NEW YEAR’S EVE is arguably one of the most depressing shifts to work in a police station. The 0600–1400 hours crew had practically congaed their way out to the nearest pub when their shift ended, but the 1400–2200 bunch are having to make do with soft drinks and snacks. Halfway through the shift, the cola is warm, the crisps are soft and the team are feeling the party might have passed them by already.
Liz comes back from the loo, makes a quick detour to her own desk and then leans over Pete’s. ‘Fifteen possibilities,’ she says, putting the file down in front of him.
Pete reaches across and sees a printed list of industrial estates. Liz has followed Maggie’s instructions to the letter: look for modest-sized units, rented out in January 2013, due for renewal in 2018. ‘We can get round them all in the next week or so,’ she says.
Pete nods. ‘I suspect Maggie is working on it as well. She could find it before we do. If it exists. Which I seriously doubt. Did I mention that?’
Liz smiles, starts to walk away, then turns back again. ‘If Hamish gets out, it won’t be good for you,’ she says. ‘Not in the short term.’
Pete wonders if he can sneak a beer out of the Asda carrier bag under his desk. The chances of a call-out at this hour on New Year’s Eve are slim, but you never know. ‘I guess at the end of the day, all we can do is the right thing,’ he tells her.
What Liz does next is completely out of character. She bends over, and kisses him on the temple. ‘I kind of love you,’ she says.
Christ, he needs a beer. ‘Get out of here,’ he tells her.
Chapter 77
Chapter 78
THE BASEMENT BENEATH Maggie’s house is large and high-ceilinged, with several interconnected rooms. The first, at the bottom of the staircase, is the biggest. In this room, there are narrow, horizontally configured windows, very high in the walls, that allow in weak beams of dusty light, but even in daytime the single, low-watt electric bulbs – just one in each room – are needed.
Close to midnight, in winter, the subterranean rooms are full of shadows, but Maggie knows what lurks in each. Every time she comes down here, she thinks about ghosts, but she hasn’t seen one yet.
‘Bit early for spring cleaning,’ says the voice that is never silent for long, and that always has plenty to say for itself below ground.
‘Technically, late.’ Maggie carries a box to the bottom of the stairs. ‘Still a few more minutes of 2015 left to run.’ The box joins several others stretching up the wooden staircase. Before the night is out, Maggie will carry them upstairs and put them in the back of her car. She has already identified four household-waste disposal sites, none of them too close to home, where she will drop them off in the next couple of days.
There is stuff in these boxes, old books, souvenirs, with which she is loath to part, and yet there are no memories here that aren’t replicated perfectly inside her head. She has forgotten nothing. Probably never will.
‘We’re on the move again, then?’
‘Probably,’ she says, knowing it is more than probable, it is certain. One way or another, her time here is coming to an end. Will she miss this house, she wonders. Unlikely. It will be nice, if anything, to find somewhere smaller, without cavernous rooms and draughty corners. A cottage, she thinks, with thick, stone walls, a dense, thatched roof, and open fires in every room. A cottage with no hallways, or corridors, or basements. A cottage in which one room leads to another and the garden is tiny, and the neighbouring houses are close by, possibly even linked.
It might be nice to be among people again. She has already started checking available property on the Isle of Wight.
She takes one last look around.
The high shelving units around the room are empty now. She has never been a hoarder and it hasn’t taken long to clear the room completely. The second, smaller room holds nothing but the furniture she inherited when she bought this house. That can stay where it is. And the third room. She needs to check the third room.
From somewhere upstairs she can hear a clock chiming.
‘Happy New Year, Maggie,’ says the voice that has been her companion for nearly twenty years. She doubts, now, that it will ever leave her.
‘Happy New Year, Daisy,’ she replies.
Chapter 79
31 December 2015
Dear Hamish,
This time next year, my love, we will walk on sands of powdered gold and swim in waters that have the power to wash away the past.
This time next year, my love, we will eat food and drink wine beneath stars that will be dust, long before I cease to adore you.
This time next year, my love, we will fall asleep at dawn, having spent the hours of darkness in a tangle of hot limbs, spinning ecstasy from starlight and building castles from moonbeams.
This time next year, my love . . .
Me
PROPERTY OF AVON AND SOMERSET POLICE. Ref: 544/45.2 Hamish Wolfe.
Chapter 80
From the office of