disappointment.
'Guess it looked a little different in summer,' he said.
'No, the weather doesn't help.' She touched his hand on the steering wheel and made herself return the smile. His wonderfully blue eyes, darkened by the gloom of the car's interior, examined her own for reassurance.
'It's just a change, hon,' he almost apologized. 'We all need it.'
'Can we get out now, Daddy?' came Cally's impatient voice from the back seat. 'I'm tired of sitting.'
Switching off the engine and thumbing open his seatbelt, Gabe turned and gave his younger daughter a grin. 'Sure. It's been a long haul and you've been pretty good all the way.'
'Chester's bin a good boy too.' The five-year-old squirmed in her seat, searching for the seatbelt button.
The black, lean, coarse-haired dog, who slumped on the back seat between the two sisters, sparked to attention at the sound of his name. When Gabe and Eve had picked him out at the south London dogs' home six years before, they had been told that the year-old puppy was a crossbreed, something of a Patterdale in there somewhere, but Gabe reckoned the scruffy orphan was all mongrel, without an ounce of breeding in his runty little body.
Chester (Gabe had chosen the name) had grown to almost fifteen inches high: he was cow-hocked with turned-out feet, back and front, and there was too little angulation to his hind legs for dog show events; there were now grey and brown hairs among his short black fur, especially under his muzzle, chest and the untidy tufts around his neck. Seven years old, those dark-brown eyes still held their puppy appeal and, even though he was generally a happy-natured dog, his turned-down mouth gave him a perpetual cast of sadness. When they lost Cam almost a year ago, Chester had howled for three nights running as if he knew more than they did, as if he were aware their son was gone for ever.
Gabe acknowledged the now-alert dog with a slight upward tilt of his chin, the opposite to a nod. 'Yep. Chester's been pretty tight. Not even a small leak all this way.'
'Only because I told you every time he looked uncomfortable,' reminded Loren, who had that pretty but gangly appearance of many twelve-year-old girls, pre-teenage and just beginning to take a greater interest in what was worthy of 'cool', be it in music, clothes, or Mother's make-up. Sometimes she assumed a maturity that should not yet have been learned, while at other times she was still his 'princess' who loved her dolls and frequent hugs (the latter more occasional than frequent these days).
Loren had been adamant that no way was she leaving her friends and school in London to live in a place thousands of miles from anywhere, a place where she didn't know anybody, a place she'd never even heard of. It took some persuasion, plus a promise of having her very own cell phone so that she could keep in constant touch with all her girlfriends, to convince her things would be okay down in Devon. That and the quiet one-to-one chat Gabe had with her where he'd explained that the deal was to get Mummy away from their regular home and its constant reminders of Cameron for a while, just long enough maybe to allow Eve some closure to a year that had been horrendous for them all. Loren had understood immediately and had put aside her reluctance to leave—until the last few days, that is, when imminent departure had drawn out long goodbyes and floods of tears between her and her closest friends.
'Good thing you decided to come along then,' Gabe responded with only mild teasing.
Thank you,' he added seriously, looking directly into his eldest daughter's eyes, and she knew he was thanking her for more than just watching over Chester.
'Okay, Dad.'
He realized at that moment that he missed the extra 'd' and the 'y' at the end of 'Dad' and wondered when it had started happening. Was Loren, his princess, growing up so fast that he hadn't noticed? With a jab of melancholy that perhaps only fathers of growing daughters can know (sons were way different, except to doting mothers), he swung back in his seat, glancing at Eve as he did so. There was a moistness to her gaze as she studied the big house on the other side of the bridge.
'You'll like it more when the sun comes out,' he promised her softly.
'Daddy, can we get out?' came Cally's pleading voice again. Cally was seven years junior to Loren and now the same age as Cameron when he'd disappeared almost a year ago. Five. They'd lost their son when he was only five years old.
'Put your hats on first. It might pour again.' Eve was instructing them all, Gabe included. He reached into the glove compartment for his woollen beanie, pulling it down half over his ears against the chill he knew waited beyond the cosy warmth of the Range Rover. Eve checked their daughters were following suit before pulling the hood of her rainproof jacket over her own dark hair.
Beneath her untidy fringe lay deep-brown eyes that until a year ago had reflected warmth and a sly humour; but now grief had shadowed them and dulled their vibrancy so that feelings were no longer exposed, were curtained by perdurable sorrow. As the girls obeyed hat orders and reached for door latches, Chester standing on the seat and pawing at Cally's shoulder to get past her, Eve stepped out of the SUV and surveyed Crickley Hall once more.
She heard Chester's yelp and Cally's whoop as they tumbled out of the other side of the vehicle and something bit into her heart as child and pet headed straight for the wet bridge.
'Gabe,' she said apprehensively, drawing in a sharp breath.
'S'okay.' Louder, at Cally: 'Hey, rein in, Scout. Wait for us.'
Cally skidded to a halt on the wet planks of the short bridge, but Chester continued, yapping with pleasure at the sudden release, only pausing when he was halfway across the lawn. The child's swing close by stirred in the slight breeze. The dog looked back over his shoulder uncertainly.
Eve eyed the rough latticework of the bridge, then the beleaguered riverbanks. They would all have to keep a watch on Cally: the diamond-shaped openings between the diagonal struts were wide enough for a child to slip through on the deck made greasy by rain and spray, and the riverbanks were not fenced, their edges unstable. Cally would have to be warned never to use the bridge or go near the water on her own. They could not lose another child. Dear God, they mustn't lose another child. Eve raised a hand to her mouth as a latent sob caught in her throat.
Gabe hunkered down in his black reefer jacket, collar turned up round his ears, which were mostly covered by the beanie, and hurried towards their youngest daughter, while Loren followed just behind. Cally waited midway across the bridge, unsure whether she'd been silly or naughty. She looked questioningly at her approaching father and smiled when she saw him grinning. He scooped her up in his arms and together, Loren pausing to wait for Eve, they left the bridge and walked towards the tall grey house.
The building was constructed of simple dull-grey granite blocks, even the quoins at each corner and the windowsills of the same drab shade. Most of the other old and largish residences they passed in the last half hour or so of their journey had been built with limestone or sandstone, even flint: none had been as plain, nor as dour, as this place. The only embellishment, such as it was, seemed to be the shallow pilasters on either side of the huge nail-studded door, these bridged by an equally plain stone lintel which offered precious little cover for any visitor waiting in the rain on the two meagre cracked steps that led up to the entrance.
There were four sizeable windows to the ground floor, with six smaller windows along the upper storey, and four more even smaller dormer windows jutting from the slope of the slate roof, the slope itself quickly squaring off to accommodate four brick chimney stacks.
Eve frowned. Crickley Hall's architect either had a limited imagination or was hindered by budgetary constraints.
A rough-edged, sparsely gravelled pathway angled from the end of the bridge towards the house's main entrance, joining with a perimeter walkway which was also a mixture of mud and thinly layered stones. The sheer gorge wall of lush vegetation that towered over the grey building somehow should have cowed it, yet failed to do so: Crickley Hall's brooding presence was unequivocal.
Eve kept the thought to herself: this place was not just grim—it was ugly.
A little way off to the right, with bushes and tree branches on the gorge wall louring over its flat roof, stood a small garden shed whose weather-worn planking was turned dark by the rain.
'Come on, Mummy!' Cally and Gabe were almost at the front door to the house and Cally had called over her shoulder. The two of them waited for Eve and Loren to catch up.
Chester, who was still poised by the gently swaying swing, lingered until they drew level, then trotted
