Daisy in Chains(101)

Maggie walks past them, catching a scent of the chill night air, towards the back of the cellar. The smallest basement room appears to be a bathroom but the plumbing has been disconnected long ago. Turning on the taps would produce nothing but a few splutters of dank air. Any liquid poured into the Victorian-style roll-top bath would drain, not to waste pipes, but into a large, shallow tray that lies immediately beneath the plug. Several large buckets stand to one side.

The bath is spotless. So is the drain tray. So are the buckets.

By the side of the bath is a large plastic container of household bleach. More out of habit than because she knows it is necessary, Maggie opens it and pours it around the rim of the bath. Bleach is thick and it takes time to run down the enamel sides of the bath, gathering in the bottom, draining out into the tray. Slowly, the tray fills. She will empty it tomorrow, on the land at the bottom of her garden, because pouring that amount of bleach down the drain would be traceable.

The sudden banging makes her jump. Someone is upstairs, hammering on her back door. Knowing she has no choice now but to move with events, she makes her way up, expecting to see Pete. He will want to make sure she knows about the escape, that she is taking sensible precautions. He will think she needs to fear Wolfe. She sensed a new and unsettling coldness in him earlier, but Pete is a good man. He will no doubt offer, once again, to find a room for her at the Crown in Wells.

The very air seems to be thickening around her, making it harder to move freely. Every step she takes upstairs increases the heaviness in her chest. Is it possible, really, that she might never see Hamish again?

Silently she opens the door to the back hallway. She has disconnected the security lights at the back of her house and can only see a dark silhouette through the glass of the door. She doesn’t think whoever is out there is tall enough to be Pete. Her heart leaps momentarily, but too small to be Pete is too small to be Hamish and it settles back down again. She unlocks the door and opens it.

Sirocco.

‘He’s out,’ Sirocco steps forward, as though Maggie will simply invite her in, take her coat and put the kettle on. ‘He’s escaped. Have you heard?’

Sirocco seems to be wearing even more loose, flowing clothing than usual. On her head, clamping down her unruly black hair, is a tight-fitting beanie-style cap. She looks dressed to travel and the sight sends another pang into Maggie’s heart.

There is some hope, though, in her being here. She isn’t with Hamish yet.

‘I saw it on the news,’ says Maggie, wondering how to take this forward. The last time she saw Sirocco she’d been afraid for her life. This isn’t the top of a Ferris wheel, though, here she is on home ground.

‘Read this.’ Sirocco has fumbled in her coat pocket and is holding out a sheet of pale blue paper. ‘Read this and tell me what it means.’

Maggie glances down and sees handwriting that she recognizes. Suddenly, the heaviness inside her seems more manageable. Her heart, that has been fighting to keep beating, picks up its pace.

‘Come in,’ she says, stepping back from the doorway. In the kitchen she will have room to move. In the kitchen there will be enough light. She will be able to see what’s coming.

‘There isn’t time. He’s on his way. You need to read it now.’ Agitated though she may be, Sirocco seems strangely reluctant to come any closer to Maggie. This time, it seems to be she who is afraid.

He’s on his way. Maggie can hear a drumming in her ears as she backs into the kitchen. ‘Why should I be able to understand it?’ she asks. ‘If you can’t, what makes you think I can?’

Sirocco approaches cautiously. The letter – Hamish’s last love letter? – dangles in the air between them. Then it is in Maggie’s hand. It is damp. Maggie glances down, then back up again.

‘I can’t I’m afraid. I need my reading glasses.’

‘I’ll read it to you. Give it back.’

Still holding the letter, Maggie walks past her, out of the room, heading once again for the basement. ‘I left them downstairs just now. I won’t be a second.’

‘Get back here.’

The stairs are seconds away and Sirocco is following her. ‘Where are you going?’ Her voice has risen, become shrill. ‘Is that the cellar? Are you going in there?’

‘You can wait up here,’ Maggie reaches the cellar door and pulls it open. ‘What did you mean when you said, “He’s on his way”? Why on earth would Hamish come here? This is the first place the police will look.’

She looks back when she is halfway down the steps. Sirocco is hovering, uncertain, at the top.

‘He’s coming for me,’ Sirocco says. ‘He’s been planning it for ages. I’ve been helping. He wrote to me, telling me where to meet him.’ She points to the letter in Maggie’s hand.

‘So why am I involved?’ asks Maggie.

‘He said to ask you. He said he had to write in code, so the prison staff wouldn’t know what he was telling me. If there was anything I didn’t understand, I had to ask you. Let me just read it to you, please. We don’t need to go downstairs. I have to meet him now.’

Maggie’s heart, which has been accelerating for some time now, is starting to beat painfully. She climbs back up four steps. ‘I may still need to read it for myself,’ she says. ‘But OK.’