To distract her from her destructive thoughts, she plugged earphones into her mobile and settled down to listen to one of the podcasts she downloaded regularly. The time drifted past without tedium and at last Balmouth started to stir. Dog walkers first. A couple with a pair of lurchers. An elderly man with a Border terrier. A young woman with a waxed jacket and a black lab. The dogs crossed paths with obvious familiarity, the lurchers frisky, the Border grumpy, the lab wagging its whole body in greeting.
A van drove into the village and parked beside the shop. A young man got out, took a bundle of newspapers from the passenger seat and rolled up the shutters that covered door and windows. The first podcast came to an end and Carol clicked on to the next.
She sat patiently through the morning life of the village. There was no sign of activity in Cove Cottage, however. Not a curtain twitched, not a light gleamed at the edge of a window. As the morning tailed off, she moved back out of sight to pee but when she took up her station again, it didn’t look as if she’d missed a thing. Towards noon, three children came zigzagging up the slope at the back of the cliff with an over-excited springer spaniel running circles round them. They looked astonished to see Carol, muttered to each other and veered off back down towards the shore. Now she felt guilty for being a killjoy.
The sun burned off the last of the clouds by lunchtime and she had to remind herself she wasn’t here for pleasure as she tucked in to her cheese and salami sandwiches. Carol was about to bite into an apple when her phone rang, loud in her earphones. Startled, she dropped the fruit and answered before she’d registered the name on the screen. ‘Carol?’ The voice was unmistakable.
‘Vanessa,’ she said wearily.
‘How are you getting on? Have you tracked the bastard down yet?’
‘I’m not sure. I’ve found the holiday cottage, but the curtains are closed and there’s no sign of life.’
‘Well, you have been busy.’ Vanessa managed to make the praise sound like an insult. ‘Where are you? Exactly?’
‘I’m on a clifftop in Northumberland trying to look like a very assiduous bird watcher.’
‘Yes, but where? Don’t be coy, Carol. I need to know.’
‘Why? I’m managing this.’
‘And if something happens to you? If you have an accident? If Gardner turns on you? I’m sure you’ll have told one of your old cronies what you’re up to. I’m not carrying the can if you disappear. Tony wouldn’t like that one little bit, would he?’
Did she never give up? Not water on stone so much as a hammer drill. ‘I’m in a village called Balmouth. Watching a house called Cove Cottage. But I don’t think there’s anyone in it. I’ve been here since dawn.’
‘Better give it till dusk, then. Maybe Gardner’s turned into a creature of the night.’
‘You’d know, Vanessa.’
A dry chuckle. ‘Good to see there’s still a bit of fight in you, Carol. Stick with it. Let me know as soon as you’ve dealt with him.’
The call ended abruptly. ‘Fuck you,’ she yelled, enjoying the feeling of letting rip. She pulled out her earphones and straightened her spine, then ran through a set of her exercises in a bid to loosen the tension Vanessa had provoked. Then she stood up and stretched, stiff from sitting for so long. Time to make a move. Do a circuit of the village and find another vantage point. Maybe in the dunes?
She took her time descending, careful of her footing, conscious that her knees were protesting at being wakened from their fixed position. A sign in the store window promised a coffee machine, so she went in and helped herself to an insipid-looking cappuccino. Exchanged a few words about the weather with the man she’d seen opening up earlier and who clearly couldn’t be bothered developing conversation with someone he’d likely never see again.
Carol walked back along the front, sipping her coffee, and casually turned down the ginnel by Cove Cottage again. And felt as stupid as she’d ever done when she passed the gable end and saw a man sitting at the wrought-iron table with a glass of white wine and a book. It hadn’t occurred to her that Harrison Gardner would go straight out to his sheltered back yard, invisible from her viewpoint on the cliff. Because who’d sit in a yard with no view when the sea was spread out before you? She hadn’t bargained on the fact that the sun had moved round and turned the yard into a sun trap.
If indeed it was Harrison Gardner. On a quick pass, it was impossible to be certain. He looked the right sort of age. But he was wearing a baseball cap pulled low and wraparound sunglasses. Not to mention a rather distinguished beard that had featured in none of the photographs she’d managed to track down. She carried on without a backward glance and turned left so she was obscured by what turned out to be a low stone byre converted to a studio holiday home.
Carol pulled up the photos of Gardner she’d loaded on to her phone. Only one gave her what she needed. Ears were always the giveaway. Change the hair, stick in coloured contacts, alter the eyewear. But there was nothing you could do with the ears, short of mutilation. She hunkered down and finished her coffee, letting a few minutes pass. Then she set off back down the alley, unhurried, casual. Gardner didn’t even look up. She gave him a quick
