Anyway so she ran off and, erm, I don’t, I don’t remember her coming back, but as time went on, I think the kids were getting a little bit hungry, so we drifted back up the beach to the, the Paradiso Restaurant, I think it’s called, erm, and got some chairs there, ordered some, some food for the children, because they’d missed, they’d missed high tea. I have missed something out, something out here, of course, is that, erm, around the five o’clock mark, erm, I had to pelt up to Ocean Club to get El out before the Nannies would have taken them up to high tea back at the Tapas. So I went up there, collected E and brought her back to the beach. You’ve already asked me whether I saw Madeleine there, I have to say, hand on heart, you know, a year later, I don’t remember whether Madeleine was there or not, but the routine would have been that none of us would have needed to pick, to pick them up, so I, I presume she was, but can no longer absolutely place her there when I picked Ella up. So we came back to the beach and, you know, as it was getting, you know, we headed off with Ella, after a short play, up to the Paradiso Restaurant, they played on the frames in front of there while the food was being ordered and had food, all fairly uneventful. Erm, around, around the six o’clock mark we were, we were having such a good time down there we were, we were half tempted to, for the men not to go back to what was planned up at the Tapas, erm, namely a sort of men’s social tennis round, you know, which I think was due to start at six. And I think as it got around six we thought it’s not really fair, you know, three of us not going there, there might not be enough players, you know, there wasn’t a full resort, so me, Matt and Dave, erm, left everybody else down at the beach and headed back up to the, to the, erm, the apartments, well to the Tapas anyway. And I think, from the best of my recollection, I think me and Matt went straight to the, the courts, Dave went off to his apartment and I believe, erm, to Gerry and Kate’s apartment as well. Erm, we then went down to the tennis, erm, it had already started because we were a little late, erm, and, erm, there was Gerry, Dan and a number of other male guests, maybe just sort of another three, two or three people, whose name I may have known at the time but no longer do, I certainly didn’t know them terribly well. And we started off playing doubles on both, both of the two courts, erm, sometimes changing, changing players�?
01.01.51 1578 “So there is Gerry, Dan, yourself and Matt?�?BR>Reply “And Dave and a couple of other guests�?
1578 “You said Dave went to the apartment?�?BR>Reply “Well he did, but only briefly and then, well he went, he went back there and then, and then joined us, so fairly rapidly there was the full kind of compliment of, erm, of, the male adults within the group were playing tennis. And, erm, we played for, you know, a fair amount of time, I mean, in total, we were out there probably an hour and a half nearly, erm, you know, something between an hour and an hour and a half. Erm, and at some point during that period, erm, all the, the people came back up from the beach, so the kids were up at the, I can remember them being up at the, erm, the netting looking down at the sunken courts. Erm, I say, they may have come down onto the court briefly and, erm, well it’s the point we weren’t playing anything like competitive tennis anyway. Erm, and at some stage Jane, I think, well the kids had had a fairly long day, it had been quite hot, erm, and all that week they were usually absolutely exhausted at the end of the day and ready for bed, erm, and Jane took our children back. I think Matt took, erm, Grace took, sorry, Rachael took Grace. And I think Gerry actually left the court because he had been playing for longer than us, I think he went back a little earlier than me, Matt and Dave. Erm, and Dan, the tennis coach, had also left before we did, I think he’d been playing all day and it was quite a hot day so he’d had enough. Erm, and the reason I mention that is that normally if you went, if they were still there when you finished, you could put all the b*lls and the rackets away in the pavilion, erm, within the grounds, erm, but we had to take all of the rackets and b*lls back with us, so, you know, it was relatively late. And I’m not entirely sure what time I got back to, to the room, but, you know, well eventually, me, Matt and Dave all came back. And it was probably the latest that we’d got back and Jane and the kids had been in there for some time. Erm, I’d say it was probably coming up to, you know, not, not far shy of eight o’clock itself. Erm, and I would have probably had a quick shower, helped with the, erm, you know, with the stories and getting ready for bedtime. I know, I know our kids were pretty tired that, that evening, they’d been playing on the beach and had a really, a really busy. But we were running a bit close to our half eight, erm, booking, so the kids were in bed, but they hadn’t been in for long. So I think shortly after half eight, erm, maybe sort of twenty-five to or twenty to, Jane went down and I certainly can recall saying ‘Well you know what I like�? you know, we’d ordered, it was a very limited menu, we’d discussed what we liked each night, and I said, you know, ‘Just order the me the�? ‘Order the X, Y and Z and I’ll be down when I’m happy that the kids are definitely asleep�? And I didn’t stay much longer, to be honest, they were, they were all fast asleep and there wasn’t a noise out of them at all. So I headed down, you know, about quarter to or so, erm, to the Tapas, exiting through the main door on the car park, erm, and double locking it there, the patio was shut and everything down and didn’t see anything particularly remote on the way down, erm, and just arrived as normal. The mood entirely normal at the table and I, on my arrival, the only people who weren’t there, erm, as we discussed, would have been the adults in five ‘H�? so Dave, Fi and Dianne, who were pretty routinely the last ones there, as, erm, you know, all week. Erm, we kind of sat and, and, and talked, waiting for them. And I can distinctly remember, from the position I was sitting, I was looking towards the apartment block and, erm, you, you could see the lights on in their, in their rooms, inside, and occasionally see people walking about. So there were lots of jokes about the fact that they were still, still not there and probably if we didn’t get a move on they weren’t going to serve us. So Matt, erm, around nine o’clock, give or take a few minutes, but around that sort of time, he got up and said ‘I’ll go and drag them out�?and I believe also had a listen outside of all of the rooms as well. In any case, as he was walking back, he actually met them on the way down. And so by the time they had sat down and Matt had come back from a brief listen at the windows of the bedrooms, we were all there. Erm, I don’t know whether we’d ordered individually, I doubt we did, I think we probably put the order in altogether. Erm, so we’d have ordered. Erm, obviously we create, we sat down and created a timeline so I’m aware that the next person who got up was, was Gerry, not from a really clear recollection of him getting up necessarily, but, nonetheless, Gerry was away from the table for, erm, for five or ten minutes. And during the time that he was away, erm, you know, we decided, me and Jane, that we’d do, we’d do a check on our room. So Jane actually got up, erm, and went over and did a check, erm, and then came back. And I don’t remember her saying anything about Gerry talking or, or, or, or any problems in the room or having seen anyone, I think she just, she just did the check and returned. Erm, and, erm, I presume at some point, although I can’t picture it, you know, Gerry himself coming back. We had, we had the starters. And I think the next clear thing in my mind is actually that, erm, by the time the starters arrived, we’d eaten them and everything else, I thought it was probably about, you know, it was time we did a check and I also needed the toilet so rather than just go to the toilet, which was almost up to the portal, I got up and Matt, erm, said ‘Oh I’ll come and do a check as well�? So me and Matt walked back to the, to the, erm, to the flats, erm, this would have been about, about kind of twenty-five past nine, I suppose. Erm, and as we, you know, it will probably come back to, but as you asked me the other day, I didn’t certainly notice anything particularly strange or different, I didn’t see any cars parked or anyone standing around or loitering. I don’t think we, we walked around the side of the building and I don’t recall making any particular look at the front of the building to notice any changes in the, in the shutters. But we probably wouldn’t have bothered, you know, ‘a�?low suspicion anyway and ‘b�?we were going to go to each of the flats and just have a listen, so I don’t think we made any visual check of it first. Got to my flat five ‘D�? erm, and as we, you know, got sort of quite close I could hear Evie murmuring, so she was, she was obviously awake. So I went into five ‘D�? erm, I actually went to the toilet first. Erm, and then Matt broke off at this point and he went over to his flat five ‘B�? And I was just, just in the process really, after having a wee, of checking, erm, of checking Evie and had, you know, had established that she’d, erm, that she’d been, that she’d actually been sick in the cot. Erm, I, you know, Matt returned, so this was only really a matter of a couple of minutes or so later, and, you know, he asked if everything was alright and I said, you know, ‘Well Evie’s obviously awake and I think she’s been sick�? So he offered to help and stay if I needed it and I said ‘No, you go back, just let Jane know that Evie’s awake and she’s been sick and�? you know, ‘and whether she’d come back after she’s finished her dinner�? Erm, so Matt then went away and, to the best of my knowledge, he then went round the back of the building and did a check of Kate and Gerry’s room via the patio door, before returning to the table. Erm, within the flat, erm, you know, I got Evie out and she had some sick on her, on her, on her clothes and on her face, so I actually turned on the sort of shower taps and I got her out of her, erm, out of her kind of nightie that she was in, gave her a quick wash, erm, and then, at some stage, either then or later on, I also stripped the, stripped the cot, I think I must have done it at the time because I think that actually had more sick on it than anything and I just rinsed that off in the bath. And then they went into the, erm, fully functioning, easily to operate by men, washing machine, that, erm, that MARK WARNER had, had, erm, provided, that was in the flat anyway. Erm, and then I just sat really with Evie down near the patio door, erm, she was, you know, she was awake but otherwise, otherwise fairly happy, and just read a book, read a book to her I think. Erm, and then Jane, you know, a number of minutes later, I mean, I would have thought his was probably around, round about the sort of twenty to mark, sort of ten minutes later from when I arrived, had come back having sort of eaten her main course. We were in the flat together for a little while and I would imagine at this point probably put the washing on and, erm, you know, and then Jane, Jane said, you know, ‘They’ve made your main course, why don’t you go back down and get it�? I’m not entirely sure which way out I went, I mean, ordinarily we would have always have gone out through the front door and deadlocked it. Erm, I mean, you asked the other day whether I did go that way, I have to say there’s, there was nothing stopping me nipping out the quicker patio way and Jane was shutting the door, but I don’t recall which way I went back, but I certainly didn’t see anything untoward on the way back either, although, by this point, obviously, it was pretty, it was, it was dark. Erm, I arrived back at the table, erm, everyone, there was, there was some hilarity in the fact that Jane had been dispatched, erm, to relieve me in the apartment, erm, and I kind of, erm, quickly picked up that that was what the, what the, the joke had been. There was, there was some dialogue with the waiters, erm, of a humorous nature as well. And I think my food was actually still there at the minute, but as I was starting to eat that, I mean, one came over and said ‘Oh no, don’t�? you know, ‘it’ll have gone a bit cold�? you know, ‘we’ll do you a fresh one�? So I then waited for a period of time, you know, sort of five or ten minutes while they quickly, you know, it was sort of thin steak so I’d imagine quickly grilled or fried, erm, fried up a meal of that. Erm, mood, identical, you know, a very good humoured night, I think it was probably the, out of all the days of the week it was the one where, I think, where everyone was really, you know, really had had a, you know, enjoyed the day, the weather had been great. Erm, you asked the other day whether I specifically recall Kate getting up to leave, erm, I can’t picture her, her going, but obviously at some point she, she was the, the only person I think to, to go back to the room sort of after my return to the, the table, I think. Erm, the, and the only real point of reference that we can, that I can remember now is that, is that somebody did ask what time it was at some point, probably while Kate was away, and Rachael, erm, sort of said that it was around the ten o’clock mark, so I think, you know, although we have to be a little bit, you know, there’s a bit of, erm, a bit of a guesstimate going on, on sort of the other times, there as certainly a time check that was announced, you know, around the ten o’clock mark. Erm, my food had arrived, well my food had arrived I think by this point. And, and then Kate, erm, erm, returned, erm, obviously Jane wasn’t there but the rest of us were still there, and she came through and, you know, into the portal, I didn’t see her arrive, but the first thing really we recall then is, erm, is, is Kate shouting across from the, from the reception area and perhaps she didn’t come particularly close, I don’t recall. Erm, and as we discussed the, on the initial recording, erm, if I’m honest, I don’t recall her absolute words, only really the meaning that, erm, you know, that, that Madeleine, that Madeleine had gone. Erm, and so, you know, at this point, you know, she, we all just got up and, erm, erm, and, and left with the exception of Dianne who, who I think stayed, who stayed at the chair. We then got up to the foot of the, of the apartment and, erm, you know, clearly, you know, a state of, you know, growing, growing panic. Erm, some people went directly into the flat initially, erm, included, including Gerry and, and Kate, others just stayed at the, at the, at the gate, erm, on the road leading down beside the apartment. Erm, and you know it was, it was absolute, you know, bedlam, there was panic and, you know, I’m not, the, the order of how things were decided and what, and what we did is, is just a complete blur at this point, but, you know, nonetheless, I think people came back out and then, you know, she’s, she’s certainly not there. And I recall, certainly me, erm, erm, Dave, Matt and I think initially at least Gerry, just said ‘Look, let’s just�? erm, ‘let’s just split up and find�? erm, you know, ‘see if we can find her, see if she’s just wandered out�? So everyone did a little bit of a search just in the, in the immediate area and I went along the passageway which was in front of the patio, the patio entrances of, of the apartments, erm, round, all the way along that initially, I think, and unbeknown to me at this point, because we hadn’t really used this entrance a great deal, certainly not walked to the other end of it, it was actually a dead-end, so I then had a look in the, in the front gardens of, of the apartments on the ground floor that you could see, searched a little bit just in between the two apartments and obviously this was a fairly brief search and rapidly doubled back and, erm, you know, the, other people had just came back from the immediate vicinity as well and it was established obviously that no-one had, had found her. I’m not entirely sure whether I went round to quickly see Jane at this point or whether it was after my next, erm, my next search, but while I’m talking about the searches I’ll just say that. I think then we decided that we just needed to look a little bit further afield, erm, and I went round the, the front of the apartments, the high side of the apartments, had a look along there, erm, got to the, what I’m calling the main road that drops in from, erm, from the, from the motor, from the dual carriageway outside of town, and then looked, you know, down, you know, looked down the hill there, erm, towards the, the, erm, the western side of the tennis courts, erm, really looking, you know, either side of the road just to see if she was sort of wandering there, erm, and you could hear kind of ‘Madeleine�?being shouted pretty much everywhere around at this point. Erm, that, the next, after I kind of moved down a bit to the left, there was the Supermarket quite some distance away, but there’s a, there’s a, there’s a road and I think it had a car park or a, well certainly a car park but there was an area of sort of rough that you could probably, you know, it’s not tarmaced or anything, had a look around there, couldn’t see her. And then there’s, erm, there was an entrance into, erm, the building kind of opposite this, which is, is, which is like a Shopping Centre, erm, or at least the lower floors seemed to have a kind of a set of like a Curry House and a Bar and a few things and a swimming pool as well, and, huh, I can’t remember the layout in there very much, but I remember it being kind of split on, on at least sort of two levels, lots of little recesses around kind of, I think kind of shop windows and stuff. So I didn’t really know where I was going, I’d never been in it before, but, nonetheless, sort of wandered around the lower floor and didn’t find anything. I went up on, on, I think on the next floor up, as I came off the stairs and came round there was a, a small Coffee Bar or a Bar on the left and looked in there and asked, there was a, there was a, a man and a, erm, erm, presumably a barman in there, just, there was only a couple of people, and said, you know, ‘Have you seen a little girl�?and, I mean, I don’t know how much English they spoke, but they seemed to, they just sort of shrugged and said no. So then just around that area. And then, and then found my way out of the, the Shopping Centre and actually came out at the other end from where, well a different entrance, I didn’t come out the same way I don’t think, erm, and, erm, it was actually on the road that comes down in front of the Baptista Supermarket. I don’t know whether I searched a little bit more around there, but not long thereafter I met Dave coming down the road in front of the Supermarket, erm, just looking terrible, just pale, erm, you know, sort of, you know, sort of fear in his eyes, saying, you know, ‘This is�? erm, ‘This is really bad. This is bad�? you know, ‘No-one’s found her. No-one’s found her�? Erm, and I don’t know what happened at this point particularly, erm, whether we went around there, but at some point or other me, Matt and Dave found ourselves either back at the flat or, or, or, together somewhere nearby and decided that we would, erm, head down to the beach, I think that was just ‘a�? you know, you think ‘Oh there’s water down there it’s dangerous if she’s got that far�?and ‘b�?just, it was, it was desperation and gravity takes, you know, would take you that way. So the three of us swept down through a number of roads, erm, and then came out down at the, you know, down on the beachfront and I think by this point we thought it, you know, it was fairly futile searching as a three so we split up and took sections of the beach and, as I’ve described before, I think Matt looked immediately around where we had come out on the beach, me and Dave kind of headed along towards where the majority of the beach was in the other direction and Dave started searching on that part of the beach and I got myself almost over to where this Café Paradiso or Restaurant Paradiso is, along the boardwalks and out to the, to the water edge, erm, and I found there that you could, if looking back, you, it wasn’t perfect, but you could see a fair amount of the beach and as well, and also be able to look at the waterline as well. Erm, went along there for a bit towards Black Rock, erm, and then, and then at some point decided to turn, to turn back, I mean, I thought, I think it felt rather unlikely that, that Madeleine was going to have walked the distance that I was starting to go, I think, you know, there’s no, there’s no reason why she would have necessarily left the kind of the beach area and gone down there. So I didn’t go all the way, turned back, as I came back, erm, you now, I bumped into the, the woman I described before, early twenties, fair hair, given the light, English, possibly a MARK WARNER employee, although I don’t, I don’t remember, I don’t know whether I’d seen her before, erm, or since, but she was certainly, you know, either, erm, tut, someone who worked out there because she wasn’t Portuguese, she seemed to be already aware that, that somebody was missing, either through bumping into Dave or, you know, having been higher up in the town recently. Erm, and then did a, a, a comb through various streets, erm, not with any great, erm, plan but just to try and cover some area on the way back up to the, the apartments. And then obviously got back up to the apartments and it was clear that, you know, the, erm, you know, that things were still, you know, very, very dire and no-one had found her. I mean, right up until this point I, I thought some, you know, I did honestly think that this was just, that the patio was open and she, you know, and she had gone for, gone for a wander. Erm, by the time we got back from this I think, you know, there was, there were other people were certainly starting to congregate and, in fact, I think some people were starting to search, mainly staff from MARK WARNER, who I think had been alerted fairly quickly. Erm, and it’s a, and it’s a bit of a, it’s a bit of a blur as to, you know, what, what happened at this point.