The Crossing Places

CHAPTER 27

Nelson's mood is dark as he drives back to the station. The so-called 'information received' has turned out to be a load of bollocks. A man answering Erik Anderssen's description had been spotted at a King's Lynn pub. But when Nelson arrived at the pub it turned out to be folk music night, which meant that every man in the place answered to Erik Anderssen's description, grey ponytail, smug expression and all.

He glowers out at the rain as he edges through the Sunday night traffic. Then he thinks, sod it, and puts on his siren. The traffic parts for him in a way that he never ceases to find satisfying as he heads back to the station.

Christ, he hopes Ruth is OK. Still, she should be safely on her way to London now. Not that he thinks Erik will try to contact her. Privately, he's sure that he has already left the country, leapt on a late flight last night and is happily on the way to… where's a place in Norway? Oslo, that's it. He'll be sitting in a cafe in Oslo now, drinking whatever Norwegians drink and laughing his bearded head off.

The desk sergeant tells him that Ruth collected her car an hour ago. Nelson frowns. That's too late for his liking.

Whatever was she doing, hanging about all day? He'd spoken to her at lunchtime, she should have left straight away.

At his office door he is stopped by a WPC. He doesn't know her name but he composes his face into something like a smile. She is young (they get younger all the time) and looks nervous.

'Er… there's someone to see you, Detective Chief Inspector.'

'Yes?' he says encouragingly.

'He's in your office. He wouldn't leave a name.'

Why the hell hadn't he been stopped downstairs, thinks Nelson irritably. He pushes open the door and the first thing he sees is a swirl of purple cloak. He shuts the door behind him, very quickly indeed.

Cathbad is sitting, quite at his ease, on Nelson's side of the desk. He had his feet, encased in muddy trainers, actually on the desk. Nelson can see mud on one of his beautiful clean 'to do' lists.

'Get your feet off my desk!' he bellows.

'You really must watch that anger, Detective Chief Inspector,' says Cathbad. 'I'm sure you must have Aries rising.' But he takes his feet off the desk.

'Now get out of my chair,' says Nelson, breathing heavily.

'We own nothing in this world,' counters Cathbad, getting up fairly quickly all the same.

'Did you just come here to spout New Age rubbish at me?'

'No,' says Cathbad calmly. 'I've come to give you some information about Erik Anderssen. I thought I would bring the news in person so I slipped out when your two… er…

guards were otherwise occupied.'

Nelson's hands clench into fists as he thinks of the officers sent to watch Cathbad. They've made a fine job of surveillance. What the hell were they doing? Sheltering in their car probably, unwilling to face a cold night on the beach in Blakeney. Goons!

'What information? If you've come to tell me he's at a folk music gig you're wasting your breath.'

Cathbad ignores this. 'Erik telephoned me an hour ago.

He told me that he was on his way to see Ruth Galloway.'

Nelson's heart starts to beat faster but he forces himself to speak calmly. 'Why are you so keen to help the police all of a sudden?'

'I dislike the police,' says Cathbad loftily, 'but I abhor all forms of violence. Erik sounded distinctly violent to me. I think your friend Doctor Galloway could be in danger.'

Ruth lies in the reed bed, listening to the roar of the tide and the howling of the wind and thinks, what the hell am I going to do now? She can't go back to the house and every moment that she stays on the Saltmarsh adds to the danger. Soon the tide will come in and she has no idea if she is already on the tidal mudflats. But Ruth has no intention of cowering in the mud, waiting to die. She has to find a way out; at any rate she may as well run as lie here waiting for Erik to catch her. She starts to zigzag through the reeds, head down against the wind.

A mighty crack of thunder almost throws her off her feet. It's a deafening, industrial sound, like two express trains colliding. Immediately, another lightning blast turns the sky white. Christ, the storm must be right overhead. Is she going to be struck by lightning? Another explosion of thunder sends her, instinctively, down amongst the reeds with her arms over her head. She is lying in a shallow stream. This is dangerous. Water conducts electricity, doesn't it? She can't even remember if she is wearing rubber soles. She edges forward on her stomach. This is how she imagines the First World War; face down in the mud while mortar shells explode into the sky. And this is no-man's-land alright. Hand over hand, she crawls slowly forward.

Jaw clenched, Nelson drives like a maniac towards the Saltmarsh. Next to him, humming softly, sits Cathbad.

There is no-one whose company Nelson desires less, but there are two important reasons why Cathbad is currently occupying the passenger seat of Nelson's Mercedes. One, he claims to know the Saltmarsh 'like the back of his hand', and two, Nelson does not trust him to be out of his sight for a second.

Clough and Judy are following in a marked police car.

Both cars have their sirens blaring but there is little traffic as they scorch through the country lanes. The storm, raging unnoticed above them, has driven everyone inside.

At New Road, Nelson recognises Ruth's car and his breathing eases a little. Then he sees the open door swinging in the wind and he feels his heart contract. When he enters the sitting room, however, his heart almost jumps out of his chest. Because the room is filled with a terrible, unearthly wailing. He stops dead and Cathbad cannons into the back of him.

To Nelson's eternal shame it is Cathbad who notices the cat basket and goes to rescue Flint.

'Go free, little cat,' he murmurs vaguely. Flint doesn't need telling twice. Tail fluffed up in outrage, he disappears through the open front door. Nelson hopes that he hasn't gone forever. He doesn't want another of Ruth's cats meeting a sticky end.

By the time Clough and Judy arrive, Nelson has already searched the tiny cottage. There is no sign of Erik or Ruth though a packed suitcase sits by the door and a broken umbrella, like a prehistoric bird, has been thrown onto the floor. Cathbad is examining a crumbled piece of metal which was lying on the table.

'What's that?' asks Nelson.

'Looks like an Iron Age torque,' replies Cathbad. 'Full of magic'

Nelson loses interest immediately. 'They can't have gone far,' he says. 'Johnson, Clough, go and ask the neighbours if they heard anything. Radio for some dogs and an armed response team. You and me' – he grasps Cathbad's arm 'we're going for a little walk on the Saltmarsh.'

Bent double, Ruth is running across the Saltmarsh. Falling headlong into muddy streams, clawing herself out, tasting blood in her mouth, getting up again and falling again, this time into a pond about a foot deep. Spluttering, she staggers to her feet. The marsh is full of water like this, some stretches several feet wide. She retraces her steps, finds some firmer ground and starts running again.

On she runs; she has lost a shoe and her trousers are ripped to pieces. Thank God though for the police jacket, which has, at least, kept her top half dry. She must keep going, she owes it to Nelson if no-one else. It really would finish his career if another body was found on the marshes.

She pulls the coat more tightly round her and, as she does so, she feels a faint, a very faint, glow of courage, as if it is being transferred to her via the coat. Nelson wouldn't be scared by a bit of wind and rain, now would he?

But where is Nelson? And, more to the point, where is Erik? She stops, tries to listen but she can hear only the wind and the rain and the thunder. What the thunder said. Isn't that T.S. Eliot? For a second she thinks of the letters, of Erik and Shona quoting T.S. Eliot to taunt Nelson. She can believe this, though it makes her sad, but does she really believe that Erik killed Scarlet Henderson? Does she really believe that he would kill her? Trust no-one, she tells herself, staggering onwards over the uneven ground. Trust no-one but yourself.

Then she hears a sound which makes her heart stop. A voice like no human voice she has ever heard. It is as if the dead themselves are calling her. Three calls, low and even, the last shuddering away into silence. What the hell was that?

The call comes again, this time from very close by. For no reason that she knows, she starts to move towards it and suddenly finds herself facing a solid wall.

She can't believe it at first. But it is, unmistakably, a wall. Gingerly, she puts out a hand to touch it. No, it isn't a mirage. It is a solid wall, wood, made of rough boards nailed together.

Of course, it's the hide! She has reached the hide. She almost laughs out loud in her relief. This must be the furthest hide, the one where she and Peter met David that day. But that hide, she remembers, is above the tidal mark.

She is safe. She can shelter inside until the storm passes.

Oh, thank God for bird watchers.

Half-drunk with relief, she staggers into the hut. It's open on one side so it doesn't offer brilliant shelter but it's a great deal better than nothing. It is wonderful to be out of the wind and the rain. Her face aches as if she has been repeatedly slapped and her ears are still ringing. She rests her head against the rough wood wall and closes her eyes.

It's crazy but she could almost go to sleep.

Outside the storm is still raging but she has almost become used to it. Now the wind sounds like children's voices calling. How sad they sound, like the cries of sailors lost at sea, like the will o'the wisps searching the world for comfort and warmth. Ruth shivers. She mustn't get spooked now and start thinking about Erik's fireside tales.

About the long green fingers reaching up out of the water, about the undead creatures roaming the night, about the drowned cities, the church bells ringing deep below the sea…

She jumps. She has heard a cry coming from beneath her feet. She listens again. For a moment, the storm is still and she hears it again. Unmistakably a human voice. 'Help me!

Help me!'

Stupidly Ruth looks at the wooden floor of the hide. It is covered by a carpet of rush matting. She tears at the carpet. It is obviously pinned down but comes away after the third or fourth tug. Below are floorboards and a trapdoor.

Why on earth would there be a trapdoor in a bird-watching hide? And there is the voice again. Calling from beneath the floor.

Hardly knowing what she is doing, Ruth bends down and puts her face to the trapdoor.

'Who's there?' she calls.

there is a silence and then a voice answers, 'It's me.'

The simplicity of this response strikes Ruth to the heart.

It presupposes that Ruth knows the owner of the voice.

And, almost at once, she feels as if she does.

'Don't worry,' she shouts, 'I'm coming.'

There is a bolt on the trapdoor. It slides back easily as if it is used regularly. Ruth opens the door and peers down in the darkness. At the same time a flash of lightning illuminates the surroundings.

A face looks back up at her. A girl, a teenager perhaps, painfully thin with long, matted hair. She's wearing a man's jumper and tattered trousers and has a blanket round her shoulders.

'What are you doing here?' asks Ruth stupidly.

The girl just shakes her head. Her eyes are huge, her skin grey with pallor.

'What's your name?' asks Ruth.

But, all of a sudden, she knows.

'Lucy,' she says gently. 'You're Lucy, aren't you?'