'Is this the way?' Hugh blurted.
For a moment this made Ellen as nervously distrustful as he sounded. 'This is it all right,' she said, hoping this reassured him more than it managed for her.
The road did indeed end on the brink of the cliff. To the left a solitary triangular kite was drooping its tail against the charred sky above the common beyond a centre for visitors to the nature trail; to the right a path led down to the beach. Hugh fumbled out money and paid the driver while Ellen supported her weight on the spade, having clambered forth. As the taxi performed an impatient three-point turn and sped inland, Hugh said 'Who's that? What's he want?'
The spade scraped across the tarmac as Ellen twisted around to see a figure turning its back in a gap in the hedge where a path led to the visitor centre. She'd failed to notice him when she left the taxi. He wore a grey anorak with the hood up and greenish rubber boots over equally muddy trousers, and was carrying a spade. 'Up here if you're helping with the path,' he said.
His voice was so muffled by the hood that Ellen had to strain to be anything like certain she was hearing him. The anorak was fatter than the humid afternoon warranted, and a good deal bulkier than him, to judge by the bony outlines of his legs. 'That's all right. We'll follow,' she called to send him on his way.
'No we won't,' Hugh whispered, and even lower 'Don't speak to him.'
Ellen peered after the figure as it shuffled along the path. The anorak was stained so variously grey that patches reminded her of lichen, not least by their texture. 'Why not?' she murmured.
'He's –' Hugh relinquished whispering and said at the top of his voice 'He's not there.'
The man was out of sight beyond the hedge now. His spade rose above it at some distance, long enough to beckon, scattering lumps of earth. 'Don't be silly, Hugh,' Ellen said, but when his eyes began to dodge from side to side she tramped to the gap in the hedge. The common was deserted under the blackening sky; even the kite had vanished. Were there traces of footprints on the path until the hedge around the visitor centre concealed it? They didn't look shod; indeed, they struck her as somehow even barer. 'Just come on,' she told Hugh and made for the path to the beach. She oughtn't to have spoken so sharply, but her nerves were to blame. She was beginning to wonder what else might intervene to prevent her and Hugh from reaching their goal.
TWENTY-NINE
When Hugh dug the spade into the base of the cliff, a handful of clay trickled down at him. Ellen glanced nervously upwards, but nobody was visible against the sky, although it was almost black enough to hide a watcher. 'Go on,' she urged, sounding muffled by the gloom. He planted one foot on the metal blade and leaned all his weight on it, heaving out a lump of earth as big as a man's head, which came so readily that someone might have been pushing it. Hugh stumbled backwards and, having flung away the spadeful, thrust the blade into the gaping cavity. Before he could exert his weight the mass of earth above him quivered as if it or its tenant were shaking off slumber. The next moment a bulk taller and broader than a house collapsed towards him.
'Watch out,' Ellen wasted time in crying as she made to drag him back. The sound of her approach only distracted him. He swung around to shove her out of danger – swung around the wrong way. His gaze and his frantic movements failed to coincide in search of her as the wall of earth slid towards them so lethargically it might have been relishing its deliberateness. Charlotte couldn't cry out, she could only dash to grab him and Ellen, to haul them clear if there was time. She had nothing to say that would help, and in any case she needed to devote her breath to sprinting faster. But her mouth was open, and it filled with mud as she and her cousins were buried deep in earth.
It blinded her and stuffed her nostrils as soon as she was desperate enough to try to draw a breath. It pinioned her, arms helplessly outstretched, and she was as incapable of movement as a statue. Nevertheless a hand found hers, and she wondered which of her cousins had somehow managed to reach out until she realised that the fingers consisted of very little more than bones. As she struggled to fend off their clasp she grew aware of another unwelcome companion – a large insect that was attempting to crawl over her breast, buzzing silently with the effort. This was one outrage too many, and Charlotte attempted to project her distress into a cry that barely penetrated her clogged ears, if indeed she wasn't imagining she had uttered it. She put her entire self into the next suffocated protest. Enfeebled though it was, it succeeded in emerging from the dark, because it brought a response. 'Are you all right, dear?'
This made no difference to the insect, which continued to nuzzle her breast. She opened her eyes to find she was still holding a hand. The fingers weren't so bony, and surely not as limp as death. They were Rory's, and the breath on her neck was an earthy draught from the open window. As she reassured herself that his hand was too warm to be other than living, Annie spoke from her post by the opposite bed. 'I was letting you have your nap. You have to take them when you can in here.'
The silenced mobile finished vibrating as Charlotte took it out of her pocket. 'Was that what was disturbing you?' Annie said. 'I should think they're a nuisance, those things. I wouldn't want anyone being able to get me wherever I am.'
Charlotte's eyes were muddy with sleep, and she had to blink hard before she could make out the displayed number. It was Hugh's. 'Could you keep an eye again?' she said. 'I just need to step outside for a few minutes.'
'Everyone's deserting us,' Annie informed or at least said to her husband, and reminded Charlotte 'You never did say where your family ran off to.'
'That's what I'm going to be hearing about, I hope.'
'All right, you can tell me all about it when you come back.'
Was she establishing this as her reward for watching over Rory? Charlotte left her a faintly promissory smile and hurried down the ward. The corridor seemed narrower than ever, except where side passages made room for shadows, more of those than she had time to identify. She dashed to the lifts and sent herself forwards as soon as one parted its doors. She was tempted to return Hugh's call at once, because she found the ponderous descent even more suffocating than the lack of windows. She managed to resist until she was out of the lift and past the reception desk, only for a mass of cigarette smoke that was loitering outside the main door to catch her breath. She hadn't finished coughing by the time she walked a few yards while raising Hugh's number. It rang several times, and then there was silence that she tried not to fill with a cough. As she spluttered instead Hugh demanded 'What is it?'
'Nothing as long as you're both all right.' When this earned no response she had to ask 'Are you?'
'Same as you saw. How about you? You sound as if you can't breathe.'
'Of course I can,' Charlotte more or less declared until a cough completed her last word. As she retreated from the smokers and the fumes of a tarrying taxi she said 'Why did you call?'
'Just wondered if you'd anything to tell us.'
'I don't think so.' While she felt ashamed of having fallen asleep on watch, surely Annie would have alerted her to any change. 'He's as you left him,' she said.
'No, I mean did your editor call, that's to say Ellen's.'
'Not a sound.' This resembled a warning more than Charlotte liked, and made her wonder 'Where are you?'
'Pretty well there.'
'You're really going to do whatever you're planning to do, then.'
'Unless you've got any better ideas.'
'I think you've left me behind this time. If you're going through with it,' she felt forced to add, 'go all the way.'
'That's a promise.'
It seemed more like a threat if not worse. She heard Ellen ask a question, which prompted her to say 'Does Ellen want to speak to me?'
'Do you want a word?'
'Just tell her to look after Rory.'
'She says –'
