Author's Note: This is a light-hearted, cross-dressing mystery story, written in my normal style, which I hope you enjoy. It does contain references to adult themes, and some of its characters have little sympathy with the Catholic Church. Please don't read if you feel this will upset you.

CHAPTER 7

"There's something you should know about Steve Baines, Barry Jones and you," GG said. "Something I haven't told anyone before."

Sam's interest was piqued. Something GG had never told to anyone? "What is it?"

"It was about three months before you disappeared. I'd got back late from London to find the house deserted, which wasn't unusual. You and Edward were regularly out with your friends, and Mary would often be over at Jenny McCallum's house - that's Doreen's mother. It had been a long day, and I decided to have a nice, relaxing, hot bath. I think I probably nodded off for a few minutes.

"I was awoken by the sound of your voice, and it was clear you were either drunk or on something else. And you were in our bedroom, rather than your own, and just as clearly, you were getting into our bed, accompanied by Jones and Baines. Had you not been high, I don't know how I'd have reacted. As it was, you clearly weren't fit to make your own decisions and I guessed that those two had got you like that in order to have sex with you. I put on a dressing gown, and threw Jones and Baines out of the house. Not quite physically, but almost. When I got back to my bedroom, you'd left and I could hear you crying in your own bedroom. I knocked on the door and you told me to go away, which I did. The point is…" GG broke off.

"Well, the point is that from what I overheard Baines and Jones saying before I interrupted, it was quite clear that was going to be a first for them."

TUESDAY

"Samantha, I just couldn't believe it when I cast eyes on you," Steve Baines said. "You are so like your grandmother. She was incredibly sexy, as well."

Sam decided to ignore that remark. "I told you on the phone that Sir George has asked me to talk to people who knew the real Samantha to try to find out what happened to her."

Steve shook his head. "He never gives up, does he?"

"If it was your daughter, would you?"

He nodded. "Fair point. But most parents seem to learn to live with it after a few years. He never did. Perhaps it's guilt."

"Guilt? About what?"

He shrugged. "Bringing up a daughter like that, if for nothing else."

"How do you mean?"

"Look, it's easy, looking back, to think that the 1960s were great times, and I suppose they were – if you managed to adapt to them. But we'd all been brought up in the straitlaced 1950s, taught about what was right and what was wrong. Then we get to our late teens, and someone tore up the entire rule book." He smiled. "I remember Barry and I were convinced we were the last male virgins on earth. You'd see fourteen-year-old pop stars who'd had more sex than we had. We both fell head over heels in love with Veronica Makepeace, and she seemed quite interested in us. The problem was, it was always the three of us together and that's a crowd. Later on, Tony Thompson became another of those infatuated by her."

He grinned at Sam. "Seeing Veronica now, you can't believe how fantastic she used to look. I'm afraid she hasn't worn well." He didn't actually add, "Unlike me," but from the way he visibly preened, Sam could see he thought it.

"So there we were, three guys and one girl, and certainly we guys were getting mighty frustrated.

"Then Veronica introduced Samantha and Christine and the dynamics changed. Barry and I could see we were never going to get anywhere with Veronica, so we switched our attentions. Tony obviously thought he was in, but then Samantha's brother, Edward, appeared, and he was equally hooked on Veronica. Meanwhile, things seemed to be going great with Samantha and Christine. Christine was prettier, and more world-wisely, whilst Samantha had the bigger... well, you know, which certainly turned me on.

"Problem was, after months of dating them, we were all still virgins, and Barry and I were going up the wall. I mean, why get your daughter to dress like a sex siren if you're also telling her to keep her legs firmly closed?"

It was a question to which Steve patently hoped that Sam would answer. Instead, he smiled, he hoped enigmatically, and said, "You were saying."

"Well, one evening, all of us except Christine were round at Tony's house, and Tony produces these purple hearts. Us four guys all pop some, and then amazingly, even Samantha does the same. We're all feeling incredibly relaxed but really up for it. Of course, that leaves Veronica standing out from the crowd. We're all trying to persuade her to take some, but she says, 'Edward, my parents are away. Why don't you and I go back to my place?' It was obvious what she wanted. Next day, they only announced their engagement, lucky bugger."

He shrugged philosophically and added, "Barry and I weren't at all surprised but Tony was upset as he so wanted it to have been him. But then, he was more upset by what happened that same evening, for with Veronica and Edward gone, it left Samantha alone with us three guys, all feeling ready to explode. But Samantha really disliked Tony so she says to us two, 'Steve, Barry. My parents are away, as well. Why don’t the three of us go back to my place?'

"So we leave poor old Tony, who'd supplied the purple hearts, on his own and looking mightily pissed and go back to Samantha's house. We really thought our luck had changed. We got Samantha undressed and were getting her into bed, when in marched her father who is monumentally livid. Says he's going to call the police for attempted rape and drugging a minor.

"He put the fear of God into us and we were out of there pronto, and once more feeling mighty frustrated. So we decide to go back to Tony's and his purple hearts, and on the way, we picked up Christine from her house. And that was the start of a real night to remember, and a relationship that went on for years."

***
"Hello. You must be Mildred Brown?"

The thin, plainly dressed woman jumped, clearly startled by Sam's presence and turned around to face him. He smiled at her, but it was returned with a downturn of the thin mouth and a hostile look. Cleary, Mildred Brown disapproved. Sam did a retake; he was wearing a dress which, although a mini, was one of the more respectable of Samantha's wardrobe, with a high neckline and matching hat. A dress in which, GG had confirmed, Samantha would attend church. He removed his hat, feeling that perhaps he looked a little too formal for the rather scruffy woman before him.

"What do you want?"

"I'm Sam Dixon. I stood in for Samantha at the…"

"I know who you are. What do you want?"

"Sir George has asked me to go through the last days of Samantha's life before she disappeared, with a view to finding out what happened to her. You knew her. I wondered if you could help?"

"We hated each other. She was a brazen slut, and always laughing at me; scorning and ridiculing me."

"Oh." It was the first time anyone had talked of Samantha being anything other than a pleasant and fun person to be with. "What kinds of things did she say to you?"

"Well, for instance," Mildred said, "a week before the debutante presentation, we had to do a rehearsal, just to make certain everything went smoothly on the day – as though it mattered. I didn't want to have anything to do with the stupid idea, but my mum made me; said we'd been personally invited by Mrs Harper so it would be rude to refuse. Besides, Mrs Harper gave my mum a hundred pounds to buy me a dress to wear – a hundred pounds on a dress! Can you imagine that? Anyway, we borrowed my cousin's wedding dress and paid a friend a few pounds to alter it to my size. We would had to have given back the money if we didn't go through with it." She stopped, clearly still pleased that she and her mother had made such a profit out of Mrs Harper.

"You were saying about the rehearsal," Sam prompted.

"Well, it was all happening at their house near Kingsford, and it would have taken ages to get there by bus, so Samantha said that she'll come over and pick me up – which of course, was just an excuse to show off her stupid sports car."

Sam thought it was actually a friendly gesture, but he let it pass as Mildred was now in full flow.

"Of course, she had to have the top down, and of course, she was wearing her usual tarty clothes, revealing her bosom and her legs. It was hardly a surprise when we stopped at a set of traffic lights in the town centre and two workmen looked down at her and one of them said to the other, 'We must have come to Arizona by mistake. I've always wanted to see the Grand Canyon.' He was staring at her breasts, of course. The other man said, 'It's no mistake. I'd love to go into that valley.' Samantha just laughed and shouted, 'In your dreams,' as she drove off from the traffic lights, squealing her tyres, of course."

Having endured plenty of comments about the size of his breasts over the last few days, Sam admired Samantha's bravado just as much as Mildred despised it.

"Then," Mildred continued, "as though the men hadn't already made the point obvious, she said to me, 'I think they've grown larger recently. What do you think?' "

"What I thought," Mildred went on, "was that if she wore a proper blouse and bra, she could have made her breasts far less obvious than exposing them like peaches on a greengrocer's shelf, and that her comment to me was clearly designed to show how much bigger her breasts were than my own."

Fifty years on, it was impossible to say with any certainty what Mildred would have looked like as teenager, but Sam guessed her breasts had been almost as small then as they were now. Easy to see how a girl would become envious – no, jealous – of such a well-endowed contemporary who attracted men like wasps around a jam jar. A salutatory lesson for Sam, with his newly acquired large breasts.

"I have to say," Sam said, "that I have found wearing Samantha's clothes incredibly strange."

"But you're doing it," Mildred said. "I could never wear clothes like that when I was your age, even if I had the figure."

"I thought you looked very attractive at the debutante presentation on Saturday," Sam said. "Was that dress you wore the same one you were intending to wear all those years ago?"

"Oh, no," she replied. "Sir George wanted to get as many people as possible along to the memorial presentation, so he arranged that everyone could hire a costume and he would pick up the bill. I got the most expensive one I could find. After all, he's loaded so we have to screw him for as much as we can."

Mildred's tight-fisted attitude was common of so many people and Sam always found it depressing. "Getting back to the original debutante presentation," he said, deciding to change the subject, "was the rehearsal the last time you saw Samantha?"

"I couldn't get away from it quickly enough," Mildred said. "All those snooty girls from the girls' grammar school - and their parents. I certainly didn't want to meet up with Samantha or anyone else before I was forced to. I was delighted when she disappeared in time for Mrs Harper to cancel the ceremony."

Her words left a silence between them which dragged on for several seconds.

"Well, obviously," Mildred said, clearly wishing she had not used those words, "I'm not glad she disappeared, but it was convenient she did it when she did."

"What do you think happened to her?"

"There's only one outcome for girls like that."

"You think she was pregnant?"

"It was only later I realised the significance of her remark about her breasts growing," Mildred said with a smirk, "but it's obvious, isn't it?"

"Who do you think the father was?"

"There were obviously so many contenders," Mildred said, "it would be impossible to tell."

"Presumably," Sam said, "she came here to see the priest…" he'd been about to add for confession, but Mildred broke in.

"How dare you? I can assure you that Father Wigley was an honourable man. He would never…"

"Is there a problem," said a male voice from behind them.

Sam turned to see a priest staring at him in a rather formidable way.

"I was asking," Sam said, "about a girl who attended services at this church with her mother, almost fifty years ago, and who subsequently disappeared."

"I hope you're not suggesting there was a connection between the two," the priest said.

"Well, I wasn't." Sam emphasised the 'wasn't'. "But I am a little surprised at how I came here with a simple question, only to find people are assuming I am making some kind of an accusation."

"Then I apologise," the priest said. "I am Father Roberts. Please come to my office and we can discuss your enquiry."

He led the way into a rather large but shabbily furnished office, to one side of the main church. "Now, perhaps you had better start again with your query."

So Sam told him about Samantha's disappearance, and that many people, Mildred included, believed that Samantha had been pregnant. "If she was pregnant," Sam said, "and she came to the church for help, what advice would she have been given?"

"I really cannot say what Father Wigley would have advised fifty years ago. Nowadays, we have a helpline I would have contacted and handed the issue over to them."

"Are there not church records you could look up to see if she did come here for help?" Sam asked.

"I can assure you, young lady, that all such records are held in strictest confidence. They are not available to any passing person to satisfy their curiosity."

"I am acting on behalf of the girl's father," Sam said.

"I cannot help you," Father Roberts said. "Good day."

***

"You probably don't remember me," the elderly lady said with a smile, as Sam left the church. "I was simply one of the hangers-on last Saturday, come to see my daughter have her debutante presentation at last. I'm Maureen Brown, Mildred's mother."

As they shook hands, Sam could see the resemblance between mother and daughter but, in spite of her extra years, Maureen's face had a liveliness to it which had been lacking in Mildred.

"I do remember you, actually," Sam said, "but I found the whole event overwhelming. I'd been thrown into it at the last minute with no time to get accustomed to the idea, let alone remember everyone's name. Did you enjoy the evening?"

"Lovely meal, and all that free wine," Maureen said. "Mind, at my age, I can't take much. I just wish that the original presentation had gone ahead as planned. Perhaps some young man there might have taken a shine to Mildred and her life would have been completely different. And I'll always wonder what happened to that young girl."

"Do you have any idea?"

"You're so much like her, you know. You're obviously related."

"I don't think that's possible," Sam said. "Sir George has looked at photographs of my two grandmothers and he's convinced that neither is his Samantha."

"Photographs prove nothing," Maureen said. "A lot of things can happen in fifty years that you wouldn't even have been aware of. Divorce, death, adoption. You mark my words, you're her granddaughter."

She hesitated a little before continuing. "Mildred rang me to say you were 'snooping around', as she put it. Asking questions about Father Wigley. Now I've spoken to you, I can understand why. You may look like Samantha, but you've got Father Wigley's voice; if you're not his granddaughter, I'll eat my hat."

"My voice?" For a moment, Sam wondered whether he'd forgotten to take his voice tablet, and his voice had reverted to his normal male tones, but no, as he mentally relayed his words, he realised that his Samantha voice was now natural to him.

"Oh, obviously, he had a lot deeper voice than you, but anyone who knew him would immediately recognise it. That's what startled Mildred just now, when you first spoke."

"You think that Father Wigley made Samantha pregnant?"

Maureen shrugged. "A man, even a priest, has his needs. Let's say that there have been a number of allegations made about Father Wigley that the Church is earnestly denying. I seem to remember Samantha gave up Catechism classes quite suddenly."

"Did Mildred not have an explanation?"

"She said Samantha just found them too boring, which is quite likely. On the other hand…" She let the innuendo hang in the air.

"Whilst you're here," she went on, "come and see your great-grandmother's grave. She's buried just around the corner."

"But I thought Mary Harper committed suicide," Sam said, having by now given up trying to insist he was not her descendant. "Surely, she was not allowed a Christian burial?"

"The Coroner is usually quite understanding about such matters," Maureen said. She led the way to a simple grave and stood by it, whilst Sam joined her and stared down at the gravestone. Could this possibly be the grave of his great-grandmother?

"Mary Harper," the inscription read. "Born 15 February, 1928. Died 3rd October, 1966. RIP."

***

Sam's mother rang him that evening from Malta. "Hello, love? How are you?"

"I'm fine, Mum."

"Your voice sounds very strange."

"I've had a bit of a cold. I think it's gone to my larynx."

"I told you that you should have come with us to Malta. It's lovely sunshine here. We're sitting on a terrace overlooking the sea, and we'll be eating soon."

"So will I, Mum. I'm going to microwave something."

"Oh you poor thing. But aren't you at home? I rang there first, and the answering machine came on."

"I've stayed in Seacombe for a few days extra. It's a bit difficult to explain, but…"

"I thought you said you had to vacate your college room in the holidays so they could use it for conferences… Oh, I bet you're staying with a pretty girl, aren't you?"

Sam grinned. "Well, I have become rather inseparable from one, actually. She's called Samantha."

"What's she like?"

"Don't be nosy. But Mum, there's something I wanted to ask you. Was Dad adopted?"

"Your dad? Adopted? No, of course not."

"Are you certain? I mean, sometimes people keep that sort of thing quiet. Do you think I could ask Nan?"

"Don't you dare. You know how easily she gets upset by just little things. If there was any truth in what you're saying, it would probably kill her off. Anyway, why have you suddenly got interested in this?"

"This girl I was talking about, Mum, well her face is almost identical to mine. Everybody's saying we must be related and it's quite embarrassing really."

"Mmm." For once, his mother sounded quite thoughtful. "I can see what you mean. I know that your grandpapa and Nan were married for a long time before they had Tom. Can't you find out through the Registrar of Births and Deaths?"

"Maybe," Sam said. "But with Dad no longer being alive, it's bound to make it more complicated, and it will probably take for ever."

"OK, well, I don't know what to suggest, but whatever you do, you mustn't ask your Nan. Promise me."

"I promise I won't ask her about Dad," Sam said.

As Sam ended the call, GG asked him, "Everything all right?"

Sam shrugged. "You probably heard most of it. I asked Mum about the possibility of Dad being adopted, and she didn't know anything and forbid me from talking to Nan."

"So you think adoption might be a possibility?" The hope in GG's voice made Sam feel quite emotional.

"I was speaking the absolute truth when I said that everyone I meet seems to feel that I must be Samantha's granddaughter; except that is, for Doreen McCall, who thinks Samantha is either in prison or has been executed."

Sam hesitated and then said, "Look, I think I need to go up to Sheffield for a few days and do some digging. The problem is… well, it's going to be difficult if I stay in my own home. Neighbours are either going to think a strange woman has broken into the house, or they're going to realise that it's really me, and I don't know which is worse."

"Then stay in a hotel," GG said. "Take the Lotus, then you'll have no problems getting about whilst you're up there. Incidentally, your new credit card came today, so there'll be no problem with paying the bills."

"Is that all right?" Sam asked, rather embarrassed at the cost involved.

"It's got a ten thousand pound credit limit on it," GG said, "so it should be. The only thing is I'd be happier if you took someone with you, and I'm a bit elderly to make that kind of journey. Why not ask Matthew if he'd like to accompany you?"

"Matt! But he'll get the wrong impression."

"Then tell him what the right impression is. Book single rooms and tell him that's the deal."

Sam was suddenly aware he had a stupid grin over his face, and hurriedly changed it to a grimace. But he could see GG was smiling at him, and knew he hadn't been fooled.