a fight ... I sure as hell didn't know Dad was calling Cill a tart before anyone knew she was missing.'

There was a long silence.

Sasha opened her notebook again. 'Why is that important?' she asked.

'He said Cill 'deserved what she got.' I think it means he knew about the rape.'

Sasha eyed him with a frown. 'I still don't understand why it's important. It may not reflect well on your parents, but it doesn't mean they had anything to do with Cill running away.'

Billy took a printout of his father's email from his shirt pocket. 'Read this,' he said harshly, 'then ask yourself what else he's been lying about. You don't tell a man his kid deserves what she gets if you think he's abusing her ... and you damn well talk to the police if you think that man's been after your own daughter as well.'

*22*

25 MULL1N STREET, HIGHDOWN, BOURNEMOUTH

THURSDAY, MAY 15, 2003, MIDDAY

Jonathan suggested they sit in the garden so that he could inspect the rear of George's house, but she told him there was only one chair and no table. She seemed depressed, and he thought it sad that she had no one to share her garden with. He said the day was too glorious to miss and insisted on moving furniture out from the kitchen. Puffs of high cloud drifted across a turquoise sky and the scent of wisteria on her neighbor's wall was heavy on the air. He collected a cushion from the sitting room and tucked it behind George's back, worried about the signs of pain and weariness that were showing round her eyes. 'What's wrong?'

'Nothing,' she said. 'I'm just aching a bit.'

He took the chair next to her. 'You look tired.'

'It goes with the job. I'm on nights again.'

'I hope you're not playing the martyr,' he warned her. 'I'm investing a lot of time and energy into this book.'

She gave a faint smile. 'You're such a bully.'

'I've been taking lessons from Andrew. Have you been to the doctor?'

'I'm going tomorrow.'

He didn't press it. Instead he produced a printout of Andrew's bullet points which he'd emailed George at the beginning of the week. He began with what could be proved. If, as George's previous neighbor had told her, her house was an exact replica of Grace's, then Louise could certainly have seen into the sitting room through the French windows. Jonathan was less convinced about the girls entering through a gate in the fence at the back in order to truant. He nodded at George's rear boundary. 'Their only access would have been through other people's gardens,' he pointed out, 'so why were they never seen by Grace's neighbors?'

George sorted through a folder that she'd asked him to fetch from her sitting room. 'I think I've solved that.' She drew out a photocopy of a street map and spread it on the table. 'I found this in the library. It's from an early A-Z of Bournemouth, printed in 1969.' She took up a pencil and placed the tip on Mullin Street. 'This is where the houses were demolished to make the apartment block and, as near as I can get it,