'If it wasn't Anna, I don't know what it was. It certainly wasn't tall enough for Alan.' Nevertheless something had undermined her certainty. 'He isn't here, is he?'
'No, he isn't,' Liz said fiercely, 'so there's no reason for you to stay.'
Isobel gave a shrug which dismissed that and Liz as well. 'Perhaps it was a shadow. Well, I'm not here to talk about shadows,' she said, and stepped around Liz into the long room.
Liz's nails were throbbing, her nails were going to puncture her palms. Shaking with rage and frustration, she went to the foot of the stairs to make sure that Anna hadn't got out after all, though she knew it was impossible. Upstairs all was silent, but for how long? Suppose Anna was already conscious, and plotting? Suppose the child tried to phone for help? Liz grinned savagely: the phone wasn't working. But she couldn't afford to feel secure, she couldn't take the chance of Isobel's hearing Anna. She strode into the long room. 'Isobel, will you please leave my house at once.'
'Is it just your house now?' Isobel shook her head sadly and sat back in her chair, as if to be more immovable. 'I thought it belonged to my son.'
'I've told you he isn't here, nor is Anna.' Liz's head felt raw. 'So what do you want here?'
'You'll find out.' For a moment Isobel looked almost sorry for her. 'You'll see soon enough.'
'Don't play games with me, Isobel.' Liz^s voice was rising; soon she'd be screaming, loud enough to wake Anna. 'Can't you see I need to be alone? Will you please have the decency to leave!'
'Why are you here if Anna's at the hotel?'
Liz was trapped. Get out, you interfering bitch, you fucking dried-up cunt, she screamed. She had never expected to use language like that, and saying it out loud would be no use. Instead she said the first thing that came into her throbbing head – anything to get rid of Isobel before Anna heard her, or she heard Anna. 'Look, Isobel, I haven't been honest with you. Alan's coming home.'
'Indeed,' Isobel said, with an unreadable look.
'Yes, and I want to be alone with him. We haven't been together for so long. I have things I want to say to him as soon as he comes home. Surely you can understand that? If you care at all about our marriage, you'll leave now.'
'I can certainly see that you'd rather nobody was here when he comes home, but I'm sorry, Elizabeth, it's not to be.' She folded her arms again. 'He called you to say he was coming home, did he?'
'That's right. Why not?' Then Liz remembered that the phone was out of order. Well, that didn't matter; as far as Isobel knew, he could have phoned Liz at the hotel. Or had Isobel already called the hotel? Did she know Anna wasn't there – was that why she was insisting on staying? Liz's thoughts whirled about her throbbing skull; she couldn't get rid of Isobel without knowing what she'd come for, but she didn't dare find out in case that gave her away. By God, if she couldn't make Isobel leave, she'd render her incapable of interfering. Before she knew exactly what she meant to do, she was sneaking behind Isobel's chair; whatever it had to be, she was committed to it now – and serve Isobel right… Then Liz faltered; she'd seen that Isobel was listening.
Had Anna made a sound upstairs? So much the worse for her and Isobel. But Isobel wasn't looking upward, she was staring towards the fog where the road should be. Now Liz could hear what Isobel had been waiting for: the sound of a car approaching slowly through the fog, a car that was slowing to a stop outside the house. The ignition was switched off, and there was silence.
Isobel stood up. Liz stayed where she was; moving would be pointless now. She wanted to lash out at Isobel, but what was the use? She knew the police were out there. Isobel had called them and come here to wait for them. Liz could hear them, two sets of footsteps on the path.
Isobel strode into the hall. Liz followed her, though she wasn't sure why. Had she time to confront the police before Anna stirred, to persuade them that nothing was wrong except interfering Isobel, or could she still dodge upstairs and sneak Anna out of the house? She was wavering as Isobel went quickly to the front door and let in the fog.
Beyond the drift of fog, two men were advancing down the path. At first Liz couldn't see their faces, because she was staring past them in confusion. The vehicle beyond the gate wasn't a police car at all, it was a taxi. It must be the taxi-driver who was helping the other man along the path. Liz's feelings were chaotic, and she had to support herself against the wall. Then the men came forward into the light from the house, and she saw that the man whom the taxi-driver was supporting was Alan.
Forty-eight
At first, when Anna realized she wasn't in bed, she thought she was at the dentist's. That was why she'd come back to herself in such a strange place, that was why her head and her jaw were aching. When she opened her eyes mummy would be there, leaning down into her eyes, saying, 'It's all right now, mummy's here.'
Then she remembered, and her eyes sprang open in terror, in case mummy was. But daddy's workroom was deserted except for her. One arm of the cross that his chair swivelled on was digging into her thigh, which throbbed worse when she flinched away. As she stumbled to her feet, she realized that the rough weave of the carpet had left an imprint on her cheek.
Standing up made her headache worse: the room was tilting, and she was crying out with the pain. As she limped giddily to the door, she was only half-aware of what she was doing. She shook the door when it wouldn't open, until she heard the noise she was making, and then she stumbled, sobbing, away from the door and sat in daddy's chair in case she fell down. Mummy had locked her in. What would she do if she heard her trying to open the door? She'd already knocked her down when Granny Knight was here – what would she do when Granny Knight had gone?
Perhaps Granny Knight already had. Perhaps mummy was coming upstairs now, stealthy as a cat. Anna glimpsed her creeping upstairs on all fours, her claws ready. She spun round wildly on the chair, but that made her feel so dizzy and vulnerable that she grabbed the desk. The desk jerked, the phone jangled, and she sat shaking with the effort of trying to be still for minutes while she wondered if the phone had also rung downstairs.
She began to relax eventually, but also to sob. The phone had told her what to do, but she was afraid to. She'd tried to phone from the hotel room; how could she go through all that again? But if she didn't phone, the only alternative was to wait until mummy came upstairs to her. Perhaps the phones downstairs wouldn't ring when she picked up daddy's phone. Sometimes they all rang, but not always.
She stared out at the billowing fog until it made her so dizzy she had to close her tearful eyes. Then, while her eyes were closed and she couldn't see what she was doing, she reached out and grabbed the receiver. As she lifted it off the cradle the phone rang, so loudly that she couldn't hear if the others had. Could that sound be heard downstairs? She clutched the receiver, afraid to open her eyes.
But she had it now, and she must use it while she had the chance. All she had to do was to dial 999 if anything was seriously wrong – mummy had told her that once. But her hand was shaking so much that she couldn't lift the receiver to her face. She was afraid that if she did, she'd hear mummy saying, 7 heard you.' She dragged the receiver through the air and pressed it against her ear, pressed it until her ear burned, until she realized why she wasn't dialling, why it was no use: you had to wait until you heard the buzzing, the dialling tone – mummy had told her that, too. There wasn't any buzzing. The phone wasn't working.
She laid the receiver on the desk and began to cry in earnest, hopelessly, her head and jaw throbbing with every sob. The fog surged at the window and drifted away, surged and retreated. She wished she could climb onto the sill and jump – she couldn't see the drop – but she wasn't brave enough. She could only wait for mummy to come to her. Wouldn't mummy hear her crying if she picked up the phone downstairs? It didn't matter, she didn't care. That made her cry harder. But then, suddenly, she hushed, swallowing and gulping. She'd thought she'd heard voices downstairs.
She made herself let go of the desk and crept to the door, pressing her ear against it. She was terrified that the door would open without warning, that mummy would be there – so terrified that she didn't realize how she was trying to hang onto the wall until she felt wallpaper gathering under her nails. That made her squirm, but she had to be still, because there was a voice downstairs that wasn't mummy's. She had to press her ear against the door until her blood sounded like the sea before she was sure that it was Granny Knight's voice.
