Page 21 of Little Children (Detective Kim Stone #22)

Twenty

Penn knocked on the door of a woman named Mrs Perton, Lewis’s form teacher.

She’d been spoken to by Carly Walsh and James Dickinson when Lewis had first gone missing, but that had been at the school prior to the break-up for half term.

Therefore, with no access to details of her home address, he had made contact with the school through their Facebook page.

Whoever was monitoring it had responded to say they’d passed his message along.

No more than two minutes later, he’d received a call inviting him to her home as she was babysitting her grandchildren.

One of those children was holding the woman’s hand when she answered the door. A couple of tendrils of brown hair had escaped what looked like a hastily constructed bun on the back of her head, and her only jewellery was a pair of sapphire stud earrings. He guessed her to be mid-fifties.

‘DS Penn,’ he said, holding up his identification.

‘Brenda Perton, and this is Poppy,’ she said, nodding down at the five- or six-year-old hiding behind her legs.

‘Hi, Poppy,’ he offered in his least-threatening tone.

Her face appeared, but she still eyed him suspiciously.

‘Pay no mind – she’s a shy little thing. Come in,’ Brenda said, guiding the girl out of the way. ‘We’ll go in the kitchen as the little one is asleep.’

Penn said nothing but followed her past the stairs and the lounge to the kitchen, where an assortment of toys littered the floor.

‘Sweetheart, play with your toys for a bit,’ she said, grabbing the monitor she was using to watch the sleeping child upstairs.

She set it down on the table between them. ‘Any news?’ she asked.

Penn shook his head.

The sadness that shadowed her face was genuine.

‘Is Lewis a good kid?’ Penn asked.

‘I wouldn’t say that, but I’ve taught worse.’

‘We’ve heard he likes to fight.’

‘Probably more than most, but it’s not always his fault. He has a bit of a temper, but he gets bullied a lot. He uses his fists to fight back.’

‘Bullied for what?’ Penn asked, knowing there didn’t always have to be a reason.

‘A couple of older kids once saw him rifling through bins, so they called him all kinds of names. Sometimes they have a pop at his parents.’

‘And how do you find his parents?’

‘Not very easily to be honest. They’re always busy with something else.’

‘Parent evenings?’ he asked.

Brenda shook her head. ‘Never come.’

‘But he’s well cared for?’

‘Ah, Sergeant, that’s a tricky one to answer. Has his childhood been picture perfect with attention lavished on him? No. Is he beaten and starved on a daily basis? Also no.’

‘You think he falls somewhere in between?’ Penn asked.

‘We all do. Did he occasionally turn up at school with no lunch? Yes, but many kids do.’

‘Did you ask his parents about it?’

‘Of course. They assured me he’d eaten it on the way to school.’

He waited.

‘No, I didn’t believe them, but it didn’t happen again for a while.’

‘Can you give me your honest opinion about him?’ Penn asked.

Brenda leaned down to her granddaughter. ‘Sweetie, go and watch your sister for a few minutes, eh?’

Poppy turned with a frown. ‘She’s sleeping.’

‘Well, go and make sure she’s doing a good job of it while I say some things I don’t want you to hear.’

‘Okay,’ she said, choosing a cuddly toy to take with her.

Once she was out of earshot, Brenda began.

‘I think the boy is starved but not necessarily of food. I think he’s starved of affection, guidance and general parental involvement.

Yes, the lad has learned to use his fists, and he’s pretty handy with them.

He wins every fight he gets into, but he doesn’t go looking for trouble.

He’s a lonely, solitary figure who gets ignored by pretty much everyone. ’

‘Except you,’ Penn observed.

That wasn’t in her statement.

‘Yes, I’ve got a soft spot for him, but I can only do so much. I’ve got another thirty-one in my class that need looking out for as well.’

And yet, Penn felt that she’d been looking out for Lewis Stevens extra hard.

‘He’s had a few suspensions. Wasn’t there one for stealing glue?’

Many teenagers had tried sniffing glue when he was at school. Solvent abuse had been a quick, cheap way of trying to get a feeling of euphoria. He’d tried it once and had only felt disorientated, but he’d had friends who nicked tubes of glue continually before moving on to household aerosols.

‘It’s not what you’re thinking,’ Brenda Perton said with a smile.

He waited. Why else would an angry, lonely, neglected twelve-year-old boy be trying to steal glue?

‘He likes making models out of old matchsticks. That’s why he was rifling in bins and gutters. They’re harder to come by these days, but it was something he liked to do.’

More information that wasn’t in her statement.

A clearer picture of Lewis was starting to emerge in his mind.

‘And do you think he’s run away?’ Penn asked. She seemed to know him quite well, and he trusted her judgement.

She shook her head immediately. ‘Not that particular weekend.’ She nodded towards the countertop, where piles of matchboxes were stocked.

‘He was excited for the following Monday,’ she said.

‘I was going to get the whole class to have a go. He couldn’t wait.

’ She frowned. ‘What I don’t understand is that I’ve already told the police this.

I’ve told them there’s no chance he would have run away. ’

Penn seethed silently. Her opinion on the subject was absolute.

Just one more thing that hadn’t been recorded in her statement.