“Well, good luck. We lost signal about twenty minutes ago.”
Suzie glares at her. “You didn’t think to tell me?”
“Look. The house Danny saw is right over there. We’ll walk for an hour, okay? If we can’t find it in that time then we’ll come right back to the car. I just want to take a look, that’s all.”
Suzie hesitates. Her mouth opens, as if she is about to speak but can’t form the words. She is twisting her crucifix necklace so tightly that Cathy reaches out and puts a hand on Suzie’s arm.
“You’re going to snap that thing off if you’re not careful,” she tells her. “Look, I’ll tell you what. You stay here. Sit in the car, keep warm. I’ll be gone thirty, maybe forty minutes. I’ll find the house and then I’ll come right back and we’ll drive till we get a signal and call the police. I just don’t want to wait, Suzie. I’m sick of doing nothing.”
“You know I can’t let you go alone.”
Cathy smiles and squeezes Suzie’s hand. “Then let’s go. Now.”
39
I dream of the Wiltshire fields, the hives burning beneath a giant Aztec sun. Bees inscribe the language of smoke against the sky, rising like ashes in the air. All around me the smell of scorched honey and wax, soft and caramel and slightly acrid. My other sister is watching with her gelid, luminous eyes. Deep-sea creature’s eyes. She opens her mouth and says,
See you on the other side, Hazel-Mazel.
And when I turn to look at her, it is not my other sister at all, it is Abigail, and she is crying. She is saying,I couldn’t get out. I was on fire and I couldn’t open the door!
Abigail leans closer, her face blackened with soot, her eyes haunted and dreadful, the way she’d looked when she fell out into the sunlight with her clothes and braids smoking. All I can smell is burning, burning.
Someone was watching, Hazel. They know what you did.
I swim to consciousness through what feels like layers of warm, polluted water. My eyes are sticky, hard to open. I am sat upright, unable to move. My chin is resting on my chest. I am drooling like a sick animal. I remain very still, waiting for the nausea to pass.
“Don’t try to stand up. I gave you a hell of a dose.”
Footsteps. Andrew whistling that annoying, atonal little tune. The floor is shiny and black and slightly wrinkled in places. I stare dumbly, wondering if I’ve somehow dragged remnants of my dream through with me. A cloth is passed clumsily beneath my mouth.
“I got halfway to the Spit before I realized what you’d done. I heard your phone beeping, but by the time I pulled it out my bag, it was dead.”
I don’t respond. I’m not sure I could if I tried. I shift my foot, and the floor rustles with a sound like newspaper. It’s bothering me, that floor. Not wood, not carpet. Rubbery and black, like latex. I frown.
“Iwasmad, but then I thought it was a pretty neat trick. Clever, you know? What with that and the invisible ink, you’ve certainly tried your hardest to get out of here.”
I run my foot along the floor again. Shiny. I feel a faint prick of anxiety. Andrew swipes the drool from my mouth again, lifting my head up as he does so.
“But the neatest trick of all was how you talked my sister into doing your dirty work for you. Because the note, the phone—there’s no way you could have done any of it alone.”
He has a locked room upstairs which is all his own.
“But I’ll deal with my sister later. Right now, I’ve got something special planned for you.”
There isn’t much in it. A chair.
I squint down at my arms. I am in a chair of dark wood witha high back, the slats pressing against my spine. I can see long gouges in the surface, as if people have sat here and fought. My wrists are strapped down to the curved arms. More of that rubber tubing, dark red. I curl and uncurl my fingers. The straps are very tight.
A covered table.
With a great effort, I lift my head and there it is, in the far corner. A small square table in this otherwise unfurnished small square room. A linen cloth has been draped over it, on top of which are some objects I can’t quite see.
Tarpaulin on the floor to catch all the blood.
I start to struggle then, twisting my body around in an effort to get free. At first I am simply thrashing in my seat, and then it begins to tip over, almost in slow motion, sending me crashing to the ground. I bite my tongue so hard I taste iron, stars glittering across my vision.
Andrew sighs, crouching down beside me. He holds something out, and I automatically flinch away before realizing I am looking at a distorted image of my own face. It’s the clamshell mirror. There is a crack running through it, a single, jagged line which splits my pale, thin face in half. I stare in wonder and dismay at the shadows pooled beneath my eyes, the curved dome of my shaved skull. My lips are smeared with blood.