Mr. Nobody(65)
She types “Marn Lewis” and taps search.
Nothing.
She tries “Dr. Marn Lewis” and taps search.
Nothing.
She tries “Marn, Norfolk.”
The search autocorrects to “Marni, Norfolk” and below it pages and pages of search results appear.
Marni Beaufort. The Beaufort family. Christ.
Zara catches her breath. Holy shit.
A giggle of pure joy bubbles out of her beautiful screen-lit face, because, finally, Zara cannot believe her luck.
33
DR. EMMA LEWIS
DAY 11—PEOPLE ARE COMING
The call comes at 10:07 that night.
Up until then it had been a comparatively uneventful day of memory exercises and talking through Matthew’s positive response to his antianxiety medication. The lack of drama making me feel my decision not to resign yesterday had been the right one. Joe had been less understanding when I tried to explain on the phone. But it would be crazy to leave without knowing how Matthew has come to know so much about me and my father. But of course, I couldn’t tell Joe my reasoning in that respect. If he’d wanted me to leave before, he’d have dragged me off himself if he knew my reasons for staying.
I spent the rest of the day at the hospital finishing Matthew’s preliminary medical report and fMRI analysis. I emailed it across to Richard Groves at MIT for his opinion. And I sent it on to Peter too. The report included my initial observations as well as all Matthew’s scans and test results. Richard’s opinion, though obviously not essential, would be extremely useful to me at this stage.
Back at the lodge, I crack open another bottle of wine and heat some pasta. I’m eating when the lodge phone rings, which is a surprise because I wasn’t even aware the lodge had a landline. I find it by the window next to the armchair.
“Emma, has anyone contacted you?” It’s Peter Chorley. His tone is urgent, brusque.
“About what, Peter?” I ask, momentarily confused by the question. “Is Matthew okay?”
“Yes. This isn’t about Matthew, Emma. Has anyone from the press contacted you? In the last few hours?” There’s concern for me in his voice; something has happened.
“No. Should they have? Sorry, Peter, what’s going on? You’re scaring me.” I suddenly feel like I’ve wandered out onto a ledge in my sleep. My vertigo kicking in without a stimulus.
He’s silent on the line, I hear him exhale and cover his receiver. A muffled conversation. When he comes back on the line his tone is grim.
“Listen, Emma, I need you to turn your mobile phone off, please. We’re sending a police officer around to you now. They’ll stay outside your accommodation for the night to—”
“What the hell is going on, Peter!” I erupt, cutting him off mid-flow.
There’s another thick silence before he answers.
“They’ve found out who you are, Emma. The press. We don’t know if they know where you’re staying, but best to be safe. I have a contact at the press association, he called me five minutes ago. It’s going to break online at midnight and it’ll be all over tomorrow’s national papers.” He pauses to let me take this in before continuing. “I’m truly sorry this has happened, Emma. This isn’t what anyone wanted.”
I stare unseeing out into the darkness through the window.
This can’t be happening.
“Emma, are you still there?”
It’s going to happen all over again. Just like before.
I sit down hard into the deep armchair. “Yes,” I manage. I need to keep him talking. I don’t want him to hang up, I don’t want to be left alone with this. “How did they find out?” It seems the next reasonable question. “How could they have found out without breaking the law? Without hacking data?”
“We don’t know but we’re looking into it. It was a local reporter apparently. That’s all I can tell you at the moment.”
Zara. It must be Zara. Her face last night outside the hospital. Chris must have told her who I was. That’s why she looked at me that way.
“Right. Okay,” I hear myself say. “Thanks for letting me know.” Then I remember something. “Sorry, Peter—what were you saying about the police? Why are police coming? Am I in any danger here?” The last thing I want is Chris showing up but I’m suddenly perilously aware of how isolated I am out here.
“Um, yes, the police are on their way. They’re making arrangements, you should have someone with you within thirty minutes. It’s only a precaution, but there are some concerns that the press might have information about your whereabouts. Obviously, the Beaufort case is going to attract a substantial amount of public attention as well. We’re just concerned about your safety, and in light of your need to enter the protected-persons program fourteen years ago it would be wise, I think, to be…prepared. Better to be over-prepared than under.”
Oh God. This is actually happening
I throw my mind back to that autumn fourteen years ago. The threats, the letters, the hateful words sprayed on the walls of places they put us, people grabbing at us, shoving us, their faces distorted with anger, baying for a kind of justice that we couldn’t give them, Joe and Mum and me. I wonder if I hadn’t said what I’d said back then if they would have chased us so hard. If I’d have kept my mouth shut, they’d have hated us less. They thought we were lying, that he was still alive somewhere out there, they thought we knew where he was. They wanted the truth even if we weren’t entirely sure of it ourselves.