Frozen (28 page)

He flipped me over, thumped me on the cheekbone brutally hard, and, while I was dazed, he sliced a strip of calico from the front of the sofa, and retied my wrists in front of me. He backed away warily, his eyes alert, his body tense and dripping sweat. He looked like an animal about to pounce. The knife drifted through the air in front of him as though it was alive.

“No ideas at all,” he repeated softly. Then he laughed. “You do amaze me, Harry. Did you really think that Sarah had been chasing after me with one of these?” The chuckles subsided. He watched me carefully, for far too long. “I'm sorry, Harry,” he murmured. “Truly.”

I hunched and wriggled until I could drop my legs over the edge of the sofa and sit. It was painful. The exposed springs of the sofa dug into me. My ribs were screaming; my neck was in agony. The world was blurred, and splinters of light jagged through my eyes. Finally, I perched on the edge of the sofa, still bound at wrists and ankles, trying to focus on Adam—and, more importantly, on what he had just said, and the knife he was waving.

“I'll miss you, Harry,” he said.

He stepped closer, holding the knife high in front of his face.

And instead of terror, suddenly it all seemed absurd. I was sick of it all. I was beyond pain and beyond terror. I'd had enough—not of life, I had no desire at all to die, but of the complexity and negotiation, and second-guessing, and being manipulated, of taking others into account all the time.

And so I said, “Fuck off, Ads.” Thickly. Wearily. Finally.

He fingered his knife.

He seemed about to speak; he closed his mouth and rubbed his temple with the heel of his free hand.

He stepped closer, and set the edge of the knife against my neck. His face was next to mine, his eyes blank, his breathing sharp and shallow. Then he blinked, and focused. He looked at me. And there were tears in his eyes.

“Sorry, Harry,” he whispered.

I didn't close my eyes. I kept staring at him. He pressed on the knife. There was a gritty feeling as it bit and slid, and then a warm trickle.

And then he stopped. He threw away the knife in an uncoordinated jerk. It landed somewhere near the door. I stayed very still. He sat next to me on the sofa.

“I don't want you dead, Harry,” he whispered. His voice was thick with exhaustion, and defeat.

He looked at me—and, behind the tears, I saw the same eyes I had seen twenty years before as his father beat him and dragged him away. Adam was terrified, and in pain, and driven by forces that were utterly beyond any control. I looked at him, and saw a small boy, bewildered and battered, sullen and bitter but full of hope for tomorrow. There was no hatred in him, just despair.

“What will you do?” I asked. My head was swimming.

“Plan B.” He shrugged. “Get out of here. Start again somewhere.”

He hauled himself to his feet, and plodded over to retrieve the knife. I watched him, confused but unmoving. He cut the cloth strips that held my hands and feet. Released, my arms seemed to be trying to float. I tried to rub them, and I found I couldn't move them well enough to manage it. They flopped from side to side like sacks of dough.

“I'll have to tell the police, Ads. You know that.”

“I know.” He blew out his cheeks. “Can you give me five minutes?”

“I'm not sure.” My voice was thick and indistinct. My throat felt as though it was clotted with blood.

I was not sure he deserved a head start. If he had wanted to vanish, he could have done it the moment Verity first accosted him.

Adam nodded his understanding, and gazed round the room. “There's nothing here, is there, Harry? No box with all Verity's clues.”

I squinted at the mess through puffy eyes. “I think you'd have found it, Ads,” I agreed.

Adam made his way to the telephone and cut the cord to the handset with the knife. He came back and stood next to me, staring at the door, avoiding my eyes. He chewed his lip.

“She called your name, Harry. Not on the cliffs; at the treehouse. Screamed it, over and over.” Finally, he met my gaze. “I'm sorry, Harry,” he whispered. His eyes were red and wounded.

He smashed his fist into the side of my head.

WHEN I CAME TO, Sam was there.

“Adam,” I croaked. Except my voice didn't work. Each syllable felt like I was trying to force a spiked ball through my windpipe.

“Hi,” she said gently. The word ripped through me. Currents crazed over my belly and arms, lightning tore at my eyeballs. Sam reached and stroked the hair from my forehead.

I passed out.

*

A lifetime later, I woke again, my eyes pressed closed. “Adam,” I gasped—a single convulsion, not audible.

Clothing rustled, a chair creaked. “It's all right, Harry, you're safe,” she said. Her voice was slow and blurred. My nerves screeched as sound brushed over them.

I sank away from sensation, into the velvet pool inside me.

*

You don't feel good after being beaten half to death. I had three broken ribs, a broken nose, a cracked cheekbone, splintered eye socket, fractured pelvis, and so many deep bruises that it was easier to count the patches between rather than the injuries themselves. My cheek and lips were gashed and stitched. One eye was covered in thick bandages and hurt like hell. One arm was strapped, and the other felt like it should be. I was disoriented. My head pounded. My throat was half crushed. My jaw muscles wouldn't work properly: they were numb and unresponsive. When my lips touched, I couldn't feel them; they tingled and felt ten times larger than they could possibly have been. There was a sparkle in the room. The walls were over-bright and they seemed to be moving subtly, as though they were not solid but smoke, held improbably together.

*

I woke. The curtains were still closed, but there was a flickering strip-light in the room, unbearable green, throbbing.

Sam was there. She sat beside me, held my hand in both of hers and stroked it. She was talking and she was crying. I closed my eyes against the glare, and squeezed her hand. She squeezed back and stopped talking. I heard her sob. Later, there was silence. I opened my eyes. She was there, still holding me, just looking. The light was out, and a warmer glow spread over her from the corridor beyond. She smiled and her eyes glistened. She leaned forwards with her hair brushing my face, and kissed me.

*

“Adam,” I said. This time, I heard myself speak.

It was morning, grey and early. The nurse was scraping back the curtains. “Oh! Good morning, Harry!” she said merrily, and bustled from the room.

I lay back and watched the dawn crawl across the ceiling. My teeth ached, and my cheek throbbed. I couldn't open my eyes properly. My whole body was an immense sprawl of pain. The crisp fibres of the sheets tore at my fingertips, ripped at the roots of my hair.

Sam scuttled in. She looked anxious and uncertain. Her eyes were red and gritty. She saw me and smiled.

“Hey, you,” she said. She sat by the bed and took my hand. I closed my eyes and enjoyed the feel of knowing she was there.

“I thought I'd lost you,” she said. She lifted my hand and kissed it. Pain jolted through me, though I could barely even flinch. She started.

“Oh. Sorry.” She set my hand back down, still folded in hers.

I opened my eyes and glanced at her. Mercifully I didn't have to turn my head, she was just within squinting range. I tried to open my mouth and couldn't; my cheeks were too swollen, and the pressure seared my skin.

She saw and spoke for me. “Adam.” She nodded. “We know. He's gone. No sign at all. Bank accounts cleaned out, lock, stock and proverbial. Car abandoned in a gravel-pit, house sold, it's a total mess. The police are on to it, they've notified the airports and the ferry ports. Nothing.”

Something must have shown in my face. “It's been over a week, Harry. Sorry, but there's no chance, not now.”

She looked at me for a very long time. Then she said gently, “I thought you weren't coming back, Harry.” She squeezed my hand and a tear dripped on to it. I tried to squeeze back.

I slept.

*

Sam had saved me—but for all the wrong reasons.

She had got home about ten minutes after I left my phone message. She thought it was a grand farewell—that I had gone to Verity's flat to kill myself. From her perspective, I can see the logic; I had been remote, confused. My moods were swinging unpredictably. I was consumed by losing Verity, I
wanted
there to be a mystery in it. I was sad and desperate and Sam had cut me off.

Ironic, isn't it? Because I'd had no intention whatsoever of killing myself. It hadn't even occurred to me. I was just feeling profoundly sorry for myself, finally ready for grief, perhaps, and maybe that was why my apology to Sam had been truly sincere—at last. Who said growing up had to be easy? I'm glad she misunderstood and came running, though, because I didn't want to die.

She had tried to ring me back—but by then my mobile was halfway down the stairs and I had never rung off, so she was stuck at her end with an open but useless line. She rang the police from a phone box, and drove to Verity's flat at lethal speed. She got there moments before the police and found me. The ambulance arrived shortly afterwards.

Of Adam, there was no sign.

They were treating my injuries as attempted murder, which seemed ridiculous to me—and Verity's too, of course, now that it was too late. The detectives explained to me, in charmingly methodical words, that they were also keen to talk with Adam about Serious Crimes in Which He Was Suspected of Substantial Involvement. Then there were the more petty charges: breaking and entering, fraud for some trivial misdemeanour at the council, which I couldn't follow. He was also “suspected” of grievous assault on Sarah. There were various conspiracy charges for him to answer—and a private detective working under the arches in Hackney had been arrested on suspicion of illegally entering Verity's flat on Adam's instructions.

Sarah's godfather, Michael Antrim, was on bail, charged with false dealing and accounting. Strangely, though, the theft of over two hundred thousand pounds from Sarah (the damage was worse than she had thought) was considered entirely legal; the police were sorry, but there was nothing they could do. Likewise, apparently, it was Sarah's responsibility that Adam had taken out a second mortgage of three hundred thousand on the house and defaulted on every payment after the third; that money, too, had vanished, and all the police could say was that there might be another fraud charge to add to the list.

But they would have to catch him first. He had close to half a million pounds in cash, and several very good reasons for making himself scarce. He could be anywhere, the police said helpfully. Interpol had been informed. After initial optimism and knowing nods, the police were now doing a good line in shrugs.

*

I stayed with Sam while I recovered—in her bed; she slept on the sofa. (“Unfinished business,” she said brightly, when I complained that I was now feeling well enough for a little company—and shut the door on me.)

One morning, three weeks after the attack, I announced that I was halfway well, and we went to Verity's flat. There were things to do. Verity's landlord was insisting that it was Verity's responsibility to repair the damage to the flat. Sam had weathered countless arguments on the subject, and we'd finally decided that the only sensible way forward was to salvage what we could of Verity's belongings and then leave the landlord to it. Let him protest until he was hoarse. He was a belligerent, unpleasant man, preoccupied only with money. The need to let the place again would soon override any further posturing about who was responsible; and in any case, his building insurance would cover it.

The door had been boarded up and an apologetic police officer with a jemmy had to force it open, one last time. They had thoughtfully tidied the debris into a few large mounds. The furniture had been straightened: chairs and tables now stood back on their legs, a couple of stools from the kitchen had been placed neatly against the wall in the living room. What remained of the sofa had been removed. We wandered round the flat as though it was a museum. It smelt strange—not dusty but unlived-in. The photos that had been on the wall now lay in ranks along the dining-table, glass shards over dead black and white eyes; a row of children with their tongues out, one grinning for no reason. My dried blood was smeared darkly on the floor.

Sam wandered into the kitchen to gaze at the gutted cupboards and neat piles of crockery. I stayed in the ravaged remains of the living room.

The drinks table Verity loved and everyone else hated had been set upright, a tiny round top, a twined metal stem and three unstable feet at the bottom. The answering-machine had been returned to its usual precarious perch atop it—the one piece of rearrangement that the police had got right, pointlessly ornamental in a chaotic waste. They had even placed the phone's severed handset neatly in place. The machine's message light was flashing five, and idly I hit the play button. The machine clunked, spooled some tape, clunked again, paused, clunked (just how many clunks does it take to play a tape? Clearly the machine's manufacturers had decided to be generous, just to be safe).

It began to play—voices familiar from the day after the break-in: “Verity, dear, it's Erica...”
clunk
; me, muttering, “Where were you?”
clunk
; someone who had rung off without leaving a message,
clunk
; Erica again... and the last message, a new one, but an old voice, frail and distant.

“Verity? Darling, it's Erica. Erica McKelvie at number twelve. Darling, it's been
weeks
. I've been so worried. There's a charming man across the road who's collecting my pension—Sylvia's son, lovely man—and Vera's been going to the library for me, but if you can't find the time to help any more,
could
you ring and tell me, darling? Please? It's embarrassing, asking people.” There was a pause, and a rattle as the receiver went down—almost. Then she spoke again, in an even more martyred tone: “And you'll want your things back. They're exactly where you left them. I haven't touched them. But if I shan't be seeing you...”

Then, with no goodbye, there was a click. The machine clunked a few times, and was silent.

I looked up. Sam was in the doorway to the kitchen, staring at the machine. We gazed at each other. Then, without a word, we left to find Erica McKelvie who lived at number twelve.

*

Erica was hard work. She wanted to make sure we knew how difficult life was at her age, with her arthritis troubling her and most of her friends dead. I didn't doubt it was difficult—but surely it wasn't necessary to remind us of it every third sentence? Eventually, we dispensed with the explanations and introductions, and even with the endless commiserations about the terrible problem of her legs.

She fetched the box Verity had left with her. She held it on her lap and continued her monologue. We eyed the box and fidgeted uncomfortably.

“She was such a darling,” Erica croaked. “Came twice a week. Pension, shopping, nothing was too much trouble. And such
fun
. She was an energetic young thing.” She looked at us conspiratorially. Her eyes were filmy, and I saw that behind Erica's selfishness lay desperate loneliness.

“Do you know?” Erica whispered loudly. “Some of the things she told me quite made me blush. And I thought
I'd
lived the high life!” She laughed throatily, and slapped the top of the box with the slow deliberation her gnarled fingers demanded.

It was a miniature treasure chest, less than a foot long, perhaps six inches deep and the same high, with a domed veneer lid, and a brass hasp with a tiny keyhole. Breaking it open would be easy. Sam, however, had different ideas. She groped around in her bag, still paying full attention to Erica—who didn't seem to care if we listened, just as long as we were there—and pulled out a bunch of keys, mine, which she still had so that she could look after my flat.

“Poor Verity. How terrible,” Erica burbled, as though Verity's fall was a piece of gossip. She was relishing the horror. “She was so charming. A cheery soul, yes. Thoughtful. Helpful. Always did my pension and the shopping. Never a bad word. I'm sure Sylvia's boy—I think it's Martin, I never can remember, charming man—I'm sure he doesn't
mind
doing it. But, yes, yes, I'll miss her, definitely.”

Sam was swinging the bunch of keys distractingly in the corner of my eyeline. It was deliberate; she wanted me to look. I was puzzled—and then, suddenly, I saw. She was dangling the bunch from a single key; it was tiny, brass, and hollow-centred—the kind of key you might use to lock a drawer.

*

We took the box to Sam's, and sat with it on the table between us, until Sam shoved the keys over to me, and waited.

The key fitted.

It was a sewing-box—cotton reels and little cards with needles threaded through them, shreds of cloth, strips of foam, pinking shears. The inside was sectioned into small compartments, but stuff flowed between them without restraint; there was no pattern to it.

Sam obviously knew more about sewing-boxes than I did, because at that point I'd have given up. She slid her fingertips down the inside edges, and gradually pulled the whole thing upwards. It was a tray, set inside the box. Cotton reels spilled over, then the whole thing came free.

Beneath, in the bottom of the box, there were two audio cassettes and a manila envelope. Inside the envelope were four photographs mounted in a row on a thin strip of card, and a cheque. I stared at the photos. Sam picked up the cheque. “Cash. Twenty thousand pounds.” She whistled.