Believing the Lie

wanted him to die. His death might have been a convenience to more than one person. But no one orchestrated it.”

Deborah said, “And now that terrible reporter’s going to write his story about this surrogacy situation and Alatea’s photo will be in the paper and I’m responsible. What can I do?”

“Appeal to his better angels?”

“He works for The Source, Tommy.”

“There is that,” he admitted.

Her mobile rang. Deborah hoped it was Zed Benjamin, reporting on a change of heart. Or perhaps Simon, telling her he understood the passions that had driven her to make such a mess of things at Arnside House. But it turned out to be Nicholas Fairclough, and he was in a panic. “What’ve you done to her?”

Deborah’s first horrified thought was that Alatea Fairclough had harmed herself. She said, “What’s happened, Mr. Fairclough?” and she looked at Tommy.

“She’s gone. I’ve searched the house and the grounds. Her car is still here and she couldn’t have passed us in the driveway without being seen. I’ve walked the length of the seawall as well. She’s gone.”

“She’ll be back. She won’t have gone far. How could she have done, with the weather so bad?”

“She’s gone onto the sands.”

“Surely not.”

“I tell you, she’s gone onto the sands. She has to have done. It’s the only place.”

“She’s taken a walk then. To have a think. She’ll be back soon and when she comes back, you can tell her I was talking about the reporter from The Source, not Raul Montenegro.”

“You don’t understand,” he cried. “God in heaven, you don’t understand! She’s not coming back. She can’t come back.”

“Whyever not?”

“Because of the fog. Because of the quicksands.”

“But we can — ”

“We can’t! Don’t you see what you’ve done?”

“Please, Mr. Fairclough. We can find her. We can phone… There’s going to be someone — ”

“There’s no one. Not for this, not for this.”

“This? What’s this?”

“The tidal bore, you stupid woman. The floodwaters are coming. The siren’s just gone off. Today’s a tidal bore.”

WINDERMERE CUMBRIA

When her mobile phone finally vibrated, Manette was in a welter of nerves. She was lurking in the car park of the business centre, close to a wheelie bin. Tim had gone inside a business called Shots! — a photographic studio by the look of the front window, which displayed enormous enlargements of the village of Ambleside in autumn — and he’d been followed some minutes later by a harried-looking woman with two children in tow. That woman had left moments later on the arm of an Anglican priest, and they’d all climbed into a Saab estate car and vanished, upon which time someone within Shots! had switched the Open sign to Closed and Manette had given up on Freddie and phoned the police.

Her conversation with Superintendent Connie Calva was as unproductive as it was brief, and Manette ended it by wanting to hurl her mobile onto the tarmac of the car park. She told the head of Vice about the business centre and what was going on and how the Open sign had been turned to Closed and they both knew what that meant, didn’t they, because Tim Cresswell, aged fourteen, was here to film one of those horrible, soul-destroying pieces of filth and the police had to come and they had to come now.

But Connie Calva said they had to get Tim’s laptop to Barrow, where the forensic computer specialist would go through it and discover the exact location from which Toy4You had been sending his e-mails, whereupon they would apply for a search warrant and-

“Bugger that for a lark!” Manette whispered fiercely. “I’m telling you exactly where he is, exactly where this Toy4You monster is, exactly where they’re going to film, and you bloody goddamn better get someone over here to deal with this. Now.”

To this Superintendent Calva had replied in the nicest possible voice, which indicated she was used to speaking with people on the edge, which was something they probably taught in training college. It was a case of Mrs. McGhie, I know you’re upset and worried but the only way to bring down something like this so that the entire thing doesn’t get thrown out of court on its ear is to do it within the confines of the law. I know you don’t like this and I certainly don’t like it. But we have no choice.

Manette said, “Bugger the confines of the bloody law!” and she ended the call.

Then she rang Freddie because God only knew where he was. He answered at once, saying, “Damn it, Manette. I rang you. You were supposed to — ”

“Talking to the police,” she cut in. “I had to. Freddie, he’s in a photo studio. Where are you?”

“Walking back from the railway station. Where are you?”

“The business centre.” She told him the route, surprising herself with her own memory.

He repeated it back to her and she said, “Hurry. Please do hurry. Freddie, the police won’t come. When I rang them, they said they need a search warrant, they need to take that computer to Barrow, they need to… God, I don’t know what. And he’s in there and they’re going to film him. I just know it, but I couldn’t make her see.”

“Darling, I’m on my way,” he said.

“I’ll try to get inside the shop,” she told him. “I’ll bang on the door. They’ll stop what they’re doing, won’t they? Surely?”

“Manette, do nothing. Do you understand me? These are dangerous people. I’m on my way. Wait.”

Manette didn’t know how she could. But she rang off after promising him that until he arrived … There was no way she could do that, although she tried. Three minutes of waiting did her in.

She ran to the front door. It was locked, as she knew it would be, but that was of no account. She banged upon it. She rattled it. It was mostly glass, but the glass was thick and the door was unmoving, even in its jamb. And as for the noise possibly disturbing the action inside Shots! — whatever that action was — she could see how unlikely the case was that she was achieving that. For a door behind the shop counter was also closed, and if they were filming within the building, noise would also be associated with that.

She bit her nails. She looked around. She thought of the possibilities and came up with the back of the business centre. For the shops in the centre would have more than one door, surely? In case of fire, only one means of egress from a place of business had to be illegal, didn’t it?

She dashed round the back, only to encounter a line of doors and all of them unmarked. She hadn’t thought to count up the shops in front in order to do the same in the rear, so she went back round the front at a run to do so, just as Freddie came tearing into the car park.

She flung herself towards him. He was breathing like a mountaineer without oxygen. He gulped out, “Treadmill. Starting tomorrow,” and then, “Which one? Where?” as she clung to his arm.

She told him that the door was locked, that there was an inner door, that there were also doors round the back. She said that she could bang on the back door and Freddie could wait at the front door for all of them to come pounding out of the place to make a run for it. When they did that-

“Absolutely not,” he said. “We’re not about to set these people off. They’ve a lot vested in not getting caught. We need the police.”

“But they won’t come!” she wailed. “I told you that. They won’t come unless they get a bloody warrant.”