Daisy in Chains (9 page)

Myrtle’s one great passion, verging on obsession, was Disney. Her Facebook page featured little else. Her Tumblr blog consisted of daily, short, misspelt postings about films she’d watched, news items she’d read about the theme parks and her
thoughts on characters, their costumes, even their relationships.

Her profile picture on Facebook, taken a few years earlier, showed Myrtle at Disneyland Paris, wearing Mickey Mouse ears, and standing next to Mickey and Minnie. The cover picture showed her bedroom at home, practically a museum of Disney memorabilia.

Myrtle spent all her spare money on Disney toys, clothes, posters and pictures. It was an obsession that was to cost her her life.

She had few friends in real life and few real friends on Facebook. Most of the people she interacted with were those who shared her interest, whom she’d encountered on the various Disney-related pages on the site. One of these ‘friends’ claimed to be a seventy-two-year-old grandmother called Anita Radcliffe. If Myrtle had been as smart as she was passionate about all things Disney, she might have spotted that Anita Radcliffe is the name of a character in
101 Dalmatians
.

Anita Radcliffe was yet another fake identity. The police discovered very quickly that ‘her’ posts all came from the same computer that had hosted Harry Wilson’s and Isabelle Warner’s email accounts. Harry Wilson and Anita Radcliffe were even Facebook ‘friends’ – how twisted is that?

On 12 February 2013, Myrtle spotted a posting on her page from Anita Radcliffe. Anita had been browsing through Myrtle’s photographs and had been struck by a picture of Myrtle in a Snow White costume.

‘My oldest granddaughter looks about your size,’ Anita wrote, ‘and she’s desperately looking for a Snow White costume for a party. Do you mind me asking where you got yours?’

The two women began chatting. With the benefit of hindsight, it’s easy to see how easily Myrtle was played. On Myrtle’s birthday, Anita posted a Disney-themed card on her page, writing:

‘Wishing a wonderful day to my new friend in Disney. Lots of joy, my sweet young friend.’

When Myrtle posted a rather obvious comment about the relationship between Marlin and his son, in
Finding Nemo
, Anita complimented her on her insight.

‘Watching Find Nemo for the millionth time, LOL. Wanting to scream at Marrlin to let the kid grow up, ffs.’

‘That’s quite insightful of you, Myrtle. Over-nurturing our children leads to co-dependency that becomes hard to break in later life. I sense, from your maturity and strength, that you come from a large family, in which everyone was encouraged to stand on their own feet from an early age. Am I right?’

‘
Dead right, clever lady. Five of us at home, + mum and garry. never a moments piece.
’

Anita began laying her trap. Every few days, she’d post a photograph of a piece of Disney memorabilia, supposedly that she’d bought years earlier for her grandchildren. She started to hint that it was all languishing in the loft, gathering dust and taking up space. Some of the pieces she showed were quite rare, selling for over £100 on eBay. Myrtle’s covetous nature was awoken.

At the same time, Anita’s interest in her, her willingness to talk and ask her opinion, spoke to the self-esteem of a young woman who had little in her life.

Of all the victims, Myrtle was probably the easiest prey.

On 19 October, Anita sent Myrtle a message.

‘Dearest Myrtle, I feel we have become friends and, even if what I am about to say is unacceptable to you, I hope and pray that you won’t take offence, my clever, funny young friend. I have decided, after much soul-searching, to leave my house and move into somewhere smaller.

‘The reason for writing is to ask if you would like my Disney collection? My grandchildren have no use for it any more. Of course, I know I could sell it and probably get quite a lot of money for it, but I have no need of money. I’m not boasting, I know you know that, I’m just telling the truth because I want you to understand my wish that the collection goes to someone who will treasure it.’

It hardly seems necessary to record Myrtle’s reply. Of course she wanted the Disney collection. Anita kept her waiting for a few more weeks, but eventually, on 4 November, they agreed to meet. Anita offered to collect Myrtle at a bus stop on the outskirts of town.

And another young woman steps off our pages.

A few days after Myrtle’s disappearance, the police had their first piece of luck in the case. The cashier at an Esso-owned petrol station on the Bridgwater Road (A38), a few miles north of Cheddar, had spotted something unusual in the forecourt. The owner of a black BMW had stopped to check his tyre pressure and the cashier happened to notice him opening the boot. The cashier describes what happened next as a ‘sort of scuffle’.

We may never know what might have been if he’d checked the footage immediately and called the police. He didn’t. The station was busy, he wasn’t entirely sure of what he’d seen, and he didn’t at that stage know about Myrtle’s disappearance.

Three days later, he saw a piece on the news and was alarmed enough to mention it to a police officer he knew – DC Pete Weston again.

What Weston and the cashier saw when they watched the footage was a figure dressed in dark clothes open the boot of the car carefully, then dart forward and close it again. The interior of the boot is too dark to be seen, but as the car was driven away, something that looked like fabric could be seen dangling from the boot.

A search of the grounds around the petrol station unearthed a discarded ‘pop-sock’. It was later to be linked, via DNA and skin particles, to Myrtle.

DC Weston immediately traced the black BMW to a Mr Hamish Wolfe, consultant surgeon. Wolfe was arrested.

His computer was seized. Had detectives been hoping to find a familiar IP address, they were disappointed. Wolfe had, though, made one big mistake. He’d posted, just once, on Jessie Tout’s Facebook page using the Harry Wilson account. It was the other crucial piece of evidence that was to seal his fate.

ACCORDING TO ITS
website, Minehead Caravan Park is one of Somerset’s most popular holiday destinations. Photographs on the website show the ‘homes’ painted the white of fresh milk, with picket fences and neat gardens. They show families making their way along reed-lined paths to the ‘miles of sandy beaches’ just a seashell’s throw from the closest caravans.

None of these photographs were taken in early December, at 6.30 in the evening, when the world is dark and the wind aspires to be gale force.

Maggie waits, her car engine ticking over, at the park entrance. The barrier shudders and lifts and, for a second, the ghostly movement unnerves her. Then she sees the security camera on top of the hut. Someone knows she’s here and that should be reassuring but somehow isn’t. She drives forward and the barrier closes behind her.

The road through the holiday village follows the line of the sea before curving inland towards the administration facility and social hall. In the near distance she can see the Ferris wheel and the helter-skelter of the fairground.

The edges of the road are blurred by sand. Sand lies on window ledges, weighs down roofs, gathers in corners. After a minute or two, she sees the few, low lights that indicate the admin building. In the summer neon signs offering
Dancing, Music, Licensed Bar
can be seen from the other side of the Channel, but none of them are lit tonight.

The foyer smells of stale beer, cooking fat and damp carpet. There are stacks of metal-framed chairs against one wall. Crumpled crisp packets and sweets lie amongst balls of dust in the corners. A wide-headed brush has been abandoned on its side, its bristles encrusted with dirt and human hair.

The ballroom is almost in darkness but emergency lights lend a green glow to the walls as Maggie heads for where she can now hear voices. Directly ahead of her is a stage, curtained with heavy red velvet.
For the first time, she is beginning to regret not taking Pete up on his offer to come with her.

She would not have been welcome here with Pete.

The voices have fallen silent and she has a sense of people, just around the corner in the bar area, listening to her approach. She gets closer and can see shoulders, backs of heads. Moving as one, the heads turn to face her.

She can see them all now. Around a dozen, most seated, some standing by a bar in which every optic is empty. She spots Sandra Wolfe in one of the seats, sitting next to a young woman with very long black hair.

‘Maggie?’

A man is coming towards her. He is small and skinny, with an angry-looking patch of eczema around his neck and several shaving cuts.

‘I’m Mike Shiven.’ He’s holding out a small hand towards her. She fights back a shiver when it lies, flat and dead, in her own. Up close, she can see a crusting around his eyelashes and, when he releases her hand, she feels as though he has left skin behind.

‘It was good of you to come,’ he says. ‘We’re all very grateful.’

Everyone is staring at her, not even trying to soften their curiosity. One woman looks quite elderly, a couple barely more than teenagers. Most are women. All of them, she sees now that she’s closer, are wearing paper flowers as buttonholes.

‘This is Andy Bear.’ Shiven is indicating a huge man who’s followed him over from the bar. ‘He’s the manager of the holiday village. It’s thanks to him we can meet here.’

Bracing herself, Maggie holds out her hand to Bear, whose hairy stomach is hanging below the rim of his sweatshirt. He is wearing oversized sweatpants, but the elastic in the fabric has gone in the knees and the thread is looking thin around the crotch. His hand is cold and clammy and she drops it quickly.

‘Shall we sit down?’ With one hand in the small of her back, Shiven steers her towards the waiting circle of chairs. ‘I’m sure we’d all like to welcome Maggie Rose here tonight.’ There is a half-hearted smattering of applause. ‘Maggie, thank you for coming. We’re here for you. What would you like to say to us?’

‘Can I suggest we start by you introducing yourselves to me,’
Maggie says. ‘We’ll go round in a circle. Tell me who you are, whether or not you know Wolfe personally, and why you believe him to be innocent.’

‘His name is Hamish.’ The woman on Sandra Wolfe’s immediate left, with long black hair and hard black eyes is staring at Maggie.

Maggie returns the look. ‘Why don’t you go first?’ she says.

Black eyes mutters something.

‘Sirocco, I wish you’d stop saying that.’ Sandra’s voice cuts across the cold air like a colder wind. ‘That’s the sort of nonsense that just embarrasses Hamish.’

‘Give me your name again?’ Maggie asks.

‘Sirocco.’ The woman sits upright on her chair, like a cat about to lick her paws. Her clothes are black, flowing and shapeless.

‘Like the car?’ Maggie says.

The woman shakes her long hair. ‘Like the wind. I’m Sirocco Silverwood. Hamish and I are soulmates.’

It is difficult to guess Silverwood’s age. Her dress, hair, make-up suggest early to mid twenties but there is a coarseness to her skin that typically only occurs after the age of thirty. She looks thin, but is dressed in such loose, shapeless clothes that it is impossible to be sure.

‘Does he know?’ Maggie asks.

A narrow-eyed glare. ‘Of course.’

Sandra practically jumps in her seat in frustration. ‘They’ve never met. Sirocco talks nonsense.’

The black-haired woman’s body tenses, as though she might leap at Hamish’s mother. ‘We write to each other all the time. The only reason I don’t see him is because you take all the visits.’

Sandra doesn’t seem remotely intimidated. ‘He wants to see family, not some stupid girl who’s living in a dream world.’

Maggie turns away from the quarrelling women. ‘Mike, why don’t you start with the introductions. We’ll go anticlockwise.’

They begin again and this time get round the circle without interruptions. Fewer than a third have met Wolfe. The women talk about being moved by his photograph, about feeling him calling out to them, of an instinctive belief in his innocence. All of them claim to write to him on a regular basis.

To Maggie’s immediate right is a man in a crimson corduroy jacket and a bowler hat. On his other side, barely visible, is a small, plump woman. The two of them belong together, it is obvious from their eccentric clothing, from the badges and pins that adorn their jackets and hats, from the mud on their boots and the faint smell of unwashed clothes and bodies coming from them both. They are travellers.

The woman is called Odi.

‘I met Hamish when I had pneumonia.’ Odi speaks so quietly that everyone in the circle, Maggie included, has to lean towards her. ‘I was rushed into the Bristol General and he was the doctor on call. I’ll always remember how kind he was. He knew I was a traveller, and it didn’t make any difference to how well he treated me. I just don’t believe someone that kind can kill women.’

Having said her piece, Odi shrinks down further into her seat. Maggie has yet to catch a glimpse of anything more than her colourful, shabby clothing.

‘I’m Broon.’ The man in the corduroy jacket is holding tightly to Odi’s hand. ‘I don’t know the guy. I’m here for him because my lady is.’

A man called Rowland, with the trembling hands of a drinker, speaks more about himself than Hamish. He is a crime writer, with four novels to his name. Researching his latest book, he’s become interested in Hamish’s case. He doesn’t want to tread on Maggie’s toes, of course, but he thinks the story will make a good docu-drama and is already working on the screenplay.

‘Do you think him guilty?’ Maggie asks.

By the side of Rowland’s chair leg is a lager can. Rowland reaches down but lets his hand dangle. ‘No,’ he says. ‘Too many discrepancies in the evidence.’