A Bitter Feast

by Deborah Crombie

  Booth got his Volvo out of the pub car park before Viv could back her van round in the courtyard. This time, Kincaid didn’t mind Booth’s driving. They tore up King’s Well Lane, a bloody storm-tossed sunset filling the sky ahead. Lowering the window as they reached Nell Greene’s cottage, he could smell smoke. “Just ahead,” he directed as Booth drove on. “The farm entrance is where the trees are thickest. I’ll get the gate.”

  But there was no need—the gate stood open. Booth drove over the rill and down the farm drive. As the yard came into view, Kincaid could just make out Mark’s Land Rover and the unattached trailer in the gathering gloom. There was no sign of Bea, or of Grace, but smoke was snaking from under the bottom of the barn door. Booth slammed the Volvo to a stop and they scrambled out just as Viv’s van rolled up behind them. Inside the house, the dogs barked frantically.

  “Christ,” Booth shouted as they reached the barn. “The door’s been blocked.” A piece of timber had been pulled across the bottom of the barn door, but the two men managed to shift it quickly enough.

  “Stand back,” Booth directed as Gemma and Viv came up behind them. He moved to one side as he pulled open the door, but still the cloud of smoke set them all coughing.

  Blinking, Kincaid peered inside. Flames flickered, fanned by the inrush of air, but as the smoke cleared he could see a huddled shape against the hay bales on the barn’s far side. He recognized the denim jacket Mark had worn when he’d visited yesterday. “It’s Mark. We’ve got to get him out.”

  “You can’t lift him,” Gemma said. “Stay back. Viv and I can help.”

  As much as he hated it, Kincaid knew she was right. He’d only been able to grip the timber blocking the door with one hand. “Be careful.”

  As the three of them ran crouching into the barn, Mark began to cough and try to push himself up. Kincaid breathed a prayer of relief. “Wait, wait, we’ve got you,” said Viv as they reached him and lifted him up. With Booth on one side and Viv on the other, they supported him across the barn and out the door. Gemma trailed behind, looking round, then ran after them as she began to cough, too.

  “I don’t think Grace is in there,” she gasped as she reached Kincaid and the open air. Booth pushed the door to behind her, stopping the wind from feeding the flames.

  “My head,” moaned Mark. “I don’t remember—she must have bloody hit me.” He put a hand to the back of his head, wincing, and when he pulled it away his fingers were dark with blood.

  Kincaid grasped his shoulder. “Mark, take it easy. Who hit you?”

  “Bea. It must have been Bea. She was saying crazy things about O’Reilly—” Realization seemed to hit him. “My barn! Christ! Get some water!”

  “I know where the hosepipe is,” said Viv. “But, Mark, where’s Grace?”

  “Grace? What are you talking about?”

  “She saw Bea hit you.”

  Mark shook his head, then grimaced. “Bloody hell. No, she can’t have—Viv, get the damned hose.”

  But Booth loomed out of the dimness, dragging a coil. “Viv, go turn the tap.” The sound of sirens came faintly on the wind as Booth eased the barn door open and shouted, “Now!” The jet of water hit the smoldering straw with a hiss and a billow of dark smoke.

  Viv reappeared beside Kincaid and Gemma, her face smudged with soot. “I’ve got the torch from the van,” she said. “We’ve got to find Grace.”

  Gemma and Kincaid followed Viv down the lane toward Nell Greene’s cottage. Their eyes had grown accustomed to the twilight and they made their way without using the torch, which Viv gripped more like a weapon than an implement. Looking back, Gemma saw the strobe of blue lights coming from the opposite direction.

  “We know Grace was here,” Viv had insisted back in the farmyard. “And that she was on foot. She’s terrified, and she could be hurt. I don’t think she will have gone far. We should try Nell’s—she’d feel safe there.”

  “Viv’s right,” Gemma had said, although she knew the thud they’d heard over Grace’s mobile might have been a blow, and that Bea might have bundled the injured girl into her car and taken her God knew where. But Booth had already put out an alert for the Fiat, and they had to cover every other possibility. “We should go on foot. If Bea is searching for Grace as well, we don’t want to warn her that we’re coming.”

  Reluctantly, Booth had agreed, but he’d stayed behind to direct the emergency operations and to make sure the farm was searched thoroughly. “Be careful in the lane,” he told them. “Don’t forget what happened to Jack Doyle.”

  Not having seen the accident scene, Gemma could only imagine, but she was doing that all too well as they crept along the very edge of the narrow lane, listening for the sound of an oncoming car, a crackle of movement in the hedgerows—or the cry of a distressed child.

  The thunderstorm seemed to have collapsed with the dusk, thank God, with only a brief spatter of droplets on their cheeks as they set off. The air had gone dead still. She could hear Kincaid breathing right behind her. A heavy, green scent rose from the grass on the verge as their feet crushed it.

  With a clap, a bird exploded from the hedge right in front of Viv, who swore and almost dropped the torch. When their hearts had stopped thudding, they moved even more carefully, until Viv brushed Gemma’s arm with her fingers and tilted her head to the left. They must have reached the drive to Nell’s cottage, and so far had seen no sign of either Grace or Bea.

  But when Gemma looked, she realized that they would have to move out into the open to reach the cottage itself. She tapped Viv, who was still wearing her kitchen whites, and mimed taking off the jacket. Viv slid out of it and tucked it into the bottom of the hedge.

  They kept to the grass, avoiding the crunch of the gravel in the drive. As they drew closer, there was no sign of light or movement in the cottage. Kincaid had just whispered that they should split up when Gemma saw it, a crouched shape moving around the corner of the cottage, then rising to try the door—a shape too large to be a child, the movement too furtive to be Grace. She clutched at her companions, but they’d seen it, too.

  Viv wrenched herself out of Gemma’s grasp and took off at a dead run, her trainer-shod feet only whispering on the springy grass. Too late, the shape rose and turned, and Gemma saw the pale moon of Bea Abbott’s face beneath her dark hair.

  Then Viv was on her in a rugby tackle. The impact took them both to the ground, then Viv was on top of Bea, punching and pummeling, while Bea twisted and kicked at her, grunting with the effort.

  Gemma reached them first, and between them she and Viv managed to get Bea facedown. Gemma slipped off her light anorak and, with Viv’s help, managed to tie Bea’s wrists together while Kincaid pinned her feet.

  Once secured, Bea twisted away from them until her back was against the cottage wall. “What is wrong with you?” she shouted at Viv. “Have you lost your mind?”

  “Where is she?” spat Viv, shining the torch in her face. “Where’s Grace?”

  Bea flinched away from the light. “I have no idea. Viv, listen to me—”

  “You killed them. You poisoned Fergus, didn’t you? I loved him,” Viv cried. “You knew I loved him and you—”

  “Don’t be stupid, Viv. Of course I didn’t—”

  “We found Mark Cain,” put in Kincaid, still panting. “He’s okay, no thanks to you, and he remembers what you did.”

  Bea went still. Her expression turned calculating. “So? It’s his word against mine.”

  “Grace saw you.” Dropping the torch, Viv grabbed her by the shoulders and started to shake her. “What have you done with Grace?”

  “Let me go!” Bea tried to scoot away from her grasp. “I’m telling you, I haven’t hurt Grace! Everything I did was for Grace! O’Reilly was going to ruin everything, don’t you know that? I only meant to make him sick.”

  “What did you give him, Bea?” Gemma asked quietly. “Did you put something in his coffee?”

  For a moment, Gemma thought Bea wasn’t
going to answer. But then she shrugged and said, “Diet pills. It was just a few of my mum’s old diet pills. I took too many once and they made me ill—that’s all I thought they would do to him. And then he’d go away—”

  Headlamps suddenly illuminated them as a car bumped down the drive, then another one behind it. Booth’s Volvo, Gemma realized, as he climbed out, and a panda car. Booth left the lights trained on them as he and two uniformed officers walked over. “Well, well, what have we here?” he said. “Miss Abbott. Where’s the child?”

  Bea glanced right and left, then blinked up at him, looking cornered. “I don’t know.”

  With a nod to the uniformed officers, Booth sent them to search round the cottage, but they came back shaking their heads. “No sign of the girl, sir,” said the female officer. “And both the cottage doors are locked. But we did find a Fiat pulled round behind the garage. The keys were in it. We checked the boot. Nothing there.”

  Gemma felt a wash of relief. That had been her worst fear, that they would find Grace stuffed in the boot of Bea’s car. But Bea had been searching, too, which meant that she might be telling the truth about not knowing where Grace was.

  But they still had a missing child.

  Kit had been uneasy ever since he’d told Gemma about the things Grace had said. He felt like he’d betrayed a confidence and he wasn’t sure he’d done the right thing, or what the consequences of it might be for Grace. To make matters worse, Gemma and his dad had now been gone for hours. Melody and Doug hadn’t come back, either.

  When he and Addie and the kids got back to the house after dropping Gemma at the pub, Joe had been waiting for Addie. They were closeted in her study for a long time. From Addie’s tight-lipped expression when Joe left, Kit gathered the meeting had not been a pleasant one.

  When dusk came on early and still no one had returned, he found Addie in the kitchen making the little ones their tea. “Is it okay if I walk down to the village?” he asked. “I need to talk to Gemma about something.”

  “I’ll run you down,” said Ivan, who had come in behind him. “I want to see what’s going on.”

  “Oh, cool,” Kit breathed as he climbed into the restored Land Rover, and he and Ivan talked cars on the short drive down the lane to Lower Slaughter. When they reached the pub, Kit saw immediately that Viv’s van was gone, which seemed odd. Why would she go somewhere during dinner service? Melody’s little blue Clio was in the car park, however, so he hoped that someone was there.

  Glancing in the kitchen as they went in, Kit saw Angelica, but not Viv. Ibby, however, was behind the bar, and Melody and Doug were huddled on the other side, all three of their heads together in what looked like a heated discussion. When they looked up, he saw a flare of hope in their expressions, then disappointment.

  “I’ve got to give Angie a hand,” Ibby said, and went into the kitchen.

  “What’s going on?” Kit asked, the feeling of dread growing. “Where is everyone?”

  “It’s Grace,” said Melody. Although there were punters in the dining rooms, there was no one else in the bar at the moment. Still, Melody lowered her voice. “Bea Abbott attacked Mark Cain and set his barn on fire. Apparently, Grace was there. She rang her mum but the call was cut off. They’ve caught Bea, but they still can’t find Grace.”

  “My mum and dad—are they okay?”

  Melody gave him a surprised look but said, “Yes, Gemma and your dad are fine. They’re with DI Booth and the police. So is Viv. I didn’t mean to frighten you.”

  “There’s rain coming,” put in Ivan. “Storms are building up again. What can we do to help?”

  “Did they check Nell’s cottage?” Kit asked before Melody could reply. “Grace might have gone there, if she was scared.”

  “That’s where they are now. And they’ve searched the farm. There’s no sign of her.”

  “The village?” Ivan asked.

  “We’ve looked,” said Doug. “Booth is organizing a search party. The girl just seems to have vanished into bloody thin air.”

  Kit’s mind raced. “Do they know exactly where she was when she rang Viv?”

  “No. She just said that Bea had hurt Mark, and that the barn was on fire. Then the call dropped. She—”

  “Wait,” broke in Melody. “There were dogs barking. I could hear them in the background. But they weren’t too close. So—”

  “I think I know.” Kit realized he was butting in, but he couldn’t help it. He was remembering the lane, and the bolt-hole under the gate into the pasture. And then the footpath that ran, dark and slippery, along the river. “Let me look.”

  “Can’t you just tell us?” asked Doug. “We can let the search party know—”

  “No. I need to do it,” Kit said, his urgency mounting.

  “We should check with your parents first,” said Melody. She and Doug exchanged a look Kit recognized. It didn’t mean that they thought he couldn’t find Grace—it meant they were afraid he’d find something bad if he did.

  Kit swallowed and used his most reasonable voice. “She could be hurt. And Ivan says there’s more rain coming.”

  “The lad’s right,” said Ivan. “I’ll go with him. I’ve got an emergency torch and supplies in the Land Rover. Tell me where we’re going, lad.”

  “Behind the inn. The footpath.”

  “Ah.” Ivan nodded. “That’ll be nasty enough in the dark, never mind the rain. Let’s get on with it, then.”

  “I’m coming with you,” said Doug, but Kit could tell he wasn’t thrilled.

  Melody nodded, however. “I’ll hold the fort here. Check in with me right away if you find her. Or any sign of her,” she added quietly to her dad.

  They went single file, Kit leading the way, Ivan bringing up the rear. They each had a torch, and Ivan carried an emergency pack. “Always good to be prepared when you live in the country, lad,” Ivan had said. He’d talked steadily to Kit as he prepared. Kit thought it was Ivan’s way of trying to keep him from worrying.

  The lights had been blazing in the manor house across the road as they entered the footpath, but after the first twist of the path they were plunged into a darkness that seemed absolute. The torches were necessary but disorienting. Kit found that if he didn’t hold his steady he felt woozy. The surface under their feet was slick with a coating of mud. And worse than mud.

  “Horse shit,” Doug muttered, and he wasn’t swearing. The pungent smell caught in Kit’s throat.

  “It’s a bridle path along this bit.” Ivan seemed unperturbed. “Grace!” he called out. His voice seemed to boom back and forth between the trees pressing in on either side. They all stopped, listening, but there was no answer.

  “The river goes under just here,” Kit said when they reached the little crossing. He was beginning to think he’d been wrong. But they had to go the whole way, in case Grace was somewhere between here and the pasture.

  Then, as they neared the spot where he and Grace had scrambled under the last fence and slid down the steep bank onto the path, he thought he saw something. “Grace!” He ran ahead, barely managing to keep his footing. “It’s her!”

  She might have been a bundle of rags, caught in the glare of the torch, and for a moment Kit’s heart nearly stopped. “Please,” he whispered. “Please be okay.”

  Then the bundle moved, resolving itself into Grace’s white T-shirt and dark jeans, with a flicker of safety yellow from the reflective bits on one of her trainers. The other shoe lay to the side of the path. She was huddled into the bank, but her sock-clad foot stuck out at a funny angle.

  “Mum?” she said groggily, squinting into the light.

  “No, it’s Kit, Grace.” He sank to his knees beside her. “We came to find you.” He swallowed hard, afraid he was going to cry like a bloody baby.

  Ivan knelt beside him. “Looks like you’ve hurt your ankle, love,” he said gently. “Can you stand?”

  Grace shook her head. “No. I slipped. My ankle—I was running. After I dropped my mobile
in the pasture, Bea—she was looking for me—” She pushed herself back into the bank, the whites of her eyes glinting in the torchlight.

  “Bea can’t hurt you, Grace. The police have her.”

  “But—” Grace seemed to have trouble taking it in. “But Mark—”

  “He’s fine, too. Don’t you worry. I reckon that you ringing your mum saved his life.”

  “Oh. I was so scared— I thought he was— I’m so cold . . .” Grace sighed, her eyelids drooping closed. Kit was afraid she’d fainted, but then he saw the tears on her cheeks. Kit’s face was damp, too, he realized, but not with tears this time. The rain had begun.

  “Let’s get you out of here, lass,” said Ivan, scooping her up in his arms as if she weighed no more than Charlotte.

  “I want to go home,” whispered Grace. “I want my mum.”

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  December 2007

  Blindly, she left the restaurant and turned towards the river. The Albert Bridge beckoned, its lights bright as a web of tiny stars against the hard winter sky. Her feet seemed to take her past the old gingerbread guardhouse and up the incline of the bridge of their own volition. She stopped at the apex, gripping the railing, looking down at the dark mass of the Thames swirling below.

  What was she going to do? Pregnant, jobless, her mother ill, her rent due on the first of the month. Terror made her heart pound painfully against the wall of her chest. Her head swimming, she gripped the railing tighter and tried to breathe, tried to look away from the water.

  “Excuse me, miss,” said a voice in her ear. Startled, Viv looked up. A man in a bulky overcoat stood beside her, his face creased with concern. “Are you all right?” he asked. “It’s just that you looked a bit . . . lost.”

  “No, I’m fine,” she said, when she could find her voice, and as she spoke she realized that she meant it.

  She was fine. She would be fine. She would manage somehow. She would make it all work.