The Truth Healer: A Riveting Spiritual Psychic Thriller Page 24

  ‘Urghh where are we going?….Harry please keep us safe.’ Chloe pleaded, as she followed both cars to a local supermarket. Lucy and Tom appeared to be following the man inside, so she put her sunglasses on and sauntered in behind them. She slowly sheltered herself behind gondolas in the shop, whilst the man picked up a variety of provisions, disposable bbq trays, six bottles of water, a kettle, and plastic cups and plates.

  After a few minutes, the man headed for the till point, so Chloe quickly followed Lucy and Tom out of the building, as they raced back to their car. Chloe assumed the man was going back to his house, but instead he drove on to a large parking lot with lock up garages. Chloe watched from afar as Lucy and Tom parked outside the gates, and got out of their car to peer through a fence looking over the lot. She was frustrated she couldn’t see what was going on, but she’d just have to wait and hope that Lucy and Tom discussed it in their room. Within ten minutes, the man drove out of the parking lot, and returned to his house, with Lucy, Tom and Chloe following behind in convoy.

  After half an hour of waiting outside his house again, the man reappeared carrying a holdall travel bag, but this time he had a teenage boy standing beside him. The boy seemed to reply angrily to something the man said, before they both got in the car and drove off.

  Chloe could see Lucy and Tom chatting animatedly in the car, with frequent pointing towards the house, and after a further ten minutes, they both got out of the car, and walked quickly to the side gate of the house.

  ‘Oh no, here we go…they are doing it! They are actually going in!’ Chloe could feel her stress levels rising as she was willing them to return safely to their car. She knew though, it was part of the master plan, and that they had to go into the house to find the next clue to this mystery.

  After a few minutes, Chloe could see Lucy’s mousey blonde hair pop up in the front window.

  ‘Great, they have got in.’ she muttered. Now she just had to pray they would find what they were supposed to.

  They had been in the house for twenty minutes, when to Chloe’s horror, she could see the stubbled man’s car pull back into the road, and was fast approaching the house!

  ‘Oh no, no, no…please no!’ Chloe panicked. ‘What now?’ She had to stop him! Without thinking, she stamped her foot down on the accelerator and headed straight for his front bumper.

  ‘So Ein Idiot!’ he shouted, leaning out of his window. She slammed on her brakes, as the sound of his pounding horn and bellowing abuse penetrated the street. Chloe shakily put her hand up in submission and hoped she could get away with apologising profusely. In her panic to reverse quickly, she stalled the car, but as she eventually managed to manoeuvre her car around him, he leered at her with his menacing dark eyes, giving her an angry dismissive wave.

  As she glanced back in her rear view mirror, she was relieved to see a slither of Lucy’s hair hovering behind the bush to the side of the house, with just a smattering of her green jacket visible through the leaves. Chloe couldn’t see Tom initially, but as soon as the man and his son went back into the house, she saw both Lucy and Tom racing back to their car, jumping in and speeding off at break neck speed.

  Thank goodness, they’re out! she thought. She just hoped they had found the information they needed.

  Chloe was about to follow Lucy and Tom’s car, when the door to the house opened again and the stubbled angry man and teenage boy got back in to their car and drove off again

  She suddenly felt torn between following them or returning to the hotel. If she went back to the hotel, she could listen immediately to what Tom and Lucy had found, but by following this man it may lead to finding further important contacts. ‘Urghh…what shall I do?!’ she debated momentarily, before making her final decision. ‘Yes do it, just follow him!’

  Armed with her map, she carefully made a mental note of where they were going, so she could find her way back. The man seemed to be heading out towards a town called Vurgenz. She had to stay a safe distance behind, as she was sure he would recognise her car now they had encountered a run in. She followed him down small winding roads until she could see a small village in the distance. As they drew closer, there were young children running around outside. The village comprised small run-down buildings, scattered across a muddy rural landscape.

  Chloe parked her car out of sight and crept along the side of the road to make sure she couldn’t be seen. She caught sight of the stubbled man, talking to a portly moustached man in his late fifties. ‘Photo, photo…I need to take a photo’ she flustered, searching through her bag for her phone.

  She managed to take some pictures of both men, and after ten minutes, she saw a lady come out with bleached blond hair gathered up into loose ponytail. She was holding a young brunette haired girl’s hand, who only looked around ten years’ old. The lady’s heavy black roots matched her black eyeliner and hardened exterior. The young girl looked very solemn, and on seeing the men, clung to the lady. After a grumble from the moustached man, the lady prised the girl’s hands from around her waist and pushed her towards the stubbled man.

  Chloe watched as he gripped the young girl’s hand, and pulled her back to his car, before driving off. ‘Oh no, what’s he doing?’ she fretted. She followed anxiously behind, until he arrived back at the parking lot, where he had been previously. After ten minutes, a beige campervan emerged from the gates, and Chloe could see the man in the driving seat.

  Chloe felt stick to her stomach. She was fighting every urge in her body to jump out and grab the girl from the van, but she didn’t know the full story of what was going on, and it might end up ruining her chances of finding Rosie. She didn’t know whether to turn back to the hotel or keep following the campervan, which was now headed to the other side of Austria, judging from his approach to the highway.

  Chloe took the painstaking and upsetting decision to turn back, but that little girl’s face was going to be etched on her memory now, and she would not forget it. She just hoped by heading back to the hotel and listening to what Lucy and Tom had discovered, it might lead them, not only to Rosie, but to where this little girl was being taken.

  Chapter 23

  Lucy woke up the next morning to the sound of her phone ringing. With one eye reluctant to open, she felt around for it, wincing in pain, as the punishment of the Pinot Noir had set in.

  ‘Hello?’ she answered wearily.

  ‘Hello Lucy, is that you?’

  ‘Err…yes it is, who’s that?’ Lucy asked, trying to reclaim her memory and establish where she was.

  ‘Lucy, it’s Marianne, are you ok?’

  ‘Oh Marianne, yes sorry I’m a bit hungover to be honest….think I needed a release after yesterday.’

  ‘I know it must have been traumatic for you. I have managed to find some information for you. From the three phone numbers you gave me, one was registered to Jozsef Halasz, whose details you already have. The second was registered to an Emil Jonas, but interestingly the address given is the same as Laurenz Felbiger’s as well, so obviously a lot goes on around that house’

  ‘How strange…there didn’t seem to be any evidence that he lived there, apart from that one photo.’

  ‘Maybe Laurenz bought the phone for him to use for their operations.’

  ‘Yes maybe….how about the third number?’ Lucy asked.

  ‘Oh… that no longer existed so I couldn’t find anything.’

  ‘Oh ok…well it’s great you have found out the full name and addresses of the other two. I may need to ring you again later with a few more questions. Is that ok? It’s just you speak all the languages and seem to have a lot of contacts.’

  ‘Yes no problem, I want to help where I can.’

  ‘Thank you Marianne, have a good day.’

  Lucy turned to relay the information to Tom, who was now hoisted up on his elbow, summoning up the energy to listen.

  ‘Marianne has found the contact details of two of the numbers, but the third one didn’t exist.’ Lucy said, rubbing he
r temples to ease the pain.

  ‘That’s good….so where do they live?’

  ‘Well, the first number was for Jozsef Halasz, who we knew really already, but we now have an address for him in Hungary. The second was registered to at Emil Jonas, and to the same address as Laurenz Felbiger’s, which is strange.’

  ‘That is odd….so I suppose we’d better work out our next plan of action.’

  ‘Yes, but let’s go for breakfast first…I need food before my brain will start working properly again.’ Lucy groaned.

  Tom smiled ….‘I know, we did get through a bit last night didn’t we?’

  ‘Ah look Tom, Sam has sent through a photo of him and your mum. At least he is happy…we’ll ring him later.’

  After plenty of food, and a reassuring call to Sam, Lucy and Tom felt invigorated again to continue their research. They started by searching for Laurenz Felbiger’s on the internet, along with the Golden Dreams Casino.

  ‘Look Tom….Golden Dreams Casino has come up. There are two…one in Vienna and another in Budapest, Hungary.’ Lucy declared. ‘Look….there he is…a picture of Laurenz. It looks like he is congratulating a jackpot winner.’

  Tom pulled up a chair next to Lucy. ‘Where let’s see?…..so he is. Click on that tab….there are more photos.’

  Lucy opened up the casino gallery photos, and scrolled through them.

  ‘Wait…there…go back.’ Tom instructed…..‘that’s the other man in the photo from the box file isn’t it?’

  Lucy enlarged the photo…‘So it is…Jozsef Halasz….so does that mean he works at the casino too, I wonder.’

  ‘Enlarge it again, as there is a tag to the photo……it says Jozsef Halasz, owner of Golden Dreams Casino with a Member of The Interior Ministry. It says it was a for a charity function there, where punters donated a percentage of their winnings to a children’s charity.’

  ‘But this isn’t adding up at all.’ Lucy sat back confused. ‘I am now doubting everything….a man holding charitable auction for children, isn’t going to be involved in abducting them is he?’

  Tom stared out of the window. ‘I know it would be strange wouldn’t it……well what about Emil Jonas?…try his name.’

  Lucy input his name but found nothing. ‘Now what?’ she said deflated.

  ‘I don’t know now darling.’ Tom replied, picking up his phone to check his e-mails.

  Lucy pondered what to look at next, before deciding to look for anything on child abduction in France, Austria and Hungary. It, of course, brought up the Anna Gerber case, so she scrolled through articles of the people the police had interviewed and the places they had searched, and one photo in particular took her interest. She enlarged it and stared at the image, before switching to look at the photos on her tablet.

  ‘What is it?’ Tom asked, looking up from his phone.

  ‘I just want to check something.’

  Lucy stopped at one of the photos she had taken from the box file. ‘There look at that Tom.’

  He leaned over her shoulder and looked at the picture of the three men again….Emil, Laurenz and Jozsef.

  ‘Yes …….and?’

  ‘Now, look at the photo from this article.’

  Tom studied it carefully but looked at her blankly…. ‘I can’t see…what is it?’

  ‘The picture shows a Sinti village that the police investigated when Anna went missing. Look at the wrists of these four people here.’ Lucy said pointing.

  ‘Ok, I’m looking…I still don’t get…..’

  ‘They are all wearing a coloured plaited bracelet.’

  ‘Yes…. so’ Tom queried, still confused.

  ‘Look at the photo with Emil in….he has the exact same bracelet on.’

  Tom squinted to see a better look at their wrists.

  ‘Oh yes, so they are…so how is that going to help us?’

  ‘Well, it could be that Emil maybe from the same community and that is why he didn’t have an address for the phone.’

  ‘Oh yes…you could be right.’

  ‘So we need to find the nearest Sinti village and look around.’

  ‘We can’t just get out of the car and go walking in.’ Tom scoffed.

  ‘I know that!…but we could go and survey the area, even if we find out a morsel of information it is better than nothing.’

  ‘Ok ok…so where is it?’

  ‘Here you go…the nearest one to here is in Vurgenz…about half an hour from here.’

  ‘Ok, come on then.’ Tom agreed, not sure if they were actually going to achieve anything by going there.

  As they passed the sign for Vurgenz, they could see a muddy rural landscape in the distance, with some dirty white stone dwellings. Flashes of colour from the clothes lines brightened up the squalid setting like joyous carnival bunting, whilst the laughter from playing children brought them faith that some happiness lay beyond the stone walled entrance.

  ‘Pull over on that verge Tom.’ Lucy instructed.

  ‘What are we going to do?’ he asked, steering the car as far onto the grass as possible.

  ‘I’m going to see if we can see anything with these.’

  ‘I don’t think you’ll see a lot with those’ Tom smirked, as she reached for Sam’s camouflage binoculars.

  ‘Err…yes you are right, just a few blurry images…I wonder what would happen if we just walked in claiming we were lost.’

  ‘Oh I don’t know about that Luce, it could be dangerous.’ Tom replied.

  ‘Come on…let’s go…we have to Tom.’ Lucy urged, starting to march off with Tom trailing behind.

  After cautiously approaching the entrance, they hid behind the wall.

  ‘I’m really not sure about this Luce…we don’t even speak the language, and we are in the middle of nowhere….anything could happen to us and no-one would know.’

  ‘Don’t be so mellow dramatic Tom, I’m am sure they are very nice people.

  ‘Well you obviously don’t think so, as we wouldn’t be here otherwise!’

  ‘…True….but the whole village can’t be like that….I just want to get a feel the place.’

  ‘Sshh I can hear voices….look we’d better go in if we’re going to, otherwise it will look more dubious if they come out and find us spying on them from the outside.’ Tom said.

  ‘Yes you’re right, come on then…you lead.’

  ‘Oh great thanks!’ Tom replied begrudgingly, grabbing her hand.

  They turned the corner and slowly walked in through the front gates. As they entered the villagers’ territory, Lucy and Tom suddenly felt a strong repelling force gravitating towards them, as the ‘stranger’ alarm bells started to ring out.

  Within only a few steps, the children stopped playing, the mothers got up from their plastic chairs ready to spread their protective shields, whilst the warrior husbands came forth to deal with the imminent threat.

  Lucy gripped Tom’s hand tighter as a dark spiky haired man with protruding cheekbones, yellowing teeth, and sporting a maroon rock band t-shirt, headed in their direction.

  ‘Dies ist privates Eigentum, kann ich Ihnen helfen?’

  Lucy tensed up before replying meekly. ‘Sorry….we are En-g-lish.’

  ‘Private…here private…no you come!’ he responded.

  ‘We are sorry to trouble you, but….’ Tom added.

  ‘Go…go…you no welcome here!’ the man demanded.

  ‘But…..’ Lucy continued.

  ‘No….you people cause trouble….please leave.’ the man insisted.

  ‘Ok…ok…sorry.’ Tom said, surrendering.

  Lucy and Tom could see there was no use in staying as they couldn’t communicate properly, so they made one last apology, before turning to leave.

  Lucy tried to take in as much of the village as possible as they left, and managed to glimpse sight of some of the villagers wearing the infamous coloured plaited bracelets she had spotted in the photo.

  ‘Let’s get out of here.’ Tom mumbled und
er his breath.

  As they shuffled towards the exit, they heard some shouting, before seeing a lady being pushed out of one of the stone buildings. Her bleached blonde hair was scruffily concealing her face, but it couldn’t mask the sound of her loud sobs.

  A man’s voice was bellowing out of the house, and as it grew nearer, an intimidating moustached figure came out from behind the door, grabbing the lady’s hair. The lady let out a scream as he raised his hand to hit her, which suddenly stopped in mid air as a fellow villager interjected, gesturing towards Lucy and Tom.

  The brutish man turned to look in their direction, before slowly letting the lady’s blond hair slip through his fingers. Lucy and Tom froze in fear, both silently acknowledging that what they had just witnessed wasn’t pleasant. They didn’t need to say anything. They just knew they needed to get the hell out of there.

  With one last timid wave and apology, they both slowly backed out of the villagers’s stone walled territory and sped walked back to the car.

  ‘Quick, just drive Tom, drive!’ Lucy shouted.

  Tom wheelspun the car off the verge and headed back up the road. As soon as they reached the highway, they finally let out a heavy sigh of relief.

  ‘That was him wasn’t it.’ Lucy announced.

  ‘Without doubt.’

  ‘Emil Jonas…he looked a nasty piece of work didn’the?’

  ‘I know …not very nice at all.’

  ‘So at least we have confirmed where he lives. Did you notice that not all of the children had dark hair.…some had fair hair? You assume that the Sinti community would all have dark hair. That means it would be very easy for other fair haired children to fit in with their children. It was very remote there as well wasn’t it?’ Lucy observed.

  ‘I know… I can’t bear to think that our beautiful Rosie may have been taken there.’ Tom remarked, putting his hand on Lucy’s.

  Lucy shook her head. ‘I know, I can’t bear to think about it either. Come on, let’s get back and see where we go from here.’