The Whitby Murders (A Yorkshire Murder Mystery) - J. Ellis (ebook reader with internet browser TXT) 📗

snacks and several goth dens now also adorned with Halloween displays. There were several narrow alleys down which she could have disappeared. He spent some time looking in shops, but there were so many places she could hide amongst the dense clutter that it was fruitless so he returned to the car. Granger was speaking to the driver who was none other than Philip Owen.

‘I don’t know why she’s run off,’ he was saying. ‘I was giving her a lift into town. She lives on my route in.’

‘I see. All very innocent again. You’re cropping up too many times in this case for my liking,’ said Granger. ‘Is this your dad’s car?’

‘Yes,’ replied Owen, looking a bit embarrassed.

‘I’ll bet he doesn’t know you’re driving it, does he?’ Owen didn’t reply. ‘You’d better look after it, then. Is he insured for you to drive?’ Owen looked alarmed but Granger didn’t pursue it. ‘Did Pesku say anything to you about anything? Was there any particular reason why she wanted a lift? Had she had any news or anything?’

‘No, she never says much. She just texted to ask was I going into town and could I give her a lift.’

Granger let him go and turned to Hampton who told her that Pesku had escaped. ‘Well, she obviously knows we’re onto her. I wonder if she’s somehow got word that Preston’s body has been found?’

‘It’s possible, ma’am. That industrial park where the skip was discovered isn’t far from where she lives and rumours travel fast, especially once those kids who found it got back home.’

‘I wonder what she’s going to do now?’

‘Lie low somewhere?’

‘Yes, but she can only do that for so long. She had a bag with her. She might have been going to leave the town for a while. Okay, let’s go back. I’m putting you in charge of the search; you’ve got the best knowledge of the town and the most likely places where someone might hide. We also need to find out where she was a student. That won’t be straightforward given that London’s got thousands of them.’

Hampton was a local man who had lived in Whitby all his life and relished a challenge. ‘Yes, ma’am, leave it to me. We’ll find her.’

‘Do you want to hear my latest poem?’ Oldroyd had joined Deborah in a small café in one of the steep, narrow streets on the west side of the town. ‘I was writing it last night when you were asleep. It took my mind off the case, though it is about Whitby.’

‘Go on then,’ replied Deborah, taking a bite from her smoked salmon sandwich. She’d encouraged him to write as a counter to his tendency to overwork. Oldroyd read from his notebook:

‘Whitby Light and Dark

Scudding clouds,

Flicker light and dark,

Across the sea.

Light came with Hilda,

The abbess on the hill,

A beacon of hope.

Darkness with Dracula,

Bounding from the ship

As a black dog.

All is now tame.

Tourists in the bright sunlight,

Goths dressing up in dark.’

‘Oh, I like that,’ said Deborah. ‘I take it the light is with Hilda the Abbess of Whitby?’

‘Yes, she lived in the seventh century and was apparently a very virtuous, much-loved woman. Then darkness and evil with Dracula.’

‘And why is everything now “tame”?’

‘That might not be the right word. I was just thinking about the contrast between drama and the seriousness of the past in fact and fiction with today, when everything has become sort of trivialised into tourism. I suppose I was thinking about this Dracula’s Lair thing in the case and people just coming here to sunbathe or dress up as goths. It’s a leisure and entertainment place now and it used to be a powerhouse of virtue, ideas, exploration. Think of Captain Cook going out from here to Australia and the South Seas. Do you know that Caedmon, the first named English poet, looked after the sheep at Hilda’s monastery?’

‘Well, fascinating stuff, but it’s not like you to romanticise the past. It’s great that people have the leisure to come and enjoy themselves. Life would have been very hard for ordinary people in all those times you mentioned.’

‘I know. It just amazes me what distinguished people there have been in a small place like this.’ He put the book aside and carried on eating a cheese and pickle sandwich. ‘Do you fancy a walk up the hill on the east side after this? We can see the abbey ruins and the church where Bram Stoker set scenes in Dracula.’

‘Sounds good.’

Oldroyd finished his sandwich and drank his coffee. Then he sat back with a sigh. Mixing work with pleasure as he was doing at the moment certainly had its advantages. There was nothing he liked better than pottering around an interesting place like Whitby, especially with such a pleasant companion.

Six

The time and distance seemed endless, and my knees trembled and my breath came laboured as I toiled up the endless steps to the Abbey . . . I could see the seat and the white figure . . . There was undoubtedly something long and black bending over the half reclining white figure. I called in fright, ‘Lucy! Lucy!’ and something raised a head, and from where I was I could see a white face and red, gleaming eyes.

From Mina Murray’s Journal in Dracula

Oldroyd and Deborah sauntered down Church Street towards the abbey steps. There was further evidence of the preparations for Halloween in the shops: pumpkins, witches, black cats and cobwebs were in even greater profusion. When they reached Withington’s shop, Oldroyd glanced through the window and caught a glimpse of Withington himself. For a second the crooked jeweller’s eyes met his and then he looked away frowning. Oldroyd smiled. That man would be relieved when they went past his shop and didn’t go in. He knew the police were investigating his activities and he would most likely be prosecuted. Not before time, thought Oldroyd.

They turned the corner and saw the steps curving up steeply to the right.

‘These steps appear