In the Moors (31 page)

“What did you mean,” I asked, genuinely puzzled, “about a refuge?”

“I've been surfing the web since you called, checking up on facilities for vulnerable women. I'll print some things out for you.”

She disappeared, leaving me to finish my tea. I was bone tired and ached all over. I'd become a
vulnerable woman
. The thought filled me with shame.

I pulled myself out of the stainless-steel dining chair and shuffled off in search of her. I still felt a bit wobbly, but I did not intend to stay in a refuge, not even for a single night, and I needed to tell her so. I found her in a room that felt entirely functional—Linnet's home office. She was bending over a Macintosh, tapping the keys. “I'll just bring up this site.”

“Oh, great,” I said, forcing myself to sound cheerful. Outside, a maniac I'd invited into my bed was roaming around, searching for me in the growing darkness, but I didn't feel welcome here. Last time we met, Linnet and I had been booze buddies, but today she had hardly caught my eye. She might be at home, but her brain was at work, and I knew it wouldn't be long before I was lacing up my walking boots in readiness for the drive to hospital. “I don't know if I should press charges,” I told her.

“Why wouldn't you want to?”

“Because I'm in a bit of trouble myself. Yesterday, I went out to the shallow grave on the moors and they slung me in jail overnight.”

She slammed the return key and turned to me, her face fierce with incomprehension. “You are never going to let this alone, are you?”

Her reaction was identical to Rey's. I'd been planning to explain about my trance at the grave, hoping she'd want a description of the tunnel, but she was not ready to listen.

“Yes,” I said. “Yes, I am. There is nothing more I can do, I see that. I've made up my mind. I won't need those details you're printing out.”

“I don't recommend you go directly back home.”

“I was planning to spend a bit of time in Wales.”

“That sounds good. So long as you stay in touch. I don't want to jeopardise your use as a witness.” Linnet smiled, but it was impatient round the edges, reminding me that I'd pulled her from some important work, arriving unannounced and fraught.

I was beginning to wish I'd had enough petrol to drive to Caroline's house, rather than Linnet's. I would now be sinking into a bottomless sofa and being offered sweet, milky drinks. I was sure that somewhere here was a room filled with comfortable seating, coffee tables piled with magazines, and logs flaming out heat from an inglenook hearth, but this office was not it. Even the fire, inviting though it pretended to be, was a simulation of the real thing. It burned from a central point, red and yellow flames that gave out heat without warmth. It was one of those aseptic gel fires, perfect for the girl-about-town-with-country cottage.

“You've got a nice house,” I said, resisting the urge to tell her how I longed to sample one of its bedrooms. “What's it called?”

“It doesn't have a name,” said Linnet.

“That's a pity. It's like something from a fairy tale.”

She smiled across at me, her hand still cradling the mouse. “Thank you. It was called Keeper's Cottage when I bought it, but I took the sign down. I'm not a keeper.”

“No, but how does the postman find you?”

“All my mail goes to the office.”

I took the final swallow of my tea and dumped the mug on the stone mantelpiece, stretching my hands towards the lukewarm fire. I didn't think the ultra-modern design of the fireplace did anything for this low-beamed room. But it was stunning—any TV home décor team would have given their eye teeth for the look she'd created. Circling the ruby and ivory of the flames were thick bands of the blackest cast iron, studded with fat knobs of satin steel. It was a formidable fireplace, but it overwhelmed the small room, like placing a marble statue in your loo.

“Okay, Sabbie, here's some info on your rights as a woman unable to access your own home.”

Something was knocking at the back of my mind, like a thought waiting to be let in. I'd overlooked something about the tunnel I'd seen in my trance out on the moors. It was a child who passed it on to me as an image. A child on a nightmare journey towards death. His tunnel did not have to be massive, or deep, or even frightening in itself. Josh had been sick with terror; anything he saw that made no sense to him would be scorched into his thoughts. I swung back to gape at the fireplace.

As I stared, it changed subtly, the way that optical illusion game changes from being a vase to two people kissing. Just for a second or two, it wasn't an
avant-garde
heating accessory.

It was a dark tunnel, studded with shiny metal bolts.

TWENTY-FIVE

I felt as if
my head had been held under water until my lungs burst. I spun round, my mouth drooping and my eyes straining wide, desperate to know if Linnet had heard or sensed my distress. She was still leaning over the back of the office chair, having chosen not to sit on it, her right hand on the mouse, her eyes on the screen. But she
had
heard me gasp.

“You all right?”

I kept my eyes averted from her. “I can't help think Ivan's going to turn up any second.”

“I thought you said you'd lost him.”

“I had. But after I phoned you, he caught up with me again.”

Her hand slid away from the mouse. “Let me get this straight. Are we about to be invaded by a gun-happy troglodyte?”

“No, don't worry, he's got no idea where I went. He's halfway to Glastonbury by now, I should think. No doubt he'll think I've got friends there.” I was gibbering, hoping that talking about Ivan would keep my monstrous suspicions of Linnet from showing in my eyes. I glanced back at the fireplace. On second examination, I felt even more sure this was what I'd seen in my trance. I gazed round the room, trying to work out why Josh Sutton would have ever been here. For one moment, the awful agony of an answer sprung into my mind. Cliff had kidnapped the boy. He had gone to Linnet for help—family solicitor, Rey had said. And, for some reason, she had taken his side. The speculation was so overwhelming, so appalling, I felt my legs give way. I stumbled toward the computer desk, clung to its edge. Linnet had told me she'd come down here from Scotland because of some man. Could that be Cliff?

The printer made a throat-clearing noise as it began to cough out pages from the Net. I barked a small shriek and felt my body jerk off the ground.

Linnet laughed. “You
are
jumpy.”

“It's all getting to me.” I let my hand rest over my bad eye. “Could I have a glass of water?”

As we went back towards the kitchen, I sneaked glances into the rooms we passed. Was this a place that one could secrete a child?

She took a crystal glass and filled it from the door of the fridge. I took a sip, my teeth rattling against the rim.

Not Cliff. I had believed in him implicitly from the moment I'd met him, and I wasn't going to desert him now. “Not Cliff,” I said without meaning to speak aloud.

“Sorry?”

I faced her. “You once hinted that you thought Cliff was not innocent. Not
altogether
innocent. What did you mean by that?”

“Ah, yes, Cliff. Are you up to discussing the case?

I nodded, hoping Linnet could convince me that I had got my wires tangled—or my tunnels jumbled. I thought back to the Slamblaster journey. I'd been wrong before. I badly needed to believe I was wrong about the fireplace tunnel. I snatched at her hand. “Tell me.”

“I'm pretty sure that I've secured Cliff some bail.”

“Oh, I do know that. Rey told me. How d'you do it?”

“Sabbie, you have to think like a copper in my job.” Her eyes were gleaming. “Nothing is being gained by keeping Cliff locked up. The police could be said to be complicit in Aidan's death, if he's ever found. I've suggested they release Cliff, untagged but constantly shadowed, to see if that brings about a conclusion.”

I stared into her face and all I saw was a solicitor who was chuffed at the turns the case was taking. “That's good,” I said. “Brilliant.”

“I'm also compiling an argument that Josh Sutton's death was not copy-cat. It's clear that little boy had been comfortably housed, fed, and watered … cherished, even. Where, precisely, would Cliff have hidden him?”

“I see where you're going.” I was thrilled. “Cliff doesn't have access to anywhere like that.”

“Apart from his mother's, of course. But we will request forensic run-down on the house. To verify Josh was never in it.”

I clutched my glass. “This is all so positive!”

Linnet gave satisfied smile. “I was hoping you'd come with me to ask Mrs. Houghton if we could allow the team in.”

“Yes, of course. Although, I guess you know her at least as well as me.”

“Sorry?” said Linnet.

“You're the family solicitor.”

She frowned, as if puzzling this out. The she smiled and nodded. “Yes, of course.”

I sank onto one of the steel chairs as relief washed through me. I couldn't remember any thrill ride I'd ever been on that felt quite like the roller coaster of the last twenty-four hours. The bitter cold of the graveside … the vision of the tunnel … a night in a police cell … the news about Cliff … Ivan … and now my massive, sinister assumptions about Linnet's house, which were probably so off-centre that I'd make the biggest idiot of myself ever if I ever admitted them to a soul.

The distant chugging of the printer stopped. Linnet turned her head. “That's your information.”

She paced from the kitchen, but I was waiting for my heart to slow down a bit. I was beat up, knackered, and befuddled. My blood sugar was in my boots. I needed to wake up and think clearly. I went over to the sink and turned on the cold tap. Water fizzed into my cupped hands and I threw it over my face in a desperate attempt to get on top of things. My mind was exploding with contradictions and puzzles. I felt like I was sniffing around on the edge of a labyrinth, with the answers hidden at the middle. Linnet probably thought she'd let a mad woman into her house.

Splashing my face did nothing to clear my head. It just made my wound sting and my jumper wet. I swung round the gleaming kitchen, searching for a towel rail—something in solid gold, no doubt—but towels seemed to have been overlooked. Everything went in the dishwasher, of course. I began pulling at drawers—there was an entire column of them near the massive, glossy cooker. The first two were cocktail-making requisites. Well, a girl should have a hobby. The next held fluffy orange dusters, so I thought I might be nearing the end of my quest. The next drawer was filled with over-the-counter medication. I shoved it shut and searched on, alighting finally on a drawer of J-cloths. My hand froze over the pile. I slid the drawer closed so slowly, so quietly, I might have been in a museum. I opened the drawer above it once again.

I was staring at a neat row of Calpol bottles, most still in their boxes. My body chilled as if the kitchen had become a freezer. I lifted a bottle out and read the label.
Calpol—paracetamol for children—easy to swallow and nice to taste
. I exhaled, half expecting to see a fog of steam come out of my mouth. The coincidence was too strong, too shocking.

I heard her heels clip over the quarry tiles. I turned my stunned gaze upon her. She was bearing a sheath of copy paper, holding it out to me, her mouth half opened, ready to speak. She looked at the bottle in my hand and saw everything that was in my mind.

Her reaction was instant and effective. She dropped the papers, and they fanned out over the blood red of the tiles. She came at me. She grasped my wrist with the perfect amount of force and speed, pulling me towards the floor. The only thing I had time to do was cringe. My knees buckled, an action she encouraged with the toe of one shoe. I had no resistance in me. I sprawled on my front over the scattered papers, until
COUNSELLING AND FINANCIAL AID FOR WOMEN IN DISTRESS,
was the only thing I could see. I felt Linnet's knee in the small of my back. I pushed against her with all my strength. Suddenly, we were face to face, her dark eyes boring into mine.

“Where is he, where is he?” I screamed. I was sure now, as we writhed over each other in this catfight on a kitchen floor. Linnet knew something deep and dark about this terrible crime. Something or someone had drawn her into a web of cruelty, kidnap, death. “Is he dead? Is Aidan dead like Josh?”

She didn't reply. She was too busy trying to restrain my arms, pin me on the ground. She was panting. She was older and less fit than me. The only real advantage she had over me was the surprise element. All I had to do was spring the surprise back. I looked into her eyes, but they had narrowed to slits as she concentrated on holding me down. I began to fight with every cell in my body, kicking with legs and knees, jamming my elbows at her.

Nothing made any sense. Why would Josh have been here, to gaze in terror at the fireplace tunnel? Why would Linnet attack me because I'd found a bottle of medicine?

“You fed them that stuff!” I yelled, the realization of it hitting me like a blow. “You poured it down their throats!”

That made her react. She stopped trying to pin me down and stared at me. Her jaw was tight, she spoke through clamped teeth. “Only when they cried. To help them sleep.”

“What CRAP!”

Slowly, I was gaining the upper hand. She stretched away from me, grasping for something. I had my chance to wriggle free. I pushed up enough to see what she was trying to reach.

It was a chopping board. It came down on my head and with it, came blackness.