by Bryce THOMAS
When Mrs. Lockhart and Doctor Murray entered the bedroom, they saw a paler Lucy than they had seen depart for bed the night before. Doctor Murray guessed straight away the cause of the pallor.
‘You heard them at the door?’ he stated in a reassuringly gentle voice.
Lucy nodded. Her mother let the Doctor do the talking.
‘Did you hear what they said?’ Lucy nodded.
‘And were you surprised that the woman turned out to be a police detective chief inspector?’
Lucy nodded again. ‘She used to be a detective sergeant.’ She knitted her brows. Why had she said that, she wondered?
Mrs. Lockhart’s mouth dropped open. ‘Lucy!’ It was meant to be a reprimand. Her daughter was just playing mind games with them.
Lucy shook her head. ‘No!’ she said, sensing her mother’s feelings, ‘she was a sergeant the last time I saw her.’ She was answering automatically, without thinking.
‘And how long ago was that?’ asked Doctor Murray. He pulled a chair over from beside the dressing table and sat beside her. Whatever Lucy’s mother was thinking, he, for one, was being drawn by Lucy’s behaviour. He wasn’t going to dismiss it out of hand. There were too many coincidences.
Lucy shrugged. ‘I’m not sure. I… I can’t really remember,’ she said shaking her head and concentrating on the duvet, as she drew up her legs beneath it, and folded her arms around her knees. When she didn’t have to think about something the answer seemed to pop into her head, but now she thought about it, she couldn’t come up with any answers.
‘But the woman is a police officer, we agree on that much?’ Doctor Murray continued.
Lucy sighed. ‘I don’t know,’ she said wearily. She put her hand up to her forehead and rubbed her brow.
‘I… I really can’t say.’
The doctor’s voice was still calm and soothing. ‘Can you recall why, yesterday, you told the man at the farmhouse that she was pretending, Lucy?’
‘I can’t remember why I said anything,’ Lucy countered, lowering her hand and playing her fingers along the edge of the duvet.
‘You seemed very sure yesterday,’ her mother stated, her voice sounding rather cross. Doctor Murray placed his hand on Mrs. Lockhart’s arm to calm her.
‘I really don’t know why I said any of it,’ Lucy retorted, raising her voice. ‘All I know is that I just felt that the man could be in danger, that’s all.’
Her mother sighed. ‘Really, I think this is a little too silly for words.’
‘What kind of danger?’ asked the doctor, gently.
Lucy thought for a long while before replying. She stopped playing with the corner of the duvet and lifted her head to look directly into his dark eyes. Sighing, she said, ‘What I thought yesterday was that the woman wasn’t a police woman and she mustn’t be trusted.’ There was another long pause. ‘But now I think she is a police woman but not a very good one.’
‘Go on,’ the doctor urged softly.
‘And there’s something not right,’ said Lucy, rubbing a finger along her bottom lip. She had never looked so agitated.
‘Tell me what you recall, Lucy. Take your time. And if you aren’t sure, just say what comes into your mind.’
Tears began to wash along Lucy’s bottom eyelids. Blinking them away, she looked into a distant spot beyond the bedroom wall, and shaking her head wildly, she spoke again. ‘I don’t remember anything! I’m telling you, I don’t remember.’
CHAPTER NINETEEN
Doctor Murray pulled the duvet up to Lucy’s chin and told her to rest. He went down stairs while her mother stayed and calmed her. Returning with a glass of water and some tablets, he gave her a sedative, nothing strong, but just enough to free her body of the tremendous tension that had built up whilst questioning her. It did the job and Lucy sank back into a calm dreamless sleep until noon. Or at least, any dreams she did have, she would not remember on waking. But she got up from her bed feeling quite happy and, realizing she had slept rather longer than the rest of the people in the household, she soon dressed. She delved into her suitcase, threw on a clean sweater and a pair of neatly ironed jeans and, foregoing breakfast, went in search of her new friend.
Not surprisingly, Loanne was with her horses. They didn’t feed themselves or clean out their own stables. That was Loanne’s job, a chore laid down by decree when her father agreed, after much badgering and pestering, that she could have the animals. Lucy had noticed that Loanne was a solitary kind of person, not like herself, having few friends as a result of forgetting who they were, but, apparently, Loanne had few friends totally by choice. And cleaning stables and talking to horses gave Loanne the isolation she seemed to need and seek.
So why had she taken to Lucy so easily, she wondered? She was mature for her years and, certainly, Lucy felt some empathy on that issue. And perhaps, as a result of her illness, Loanne had become a little isolated. Lucy certainly knew what that felt like, so who knows what bonding factors bring friends together. There was certainly a bond growing between the two youngsters.
Loanne had her back to the stable door. She had bent down near Ebony’s head as the horse fed from a bucket. Quietly she talked to her horse, fondling her ears and absent-mindedly untangling a knot in her mane. Lucy leaned on the door and watched for a while until, eventually, Loanne spoke.
‘Are you coming in, then?’ she asked, still facing away from Lucy.
‘Eh? Oh, yes,’ Lucy said, and opened the door quietly. She didn’t think Loanne had seen or heard her. She went over to where Loanne was still stooping by the horse and stood quietly by her side watching as Loanne gently stroked the horse’s face. Eventually she stood up and faced Lucy.
‘Are you all right now?’ she asked. ‘Daddy said you’d had a bit of a fright!’
‘Oh, I was a little confused, that’s all.’ She rubbed her cheek, pensively. ‘This amnesia thing seems to be getting me down a bit.’
‘You were right though.’
‘I was?’ Lucy thought for a moment and then added,
‘Oh, perhaps. But I really don’t know how or why I keep saying these things.’
Loanne tilted her head and frowned. ‘It’s strange, though. You really seem to have unsettled the people at Melrood.’
‘Melrood?’
‘The house next door.’ Loanne picked up the empty bucket and started to move towards the door. ‘You seem to have upset them, and that is very odd. You say you are confused, but Daddy is even more mystified.’
‘Why’s that, then?’ Lucy looked at Loanne’s face and noticed how brightly her dark eyes shone when she became excited.
‘Well, he told us about the two of them turning up first thing this morning, flashing their badges all official and trying to throw their weight about. He said he can’t understand what they are so upset about.’
‘Perhaps your father thinks I’m weird.’ I feel weird, Lucy thought, but didn’t say it.
‘No more than he thinks I am, Lucy, I can assure you.’ Lucy gave her a sceptical look.
‘I reckon there’s something very strange going on over there,’ Loanne continued. ‘I have thought so for ages now, and I think you have just brought it more out into the open. I was wondering how to find out what was happening, but I would never have gone and knocked on their door. You’re so brave!’
‘Yeah! That’s why I didn’t dare get out of bed this morning I suppose.’
They both chuckled.
‘Why did it frighten you? I mean their calling like that?’
Lucy shrugged. ‘I’m not brave at all. Not like you think, anyway. Underneath this hard exterior…’ Lucy braced her jaw and pulled back her shoulders, ‘there’s a little chicken! Cluck, cluck, cluck.’
Loanne laughed out aloud. ‘They are a lot bigger than us, I admit. I suppose that is rather frightening.’
‘No, it’s not just their size,’ Lucy said seriously. ‘They are dangerous people. I know it. Don’t ask me how I know, but as sure as I am standing here,
I know that the woman is even worse, even dirtier than the dirty look she gave us.’
Loanne grinned. ‘Perhaps we should leave them well alone then,’ she said. But Lucy got the feeling Loanne had no intention of leaving it anywhere.
‘You don’t have to say that for my sake,’ Lucy asserted.
‘I was just a bit shaken by the suddenness of it all. First I rush over there, then I come out with things I don’t even understand myself, and then they come badgering your dad.’ She paused and thought while Loanne watched her.
‘No, I don’t think so,’ she continued, her face showing a determination that Loanne had not seen previously. ‘I’m not going to be frightened off by her again.’
‘Again?’ Loanne frowned.
‘Again? Did I say again? I meant… well, I’m not sure what I meant.’
‘I know!’ Loanne suddenly exclaimed, her face lighting up with the sudden revelation. ‘We’ll go over there and snoop around!’
Lucy looked at Loanne’s wiry frame and considered what her friend had just said. She was slender but not really skinny, and her jodhpurs emphasized her long legs and made her look quite tall. Her face was very pale, only having gained the lightest tinge of colour when she had been running after the football. But quite obviously, Loanne wasn’t fazed by what grown ups said or did. In fact, she had an uncanny ability to instil courage into Lucy, a courage that had seemingly deserted her earlier in the day. ‘Why not?’ she said more determined than she had felt since she had woke up in the hospital with no memory. ‘But when? We’ll be seen if we go there in the daytime.’
‘Ah, I have a plan,’ Loanne said excitedly. ‘There’s a back door to the old farmhouse, the one which Dirty Looker uses. But there are no windows at the back.’ Lucy looked at her, a little sceptically. She was going to ask how she knew that when, suddenly, Loanne continued as if she had already asked.
‘Oh, I’ve been over the back fields. I thought I’d take a look last week, you know, when things were getting a bit boring.’ She smiled mischievously.
‘As they do!’ Lucy said grinning. Whatever Loanne’s father had said about her, looking through the curtains was certainly not satisfying or fulfilling enough for her new friend.
Loanne shrugged. ‘I’m just the curious type I guess!’
‘You know what they say about curiosity, though, don’t you?’ Lucy said, suddenly giving a violent shiver.
Loanne was about to say that she was only a kitten rather than a cat, but she could tell that Lucy was trying to recall something, and remained silent, watching Lucy’s serious expression and letting her follow her own train of thoughts.
Lucy’s eyes filled with tears and she sank back onto a bale of straw, suddenly drained.
‘Hmm, perhaps we should rethink that plan,’ Loanne said reassuringly. ‘It was just an idea.’
Lucy shook her head. ‘No,’ she said, determination rushing back into her body. ‘It’s a good plan. Let’s do it!’ Loanne opened the stable door and led the way, dropping the bucket she was still carrying, and bolting the door behind them. ‘Now would be as good a time as any,’ she said, pre-empting Lucy’s next question. They linked arms and scurried off behind the stable block, heading away from the house in such a way that Loanne’s father and Lucy’s mother would not be able to see them if they were looking out of the window.
CHAPTER TWENTY
Heading away from her home and parallel to the farmhouse, Loanne led the way across a field and along the back of a high hawthorn hedge. The hedge ran along the top of a rise at the back of the paddock and joined another similar boundary that was at right angles to it, and that hedge continued along the side of the next field and passed behind the farmhouse. It took only a few minutes to reach a hole between two thorn bushes where the two met. Squeezing through it and descending the other side of a slope, Loanne explained that it was her secret route that prevented her being spotted by all but the passing crow. At the bottom of the slope the hedge ran into a wide gulley that headed in the direction of Melrood. A few minutes later, and having followed Loanne without uttering a further word, Lucy saw the roof of the old farmhouse emerging behind some low cut trees.
‘There, I told you.’ Loanne pointed at the back of the old house as they peered through the thicket. There was an old door that looked even flakier than the one at the side of the house on which Lucy had banged the previous day. But, as Loanne had explained, there were no windows through which the occupants of the house could see any approaching visitors.
With Loanne taking the lead, quietly, they ran towards the hedge that lay between them and the back yard of Melrood. Lucy began to wonder from just where Loanne got all her courage. ‘Don’t worry,’ she whispered without turning towards Lucy, ‘nobody is going to come through the door.’
‘I wish I were as confident as you are,’ Lucy stated, once again taken aback by Loanne’s seemingly natural ability to know exactly what she was thinking.
‘Trust me,’ Loanne said, now placing her finger to her lips to signal the end of the conversation.
They climbed up a gentle rise towards an overgrown hawthorn hedge, and there, just ahead of them, Lucy spotted a gap between two thick hawthorn tree trunks which was criss-crossed with spiky branches. It seemed hardly big enough to squeeze through, but gently, Loanne moved two or three of the flexible branches up and hooked them around a thicker branch just above. Carefully she eased her body through the gap, trying not to snag her blouse or catch her face on the spikes. Lucy followed but found it difficult to squeeze through. Loanne picked up an old stick and carefully held two more small branches aside so that Lucy could follow her. Gradually, Lucy eased her way forward, careful not to get spiked by the thorns, and a few moments later she was standing facing the fence that circled the old farmhouse. Loanne and Lucy looked at each other and then, together, they climbed over the top rail and dropped down onto what was a wide, leaf-strewn, flagstone passage rather than an actual back yard. It appeared to run along the back of the building and continue around the corner.
The whole place seemed deserted. For a moment, even the birds had stopped chirping and calling to their mates, giving the place an eerie, damp atmosphere that sent a shiver down Lucy’s spine. She took a deep breath and together, they stepped silently over to the back door.
Lucy put her ear to the door, looked at Loanne and then shrugged.
Loanne followed suit, listening intently for a moment. There was no sound, just a deafening silence; no voices, not even the sound of a radio or a television. A stillness just seemed to hang over the whole place. The two girls looked at each other, and Lucy shrugged and placed her ear against the door again. She listened for a few seconds and then, lifting her ear away from the door, quietly murmured, ‘I don’t think anyone’s in.’
‘Listen,’ Loanne whispered.
Where there had been silence, they could both now clearly hear a sound at the other side of the door. Both heads turned and looked at the bottom of the door as faint scratching noises came from within. Then a cat meowed softly but pleadingly. Quite clearly they had been heard if not by the occupants, then by their cat.
‘Come on Loanne,’ Lucy said, now confident that there was nobody there. ‘Let’s look through the windows.’ Following the flagstone pathway, she headed to the far left hand corner and peered around it carefully, making sure there was nobody outside. The far side of the house fronted onto an overgrown garden which was deserted. After a moment, waiting until she was sure she was not being watched, Lucy headed to the first window. This again was in an old frame from which the ancient green paint was flaking. Loanne was on her heels and together they peered into the gloomy interior of the house, shielding their eyes from the reflected light with both hands so that they could see inside.
‘There’s nothing in there,’ Loanne exclaimed. ‘It’s completely empty!’
As Loanne moved off to look into the next window, Lucy kept on looking through the first one, searching with her eyes, looking for an
ything or everything. She could see at the far side of the room that the door into the hallway was half open. Just as she was about to look away toward Loanne, she suddenly thought she saw a shadow move across the doorway. Straining her eyes, she wondered if her imagination was playing tricks on her. Or was it the cat?
Her heart was thumping wildly now, and spying on strange people in even stranger circumstances did nothing to calm it down. She began to realize that they were trespassing on another person’s private property and not an ordinary one at that. It was a property used or occupied by some not so very nice people and as such, those occupants were likely to take some drastic action, the likes of which Lucy had really no idea, if they were caught. All she knew was that they weren’t supposed to be there, but at the same time, she got the feeling that it seemed the right thing to do. She continued staring through the empty room, but no more shadows fell across the doorway. Disappointedly but relieved, she joined Loanne at the second window.
‘It’s the kitchen,’ Loanne said matter of factly. ‘Looks to me like there have been people using it. It’s the tidiest part of the whole place.’ Lucy looked through the old slightly warped pane of glass and saw what she meant. It wasn’t a modern kitchen but it was clean, tidy and had obviously been painted more recently than the outside of the building. Over in the left hand corner was a microwave oven on a fairly modern laminated work bench. To the right of that was an ordinary electric cooker on which stood two bright and shiny saucepans. And under the window was a new-looking stainless steel sink unit with a washing up rack on its drainer containing one plate, one mug and several pieces of cutlery.
‘Seems to me like there is only one person using this kitchen,’ Lucy stated.
Loanne nodded. ‘Still no sign of anybody, though. Come on; let’s go around to the front.’
With that, Lucy followed her friend along the side of the house to the next corner. Again they stopped to make sure that there was nobody outside, and then, quietly, they went up to the first of two downstairs windows. Once again, the room was completely empty, bare of any furniture or even curtains. Bare floor boards showed several footprints in the accumulated dust, but it was clear, nobody had been in that room recently. The door leading to the rest of the house was closed.