fan in his office at the University, smiling his piano-key smile and telling her that David must be having difficulties in his research. If that was true, why hadn't David told her, his assistant since before they were married?
Now David seemed to realize that she felt cut off from him by his false gaiety. 'I meant to tell you – I've a bit of rewriting to do,' he said, 'and then I'll give you a pile of work. Some of it wasn't worth keeping. Just hysterical.'
She always typed out his work – nobody else could read his handwriting – but he hadn't let her see anything for weeks; he had even taken to locking his notes away. Could the problem really have been nothing but a snag in his research, which had preyed on his nerves but which he'd had to work out for himself? Had he just become trapped in self-doubt? She wanted to think so, but she mustn't ask until Helen was safely in bed.
He refilled her glass and closed his hand gently over hers. 'I've made dinner,' he said. 'Cold meats and salad -it's in the fridge.'
Helen had to be persuaded to join them at the table, for she was dancing around the room to the beat of her cassette. David had regained his appetite and was making up for these last weeks, which was encouraging. Joanna was wolfing down her meal despite the fluttering of her stomach, so that she could finish, bathe Helen and put her to bed, and be able to ask him at last to tell her what had been wrong. She was beginning to sense that his gentleness was a plea for reassurance, and surely that meant he wanted her to ask.
As soon as Helen had finished, she jumped down from her chair and grabbed her radio. In a moment she was disco-dancing beneath the gaze of the masks. 'Don't get too excited,' Joanna warned her. She was enjoying the chance to sit and feel comfortable with David, even though the sky and the room were darkening; it had been so long. 'Bathtime soon,' she said.
David stood up. 'You sit and rest. I've been letting you do everything lately. I'll get her ready for bed.'
All at once the sky was very dark. Raindrops that sounded big as flies spattered the windows. Joanna couldn't see his face, only the looming masks. When she switched on the lights – they flickered a little, threatening a power-cut – she felt apprehensive once again, for Helen was looking to her for guidance. The little girl still wasn't sure of her father.
Joanna glanced nervously at him, but she couldn't refuse him. Being accepted again by his child might be just the reassurance he needed. Surely Helen had never been in real danger from him? She'd been wary of him only because he'd turned into someone she didn't know, like the victim of a spell in a fairy tale. 'All right, David, if you like,' Joanna said, and was inexpressibly relieved that Helen went to him at once.
She sat for a while, listening to Helen running about the bathroom and squealing. Now there was the hollow rumble of the bath, like thunder in the midst of the sizzle of rain. The lights flickered again, the masks twitched. Then she realized that she was listening in case anything was wrong, and made herself clear the table and go into the kitchen.
Beyond the window the lawn looked drowned, and the black sky was crawling, lowering toward her, as if it couldn't bear the weight of rain. Its looming presence, breathlessly oppressive, made her feel how near the jungle was. She washed the dishes slowly, aware that she was trying not to make too much noise, just in case. Next door the Alsatian was snuffling. Perhaps it had a cold; she had been hearing the sound for days. Just in case of what? she demanded angrily of herself. That started the litany of fears all over again: another woman, cancer, a crime of some kind – but if any of those was David's problem, it couldn't harm Helen. The important point was that Helen trusted him again. That showed there was nothing to fear.
The rain was slackening. The sound of the downpour faded like tuned-out static. Now she could hear Helen splashing, and she clattered the cutlery so as not to eavesdrop. She could still hear the snuffling – in fact, it sounded as if the dog was just below the kitchen window. Had it strayed into the garden? As the lights dimmed sharply for a moment – it made her think of a heart missing a beat – she craned forward over the sink, to see.
At first all she could see was the brooding green of the lawn and the reflection of her own face, a pale mask set in sodden velvet. Then without warning her face vanished, and the dog began to bark. All at once her chest felt too tight to breathe. She knew why her reflection had been wiped out – the power had failed. That was why the dog was barking – but though the barking came from the house next door, the snuffling was still below her window.
Could something have come out of the jungle, all the way to the island? Ever since she'd come to Lagos, that had been one of her secret fears. She could only thank God that David was with Helen. The black sky pressed down, the lurid garden was closing in like jungle, and it seemed forever before the lights flared up again.
She backed away, limp with relief. Now the kitchen was lit she felt almost secure, walled off from whatever was outside. Perhaps David ought to find out what had strayed into the garden, while she kept Helen safe. She was wondering if it would be dangerous for him to go out there when the child began to scream.
Joanna ran through the living-room and into the hall. The lights were flickering again – the wooden lips of the masks were writhing, their empty eyes glaring dully – but she knew instinctively that it wasn't the dark the child was afraid of; something far worse. Before she reached the bathroom Joanna was crying out for David. But he didn't reply, though she could hear him muttering in there, and the bathroom door was locked.
Her fears rushed back, a shapeless mass of them blotting out her thoughts and leaving her nothing but instinct. Beyond the door Helen was thrashing about in the bath, and screaming. Joanna's senses were feverishly heightened, for she could hear the child scrabbling at the slippery bath, water sloshing across the linoleum. She lifted one leg, and with all her desperate strength, kicked the door just beneath the handle. The door flew inward, ripping the socket of the bolt away from the frame.
The first thing she saw as she staggered into the room was the colour of the water that had spilled across the floor to her feet. It was pink. In a moment she saw what had coloured it – saw the trickles of blood that were mingled with the water. Blood was trickling down the side of the bath. She had to force herself to look beyond that, to where Helen was cowering against the taps.
The child was struggling in the pinkish water. She was screaming so loudly that the tiled walls seemed to shriek, and her limbs seemed useless. The discolouration of the water made it difficult for Joanna to see the child's body. Her eyes were aching with strain before she made out that the child was unmarked. Once she was sure of that, she was able to look at David. She saw the razor-blade in his left hand at once.
He seemed hardly aware of her. Certainly his muttering wasn't intended for her. 'It didn't work,' he was repeating lifelessly. 'It won't stop.' Perhaps he was as drained of feeling as his voice, for he was slashing mechanically at his right hand with the razor. Though its fingers were twitching, it was scarcely more than rags of raw flesh now.
He was turning toward Helen. Up went his left hand with the razor-blade. 'Won't stop,' he moaned. Before Joanna could move, he had shoved the blade into his open mouth, and swallowed. The next moment he lurched forward at Helen. It was a convulsion, not an attack. As he slumped to his knees, nothing reached her but an enormous rush of blood.
Two
Ten hours earlier, Alan Knight was thinking: My God, he's crazy. I'm being driven by a madman.
Though the expressway to the airport was slippery with rain, everyone was driving as if they couldn't leave Lagos behind soon enough. They still had miles to go, for here on the mainland Lagos sent its housing and industrial estates swarming toward the north. They'd passed the overcrowded bungalows of Ebute-Metta, but Mushin and Oshodi were still to come – if Alan ever got there, if the car hadn't left the road by then.
'I think we've got plenty of time before check-in,' he said, as casually as he could.
When Marlowe glanced at him, the car swerved. This is it, Alan thought numbly. I've done it now, I've made him crash. But Marlowe guided them back into the wake of the car ahead. 'Better let me judge the speed. We're liable to cause an accident if I try to go slow.'
True, many of the drivers were unused to high-speed roads. Alan had already seen three cars off the road today, one attended by an ambulance and two already rusting. All the same, he could see no reason for Marlowe to drive like this, glaring fiercely through the watery fan of the windscreen wiper, overtaking whenever he saw the hint of a gap. In his great red-haired hands the wheel looked like a toy, and Alan was afraid that Marlowe
