by Clare Chase
I pushed the door shut again. ‘I’ve been feeling restless,’ I said. ‘I thought I might get out of London for the day. Just to give myself some space.’
She pushed her hair back from her sleep-crumpled face and looked at me. ‘That actually sounds like a really good idea. You’ve been under a lot of strain recently.’ I saw her glance at the map in my hand. ‘Oh God,’ she said. ‘Penrith and Keswick? Anna, that’s a heck of a day trip.’
‘I thought I might even take tomorrow off work,’ I said, ‘if I feel like staying up there. And I used to go to the Lakes when I was a child, Sally. It’s not just the place where Julia died.’
Obviously, I knew my lie was blatant. As I packed my belongings into the boot of my Mini I wondered why I’d even tried to pretend. What made me more depressed was that Sally hadn’t attempted to prise the truth out of me either. She knew damn well what I was up to and had probably lost patience with trying to make me see sense.
As I drove through London the worry stayed with me, and only when I got onto the M1 did I finally start focusing on what lay ahead, rather than what I’d left behind.
I was supposed to be able to investigate things; that was all part of what I’d trained for as a journalist. Now it was time to put my skills to something more useful than finding out the favourite underwear of up-and-coming artists.
I put Arcade Fire on the CD player and drove on towards Birmingham.
By eight-thirty I was already desperate for a break and breakfast, and I was still less than halfway there. I stopped at a services. The weather had turned even as I reached the outskirts of London and it was spitting with rain when I dashed indoors from my car.
I went into the cafe and sat there, stoking up on caffeine. I would need to go to Derwentwater first and try to find someone who knew Toby. If he was still around. Of course he might be anywhere by now. It was fourteen years since he’d helped Jez fall off a boat. And it wasn’t as though it was the best time of year to look for leads. I imagined a lot of the outdoor pursuit centres would be shut up for the winter. Suddenly I felt very tired. The whole venture was crazy.
By eleven o’clock I was nearing the end of my route. You’d never have guessed it was still morning. The sky was dark, thanks to the weather, which had got much worse as the journey wore on. Driving rain lashed my windscreen and even with the wipers going full pelt it was only just sufficient to clear my view.
Mountains rose up on either side of me: the Lake District to my west and the Yorkshire Dales to my east. The motorway sliced through the prehistoric setting, presenting a bizarre mixture of speed and stillness. I was conscious of the massive bulk of rock. Unlike London where the city danced to the tune of its inhabitants, the people in the Lakes had to work their way round the landscape, threading through corridors etched by the forces of nature.
I turned off at Penrith, and as I neared Keswick the great masses of Blencathra and Skiddaw sat on my right. The fact that they were masked by a thick layer of cloud did nothing to diminish their awe-inspiring presence.
I made for Lakeside at first. I remembered there had been a boat company operating a ferry service there, and I thought they might know where to find Toby. I parked outside the Theatre by the Lake and walked on down the lane that led to the waterfront, pulling my hood up to fend off the wind and rain. There were very few people around, but the ticket hut for the Keswick Launch was open.
‘I’m sorry,’ I said to the man on duty, ‘I don’t really think I’m in the right place. I wanted to find out about sailing tuition.’
He shuddered. ‘At this time of year?’
I shook my head. ‘I’m just here for the weekend, but I was planning to come back in the summer and learn. A friend of mine had lessons on Derwentwater from a guy named Toby, but I couldn’t remember his surname.’
‘He’d most likely be based over in Portinscale,’ the man said. ‘Follow the main road and try at Nichol End Marine.’
I found the place all right, at the end of a long track leading towards the Lake. There was no one about when I walked in, but I could hear voices from the basement and followed some stairs down to find myself in a cosy cafe with deep red walls. The smell of carrot soup and freshly baked bread made my stomach rumble. Suddenly, I felt getting warm, and fed, and travelling home again was probably the best I could hope for. I’d driven a very long way on a whim.
A boy I guessed to be in his mid-teens grinned at me from behind the counter. ‘Didn’t expect to see anyone else in here today. Sorry there was no one upstairs; we’re a bit short handed. Did you want to hire a boat?’
I shook my head. ‘Just some soup and a roll thanks.’
‘Fair enough.’
‘I might want sailing lessons next summer though,’ I said, ploughing on with my preferred backstory. I told him I’d heard a man called Toby was a good instructor.
‘Toby?’ he said. ‘Don’t recognise that name I’m afraid.’
‘He may not even be teaching any more,’ I said. Might be in New Zealand or the Outer Hebrides for all I knew, but I decided not to admit that.
‘Dad?’ The boy called out over his shoulder, into a back room, somewhere behind him. ‘Heard of someone called Toby, teaching sailing on the lake?’
‘Toby?’ A man in a navy sweater and jeans, his face outdoor lined, appeared behind the boy. ‘Name does ring a bell actually.’ He rubbed a stubbly chin and grinned. ‘Might be one of our rivals. No wait, I’ve got it. There’s a guy called Toby does outward bound stuff for schools out Lodore way. Not sailing, but raft making, things like that. He probably sails too though. If he has his own boat he might do lessons for people who want them. Then again,’ he said, ‘it might not be the same bloke.’
‘It could be worth a try,’ I said.
‘Not many Tobys that I know of, at any rate,’ the man said. ‘I’m just trying to think of his surname …’
His son handed me my soup and bread, and I paid up.
‘You tuck in,’ his father said. ‘Leave it with me.’
I went and sat at a table next to the window and stared out at Derwentwater. A handful of boats scudded past, leaning at precarious angles.
I was halfway down my bowl when the man in the navy sweater came over.
‘Got it,’ he said, tapping the side of his head. ‘Toby Mason. Don’t know his number I’m afraid, but Dan’s back in the shop now and he’s shared a pint with him in the past. Lives in Thorneygarth apparently.’ He picked up the map I’d put down on the table and unfolded it to show me.
‘It looks like a tiny place,’ I said.
He nodded. ‘As remote as it gets. There’s only a farm there, and a couple of cottages. They get cut off for weeks in winter sometimes. The road’s narrow and steep, so watch yourself.’
Back in my car I looked again at the route to Thorneygarth. Suddenly, driving over the fells in the rain to a remote cottage belonging to someone I’d never met didn’t appeal. The guy was probably some other Toby altogether. But then again it would be crazy not to investigate now, after coming all this way.
If Darrick had found out about him late afternoon yesterday he would hopefully have had time to contact him by now, so I should be able to go and quiz him in peace. I put my key in the ignition and then paused again. Oh God. What was I doing? He’d probably call the police or get his farmer neighbour to come and see me off. But I wasn’t going to back out now. And if it all came to nothing and it was the wrong Toby, or I couldn’t get anything out of him, I would be tired for work the following day, but that was the worst that would come of it.
I wouldn’t have enjoyed the road to Thorneygarth on a bright summer’s day. In this weather it was horrible. It was now well on the way to becoming dark and the road was so narrow I had to reverse each time I met something coming the other way. In some places the lane descended sharply on one side to a river valley below. Inaccuracy was not an option. I wove my way carefully past streams and ditches and hoped the car had what it took to cope with the steep
ness of the roads. At last I came to the hamlet.
As the guy at the cafe had said, there was only the farmhouse – a long walk down a muddy track – and two cottages. I didn’t see how Toby could be a farmer as well as an outdoor pursuits professional, so I tried one of the cottages first. The windows were dark and, although there was a car in the driveway, I was sure the owner was out. I walked a hundred metres or so up the lane to the other, where I could see a woman with a baby through the window.
I knocked. The woman looked up and the baby started to cry. In the end it was a man who came to the door.
‘I’m so sorry to bother you,’ I said. ‘I was looking for Toby Mason, but I wasn’t sure which of the two cottages he lived at.’
The man’s expression changed suddenly. ‘You’re a friend of his?’
I shook my head. ‘Someone said he organised outdoor pursuits and sailing and things like that. I’m only here for the weekend but I wanted to ask him about booking something up for the summer.’
The woman had appeared in the hall behind the man now, the baby on her hip. ‘She’s after Toby?’ she said, her eyes wide, face pale.
The man nodded.
I felt my insides go cold. ‘What is it?’
The woman had tears in her eyes. ‘They’d … someone had …’ She didn’t manage to go on.
‘Go back through, Tina,’ the man said, waving her towards the living room door. ‘Put Mary in her bouncer and stick the kettle on.’ He turned back to me. ‘He was found dead, out in the lane, early this morning. He’d been strangled.’
Chapter Forty-One
‘It looks as though someone had caught him from behind and put a cord round his neck,’ Toby Mason’s neighbour went on. ‘My sister’s husband’s in the local police and he says they reckon someone maybe knocked on his door and asked for help, late last night. There are signs that there was a car parked next to where his body was found, and he’d been holding a can full of petrol. It was spilled all over the road.’ His words came out in a rush, his eyes dry, but wide with shock.
I felt sick. Little pricks of light danced round me and my head swam.
‘Are you all right?’ the man said. ‘Here. Sit down.’ There was a chair by the coat hooks.
‘I’m okay,’ I said, leaning for a moment against the wall. ‘Thank you. But I must go.’ And I backed out of the house, hardly knowing what I was doing. I went to sit in my car but I couldn’t drive anywhere. I lowered the window and let the wind and rain blow in, attempting to pull out of the feeling of unreality and horror that threatened to swallow me.
I tried to absorb what the man had said, his words rattling round and round in my head. I had to get back to Keswick, get into the centre of town where I was surrounded by people. Mechanically I looked at the map. I needed to find the quickest way. It seemed as though going ahead and then cutting through the next valley might be faster than going back.
I turned the ignition and drove at what was probably about five miles an hour, my hands shaking on the wheel.
Of course, if I’d had my wits about me I might have realised that they’d have closed the road. As it was, I drove almost all the way up to the police cordon before I came to and realised that going ahead wasn’t an option.
The murderer had picked their location with care, luring Toby Mason well away from help before striking. The police had erected a screen, so that I couldn’t see the spot where he had been found, but this meant my imagination ran on without check. In my mind’s eye I saw the body sprawled, the face contorted, the cord lying loose now, on the ground. I realised I was crying when a police officer knocked at the window and told me I’d have to turn around.
In the end, after I’d explained that I’d come specifically to look for Toby and was feeling the effects of shock, the officer made me get out of my car so she could back it round for me.
‘You shouldn’t really be driving in your state,’ she said, frowning as she handed back the keys. She pointed the way I’d come. ‘After a mile or so you’ll see a pub: The Ram. It’s at the crossroads. You might have noticed it on your way here.’ She glanced at her watch. ‘They should still just be open. Stop there, get out, buy yourself a Coke and sit down for fifteen minutes before you think of going anywhere else. Promise?’
I nodded but she still looked concerned as she let me go.
I made my way back as she’d said, crawling along, gripping the steering wheel tightly now, as though it would help me hold my panic at bay. Although I didn’t want to see anyone else, by the time I got to the pub it did seem sensible to follow the officer’s advice. The effort of having to concentrate on driving the car was too much with all the frightening thoughts filling my head.
The car park was almost deserted so I thought I should be safe from small talk. I pulled up near the entrance, allowing myself a bit of a walk up to the pub to calm down. Even then I paused for a moment in the doorway, taking a deep breath before I went in.
It was only a second before I registered Darrick.
He was standing at the bar and I heard him say, ‘God, how horrible. That’s tragic,’ before taking a sip of his drink. Putting it down, he added, ‘And have they any idea who would have wanted him dead?’
Through my panic it struck me that the shock he’d injected into his tone didn’t sound natural. In that instant I knew that the news of Toby’s death hadn’t come as a surprise.
As that thought sank in, the barman looked up and saw me. I caught sight of the split second his expression transformed into one of welcome before I backed out again, running for the car, my legs turning liquid.
The barman must have expressed his surprise or something. Whatever he’d said, it brought Darrick to the door and he saw me, shouting my name as I slammed the car door closed.
I tried to start up, but in my panic fluffed it. He was running over, still shouting my name. It must have only been a second before I managed to fire the engine, but it felt as though everything was happening in slow motion. Darrick got between me and the exit but I put my foot down so sharply that he had to jump out of the way.
I caught the look on his face as I swung past: pale and shocked.
Chapter Forty-Two
I drove at random, my only conscious thought being that I had to put as much distance between us as possible. After a little while I realised I had no idea where I was. I paused in a passing place, shaking and – only then did I even realise it – crying.
I didn’t have a satnav. It had never seemed worth it; I spent most of my time on public transport.
I wanted to call Seb but there was no mobile coverage. I drove on again, glancing down at my phone in its holder every few metres to see if it had picked up a signal. Eventually I went past a footpath that was signposted High End Tarn. I paused for a moment to try to locate it on my map, but I could hardly focus on the images in front of me. The printed place names seemed to jump before my eyes as I tried to rein in my panic. It wasn’t long before I gave up and drove on again.
At last the phone flickered into life. I tucked the car into the grassy bank as neatly as I could – not wanting to move an inch in case I lost the signal – and called. Seb answered on the third ring. ‘Anna!’ he said when he heard my greeting. ‘What on earth’s wrong? You sound dreadful. Where are you?’
‘The Lakes,’ I said.
‘Shit! What are you doing there?’
‘Terry called to explain that Darrick was on to the sailing instructor Julia knew: Toby Mason. I didn’t believe you, Seb.’ I was crying again. ‘I thought you were wrong about him. Even though it looked bad I wanted to find out the truth for myself.’
‘Oh, Anna, what’s happened?’ Seb said, his voice quiet.
‘Toby was killed last night. Someone lured him out of his house and garrotted him.’ I felt the nausea rise in my stomach again. ‘And I’ve just seen Darrick. He was in a pub called The Ram, hanging round, asking questions … I think he was probing to try to find out what the police know.’
&
nbsp; ‘Anna where are you?’ Seb’s tone was urgent now. ‘Are you safe?’
‘I don’t know,’ I said, trying to steady my voice. ‘I drove away so fast when I saw him that I’m not sure what direction I took.’
‘Did he catch sight of you?’
‘Yes,’ I said, shaking as I remembered. ‘Oh yes, he saw me.’
‘Right, now listen, Anna, I’m on my way up there too and I’m not far away. I can be with you in an hour.’
‘You’re coming to the Lakes?’
‘That’s right. Terry called me too. As soon as I got his message, and heard that Farron had been asking about Toby, I made up my mind to come up. I remembered him from the old days of course, but I don’t think I ever knew where he lived, or even his surname. No one else seemed to know either, so asking questions in person was the only way.’
‘It was the same for me,’ I said. ‘I only found out by asking locally. And then, when I finally discovered where he lived, I went there, and just up the road there were police and the lane was cordoned off. They’d put up a screen …’
‘There there, Anna,’ he said, as though talking to a child, ‘we need to get you safe. I’m going to pull over and we’ll talk about where you should go until I get there, okay? I’m just coming up to a junction now.’
And then there was a longish pause. Too long. I realised the line had gone dead.
I didn’t know what to do. If I went any further I might lose the mobile connection again. I sat there, waiting, looking in the rear-view mirror, hunched in my seat.
Within seconds my phone rang and I snatched it up, my thumb pressing the green button hard. But just at that same moment, I registered it wasn’t Seb’s number on the screen, but Darrick’s.
Chapter Forty-Three