There would be precious little sympathy from him when he heard that she’d found Cassie dead. He disapproved of Cassie on every level. Being an unmarried mother with a mixed race child was, in his bigoted view, beyond the pale, and because Cassie didn’t creep around hanging her head, that was evidence she was no good. He often called her ‘that red-headed whore’, angering Molly, because that was such an ugly and untrue label. In fact, he was very likely to relish Cassie’s death and he wouldn’t be concerned about Petal being missing either. Molly often thought that whatever part of the brain it was which gave people compassion and empathy was missing in him. Her mother didn’t share her husband’s views, but she was afraid of him and wouldn’t dare do or say anything he disapproved of.

Molly put her elbows on her knees, held her head in her hands and began to cry again, this time because of the situation with her father. He was a tyrant, and he sucked all the joy out of everything, growing nastier with each passing year. Yet she couldn’t leave because of her mother.

With hindsight, she should’ve left home at sixteen, as her sister, Emily, did, even if that meant moving into a girls’ hostel for a year or two, or getting a live-in job like a mother’s help. But what she had planned after that was to go to drama or art school when she was eighteen, and she stupidly thought she could save some money by living at home and working in the shop.

As it turned out, her father had never paid her a proper wage. All she got was the odd half-crown as pocket money, and she had to beg for money for a new dress or shoes. He poured scorn on her plan of drama school and insisted it was her duty to help in the shop and look after her mother.

Nothing could’ve been less appealing to Molly than a life of slicing bacon and stacking shelves, but she loved her mother dearly. She was a timid, gentle person and she suffered from her nerves, often having such bad attacks that she could barely breathe and had to go to bed until it passed. She needed calm, love and encouragement to bring her out of it, and she certainly wouldn’t get that from her husband.

Emily was far braver than Molly was; she’d gone after their father had given her a good hiding for seeing a boy he considered a lout. He broke two of her ribs and one of her front teeth, and when she left she vowed she’d never return. She had been true to her word. There was the occasional letter, which their father tore up if he saw it. In one, which got through unseen by her father, Emily had written that she’d got a job as a secretary for a solicitor. Both Molly and her mother had written back immediately, explaining this was the first letter they’d received in months, and begging Emily to let them have a telephone number so they could ring her, or for her to ring them after eight in the evening, when her father would be at the pub. But she never did give them a number or ring them, and the chilly tone of her subsequent rare, brief letters implied she had decided that her mother and sister were as bad as her father, so it was difficult for Molly and her mother to know what to do. In the last couple of years there had been no further letters; they didn’t even know if she still lived at the same address.

Now, at twenty-five, Molly virtually ran the shop. Jack Heywood sat in his office out the back all day and did crosswords and smoked his pipe, and Molly never got a word of praise from him for all she did, only sarcasm and abuse.

It was a terrible thing to hate and fear her own father, but she did. He was a bully, a bigot and a complete hypocrite. She couldn’t help but wish he would have a heart attack and die. Perhaps then her mother could learn to laugh again instead of trembling with anxiety every time he had that scornful expression on his face.

George came back through the door behind the desk. ‘Sergeant Bailey has gone up there now. I expect you heard him drive off. I’ve spoken to the guvnor on the phone, and he’ll be joining Sarge up at Stone Cottage. He asked that I take a statement from you, and said he’ll talk to you when he gets back.’

George held up the flap in the counter for her, then led the way through into the back of the police station.

‘I’m going to get you that cup of tea first,’ he said. ‘You look as white as a sheet, so just sit there while I get it.’

Molly sank down gratefully on to the chair he pointed out. She felt very shaky and faint.

George didn’t take long, and came back with tea on a tray. ‘Luckily, Sarge had put the kettle on, and his wife brought us in some rock cakes. Come on. We’ll go to the interview room.’

The room he took her into had grubby green walls and stank of stale cigarette smoke. George noticed her wince as he put the tea tray down, and he turned to open the window.

‘Sorry about that,’ he said. ‘You and I must be the only people in the village who don’t smoke, and it comes hard when you have to live with the pong.’

‘I don’t normally find it so bad, but I feel a bit sick after finding Cassie.’

‘I’m sure you do,’ he said, indicating she was to sit down opposite him at the table. ‘You’ve had a terrible shock, so have your tea and, when you feel up to it, we’ll start on your statement.’

The tea and George’s gentle manner did help to calm her a little. If she’d had to talk to any of the other officers she wouldn’t be able to cope.

‘What a wash-out for the Coronation,’ he said to distract her. ‘As it turned out, perhaps it was as well we didn’t get the coach to London to see it.’

Even through her distress, Molly remembered that one of the reasons she hadn’t minded too much about not being allowed to go to London was because George had told her he’d be on duty that day. He’d even made a little joke about his disappointment at not being able to sit next to her on the coach. For several days afterwards she kept thinking about it and wondering how she could engineer being somewhere alone with him. But she hadn’t intended it to be here in the police station like this.

‘Well, Molly,’ he said, once he thought she was ready. ‘We’ll start first with your full name, age and occupation, which of course I already know, but I need you to tell me officially, then tell me why you went to Stone Cottage.’

Molly told him, and he wrote it down.

‘And what time would you say it was when you found Cassie?’ he asked.

‘Well, the children’s tea party began at three … I suppose it was quarter past when I began to worry that Petal wasn’t there. I spoke about it to Brenda Percy and left soon after. It must have taken me at least twenty-five minutes to get to Stone Cottage, so it was probably ten to four when I found Cassie.’

‘Did you touch anything?’

‘No. Well, apart from the door and maybe the rail on the stairs. I went up there to look for Petal, and in the privy and woodshed.’

‘What made you think Cassie was dead?’

Tears started up again in Molly’s eyes. ‘There was so much blood and her eyes were open. But I felt for her pulse, too, and couldn’t find it.’

‘So, after you’d looked for Petal, you left and came back to report it at the police station?’

Molly nodded and wiped her eyes.

‘Did you see anyone, either on the way up there or on the way back?’

‘No. No one at all,’ she said.

‘When did you last see Cassie alive?’ he asked. ‘Was it today?’

‘No.’ Molly shook her head. ‘It was yesterday afternoon after school. She came into the shop for some tea and bacon. Petal was really excited about the party.’

‘Excited’ didn’t really cover the mood Petal was in. She had rushed into the shop, dark eyes blazing with excitement, flung her arms around Molly’s waist and gabbled something so fast Molly couldn’t follow what she was saying.

‘Say it slower, sweetie,’ she said, holding Petal’s arms and pushing her a little away from her.