There are cobwebs and stains and warped boards and cracks in the glass. There are patches of rust in the roof and plastic buckets set below to catch the rain. There are shelves full of mechanical parts — levers, cogs, engine bits, most of them rusted.
I climb into the digger and start it up. The seat is uncomfortable, and has sharp splits in the vinyl where the foam bleeds through and looks like snow. I pull up a lever to slide the seat back. I’ve never driven one of these machines before, but the simplicity of the levers and pedals makes it easy enough after a few minutes’
practice. The digger vibrates as I roll forward. It bounces up and down with every small dip in the shingle road. The wheels leave deep imprints in the wet lawn.
I drive back to the grave.
Getting my daughter back is the priority, and anything that happens in between I’ll put down to God’s will. That ought to keep Father Julian happy.
chapter twenty-two
There is an abyss. Those it waits for can stand on the precipice, some live there, and then there are those who sink into the depths as if attached to cinderblocks. I’m not sure where I stand, and that might be one of the problems with the abyss — you never really know if you can keep dropping lower. That’s what the last two years have been like. I slid into the abyss, and what I saw down there frightened me; since then, I’ve been doing what I can to pull myself away. Perhaps, though, all I’ve been doing is staying at the same depth, just waiting for one more moment to sink me lower.
I think that moment is here. I don’t know. I hope the fact I’m indulging in some self-evaluation means I’m aware of the slide, just as an insane man can’t be insane if he is wondering if he is.
A man who thinks he has sunk as far as he can perhaps hasn’t sunk that far at all. The problem is, when you’re sinking and not looking for a life preserver to pull you back, then perhaps you really are gone.
I try making another call, but Sidney doesn’t answer. His phone is switched on, because it goes to voicemail after five rings. He’s probably sitting there staring at it. He’s got my dead daughter in the back of his car and that means he’s going to ignore my calls. He’s got his own dead son whom he has to start making arrangements for lying on a slab of steel in a cold morgue with a sheet draped over him. He has to start picking out coffins and flowers and headstone engravers. He has to pick out a suit for his son, and a funeral home, and he has to let people know so they can show up. He’s got a lot on his mind. But he has to figure out first what he’s going to do with Emily. And he’s worrying about what I’m going to do to him.
I close my eyes. I question what I’m doing, but not enough to stop doing it. I send him a text.
I want my daughter back and you’re going to give, her to me.
We’re going to make a trade. Trust me, it’s a trade you’ll be willing to make.
I’m sitting in the digger underneath one of the bluest skies this summer. I’m parked back by the shed. It feels like I’m melting out here. It’s taken me the best part of two hours to do what I figure would have been a twenty-or thirty-minute job for one of the Alderman duo. Nobody came over to investigate the sound.
Cemeteries don’t get a lot of foot traffic in the middle of the week, and I’ve had this area all to myself.
The phone starts to ring. I flip it open.
‘Fuck you,’ he says. ‘You murdered my boy, and you think you have something to trade?’ His words are slurred, and I realise whatever bar he dragged himself out of to take my daughter away he has crawled back in to.
“I didn’t kill your son.’
‘He’s dead, ain’t he?’
‘Bring back my daughter and we’ll talk about it.’
‘What?’
‘You heard me. I want to make a trade.’
‘Trade? You have nothing that I want.’
‘That’s what I thought at first. Until I started playing your game. The digger wasn’t that hard to use. I got the hang of it in the end.’
‘Where are you?’ he asks.
‘I’m where you were ten years ago,’ I say, and I hang up.
A few seconds later the phone rings again. I switch it off There’s a tap outside the shed and I’m thirsty, but I don’t want my lips to touch anything that Sidney Alderman’s lips might have touched. I climb down from the digger and step into the shade.