She felt the nerves as barbs sticking in her gut as she walked up to the building. It was a tiny glass-fronted office building with a small metallic sign reading Kilton Mail beside the main door. And although it was a Monday morning the place looked and felt abandoned. No sign of life or movement in any of the lower windows.
Pip pressed the button on the wall next to the door. It made a tinny whining sound that grated in her ears. She let it go and, seconds later, a muffled robotic voice came through the speaker.
‘Hello?’
‘Err, hi,’ Pip said. ‘I’m here to see Becca Bell.’
‘OK,’ the voice said, ‘I’ll buzz you in. Give the door a good push ’cause it’s sticky.’
A harsh buzz sounded. Pip pushed the door and barged it with her hip and, with a clacking noise, the door unstuck and swung inwards. She closed it behind her and stood there in a small and cold room. There were three sofas and a couple of coffee tables but no people.
‘Hello?’ she called.
A door opened and a man strolled through, flicking the collar up on his long beige coat. A man with straight dark hair pushed to the side and grey-tinged skin. It was Stanley Forbes.
‘Oh.’ He stopped when he saw Pip. ‘I’m just on my way out. I . . . who are you?’
He stared at her with narrowed eyes, his lower jaw jutted out, and Pip felt goosebumps crawling down her neck. It was cold in here.
‘I’m here to see Becca,’ she said.
‘Oh, right.’ He smiled without showing his teeth. ‘Everyone’s working in the back room today. Heating’s busted at the front. That way.’ He pointed at the door he’d come through.
‘Thank you,’ she said, but Stanley wasn’t listening. He was already halfway out of the front door. It banged shut, drowning out the ‘ooo ’ in her thanks.
Pip walked over to the far door and pushed through it. A short corridor opened up into a larger room, with four paper-laden desks pushed against each wall. There were three women in here, each typing away at the computers on their desks, jointly creating a pitter-patter song that filled the room. None of them had noticed her over the sound of it.
Pip walked towards Becca Bell, her short blonde hair scraped back in a stubby ponytail, and cleared her throat.
‘Hi, Becca,’ she said.
Becca spun around in her chair and the other two women looked up.
‘Oh,’ she said, ‘it’s you that’s here to see me? Shouldn’t you be at school?’
‘Yeah, sorry. It’s half-term,’ Pip said, shifting nervously under Becca’s gaze, thinking of how close she and Ravi had been to getting caught by her in the Bell house. Pip looked instead over Becca’s shoulder, at the computer screen full of typed words.
Becca’s eyes followed hers and she turned back to minimize the document.
‘Sorry,’ she said, ‘it’s the first piece I’m writing for the newspaper and my first draft is absolutely awful. My eyes only,’ she smiled.
‘What’s it about?’ Pip asked.
‘Oh, um, it’s just about this old farmhouse that’s been uninhabited for eleven years now, just off the Kilton end of Sycamore Road. They can’t seem to sell it.’ She looked up at Pip. ‘A few of the neighbours are thinking about pitching in to buy it, trying to apply for change of use and doing it up as a pub. I’m writing about why that’s a terrible idea.’
One of the women across the room cut in: ‘My brother lives near there and he doesn’t think it’s such a terrible idea. Beer on tap just down the road.
He’s ecstatic.’ She gave a hacking foghorn laugh, looking to her other colleague to join in.
Becca shrugged, glancing down at her hands as she picked at the sleeve of her jumper. ‘I just think the place deserves to be a home for a family again one day,’ she said. ‘My dad almost bought and restored it years ago, before everything happened. He changed his mind, in the end, but I’ve always wondered what things would be like if he hadn’t.’
The other two keyboards fell silent.
‘Oh, Becca, sweetheart,’ the woman said, ‘I had no idea that was the reason. Well, I feel terrible now.’ She slapped her forehead. ‘I’ll do the tea rounds for the rest of the day.’
‘No, don’t worry.’ Becca gave her a small smile.
The other two women turned back to their computers.
‘Pippa, isn’t it?’ Becca spoke quietly. ‘What can I help you with? If it’s about what we discussed before, you know I don’t want to be involved.’
‘Trust me, Becca,’ Pip said, her voice dipping into whispers. ‘This is important. Really important. Please.’
Becca’s wide blue eyes stared up at hers for a few lingering moments. ‘Fine.’ She stood up. ‘Let’s go out to the front room.’
The room felt colder the second time around. Becca took a seat on the nearest sofa and crossed her legs. Pip sat at the other end and turned to face her.
‘Um . . . so . . .’ She tapered off, not quite sure how to phrase it, nor how much she should tell her. She stalled, staring into Becca’s Andie-like face.
‘What is it?’ Becca said.
Pip found her voice. ‘So, while researching, I found out that Andie might have been dealing drugs and selling at calamity parties.’
Becca’s neat brows drew down to her eyes as she cast a distrustful look at Pip. ‘No,’ she said, ‘there’s no way.’
‘I’m sorry, I’ve confirmed it with multiple sources,’ Pip said. ‘She can’t have done.’
‘The man who supplied her gave her a secret second phone, a burner phone, to use in her deals,’ Pip carried on over Becca’s protests. ‘He said that Andie hid the phone along with her stash in her wardrobe.’
‘I’m sorry but I think someone’s been playing a trick on you,’ Becca said, shaking her head. ‘There’s no way my sister was selling drugs.’
‘I understand it must be hard to hear,’ Pip said, ‘but I’m learning that Andie had a lot of secrets. This was one of them. The police didn’t find the burner phone in her room and I’m trying to find out who might have had access to her room after she went missing.’
‘Wh . . . but . . .’ Becca sputtered, still shaking her head. ‘No one did; the house was cordoned off.’
‘I mean, before the police arrived. After Andie left the house and before your parents discovered she was missing. Was there any way someone could have broken into your house without you knowing? Had you gone to sleep?’
‘I . . . I –’ her voice cracked – ‘no, I don’t know. I wasn’t asleep, I was downstairs watching TV. But you –’
‘Do you know Max Hastings?’ Pip said quickly before Becca could object again.
Becca stared at her, confusion glassing over her eyes. ‘Um,’ she said, ‘yeah, he was Sal’s friend, wasn’t he? The blonde guy.’
‘Did you ever notice him hanging round near your house after Andie disappeared?’
‘No,’ she said quickly. ‘No, but why –’
‘What about Daniel da Silva? Do you know him?’ Pip said, hoping this
quick-fire questioning was working, that Becca would answer before she thought not to answer.
‘Daniel,’ she said, ‘yeah, I know him. He was close with my dad.’ Pip’s eyes narrowed. ‘Daniel da Silva was close to your dad?’
‘Yeah,’ Becca sniffed. ‘He worked for my dad for a while, after he quit that caretaker’s job at school. My dad owns a cleaning company. But he took a shine to Daniel and promoted him to a job in the office. He was the one who convinced Daniel to apply to be a police officer, supported him through the training. Yeah. I don’t know if they’re still close; I don’t speak to my dad.’
‘So did you see a lot of Daniel?’ asked Pip.
‘Quite a bit. He often popped round, stayed for dinner sometimes. What has this got to do with my sister?’
‘Daniel was a police officer when your sister went missing. Was he involved in the case at all?’
‘Well, yeah,’ Becca replied, ‘he was one of the first responding officers when my dad reported it.’
Pip felt herself tilting forward, her hands against the sofa cushion, leaning into Becca’s words. ‘Did he do a search of the house?’
‘Yeah,’ Becca said. ‘He and this policewoman took our statements and then did their primary search.’
‘Could Daniel have been the one that searched Andie’s room?’
‘Yeah, maybe.’ Becca shrugged. ‘I don’t really see where you’re going with this. I think you’ve been misled by someone, really. Andie was not involved in drugs.’
‘Daniel da Silva was the first to access Andie’s room,’ Pip said, more to herself than to Becca.
‘Why does that matter?’ said Becca, annoyance starting to stir in her voice. ‘We know what happened that night. We know Sal killed her, regardless of what Andie or anyone else was up to.’
‘I’m not sure he did,’ Pip said, widening her eyes in what she hoped was a meaningful way. ‘I’m not so sure Sal did it. And I think I’m close to proving it.’
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Pippa Fitz-Amobi EPQ 23/10/2017
Production Log – Entry 34
Becca Bell did not respond well to my suggestion that Sal might be innocent. I think asking me to leave was proof enough of that. It’s not surprising. She’s had five and a half unwavering years of knowing that Sal killed Andie, five and a half years to bury the grief for her sister. And here I come, kicking up the dirt and telling her she’s wrong.
But she’ll have to believe it soon, along with the rest of Kilton, when Ravi and I find out who really killed both Andie and Sal.
And after my conversation with Becca I think the front runner has changed again. Not only have I unearthed a strong connection between two names on my suspect list (another possible murder team: Daniel da Silva and Jason Bell?) but I’ve confirmed my suspicions about Daniel. He not only had access to Andie’s room after she went missing, but he was probably the first person to search it! He would have had the perfect opportunity to take and hide the burner phone, and remove any trace of himself from Andie’s life.
Web searches bring up nothing useful about Daniel. But I have just seen this on the Thames Valley Police Kilton area page: Kilton has only five
designated police officers and two police community support officers. I like my odds that Daniel will be there. I don’t like my odds that he’ll tell me anything.
