The Girl in the Dark by Angela Hart

Author:Angela Hart
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Pan Macmillan UK

13

‘Fostering is a world of worry!’

It was already dark when Melissa disappeared in TJ’s van and so we only waited an hour before calling the social services out-of-hours number to report her missing. They told us to call our local police station.

‘I can give you the nickname of the boy she’s with and I know where he works and what vehicle he was driving,’ I said to the sergeant on the desk. Jonathan had managed to see the registration number of TJ’s van and had scribbled it down on a pad he kept in his apron pocket. We already knew it was a small white Ford, and Jonathan even knew the name of the model, being the avid reader of Auto Trader he’s always been.

The police officer took down the information and assured me that patrols would be alerted and we’d get a call as soon as there was any news. Then he asked me if I had any concerns that TJ had taken Melissa against her will.

‘No, I have no reason to think that,’ I said. ‘He’s her boyfriend, and she’s run away before.’

‘Gotcha,’ the officer said casually, as if that explained everything.

I told him that even though this was not Melissa’s first disappearance, I was as concerned as any parent or guardian of a missing twelve-year-old would be in the circumstances. I also mentioned we had a recent photograph of her.

‘What’s her date of birth?’

I gave it to him and he commented cheerfully that she was nearly thirteen, as if that made the situation somehow less serious or pressing. Then I heard a colleague in the background ask him if he wanted a cuppa.

‘OK, love. I’ve got all this. Leave it with us. Thanks for phoning. If you could bring in the photo to copy that would be helpful.’

The line went dead.

I know now that police usually come out to the house to collect a photo in the case of a missing child. At the same time they sometimes check the child is not hiding in the house, as this is not unusual. But, just like the first time Melissa had gone missing, the police did not volunteer to come to the house, and it was up to us to take the photo in to the station to be copied. I didn’t question this as I didn’t have experience of dealing with a missing child and had no idea what the normal police routine was. In hindsight, I wonder if the officer who took my call knew there would already be a file on her, because of her history? However, if that were the case, nobody spelled this out to me and I was left feeling that Melissa’s disappearance was not being taken as seriously as it would have been if she’d had no history of going missing.

I tried to eat some chicken curry with the boys but I didn’t have much of an appetite. I couldn’t compute how Melissa had been merrily singing ‘chicken tikka’ to an ABBA tune one minute, and then disappearing in TJ’s van like that the next.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.