Gone in the Night. Mary-Jane Riley

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       DAY TWO: MORNING

      Alex stepped out of the Forum – a modern building constructed of glass that housed the city’s library, a café, a shop and television and radio studios – and into the grey and drizzly daylight. Norwich was getting ready for work, and people splashed to and fro huddled under umbrellas. The market stallholders were busy pulling back the awnings over their stalls and putting goods out on display – all manner of things from spare vacuum cleaner parts to high-end leather goods. The smells of bacon and coffee from the fast-food outlets wafted over to Alex, making her stomach rumble.

      The interview down the line to BBC Scotland had gone well, even though she’d been stuck in a small cubbyhole behind the Norfolk radio station’s reception and had to imagine the jolly-voiced person at the other end of the microphone. Still, at least the presenter had read her book and had formed some interesting questions about it. He had even gone on to ask her about her other work, though obviously didn’t want it to get too serious, as he cut her off when she began to go down the mental health route. It seemed she was destined for evermore to be known for her love of coupons.

      It made her back itchy. Ever since she had begun her career – one that was blown off course almost straightaway when she became pregnant after an unfortunate one-night stand in Ibiza – she had lurched from one freelance job to another. Heath was right, she had to get off her backside and find herself a project, a decent story. If she wanted to be taken seriously, she had to do something serious. Sure, she had won a lot of professional acclaim for that series on Internet suicide forums, but she knew she was only as good as her last article. Or book. And if she didn’t want to be remembered for all eternity for a book about finding and using money-off vouchers, then she had to get on with it and stop feeling sorry for herself. Give herself a new sense of purpose.

      Alex yawned. Sleep had been elusive overnight, images of the crashed car and the broken man flashing through her mind. The blood. The look on his face. Frightened, not relieved when those people turned up to take him to the hospital. She had a nagging feeling that the whole set-up was wrong. Why hadn’t she been more insistent that they told her exactly where they were taking him? Too much drink. Befuddled brain, maybe.

      And there had been no call from the police. There had been a crash, a man had been injured, she was a witness. The man in the coat said he would call the police. They would want to talk to her.

      Then she remembered she had given one of the men her card. There was no excuse for them not to call. Right. She wasn’t going to wait, she was going to call round the hospitals – there weren’t that many in the area – and find out the state of the injured man. It had been, what? About eleven o’clock when she left Riders’ Farm. Allow about fifteen minutes for the walk down the road and then another three quarters of an hour for them to get to a hospital, so, it would be somewhere around midnight when he arrived, a bit longer if they went to the Norfolk and Norwich Hospital. She turned and went back into the Forum.

      Five minutes later and she was in the radio cubbyhole again. The man on reception had assured her that it wasn’t going to be used until lunchtime and said she was welcome to make her calls from there and could he have her autograph. For his mother. Of course.

      She took her damp coat off again and settled down and spent fifteen frustrating minutes on the phone. No injured person had been brought in by one or two men at midnight to any of the hospitals she called – Norwich, Ipswich, Great Yarmouth and Bury St Edmunds. She even tried Colchester just in case. The only road traffic accident victims had been taken to hospital by ambulance.

      ‘Sorry, love,’ said a kind nurse at Colchester. ‘Are you sure you weren’t mistaken? Maybe the man wasn’t that badly hurt after all and they took him home.’

      Had she been mistaken? Could the blood and bruising have been superficial? You did hear about people walking away from horrific crashes without a scratch on them – perhaps that was it?

      No, he had definitely been in pain, definitely needed hospital treatment.

      ‘Maybe. Thank you for your help.’

      ‘I hope you find him, love.’

      Her journalistic instincts were beginning to kick in. It didn’t smell right. How could someone seemingly so gravely injured disappear off the radar? The only explanation was if the men in the car hadn’t taken him to hospital at all. But why wouldn’t they? Perhaps the more pertinent question was: who were the men in the car? And how was she going to find that out?

      Coffee, she thought, to help the brain function. She picked up her coat from the chair and looked at it. The same one she’d been wearing last night. And the injured man had pushed something into her hand that she’d stuffed into the pocket. Reaching inside, she took out a damp, crumpled piece of paper and carefully smoothed it out on the desk. The ink had run, blurring the letters and numbers, but she could just about make them out. A name and a phone number. She stared at it. No time like the present.

      The phone was answered after the third ring. ‘Hello?’

      ‘Is that Cora?’ asked Alex.

      ‘Who is this, please?’ The voice on the other end was wary.

      ‘Cora, my name is Alex Devlin. A man gave me your name and number last night.’

      ‘What do you mean, a man gave you my name and number? What man?’ Wariness had given way to suspicion.

      Alex hesitated. Something told her not to go into the events of last night on the phone. ‘Look. It’s a bit of a story. Can I come and see you?’

      ‘But I don’t know you. You could be anybody.’ Her tone was hostile. ‘And I’m busy. This is a scam.’

      ‘Wait.’ Alex didn’t want her to put the phone down. ‘I’m a journalist, Cora. I freelance mainly, you can google me. I’m quite harmless. Honestly.’ She injected a smile into her voice.

      There was a silence at the other end of the phone. For a minute Alex thought Cora had hung up.

      ‘I see you,’ said Cora. ‘Articles for a London paper and a book on—’

      ‘Yes,’ Alex said hastily. ‘I know it doesn’t sound too serious, but I do know what I’m doing.’

      ‘Do you?’ Another silence. ‘Okay.’

      ‘Where are you? Only I’m in Norwich at the moment and I’d like to come as soon as possible.’ All at once she realized Cora could have been anywhere in the country.

      ‘I live in the city, on the Ipswich Road.’

      Alex looked at her watch. ‘I can be with you in about ten minutes?’

      In fact, it took less than that for Alex to find Cora’s flat, which was up two flights of stairs in a sixties block with tidy grounds. It was the second one along the walkway, with a honey-coloured wooden bench beneath the kitchen window and pots of straggly, struggling herbs by the door. She rang the bell.

      A petite and too-thin woman with dark rings under her eyes and a blooming bruise on her cheekbone answered the door. She was wearing jeans tucked СКАЧАТЬ