‘I do,’ he replied.
‘And do you remember how we used to jump over them, saying that if we made it to the other side, our wishes would come true?’ Claire’s hand briefly brushed against Nick’s. Instinctively, she wrapped her arms around herself, hugging her body. ‘How do you get over losing a daughter, Nick?’
‘You just jump very high and hope you make it to the other side, I guess. Like the bonfire.’
‘And did you make it across?’ She stopped, turning to face him. The sun was warm on her back and her bare toes curled into the cool sand. She felt a piece of seaweed beneath her foot and toyed with it nervously. They’d stood like this countless times before as teenagers, and each time Claire had prayed that Nick would lean in and kiss her. They’d had their moment long ago, she knew that. But it still added to the churning sadness inside.
‘Think I’m stuck mid-leap.’
‘You need a hand to pull you across then.’
‘And what if there’s no one standing on the other side?’ he said, drawing her in for a hug. Claire allowed it only briefly before pulling away.
‘If I tell you something, will you keep quiet?’ she asked, walking on again. Nick nodded. ‘Callum told me that Maggie… well, he said that she’d come on to him the other night.’
‘OK,’ Nick said slowly. ‘Tell me more.’
‘On the one hand, I don’t believe Maggie would do a thing like that, but then I don’t get why Callum would tell me such a thing if it wasn’t true.’ They walked to the water’s edge and stood with the sea washing around their ankles. ‘Anyway, look, forget I mentioned it. It hardly matters in the scheme of things.’ She kicked at the sand, but Nick led them on walking again.
‘I think it matters a lot. It’s your oldest friend, your husband.’
‘Such a cliché,’ she said. ‘I can hardly ask Maggie about it at a time like this.’
Claire wished she hadn’t mentioned it, wondering if he felt uncomfortable, because he quickly changed the subject. ‘I’m so sorry to see your dad unwell. He really doesn’t seem like himself. When I arrived back from London earlier, I found him in the yard. He had no idea where he was.’
‘Oh, not again.’ It broke Claire’s heart to hear this. She stopped in her tracks.
‘What is it?’
‘You’ll think I’m silly,’ she said.
‘Try me.’ Nick laughed.
‘See that little boy over there with the kite? It reminds me of something I saw years ago.’ She looked at him, her face serious. ‘I once thought I saw Lenni, Nick. In the early days she was everywhere. In the supermarket, on the television, walking down the street…’
‘That’s only natural.’
‘But there was this one time, it was different.’ She shook her head, knowing it sounded ridiculous. ‘It was about three years after she went missing. I was down here on the beach, heavily pregnant with Marcus at the time. A little boy was flying a red kite. I remember it so clearly, as if it were yesterday. I was watching it when a glint on the headland caught my eye.’ Claire pointed to the rocky jut. ‘I thought it was a pair of seals at first. Silly in hindsight because seals would never go that far up onto the land. Anyway, I wanted a better look, so I walked – no, waddled – closer. I was very pregnant,’ she said with a laugh. ‘As I got nearer, I could see that it was actually two people. A man and a girl.’
She felt Nick’s warm hands slip around the fists she hadn’t realised she’d made. ‘They were still a good distance away and the man had his back to me but the girl, oh Nick, I swear it was Lenni up there.’
‘Our minds can play cruel tricks. I’ve seen a thousand Isobel lookalikes since she died.’
‘This was more than a lookalike, Nick. I walked as fast as I could towards the headland, calling out her name, but my line of sight became obscured by the rocks at one point. It was so breezy I don’t think they heard me calling out, and by the time I’d got closer, they’d gone. There was no way I could climb up in my condition. I called the police and they sent someone out immediately. They found nothing, Nick. Nothing at all.’
‘I’m so sorry,’ he replied, leading her away from the boy and his kite. They headed back towards the farm, chatting about everything, from Nick’s new restaurant to the weather to Claire’s job. At the top of the track leading up from the headland, when the dark slate of Trevellin Farm’s rooftop came into view, Claire stopped. ‘I don’t want to go back just yet,’ she said. Even though she wanted nothing more than Nick to say the same thing, for them to carry on walking, she needed some time alone. ‘I’ll see you back at the farm in a bit.’
Nick nodded, and she felt his eyes on her as she walked away from the house. She went through the kissing gate, passing through a couple of paddocks and briskly up the steep hill of the most distant of the farm’s fields. This was where they’d always kept the goats, but these days the few animals her parents owned lived in the smaller, more easily accessible paddock near the house. Amy loved to go and feed them handfuls of grass after school and, if she had friends to play, it was the highlight of their afternoon.
She continued on over the crest of the hill where the breeze kicked up, blowing against her face, her hair flying everywhere. The view was stunning. Down below to her right was the array of buildings making up Trevellin Farm, her own house included, and down to her left was the jade-green expanse of fields leading down to the cliffs and the coast. Beyond this, a strip of white-flecked royal-blue sea was visible, and today there was the smudgy-grey outline of a tanker on the horizon. Clouds rolled in from the west.
Claire pressed on down the other side of the hill, the land sloping more gently. After another ten minutes’ walk, the grassy pasture turned into granite outcrops and a scrubby woodland. She’d not been out this way for a few months, though she knew her father still tended to the stone walls and stock fences, albeit badly. It was a ritual to him. In his blood to do it. No one could keep him off the land.
As kids they’d played endlessly up here, leaping between the rocks that stuck out from the ground like the elbows or knees of long-buried giants – that’s what they’d pretended anyway, as their father worked nearby. Having him close made the monsters in the wood not quite so scary.
Claire continued through the coppice towards the derelict cottage. The mossy stone and rotten timbers of the fallen-out windows soon materialised through the mottled light and, as she stepped out into the clearing where the old building stood, she felt a pang of sadness at how dilapidated it had become. It was in far worse condition than Galen Cottage, although it did look remarkably similar, making her heart race as she was reminded of Saturday’s scare. Whoever bought the place, she could only imagine them knocking it down and starting from scratch rather than trying to salvage it. The thought broke her heart.
She walked up to the front door – or rather the place where the front door had once been – and peered inside. Half the roof was missing and many joists were hanging down, covered in the rampant ivy that was strangling the building. She daren’t go inside all the way for fear of dislodging something and bringing the whole place down. Inside was the same old broken furniture that had been there when they’d played here as kids, but it was rotten now. It had been their real-life Wendy house, and she and her friends had arranged the old table and chairs and sideboard as if they were a happy family living there. Once or twice the table had been turned upside down, a broom-flagpole erected with a pillow-case tied on the end, and they’d set sail to Africa. Claire’s eyes misted with tears.
‘Oh God,’ she said, covering her mouth, spotting the ancient refrigerator where they’d stored their sandwiches when they’d come out to play for the day. It hadn’t done much in the way of chilling their food – the electricity had been cut off long ago – but it made their make-believe house all the more real. Eventually, their father’s repeated words about the dangers of the place finally sunk in and they had to play elsewhere, usually climbing on the bales of straw in the barn until Shona de
clared that off limits too when Lenni fell and badly hurt her ankle. The real dangers in life weren’t always the visible or the obvious ones, she thought.
Where did you go, Len-monster?
A twig cracked. Claire’s skin prickled with goose bumps.
‘Hello?’ Had she trodden on something? ‘Who’s there?’ She swung around, expecting to see someone – had Nick come after her? – but there was no one there, just a crow flapping out of a tree above her. She shivered. It was time to go back.
She stopped again. She definitely heard something.
‘This is private property,’ she called out nervously, bending down to pick up some litter. Someone had been up here recently, she thought, gathering up the discarded food wrappers. Probably kids from the village. When she stood, she felt lightheaded, so she took hold of a tree trunk to steady herself. Looking up, the treetops spun around her as another crow, squawking and beating its wings, escaped the confines of the wood. Claire breathed deeply, gathering herself. ‘No one’s here,’ she said. ‘Everything’s fine.’ But she still walked briskly back to the farm.
Chapter Fifty-Seven
Near the Beginning
Everything’s dirty and stale and, even though Mummy’s not here, I can hear her calling out to me… Clean your room, Eleanor!
I pull the wet sheet, yanking it off the mattress. It’s not really a mattress at all but a piece of yellow foam chucked on the floor with bits nibbled away as if mice have been chomping on it while I sleep. Sometimes I helped Mummy make up the beds for the boarding guests, so I know what to do. I’m not sure how I will wash the sheet though, in this tiny little house. It’s not even a house. Just a stinky room.
I think I’m going to get killed.
I bet Claire got a good telling-off for letting me go off alone to get ice cream. Mummy always warned me that I’d get kidnapped if I kept going off alone. And she was right. I’ve gone off alone a few times before by accident and Mummy always got scared and angry. But there was one time I went off and I don’t even remember because I was too little. Claire does, though, and she used to tell me the story often. I liked hearing it. She would wrap me up in a warm towel after my bath and sit me on her bed. She used to take a comb and gently untangle the mass of my wet hair after a day at the beach. ‘Didn’t you wash your hair properly, Len-monster? Look, I’ve found a starfish, an octopus and two crabs in it.’
Then I’d say, ‘Tell me the story of when I went off on my own,’ and I’d get all snuggly next to her on the bed.
Claire grinned. ‘Well, Len-monster, you’d not long learnt to walk. It was summer and you went barefoot everywhere – all around the house, climbing up the stairs and across the soft patch of lawn near the back door. You drove Mum mad with all your walking. But she knew you’d never venture out onto the drive because you didn’t have any shoes. You hated walking on the gravel because it hurt your little feet. You did it once and screamed, wailing on the stones with your arms stretched high to be picked up.’
Then Claire tickled my feet and I asked her who saved me.
‘I saved you. I came and scooped you up and picked out the gravel from between your toes.’
She was the best big sister.
‘Then what?’
‘Then Mum took you to town to buy you your first pair of shoes. They were red. You loved them. You walked faster than ever in them.’
I bounced on the bed, waiting for the big finale.
‘We were all playing in the garden, Maggie too, and Mum went inside to answer the phone. She came right back out, smiling and chatting. A moment later, she said, “Where’s Eleanor?” and she ran around and around the garden peering behind trees and bushes, calling your name until she was screaming.’
I laugh and laugh at this bit.
‘Suddenly, we heard a skidding noise further up the drive. Then we heard the crunch of gravel as Mrs Lyons carried you back down to the house with a scowl on her face. “She was halfway to freedom and beyond,” she said in her funny Mrs Lyons voice. “Lucky I’m a slow driver. Anyone else and she’d be…”’ – and we yelled this together every time she told the story – ‘“She’d be splat!”’ Claire and I both clapped our hands together as hard as we could and laughed ourselves senseless. ‘That’s when Dad first called you Len-monster, when Mum told him what had happened.’
‘Raarrr!’ I yelled with my claws out, just to prove I was still a monster.
Not really a monster any more, I think, bundling up the stinky sheet and wishing I was halfway to freedom and beyond right now.
Chapter Fifty-Eight
Nick was the first to reach Maggie in the garden. He was trying to slow down her sobs with a steadying hand on her shoulder, crouching down beside her, talking softly as she shook and wept. ‘Stay calm, Maggie. What’s happened? Speak to me…’
Claire also heard the scream and ran outside, dashing up to Maggie, flinging her arms around her. She didn’t care what Callum had said any more. Maggie fell forward and flopped down onto her knees in the grass. Claire supported her as she went down. ‘Maggie, what is it? Please tell us.’
She pointed to the telephone dropped on the grass, sobbing. ‘The police have… they’ve found a pair of denim shorts.’ Her words were tissue-paper thin on the breeze. ‘And some underwear.’
‘Oh God,’ Nick said, clenching his fists and closing his eyes.
‘What else did they say?’ Claire asked. Jason and Callum rushed out, having heard the noise. ‘Let’s give her some space,’ she said, indicating for everyone to step back. ‘Did they say the clothing belonged to Rain?’
‘They think so, yes. A woman walking her dog found them wrapped up in a carrier bag. She’d heard the story on the news and called the police,’ Maggie’s lips trembled. ‘They said there was blood on the shorts.’
* * *
The day had been a scorcher, she’d never forget that. It was emblazoned on her mind as much as the growing panic and fear as she and the others charged up and down the beach. Claire was soon in tears. Nick was silent but diligent in his search and Jason, when he came back from wherever he’d gone off to do, darted about asking people if they’d seen his little sister, tearing across their spread-out towels and picnics, kicking sand over everything.
Twenty minutes later, they assembled back at their own pile of discarded towels and food. The tide had crept up and wet their stuff yet again. ‘She’s nowhere,’ Claire said through choked sobs. ‘Please, dear God, don’t let me have lost her.’ She doubled up, then stood straight again, scanning down the beach.
Then Jason started laughing – almost mockingly, she’d thought – as she’d gone back over things in her mind. ‘Listen to yourself, Claire. Lenni walked along the beach, went to the ice cream shop, most likely bumped into a friend, got chatting, got distracted, then went home without coming back to tell you. You know she’s away with the fairies most of the time.’
Claire thought about this. Relief washed through her. ‘Yes, yes, you’re right. I’m being silly.’ She touched her temples, frowning, even though she knew that Lenni didn’t have any friends. ‘Why don’t you go back home on the shingle track route with Mags. Nick and I will take the long route past the shops to look again.’
Everyone agreed. She prayed one of them would find Lenni sitting on a log with ice cream dribbling down her chin, loving her new-found freedom and perhaps chatting with someone from her class. All the other kids were allowed out all over the place in the holidays, unlike cooped-up Lenni, and so the novelty of being able to hang out if she’d bumped into anyone would be too great to resist.
‘See you back at the farm,’ Claire called out, as she and Nick walked off carrying most of their stuff. Maggie and Jason gathered up the remainder of the belongings and headed for the shingle track.
‘She will be OK, won’t she?’ Maggie asked, as they reached the top of the cliff. Even though they took the route regularly, she was out of breath. They continued along the gently rising path heading inland, Maggie wa
lking backwards so she could get a view of the beach below in case the skinny little girl in her too-big swimsuit wandered back to where they’d been sitting. She could clearly see the message that Claire had written in the sand: Go home Lenni. They’d also told a lady sitting nearby that if she saw a little girl lost, please tell her to go home.
‘She’ll be fine,’ Jason said, sounding bored. ‘I don’t know why we’re all panicking. The surf’s just getting good.’ He eyed the sea longingly.
But they were all back at the beach soon enough. Maggie and Jason reached the farm, discovering that Lenni hadn’t come home as they’d hoped. Shona, oblivious to Lenni’s disappearance at this point, was talking to B & B guests and so they didn’t interrupt. The pair sat outside on a wall in the courtyard and, half an hour later, Claire and Nick marched down the drive, their faces expectant, salty and tanned. ‘Any sign at the shops?’ Maggie called out to them.
‘No. Didn’t she come home?’
Maggie shook her head.
‘God, will you come with me to search down at the beach again,’ Claire said, feeling the panic rising.
‘Did you ask at the ice cream shop if she’d been in?’ Jason said.
‘No, but we looked inside and saw she wasn’t there,’ Nick replied, thinking they should have done. ‘I’ll go back and check. Look, we’ll find her. She’s not stupid.’
Everyone was silent as the weight of that sunk in. Lenni was stupid. Not because she couldn’t do her sums or hum a tune or bake a cake or play board games – no. Lenni was touched with something that no one had ever identified, a cowl of innocence that she’d been born with. Her delightful, trusting nature radiated from her and may as well have been a sign on her head. A sign that told the unscrupulous that she was ripe for the picking. The way she allowed the kids at school to take her belongings, how she offered up her dinner money, or let them ruin her solitary games at playtime, over the years it had made her seem stupid. The more her parents smothered and protected her, the more they tried to keep her safe and out of harm’s way, the weaker her defences became. Until she had none left. Lenni would believe absolutely anything anyone told her.
The Reunion: An utterly gripping psychological thriller with a jaw-dropping twist Page 24