The Mystery Of Anna Grace

RUFUS kept barking. Charlie froze, fearing that the two men in hoodies would try to force the front door with a crowbar. The burglar alarm was off and no cars were in the driveway, so they must think that the house was empty.

However, just before they came to the three steps up to the house, the two men skirted around the path to the back, which ran towards Little Wood.

Charlie ran upstairs, Rufus tracking her every move. She peeked out of the landing window, hoping to see which way the men had gone.

Sure enough, she could see a figure disappearing into the thicket at the start of Little Wood. She was still clutching her phone, and she dialled Albert’s number again.

“One of them has run into Little Wood,” she told him.

“Me and Dean will see if we can track them down. Don’t let anyone in until we come,” Albert said.

Charlie dared to look out again. There it was: a slight movement.

She strained to make out anything through the lashing rain. The figure had dropped something. Was he coming this way again? She ducked down, just in case.

It all seemed to happen so fast. A few moments later, Albert was running to the back door, where Charlie let him in.

“Dean ran like a hare and nearly caught him. Got a good description,” Albert said. “The police are down by the boathouse.”

“Is Dean OK?” Charlie said, rising to fill the kettle.

“He’s grand. No, Charlie, you sit down. You’ve had a shock.” Albert took the kettle from her.

“I’m fine,” Charlie said, but her hands were shaking, and Rufus still hadn’t settled.

“That was good thinking, to call me,” Albert said, handing her a mug of tea. “Now, you get this down you before you think about anything else.”

“Do you think they’ll be back?” Charlie asked, sipping her tea.

“Hard to tell. Old houses like this one are always fair game. We’ll see what the cops have to say.”

A policewoman came and took Charlie’s statement, chatting away as if it were all in a day’s work to her. Her reassuring attitude calmed Charlie down, and she tried to focus on remembering as much as she could while it was still fresh in her mind.

“It was hard to make anything out. If it hadn’t been for Rufus barking, I don’t think I would have heard anything.”

“What were you doing before that?” the policewoman asked.

Charlie told her as much as she could remember, from reading Anna’s journal to hearing the squeal of brakes.

“One of them dropped something,” she said, suddenly remembering. “I was standing at the landing window.”

Albert was already running out to the garden.

“They’d have lifted this from the boathouse,” Albert said when he returned, clutching a rain-soaked object.

It was an old cigar box with a broken clasp, held together with an elastic band.

“What is it?” Charlie said. “It holds the keys to the summerhouse. Old Mr Graystone always kept a spare set there.”

“What do you think they were after?” Charlie said.

“Oh, money, valuables. They were likely waiting until the house was empty and all the cars were away. What they didn’t know is that we were at the summerhouse, but you can’t see that from the main driveway. This fellow here likely scared them off,” Albert said, reaching down to stroke Rufus.

“I need to make sure everything is OK for when Robin’s mother comes back,” Charlie said. “Oh, and there’s that couple who were meant to be coming tomorrow.”

“Never mind Mrs Cecilia, Charlie. She’s more robust than folk give her credit for. I’ve phoned Robin and he’s on his way,” Albert finished.

“Are you OK?”

Robin rushed straight to the kitchen, where Charlie was sitting with a pen and notepad, determined to jot down anything else she could remember.

“I’m fine,” Charlie replied. “Albert sorted everything. The police have had a look round and taken a statement.”

“You shouldn’t have been here on your own,” Robin said. “We’ve been broken into a few times and that was before the burglar alarm. Where was everyone?”

“It’s Saturday afternoon,” Charlie said with a shrug. “Let me make you some coffee.”

Robin took off his coat and sat down beside her.

“There are dangerous sorts out there. Tell me exactly what happened.”

As she made the coffee, Charlie went through everything again with Robin.

“I’ve spoken to the lads,” Robin said. “Albert reckons one of them got through the gap in the old wall on the edge of the estate. They think their car was parked behind the boathouse and the other one drove off from there.”

“That path leads out to the motorway slip road where the lorry park is,” Charlie mused.

“Albert and Dean went down there and the police are asking around. The police reckon they had been waiting a while and saw their chance when there were no cars around.

“Albert said you did brilliantly,” Robin added gently. “I’m sorry. This place is in the middle of nowhere and fair game for any passing thieves. You must be pretty shaken up.”

“I’m nothing of the sort!” Charlie argued.

Albert came back in, closely followed by Dean and Rufus.

“We’ve asked around and Eric, the man who owns the burger van at the lorry park, reckons he’s seen a broken-down car there for a few days and told the others to keep an eye out. It’s disappeared now.

“We’re going to check the dairy room and all the sheds again,” Albert added.

Charlie looked at Dean’s soaked hoodie.

“Not like that, you’re not,” she said.

She went down to the cloakroom and grabbed an anorak of indeterminate age, which looked like it might fit the gangly Dean.

“She’s right,” Robin said, as the teenager reluctantly took off his hoodie and put the coat on. “But I think Dean should stay here with you, Charlie, just in case. We can’t take any chances. You OK with that, Dean?”

Dean nodded and Albert and Robin left.

Charlie cubed the stewing steak and dusted it with flour and a teaspoon from Katarina’s jar of herbs. The simple actions calmed her and the upset of the break-in started to recede.

“What’s that for?” Dean asked as she took the suet out of the fridge.

“Dumplings,” Charlie replied.

“Cool. I like doing the kitchen stuff,” Dean said.

It was the longest sentence she’d had out of the teenager since they’d found him sleeping in the barn, and as he deftly chopped onions Charlie dared another question.

“Where did you learn to do that?”

“Home Ec at school. The teacher was really cool,” Dean declared.

“Would you want to go back to college?” she asked, trying to sound casual as she chopped mushrooms.

“Suppose,” he said, and she decided not to push things any further as he added the onions to the sizzling pan.

When Albert and Robin

Albert had found the remains of a fire in Little Wood

returned, Robin reported that there was some damage to the boathouse. The men had used a crowbar to force the door, but had obviously decided the dilapidated boats and canoes weren’t worth the bother.

It was hard to tell with the rain, but Albert said they had found the remains of a fire in Little Wood.

“As the police suggested, they’d possibly been watching the house for a while,” Robin said.

“There was no fire there the other day,” Dean pointed out. “I took Rufus for a walk down that way and I would have seen it.”

By now Katarina and Mrs Cecilia were back and they were having a conference of sorts around the diningroom table before dinner.

As Albert had predicted, Mrs Cecilia was much sharper than Charlie would have expected.

“Dean, when you were sleeping in the barn did you hear anyone else around the place?” she asked.

“Sometimes,” Dean replied. “I heard the foxes and some guys shouting one night.”

“Do you know what they were saying?” Robin said.

“Something about pictures or art stuff. I stayed out of their way. There were too many blokes like that when I was sleeping rough.”

“Can you think of anything else?” Robin