Chapter 36 #2
The beam of Christina’s torch cut through the vast greenhouse like a scalpel, slicing open the gloom to reveal suspended droplets of condensation that hung in the air like frozen stars.
She had been walking for nearly a minute and still couldn’t see where the glass and iron structure ended.
Built against one side of the old walled garden, the Victorian greenhouse loomed larger than she’d imagined, its curved ribs disappearing into darkness, its breath of damp earth and old ferns pressing close around her.
Her breath came in shallow gasps, fogging before her face in the evening chill.
‘Elspeth!’ Her voice cracked, ricocheting off the glass panes. ‘Elspeth, darling, if you can hear me—’
Nothing. Only the drip, drip, drip of the automatic watering system and the rustle of leaves in the darkness beyond the Victorian ironwork.
Christina’s hands trembled as she pushed deeper into the greenhouse, her sleeve snagging on a wooden stake. The earthy smell of compost was overwhelming, mixing with the sweet rot of fallen fruit. She kicked aside a terracotta pot – too hard – and it shattered across the flagstones.
Eleven years old. What eleven year old went anywhere without their phone? Unless they didn’t have a choice. Unless—
No. No, Frank wouldn’t. Even furious by what she’d done, he wouldn’t stoop to that.
Would he? But Frank knew people. All those years on the force meant he knew exactly the sort of people who’d do anything for cash.
The sort with dead eyes and no questions asked.
Tina’s stomach lurched. She thought of hands clamping over mouths.
Of a van with its lights off, screeching away with a cargo of bound and gagged prisoners.
Why hadn’t the children just told Penelope where they were going? Ben adored his mother – he wouldn’t want to frighten her. Unless they couldn’t.
The image crashed through her mind before she could stop it: Elspeth’s terrified face, a stranger’s hand twisted in her hair, pulling—
Christina pressed her forehead against the cool glass of the greenhouse, leaving a smudge of condensation.
She could hear Hamish calling from the stables, his voice distant and hollow.
William’s deeper shout followed. But here, in this cathedral of glass and shadow, there was only her ragged breathing and the mad hammering of her heart against her ribs.
She left the greenhouse, moving to the potting shed, wrenching the door open and sweeping her torch across every shadow that might hide a child, all the while her mind whirring with ever more dreadful possibilities. The only living thing she spotted was a spider, crouched on a windowsill.
She stepped outside. The Devon countryside stretched into infinite darkness, dotted with the occasional light from a distant farmhouse. ‘Elspeth! Where are you?’ Christina’s voice broke into something animal.
They couldn’t have gone far. They couldn’t have. Then a ping from her phone. She nearly dropped it in her haste to check. But it was from Hamish:
Not in stables. Checking cider barn and orchards. Let us know if you find them.
She hadn’t.
Elspeth was gone. And so was Ben. And Tina was starting to believe the timing of their disappearance and her standing up to her fellow forgers was not a coincidence.
If this involved Ernest or Frank, what did they want from her? Or was it just revenge for alerting potential buyers to the value of the loving cup?
She strode back to the house where she met William and Hamish in the entrance hall, a group of spaniels milling round their legs. William shooed the dogs outside. ‘I’ll just get Molly; she must be in with Pen, the naughty rascal. Come inside, might as well be warm.’
William led the way to the drawing room where Penelope sat with her feet curled up underneath her on the sofa, a magazine in her hands. Despite the studied elegance, Christina couldn’t help but notice she was still on page one. ‘Found them?’ she asked, peering up over her reading glasses.
‘Not yet. I just came to fetch Molly,’ said William. ‘Thought the dogs could help me search the woods.’
‘No Molly in here,’ said Penelope, letting out a theatrical sigh. ‘Isn’t she with the others?’
‘No’ said William. His eyes suddenly lit up as something seemed to occur to him, a spark of excitement crossing his face, then he started fiddling with his phone.
Before Penelope could reply, William looked up from his screen.
‘Got ‘em!’ he shouted. ‘Pen, find a map while I get the Landy! Meet you out the front!’ Hamish shot out after him, and Tina, confused but full of adrenaline, watched as Penelope’s expression sharpened with rare purpose; she leaped off the sofa and rummaged through drawers, scattering envelopes and leaflets onto the carpet.
‘Somewhere in here – aha!’ She tossed a folded Ordnance Survey map at Tina.
Tina caught it mid-air and bolted out of the room, her feet slapping against the wooden floor of the panelled corridor.
Outside, a battered Land Rover sat idling, its ancient exhaust coughing out clouds of fumes.
William stood rigid beside it, as if standing to attention, phone in hand, Hamish at his side like a loyal batman.
‘Map!’ William bellowed the moment he saw the women.
Tina held it out, and he snatched it like a hawk diving for prey.
He threw it onto the car’s bonnet and leaned over, his finger jabbing at the lines and contours, alternating glances between the map and the glowing screen of his phone.
He spoke with a clipped voice, his jaw tight. ‘Come on! I think they’re in New Wood!’
His shoes crunched on gravel as he spun around, tore open the door, and leaped into the driver’s seat.
Tina and Hamish scrambled in after him, barely shutting their doors before the vehicle took off, tyres screaming and spitting pebbles as they peeled away from the house, leaving Penelope standing in the porch waving them off with her fingers crossed.
William sped across the open parkland, slamming Tina back into her seat, then jostling her like a swinging pendulum as the headlights bounced wildly with every rut and rise in the ground.
‘New Wood?’ she shouted over the noise.
‘Planted in 1815 to commemorate Waterloo,’ William barked, his eyes fixed on the horizon. ‘Quickest route is across the park, so hold tight!’
Tina gripped the dashboard as the Land Rover pitched forward and bounced violently. Her breath hitched as they hit a ridge. The trees ahead loomed like blackened beasts etched against the deepening dusk. A hare exploded from the undergrowth and darted across their path, disappearing like smoke.
Behind her, Hamish clung onto the back of her seat. ‘What makes you think they’re in New Wood?’ he asked.
‘I fitted Molly’s collar with a tracker,’ he said grimly, ‘and it’s pinging from New Wood. She’s Ben’s favourite dog and though she’s a bloody mischievous little monster, she wouldn’t go that far on her own. Why they’ve gone there? No clue.’
‘It’s the play,’ Hamish said suddenly.
‘Eh?’
‘As You Like It. It’s set in a forest. Elspeth’s obsessed with it right now. I bet they’ve gone full method.’
Tina didn’t know whether to laugh or cry.
Then she heard it – a sharp bark, high and frantic, somewhere ahead.
‘There!’ she shouted, pointing.
The headlights swung to catch a blur of black and white – a spaniel hurtling toward them, ears flapping like torn flag pennants.
William slammed on the brakes. Clods of grass and mud sprayed up.
He opened the door, and the dog launched herself into his lap, tail wagging so fiercely it was just a blur.
‘Where are they, old girl?’ he asked, stroking her.
Molly whined and twisted in his arms, trying to leap back out toward the trees again.
And then Tina saw them.
‘There!’ she gasped. ‘Elspeth!’
The headlights picked her out. Elspeth beneath a tree, her dress muddied, her plait coming undone, arms wrapped around Ben.
He sat hunched beside her, one leg stretched awkwardly in front of him, his face pale with pain.
She was holding him steady, her slight frame braced under his weight, as if she were the only thing keeping him upright.
Tina’s heart stopped, then kicked hard. Relief flooded her body so fast she felt faint.
The children were safe. Stupid. Beautiful. Reckless. But safe.
And as she held her daughter close, heart still thudding, Tina’s mind flicked to something else. Ernest. The auction. He thought he’d already won. Thought he’d played it beautifully.
But holding Elspeth – fierce, stubborn, brave Elspeth who’d risked her own safety to help a friend – Christina knew she wasn’t the same woman who’d been trembling in Ernest’s shadow a few weeks ago.
He had no idea what he was dealing with now. She was going to destroy his plan, and him.