In footsteps of Amelie's last journey

IT WAS, on the face of it, a bus journey just like any other past the sights and the sounds of suburban London - people walking home in the twilight, a crowd enjoying itself in the pub. But such glimpses of daily life were among the last things Amelie Delagrange saw.

Last night I took the same bus journey Amelie did before she was beaten to death in Twickenham.

I had started the night in Cristalz bar, in London Road, where I sat at the table next to where Amelie and her four friends had stayed for a few hours that night. Like then, the bar was relatively empty.

As I boarded the 267 outside the Sorting Room pub in London Road to head towards Hampton past Twickenham Green it could not have seemed less threatening.

And yet thoughts of Amelie made me more cautious than normal. The bus was virtually empty when it pulled into the stop, opposite the police station, with just a man in his forties downstairs. Almost instinctively, I climbed to the upper deck.

There was little traffic, as there would have been at the time Amelie travelled home from drinks with friends at the Cristalz at about 9.40pm on Thursday.

The bus swiftly turned off the main road into King Street and Heath Road, moving into the leafier suburban streets.

Stopping every few minutes to let one or two people on or off the bus, we made our way past the green. A police forensics team was still searching for evidence.

I noticed how many girls were travelling alone. Usually, no doubt, they made the same journey without a thought.

When Amelie pulled up at the bus depot on Wellington Road she realised she had missed her stop and needed to get off and walk back. As I traced her steps, it struck me how very quiet it was.

As I walked up Hampton Road there were no cars driving by and I passed only a handful of people in the half-mile walk back to Twickenham Green.

I passed the Loch Fyne restaurant where someone had spotted Amelie on that last walk back, and felt loath to continue past the light and comforting sound of people enjoying a night out.

Then, there was the green itself. An attractive stretch of well- cut grass with a cricket pitch, it is also the last place on Amelie saw. She was attacked right in front of a cricket sightscreen.

Now the only sound was the wind in the trees. It was dark and hard to see much around me. With a last thought of Amelie, I turned back to home, and safety.

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