Chapter 6: Islas Dad Finds Out

‘You’ll do both of you a big favour,’ Lewis told him, ‘If you don’t push her for information and you try and forget it ever happened as soon as you can.’

Lewis got up and went over to the door. ‘Isla,’ he called upstairs. A few minutes later she came in and flew into her dad’s arms. ‘I’m ok dad, thanks to Lewis.’ she said. Her dad had tears pouring down his face as he hugged her.

Lewis picked his coffee up and went through into the lounge. A while later Isla and her dad came to join him. ‘Young man I am forever in your debt.’ her dad said shaking his hand as he stood up. Isla just gave him a hug and a kiss on his cheek.

‘I just don’t know what to do next.’ her dad said. ‘You’ve just done the most important thing,’ Lewis told him. ‘The two of you have accepted that it happened, you’re fine with each other and now you can move on. Your future as father and daughter is assured.’

‘Now your job and the jobs of all of Theo’s workforce in two places is at risk. You can best vent your anger on him by taking Theo’s business away from him and saving all of their jobs.’ ‘How can I do that?’ her dad asked surprised.

Lewis looked at the time, it was half eight already. ‘Excuse me a moment.’ he said. He rang his form master. ‘Hello sir, it’s Lewis,’ he said, ‘I need your help again.’ ‘Go ahead Lewis.’ his form master said. ‘I won’t be in until lunchtime.’ Lewis said. ‘Can you contact Isla Murrays form master and have her marked present for today. She’ll be back tomorrow but no questions asked please.’

‘Is she ok?’ he asked, ‘Yes sir, she’s fine now thanks,’ he said smiling at Isla. ‘Ok Lewis,’ he said, ‘Consider it done.’ ‘Thank you, sir.’ Lewis said, ‘I’ll see you later.’

Turning to Isla’s dad he said, ‘Today you spend the day with your daughter. Turning to Isla he told her, ‘I’ve cleared it with school, and you’ll be marked present. When you return tomorrow, your form teacher will not ask you about or even mention your absence. You can make something up for your classmates.’

Turning to her dad he said, ‘During the day, contact your other half at the Scottish works. ‘You can tell him that Theo has been arrested for raping the daughter of a member of your staff. Tell him you believe he has done it before at least four times. Say he’s likely to go to prison for a long time so you need to unite to preserve all your jobs.’

‘Are there any facilities in the works to transmit a Zoom message to everyone at once?’ Lewis asked. ‘There are lots of monitors around the factory,’ he said, ‘So yes, I suppose it could be transmitted through them.’

‘Check it can be done and at your works too,’ Lewis said. ‘Then set a time on Friday so I can address the entire workforce. I am hoping that as a result of that, plus my speaking to Theo afterwards, the works can carry on.’

‘Next, I want you to speak privately to those in the top management that you trust and discuss the possibilities of a management buyout.’

‘Now for the moment this is for your ears only. Do you know of Graham Engineering?’ ‘Yes,’ he said, ‘We deal with them quite a lot.’ ‘If it becomes a possibility and you need any guidance with a management buyout or help running things in the meantime, John Graham will do what he can to help you. I’ll give you his personal contact number before I leave.’

‘Finally, also for your ears only. If all that fails, John will put in an offer to buy the firm in its entirety. If he does, he will guarantee everyone’s jobs.’

‘I can understand him wanting to buy the place,’ Islas dad said, ‘But why would he help us otherwise?’ ‘Because he’s a nice guy,’ Lewis said. ‘Also, he says his experience of dealing with everyone except Theo has been good.’

‘But how did he know we needed help?’ Isla’s dad asked. ‘I contacted him on Tuesday evening and asked him.’ Lewis told him.

By now it was ten o’clock. ‘I’d better go home and get changed for school,’ Lewis said. He got up. Isla threw her arms around his neck and kissed him properly. ‘Thank you so much.’ she said. Her dad shook his hand. Then overcome with emotion he hugged him too. ‘Thank you.’ he said with great feeling.

‘I’m glad to have been able to help.’ Lewis said. ‘He took her dads phone number then texted him John’s phone number. ‘Let me know about the Zoom meeting,’ he said. ‘Half an hour or less will be fine.’ He handed Isla the front door key back.

After he had gone, Isla’s dad hugged her again. ‘Are you really ok.’ he asked. ‘Yes, dad,’ she said, ‘Lewis is a counsellor and he’s talked it all through with me. I’m fine now, I just want to put it all behind me.’

‘Just who is Lewis?’ her dad asked, ‘He’s just a pupil at school,’ she told him. ‘I only met him last Friday evening. One of my friends said I looked worried and when I told her I couldn’t tell her what was up, she told me to get in touch with Lewis. I did. He was so easy to talk to. He arranged for a policeman to come with him and arrest Theo. He came to the police station with me when I made a statement and stayed with me overnight to keep me company and to talk to you for me this morning.’

‘Where did he sleep?’ her dad asked. ‘He was going to sleep on the settee.’ Isla told him. ‘But I felt really nervous and asked him to sleep with me.’ ‘In your bed,’ her dad asked sounding incredulous. ‘Yes,’ Isla said. ‘I told him I would feel safe with him sleeping down here, but I’d much rather go to sleep in his arms.’

‘Lewis said as long as I realised that we were only going to sleep, he would. So, we got into bed, both in T shirts and shorts. He held me close, and I fell asleep in his arms almost immediately. I slept really well.’ ‘Well, I never,’ her dad said. ‘She’s grown up overnight,’ he thought to himself.

Then he got to work on the phone. After doing everything he could, he took Isla out for the day. They went out into the countryside and walked in the nice weather. They didn’t say much, just being together was enough.

That evening her dad had a message from both works saying that the Zoom idea was workable and suggested 16:30 so they could bring the works to a stop for the weekend. He texted Lewis to let him know. ‘Would you like to come and do it from here?’ he asked. ‘Then I can introduce you. Nearly everyone in both works knows me.’

‘That would be good,’ Lewis said, ‘I’ll bring my laptop as I’m used to it. I’ll come home with Isla.’

FRIDAY

After school he met Isla at the school gates and walked home with her. ‘Any problems?’ Lewis asked? ‘No, not really,’ she said. ‘I didn’t sleep as well last night as I did Thursday night, I had a nightmare.’ ‘Don’t worry,’ Lewis told her, ‘We can soon get rid of those. Come and see me at the shop at five to five tomorrow.’

Arriving at Isla’s, Lewis set his laptop up on the kitchen table. He had previously set up a Zoom meeting. Isla’s dad gave him the emails for the two works. Lewis sent each an email with the link in for the meeting.

Just before half four he opened the meeting, and both works signed in. Isla’s dad spoke to the managers of both factories. The plan was that they would both stay online with him, but when Lewis gave the word, they would transmit the meeting around their works.

Islas dad sat at the table next to Lewis. He slid his laptop over to him. ‘Go ahead.’ he said. Each manager confirmed they were live around the works. ‘Hi,’ Isla’s dad said. ‘Most of you know me. In a moment I’m going to introduce you to Lewis. He’s very young, but what he has to tell you is very important. This is Lewis,’ he said and slid the laptop back.

Lewis smiled into the screen. ‘Hi, everyone,’ he said. ‘I’m Lewis. I’m sure most of you know by now that your employer was arrested last Wednesday night for the rape of a minor. I was responsible for that arrest. I make no apologies for doing it, but I do apologise that my actions have put your future employment at risk.’

‘I have a solution to that, but I’ll return to it shortly. What you may not know, is that Theo first raped his underage victim six months ago. Then he returned and repeated it last Wednesday. Yesterday he appeared in the magistrate’s court and was remanded in custody to Crown Court for sentencing.’