The Claw

Twenty-five

In a couple of days both Liz and her ideas were exhausted. Haw did people in novels always know where to search? Because the author always left them a clue – there was always something the police had overlooked. But if the police hadn't searched where Liz was searching, she suspected that it was simply because it was useless.

She drove along the coast, stopping at every antique shop to poke through the musty clutter: books with rickety faded covers, chipped furniture, dusty glass and copper and porcelain – until Anna grew bored and wandered out into the sunlight, and Liz had to keep running to the door like a nervous shoplifter to make sure she was still there. She krlew Anna was basically sensible and wouldn't just wander off, so why was Liz so nervous? She didn't want Anna out of her sight, that was all.

The whole thing seemed hopeless. Why would even a teenage thief sell stolen property in shops like these? Liz drove inland to Norwich and bought all the collectors' journals she could find, then felt compelled to search the shops there too. The streets were full of cars, coasting by or waiting at the kerb, and she refused to let Anna stay outside. When the child said, 'What are you looking for, mummy?' she had to mutter vaguely about a present. She wasn't sure if Anna believed her.

Back home she pored over the journals. Anna offered to help, and so Liz had to watch television with her instead. When the child had gone to bed, Liz searched the columns of items for sale until the tiny print began to writhe before her eyes like dancing snakes and ceased to look like words. Why should thieves advertise? Why should they be less intelligent than she was? In a world that contained so many unsolved crimes, it was ridiculous to look for clues. At last she stumbled upstairs to bed and dreamed she was searching for goats.

Sunlight woke her. Anna had drawn the curtains and was sitting next to her, waiting patiently for her to wake. 'Shall we go on the beach today, mummy?' she said.

The day was too bright to waste. 'Yes, let's have a picnic – just the two of us.'

She hadn't been awake enough to choose her words. On the beach she found they'd lodged in her mind like the memory of a disturbing dream. Anna seemed happy to search for stones for Rebecca, but Liz was unable to relax, even when she started on a half-bottle of Chianti. The sky was cloudless, the sand sparkled minutely, the sea was calm except for an enormous impersonal whispering. Everything felt as flat as it looked, and accentuated how far she was from anyone else on the beach. She used to like the feeling of not being crowded, but just now she would have welcomed company. She wondered if Barbara Mason still wanted to stay. Probably Barbara had made other plans by now.

Liz was glad when a family set up camp nearby, windbreak and folding chairs and a hamper. Their two children were throwing a striped ball that kept peppering her wine with sand, but she was pleased when Anna progressed from returning the ball to playing with the other children. Really, she ought to have the chance to play with children of her own age more often; no wonder she was frustrated sometimes. Of course there was always the hotel nursery, but it wasn't the same. If only her school and her friends weren't miles away along the coast! Liz could have driven her there to visit, except that the drive would take her away from the phone, and she wanted to be near it – even though she had no idea what she was waiting for.

When the children came hungrily back to their parents, bare feet glittering with sand, the family invited Liz and Anna to share their picnic. Liz had brought plenty, but accepted a token hard-boiled egg and chatted to them as she surreptitiously picked fragments of eggshell out of the soft white flesh. Yes, she lived here. Yes, her husband worked here. He was a writer, a writer of crime fiction. Yes, it did get lonely round here in the winter sometimes. She offered them some wine, but the woman's long face stiffened beneath the dyed hair, and the bull-necked man's lips pursed. Before long they were packing their hamper and shifting camp along the beach. As they left, the woman opened her handbag. 'I think you should have this,' she told Liz.

It was a pamphlet from the Evangelical Tract Society of Hinckley: a testimony of religious conversion written by a schoolboy shordy before he was knocked down and killed by a car. It didn't seem much of an argument for getting religion. Had the woman given her the pamphlet because she was drinking or because her husband wrote crime stories? No doubt both activities were frowned upon.

Anna went back to searching for the best stones. A water-skier raced by on his leash, feathering the water; otherwise there was nobody for half a mile. Liz wished she could close her eyes for a little – she felt as though the beach and the sea were pressing against them, burning them – but she kept nodding and waking, thinking she could hear a phone, or that someone was spying on her from the cliff, or that Anna had run away. She mustn't doze in case Anna wandered too far. Joseph was locked up, yet the day of the pillbox was still fresh in her memory, and with it the figure she'd seen in the dark. She narrowed her eyes to keep out some of the light, and watched Anna search.

Then her eyes widened. Suppose Alan had been right to search down here? Suppose he hadn't looked far enough? All at once, to Anna's surprise, Liz was searching too. Anna looked pleased that her mother was helping her.

It didn't seem a good idea for very long. There were grey gleams everywhere, and it was impossible to tell whether or not they were stones until she went to look.

Suppose the claw was under the stones? Then a hundred people might never find it, let alone one woman and a child.

'You haven't seen anything of your father's down here, have you?' Liz said, suddenly wondering if Anna could have seen the claw down here, and, if she already had, whether she would say so.

Eventually Liz gave up. She kept thinking she could hear a phone. Besides, she couldn't shake off the notion that someone was pacing her along the top of the cliff, peering down at her. Every reddish glimpse up there looked like a figure, though whenever she glanced upward there was no sign of anyone, nor of anything red. Why did she feel as if it were Anna's fault? She must have had too much to drink. 'I think I need to get out of the sun for a while,' she said. 'Come home while I have a lie-down.'

She knew nobody would be waiting at the top of the path. The snuffling sound was only the wind. Or perhaps it had been a goat. When she reached the top, the goats were quite near, until they fled to another patch of relatively green grass. They were all that she could see; the sun was in her eyes, eating away the oudine of her house. She must be drunk, for in some way the goats seemed an answer. But what on earth was the question? Head down, she hurried blindly toward the house.

As she entered the shadow of the house, she faltered. The plunge into shade was too sudden – the grass looked almost black – and so she couldn't really be seeing a red trail that led across the garden to the house. She hurried to the front door and scraped the key into the lock. 'Hurry up, child,' she said to Anna, pushing her inside.

In the hall she found that she was virtually blind. No wonder she almost tripped over Anna, who had halted. 'It's all right,' Liz said harshly. The low blurred voice coming from the long room must be the television or the radio. Anna had left one or the other switched on, that was all. Half-blind, Liz strode to the door of the room and threw it open. Yes, it was the television. Anna really must learn to be less careless and untidy; she'd left some article of clothing on a chair in front of the set, a dark blur against the screen. But as Liz stumbled forward, dizzy with drink and sunlight and needing to sit down, the blur rose up in front of her. She screamed.

'I'm sorry, I didn't mean to alarm you,' Isobel said.

Anna was giggling uncontrollably, perhaps from shock. 'You stop that right now, miss,' Liz said furiously, 'or I'll give you something to make you stop.' She turned on Isobel. 'How did you get in?'

'Why, the front door was open. I assumed you'd stepped out for a moment. Weren't you aware that it was?'

'No, I wasn't,' Liz said, and thought that she sounded accusing. That would do no good, even though she hated the idea of Isobel prying into her home. 'I've been a bit distracted lately,' she said.

'Yes, quite. I hope you don't mind, I made coffee while I was waiting. Let me get you some.'

Liz sat down while the blackened room paled and swam back into focus. She had to close her eyes before she could get rid of some of the dollops of blackness. Now she could see Anna, who looked upset by the way she'd snapped at her. Before Liz could apologize, the child followed Isobel to the kitchen. Wonderful, Liz thought. Just the way to make Isobel think that the child wouldn't even stay with her mother.

When Isobel brought in the coffee, Anna returned with a glass of lemonade for herself. Liz smiled at her, but she wasn't looking. 'Would you like to find yourself something to do in your playroom, Anna?' Isobel said. 'Your mother and I would like to talk privately.'

Did Isobel want to take over the running of the house? Once Anna had gone, Isobel said, 'Well, dear, what seems to be the trouble?'

'I don't know that anything is.'

'Oh, really, dear, you mustn't try to keep things from me. What's the trouble between Alan and yourself? Why did he go away so suddenly?'

'Because he needs to do more research.'

'Is that your story? I see.' Isobel shook her head sadly. 'Don't you think it's strange that he went away without telling me?'

'No, not particularly,' Liz said, and almost added: Not when he married me for his freedom.

'Well, I do. We always used to be close. It isn't like him to leave me worrying like that.' Now she was offended. 'And how long is he supposed to be staying away?'

'I really couldn't tell you, Isobel.'

'Well then, there's something wrong there, don't you think?' She seemed to be debating which approach to take. 'I wonder,' she said, as if performing a duty, 'if he'd stay away if he could hear some of the talk.'

'What talk? What on earth do you mean?'

'I don't like spreading gossip. Still, it's best you should know what's being said.' She frowned like a headmistress conducting an unpleasant interview. 'I put you on your honour, Elizabeth. Is it true that after Alan had gone away, you left the child alone in the house while you went to a party at the hotel?'

'You put me on what? Who the hell do you think you are? No, it certainly isn't true, and you'd better tell me who said it.'

'I'm sure you understand that I can't do that. I was told it in confidence. In fact, I can't remember who it was. Anyway, that's rather beside the point. You won't deny that the child came crying to you at the hotel?'

'No,' Liz said dangerously, 'I won't deny that.'

'Then you can appreciate why people are talking. They're worried about you.'

'Worried how?*

'Really, dear, you force me to say these things. They're worried about your behaviour lately.'

Liz remembered the night that Alan had virtually accused her of wanting to ill-treat Anna – the night before he'd left her. 'Let me make something clear to you. Alan was still here the night she came running to the hotel. Here with her, do you understand that? That's why she came running to me. Maybe you should start worrying about his behaviour.'

Isobel held up one hand. 'I really think that's rather cheap, accusing him in order to defend yourself. I should have expected better of you. He would never harm the child. At least, he wouldn't have when I knew him,' she said with a kind of bitter triumph, 'when he lived with me.'

'But he wouldn't have been able to have a child then, would he? That would have been taking things a bit too far.'

'I don't know what you mean, and I don't want to know. You can be very coarse sometimes.' She shook off her disgust. 'In any case, dear, we shouldn't be quarrelling. Don't feel that you have to defend yourself to me. I know how much of a strain it can be to bring up a child single-handed. That's really all I came to say. I'll take the child off your hands for a while whenever you need a rest from her.'

Just now, despite all that had been said, it seemed a tempting offer. 'All right, Isobel, I'll tell her you've invited her.'

'I hope you'll allow her to decide for herself whether she wants to come.'

'Of course I will. What are you trying to say? I don't keep her locked up, you know.' She was tired of the argument; she wanted to be alone to think, if she could. At least, she thought she wanted to be alone, but now she wasn't even sure of that; her head was pounding. 'I'd like to be quiet now, Isobel. I'll be in touch if I need you.'

At the front door – rather grotesquely under the circumstances, Liz thought – Isobel said, 'I hope you'll both still come for dinner,' and wouldn't leave until they'd agreed a date. Liz stood gazing at the flat landscape long after Isobel had driven away. Who was spreading stories about her? How dare they suggest that she wasn't looking after the child as well as she possibly could, considering all that she had to put up with?

But there was another problem, more immediate and perhaps more disturbing. How had Isobel got into the house? The more she thought about it, the more Liz was convinced that she hadn't left the door open at all.