Rainstone Fall

Chapter Twenty-One

Five minutes to eight.

I felt chilly even though I was still only standing in the hall of my own house. Annis pulled me hard against her. ‘You make sure you come back to me, okay, Honeypot? No heroics, just do as you’re told for once and bring them back. Promise?’

‘I love you, Annis.’

‘I know, Chris.’

This time, apparently, it counted. It also saved me from having to make promises I might not be able to keep.

In the yard, parked as close as possible to the front door, the Landy had been ‘warming up’. I got in and mentally went over everything again. There wasn’t much to check. The stamp in its envelope and the Rodin were on the back, wrapped in black plastic and covered with a bit of old carpet. I myself was wrapped in a scratchy grey blanket, the only one I could find, making me already feel like the survivor of some kind of disaster. Despite the kidnapper’s warning I was wearing basketball shoes. If he objected he could always make me take them off. I had my mobile, as instructed. I had also purloined Tim’s far flashier mobile, and his Bluetooth headset, without bothering to tell him, because I had made no decisions yet about what to do when I got there and was literally going to play this by ear. I put my mobile on the dash, stuck the Bluetooth set on my right ear and let my hair fall over it. I set Tim’s mobile next to me on the seat.

Eight o’clock.

I waved to Annis in the doorway, silhouetted against the warm light of the house, put the engine in gear and rumbled out of the yard.

The heater in a 1960s Land Rover was a well-known joke and Annis’s decrepit example was no exception. Only most people who complained about how bad their Landy’s heater was didn’t usually drive it half-naked through a late-October night.

My mobile chimed its hateful little tune. I answered it. ‘I’m on the move, so where am I going?’

‘Patience. You’re on your lonesome, like I told you?’

‘I am.’

‘And you are unarmed and in your shorts?’

‘Unarmed, freezing cold and half-naked, apart from a pair of basketball shoes.’

‘Who said you could wear those?’

‘You want me to slip on the brake and drive your Rodin into a ditch?’

He grunted reluctant agreement. ‘Where are you?’

‘Top of my drive.’

‘Turn left and keep going until you get to the London Road. Keep the line open. If you disconnect your mobile even for one second then the deal is off and the woman will feel the consequences.’

I turned and drove slowly along the unlit, narrow road through the valley. The worn blades of the windscreen wipers squeaked as they ineffectually scraped at the renewed offering of rain falling out of the blackness. I was once more on the move, on my own, with the spoils from a robbery. My memories of the hold-up on Charlcombe Lane were still vivid in my mind. What was to stop the kidnapper from taking the plunder off me by force when I got to my dark destination, and go on indefinitely with his demands? Now that he had abducted a second victim he could afford to kill one of them simply to demonstrate the seriousness of his threat, if he hadn’t already done so.

As I reached the sodium-lit London Road at Batheaston I put the phone to my ear. ‘I’m there.’

‘Turn right. Drive carefully and at legal speeds. Don’t attract attention. When you reach Bailbrook Lane, turn into it.’

There was not a lot of traffic on the road, it was dark and the rain was hammering down; chances were that no one would remember a dirty old Landy. The goose bumps on my arms were an indication not just of how cold I felt but also of the hideousness of the realization that this time I really was in deep shit, just as Needham had predicted. I had let myself be drawn into the deepest mess of my dubious career and my only backup was Tim’s dinky little Bluetooth mobile. The turn-off into narrow Bailbrook Lane came up quickly. Bumping the car into it I asked for instructions.

‘You know this lane? You must do. Just keep going until you get to the highest point from where you can have a good look over Larkhall and the rest. Then stop.’

He was right, I knew the lane well. It skirted the bottom of Solsbury Hill, made famous beyond its stature by some dippy song. Dark, evergreen hedgerows whizzed past on either side as I hustled the Landy along. A particularly nasty pothole made my load jump on the back and I slowed down a bit. Soon after I’d passed the rusty corrugated iron mission church the view opened out. The lights of Larkhall and Lower Swainswick twinkled below. I stopped. ‘I can see Larkhall below. Now what?’

‘Turn off your lights.’

I did as I was told. At least it might save them having to bash them in with baseball bats. It was baseball, last time, I remembered it clearly. Unlike poor old Albert who’d apparently been hit with a cricket bat. Same result I should think.

‘Now turn them on again and flash your lights. Very good. Just wanted to be sure you were where you said you were. I can see you. Which means I’ll also be able to see any monkey business. Well, what are you waiting for? Come on down.’

It was quieter in the cab because the engine was still in neutral and I thought I heard an engine start up at the speaker’s end. I put the phone on the dash and kept on driving downhill, over the bypass and plunged further down until I reached the bottom.

‘Where exactly are you now?’ he asked after I’d announced my arrival.

‘St Saviour’s to the left. Dead Mill Lane to the right.’

‘You’ve gone too far. Take Dead Mill Lane. Then turn left and take the second turn on the left again. And keep going.’

I had suspected it since he made me leave the London Road and this confirmed it: I was heading into the Lam Valley. Soon the now familiar tracks swallowed me up. I recognized this one in particular. Very soon it would bring me to Jack Fryer’s farm. I slowed down, fingering Tim’s mobile beside me on the bench. The farm buildings hove into view on my left.

Dimly illuminated by a single watery bulb fixed to a telegraph pole in the yard the main structures of Spring Farm squatted in the wet darkness like black cattle depressed by the rain. I speed dialled the number for Mill House on Tim’s mobile while driving slowly up to the gate, peering into the gloom beyond. The dial tone snarled in my ear via the headset. I stopped. This didn’t feel right at all.

‘Hello?’ Annis’s voice in my ear.

A door opened in a concrete shed on the other side of the yard. Fryer’s farmhand shielded his eyes against the glare of the Landy’s light, looking puzzled.

‘I’m at Spring Farm,’ I said into the mobile.

‘Hello? Is that you, Chris?’ Annis spoke into my ear.

‘Keep going, follow the sign, don’t stop until you get there,’ came the impatient voice on the other mobile.

This was the wrong place. I hastily reversed back into the lane and drove on.

‘Did you say Spring Farm? Hello? All I can hear is noise now,’ Annis said in a faint voice, to Tim, presumably. Both mobiles started crackling as I drove deeper into the darkness of the valley, then reception died. How would I get my instructions now?

The answer stood at the turn to the narrow track on the left. A roughly made blank finger post had been rammed into the soft verge. It pointed forlornly down towards the ford of the Lam brook. This slippery track led to only one place: Grumpy Hollow. One way in, one way out.

I cranked the wheel over and plunged the ghostly signpost back into darkness as I followed its direction down towards the Hollow.

When I reached Gemma Stone’s herb farm I turned off both mobiles. I no longer needed them.

I had arrived.