Lizzie walked slowly up the valley. Her hands were in her pockets and she had her hood up against the drizzle. She could have phoned her parents for a lift when she got off the bus, but she had other plans. She wouldn’t be going straight home. Not now. In her right pocket was the Stanley knife she’d bought earlier in the day in the cheap hardware shop in Kimmerston. She’d unscrewed it so that the blade was exposed and she rubbed her thumb against the metal.
Jason Crow had been disappointing. He seemed to have got old while she’d been in prison. He’d lost his edge. Become soft and sentimental, talking about his family as if he cared about them. Gutless. Saying he loved Lizzie, but he couldn’t run away with her, not while the kids were at university. Not until he’d sorted out the business and released his assets. Too many excuses, so she didn’t believe any of them. Then: ‘You’re playing with fire, Lizzie Redhead. Just let it go. Do you want to go back inside? You won’t get such an easy ride next time.’
If she’d had the knife then, she might have been tempted to use it on him. She shut her eyes briefly and imagined how that would feel. The rip of the blade through the skin, like scissors through fabric. That would bring Jason Crow alive again. He wouldn’t ignore her then.
Lizzie opened her eyes. She’d reached the turning to Gilswick Hall and paused for a moment, remembering childhood teas with the Carswell kids. Chaotic affairs in the kitchen: sliced white bread with honey or Marmite, mucky jars on the table, cakes from a packet. Stuff she was never allowed at home. The major had fought in the Falklands and had told stories that entranced her. If she’d been brought up in that house, where adventure was encouraged, she might be a different person. She turned into the drive and her feet crunched on the gravel. She walked slowly now and moved away from the drive, keeping to the trees. The detective’s Land Rover had been parked in here when she’d walked out to the bus in the morning, and the last thing she needed was to meet a bunch of cops. The rain wasn’t heavy, but water dripped from the branches. No Land Rover. No sign of life in the big house.
Shirley Hewarth had told Lizzie about the moth traps during that last conversation in Sittingwell. They’d talked about Patrick Randle and Martin Benton at an earlier meeting. Two dead men who’d shared a passion. And a secret. Lizzie knew what she was looking for and walked through the trees until she found the traps. Her shoes were wet from the long grass, her socks sopping. She looked at her watch. Not long to wait.
She flicked a switch and the lights came on. Long neon strips, so bright they hurt her eyes if she looked directly at them. So white that they appeared tinged with icy blue. They’d attract more than bugs that night. She squatted beside them, pulling her waterproof under her bum so that she didn’t get too wet. Then she began to rehearse the words that she’d use to the person she’d arranged to meet here. The words that she’d been planning since she’d come across the book published by the National Geographic in the prison, rehearsing them while she was lying awake in her room, listening to the other women’s breathing. She’d repeated the phrases over and over again while she dreamed of deserts, forests and wide, open skies.