Chapter 6

If I had expected to get anything done at work, I was sadly mistaken. Jock and Joyce had swapped notes and I spent all morning in a continuous inquisition. All the more futile because I didn't have any more information to give them - they knew everything there was to know apart from Laura's attempt at propositioning me. I admitted readily that I was growing very fond of Laura. Joyce can read me like an open book, and Jock is no fool when it comes to human emotions so there was no sense in holding that back. But that was all I could offer.

"And what do you think your daughters will say?" Joyce challenged. "She is, what - four years - younger then Elise, isn't she?"

My endurance was at an end. "What has that go to do with anything? She is not my lover!" I exclaimed.

Joyce and Jock exchanged significant looks over my head like I wasn't there. It was a bad morning.

In the afternoon Jock came into my office with two optical disks. "This one holds Laura's iTunes library, and the other the family pictures."

"That was quick work," I said. "I had expected it would have taken days to put together the pieces."

"Well, her father stayed on-line all night it seems," Jock said in a flat voice.

I have known him for quite a while, and I knew he was holding something back. I went over, closed my door, motioned Jock to a chair and said "Spill the beans."

"Oh, it's nothing much. Except it seems Laura's father has a, shall we say, unusual taste in on-line literature for an avowed Christian churchman," Jock stated.

"Meaning?" I asked.

"Meaning hundreds and hundreds of stories with the same motif - under-aged girls being impregnated by close relatives, including brothers, uncles and fathers. And not always consensual." Jock's voice was still level, but there was an undercurrent of deep anger.

"Stories alone are not illegal," I said. "I take it there are no pictures?"

"I looked, but found none," he replied. "Believe me, I looked. Some of his search strings are pretty dubious, but his ISP has an effective filter, so there's nothing there."

I cocked my head. "Well, that's good, isn't it?"

"I so want to nail that bastard," Jock replied. My eyebrows rose. "Don't think for a moment you're the only one taken in completely by little Laura," he said.

I raised my eyebrows even further, but said nothing. "Oh, sex has nothing to do with it," Jock continued almost irritated. "As Joyce will proclaim loudly when she falls under Laura's spell too."

We were silent for a while. "Let's summarize," I said. "He has dirty reading habits and has sought, but not found, potentially illegal pictures. Nothing for the Police Department just now, but it can be stored away for a rainy day. That is to say, if we need to apply, shall we say moderate, pressure to make him let Laura have her way? Correct?"

"Correct!" Jock said and rose to leave.

"Thanks for the disks," I said. "Laura will be so pleased."

When I came home late that afternoon, I parked the car and walked round to a nearby shop to get more fresh milk. Coming back to the lobby I heard a loud voice "Who the hell is 'Laura Elizabeth Jones'?" It was Debbie, Ramone's significant other, and the inquiry was directed at him, not me.

"Why don't you ask her herself Debbie?" I said mildly.

She spun round. "Oh, hello George. I didn't know you had a resident girlfriend!"

"I don't," I replied. "Laura is staying with me for the time being because she has nowhere else to go."

"Meaning what?" Debbie asked.

I gave a brief summary, including Laura's age, condition and parental situation.

"Are you out of your mind George?" Debbie exploded. "You could have the cops coming for you any moment if her parents were to find out!"

"Oh, but they know all about it," I replied calmly. "I rang them and have sent them my details by registered post. I am hoping they will formally consent to Laura being here."

"How about school?" Debbie asked.

"Miss Laura started at 'Sacred Heart' today," Ramone offered. "I saw her when she returned earlier this afternoon, 'cause she came to me for her keys. She'd had a lovely day, but was pretty tired. No wonder, poor thing. But she loved the sign!" - He nodded in the direction of the directory of tenants.

"You seem to know all about her!" Debbie challenged.

"Ramone has been most helpful setting up Laura's living room," I replied.

Debbie shook her head. "It seems I can't leave town for a weekend without something like that happening. Anyway, have you considered that my people might have one or two things to say about this arrangement?"

By 'my people' she meant work. Debbie is a senior social worker, and she had a point. "I have," I replied. "In fact I was meaning to ask you how to make the initial contact."

Debbie laughed. "Well, I think that has now well and truly been taken care off. I'll talk to Lorraine tomorrow."

Lorraine is Debbie's boss. One of those immensely competent no-nonsense people you can't do without when running social services in a huge city. Having her involved right from the start was good news. While she was completely incorruptible, she was also very practical and no stickler for formalities if an unorthodox solution was better.

Debbie declined an invitation to go and meet Laura right away, so I went up alone. I found Laura at the new desk in her living room immersed in school work. "Jeez, that's rough!" I said. "Homework on the first day!"

She looked up with a brilliant smile. "Uh, hi. Well, it isn't the first day for everyone else. Besides, there wasn't much real homework ­- I just like to catch up with what the rest of the class has been doing. And we don't have a single book in common with my old school."

"Poor you!" I said.

"No, it's OK," she replied. "I'm so happy being back at school. And Sister Joanna has managed to get me a complete set of books." She pointed at a huge pile.

"Please don't tell me you carried all those home yourself!" I said.

"Oh, don't you start on that too!" she laughed. "You should have heard Ramone - he gave me a serious scolding and refused to let me carry my bag up to the apartment."

I laughed too. "I can well imagine that!"

"It's not like I am sick, just pregnant," she said.

Touché! That used to be my line. "Indeed," I replied. "Just be careful. Anyway, I'll go and start dinner."

That night I again dreamt of Laura standing in my bedroom looking at me. The dream was disturbingly real.

On Tuesday morning, I went up to Laura's suburb after having dropped her off at school. I did call on the new client, although that was mainly a courtesy call. They were pleased enough with the attention, though, and it provided me with an excuse for the main objective of the expedition.

After lunch I first went to Laura's erstwhile home. With street after street of more or less identical houses, I was glad of my GPS, or I would never have found it. The house was the model of anonymous suburbia - respectable, but dull to the nth degree. I rang the doorbell, but there was nobody home. I hadn't expected that either - although I was hoping that Laura's things would be ready to collect. They were - the garage was open, and I easily spotted a couple of boxes labeled "LAURA" in large lettering. There were no external signs of a message or a letter. There could be one inside one of the boxes, of course, but I was not exactly hopeful. I put the boxes in the back of my car and drove off.

Finding the pawn shop was not difficult. It was located in a side street off the main street and the shop was tidy, but overstuffed with the most amazing things. "Can I help you?" a voice said and I turned to see a small man with a large moustache emerging from a back room.

"Yes, you can," I said. "I am here to retrieve some goods on behalf of a friend. I am sorry, I have no idea how this works."

He eyed my expensive business suit and nodded - I am sure I stood out from his usual clientele. "Have you got the receipts?" he asked.

"Sure," I said and handed him the two I had managed to find.

"Ah yes," he said, looking at them and then back up at me. "I remember those. And her." He looked at me questioningly.

"I believe there may have been a third, but that has gone missing." I said.

"Sorry, I must have the receipts, or I cannot identify the goods," he replied almost mechanically - obviously used to this.

"I understand," I said. "But what if I can provide unique identification? It is a green iPod and I know the serial number."

"That's different," he said. "Then we should be OK."

I handed him the information Jock had given me and he disappeared for a while before returning with the iPod, a mobile phone and a small collection of jewelry.

"Here it is," he said and mentioned a sum.

I paid it in cash. Obviously some of it was interest, but it still seemed like he had advanced a remarkably large sum compared to the apparent value of the goods. I told him so. "You cannot have expected to cover your costs if these things went uncollected," I said.

He looked straight at me. "No," he said. "I didn't. The jewelry was more or less OK - there are one or two old pieces of some value, but neither the phone nor the iPod were worth what I gave her."

"And still?" I prompted.

"Listen," he said. "I hear a lot of stories in this place and most of them are a load of bull. But I know true desperation when I see it. And this girl was in trouble. Real trouble."

I smiled. "She was. She isn't any more - I am helping her now."

"I am glad to hear it," he said. "Truly. I hadn't expected that story to have a happy ending."

"It hasn't ended yet," I replied. "But we're working on it."

Laura was excited when I presented her with her belongings from home. She knew I had talked to her mother about getting stuff, and she happily unpacked her books and clothes, laughing at some of them. "I can't wear those for a long while!" she said and patted her belly. There was no letter or anything, but she didn't seem to expect one and I didn't mention it.

When she had finished the boxes, I silently handed her a small bag with the goods from the pawn shop. She looked puzzled, opened the bag and retrieved the items in awe. Her joy was beyond measure. "Oh George!" she said. "How did you manage to get those?" I confessed that I had found the two receipts and told her how Jock had retrieved the serial number of the iPod. She came up real close, tears streaming down her face. "Oh George, when you said you would do anything for me, you told no lies."