Reluctantly Home(51)

The story was irritatingly incomplete. She had no idea why Scarlet had been out on her own, why Evelyn seemed to feel so little guilt nor whether she had actually killed Joan. She would have to find out the truth, though, or she was going to drive herself mad with speculation.

For a moment she considered talking to Jez about what she suspected, but then dismissed the idea almost at once. If the entry for 30th November was a confession of sorts, then it wasn’t her secret to tell, and anyway, she might just have got the wrong end of the stick. That was most likely to be the case, she told herself, but at the same time something about the abruptness of the entry made the hairs on the back of her neck stand to attention.

One thing was certain, however. There had to be more to all this. What she had gleaned from the diary and her investigations at the library told her part of a story, certainly, but not all of it. She needed to find the missing pieces.





30


The next day Pip was in the back room of the shop sorting through a pile of children’s clothes to be put out for sale when she heard raised voices. There was some sort of rumpus going on at the till between Audrey and a man Pip didn’t recognise. Even though she couldn’t make out the words from where she was, their body language made it clear this wasn’t a friendly discussion. Audrey had raised herself up to full, but slightly short, height, her chin jutting defiantly, whilst the man pointed an accusing finger.

As nothing ever happened in the shop generally, a confrontation like this constituted entertainment. Pip raised an eyebrow and edged closer to the doorway to try to hear what was going on.

‘That’s bloody ridiculous,’ snapped the man. ‘Don’t you have any systems at all?’

‘I can assure you that we do have systems and this shop is run entirely in accordance with them,’ Audrey replied archly.

‘Then you should be able to locate one simple item,’ the man said.

‘Sir,’ Audrey said, clearly struggling to maintain her temper, ‘this is a charitable donation establishment. Generally, people bring us the things they no longer want. We put the items out for sale. Items are sold. It is as simple as that.’

The man’s shoulders slumped a little. ‘That’s just it,’ he said with a sigh, the fire going out of him. ‘This wasn’t an item that was no longer wanted. It came to your shop in error and it is of the utmost importance I get it back.’

Whilst it wasn’t as common as one might think, Pip knew people did occasionally come to retrieve items they had given away, and it was just chance whether the shop still had them or not.

Audrey pursed her lips into a tight little line. ‘Perhaps if you could give me some indication of what it is you have lost, then we might be able to help.’ She emphasised the ‘you’, just to make it absolutely clear who was at fault.

Pip felt her stomach knot. It was going to be the diary, she just knew it. It had been clear from the very beginning that it didn’t belong in the box of books she had opened.

‘It’s a book,’ the man said. ‘A diary, in fact. It’s about this big.’ He indicated the size with his hands. ‘And it has flowers on the cover. Daisies, I think. It was accidentally swept up with some other books I brought in, but that was a mistake. It should never have been in the box in the first place. I really need it back.’

He looked totally forlorn now and Audrey, seeing that she was holding all the cards, seemed to soften her stance a little.

‘And when did you bring the box in?’ she asked him.

‘I left it on the doorstep about a week ago,’ he said.

Audrey sprang back up. ‘You see, that’s why we have rules,’ she said, pointing at the sign on the wall. ‘Had you brought the box to us in working hours, we would have checked the contents with you and this would never have happened.’

She gave a triumphant little smile, and the man sighed and ran his hand through his hair.

‘Yes,’ he said. ‘But I was in a hurry, and it isn’t always easy to park . . .’

‘During the day,’ Audrey finished for him. ‘Yes. I know. But we are where we are.’

‘So?’ he asked a little impatiently. ‘Do you remember the box?’

Audrey cocked her head to one side and made a play of trying to remember, but then she conceded that no, she didn’t remember the box in question.

The knot in Pip’s stomach twisted tighter still. She knew exactly which box he was talking about and knew the precise location of the diary he was so desperate to recover – in her chest of drawers, hidden underneath her knickers. But if she admitted it then she would have to confess to having taken the diary herself (which was entirely against Audrey’s rules) and then keeping it, which would make it obvious that she had read it. The voice of her conscience was screaming at her to speak out, but she ignored it. She didn’t have the energy to be in trouble with Audrey and anyway, she didn’t know this man from Adam. He might have no more entitlement to the diary than she did, although she had to admit that was unlikely.

‘What would have happened to the box?’ asked the man. ‘In the ordinary course of events, I mean.’

‘Well, assuming it wasn’t stolen from the doorstep . . .’ replied Audrey, taking an exaggerated look at the sign, ‘then it would have been emptied the next time we were open, prepared for sale and then added to the shelves.’