by Camilla Way
There was one incident that has always stuck with me. When she was twelve, a new neighbor popped round to introduce herself. She came in and I made us both a cup of tea. I remember feeling so pleased, because the rest of the villagers ignored us, more or less. When she left, I said good-bye to her at the door and turned to find Hannah standing on the stairs, watching us. When she saw me notice her, she continued to the kitchen to get herself a glass of milk. I thought nothing of it at the time, but later that day while I was in my room, I heard the sound of her voice.
When I went to investigate, I looked through the crack of her door to see her standing in front of her mirror, talking to herself. “Good-bye, now, Carol, so nice of you to call round,” she said. It was exactly what I’d said to the neighbor a few hours before. She practiced it over and over until she had the intonation, the inflection, just right. “Good-bye, now, Carol, so nice of you to call round!” She copied the exact way I’d smiled, the little wave I’d given. It made the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end.
Did I know what she was back then? Could I have stopped her? Years later, of course, at Hannah’s trial, they had no hesitation in using the term I couldn’t bring myself to say out loud. Sociopath. That’s what their expert witness called her, that beautiful summer’s day, the afternoon light pooling through the small, rather dingy windows, while she stood in the dock awaiting sentencing. But when she was still a young child, I prayed that I was wrong about her; that she’d grow out of her problems, that it would somehow all go away. And for those five years she behaved herself. She kept out of trouble. I suppose I allowed myself to hope that it would all somehow be okay.
SIXTEEN
LONDON, 2017
Turning the corner into Great Eastern Street, Clara saw the Octopus Bar ahead of her and slowed her pace, suddenly gripped with nerves. Perhaps Mac had been right: perhaps she was crazy to do this alone. “What if it’s the nutcase who’s been stalking Luke?” he’d pleaded. “It’s too risky. Let me go, please, Clara. Let me go instead just to make sure.”
But she’d brushed away his concerns, her gut telling her that Emily was who she said she was, that meeting her today would be the first step to reuniting Rose and Oliver with their daughter, a thought too exciting to risk by going back on the promise she’d made. “I said I’d go alone,” she’d told Mac stubbornly, “so that’s what I’m going to do.” Besides, the person who’d sent the messages had known about the song Luke and Emily had sung at bedtime and about the T. S. Eliot book. It had to be her. So she’d left Mac waiting at his flat, beside himself with worry, promising she’d call him as soon as she could.
Clara paused a few meters from the bar now and pretended to check her phone before glancing up and down the street. It was ten to six, the pavements fairly busy with office and shop workers beginning their journeys home. She felt a stab of fear now that she was so close and for a moment contemplated turning back round again. Just then, a burst of evening sunlight penetrated the clouds, and the passersby lifted pleased, surprised faces to the sky. Surely nothing bad could happen here, in such a public place?
Encouraged, she walked on and when she entered the bar, she was relieved to see that at least half the tables were already taken. There was a low buzz of music and conversation in the air, and the barman smiled cheerfully at her as she approached. Her body tensed with anticipation and nerves, she scanned the room. There were no lone drinkers, male or female, and she relaxed a little, glad that out of the two of them it was she who had arrived first.
When she’d bought her drink, she chose a seat that gave her a good view of the street—close enough to the large plate glass window to be able to see people as they approached. The minutes passed slowly. Six o’clock became six fifteen, then twenty past. Restlessly she glanced around. It was a nice place, simply decked out without any of the self-consciously hip touches so many bars in the area were afflicted by: no ironic taxidermy on the wall, no neon flamingos, or jam jars used as cocktail glasses. Just an ordinary bar with an unpretentious, after-work crowd. She settled back into her seat and continued to wait, her eyes fixed on the door.
It was quarter to seven before she finally admitted to herself she’d been stood up. The disappointment crushed her. She realized at that moment that the biting anxiety she’d felt since Luke disappeared had been temporarily lifted a little by the prospect of finally meeting Emily, and it was only now, as she slowly and despondently began to gather her coat and bag, that she realized how desperately she’d wanted it to be true. The despair she’d been feeling since the day Luke had gone missing returned now with renewed strength; everything seemed entirely hopeless once more.
Just then, the sound of smashing glass turned her attention to the bar, where she saw the guy who’d served her earlier looking down at a dropped tray. He grinned ruefully at her when their eyes met, and she smiled her sympathy back. When she turned back to her table, it was to find a woman standing in front of her and she jumped in surprise.
“Clara?” the woman said, and then, with a quick, tentative smile, added, “It is you, isn’t it?”
The stranger was so unmistakably Luke’s sister that at first Clara could only stare at her in stunned silence. She was slim and slightly younger looking than her thirty-seven years, strikingly attractive, and dressed in a simple T-shirt and jeans. Her hair, thick and dark like her brother’s, framed a finely featured face that had large brown eyes the replica of Luke’s. Even their mouths, with their wide, full lips, were identical. “Oh,” said Clara, jumping to her feet, “oh my goodness, it’s you, isn’t it, it’s really you!” She wanted to hug Emily, but she seemed so nervous, as though she might bolt at any moment, that she just stood, drinking her in.
When they’d sat down, Clara gave a shaky laugh. “I thought you weren’t coming.”
Emily’s voice was low and soft, with the same gentle middle-class Suffolk accent as her brother’s. “I’m sorry I’m late,” she said, before adding anxiously, “You didn’t tell my parents you were meeting me?”
Clara shook her head. “No.”
“You told no one? Are you sure?”
For a split second Mac’s face flashed into her mind, but before she could even process the thought, she heard herself say, “No. I promise. I didn’t tell a soul.”
At this, Emily relaxed a fraction, though she continued to scan the room with quick nervous glances.
What was she so scared of? Clara wondered, because there was no doubt about it: Emily certainly seemed afraid of something. She was like a tightly wound spring, as though at any moment she might jump out of her chair and run off into the night. “Would you like a drink?” Clara asked, the normalcy of the question sounding utterly surreal in the circumstances.
“No. No, thank you, I’m afraid I can’t stay long.” She tucked her hair behind her ears and the smile that flickered across her lips was one of such sweetness that Clara smiled back.
“I’m so glad you came,” she said.
“When I saw you on the news, I couldn’t believe it . . . that it was my brother you were talking about.” Emily shook her head in wonder. “When they showed his picture . . . Seeing him again after all these years, all grown up . . .” Her eyes swam, and instinctively Clara reached over and put a hand on hers. “I’ve missed out on most of his life. He was ten years old when I last saw him and I’ve thought about him every single day since. When I saw you, I just couldn’t . . . I couldn’t not contact you.”
Clara was about to reply when Emily leaned down and pulled something from her bag. “I have something to show you,” she said, handing her a small, creased photograph.
Clara gazed at the faded picture in amazement. It was of Luke aged about four, wearing stripy pajamas and a huge toothy grin. Behind him stood Emily, a gangly, pretty girl of around twelve, her arms wrapped tightly around her brother’s shoulders, her smile a replica of his. In the background was the living room of t
he Willows, its walls painted an unfamiliar green.
“Oh my goodness,” Clara murmured.
“I carry it with me everywhere,” Emily said. “And this one too.” She passed her a second picture, which showed herself aged about fourteen or so and standing between a smiling, much younger-looking Rose and Oliver in the back garden of the Willows, both of them with a glass of champagne in their hands. They looked so relaxed and happy, Clara thought, such a stark contrast to how battered by grief and worry they were now. “How are they?” Emily asked. “How are Mum and Dad?”
There was such anguish in her face that Clara felt her throat thicken with sympathy. She paused, searching for the right words. “They’re not good, Emily,” she finally admitted. “Luke’s disappearance . . .”
Emily looked so sad that Clara couldn’t help herself any longer. “Emily, what happened to you? Where have you been all this time? What happened when you were eighteen?”
But it was as if the shutters slammed down in her eyes and she looked away.
Into the tense silence Clara said miserably, “I’m sorry. I don’t want to push you. It’s just . . . your mum and dad, it would make them so happy to know that you’re okay. Can I just tell them that I’ve seen you, that you’re alive and well? It would—”
“No!” A group of people sitting at the next table glanced over at them in surprise, and Emily stared down at her hands for a while. When finally she spoke again, her voice was very quiet. “I hope, very soon, that I’ll be able to go home. When all this is over, when we’ve found Luke, I will go back to my parents. But you must let me do that myself. I don’t want someone else to break the news to them, to fill them with hope when I don’t know how long it will be before I can go back to them.”
“But—”
Emily leaned forward, gazing at her urgently. “It wouldn’t be safe, for my parents, or for me, if I return home now. You just have to trust me, Clara. But I will go to them. When they’ve found Luke, I will go home. I need a little more time, that’s all.”
Clara searched Emily’s face. “What do you mean,” she said, “that it wouldn’t be safe? What are you frightened of? If you’re in danger, you must—”
“Clara,” Emily cut her off. “I can’t talk about it. If you can’t promise me that you won’t tell them, then I’ll have to leave.” She half rose from her seat and Clara put her hand out to stop her.
“No, please stay, please. I promise. I . . .” She trailed off uncertainly. It didn’t make any sense, and she didn’t know if she could bear to keep something so huge from the two people she loved so dearly. But it was clear that Emily wasn’t going to explain herself now. Finally, she said, “Do you promise you will go to them, when Luke’s found?”
Emily nodded. “I promise, Clara. All the attention should be on him now, on finding him. There’s nothing I want more than to see them again. I’m just asking you to keep this secret for a little while longer.”
And what if we don’t find Luke? The unwelcome thought snaked its way through Clara’s mind and with effort she pushed it away. Reluctantly she nodded. “Okay.”
A man by the bar went over to the jukebox, and within moments the soulful strains of a Joan Armatrading song filled the room.
“What are they like now,” Emily asked then, “my mum and dad? I’ve tried so hard to imagine them over the years, to picture them as time passed, but it’s so difficult after so long.”
Clara stared down at her drink for a moment as she thought how to answer. “Before Luke went missing, they were . . . happy, in a way, I guess. But you must know that they never got over you leaving. How could they? They don’t talk about you because it’s too painful, but I know that they think of you every day.”
“I had to go,” Emily said, her voice so low now that Clara had to strain to hear her. “I had no choice.”
Clara nodded, desperate for an explanation but knowing better than to push for it again, and, her gaze falling to the photos in her hand, asked, “Don’t you have one of Tom?”
“No,” she replied. “No, I don’t have a picture of Tom.” And there was something in her tone that made Clara stare at her in surprise, but before she could speak, Emily asked quietly, “Do you see him ever?”
“No—that is, only now and then. He lives in Norwich, so . . . but, um, he’s well, I think. I mean he seems quite well. Desperately worried for Luke too, of course, but . . .”
The barman came over at that moment and wiped down their table, and they waited until he’d finished. “Tell me about Luke,” Emily asked when he’d gone. “Have the police any idea what happened to him? Is there any news at all?”
Slowly, while the bar filled up around them, Clara told her everything that had happened since Luke’s disappearance: the threatening e-mails she’d found, the break-ins, the police inquiry, which had so far come to nothing. “Mac—that’s Luke’s friend—and I have decided to try to find out who it might be who hates Luke enough to do all these things,” Clara told her, describing their visit to Amy and the list of women they had yet to see.
Emily listened to her with rapt attention and, when she’d finished, gave Clara a sad smile. “I could tell, when I saw you on the news, how much you love my brother. And I bet he loves you too. I bet he loves you so much.”
An unwelcome picture of Sadie’s face flashed before Clara’s eyes, but she pushed it away. “I just wish I knew what had happened to him,” she said. “To just vanish into thin air . . . it’s . . .” She shook her head.
“It must be so hard for you.”
They were silent for a moment; then Emily asked, “You were talking about my parents. Be honest with me. Are they coping, do you think?”
Clara considered this. “They’re strong people, and they’re trying to stay positive, but yes, they’re deeply upset. I don’t think they’re sleeping or eating properly, and I have to admit I’m worried for them.”
Emily nodded, and after a moment Clara said cautiously, “I’m sorry, but I have to ask because it might help us find Luke. I can’t help thinking . . . it’s such a coincidence that first you disappeared, and now Luke too. . . . I thought maybe the two might be linked. They’re not, though, are they? I mean, they can’t possibly be . . . ?”
Emily’s gaze held Clara’s for a beat or two, her expression unreadable. Finally she said, “Is that what my parents think too?”
Clara shook her head in surprise. “I don’t know.”
Emily looked away. “No,” she said. “They aren’t linked.”
Just then, a group of men in business suits came through the door on a wave of noise and cold air. It was dark in the street now. The lights inside the bar burned brighter, the atmosphere deepening into something more raucous and drunken. Emily glanced nervously around her. “I have to go,” she said. “I’ve stayed too long. I have to get back. . . .”
“So soon?” Clara asked in dismay.
“I’m sorry.” Emily got up. “I have a very long journey.”
“But where are you going back to?” Clara asked desperately, getting to her feet too. “Where do you live?”
She turned away without answering, and Clara picked up her things and hurried after her into the street. They stopped and regarded each other. “I’d like to meet you again—if you want to?” Emily said.
“Yes,” said Clara eagerly. “Yes, please. You can message me anytime.”
At this, Emily reached over and surprised her by taking both her hands in hers. “Clara, I can trust you, can’t I?” she said. “When I saw you on the news, I felt that I could trust you. I wasn’t wrong, was I?”
She shook her head, unable to look away from Emily’s gaze, its quiet intensity reminding her suddenly so much of Tom. “No,” she said, “you weren’t wrong.” Then, as she watched, Emily pulled her hood up so that it half obscured her face. “I better go,” she said, shooting quick, tense glances
at passersby. “I’ll be in touch.” And without another word she set off, slipping away through the crowd. Clara watched her go, adrenaline shooting through her now that their meeting was over. But then something strange caught her eye. Just before she lost sight of Emily completely, Clara saw, or thought she saw, someone who looked very much like Mac. He was walking just behind Emily—in fact, as Clara strained to see, it almost looked as though the two were in step, as if, in fact, they were walking side by side. A moment later they turned off down a side street and disappeared, swallowed by the London night.
She stood staring after them in confusion. Surely it couldn’t have been Mac? That made no sense at all. At last she turned away and, finding her phone, clicked through her contacts until she found his number. But when she rang, it went straight to voice mail. She listened to the answerphone message in surprise. He’d said he’d be waiting for her to call, desperate to hear how it went. Why, then, was he not picking up? Eventually she put her phone back in her bag and began walking back toward the tube. It can’t have been Mac, she decided finally. It was pretty dark and the street had been crowded; she must have been mistaken. She’d go straight to his place now and then she’d know it hadn’t been him.
Now that she was away from Emily, her anxiety at keeping something so momentous from Rose and Oliver returned. Could she really do it? What had Emily meant when she said it would be dangerous for her to go back to them? It made no sense. Guilt nagged at her. But perhaps Emily was right that everyone’s focus needed to be on Luke now, and it was true it wasn’t Clara’s place to break the news to Rose and Oliver if Emily wanted to do it herself. Plus, Emily had promised she’d go to her parents as soon as Luke was found. It was so hard to know what to do for the best, but finally she came to a decision. She would give Emily a week. Whatever happened in that week—and she hoped to God they would find Luke—she would tell Rose and Oliver herself if it looked like Emily wouldn’t. Besides, the last thing she wanted was to give Rose and Oliver false hope, tell them she had found their long-lost daughter only for her to disappear off the face of the earth again—that surely would be too heartbreaking for them. No, she would keep quiet for now. Hopefully she’d see Emily again soon and be able to unravel a little more of the mystery then.
