A Place Of Safety(10)

‘I had a . . . row. With Carlotta.’

‘Good for you.’

‘She ran away.’

‘I’ll bet she did.’ Louise had her own ideas about Carlotta.

‘Lionel can’t find her. He’s tried everywhere.’

‘Is that all?’

After a long pause, Ann whispered, ‘Yes.’ She had stopped shivering but had become intensely pale. Her eyes slid away, she gazed over Louise’s shoulder, into the air, examined the ground.

Louise thought Ann was the worst liar she had ever come across. The first bit had been convincing. She believed there probably had been a row with Carlotta. The girl might even have run away. But that was not all there was to it. Not by a long chalk.

‘When was this?’

‘Last night.’

‘Have you told the police?’

‘No!’ A small scream.

‘All right, love.’ Louise stroked Ann’s hair. Slow, calming movements. ‘All right . . .’

‘Sorry.’ Ann produced a crumpled ball of tissue from her skirt pocket and blew her nose. ‘Lionel said she’d hate that. Bringing the . . . the pigs into it.’

Pigs indeed. Louise had no patience. If Lionel thought aping the young would make him one of them, he was well up the wrong tree. Next thing it’d be a baseball cap the wrong way round and a Radiohead T-shirt.

‘I’m not leaving you out here.’ She got up, holding Ann’s hand, hoiking her up too. ‘Come home and have some tea.’

‘I can’t.’

‘Course you can.’ She tucked Ann’s arm through her own and marched her off down the drive. ‘I’ve got a gorgeous coffee cake from M & S.’

‘I should let Lionel know—’

‘Rubbish. He won’t even notice you’ve gone.’

‘No,’ agreed Ann sadly. ‘I don’t suppose he will.’





Candy always regarded herself as Mrs Leathers’ dog and knew that Mrs Leathers felt the same. Neither of them made a thing about it, especially when Charlie was around. This evening he was in the front room where they usually ate and watched television and had been there so long and was so quiet, Mrs Leathers thought he must have fallen asleep. So she patted her lap. Candy hesitated then, after an anxious glance towards the closed connecting door, sprang up.

Mrs Leathers fondled her golden-brown ears, like little triangles of warm toast. She scratched the dog’s stomach and Candy gave an ecstatic whine. Mrs Leathers wondered what her husband could possibly be doing. He had disappeared nearly an hour ago with yesterday’s People, some scissors and a tube of Super Glue.

We shouldn’t grumble, should we? Mrs Leathers said to Candy and they smiled at each other, snug as two bugs in the shabby old rocking chair next to the Rayburn. But when another twenty minutes had gone by and no sound or movement had been heard, Mrs Leathers reluctantly put the dog in her cheap plastic washing basket and went to see if everything was all right.





On the rackety gateleg table, Charlie, wearing a pair of his wife’s washing-up gloves, was cutting out large pieces from the newspaper. Old football coupons and loser’s lottery tickets had all been pushed aside to make plenty of space.

Charlie cut smaller. And smaller still. Selecting a paragraph, a sentence, a final word, a letter. He released a rattling sigh of satisfaction. That hadn’t been too difficult. Only six words needed and all what you might call common or garden.

Charlie removed his gloves and picked up a Rizla packet to make himself a smoke. Laid the pungent ginger threads of Samson tobacco in an untidy pile, rolled up, ran the grey, corrugated tip of his tongue along the width of the paper and lit the end.

A click of the latch and his wife stood on the threshold. Charlie sprang to his feet, scarlet with rage.

‘Get out!’

‘I wondered if you were—’

‘Can’t a man read the papers in peace?’

‘I’m sorry.’

Charlie Leathers glared at his wife as she backed away. At her meek scrawniness and straggly grey hair and sorrowful hunched shoulders. God, she was a whingeing pain in the arse. In normal circumstances he would have followed her out into the kitchen and given her what for.

But not tonight. Because tonight, for Charlie, was far from normal. Tonight you might say the writing was on the wall. In front of him were six wallet-cramming hieroglyphs that could spell freedom. He looked around the tiny room, treating himself to a good snigger at the pockmarked vinyl suite, cheap veneer sideboard and old-fashioned cabinet television. Because soon he would be saying goodbye to all this. It would be your nice fur recliner, a bottle of Scotch on ice, Players High Tar to hand and something young and blonde and cuddly on his knee.