The Card at the Ramp

“Maudren says she never used the card.”

Rusk laid a copy of the access report on the kitchen table. The secured house had a table, two chairs, and a police officer stationed by the front window. Merrit had spent the morning learning which floorboards creaked. Now she looked at the printed lines instead.

“She says it was issued to her household,” Rusk continued. “She says staff had access to it. She denies knowing it was used below the stable.”

Merrit read the timestamp twice. The card had opened the underground ramp’s service door on the night Bethan Pike disappeared. Another entry showed it had been used again before dawn.

“Can you prove she had it with her?”

“Not yet. The card was recovered in the room beneath the stable. The access system records the assigned holder, not the hand that presented it.” Rusk pulled out a chair. “We’re checking who else could have had access, and whether the time stamps match other evidence.”

Maudren’s denial made the card sound like a lost umbrella, passed from one person to another without anyone remembering when. Merrit could still see the neat entry on the old register: M. Pell. A name reduced to an initial and a surname, as if that made the thing beneath it less human.

“What did she say about the name?”

“She acknowledged M. Pell meant her.” Rusk’s expression stayed even. “She says the entry is not evidence that she received anything.”

The distinction was careful. Merrit had heard that kind of care before, in Greenvale’s dining room, where Dr. Pell’s questions had sounded almost kind until she understood what he was measuring.

Rusk pushed a second sheet toward her. “I’d like you to check this against your statement. Tell me only what you actually remember.”

It was a floor plan of the service level, with the ramp and the concealed room marked in pencil. Merrit studied the narrow corridor leading from the ramp to the room. She had never seen it herself. Jory had described it. So had the police, after the search.

“I can’t identify this route from seeing it,” she said.

“Good. Keep that distinction.” Rusk tapped the access report. “You can say what Jory told you, and what you saw in the register. The police need him to tell us what he saw.”

Merrit glanced at the officer by the window. “Is he safe?”

“He’s in police-arranged accommodation. We’ve kept his location restricted.” Rusk paused. “He’s agreed to give a further statement. He asked whether you were told about the card.”

The answer sat between them. Jory wanted to know whether the facts had moved enough to make speaking worth the risk. Merrit had no good assurance to offer him.