‘Scarlett, Janey, it’s the police,’ she shouted, and her voice echoed around from every direction.
Morgan stood still, listening for a reply, but none came. She wasn’t sure if she was relieved or not. She’d hoped they were in here but knew by how hard it had been to climb through the gap that they couldn’t be. Not unless there was another entrance that led to it further along. Her shoulders sagged and she felt totally deflated. She shone her torch around on the floor one last time.The light picked up on something glinting near to one of the dark, open spaces.
Looking for the safest way down, she began to climb. She had to jump the last bit and landed on the floor with such a thud it sent shockwaves through her ankle that she’d badly sprained last year. She gritted her teeth and shook it until the pain eased off, cursing under her breath.
The floor was dry, and her boots crunched on the loose stones underfoot. She kept her beam of light on the thing that had caught her eye and bent down to take a look. It was a silver charm bracelet and way out of place in here. She took out her phone and photographed it, then tugged a pair of gloves out of her pocket and felt around for an evidence bag. She didn’t have one, but she did have one last spare glove. She opened it and then picked the bracelet up, dropping it inside. That would have to do. It was better than nothing; she couldn’t leave it here. Though she was unsure if either Janey or Scarlett had been wearing one at the time of their disappearance, it didn’t matter. She would find out. Knotting the glove, she pushed it deep into her pocket and straightened up.
‘Janey, Scarlett, are you in there?’ She shouted into the blackness, but the only noise she heard was the echo of her own voice.
‘Morgan.’ Ernie’s voice faintly called to her, and she realised he must be trying to come in.
‘I’m coming, it’s okay,’ she yelled back, feeling bad that she’d taken longer than he’d probably anticipated and was likely starting to panic.
She made her way back to the entrance, climbing up the ledge and squeezed her way through to get to the outside. It was so bright out here in the glare of the winter sun she had to squeeze her eyes shut and shield them with her hand.
‘Thank God you’re okay, I was starting to panic. You were in there ages.’
‘I was?’
He nodded, and she realised that what had seemed like a couple of minutes to her had most likely felt like an hour to him. ‘Sorry, I had to double check.’
‘No, I’m just glad you’re okay. Find anything?’
She looked at the entrance and realised that for her to have heard Ernie’s voice he must have had to squeeze his way through, but he’d got himself out of there pretty fast for a guy with a bad back. She shook her head. ‘No, I was just double checking.’
‘That’s a shame.’
She nodded. ‘Thanks for showing me though, I really appreciate it. We better get back; Ben will be beside himself wondering what’s taking so long.’
She didn’t tell Ernie that nobody knew she was here, alone. Had he lied to her about his back, or had he pushed through that awkward, narrow entrance because he thought that she might need his help? Either way it unsettled her a little bit and she began to climb back up to get to the top.
‘Do you need a hand, Ernie? Can you manage okay?’
‘No, I’m good. Thanks.’
Going up was a lot easier than going down and she reached the top much faster, Turning around expecting to see him still near to the bottom, he was directly behind her. She still had an uneasy feeling that maybe he had lied to her about having a bad back, but why would he do that? Unless he was afraid to go into the cave?
She didn’t know what was going on with him, but she did know that when she got to the safety of her car she was going to do a little digging around into his background. She owed it toher aunt Ettie to make sure she was safe with the man she was obviously falling for.
FORTY-EIGHT
Amos had spent most of the night awake. Shep had been whining and pacing up and down as best as he could in the kitchen and had refused to move away from the pantry door. Which meant that Amos, who hadn’t really used the pantry for its original purpose since his mother died, was also on edge and pacing up and down. He sat staring at it, sipping his tea and trying to cajole Shep into sitting down or eating his breakfast. Shep was having none of it and he kept staring at him with his big, brown eyes. Unable to take it anymore, he stood up and hobbled across to where he’d left his false leg last night.
‘Okay, boy, I’m going to take a look. We should be keeping our nose out of this, you know that, don’t you? You have no business being so demanding, it’s not your concern.’
But Shep wouldn’t look away from him. Amos strapped on the leg, took hold of a torch from the kitchen drawer and opened the door that led to the room which had once been stocked with jars of every pickled vegetable you could imagine. When his gran was alive it had also been full of home-made jams, damson gin, blackberry wine. You name a fruit or vegetable, and his gran would either preserve, pickle or turn it into alcohol. He had no light in there; the bulb had gone out just before his mother haddied and he’d never replaced it. He had no use for the room – he didn’t like pickled anything – and there were still dusty jars on the shelves from over thirty years ago that he just didn’t have the heart to throw away. He always had been sentimental and too soft for his dad’s liking, which was the reason he’d run away to join the army. Determined to prove himself, he’d done that by going and getting the bottom half of his leg blown off, but he didn’t feel sorry for himself. He managed; he had lived when many of the guys he’d known hadn’t been that lucky.
The old rug hadn’t been moved in a long time, and he peeled it back revealing the trap door underneath it. Shep was watching him, his hackles on edge. Amos turned to him and patted his head.
‘You wait here, old boy. I’m going to struggle enough myself getting down there. I don’t want you following me and getting hurt, okay?’
The trap door was a little too easy to lift, which made him wrinkle his forehead. As he lifted it, a blast of arctic air filled the room and the fusty smell of damp assaulted his nostrils. He shone the torch down into the black hole and then turned to Shep.
‘Stay.’ He held up one hand, and Shep finally sat down on the floor. His head resting on his paws, he watched as Amos tried to navigate the old ladder that led down into the tunnel that ran underneath his house and right under the old campsite.
Amos wondered if he should have told the cops about it and let them search it. But he knew he hadn’t put those missing girls down here, so he’d kept quiet about it, but now he couldn’t be sure that somebody else hadn’t.
To his knowledge, the tunnel hadn’t been in use for many years. It was originally built as a way to get from one property to the next should the weather turn and they got snowed in. Amos never saw the point. His dad used to talk about filling it in but hismother, who had always had the opposite opinions of whatever his dad did, wouldn’t allow it.
