“What d’you lot want?” Udy asked. His gaze went from Lynley to Daidre and back to Lynley. He seemed to be assessing everything about them but most particularly their shoes for some reason. Lynley saw why when he looked at Udy’s own feet. He wore boots but they were long past their prime. The soles were split at the toes.
“Paying a call…” Daidre had stepped away from Lynley’s embrace. Face-to-face with her father, she bore no resemblance either to him or to her brother.
“What you doing here, then?” Udy said. “We got no need of do-gooders round here. We make it on our own and always have done. So you lot clear out. This’s private property, this is, and there’s a sign posted.”
It came to Lynley that while the women in the caravan knew who Daidre was, the men did not, that for some reason Gwynder had sought and found her sister on her own, perhaps knowing at some level that her mission was futile. Hence, Udy had no idea that he was speaking to his own daughter. But when Lynley considered this, it seemed reasonable. The thirteen-year-old who had been his daughter was someone from the past, not the accomplished, educated woman before him. Lynley waited for Daidre to identify herself. She did not do so.
Instead, she gathered herself together, fumbling with the zip on her jacket, as if with the need to do something with her hands. She said to the man, “Yes. Well, we’re leaving.”
“You do that,” he said. “We got a business we’re running here and we don’t fancy trespassers comin’ round on the off-season. We open in June and there’ll be bits and bobs aplenty for sale then.”
“Thank you. I’ll remember that.”
“And mind the sign as well. If it says no trespassing, that’s what it bloody means. And it’ll say no trespassing till we’re opened, understand?”
“Certainly. We understand.”
There was actually no posted sign that Lynley had seen, either one forbidding trespass or one indicating this desolate spot was a place of business. But there seemed little enough reason to point out the man’s delusion to him. Far wiser to clear out and to put this place and its people and their way of life behind them. He understood, then, that this was exactly what Daidre had done. He also saw what her struggle now was.
He said, “Come away,” and he put his arm round her shoulders once again and led her in the direction of her car. He could feel the stares of the two men behind them and, for reasons he didn’t wish to consider just then, he hoped they wouldn’t realise who Daidre was. He didn’t know what would happen if they realised it. Nothing dangerous, surely. At least nothing dangerous as one typically thought of danger. But there were other hazards here besides the removal of one’s personal safety. There was the emotional minefield that lay between Daidre and these people, and he felt an urgency to remove her from it.
When they returned to the car, Lynley said he would drive. Daidre shook her head. She said, “No, no. I’m fine.” When they climbed inside, though, she didn’t start the engine at once. Instead, she pulled some tissues from the glove box and blew her nose. Then she rested her arms on the top of the steering wheel and peered out at the caravan in the distance.
“So you see,” she said.
He made no reply. Again, her hair had fallen over the frames of her glasses. Again, he wanted to push it away from her face. Again, he did not.