Silent Playgrounds. Danuta Reah

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СКАЧАТЬ no longer looked homely and comforting, it looked disrupted, as though a high wind had taken the room apart and let things settle where they would.

      ‘… cup of tea.’ Suzanne brought herself back sharply. Hazel was speaking to her. Seeing Suzanne’s blank gaze, she said again, ‘I think Jane would like a cup of tea.’

      For a moment, the words meant nothing, then Suzanne said, ‘Oh. Yes, of course.’ She brought tea and biscuits from her own house, nipping across the shared yard to her back door. She went back into the room, carrying the tray, and occupied herself setting out cups, pouring tea, putting biscuits on a plate.

      ‘She’s very independent, and she knows about, you know, not talking to strangers … She wouldn’t go off with anyone.’ Jane was whistling in the dark, as if convincing Hazel could make it true, make it be all right. It was true that Lucy was resourceful and streetwise, Suzanne thought, but she was only six.

      She passed Jane a cup of tea, and offered her support. ‘Lucy’s very sensible,’ she said to Hazel, and Jane looked at her gratefully.

      Lucy’s colouring book and crayons were on the table and Suzanne moved them to one side. She tried not to look at the picture Lucy had been drawing, but it pulled at her attention and she found herself staring at it as she listened to Hazel telling Jane again that it was still early days, that most missing children turned up safe and sound. It was a typical child’s drawing, a blue sky across the top of the page, and green grass across the bottom. Two figures, a tall one and a small one, stood on the grass. Their arms came out of the sides of their bodies, each finger carefully drawn. They were holding hands. Lucy and Jane. Suzanne looked more closely. No, the taller figure had brown hair. Lucy and Sophie? She could picture Lucy sitting at the table, hunched intently over the paper, her face serious, talking her way through the picture, partly to herself, partly to her mother and Suzanne. And they’re in the park and they’re walking on the big field and also they’re holding hands and they’re smiling, look … But these faces weren’t smiling, she noticed. The mouths were turned down, grim.

      She looked up and saw Jane’s eyes fall on the book. She should have put it out of sight. Jane picked it up. ‘She did this,’ she said, her focus wavering between the two women. ‘She did this last night. She’s good at …’ Her voice died away and she swallowed.

      The man had now come back. He looked to where Jane and Hazel were talking, and then he signalled to Suzanne with his eyes. She went over, and he led her out of the room. Jane looked up as she went out, but only for a moment. The man was waiting by the phone in the hallway. ‘You said you phoned the mobile the babysitter has?’

      ‘Yes. There was no reply.’

      He looked at her. ‘But it was turned on?’

      Suzanne shook her head. She’d never had a mobile and didn’t know much about them. ‘I don’t know. How can you tell?’

      In answer, he dialled the number and held the phone out to her. She heard the static before connection, then a recorded voice: ‘This number is currently unavailable. Please try later.’ Suzanne looked at him and shook her head. ‘No. It just rang last time.’

      ‘And that was … ?’

      ‘Half an hour ago? Just before I phoned you.’ He didn’t say anything, so Suzanne pushed. ‘What does that mean?’

      ‘It’s nothing. It’s not likely to be important.’

      She wasn’t going to be fobbed off. ‘But it might be. So what does it mean?’

      He shrugged. ‘It probably means that the battery’s run down. Or that someone switched the phone off since you last rang the number.’

      Lucy had been in the park. They found traces of her, far away from where her mother said she had been going. About a mile through the woods, there was a playground close to Forge Dam, the last dam. In the café by the playground at the end of the woods, the owner came out into the sunshine for a cigarette, and said, ‘Yes, little girl, fair-haired, yes, she was here earlier this morning, around tenish. She bought an ice cream.’ He thought for a bit. ‘And a piece of cake. I asked her if it was for the ducks. I’ve seen her up here before and her mum buys cake for the ducks.’

      ‘Is this her?’ The officer showed him a picture and he nodded.

      ‘That’s the one. Has anything … ?’

      ‘Was anyone with her?’ The radio on the man’s jacket crackled and said something the café owner couldn’t catch. The policeman spoke briefly and quietly into the radio, then returned to his question.

      ‘Yes … Well, I think so.’

      ‘Who was it? Could you describe the person who was with her?’

      Feeling more uneasy now, the café owner thought back. He hadn’t really seen, now he came to think of it. She’d come to the side window of the café twice, once for ice cream and once for cake and a drink. He hadn’t actually seen anyone. ‘I don’t know,’ he said, slowly. ‘I just assumed … I didn’t see anyone.’

      It had been a quiet morning, a quiet day. Some walkers had passed through earlier, shortly after nine, and had stopped for a cup of tea. He’d seen people go past on their way up to the dam or beyond. The path formed part of the Sheffield Round Walk, and also offered a walkers’ route into the Derbyshire Peak District. It was a busy path. Some of the passers-by might have stopped at the dam, spent the day fishing, he didn’t know. He’d kept an eye on the café – quiet as he’d said – done his books, had the telly on for some of the time. The officer, making notes, realized gloomily that if this became a real inquiry, someone would have the job of tracking these people down, asking them what they had seen, trying to find out if there was anyone who’d been through that way who hadn’t come forward, and if that person hadn’t come forward was it because he knew all too well what had happened to the missing child.

      Suzanne knew that something had made the police more concerned now. The arrival of a man in civilian clothes, a detective, made the knot in her stomach tighten. She felt uneasy around the police. She had too many memories of Adam, the voice on the phone. I’m afraid we’ve got Adam here again. He’s been … And her father. You deal with it, Suzanne. This is your responsibility. She’d trusted them then, listened to them, done what they’d said. She could still hear the woman’s voice. Just tell us where Adam is. We want to help the lad, Suzanne.

      The man introduced himself as Detective Inspector Steve McCarthy. He checked quickly through the same things Hazel had done, asking one or two more questions as he went. Suzanne was impressed by his efficiency, but found him brusque and cold. Then he began asking about Emma – how well Jane knew her, what she did, where she lived. Jane’s face went whiter as he told her that Emma wasn’t a student, and had never been an official tenant at number fourteen.

      Suzanne hadn’t realized before how much they had taken Emma on trust, because they knew her – or thought they did. This was why the police were so concerned. There was something wrong with Emma. She moved to sit on the arm of Jane’s chair. She put her arm round Jane and said, ‘We know Emma well. We both do. She’s Sophie’s friend.’ He raised an eyebrow at her in query, and she realized what a thin recommendation it sounded.

      She told him about Sophie, about her parents, her tutor, the course she had been doing. ‘That’s how we got to know Emma,’ she explained. When he said nothing, she asked, ‘What’s wrong? There’s something about Emma, isn’t there?’

      ‘We СКАЧАТЬ