The Retreat(30)

But that didn’t help with the investigation into what had happened to Lily. After singing ‘Happy Birthday’ with Julia the night before, I wanted to help her more than ever. But I hadn’t actually got anywhere, not really.

The truth was, I was stuck. And if Zara didn’t call me with some groundbreaking news soon, I figured it was time to give up and go back to the most obvious solution.

Lily had drowned. End of story.



I spent the afternoon working on my novel, immersing myself in the new world I was creating. It was hard going. The cries of missing children kept piercing the surface, echoing through the text, trying to drown out the story I wanted to tell. I had situated my fictional family in the hut in the middle of the woods, with monsters closing in. A stranger had joined them, a young woman who tried to persuade them they needed to go somewhere safer, somewhere far away.

I kept being drawn back to the section I couldn’t remember writing, the part about people going door to door looking for a child. Had I come up with a brilliant idea while drunk; an idea that had died during the night? I tried to dig into my memory but it was exhausting.

Every so often, I checked my phone. There was no word from Zara. I tried to call her but she didn’t answer.

At around four, I looked out through the window and saw Karen in the front garden, pacing about with her back to me. She was gesticulating as if she were having a conversation with someone. I thought perhaps she was on the phone, using an earpiece. Or maybe she was speaking dialogue from her book aloud. I knew a few writers who did that. She seemed agitated, anyway, but I decided to leave her be. No doubt she would tell me all about it over dinner. I had decided not to go to the pub this evening; I’d had enough of Max and needed a break from him, plus I was still off alcohol. At forty-two, my hangovers lingered for days, and the black hole in my memory from my evening in the pub made me uneasy. The guilt and the fear, they called it, and I was suffering from it big time.

At seven I went down for dinner. Max and Suzi were at the table, chatting.

‘Where’s Karen?’ I asked.

Max ignored me. I guessed he was still sulking after I’d had a go at him, last night before I’d found Julia with the birthday cake.

‘We haven’t seen her,’ Suzi said.

Julia came into the dining room with a couple of bottles of mineral water. She gave me a little smile, then said, ‘Karen told me she’s not feeling well, so she’s having an early night.’

After dinner, I went back to my room to work, then went to bed.

Yet again, I couldn’t sleep. I kept thinking about Zara, wondering why she hadn’t called me back and wasn’t answering her phone. Then I started thinking about Julia and Lily and my book, a jumble of thoughts going round and round like clothes in a tumble dryer.

It must have been 1 a.m. when I eventually drifted into sleep.

I was immediately woken by a scream.





Chapter 15

I jumped out of bed and pulled on some trousers. I was sure the scream had come from upstairs.

My first thought was that something terrible had happened to Julia. I took the stairs two at a time, panting as I reached the landing. With every step, I saw flashes: Priya, with her scraped and bloody face.

Lily, arms windmilling as she fell with a splash into the river.

Blood oozing from a hole in my bedroom wall.

Julia was there on the landing, wearing a dressing gown, her hair sticking out at crazy angles.

‘Are you all right?’ I panted. ‘I heard a scream and thought . . .’

She looked me up and down. I must have looked wild-haired too. And wild-eyed. ‘It wasn’t me,’ she said. ‘I think it came from Karen’s room.’

Suzi’s door, which was opposite Karen’s, opened and she emerged, wearing a pair of pink silk pyjamas. A moment later, Max stuck his head out of the same door, saw us all standing there and quickly vanished. Suzi blushed.

Gently, Julia tapped on Karen’s door. ‘Karen? Are you okay?’

A high-pitched yell came from inside the room, followed by banging and another scream, one that started anguished and ended with fury.

The door was unlocked and Julia opened it and rushed inside, Suzi and I following.

Both doors of Karen’s wardrobe stood wide open and I couldn’t see Karen at first. But then I heard her shout, ‘Where are you? Where the fuck are you?’ A pair of trousers flew across the room, landing on the bed, followed by a black shoe. As we entered the room we saw Karen, leaning into the wardrobe and yelling as if she’d discovered Narnia but the door to the magical kingdom had slammed shut.

Julia tried to take Karen’s arm, but Karen shook her off and carried on rifling through the wardrobe, chucking stuff behind her like a crazed poltergeist. A coat hanger missed my ear by an inch.

‘Do something,’ Suzi said, and I stepped forward.

‘Karen,’ I said, ‘what is it? What are you looking for?’

She didn’t seem to notice me, so I said it again. I put a hand on her shoulder and she went stiff, then turned and stared at me with wild eyes. Her body was rigid, as if she were afraid to breathe; her knuckles were white where she gripped a coat she’d been about to chuck across the bedroom.

‘They were in here,’ she whispered. ‘I heard them.’

‘What did they say?’