Читать книгу The Mother’s Lies - Joanne Sefton - Страница 13

Katy

The honeysuckle made no difference; Katy couldn’t tell them anything.

The builders and their machines had changed the very shape of the earth. It had been moulded and flattened and moulded again, like the sandpits in the infant school.

‘Well, did you come in to the left of the oak, or the right of the oak? The damn tree’s not moved!’ The sergeant with the moustache was making no effort to hide his annoyance.

Katy could remember there being trees; she didn’t know if the one he was waving at had been one of them. She wanted to tell him that she’d been terrified and panicking. That she’d barely slept and it was the furthest she’d ever gone from home on her own. When she thought about that day, it was through a fog of guilt, the horror of what she’d done weighing down on her with each day she got older, each day she spent at Ashdown. Mr Robertson might understand, but she knew this man never would.

‘I only remember there being a road sweeping up ahead of me,’ she said, and the muscles round her mouth twitched oddly as she fought back tears. ‘There was a bank of loose earth and stones. That’s where … that’s where …’

‘It’s okay.’ Miss Silver stepped closer, patting her arm.

‘It’s bloody well not okay,’ interjected the policeman. ‘How far from the site perimeter was this road? How far did you have to walk to get to it?’

Katy shook her head. She couldn’t answer.

‘How was the road orientated? Which direction did it go in?’

‘I don’t know.’ Her lips formed the words, but there was no voice.

The man’s face was in hers now. She could see the smattering of ginger hairs in his brown moustache, and the spittle catching at the corners of his lips.

‘There were signs bloody everywhere; what did the signs say? How high was this banking? How far were you from the building itself?’

Eventually it was over. The little group picked its way across the field and back to the car park, the policeman muttering darkly about not having any more of this sort of little jolly. Katy managed to keep her silence, though a few tears escaped down her cheeks. They didn’t sting like they had in the cold of January. The inspector went ahead to where Etta Gardiner stood, the same constable still by her side. Katy couldn’t hear what he said, but she heard Etta’s loud gasp and saw the inspector’s white handkerchief flutter as he pulled it out to comfort her. Although they kept a good distance away, Katy’s cheeks burned as they walked past, feeling Etta’s gaze track her all the way to the Austin.

That was it. They wouldn’t be back in time for dinner and would have to get something on the road, Mr Robertson noted with a strained cheerfulness. For a moment, Katy imagined running. Never having to go back to Ashdown with its menace and melancholy and stink of boiled cabbage. She could bury her face in the smell of the wet earth and go to sleep cradled in the scent of honeysuckle without ever waking up.

She didn’t run. It would give the creep with the moustache too much satisfaction.

As Mr Robertson made heavy weather of turning the Austin, she caught a final glimpse of Etta through the window. There was a man beside her, his slim, slightly hunched figure unmistakable. Simon Gardiner handed his wife a posy of white narcissus and linked arms with her to walk towards the fence where Katy guessed the flowers were to be laid. Etta leant in to him as they walked the few steps, almost collapsing in his arms as they drew to a pause.

White for innocence, Katy thought. If only you knew, Etta Gardiner.

The Austin wheeled round abruptly and the tableau was gone.

Katy made a silent vow. One day I’ll show her what he is. One day I’ll show everyone.