Half the World Away

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

‘Mummy, phone!’ Finn stands at the kitchen door, waving the handset. I’m fetching the washing in. I dump the clothes in the basket and take it from him. ‘Hello?’

‘Mrs Maddox?’

‘Yes?’

‘My name’s Dawn Jeffreys. I’m Lori’s friend, in Chengdu.’

‘Dawn, yes.’ My pulse speeds up – there’s drumming up my spine. I move to sit on the bench, willing her to say, Don’t worry, she’s here, I just spoke to her, everything’s OK.

‘I heard about Lori, that she’s missing. I’m so sorry.’ The line is clear but her Australian twang is unfamiliar so I have to concentrate hard to follow.

‘You haven’t seen her? Or heard anything? You don’t know where she is?’

The sparrows are fighting over the bird-feeder, jostling for purchase.

‘No, I’m sorry.’ There’s a slight delay between one of us speaking and the other person hearing it.

‘When did you see her last?’ I say.

‘Thursday, the third of April.’

After the blog. Suddenly that seems good. We thought that the Wednesday was her last contact. But Dawn saw her on Thursday. I feel giddy. So it’s not twenty-one days now, it’s twenty.

‘Didn’t you think it was odd,’ I say, ‘that there was no word from her?’

There’s a pause and I hear a muffled sound, gulping. Dawn is crying. ‘We broke up,’ she says, her voice choked, ‘that Thursday. I thought she needed some space… I…’

Oh, God. The racket from the sparrows drowns her out, forcing me inside through the kitchen to the stairway, far enough from the kids’ television to hear her.

‘Everybody here is doing what they can,’ she says. ‘The police have been talking to us.’

‘Was she OK about the break-up?’ Could this be the reason for Lori’s silence? A broken heart triggering a crisis? I’m shaken, then feel a flicker of anger that Dawn rejected her.

‘It was her decision,’ Dawn says.

Lori ended the relationship. Why? I struggle to reorient myself. ‘Right,’ I say.

‘And she was around on the Friday – there was a party,’ Dawn says.

The Friday. Nineteen days. ‘Do you think she might have gone away somewhere?’

‘I don’t know,’ Dawn says. ‘No one here has heard anything from her.’ She gulps again.

I can’t think what else to say, still trying to process the new information. ‘Dawn, can I take your number so we can talk again?’

‘Of course.’

‘I’ll just get a pen.’

She reads it out and gives me her email address as well. Our goodbyes are clumsy, speaking over each other, my timing disrupted by all the new questions crowding behind me. And at the core of them, like a heartbeat, driven and relentless: Where are you, where are you, where are you, Lori?

‘How long do we give them?’ Tom is on the phone to Jeremy Chadwick at the Foreign Office, badgering him. ‘It’s been a week since the Chinese police started work,’ he says, ‘and we have to hear second-hand from a mate of Lori’s, who had the decency to get in touch, that Lori was seen on Friday, the fourth, two days later than we thought. Why are the police not keeping us updated?’

‘They may wish to complete their enquiries-’

‘No, that’s not right,’ Tom says. ‘We’re being kept in the dark. And that means that the information we’re using for the appeal is inaccurate. That’s not helping anybody. A week, and they’ve given us nothing. Nothing.’

I can hear the voice, tinny through the handset. ‘It isn’t very long in the scheme of things. A missing-person inquiry can take many months.’

‘Well, we’re not going to sit around on our arses any longer.’

I flinch at Tom’s rudeness – he sees, and juts out his chin, his eyes hard.

Nick arrives back from taking the kids to school and walking Benji. He stands in the doorway.

‘How many people are on the team looking for her? Exactly what are they doing?’ Tom says.

‘I don’t have all those details,’ Jeremy Chadwick says, ‘but I can assure you that they are taking this situation very seriously. Our relationship with the authorities-’

‘I don’t want assurances,’ Tom says, ‘I want action. I want results.’

I’m shaking my head at Tom, signalling with my hands for him to turn it down. Nick watches. I can’t read the look on his face – scepticism, disdain?

‘As do we all,’ says Jeremy Chadwick.

‘I want to come out there,’ Tom says, ‘come and help search.’

Nick looks at me, questioning.

The prospect of travelling to Chengdu has arisen but in a vague way, mentioned as something that might eventually happen, if necessary. But it’s not something that’s ever been thought through. Now, though, I share Tom’s sense of urgency. Inside my fears thrash and churn. Staying put, carrying on as we have been with calls and interviews for the papers, with emails and Twitter, knowing we’re five thousand miles away, is no longer bearable. As soon as Tom says it, I know that he’s right: we have to act.

I glance away from Nick.

‘That’s an option,’ says Jeremy Chadwick.

‘Right. Well, that’s what we’ll do. Can you let Peter Dunne know, in Chongqing?’

‘Certainly. The consulate will need to issue you with letters of invitation for the visa. They can be sent by email.’

When Tom’s hung up, he says to me, ‘I’ve got an auction at midday. Can you call Edward and ask for his help arranging flights and hotels?’

I nod.

‘What about vaccinations?’ Nick asks Tom.

‘I should be covered – I was in Thailand, year before last.’

‘I’m not,’ I say.

Tom stares at me, his light eyes brightening.

‘You’re not thinking-’ Nick stops abruptly.

Silence sings in the air.

‘Yes,’ I say to him, ‘of course.’

His face flushes.

‘I know you and I can’t both go,’ I say to Nick, ‘with the boys…’

‘But if Tom can…’ Nick says.

Tom busies himself, putting his laptop away.

We wait until he’s gone, the atmosphere thick with tension. Then I say to Nick, ‘I can’t stay here – it’s driving me mad.’

‘But you expect me to?’

‘Nick-’

‘You just do what you like, don’t you? You don’t even bother consulting me.’

‘It’s not what I like,’ I shout. ‘There’s nothing to like about it. For fuck’s sake…’

‘Maybe I should go. You’ve got work, the boys-’ Nick says.

‘You and Tom? That’s going to work really well,’ I say.

His face darkens. ‘I don’t have a problem with it. If he does-’

‘I’m going. I just think it’s best.’

‘We don’t even get to discuss it,’ he says. ‘I’m her parent too.’

I don’t reply. I walk round the table to get the phone.

‘Isn’t it a bit premature?’ he says.

‘I don’t know,’ I say, ‘a week, a month, a year. I don’t know. How can we possibly know if we’re being premature, or if it’s too late?’ The words are loud, raw and dirty. ‘Oh, God, I don’t mean that,’ I say quickly. ‘I don’t even think that. Oh, God, I don’t. But I can’t wait any more. At least we’ll be doing everything we can.’ My mouth is dry and I feel shaky. I fetch myself some water. As I drink it, Nick sits at the table, which is strewn with notes and copies of the press-release flier and typed lists of who has said what to whom. He tidies the papers into piles.

‘I have to go,’ I say.

There’s a pause. Then, ‘OK,’ he says quietly.

‘I’d better ring Edward,’ I say. Nick catches my wrist. He gets up and puts his arms around me. I’d like to let go, to weep in his embrace, but I don’t because I need to stay in control: I need to walk and talk and get things done. I rest my eyes a moment and breathe steadily until the danger is past. Then I make the phone call. The prospect of going to find her gives me something to cling to, like a guide rail to help me on a swaying bridge over a bottomless gorge.