Part 5 (1/2)

Chapter 21.

For a while, after Samuel left on his quest for cell phone signal and onward from wherever that had led, Sylvie played house. She repacked the clothes in her bag, at first she was afraid to use the iron and ironing board but it was simply stored in a corner of the kitchen and she was sure she could return it so it appeared undisturbed.

She pressed the creases out of her trousers and s.h.i.+rts and hung them on the empty hangers in the bedroom wardrobe. It would have been fun to display her toiletries in the bright bathroom but she didn't want Samuel to think she had taken liberties. His kindness, his pa.s.sion and the growing affection between them was precious and she didn't want to risk upsetting him. Until she knew him better she was willing to tiptoe on eggsh.e.l.ls if it meant he would keep her with him.

She lay on the bed for a while listening to her ipod but none of the stored music suited her mood. She wavered between thrill at the events of the night and morning and residual misery at the memory of what had brought them here. She turned to the radio trying to find a station to entertain and relax her but was dissatisfied with them all. It struck her then that she hadn't had any real contact with the outside world for a couple of days now, confined to the car and now here in this place devoid of internet and without a television.

She listened to the news, fearing every item, praying silently that there would be no mention of Phil and his disappearance. She still had no idea what Samuel had done with the body and it seemed he wasn't willing to share any information. In truth she was happier that way, could more easily turn from the pictures filling her mind if the story wasn't finished. There was a tiny nugget of fear eating away continually in the back of her mind. If his body was found, she a.s.sumed her own disappearance would be noted and a search for her would follow.

There was nothing though and when the weather report began with news of torrential rain covering practically the whole of the country she turned off the radio with a sigh of relief.

Back in the kitchen she made a drink and a sandwich. Samuel had given her no indication of how long he might be away and, unable to stray outdoors and with the strict constraint on her movements inside the house, she grew restless and bored. She knew now that actually she would have been better going with Samuel in the car.

She wandered back to the bedroom but found nothing to do. An idea slid through her mind briefly but she didn't believe Samuel would appreciate her unpacking or ironing his clothes. She pulled her own bag to the corner of the room, allowing easier access to the dresser, she dragged his nearer to the wall to make a wider s.p.a.ce beside the bed. There were two bags, a small one which was gaping open to reveal his clothes and toilet bag and the large black hold-all which he had carried from the car. She was amazed by the weight of it as she struggled to drag it across the carpet and push it, bulky and intriguing, alongside its mate.

The honourable thing obviously was to leave it closed and she was determined to respect his privacy but the temptation to pry was enormous. She left the room closing the door on the tantalising piece of luggage and turned to the stairs. Out of sight, out of mind she hoped.

Boredom and inactivity played its part and natural inquisitiveness drew her back to the other doors on the landing. He hadn't said she couldn't have free access to the whole house. He had simply said she must keep away from the windows and outside doors and not use any heating lest the steam from the vent was seen outside. She laid her hand on the handle, for a moment she was undecided, was it moral to explore? She couldn't imagine why it would not be and so she turned the k.n.o.b and pushed against the wood.

The door swung back to reveal another room with the curtains open letting in the rain-soaked light of the late morning. The walls were palest yellow and half way down was a border of cartoon animals and colourful alphabet letters. On the wall opposite the window great cartoon sheep gambolled across bright green hillsides peppered with yellow flowers. Against the wall behind the door stood a white cot, a changing table flanked one side and a tiny ba.s.sinet on a wooden stand was placed at the bottom. There was a tall chest which had been painted in pale pastels and decorated with cartoon decals.

Sylvie's hands flew to her mouth. This pretty nursery was not what she had expected, not this at all.

Chapter 22.

She moved further into the little room, it was clean but the atmosphere was closed up and suspended. There were no fluffy blankets on the cot, no tiny teddy bear propped in the corner of the ba.s.sinet and no tinkling, glittering mobile dangling from the ceiling hook. A display in a department store would hold more life.

The surfaces were bare, covered with a thin layer of dust as had been the rest of the house. The cleaner must be due to come soon. She slid open the first three drawers of the dresser, there were no cute miniature outfits or soft sheets and coverlets. This nursery was waiting, for a tiny inhabitant, for the smell of milk and baby powder and the sound of lullabies. The rocking chair in the corner was forlorn in its stillness, the room would have been better picked up and packed away, so great was the air of abandonment.

She dragged open the lowest drawer, there was a flat packet lying on the bottom and she reached in and lifted it. It was obvious immediately that it was a frame, wrapped in a piece of towelling.

She placed the parcel onto the top of the dresser, her hands were shaking and there was a risk it would be dropped and damaged. She unfolded the soft fabric. In the bright picture a young, dark haired woman, in the early stages of pregnancy smiled out at her. She was leaning into the arms of a tall man in military uniform. The soldier held her lovingly around her waist, big hands spread over the slightly swollen belly. Samuel cradling his unborn child.

The discovery of this sad s.p.a.ce had been so surprising that her nerves felt jolted. Samuel must be married, or at some time he had been, or anyway there had been a partner. His past was a secret place and there had been no reason for her to make a.s.sumptions but she had never imagined him with a family. The reality of him with a baby was impossible to equate with the surly and brusque person she had first met. True the Samuel emerging now was very different but, a family man, a daddy, she was completely unprepared for this.

The love captured by the camera was real and undeniable. Where were they now, this lovely woman and the child she had carried. How had this love been lost and what misery had resulted in this empty, forlorn little room and was it the reason Samuel had been hidden in the forest so many miles away.

None of it made sense, he was older than she but surely he wasn't so old that his military career had reached its end. What was he hiding from, why was he running. She had known from the very start that he was on the outside limit of society but now layer upon layer of mystery was building and it left her bemused and uneasy.

She wrapped the picture carefully and replaced it, sliding the drawer home. Backing out of the little room she took one last look before closing the door as gently as if a child slumbered in the white cot. The pleasure she had taken from this little house felt flattened now and she went back into the bedroom and flopped onto the bed.

She tried to think rationally, so he was married, or he had been. There was nothing unusual in a broken marriage, no surprise in a fractured family, it meant very little these days. What if the photograph had captured a time of love and happiness, so did millions of wedding portraits, times changed, people fell out of love and moved on. Did it explain why the nursery was still there, yet not quite there, a shadow of what it should have been? Where were the bits and pieces left after a sharp and sorrowful split, the old outfits, no longer worth packing and carrying away, where were the half empty bottles and jars? Maybe it had been so long ago that those things had been discarded, but if so why not the rest of it? Surely the cartoon characters should have been swamped below a coat of bland emulsion and the furniture replaced by a bed or perhaps equipment for an older child, visiting for a weekend with daddy. This wasn't normal, not in her understanding of human behaviour, limited though she knew this to be. It was odd.

She swivelled her head on the bare mattress, there in the corner was the big black bag. She didn't think about it now, there was no internal struggle, sliding from the bed she took two small steps, bent and pulled the zip.

The bag gaped open, filled as it was almost to the top. She reached in and dragged out one of the bundles. How much was this, she could not compute the amount, she had never imagined she would ever see so much money in one place at one time. She plunged her hands in further and drew another wad from the bottom, there must be thousands and thousands of pounds here, all neatly bundled and all high denomination notes. The fear now was real and sparking on her nerve endings, this was wrong, there couldn't be a simple explanation. The rumours had been true, he was rich, he had a great holdall full of money, her heart pounded as she looked at it, not with avarice, but with an animal instinct to flee and an acknowledgement that this could be the means.

Chapter 23.

Samuel had driven out of the valley to find a strong signal for his phone. He would need to pull in favours. Contact with the people from before was something he had managed to avoid for the past three years, but it was his best option now. He had really hoped it was over, though in honesty acknowledged it might never be. This favour would have to be paid for with one in return and he would be swept back into the maelstrom he had struggled to escape. He shrugged and focused, there was no point grieving, this had to be done.

He should have a pa.s.sport for Sylvie in a day or two and then they could carry on.

He struggled with the concept of them as a couple. For many years he had been alone, through choice and necessity and he was sorely afraid it was best to keep it so. It wasn't fair to form a relations.h.i.+p with this young woman. It was too much risk letting the attraction grow into something stronger, letting down his guard and starting to believe. It had all gone so horribly wrong before and the dangers in his life now were even greater.

For a moment the memory of his other love overwhelmed him, a painful twist in his gut. He knew it of old, faced it and rode it out, the desolation that had gripped him for so long, was always but a small beat away. He would never again feel complete, his heart had been ripped out and the void was a part of him real and permanent forever.

Yes, these last two days with Sylvie had been good, really good. Last night had shown him he could still find pleasure and gentleness and pa.s.sion but he wasn't ready to try to heal, he didn't want to. The person he had once been was a stranger, lost in the murk behind all the things he had done since then, unreachable. This ent.i.ty that he had become was broken and ruined, undeserving of happiness.

He would take her with him to Holland and then when they were sure it was safe he would send her back. He would give her money and advice and make her accept her freedom. It was the right thing to do and for once he was going to do the right thing.

He made his calls, organised things, emailed the digital images. He bought milk and bread from a tiny shop attached to a filling station. Then he turned to the winding road that would take him back to the place which had once formed the whole of his world...

In the south the river continued to swell with the torrential rain, the wind was building now and great branches whipped and groaned before the force. It was many years since the level had reached so high on the ancient banks. Small rocks and boulders began to break away and tumble into the creaming force. The smaller shrubs and bushes held out until the soil beneath their roots was eroded and then they in turn joined the detritus flowing seaward. At times debris from the banks would catch and wedge against a barrier of mud and green stuff until the bulk of it formed a whole which was too big to hold and then, jolted by a greater clump, it flushed downstream The branches of the willow flicked and whipped in the gusts, the trunk bent and groaned with the strain and the great roots pulled and dragged at the mud of the new formed river bank. Holes were fas.h.i.+oned beneath the old tree, the water crept further into the darkness, flowing around the rocks and boulders and creeping between the decaying limbs of the soaking corpse...

In the cottage Sylvie curled into a ball on the couch in the living room, she had cried a little and then acknowledged she had no right to tears. What Samuel was, what he had done was no concern of hers and his past was his alone.

She had chosen, for poor and squalid reasons, to approach him and through that she had drawn him into this nightmare. The money, the sorry little nursery and this place were not hers and the proper, honest thing for her to do would be to leave. He had a right to his life no matter what misery or joy it may hold and there was no reason to believe there was s.p.a.ce for her within it.

She could take some of the money, she didn't want to but saw no other choice. There were so many bundles; a few notes from each one would be unnoticed. Though she didn't know really where they were or how to get away she wasn't stupid. Even in this day and age she had hitched at times and once in a decent sized town then there were buses, trains, the whole of the transport system. With some money she could go anywhere and sort herself out.

The ghost of his arms around her, the memory of his body against hers and the rush of love she felt for him were the cause of her tears and the root of the struggle pinning her now to this room and this house.

Back on the road Samuel glanced again into his rear view mirror, at this time on a wet Lakeland evening the roads were relatively quiet, he was probably being paranoid. He had kept the cell phone calls short and discarded the SIM quickly but the black Range Rover he had noticed outside the garage was still there now. After each bend and turn in the road it shadowed his route. His instinct for self-preservation didn't like it, not one bit.

Chapter 24.

He had been gone a long time, the light was fading and the rain was heavier now. She had thought he would be away just a few hours, back long ago and felt sharp regret at the decision to wait at the house. A thrill of fear shot through her, what if he'd left her, abandoned to whatever came and even now was boarding the ferry to Holland or driving through the night to some other salvation than this.

Her head and her heart had argued all day, she wanted to flee, just go and find somewhere to rest and recover, to be alone and find some quiet. A greater part of her, wanted to stay and wait for him. More than anything else she wanted to be with Samuel. The need to speak to him was a physical ache, there was a desperate wish to ask him to explain, if he would, and her hopeful spirit held to the belief that there would be an explanation.