Home Before Dark (27 page)

house.
It wasn’t ready for him yet.
What if he does come in, though, uninvited? You thought this
through, Ernster? What you do? Hide in the broom closet again? Short even for a Chinese, the kid had a wiry athletic build.
It wasn’t that Ward didn’t think he could take him. Just that
once he entered the premises, he couldn’t let him leave. His
eye fell on a lead sash-weight lying on the window ledge. Now wait . . . wait just a goddamned minute. No,
YOU
pick

it up . . .
Gripping the foot-long lead in one hand, Ward went quietly
downstairs.

'How long will you be gone?’ Laura asked. She was waiting
for me in the bedroom when I came out of the shower.
'A day or two … I won’t really know until I see what’s
involved. We’re looking at a couple of potential sites, maybe

more.’
'I don’t understand. This just happened?’
I used the towel to dry my hair, rubbing vigorously. 'Al
called me two hours ago from New York. He’s got an inside
track on a deal that could be spectacular. I have to move fast,
or risk missing out.’ I smiled at her. 'You know how it goes.’
'Why don’t you let him handle it, or send someone else?’
'It’s an old estate in Connecticut. Al said the view from
the house is “America before the Fall”. Not that I don’t trust
him, I just like to see what I’m buying.’
I dropped the towel and reached for the clean shirt I’d laid
out on the bed and slipped it on. Laura stared at me for a

moment, then went over to the sofa under the window and
sat down. 'I suppose you’ve forgotten we’re meant to be
having dinner with the Rentons tonight. Shall I ring them
and cancel, or will you?’
'Why don’t you go?’ I said lightly. 'It’ll be fun.’
'You know I can’t face dinner parties on my own.’
She frowned and looked down at the floor. There was a
silence. I felt she knew that I was keeping something from
her. I got dressed, selecting one of the dark blue suits I always
wear when I travel on business. Betrayal hung in the air, but
I could only think about Jelly and the fact that I needed to
find her before Ward did.
Laura seemed lost in her own thoughts.
'There’s another reason,’ I said hesitantly, as if I was about
to reveal the real purpose of the trip, 'in case you were wondering.’
After Paris, I’d been expecting her to question my 'work’
pretext for flying to America; in fact, I was almost hoping
she would. 'I’m going to meet up with Campbell Armour
while I’m over there … the private detective I told you about.
It looks like he’s made real progress.’
'I thought he lived in Florida.’
'He’s planning to be in New York on Thursday.’
She rose and walked slowly over to the door, then turned
and stood there for a moment; dressed in all white, she looked
ominously serene. 'I take it I’ve heard all I’m going to hear
from you on that subject.’
I shrugged. 'I know you disapprove, so … I spare you the
details.’
There was another difficult silence.
'By the way, that policewoman rang . . . Edith Cowper.
She must have just missed you at the office.’
With a heavy, wound-tight feeling I went on packing, folding
my clothes into a small suitcase. 'I’ll call her when I get – back.’
'She said it was important.’ I sensed Laura’s eyes on me
waiting for some reaction, but then she gave up. 'If you need
me, I’ll be downstairs.’

The front door to Skylands was locked.
Walking slowly around the porch, Campbell tested the shutters
for all the ground-floor windows in case one had been
left unfastened. At the back of the house he came to a glassed
in section and, behind a torn screen, another locked door.
He could see into a mud room with snow shoes and an old
pair of wooden ski poles hanging on the wall; beyond it lay
what looked like the kitchen.
He wandered through the backyard taking pictures – he
might need up-to-date evidence that the virtual mansion was
a recreation of Ernest Seaton’s old home.
The afternoon was hot and still and what remained of the
garden gave off the rank smell of overgrown vegetation.
Behind an abandoned berry patch, Campbell came on traces
of enclosure wire for a tennis court that had long ago reverted
to scrub. Hidden away lower down the slope, there was a
pond choked by rushes and yellow iris with an old swimming
platform half sunken in the weeds. A heron standing on a
dead tree flapped off over the water.
Looking back up at the white house on the hill, framed
by live oaks and hemlock, he could see what Skylands must
have been like when the place was lived in and cared for the
sun catching its hipped slate roof, smoke rising from
the end-chimneys of glazed dusty pink brick, the black
green shutters thrown wide open, and in the violet shadow
under its long white-pillared porch, a suggestion of movement,
the promise of a cool drink … it was like a house
in a dream.
For a nine-year-old boy, growing up here, Campbell
imagined, it must have seemed like paradise. Then, one hot
summer’s night, a kitchen knife snatched up in God-knows
what kind of murderous rage turns it into hell on earth,
and the dream that was Skylands is gone forever. The only true paradises are the ones we have lost. Was there a clue
there to what made Ernest Seaton tick? He wondered if
there were any childhood relics, toys and other stuff in the
house that might help him trace the man Ernest grew up
to become.
The shrill jangling of his cell phone startled him.
Half expecting it to be Ed Lister, he glanced at the display.
Unfamiliar number, but the 941 area code covered a fair
chunk of Southwest Florida: the loan sharks worked out of
Sarasota and Venice. Campbell hesitated, then switched off
his cell and, sweat breaking out at his temples, walked slowly
back towards the mansion.
The interior of Skylands, he’d learnt from a local realtor,
was pretty much intact. The present owners, an elderly New
York couple, bought the estate as an investment in the early
’90s, then retired to Hawaii. They’d never lived there.
'Nobody knows their plans for the property,’ Hersey Dodds
had confided in him, loosening up once she realised that
Campbell wasn’t interested in moving his family to Norfolk.
'It’s not on the market, hasn’t been rented out or occupied
for fifteen years, you can guess why… great potential though.’
He thought about Susan Mary at the town library: when
he’d asked her who else had wanted directions to get here,
she’d just said, oh, some developer from New York who
seemed interested in buying the place. Even though it wasn’t
for sale.
Sitting on the front porch, removing tares that had become
entwined in the laces of his trainers, Campbell considered
his options. It would be simple enough to force his way into
Skylands. The problem was half the town, including the fat
deputy, had to know he was up here. Jail-time for breaking
and entry – there were no-trespassing signs posted on the
trees along the driveway – wouldn’t look too good on his CV.
On the other hand, he might not get another chance.
A faint creaking of timbers came from somewhere deep
inside the house. He kept still for a moment, but the sound
wasn’t repeated and he put it down to heat expansion or
settlement. When he thought about the trouble he was in, the
money he owed, the huge bonus his client had promised he
didn’t have a choice.
He went over to examine the front door, remembering that,
when searching for a hidden access to the virtual house, he’d
tried the cat-flap. He hadn’t noticed it before, but the bottom
left-hand panel of the door had been overlaid by a thin sheet
of ply secured by light nails, then painted. Hunkering down,
Campbell used his pocket knife to lever off the veneer and
found the cat-flap behind it, still intact.
The hinged plastic lid wasn’t locked and with a squawk of
resistance it swung back as he pushed his hand through the
small opening and felt around inside, looking for a key. Then
his arm, up to the elbow. There was nothing.
Wanting to be sure the key wasn’t there but just out of
reach, he changed his position and, holding the flap back
with one hand, put his eye up to the hole. He could only see
a few feet into the dim hall, but it was enough for him to
register that the thick layer of dust covering the floorboards
had been disturbed – how recently it was impossible to say.
He could make out footprints going away from the door, and
coming back. He tried turning his head, straining for a better
view.
He let the cat-flap go and it rocked briefly on its hinges,
then was still. All he could hear was his own slightly raised
heartbeat.
His hands shook a little as he closed the pocket knife.
Off to the left, in the far corner of his limited field of vision,
he had seen a pair of tan hiking boots . . . somebody was
standing there, motionless, just inside the door.
Backing away slowly, he stepped down off the porch, then
forced himself to walk not run across the terrace to his car,
the katydids falling silent ahead of him, then starting up fheir
racket again in his wake.
Campbell resisted the urge to look back at the house until
he was safely behind the wheel, doors locked and the motor
running.

46

'How would you feel,’ I heard Laura say behind me, 'about
my coming with you?’
I was standing at our bedroom door, looking around to
make sure I hadn’t forgotten anything. 'Coming with me?’ It
was so unexpected I didn’t understand at first what she
meant. 'You mean to New York? Tonight?’
She’d just run up the stairs and was a little out of breath.
I turned to face her, a suitcase in each hand, afraid of seeing
something in her eyes that said, I know.
Laura smiled. 'Don’t look so stricken, Ed.’
'It’s just that I’m surprised. You’re not a last-minute sort
of person. I mean . . . you don’t have a ticket, you’re not
even packed.’
'Those are details.’ Her voice unnaturally bright.

'Otherwise,’ I recovered enough to add smoothly, 'I can’t
think of anything nicer.’
'We haven’t been to New York together in ages.’

'I know, but why now? I’ll be busy all the time.’
'I just thought it might be an opportunity to see Alice. You
know how she’s been on my conscience and, while you’re
working, I could go out to La Rochelle and spend some time
with her.’
Alice, old Mrs Fielding, was Laura and Will’s grandmother.
In her late eighties, frail and befuddled, but with a tenacious,
independent spirit she attributed to her Virginian ancestry, she
lived more or less alone at Gilmans Landing on the Hudson.
'It’s a wonderful idea. Just a pity you didn’t think of it
sooner. Laura, I have to leave now or I’ll miss my plane.’
Audrey had found me a seat on the 8.30, the last Virgin
Atlantic flight to
JFK
. I had under an hour to get to Heathrow.
'I didn’t know that you were going until an hour ago.’ Laura
stood there at the top of the stairs, one hand on the banister,
blocking my way down.
'We’ll do it another time, I promise,’ I said, trying to resist
the undertow of remorse, but knowing full well I was destroying
the trust of someone I’d shared my life with for twenty
three years.
'You could at least suggest I get a flight tomorrow and join
you.’
'Sweetheart, I was going to … I just don’t think it’ll work.
We’d hardly catch a glimpse of each other. Listen, if it’s any
comfort to you, I’ll go out and check on Alice, make sure
she’s all right.’
'Would you? She’d really appreciate a visit. You know how
she adores you.’ Laura started to smile, then bit her underlip.
'Sure you can spare the time?’
No doubt she was being ironic, but I’d talked her out of
coming: that was all that mattered. I caught a look of regret,
or maybe just resignation in her eyes. 'Listen, when I get
back, it might be a good idea if we had a talk.’
'About?’
'I dunno . . . Sophie, our marriage, us.’
She gave a little laugh. 'What is there to discuss?’
I knew what she meant. We couldn’t seem to connect any
more, so why waste time talking when it could only make
things worse? I’d imagined a different kind of conversation,
one perhaps where we agreed amicably that we’d reached the
end of the road. Only we weren’t there yet. 'I’ve never told
you this before,’ I said. 'I don’t think you realise how much
I loved her. Sophie, I mean.’
Laura sighed. 'Still all about you, isn’t it?’
'All right, if that’s the way you feel . . . forget it.’
'Ed, I’m sorry.’ She came forward and put her arms under
my jacket around my waist. I lowered the cases. We said goodbye
with a clumsy embrace, hugging each other more tightly
and for longer than usual, clinging to the wreckage I suppose.
I sensed that Laura had more that she wanted to say, but
I didn’t really have time to listen. The Mercedes was waiting
outside the front door. I could hear Michael, my driver, fidgeting
in the hall below.
'If we ever find who did this to us . . . maybe then we can
start to rebuild our lives.’
She pulled away and I saw she was crying. 'I don’t know.’
I had no idea what was really on Laura’s mind, but I suspect
that at this point neither of us believed we had a future
together. I just knew I was flying to New York to protect the
girl I’d fallen in love with, whose life I’d unwittingly placed
in danger – and, as focused as I was on tracking down Sophie’s
killer, I could think about nothing else. The two aims, anyway,
were now intimately intertwined.
My last online conversation with Jelena, unsettling as it
had been, had let me see that while she appeared to be saying
'come’, it could equally well have been Ward who’d invited
me over to the party at Scarlett’s.
Somebody had a lucky escape.
What about you? Relieved? Or are we just the tiniest bit disappointed?
There
you were waiting for him behind the door like some
psycho in a splatter flick. Ernie, I warned you about getting a
taste for this shit.

Ward closed his eyes. He’d let a whole ten minutes elapse
since he heard the detective’s car engine fade away at the
bottom of the hill. Just to be sure he wasn’t coming back.
Now for the hard part. He started to climb the stairs.
On the landing, he stopped outside the third of four
identical panelled oak doors, the door to his parents’
bedroom. Ward reached out a hand, hesitated. He could
hear it already. The banging gradually getting louder and
more insistent, swelling to a relentless pounding beat. It
sounded like it came from downstairs, but he’d checked
the screens and shutters, they were all securely fastened,
and there wasn’t a breath of wind.
He’d come across his mother’s packed suitcases in the hall. . . He turned the handle and the din stopped; he cracked the
door, pushed it all the way open. Before him lay the scene
that had greeted him that night.
His bewildered eye had fled at first to a reproduction of
the painting Christina’s World by Andrew Wyeth hanging
crooked over the bed, unable to meet the freeze-frame stillness
of the devastation below – then something splashed to the
floor and the room rushed out at him.
The colours, shapes and tastes flowing through him in a
giddying swirl he had no way of controlling. He felt the heat
rising – a night-time heat, muggy and close – as a solid obelisk
he could see and touch. He heard a high-pitched whine that
felt like a hand around his heart. His senses were cross-firing
at will, going haywire.
The images that followed came with an emotional intensity
he found almost unbearable: his mother’s head hanging off
the bed, her pearly teeth glistening through the mask of blood
that had the smell of an eraser . . . her open eyes, staring at
him upside down, searing his tongue with the bitter inky taste
of quinine . . . the grey and pink matter of his father’s brains
spilled on the rug, on the ceiling . . . smoke clearing, the
scent of cordite, green apples, the dry rustle of a million
insect wings.
He couldn’t cross the threshold, couldn’t move, couldn’t
see who was in there with them. But there was someone . . .
He was sure of it now.
The vision cleared, leaving the room empty, yet when he
tried to close the door, it seemed to stick halfway, as if there
were an obstruction on the other side. He put his shoulder
to the frame and pulled with all his strength, then the resistance
suddenly gave way and he fell back. The door banged shut
and for an instant, marooned on the bare, silent landing,
Ward felt the rapture of complete certainty.
He knew he was justified.