The Child Who

14

Their house was on fire. In the midnight dark that had swallowed the evening, that was how it seemed. The bedroom, the kitchen, the hallway, the study: each of the windows at the front of the house was ablaze with light. It was as though every curtain had been hauled back and every bulb angled to fend off the encroaching darkness. The effect, truly, was that the house was being consumed; that Leo would open the front door and be blinded, burned. And it was Megan at home. The woman who had been parentally programmed to turn out the light in the kitchen if she were popping upstairs to use the bathroom. Had Leo come home to find flames feasting on the mock-Tudor timbers, he did not think he would have been any more alarmed.

He did not wait for his change. He spilled from the taxi and hurried up the driveway and rang the bell at the same time as fishing for his key. He found it, found the lock, but when he turned the key the door clung tight to the frame. It had been bolted on the inside, top and bottom it felt like. He rang the bell again and rapped with his good set of knuckles. ‘Meg?’ He listened, rapped again. ‘Meg, it’s me.’

Shuffling, scrabbling – the sound of the bolts sliding back. The door opened, on the chain, then shut again to allow the chain to be unhooked. Finally Megan showed herself, pale and looking frayed in the unrelenting light.

‘Leo. Where have you been!’

‘What? I was…’ He had told her, surely, about his trip to London. ‘In a meeting,’ he said. ‘What’s going on, Meg? You look… Why are all the lights on?’ The question did not come out as intended. It was the tone he might have used with Ellie had he discovered that his daughter had left a tap running or the television blaring.

‘Come inside,’ Megan said. She peered into the outdoors and kept watching until she had sealed them both inside the house.

In the hallway, Leo sniffed. ‘What’s that smell?’ He angled his nostrils towards his wife. ‘Have you been smoking?’ Again, the tone. Christ, Leo.

‘I’m fine, dear husband. Thank you for asking.’ Megan turned away from him and towards the kitchen. Leo followed but lingered in the doorway. He watched Megan set herself behind the counter. On the worktop was a wine glass, half full, and a bottle of red, half empty. There was a saucer beside the bottle containing the charred filter of a single cigarette, and a Zippo, next to the saucer, that Leo had long since assumed lost. Neither Megan nor he had smoked a cigarette in over a decade – since Megan’s thirtieth birthday. So Leo had thought.

‘Megan? What’s going on?’

His wife, to Leo’s surprise, replied with a laugh. She shook her head, picked up her wine and spluttered as she took a sip. She wiped around her mouth with the hinge of her thumb.

‘Where’s Ellie?’ said Leo, casting round. ‘Is she upstairs?’ He took a step into the room. ‘Megan? Will you please just tell me—’

‘Ellie’s at Sophie’s house. I rang and checked. She wouldn’t talk to me, of course. She’s still angry because I made her go to school.’

‘You made her go to school?’ Every question Leo asked seemed to come out as an accusation.

‘What else was I supposed to do! You said you’d talk to her, Leo. Today, you said: two days ago. Yesterday you said the same and then this morning you were gone before dawn and all she’s been doing is sitting and moping in her room! I just… I thought… I just thought it would be better for her…’

‘Meg. Calm down. It’s fine. She went to school. She’s at her friend’s house. Everything’s fine.’

‘Everything’s not fine, Leo! Everything’s far from bloody fine!’

Megan turned. She clumsily set down her wine glass and reached to open the cupboard above the cooker – the cupboard no one in their family ever used. Leo watched, wondering what on earth Megan would produce that would explain things, but the object she brought down solved another mystery entirely. It was a tin, barely big enough to contain a packet of cigarettes. Megan plucked a cigarette from the box. Her fingers shook as she lit it and her face, when she dragged, puckered.

‘Meg? You’re smoking. I mean, why are you smoking?’

Megan exhaled. She glared as though daring him to go on. When he failed to, she propped an elbow on her wrist and dangled the cigarette level with her chin. She started forwards, trailed by smoke. ‘In here.’

Leo watched her go. He looked at the tin, the cigarette packet – and then he followed. In the hallway again he noticed a chair in front of the door to the living room. Not just in front of it: the seat back was wedged under the handle.

‘What is it? What’s in there?’

‘Nothing,’ Megan said. She reached for the chair and scraped it free. She did not open the door, however. She stood aside as though waiting for Leo to go first.

‘Meg?’ He looked at her. When she did not answer he faced the door. He grasped the handle but kept it at arm’s length. The door opened and he held it ajar, then gradually eased it wider. The space beyond was black. It was surely the only room in the house in which Megan had neglected to turn on the light. Leo submerged his hand in the darkness and frisked the wall for the light switch. He found it, flicked it, and braced himself for what he might see.

He turned to Megan, who was peering now across his shoulder. ‘Meg?’ he said and stepped into the room. ‘There’s nothing in here.’

Megan continued looking. ‘That’s what I said.’ She did not, though, sound convinced.

Leo spread his arms and glanced about. There was just the sofa, the television, the piles here and there of everyday clutter. The only thing amiss was that the curtains, like those in the rest of the house, would normally by now have been drawn. The bay, with the light on, was a span of impenetrable blackness. Leo moved to cover it.

‘Leo!’

He stopped halfway to the window. ‘What? I was just going to—’

‘Don’t. Leave it. Can we… Let’s go back into the kitchen.’ Megan waited for Leo to follow her.

‘Megan. Honestly. What on earth are you so frightened of?’ Now it was Leo who sounded uncertain. He looked again at the window.

Megan raised her cigarette but it had burnt already to the filter. She looked for somewhere to dispose of it and settled on the soil beneath the Kentia palm beside the door. When she unbent she folded her arms.

‘There was a man.’ She spoke across Leo’s shoulder. ‘There. At the window.’ She shuddered and wrapped herself tighter.

‘A man?’ Leo looked where his wife was looking. ‘I don’t understand. What man?’

‘I don’t know what man! Just a man! Staring at me! Pressed against the glass and… and… leering!’

‘Leering?’

‘Leo, don’t!’

He had started again towards the window and this time he made it across the room. He pressed his face to the glass. ‘There’s no one out there, Meg. There’s no one there.’

‘Of course there’s no one there! He’s hardly going to sit around waiting for you to come home!’ She sniffed. ‘He’d be there all night.’

‘What was he doing?’ Leo said. ‘What did he want?’

‘It completely slipped my mind to ask,’ Megan said, sounding dangerously reasonable. ‘Maybe he just needed directions. Maybe he got lost delivering pizza.’

‘What? You think he was just—’

‘No!’

The word pealed. It took an age, it felt like, to fade.

‘He was in the bushes, Leo. In the dark, at the back of the house.’

Leo struggled for something to say but before he could settle on the words his wife, without warning, left the room. He trailed her back towards the kitchen.

‘Meg? What then? He was looking at you. “Leering,” you said. As in…’

Watching.

Leo stopped short at the threshold

I am watching. You will be judged by your lies.

Leo felt a tightening in his gut. Ellie. He thought again of Ellie. ‘Meg, wait. Ellie. Are you certain she’s at Sophie’s house? You said you didn’t speak to her. How do you know she was definitely there?’

Megan had a hand on her cigarettes. ‘What? What are you talking about?’

‘Ellie. If you didn’t speak to her, how do you know—’

‘I spoke to Sophie’s mother. She’s not going to lie to me, Leo.’

‘I’ll go and get her.’ Leo patted his pockets, checked about him for the car keys. ‘Shall I?’ But Megan. The man at the window. Fetching Ellie would mean leaving Megan on her own.

‘They’ll bring her over, Leo. Sophie’s father will, after dinner. Don’t you dare leave me here on my own.’

‘No. No,’ Leo said again. ‘Of course not.’

‘Leo?’ Megan was studying him. ‘What is it? Why are you suddenly acting so strangely?’

‘What? I’m not.’ Except: the notes. He should tell her about the notes. Shouldn’t he? A man at their living-room window, ground-up glass with the most recent note. Leo looked at his bandaged finger. It still hurt when he tried to bend it but the pain, apart from that, was fading.

He covered the injury with his other hand. By the sackload. Isn’t that what Dale had said? And if he told Meg while she was in this state – if he told her, actually, any time at all – there was no question she would insist he drop the case. And he couldn’t. He just could not.

Besides. A man at the window. It could have been anyone, no one.

‘Tell me again,’ he said to Megan. ‘The man. At the window. Did you see his face? What did he look like?’

‘He had a beard,’ Megan said. ‘He seemed big but maybe just because he was standing so close to the glass.’ She shivered, shook it off. ‘And his eyes were…’ She narrowed hers. ‘Bright. Light, I think.’ She made a gesture: that’s all. Rather: that’s enough.

‘But… You said it was dark. Didn’t you? How did you see him if—’

‘I’m not lying, Leo! I’m not making things up!’

Leo raised his hands. ‘I didn’t say you were. I’m just trying to understand, that’s all.’

‘He was smiling at me, Leo. Like he was gloating. Like me seeing him, being frightened by him, was the point.’

There was a rhythm in Leo’s chest and he breathed to try to settle it. ‘And then? What happened then?’

‘Then? Then he went,’ Megan said, her expression fierce. ‘Down the passageway, I assume.’ She looked at her wine glass on the counter. ‘I ran around checking all the windows, all the doors, but everything was locked. After that I shut the curtains. But that was worse, somehow, so I opened them again.’

‘And turned on the lights.’

Megan did not answer.

‘What about after that? Did you see him again after that?’

‘No. I didn’t. The first time was enough, I promise you.’

‘But you didn’t call the police? Why did you not call the police?’

‘I thought about it. I called your office instead. No one seemed to know where you were.’ She tipped her head. ‘Where were you, Leo? Were you with him?’

‘I… I should get a mobile,’ Leo answered, to distract her. ‘They’re expensive but if it means you’re more at ease. That you’re able to contact me in… When there’s an…’ He did not want to say the word.

Megan made a noise: something between a scoff and a sigh. ‘It was hardly an emergency, Leo.’

He looked at his wife in surprise.

‘I was scared,’ she said. ‘Probably he was just… just some…’ She shook her head. ‘I was on edge. After arguing with Ellie, after not knowing where you’d gone. And, anyway, there’s a less expensive solution. If you’re so worried about cost, I mean. If you’re worried about putting me at ease.’

And here it came. Exactly as Leo had predicted. Was this, really, what this whole thing was all about?

‘We’ve discussed this, Meg.’

‘No, Leo, we haven’t. Not properly.’

‘We’ve said all we need to. Don’t you think? I know how you feel, you know how I feel. At the end of the day, it’s my decision. I’m not going to be swayed just because you… because of some…’ He gestured loosely towards the living room.

‘Your decision?’ Megan seemed to wrestle for a moment with her fury. She closed her eyes and clasped her forehead. ‘Can’t you see?’ she said at last. ‘Don’t you realise how this is hurting us? You, me. Ellie above all. And why? For some evil little…’ She shook her head in lieu of the noun.

‘Evil? How do you know he’s evil? Christ, Meg, you haven’t even met him!’

‘I don’t want to meet him! That’s the last thing I would want to do! And what’s evil, Leo, if not what he did? What’s evil if not him?’

Leo directed his disgust towards the floor. ‘You don’t understand,’ he said. ‘You can’t possibly understand.’

‘I understand perfectly. Better than you do, clearly.’

‘Meaning what exactly?’

‘Meaning why you’re doing this. Meaning what it is you’re trying to prove!’

‘Trying to prove? The only thing I’m trying to prove is that this boy – this child – needs help, not a life in prison.’ Leo shook his head, forgetting for an instant that he was in the middle of an argument. ‘You should meet Daniel’s parents, Meg. In their way they’re as messed up as he is. I mean, it’s no wonder, when you think about it, that—’

‘I don’t care!’ Megan gripped the air. ‘I don’t know why you care! Why you seem to care more about a murderer than you do about your family!’

‘That’s not true! And he’s not a—’

Leo stopped himself. Megan stared. She did not speak but she did not have to.

Leo coughed. ‘That… that’s not true,’ he said. ‘You and Ellie come first. You know you do.’

Megan moved from her position by the counter. ‘Then put us first, Leo. Please.’