The Shifting Fog (61 page)

We were in the Egeskov Garden when Emmeline’s heel snagged and she tumbled.

I almost tripped over her, stopped, tried to help her up. She swept my hand aside, clambered to her feet and continued running.

There was a noise then in the garden and it seemed that one of the sculptures was moving. It giggled, groaned: not a sculpture at all but a pair of amorous escapees. They ignored us and we ignored them.

The second kissing gate was ajar and we hurried into the fountain clearing. The full moon was high and Icarus and his nymphs glowed ghostly in the white light. Without the hedges, the band’s music and the whooping of the party were loud again. Strangely nearer. With aid of moonlight we went faster along the small path toward the lake. We reached the barricade, the sign forbidding entrance, and finally, the point where path met lake. We both stopped in the shelter of the path’s nook, breathing heavily, and surveyed the scene before us. The lake glistened silently beneath the moon. The summer house, the rocky bank, were bathed in silvery light.

Emmeline inhaled sharply.

I followed her gaze.

On the pebbly bank were Hannah’s black shoes. The same I’d helped her into hours before.

Emmeline gasped, stumbled toward them. Beneath the moon she was very pale, her thin figure dwarfed by the large man’s jacket she wore.

A noise from the summer house. A door opening. Emmeline and I both looked up.

A person. Hannah. Alive.

Emmeline gulped. ‘Hannah,’ she called, her voice a hoarse blend of alcohol and panic, echoing off the lake. Hannah stopped stiff, hesitated; with a glance to the summer house she turned to face Emmeline. ‘What are you doing here?’ she called, voice tense.

‘Saving you?’ said Emmeline, beginning to laugh wildly. Relief, of course.

‘Go back,’ said Hannah quickly. ‘You must go back.’

‘And leave you here to drown yourself?’

‘I’m not going to drown myself,’ said Hannah. She glanced again at the summer house.

‘Then what are you doing? Airing your shoes?’ Emmeline held them aloft before dropping them again to her side. ‘I’ve seen your letter.’

‘I didn’t mean it. The letter was a . . . a joke.’ Hannah swallowed.

‘A game.’

‘A game?’

‘You weren’t meant to see it until later.’ Hannah’s voice grew surer. ‘I had an entertainment planned. For tomorrow. For fun.’

‘Like a treasure hunt?’

‘Sort of.’

My breath caught in my throat. The note was not in earnest. It was part of an elaborate game. And the one addressed to me?

Had Hannah intended me to help? Did that explain her nervous behaviour? It wasn’t the party, but the game she wanted to go well?

‘That’s what I’m doing now,’ said Hannah. ‘Hiding clues.’

Emmeline stood, blinking. Her body jerked as she hiccoughed.

‘A game,’ she said slowly.

‘Yes.’

Emmeline started to laugh hoarsely, dropped the shoes onto the ground. ‘Why didn’t you say so? I adore games! How clever of you, darling.’

‘Go back to the party,’ said Hannah. ‘And don’t tell anyone you saw me.’

Emmeline twisted an imaginary button on her lips. She turned on her heel and tripped her way over the stones toward the path. She scowled at me as she got close to my hiding spot. Her makeup had smudged.

‘I’m sorry, miss,’ I whispered. ‘I thought it was real.’

‘You’re just lucky you didn’t ruin everything.’ She eased herself onto a large rock, settled the jacket around her. ‘As it is I’ve a swollen ankle and I’ll miss more of the party while I rest. I’d better not miss the fireworks.’

‘I’ll wait with you. Help you back.’

‘I should think so,’ said Emmeline.

We sat for a minute, the party music reeling on in the distance, interspersed occasionally with a whoop of excited revelry. Emmeline rubbed her ankle, pressed it onto the ground every so often, transferring her weight.

Early morning fog had started to gather in the fens, was shifting out toward the lake. There was another hot day coming, but the night was cool. The fog kept it so.

Emmeline shivered, held open one side of her companion’s coat, rifled through the large inside pocket. In the moonlight, something glistened, black and shiny. Strapped to the coat’s lining. I inhaled: it was a gun.

Emmeline sensed my reaction, turned to me, wide-eyed. ‘Don’t tell me: first hand gun you’ve ever seen. You are a babe in the wood, Grace.’ She pulled it from the coat, turned it over in her hands, held it out to me. ‘Here. Want to hold it?’

I shook my head as she laughed, wishing I had never found the letters. Wishing, for once, that Hannah hadn’t included me.

‘Probably best,’ Emmeline said, hiccoughing. ‘Guns and parties. Not a good mix.’

She slipped the gun back into her pocket, continued to fossick, locating finally a silver flask. She unscrewed the lid and tossed her head back, drank for a long time.

‘Darling Harry,’ she said, smacking her lips together. ‘Prepared for every event.’ She took another swig and tucked the flask back into the coat. ‘Come on then. I’ve had my pain relief.’

I helped her up, my head bent over as she leaned on my shoulders.

‘That should do it,’ she said. ‘If you’ll just . . .’

I waited. ‘Ma’am?’

She gasped and I lifted my head, followed her gaze back toward the lake. Hannah was at the summer house and she wasn’t alone. There was a man with her, cigarette on his bottom lip. Carrying a small suitcase.

Emmeline recognised him before I did.

‘Robbie,’ she said, forgetting her ankle. ‘My God. It’s Robbie.’

Emmeline limped clumsily onto the lake bank; I stayed behind in the shadows. ‘Robbie!’ she called, waving her hand. ‘Robbie, over here.’

Hannah and Robbie froze. Looked at one another.

‘What are you doing here?’ Emmeline said excitedly. ‘And why on earth have you come the back way?’

Robbie drew on his cigarette, fumbled with the filter as he exhaled.

‘Come on up to the party,’ Emmeline said. ‘I’ll find you a drink.’

Robbie glanced across the lake into the distance. I followed his gaze, noticed something metallic shining on the other side. A motorbike, I realised, nestled where the lake met the outer meadows.

‘I know what’s happening,’ Emmeline said suddenly. ‘You’ve been helping Hannah with her game.’

Hannah stepped forward into the moonlight. ‘Emme—’

‘Come on,’ said Emmeline quickly. ‘Let’s all go back to the house and find Robbie a room. Find some place for your suitcase.’

‘Robbie’s not going to the house,’ said Hannah.

‘Why, of course he is. He’s not going to stay down here all night, surely,’ said Emmeline with a silvery laugh. ‘It might be June but it’s rather cold, darlings.’

Hannah glanced at Robbie and something passed between them.

Emmeline saw it too. In that moment, as the moon shone pale on her face, I watched as excitement slid to confusion, and confusion arrived horribly at realisation. The months in London, Robbie’s early arrivals at number seventeen, the way she had been used.

‘There is no game, is there?’ she said softly.

‘No.’

‘The letter?’

‘A mistake,’ Hannah said.

‘Why’d you write it?’ said Emmeline.

‘I didn’t want you to wonder,’ said Hannah. ‘Where I’d gone.’ She glanced at Robbie. He nodded slightly. ‘Where we’d gone.’

Emmeline was silent.

‘Come on,’ said Robbie cagily, picking up the suitcase and starting for the lake. ‘It’s getting late.’

‘Please understand, Emme,’ said Hannah. ‘It’s like you said, each of us letting the other live the life they want.’ She hesitated: Robbie was motioning her to hurry. She started walking backwards.

‘I can’t explain now, there’s no time. I’ll write: tell you where we are. You can visit.’ She turned, and with one last glance at Emmeline, followed Robbie around the foggy edge of the lake. Emmeline stayed where she was, hands dug into the coat’s pockets. She swayed, shuddered as a goose walked over her grave. And then.

‘No.’ Emmeline’s voice was so quiet I could barely hear. ‘No.’

She yelled out, ‘Stop.’

Hannah turned, Robbie tugged her hand, tried to keep her with him. She said something, started back.

‘I won’t let you go,’ said Emmeline.

Hannah was close now. Her voice was low, firm. ‘You must.’

Emmeline’s hand moved in her coat pocket. She gulped.

‘I won’t.’

She withdrew her hand. A flash of metal. The gun. Hannah gasped.

Robbie started running toward Hannah.

My pulse pumped against my skull.

‘I won’t let you take him,’ said Emmeline, hand wobbling. Hannah’s chest moved up and down. Pale in the moonlight.

‘Don’t be stupid, put it away.’

‘I’m not stupid.’

‘Put it away.’

‘No.’

‘You don’t want to use it.’

‘I do.’

‘Which of us are you going to shoot?’ said Hannah. Robbie was by Hannah now and Emmeline looked from one to the other, lips trembling.

‘You’re not going to shoot either,’ said Hannah. ‘Are you?’

Emmeline’s face contorted as she started to cry. ‘No.’

‘Then put the gun down.’

‘No.’

I gasped as Emmeline lifted a shaky hand, pointing the gun at her own head.

‘Emmeline!’ said Hannah.

Emmeline was sobbing now. Great hulking sobs.

‘Give it to me,’ said Hannah. ‘We’ll talk more. Sort it out.’

‘How?’ Emmeline’s voice was thick with tears. ‘Will you give him back to me? Or will you keep him the way you have all of them. Pa, David, Teddy.’

‘It’s not like that,’ said Hannah.

‘It’s my turn,’ said Emmeline.

Suddenly there was a huge bang. A firework exploded. Everyone jumped. A red glow sprayed across their faces. Millions of red specks spilled across the lake surface.

Robbie covered his face with his hands.

Hannah leapt forward, seized the gun from Emmeline’s slackened fingers. Hurried backwards.

Emmeline was running toward her then, face a mess of tears and lipstick. ‘Give it to me. Give it to me or I’ll scream. Don’t you leave. I’ll tell everyone. I’ll tell everyone you’ve gone and Teddy will find you and—’

Bang!
A green firework exploded.

‘—Teddy won’t let you get away, he’ll make sure you stay, and you’ll never see Robbie again and—’

Bang!
Silver.

Hannah scrambled onto a higher part of the lake bank. Emmeline followed, crying. Fireworks exploded.

Music from the party reverberated off the trees, the lake, the summer-house walls.

Robbie’s shoulders were hunched, hands over his ears. Eyes wide, face pale.

I didn’t hear him at first but I could see his lips. He was pointing at Emmeline, yelling something at Hannah.

Bang!
Red.

Robbie flinched. Face contorted with panic. Continued to yell. Hannah hesitated, looked at him uncertainly. She had heard what he was saying. Something in her bearing collapsed. The fireworks stopped; burning embers rained from the sky. And then I heard him too.

‘Shoot her!’ he was yelling. ‘Shoot her!’

My blood curdled.

Emmeline froze in her tracks, gulped. ‘Hannah?’ Voice like a frightened little girl. ‘Hannah?’

‘Shoot her,’ he said again. ‘She’ll ruin everything.’ He was running toward Hannah.

Hannah was staring. Uncomprehending.

‘Shoot her!’ He was frantic.

Her hands were shaking. ‘I can’t,’ she said finally.

‘Then give it to me.’ He was coming closer now, faster. ‘I will.’

And he would. I knew it. Desperation, determination were loud on his face.

Emmeline jolted. Realised. Started running toward Hannah.

‘I can’t,’ said Hannah.

Robbie grabbed for the gun; Hannah pulled her arm away, fell backwards, scrambled further onto the escarpment.

‘Do it!’ said Robbie. ‘Or I will.’

Hannah reached the highest point. Robbie and Emmeline were converging on her. There was nowhere further to run. She looked between them.

And time stood still.

Two points of a triangle, untethered by a third, had pulled further and further apart. The elastic, stretched taut, had reached its limit.

I held my breath, but the elastic did not break. In that instant, it retracted.

Two points came crashing back together, a collision of loyalty and blood and ruin.

Hannah pointed the gun and she pulled the trigger. The aftermath. For, oh, there is always an aftermath. People forget that. Blood, lots of it. Over their dresses, across their faces, in their hair.

The gun dropped. Hit the stones with a crack and lay immobile.

Hannah stood wavering on the escarpment.

Robbie’s body lay on the ground below. Where his head had been, a mess of bone and brain and blood.

I was frozen, my heart beating in my ears, skin hot and cold at the same time. Suddenly, a surge of vomit.

Emmeline stood frozen, eyes tightly closed. She wasn’t crying, not any more. She was making a horrible noise, one I’ve never forgotten. She was crawing as she inhaled. The air catching in her throat on every breath.

Moments passed, I don’t know how many, and a way off, behind me, I heard voices. Laughter.

‘It’s just down here a little further,’ came the voice on the breeze.

‘You wait until you see, Lord Gifford. The stairs aren’t finished—

damn French and their shipping hold-ups—but the rest, I think you’ll agree, is pretty impressive.’

I wiped my mouth, ran from my hiding spot onto the lake edge.

‘Teddy’s coming,’ I said to no one in particular. I was in shock of course. We were all in shock. ‘Teddy’s coming.’

‘You’re too late,’ Hannah said, swiping frantically at her face, her neck, her hair. ‘You’re too late.’

‘Teddy’s coming, ma’am.’ I shivered.

Emmeline’s eyes snapped open. A flash of silver blue shadow in the moonlight. She shuddered, righted herself, indicated Hannah’s suitcase. ‘Take it to the house,’ she said hoarsely. ‘Go the long way.’

I hesitated.

‘Run.’

I nodded, took the bag and ran toward the woods. I couldn’t think clearly. I stopped when I was hidden and turned back. My teeth were chattering.

Teddy and Lord Gifford had reached path’s end and stepped out onto the lake bank.