Lost Summer

by Stuart Harrison

  He hesitated, but he didn’t see how he could refuse. She told him she’d be there as soon as she could.

  Adam sat on a rock out near the end of the promontory in a patch of late afternoon sunlight. Down below in the small crescent-shaped cove John Shields was talking to the police. The area had been cordoned off by a constable who’d run a police tape through the trees, though for now there was nobody else there. Janice climbed up to join him. When she got there she was breathless.

  ‘What did you find out?’ he asked.

  She pulled a face. ‘Not a lot. There’s no’ much they can do until the morning. They’re bringing divers in tomorrow.’

  ‘Did they tell you anything about what they found?’

  ‘Not really. That sergeant wouldnae let me near those fishermen.’ Down below Graham glanced up as if he’d heard her, though in reality he was too far away. Janice looked at Adam curiously. ‘Do you two know each other?’

  ‘Why do you ask?’

  ‘I get the impression he’s no’ exactly thrilled about you being here.’

  ‘I used to know him when I lived here.’

  ‘I take it you weren’t friends then?’

  ‘No, not really.’

  They sat in silence for a while, watching what was going on, though in fact there was nothing much happening. Adam was aware of the curious looks Janice gave him every now and then, and he could almost hear her thinking. Findlay had said that she was a good reporter, which he could believe. He’d often thought that women made better journalists than men. They were more attuned to the subtleties of human behaviour. He guessed that she’d sensed something underlying whatever Graham had said to her about him.

  He looked across the lake. The surface was still and dark. What secrets would be revealed in the morning he wondered? It wasn’t far from where he sat that David had shot him all those years ago. Everything had looked very different then, shrouded in snow, the lake all but invisible. But he was thinking of another occasion a year before that when he’d watched David standing on the narrow strip of beach where John Shields now stood talking to Graham. David had been about to throw something into the lake. Whatever it was had flashed in the sun when he drew back his arm, but then he’d hesitated and evidently changed his mind, because whatever it was in his hand he’d put back in his pocket.

  He came to, realizing that Janice had spoken to him. ‘Sorry, what did you say?’

  ‘I said I wonder how long it’s been in there. I mean how long does it take for a body to decompose to just bones?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘It must be years though. Especially in cold water. What do you think? Ten? Twenty maybe?’

  ‘Nearer twenty I’d say.’

  She looked at him strangely, perhaps struck by his tone.

  In his room at the New Inn Adam brooded on the events of the afternoon. He was thinking about Meg Coucesco, wondering how long it would be before somebody connected the find in the lake with a gypsy girl who went missing seventeen years earlier. There was nothing to say it was her, of course, but he didn’t think it was a sheep either, and how many people around here had vanished the way Meg had?

  Some intuition told him that it was her. In a curious way he wasn’t even surprised, rather he felt that the discovery had about it a kind of fatalistic inevitability. He had even been instrumental in it, since had he not told Shields where to fish the bone might never have been discovered.

  What he felt chiefly was a kind of numbed shock. Like somebody rudely jolted from their own self-deception. He supposed a part of him had always wanted to believe that she was alive, that she had simply run away. But deep down he’d known that wasn’t true. He’d been at war with his own conscience over the years, and the direction his career had taken had ultimately been an effort to make amends. Perhaps his obsession had also been about subconsciously destroying relationships with women whom he had chosen because they reminded him of Angela, but Meg and Angela were all part of the same mixture, all connected to him through David. He felt he was at the centre of a web of interconnected relationships and events, and that circumstances had brought him to this point, this place, for a reason. He didn’t know what had really happened to Meg, but had he spoken out about the things he’d seen, the truth would have come out. That much he was certain of.

  He stood up and paced the room. The broken glasses he’d found half-buried in the pine needles where Ben Pierce and his friends had been killed lay on top of the photograph Ben’s sister had given him. He picked them up and turned them over in his hand, the one remaining lens with its spidery cracks catching the light. When he’d found them he’d been struck by the notion that they were symbolic of a kind of vulnerability. He could feel the sharp ridge of glass from the cracked lens beneath his thumb. Ben and his friends were young when they died, as Meg had been when she vanished, and what was youth if not innocence, and what was innocence if not vulnerability? He felt as if Meg had risen from her watery resting place to remind him of an obligation he owed her. A debt he was being asked to fulfil dating from a long-lost summer of his youth.

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  Adam killed the engine and switched off the lights. He remained in the car for a while to allow his eyes to become accustomed to the darkness. He was parked on the grass verge beneath a tree through the branches of which a yellowing moon was occasionally visible between breaks in the clouds. When he got out a cold wind rattled the turning leaves. He shivered and pulled up his collar and started back towards the gate that barred the entrance to Nick’s yard. In one hand he carried a torch, and at his waist he’d tied two plastic bags containing several pounds of steak and sausages. The knife he’d used to cut the meat up, both of which he’d stolen from the kitchen of the New Inn, was tucked in his belt. As he walked along the edge of the chain-link fence that surrounded the yard the torch beam flashed on one of the signs warning intruders to beware of the dog. He touched the handle of the knife for reassurance.

  Through the gate he could make out dark stacks of rusting cars. There was no sound, other than a frog croaking somewhere nearby. He shook the gates so that the chain clanked, expecting at any second to hear the rush of paws across muddy ground as some half-starved and demented beast flew out of the darkness. However, there was nothing. He wasn’t sure if this was a good or a bad thing. Did it mean the dog, for whatever reason, wasn’t in there? Or worse, was it being cunning and even now was lying patiently in wait? Reluctantly he tucked the torch inside his jacket and started to climb.

  Getting over the gate wasn’t in itself a problem. He dropped the last couple of feet on the other side, taking care to favour his good leg and fall into a roll. Picking himself up he grabbed a chunk of meat with one hand and the knife with the other, his heart thumping as he searched the darkness. Twisted shapes rose from the ground and threw deep shadows where it would be easy for something to hide. The muddy avenues that led through the stacks of wrecks were black as pitch.

  Adam had a plan. It depended on his reasoning that a guard dog’s basic drive for food would override whatever training it had been subjected to. If it came after him he was going to keep it at bay with chunks of meat, at least temporarily. Somehow it had seemed like a better plan when he’d conceived it in his room.

  He whistled, a low beckoning note, though it took him a couple of attempts to actually produce a sound because his mouth was as dry as sand. If the dog came he wanted to be close to the gate when he tested his theory. His palms were sweating. Fear oozed from his skin in what he was sure must be a heady chemical brew. There was no sound, no response at all.

  ‘Here, boy,’ he croaked.

  His muscles began to cramp from the tension. There was no dog, he concluded. Perhaps the signs were a bluff. Perhaps Nick took it home at night.

  Even so, as he began to make his way towards the corner of the yard where the Vauxhall was, he paused every few steps to listen and look around. Once or twice when he thought he saw a movement he froze, but each time
nothing happened and he decided it must have been either a rat or else his mind playing tricks on him.

  When he reached the wreck he shone his torch inside. It looked the same as when he’d left it. The knife went back in his belt and then he climbed in and closed each of the car’s remaining three doors. They creaked loudly, sounding like a shriek in the stillness of the night. None of them had windows but at least he had the illusion of protection. Working by torchlight he squeezed his hand into the narrow space at the rear of the glove compartment until he felt something back there. As he had earlier that day he formed an impression of something damp and pliant. Gradually he worked his hand in far enough to get a grip on it. He tried not to think about the dog coming now, rushing out of the darkness while his hand was stuck fast.

  Getting it out again was painful. He scraped the flesh of his knuckles against the broken edges of a chunk of plastic inside, gritting his teeth as he slowly shredded his skin. His prize was a damp wad of papers, which in the light of the torch he could see were covered with writing, though the ink had run and it was mostly illegible. He folded them and tucked them in his pocket. Just then he heard a sound and froze.

  He strained to listen, his heart thudding, barely breathing. A gust of wind moaned softly through the abandoned wrecks as if they themselves were some hunched, stirring beast. Then it was silent. He began to breathe again, and reached for the door handle, and then he heard it again.

  This time he knew what it was. A low bubbling snarl getting rapidly closer. His heart leapt in his chest. He flicked the torch beam into the darkness between two piles of wrecks and glimpsed a blurred black-and-tan shape thirty feet away hurtling straight at him.

  ‘Shit.’

  Desperately, he grabbed for a piece of meat from one of the bags at his waist. At the same time he dropped the torch and scrabbled for the knife. He heard the sound of breaking glass and the light went out, but by the light of the moon he could still see the dog. It was almost on him. He registered a broad muscular chest and lips drawn back over yellowed teeth. It scared him half to death that it had moved so fast. Ten feet away it leapt towards the open window that framed Adam’s head. He reacted instinctively, propelling himself into the back seat with feet and hands like a terrified crab. He felt fur brush his hand as the animal’s front paws landed squarely inside the car and its head and shoulders filled the open space of the window. The snarling grew frenzied accompanied by the sound of claws scratching frantically against the side of the door. He heard his jeans rip and felt fangs rake his ankle, but he was moving fast, still scuttling backwards out of the missing rear door. The dog came after him through the window and lunged for his face, teeth bared, eyes maddened by rage, and then Adam was out and rolling to get to his feet. He was on his knees but the dog was already there. It burst from the door with terrifying speed. He felt its hot breath against his skin and instinctively raised an arm to protect his face. A scream formed in his throat as the dog slammed into him and the force of its momentum knocked him off balance. He sprawled on his back expecting the crunch of its jaws and agonizing pressure as teeth ripped through flesh and splintered bone.

  But suddenly the weight was gone. When he looked the dog had retreated a step or two and was wearing an almost comical expression of surprise.

  It shook its head and swallowed. A single hungry gulp. He realized then that it had inadvertently seized the chunk of steak he’d been holding rather than a piece of his face. The respite lasted about two seconds before the dog lowered its head and growled menacingly, its purpose in life recalled. It took a stealthy step towards him.

  Adam grabbed another piece of meat and tossed it a couple of feet away. ‘There, boy, go get it.’

  The animal hesitated, torn between its duty to rip out his throat and the lure of prime fillet. The fillet won. The dog sniffed it out and swallowed it.

  Shakily, Adam rose to his feet while the dog fixed him with a baleful glare and a low threatening rumble escaped its throat. He fed it another chunk, tossing it further into the darkness, and then another while he quickly checked himself over. He was relieved to find he’d suffered no more than a few scratches, though he’d lost his torch. Warily he edged his way around to the front of the car with the dog following, its eyes never leaving him and its growling growing louder.

  ‘Good boy. Want some more? Here you go.’ He threw another handful of meat and while it was occupied retrieved his torch, which turned out to be broken, and started back towards the gate.

  The dog followed, getting bolder and more threatening all the time as its stomach filled. Thirty yards from the gate the steak was gone and he was down to sausages. He fought the impulse to turn and run, and instead cut the bag free and heaved what was left as far away as he could.

  ‘There you ugly bastard, go and make yourself sick.’

  The dog stood its ground, seeming to sense this was its last chance to kill him. Its head twitched in the direction of the sausages but then it fixed its eye back on him, snarling, its legs quivering.

  ‘Fuck.’ Adam gripped the knife. His legs felt like jelly and his heart was pounding fit to burst.

  Then abruptly the dog fell quiet, its posture relaxed. Defeated, it cast him a final, almost reproachful look before it turned and trotted into the darkness. Adam turned and ran. He scrambled up the gate and quickly dropped over the other side where he collapsed on his hands and knees, shaking all over, and was violently ill.

  It was past midnight by the time he got back to his room. He felt drained. He took out the wad of papers he’d found in the wreck and put them on the bed. For this he had almost got himself killed.

  Though they were damp and the ink had run on all of them, he managed to separate them into three identifiably separate documents, two of which were clearly photocopies. The first was a copy of some kind of certificate that was too far gone for him to have any hope of deciphering. The other was made up of seven sheets, each covered with handwritten notes in the same left-sloping hand with tight loops and curls. Four of the sheets were almost completely illegible, and of the rest only the occasional phrase could be made out. For the time being Adam laid them against the heater to dry them out while he turned his attention to the final document.

  It was a single sheet. The weight and texture of the paper was different from the others. The ink had smeared in a haze of colours. Whereas the others were all black print on white, this one had red, green and blue at the top, all of which made him think that it was an original rather than a photocopy, and possibly a letterhead of some kind.

  He removed the shade from the lamp by his bed and examined it under the bare light bulb, and after a while he put it down and fetched a pen and on a separate piece of paper he tried to copy down letters that he could read, and so isolate them from the smudges and faded characters that only distracted him. When he was done he looked at the result and was certain that it was a letterhead. The first letter looked like an L, but the rest of the word he couldn’t make out at all, except for the final letter, of which only part was clear; a single horizontal line. The other words were the same, letters and parts of letters. He did his best to isolate each one. He thought there were two on the first line, the first with four letters, the second with five and possibly also beginning with L. The next line had four words, and then something beneath that in much smaller letters he couldn’t make out at all except that perhaps it ended in a set of numbers.

  A phone number, he wondered?

  He went to work on the second word at the top starting with L. It was L something and then D and then what looked like an O. The O was strange though. It seemed to be the wrong size. Not an O, part of another letter. P? No, that wasn’t right.

  ‘What is it?’ he murmured aloud.

  He put it down for a moment, and walked around the room before he went back to take another look. At first there was nothing, then it came to him. G. It was a G. LblankDGblank. It didn’t make sense. DG? And then suddenly it did make sense. He filled in the bla
nks. LODGE. He stared at the word he’d formed, his heart quickening.

  A lodge. Something Lodge. Where Ben and his friends had stayed for two nights after they left the camp the night it was attacked. He grabbed the phone book and flicked through the Yellow Pages. It had to be somewhere close, he thought, and probably somewhere inexpensive. He found it almost immediately.

  LAKE LODGE

  CAMPERS’ AND WALKERS’ ACCOMMODATION

  Peaceful Chalets with Views of Cold Tarn and the Fells

  Though it was late he picked up the phone and dialled the number in the advert. After a few rings an answering machine cut in and a voice informed him that the lodge was closed for the season and went on to give details of when it would reopen, but no other contact number.

  Adam hung up. A small map in the advert showed that the place was off the Geltsdale road high on the fells. He vaguely remembered a building visible from Cold Tarn, which had once been a hotel.

  It was almost three in the morning when he called Karen’s number in London. The phone rang endlessly, and then finally she answered, her voice heavily blurred with sleep.

  ‘What time is it?’

  ‘Late. Early. Sorry.’

  Suddenly she sounded more awake. ‘Adam? Is everything alright?’

  ‘I’m fine. I nearly got my leg chewed off earlier, but I’m okay.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘I’ ll tell you some other time. Listen, have you found Jane Hanson yet?’

  There was a pause. ‘Are you calling me at … what? Two a.m.? Jesus, Adam!’ He heard her take a deep breath. ‘No, I haven’t found her yet, but I will let you know when I do.’

  ‘I’m sorry, Karen.’ He passed a hand wearily through his hair. He shouldn’t have called, but he needed someone to talk to, and it was Karen he’d thought of. ‘Listen, go back to sleep, I’ll speak to you tomorrow.’

  ‘Great. Thanks for waking me, Adam.’

  He was perplexed at the edge of anger in her tone until he recalled the way she had practically hung up on him the last time they’d talked.