‘What was she like?’ she’d asked softly.
He smiled. ‘She was ace. She was funny and sweet but kind of … fierce, you know? I was only ten, and I guess I’m biased, but I don’t think you meet many people like her. She was so passionate about stuff, she’d go off on all these rallies and marches, save the whale, women’s rights, you name it. Drove Mum and Dad mad because she’d never just stay still and get on with her school work. I was only a kid, but even then I admired her for it, how principled she was, how sure she was about what was right and wrong. And she was a free spirit, you know?’ He sighed and rubbed his face. ‘Maybe our house was too restrictive for her and she wanted her freedom. Who knows? Maybe that’s why she went.’
‘I’m so sorry,’ Clara had said quietly. ‘I can’t imagine how hard it must have been for you all.’
He got up, crossed the room to pull a book down from its shelf and handed it to her. It was a thin volume of children’s poems. T.S. Eliot’s Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats. ‘She gave me this a few months before she left,’ he told her. ‘She used to read it to me when I was a kid. It was …’ he stopped. ‘Well, anyway. That’s kind of all I have left of her.’
Reverently, Clara had opened it and read aloud the message written on the flyleaf. ‘“For Mungojerrie, from Rumpelteazer. Love you Kiddo. Always, E xx” ‘Mungojerrie?’ Clara had queried, and he’d smiled.
‘They’re the names of the cats in one of the poems – her favourite one.’
He’d been silent for a while before saying, ‘Anyway, it’s all in the past now,’ and he’d taken the book from her hands and pulled her towards him and started kissing her again, to stop her questions, she’d sensed. Whenever she’d tried to bring Emily up after that, he’d simply shrug and change the subject until eventually she’d given up, though she’d found herself thinking about her often, the missing sister of her boyfriend who’d walked away from home one day, never to be heard from again.
Now, with sudden decisiveness she said to Mac, ‘I’m going to drive over there.’
His eyebrows shot up. ‘To Suffolk? How long will that take?’
She looked around for her keys and bag. ‘An hour and a half tops. At least I’ll be doing something. I can’t just sit here waiting for him, I feel like I’m going mad. And I think you’re right – I think that’s where he’ll be. He’s so close to his mum and dad. And if he has gone there because he’s freaked out by the emails, I’d prefer to talk to him face to face.’
‘OK,’ Mac said slowly, ‘but what if he’s not?’
She glanced at him. ‘Then I’ll call the police, which is another reason why I should warn Rose and Oliver first. Will you stay here in case he does come back?’
Mac nodded and patted his laptop bag. ‘Sure, I’ve a load of pictures to edit – might as well work here as anywhere else.’
She hesitated. ‘Will you call the hospitals too?’
‘Clara, I really don’t think anything …’
‘Please, Mac.’
He held his hands up in defeat. ‘OK, sure.’
As soon as Clara got into her car, she phoned her office, putting her mobile on hands-free, before setting off across town towards the M11. She was almost at the North Circular before her editor grudgingly accepted her explanation of ‘personal problems’ and agreed she could have the next day off. After that she phoned Lauren, who confirmed there’d still been no word from Luke all day. Finally she asked to be put through to the security desk where she reached George, the guard who’d been on duty the night before. He told her that Luke had left the building via the back entrance at around 7.30, that they’d had a brief chat about the football and there’d seemed nothing wrong. ‘You know Luke,’ he chuckled, ‘always got a smile on his face.’
As she drove through the London streets she thought about Luke’s parents. She remembered how nervous she’d been the first time he’d brought her to The Willows, his childhood home in Suffolk. Rose and Oliver had sounded so impressive; so very much larger than life – and so very different from her own mum and dad.
It had been a morning in late May. The house they drew up to stood alone, stark against the bleak beauty of the Suffolk landscape, the seemingly endless flat fields, the sky vast and blue and cloudless above them. Luke had led her around the side of the building through to a long and sweeping garden, its borders a carefully controlled riot of colour, a white lilac tree at its centre heavy with flowers that filled the air with their sweet powdery scent. ‘Wow,’ she’d murmured and Luke had smiled. ‘My mum’s pride and joy, you should see the parties she throws here every summer – the whole village comes along, it’s insane.’ And there, at the far end of the garden, kneeling at a flower bed, secateurs in hand, had been Rose. She’d stood up when she heard them approach, and Clara’s belly had dipped with apprehension. What would this woman, this cultured, educated, retired surgeon, think of her? Would she like her, think her good enough for her son?
But Rose had smiled, and walked towards them, and in that instant Clara had known everything would be OK. This slim, pretty, fresh-faced woman in a pink summer dress was not in the least intimidating. Instead, Clara had been bowled over by Rose’s charm, the way her eyes lit up when she smiled, the genuine warmth with which she’d hugged her, her infectious, enthusiastic way of talking. Rose had led her into the kitchen that first day and patting her hand had said, ‘Come and have a drink and tell me all about yourself, Clara, it’s so lovely to have you here.’
Oliver, Luke’s dad, had emerged from somewhere out of the depths of the house, a tall and bearded bear of a man, Luke’s features mirrored in his own, his son’s kindness and good humour shining from his almost identical brown eyes. He was a university lecturer, the author of several books on art history. Slightly shy, he was quieter and more reserved than his wife but Clara had warmed to him instantly.
In fact, she’d fallen in love with everything about the Lawsons that day: their beautiful, rambling house, the easy affection they’d showed one another, even the way they argued and joked, good-naturedly mocking each other’s flaws – Oliver’s messiness and tendency towards hypochondria, Rose’s bossy perfectionism or Luke’s inability to lose at anything without sulking. It was a revelation to Clara, who’d grown up in a house where even the smallest of perceived slights could lead to weeks of offended silence. She had been conscious, that first visit to The Willows, of the strangest feeling of déjà vu, as though she’d returned after a long absence to somewhere she’d once known well; the place where she was always meant to be.