bring her back.. He'd gone away because Liz had lost the claw, not because of Anna at all. Even if he had lost his temper with the child that night, who could blame him? Liz had – perhaps that had been another reason why he'd gone away. She stared at Anna, then looked away quickly. If she lost her temper now, she didn't know what she might do to the child.
Anna was behaving as if Liz had already mistreated her. She winced whenever she reached for the salt or the pickles. 'Stop your play-acting,' Liz said. 'I didn't hurt you that much.' The bruises weren't very marked – less so than the scratches on the child's other arm. The sound of Anna crunching lettuce grated on her nerves.
After they'd washed up the dinner things – Anna taking plates mutely, holding herself aloof – Liz decided she couldn't stand any more. 'If you're going to sulk, young lady, you can take yourself off to bed.' It was a relief when Anna did so. Coming out of the bathroom, she hesitated over which bedroom to enter. Eventually she went into Liz's room as though she were doing Liz a favour. Liz tucked her up and made herself stoop to give her a token kiss, but the child turned away under the sheets.
For a while Liz sat in the long room with the telephone by her side and wished that Alan would call. She didn't blame him any more and would have hated him to feel that he couldn't come home. She would have called him if she'd known where he was. Eventually she moved the phone into the hall and made herself watch television, though she hardly knew what she was watching. Here were television cops, beating up someone as usual; here was a play that might be a horror story or a comedy, she couldn't tell which.
She'd moved the phone into the hall, yet she kept glimpsing red at the edge of her vision. As she glanced at the empty space on the mantelpiece, she realized that that was why the house felt empty – because she'd lost the claw. The sound of the sea made it feel even emptier, the sea that separated her from Alan, the sea that she could never cross.
Eventually she called her parents. Her father said he was glad of the rest – just what the doctor ordered; she could only pray that it was the line that made his voice so weak. Then she went to bed. Anna was asleep, otherwise she might have drawn away from her mother. Liz could hug the small warm body to her, purge her mind of other feelings, believe that they would be friends again tomorrow, reach inward to the untroubled centre of herself and sleep.
She'd forgotten her strange feelings of the night before until she switched off the bedside lamp. It was as though she'd wakened something in the dark by switching off the lamp – as though she'd wakened the dark itself. It was crouching by the bed, watching her, licking its lips. How could waves sound so much like slobbery breathing? She hugged Anna to her, to cling to reality, but the child was hot and restless. Liz inched away for fear of waking her, and felt as if she were trying to be inconspicuous. She lay stiffly on her back, trying to think of nothing.
She must have slept, for she woke in the night, halfway through a dream of lying in wait for someone. There was a taste in her mouth, so unpleasant that she stumbled to the bathroom without thinking of the dark, and gargled with cold water. The taste was gone before she had a chance to decide what it was. She switched off the bathroom light and groped back to her room.
The dark was darker after the bright room. She was tiptoeing barefoot through the dark, and she wouldn't see the crouching figure until she fell over it, or until her bare foot touched its face… She stumbled loudly back to the door and grabbed the light-switch.
The room was empty but for Anna, and the light had wakened her. 'What's wrong, mummy?' she whimpered, half-asleep. 'Where did you go?'
'Just for a drink. I'm coming back now. Snuggle down and go to sleep.'
'I want a drink too.'
'You would.' Liz brought her a glass of water, which she drained in two gulps. In bed Liz hugged the child until Anna pushed her away, complaining she was too hot. Liz lay awake as the child tossed and turned restlessly, and tried to control her thoughts – forced herself not to tell Anna to be still. Why should Anna's restlessness matter when there was nothing in the dark?
At last Liz slept, only to dream that something was dragging her down into darkness – darkness that was hot and sticky and capable of suffocating her with its stench. She hacked and sliced at her captor, but the small fingers wouldn't let go. At last she woke, still in the grip of the dream, and found that Anna was staring at her along the pillow. For a moment Liz thought the child knew what she'd dreamed. But at least it was daylight now, and they could get up.
After such a restless night, no doubt arguments were inevitable. When they sat down to breakfast Anna said, 'I want to go to the shop today.'
'No, not today. You were there all yesterday morning.'
'Rebecca doesn't mind. She says I can go every day if I want to.'
'Does she indeed. Well, I don't want you to. Not for a while at least.'
'But I want to go. I like being with her.'
'But you don't like being with me.'
'Of course I do,' Anna said – too quickly, Liz thought. 'But I like making things in the shop.'
'You just try staying at home with me for a while instead of running off all the time.'
'I don't want to. There's nothing to do.'
'So you have to go to Rebecca's to make things, do you?' Liz was losing her temper. 'I'm sure you'll find plenty to do if you put your mind to it. If you can't, it's your own fault.'
Anna sulked for a few minutes, clanking her spoon against her eggcup until Liz was ready to grab it from her.
'But I want to go to the shop,' Anna said at last. 'Why can't I go?'
'Because I say so, and you're not too big to have your bottom smacked if you can't do as you're told.' In the past she always used to explain things to Anna; what had happened to their closeness? 'Because I think Rebecca has used you as an unpaid worker long enough,' she said, 'and because I want you near me.'
She hadn't known until she said h how true that was. She remembered how she'd felt when she saw that Anna was going to run across Haven Bridge, she remembered the anonymous phone call, and there were other reasons, too deep in her mind to define. She couldn't help it if she was being irrational: she didn't want Anna to be out of her sight again.
'I don't like staying at home,' Anna was complaining. 'There's nobody to play with. You never have the time.'
'My God, I spend half my life making time to be with you.'
'We never go to the nursery any more. I used to be able to play there and look after the babies.'
'All right,' Liz cried, 'we'll go there today.' For a moment it seemed like the answer: Anna would be kept busy, Liz would be able to keep watch unobtrusively.
They hadn't been to the hotel since the night Anna had fled there. At first there'd seemed to be too much to explain, and then each day Liz had stayed away had made it harder for her to go back. Now Liz realized that by staying away she was only helping the rumours to thrive. It was about time she put in an appearance, if only to show that nothing was wrong.
They walked along the beach to the hotel. The morning haze subdued the heat and gilded the sunlight on the waves. Families were already staking their claims on the beach; children were digging eagerly as terriers, spraying sand all around them. Anna chased ahead over the clattering stones, and Liz grew tight inside. Must the child be forever making her feel this way?
She left Anna in the nursery while she went to tell Gail they were here. Joseph's father was reinforcing the posts that held up the wire netting around the tennis court. He stared out at Liz through the wire. Surely it must be the sun in his eyes that made him look so fierce?
Gail was calculating bills in the office behind the reception desk, her pocket calculator chirping each time she touched its keys. 'Hello, Liz,' she said with an abstracted smile. 'What brings you here?'
'I just came to tell you we'll be in the nursery today.'
'Oh, are you coming back?' All at once Gail's face was blank. 'I thought you'd given up.'
'Things have been a bit complicated lately. I'd like to come back, and Anna would, if you still want us.'
'You know we're always glad to see you.' Suddenly Gail was sounding more like a manageress than a friend. 'I'm always here if you want to talk. I just have to finish my sums first.'
'Go ahead, don't let me disturb you.' Liz went out of the hotel, the relentlessly cheerful chirps of Gail's
