He indicated that I should pull over by the side of the road. I stared, appalled, at the oily black waters that heaved gently at their banks, as though they were breathing. Raindrops pockmarked the surface. A body could fall from this car and tumble carelessly into those waters, and they would swallow it up and spit out the bones. I felt sick with fear. If I did not act, it would paralyze me.
I reached for the door handle, but he slammed down the lock. He took my head in his hands and yanked my head around to look at him, but I could see only the dull glimmer of his eyes. His face his hair, everything that could have identified him to me was covered in a balaclava. The car was dark, but I could feel his eyes and the grip of his fingers. The rest of his body, seemed to have no shape to it, melting into the darkness.
“Who are you?” I tried again, forcing my voice out. “Why are you doing this?”
But he wasn’t listening. I allowed myself to follow his eyes, and hope sprang up inside me. In this deserted place a young couple were walking toward us, along the path next to the river. They were sheltering under an umbrella, holding hands, swinging their arms, deep in conversation—so deep in conversation that they might not see us. The man glanced up toward us. Time slowed. I felt my attacker’s hand slip from my head, saw the same hand move to the lock of the door, covering it. I sensed him shift slightly away from me, I perceived that the focus of his attention had also shifted to these outsiders. The man looked down again, said something to the woman. I heard a small sigh of satisfaction from behind me. The tip of the knife still scratched my side.
My mind did not race so much as scream toward escape. In desperation I rallied what was left of my courage and leaned forward, grinding my teeth against the stab of pain from the knife in my side as I moved, and I flicked on the lights inside the car. In the same movement, even as I felt his hand on my shoulder, pulling me back, I shook him off, reached out again, turned on the car radio and twisted the dial, and music rang out, distorted by the volume. I saw the heads of both the man and the woman jerk upward, frowning, mystified as my car turned into a mobile nightclub. He grabbed at me.
“Get out!” I screamed at him, tearing his hand from my shoulder. “Get out now!”
The couple were hurrying toward us. My attacker made a noise that was part hiss of fury, part sob of frustration. Then, suddenly, he opened the door and levered himself out and away, breaking into a run. Shaking, I reached out and switched off the radio.
The couple approached the car at a jog. I wound down the window, and they bent over to talk to me. Had I been hurt? Was everything all right? Did I want to call the police? I calmed my breathing, but still my heart was pounding and my hands were shaking. I told them I would call the police myself, thanked them for their concern. I should have told them they had saved my life. Uncertainly, they moved on, occasionally looking back at me over their shoulders.
I wound up the window and gazed into my rearview mirror. Might he come back? I was still shaking, but I could not stay here.
I drove slowly past the couple, raising a hand in thanks, my eyes raking the darkness at the side of the road for my attacker. But if he was there, I did not see him. I drove in circles, I think, for some time. My brain wasn’t working, and I didn’t know this part of west London. All I wanted was to find a place where there were people and lights. And on a night like this, it wasn’t going to be easy.
At last I saw a supermarket car park. It was busy, well lit, people coming and going. I parked in one of the families-only spaces nearest the entrance, nearest the lights and the people. Oh, how I loved those people. I watched them for a moment in the glow of neon, no children at this time of night, mostly young men in T-shirts, running in through the rain with their car keys and wallet in their hands, then emerging with a plastic bag of pizzas and beer, hurrying back to their cars, heads still dipped against the rain.
I lifted my shirt. My side was bloodied, and I dug around for a packet of tissues and dabbed, shakily, at the wound. There was no one deep cut, but a series of small punctures and one nasty gash that must have happened when I leaned forward.
I rummaged around on the floor in the back to find my mobile phone where it had landed. My attacker had turned it off. As soon as I turned it on, it started to ring, and the sudden noise made me jump.
I tried to calm my breathing. I nearly wept when I heard Sal’s voice.
“At last,” he said. “Everybody’s trying to get hold of you.”
I closed my eyes, trying to calm the panic. Who could I trust?
“Robin? Are you still there?”
I grunted into the phone.
“Jacqui called.”
“Did you tell her where I was?”
“She said you’d turned off your mobile, and asked how could she get hold of you, so I told her if it was urgent, she could try calling the switchboard at the hospital. I’ve been fielding calls all day. Next time you turn off your mobile, you get yourself a secretary. Fred Sevi was trying to reach you, too. To tell you not to use the interview he gave you.”
“And you told him the same thing?”
“Right. I told him the same thing I told Jacqui. And, let me see, I wrote it down, an Alice Jackson. She has something to tell you about Anita.”
“About Anita?”
“That’s what I said.”
Behind me, I saw a tall man in dark clothing emerge from the car parked behind me, his head lowered as he walked toward my car.
“Gotta go, Sal.” I ended the call, switched on the ignition, and backed out of the parking bay. As I pulled out and drove away, I saw a woman approach the man who had alarmed me with his dark clothing. She ran to catch up with him then slipped her hand into his, and they headed into the supermarket.
My mobile rang again. I pulled off to the side of the road and answered, expecting Finney.
“Robin Ballantyne?” a voice asked. I shook my head. The voice was familiar, but it took me a moment to place it. I’d heard this voice angry and threatening and distressed, but now it was unnaturally calm.
“Is this Mike Darling?”
“I have something to give you,” he said. “It’s about Melanie.”
“Where are you?”
“That doesn’t matter. Go to the warehouse. . . . We can meet there.”
“No way”—my voice matched his for icy calm—“if you’re innocent, show me. Go home.”
“Go home,” he repeated, his voice full of confusion.
“If you’ve got nothing to hide, go home,” I said again. And I severed the connection.
Chapter Twenty-eight
WHEN I got to Sydenham, the rain had turned into a thunderstorm, and the house was illuminated in all its decrepitude by lightning. I slowed as I drove past. There was no sign of Mike’s car. I parked farther on, in between two large vans, where I would be inconspicuous but still have a clear view of anyone arriving at the Darling house.
I rang Finney.
“Where are you?” He was annoyed, but I could hear the anxiety behind it. “I rang Jane, and she’s already back home; she said you’d left the hospital ages ago. I thought you’d vanished off the face of the earth.”
“I nearly did,” I said, and then I told him about the man who had waited for me in the car, and how he’d had me drive to the river, and how I believed my life had been saved by passersby. Finney swore softly as I spoke.
“Do you know who it was?”
This question, above all others, distressed me. That I had sat in this enclosed space and had my life threatened by a man I could not identify was simply something that my brain would not accept. My lips were shaking as I told Finney I didn’t know.
“Where are you now?”
I told him about the call from Mike.
“You wait for me, all right? You don’t set foot outside your car until I get there.”
I was in no condition to fight, and anyway as far as I could see Mike had not yet returned.
I sat and waited obediently, my side throbb
ing, and I watched the house. There was no movement.
My mobile rang, startling me again. My nerves were not in a good state. It was Jacqui, in tears.
“I’ve moved back with my friends. I’ve split up with Justin,” she told me between sobs. “I told him everything.”
“What everything?”
“About what his dad’s doing to Mum.”
I winced. “What happened?”
“He went ballistic.”
“I bet he did.”
“No, but you don’t understand.” Jacqui’s voice rose. ‘I’ve never seen him like that. He went mad. He was shouting and screaming and throwing things around. And I thought maybe the doctor was right when he said Justin’s psychotic.”
I shook my head. I was keeping my eye on the road, waiting for Mike and for Finney. I didn’t want to get embroiled in young love, or indeed in Jacqui’s fevered imagination, where Sheryl was a kidnapper, Kes was forcing sex on Anita, and now Justin was mad.
“He’s not psychotic.” I spelled it out, as if to a child. “Jacqui, he’s lost his leg. It’s going to take him years to get over it. I know you were trying to make everything all right for him, but it’s not that easy, he’s going to get angry sometimes.”
“I hate Mum,” she said, sobbing, “and I hate Kes. If it wasn’t for them, we’d be together.”
I heaved a breath. I couldn’t deal with this right now.
“Jacqui,” I told her, “go and have a drink with your friends, and then sleep on it. I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”
I ended the call. It had started to rain again. The drops splashed onto my windshield. In my wing mirror I could see Mike’s car driving slowly up to the house. He parked in the driveway. After a moment, he stepped down from the driver’s seat into the rain and walked around the side of the house, presumably to the glass door at the back. I expected the intruder light to come on as he approached the house, but it didn’t. Even that halfhearted attempt at security, it seemed, had fallen into disuse.
“So where the hell is Christopher?” I muttered.
For all my good intentions, I could not wait for Finney. I opened the car door and stepped out into the rain, following where Mike had gone, around the side of the house toward the back door.
Mike has not closed the door behind him, but I hang back. I watch as Mike flicks a switch and Anita’s bedroom is bathed in light. I see Mike’s face, hear his roar of anguish even before I take in what he has seen—Anita and Kes naked on the bed. Kes leaping up, leaving Anita cowering against the headboard, pulling the sheets to cover herself. Kes twists away from Mike and launches himself toward the glass door where I am standing. The two men hurtle out, and I step backward, but not fast enough. Kes blunders into me, and we fall against the pile of bricks. I try to pull myself up and away from him, but he grabs my hair and then wrenches my arm behind me so that I cry out in pain. He holds me in a lock against him, then stretches behind him and picks up a brick, which he holds poised above my head.
Mike is only steps away from us. Fury is written all over his face, but he cannot launch himself at Kes because his friend holds me hostage.
“I lied for you,” Mike snarls.
I see his eyes flicker beyond me, to something or someone behind me, and all at once I am knocked to the floor, and Kes’s legs are knocked from under him, and Mike lunges forward to get at Kes, and as I raise my head from the ground, all I see are bodies tangled and a naked arm lifting a brick to smash it down on Finney’s chest. Finney, I think in that instant, who I have dragged into this.
I leap to my feet and shout and run to Finney as the brick rises and crashes down again. The garden fills with people, many of them uniformed. Kes is being grappled away from Mike and Finney. Finney rolls away. He pulls himself onto his elbow, spits blood into the grass, and then collapses. I kneel beside him.
Behind me, Mike and Kes are locked in a fight that is more violent than anything I have ever seen. As police officers tear them apart, Mike has seized his friend’s head and is bashing it against the brick that Kes held against my head and that he used on Finney. By the time Mike is pulled away from him, Kes is lying still, his face covered in blood, the back of his head a mass of battered, torn flesh and hair and blood. His eyes are open, fixed on Mike. His lips seem to move, and Mike howls something unintelligible and strains back toward the naked body on the ground, but the police officers who have hold of him drag him away. Now Kes lies completely still. His mouth has fallen open.
Moments later, as Finney and Kes are loaded into the ambulance, I glance back and see Mike standing, handcuffed, flanked by police officers, and Anita kneeling at his feet, sobbing and begging for forgiveness. He stares down as though he does not know her.
Chapter Twenty-nine
I WAITED outside the operating theater. At one point a nurse came out, peeling off blood-covered gloves, and I begged for news.
“He picked the wrong men to scrap with,” he said, and hurried off.
After I had been sitting there waiting forever, Veronica Mann arrived and came to sit beside me, patting my knee.
“Do you want news, or do you want to be left to worry?”
I looked at her. “I always want news,” I said tightly. “I want to know where Christopher is.”
“He’s safe with Mike’s friends in Carlisle,” Veronica said. “We’ve sent people to check. He’s fine.”
“And I want to know what happened to Melanie.”
“I could lose my job for this,” Veronica said. She took a buff envelope from her bag and put it on my lap. “But I want you to read it. It’s a statement Mike prepared before he came back tonight. That’s why he wanted to see you. He was going to give you this and then give himself up. You have to remember he wrote it before he found Kes in bed with Anita.”
Veronica ran her tongue over her lip. She glanced up as Sheryl walked uncertainly into the waiting room. “Perhaps you could read it somewhere a little more private.”
I nodded, and Veronica rubbed me on the shoulder and told me she had to go, she was absent without leave.
Sheryl sat down opposite, pulling her jacket around her defensively. Her face was bare of makeup, and she looked more vulnerable, younger.
“How is Kes doing?” I forced myself to ask.
She frowned at me as though she couldn’t place me.
“I don’t know.” Then she added, with great precision and even more bitterness, “I decided some years ago that it was better not to know how Kes is doing, or what he’s doing. Or who.”
“You were out this evening,” I said.
She nodded, face set. “I was at the pub with Ronald.”
For a moment neither of us spoke. I wanted her to go away so that I could concentrate on Finney. I did not want to hear about Kes, I did not want to hear about her.
“I have known Ronald for less than a year,” Sheryl continued, her voice gathering in anger, “but he is more of a friend than Kes has ever been. And that little bitch Jacqui and her silly accusations—”
I interrupted her impatiently. “You must have known about Anita and Kes.”
“I was out at Ronald’s, often, in the evening.”
“You knew. Jacqui told me. I didn’t believe her, but I do now.”
“All right, say, just say, that I knew”—Sheryl was annoyed at me, and her voice quickened—“or that I suspected. What could I have done about it? Men don’t change. I knew what I was getting when I married Kes. He needed someone to look after Justin while he was away, and I thought that at least I’d have companionship sometimes, when he was in the country. But he doesn’t notice me anymore, just my friends. Why do you think I want Ronald as my friend? Because he’s a man, so Kes can’t have him. What Kes did to Anita, it wasn’t the first time. I’ve watched him do it again and again and again. . . .”
She crumpled, and as her shoulders heaved I realized she was sobbing.
I went over to sit next to her. She had tried to do things for the best. But I felt so s
ick with worry for Finney that I had no sympathy to give her.
“Why don’t you ring Ronald and ask him to come and sit with you,” I suggested. She nodded, and after a moment she went to find a telephone.
I unsealed the envelope, glanced at the document inside, then let it fall to my lap. What would I do if Finney died? How would I bear it? I had been so very lucky to find him. Why had I dragged him into this? I forced myself to start reading. The first section of Mike’s statement repeated things that I already knew: that he had known Kes for twenty years, that they had fought together and saved each other’s skins more times than they could count. That three years before, Melanie and Edwin had come upon Mike’s patrol, the vehicle bogged down in potholed terrain off the road. It was then that the SAS patrol, as well as Melanie and Edwin, had come under rocket-propelled grenade fire from Taliban forces on a ridge above them and that the SAS had responded with the vehicle-mounted GP machine gun and a 40 mm grenade launcher.
It was then, of course, that Edwin had taken his photograph of Mike firing above the low wall and Melanie lying in the ditch by his side. The Taliban withdrew, and Mike’s patrol moved rapidly on, reluctantly but chivalrously allowing Melanie to hitch a ride with the proviso that she be dumped at the earliest relatively safe opportunity.
We pressed ahead with a reconnaissance patrol in a small settlement to our east. Our instructions were to make contact with a man who would introduce us to the local warlord, who was reportedly willing to work with our forces. We proceeded to this settlement successfully and waited until dark, then proceeded according to Kes’s navigational instructions.
Kes objected to Melanie accompanying us, but at this point she had nowhere to go, and no transport, and we were in hostile territory. Like us, she disguised herself in local clothing. She carried a small handheld camera, and she was instructed to hide this under her clothing as we made our way into the town. I know she filmed us as we prepared for the mission—she undertook to disguise our faces if she ever used the film—but after that the rules were that she would be allowed to film only on our specific instruction.
Out of Mind Page 26
