“And do you think what Charles is doing is making things better?”
Tamsin seemed to contemplate a quick fiery response and reject the idea. There was a silence. “I don’t know. Sometimes I think it’s helping. I mean, I know this…what I’ve got…this illness…it’s partly to do with the mind. I don’t mean it’s in the mind,” she added sharply.
“I know what you mean,” said Jude gently. “You don’t have to convince me it’s a real illness.”
“No. That’s a good thing about Charles too. He never questions that it’s a real illness.”
Jude felt the uncharitable thought forming in her head: at the prices he’s charging, why should he? She wished she could curb the distrust that the thought of Charles Hilton always prompted in her.
“And he’s good,” Tamsin went on, “about showing how the mind works. Some of what he says is garbage, but a lot of it makes sense. So if I can understand my mind…see how that ties in with what’s happening to my body…maybe I’ll get closer to getting better…” With an unexpected surge of animation, she echoed her mother’s words. “I mean, we’ve tried everything else! I’ve had endless tests in hospital. I’ve been prescribed vitamin supplements, tonics, anti-depressants. None of them’ve worked. Maybe what Charles is doing will help…” She shrugged and repeated a despairing, “I don’t know.”
The long speech seemed to have drained her. There was now no colour in her face at all; she was in monochrome, pale, pale grey. And her eyes a darker grey.
“So you’re staying here because you think he may be able to cure you?”
An almost imperceptible nod.
“But that’s not the only reason, is it, Tamsin?”
A wariness came into the dull eyes. “I don’t know what you mean.”
Jude didn’t beat about the bush. “I talked to your mother. She said you were staying here because nobody knows where you are. She said you were afraid if you were out in the world, someone might kill you.”
The girl was too washed out to argue. “Yes,” she said, and tears spilled slowly down her cheeks, as if they too were exhausted.
“Don’t bother to say anything, Tamsin. I’ll tell you what I think happened. You stop me when I’ve got something wrong.” Jude took the silence as assent. “Let’s start that night at the beginning of February when you went back to Weldisham. You went to see your mother because your father was away on business. I think that night you couldn’t sleep and you wanted a cigarette. You knew your mother didn’t like smoking in the house… Anyway, there was the danger your father might smell the smoke when he came back and start asking questions…”
“So, as you often had done before, you went out into the garden to light up. But it was a cold night. Maybe you’d only got a dressing gown on over your nightie. You knew you’d be more sheltered in the old barn at the bottom of your garden.”
“I think it’s what you saw when you got into the barn that terrified you, Tamsin.”
The haggard girl on the bed nodded and almost smiled. Jude’s words seemed to bring relief to her. She no longer had to bear her secret on her own.
“What was it you saw in the barn?”
“There was a light set up, fixed on a pole…” The voice was very thin, but quite audible in the intense silence of the room. “There was someone there, digging…”
“Digging like in a grave?”
“Yes. But it wasn’t digging to put something in a grave…”
“It was digging to get something out? Or someone out?”
Flattened against the pillows the girl’s head could only just manage a nod.
“It was a skeleton, wasn’t it, Tamsin? The remains of a human body?”
“Yes.” The word was no more than a breath.
“And the person saw you, didn’t they? And they knew who you were.”
“Yes. And he said he’d kill me.”
“Did he come chasing after you?”
“Mm. But he had to…put the bones down and…I managed to get back into the house and lock the back door…and he didn’t follow then.” Jude could see the energy demanded by every word, but she could not come to the girl’s rescue until Tamsin had finished what she had to say.
“The next morning…I just knew…I had to get back here…I had to stay here…It’s the only place I’m safe. So long as he’s around…there’s no way I can ever go back to Weldisham…”
“Who was it?” asked Jude. “Who was the man you saw digging up the bones?”
? Death on the Downs ?
Forty-One
The vehicle clattered to a halt and its lights were switched off. The darkness around them was thick, almost tangible. They had left the village on the track that led towards South Welling Barn, but soon veered off cross-country, over bumpy fields, through woodland. Carole had quickly lost her bearings. Apart from the fear, all she felt was a desperate desire to pee.
She had tried talking to him at first, but got no response and soon gave up.
Carole had no idea where they were. Just before the lights had been switched off, she’d had an impression of something rising up ahead of them, some barrier, but she hadn’t had long enough to identify it.
She felt a solid point pressing against her side. Not pressed hard enough to pierce her layers of clothes, just enough to remind her that he still had the knife. And wasn’t afraid to use it.
“We get out here.” He reached to a shelf under the steering column and produced a large rubber torch, which he switched on. He flashed it across into Carole’s face, probably just to blind and disorient her while he got out of the vehicle. Then he opened the door her side.
“Out. Don’t try anything.”
“What do you think I’m going to try?” demanded Carole, glad at last of the opportunity for some kind of dialogue. “I don’t make a habit of carrying hidden weapons. I’ve no idea where we are, so I’m hardly going to make a run for it, am I?”
“I’m sure you’re not. But, in spite of that, I’m afraid I’m going to have to tie you up.”
A coil of rope was lifted into the cone of light. He must have picked it up at the same time as the torch. Nylon rope, stridently orange. The bright colour brought to Carole’s mind the piercing blue of the fertilizer sacks that she’d found in South Welling Barn. She shivered as she stepped out into the torch-beam.
But other priorities were more pressing than her fear. “You’re not going to tie me up before I’ve had a pee. Otherwise it could be extremely messy.”
He hesitated for a moment. Then, “All right.”
The torch was still focused on her. “I wouldn’t mind a bit of privacy,” Carole snapped. “But I suppose, if you imagine that I’m about to run away with my tights around my ankles, then you’d better keep me fully illuminated…”
She reached down through the folds of her Burberry to lift her skirt. The torch-beam stayed put, then faltered and moved discreetly away. At least he had some decency.
The pee was a merciful release, but Carole felt the coldness of the night on her bare flesh. How long was he planning to keep her there? She wondered again where they were, and what he planned to do once she was tied up.
Her eyes were adjusting to the darkness and, as she straightened her clothes, Carole managed to get some impression of her surroundings.
There was a cliff ahead of her. Though mostly obscured by scrubby vegetation and dangling tendrils of ivy, here and there a dull white glowed through. They were in an old chalk pit. She knew there were many such workings on the Downs. Some, like the one at Amberley, were even tourist attractions.
But it was a long time since anyone had visited the forsaken spot where Carole Seddon found herself. Thick woodland had grown right up to the foot of the chalk cliff.
“Done?”
“Yes.”
