I'll Never Tell, page 24
I nod and manage to smile politely. ‘Thank you again, Barbara, for all of your help.’
‘No problem,’ she repeats as she swings herself back up into the truck. ‘Just – Jesus, you should hurry up and get her. In this weather, I bet she’s fed up and miserable. Apparently it’s not so bad in summer, but even then, I wouldn’t want my daughter hanging about in that place.’
I shut the door of the jeep, and Paul and I stand in the middle of the forest on the rutted, narrow track. The foliage around us is dim and dense, but we only need to follow the path, and we’ll get there.
‘Be careful of the river,’ Barbara shouts as she slams her own door closed. ‘After the rain, it’ll be running pretty deep.’
Chapter 45
Paul
Now that they are out of the truck and the engine is shut off, Paul can hear crows cawing all around them. It sounds as if there are hundreds of the things and their racket is like angry laughter. He thinks about taking Julia’s hand to reassure her, but looking at how rocky the road is, how uneven, he imagines that will only make it harder to walk. ‘Here,’ he says instead, ‘at least let me carry the rucksack.’
She hands it to him and he slings it over his shoulder, where the straps dig into his skin. ‘All right then.’
They turn their backs on the jeep and set off along the track. There’s a bend almost at once and so they lose sight of Barbara. Paul walks slowly so that Julia can keep pace with him, even though the impatience in him burns like acid. It makes sense to go slowly, he has to tell himself: it would be a nightmare to go twisting an ankle here. There are still puddles from the torrents of rain, the stones and rocks are loose, and in some places the mud is like a bog, ankle deep. Fifteen minutes, he reminds himself. Maximum twenty, and they’ll be with her. One foot in front of the other, that’s all it takes. He imagines the moment he sees her, grasping her, wrapping his arms round her. Deep in his heart and safe, safe, safe.
They hear the river well before they see it. Paul mistakes the noise for thunder at first, or an aeroplane crossing the expanse above them. He cranes up to scan the strip of grey sky before Julia says to him, ‘It’s water.’
And then it’s obvious. That rushing roar, what else could it be? They walk-scramble along the remaining length of the track. It has smoothed out now – passable again for a vehicle, if a vehicle could be airlifted to here.
‘Paul,’ says Julia. ‘Look.’
He follows the line of her finger to where she’s pointing. A wooden sign for Camp Dìon, crudely painted with a white arrow, is nailed to a tree.
They round the final bend, and now the track fans out into a wide, gritty bankside, a semi-circular overhang, surrounded by trees. The earth slopes steeply down ahead of them, and four, five feet below them, there it is: the river.
Not blue and sparkling, but brown and writhing. Deep. Like Barbara said.
They slip-slide down to it. Their shoes are ruined anyway by now. There’s a rope strung across it as a flimsy handrail. Paul’s foot slips on the crumbly bank.
‘We have to cross?’ Julia says.
Paul scans upstream, downstream. ‘I can’t see another way.’
‘I don’t want to see him. I don’t want to talk to him.’
He knows who she means. ‘I know that. Neither do I. But she’s sixteen, Julia, and we are her parents. He can’t do anything to us. In fact, what he’s already done is probably illegal, leaving the country with a teenager. We won’t let him do any talking. We’re going to get our daughter and take her home.’
Of all the scenarios that have run through his head, he never imagined their reunion being like this. He never imagined that this was how they would find her. A nameless forest in the middle of nowhere? Rain, mud and crows, and only the kindness of strangers to rely on?
He almost jumps out of his skin when Julia’s phone rings yet again, the noise totally incongruous in this setting. He’s surprised she even has reception out here.
‘Here. Please, Paul! Can you answer?’ Julia is holding the buzzing phone out to him, as though it’s a creature that is biting her hand. She’s turning the responsibility over to him now, the way she’s done with other things in their lives, asking him to deal with whatever she can’t. Half dazed, he takes the mobile from her and hits the green answer icon. The line is poor, but he can just about make out the other person speaking.
‘Hello? It’s Ned. Yeah, Ned from the pub. Listen, I’m not sure what you two have got going on, but I’ve just had the police here.’
‘The police?’
‘Aye. And they’re looking for you.’
Paul doesn’t experience any shock or surprise, just a heavy sense of inevitability. Of course the police have traced them. DS Brayford and her colleagues aren’t stupid. She must have known all along that they were lying. Finding them was only a matter of time.
‘Ned,’ he says. ‘I’m sorry. For any trouble they’ve caused you.’
‘It’s fine, nae bother. But, mate, look. I can’t be getting involved in anything … dodgy. I’ve already texted Barbara and told her to come back.’
‘No – wait. She said she would wait for us. Didn’t she explain? Our daughter is missing but she’s here – at the camp.’
‘I dunno, mate. Seems there’s more to it than that. Like I said, I don’t want to get involved. The police are on their way, they’re in a jeep coming after you, and look – if your daughter’s missing, right, they’re probably your best bet.’
When Paul hangs up, Julia’s face is ashen. She has sunk to a crouch on the bank of the river, head between her knees. He crouches down beside her.
‘You know what this is,’ she says. ‘You know what this means.’
Even if they reach Chrissie first, there are going to be some serious repercussions. It’s so much to face; he can’t think of how on earth they would explain all this. Instead, his attention shrinks down to practicalities. There is no way the police can drive all the way down here either. They will have to walk, like them, navigating the last stretch on foot. Even so, it’s only a matter of time. He and Julia are on a track in the middle of a forest, the light is fading, and they have no transport back. But their daughter, Chrissie, is just a river-crossing away. They have to keep going. There is simply no way back.
‘I’m going to go first, then,’ Julia says. ‘If I slip, I might need you to haul me back out.’ She steps down into the water. It comes up to the middle of her shins.
‘It’s so cold.’ She gasps. ‘Why is everything so cold up here!’
She reaches down to grasp the rope that drapes across the river – a river that is clearly in flood – lifting it, dripping, up to waist height. Her hands are already red-raw with the cold, and the greenish cord looks ridiculously thin and flimsy. He can’t even see whether it’s properly tied.
‘Shit. Julia. Shit. Be careful.’ They shouldn’t be doing this. Surely there has to be another way. Maybe they could try to get a message across to her. Why don’t they just wait for one of the students to come out? For a moment, he even thinks crazily that they should just wait for the police. The police who are looking for them. Police who might arrest them – or who might help them. They could turn themselves in, explain everything. Offer money if needs be. Trust that – back home – DS Brayford is still on their side. Whatever has happened, Chrissie didn’t mean it. He knows that now. She’s just a child, a silly schoolgirl. Everything she’s done, he’s completely ready to forgive.
Julia steps forward. The water rushes up to her thighs and she staggers. She is so petite and you never think that water can be so strong. You never understand how people can be swept away in floodwater and die. You think of water the way it is in a bath or a swimming pool. Calm, placid; easy to sit and stand and swim in. Not like this. He can see Julia strain against the current. In his mind’s eye, he can see her slipping, tumbling, falling, dragged away in that violent torrent … He can see himself losing her, irreparably, after everything. He can see himself never getting her back.
She is strong though, stronger than he might have expected, for all her delicacy, all her refinement.
His turn now; he steps into the water behind her. She’s right: the cold feels like a million needles piercing his legs. The sheer shock of it, even only up to his shins, steals his breath. He wades forwards, following Julia, the current constantly dragging at his feet, his legs. The two of them don’t speak now. It would be hard to hear each other anyway over the tumult of the water. Julia wades on, close to reaching the halfway point. Surely it will grow shallower again after that. Leaves and twigs eddy all around them. The river, rain-swollen, is dragging pieces of the forest down with it. Upstream, a tangle of branches are jammed across the river, but the water pushes easily through and over. A force to be reckoned with.
But they are going to cross this river. Their family’s whole future may depend on it.
Julia has reached the middle now, and Paul is only a few metres behind. She glances back at him and he takes in the grim determination on her face. They are going to make it. He lifts his voice above the roar and calls out to her: ‘You’re doing great. I love you.’
And then, over Julia’s shoulder, he sees her, standing on the far bank, in wellington boots and with her familiar rucksack slung over her shoulder.
He almost collapses at the sight of her.
She seems thinner now, after only a few days. She looks childlike but also immeasurably older, dressed in clothes he doesn’t recognize, her hair tied back in a way he’s never seen.
It is her though.
Chrissie.
Chapter 46
Julia
Chrissie stands there, mouth open, a picture of complete shock.
I go stock-still as well, up to my knees in the icy water. My jeans and jacket are soaking; my legs, hands, lips are numb, but I don’t care.
I’ve found my daughter.
I feel tears running down my cheeks, mixing with the freezing splashes of river water.
‘Chrissie!’ I shout. I drag myself forward on the rope, stumbling over rocks, my legs continually pushed away from under me. This is stupid. This is crazy. But I’m going to get to her. I’m going to bring her home.
Under my feet, the ground is sloping up on the other side now. I’m over the worst of it. All I have to do is get up the bank. My legs are streaked with mud and I have a thin, oozing gash on my forearm. I didn’t feel it in the river but it’s starting to burn now.
I reach out a hand. The bank is steep. ‘Chrissie. Help me up. Chrissie.’
She doesn’t move. It’s as though she’s frozen. There is no one else here. No sign of anyone else from the camp. Just the three of us and this huge, gushing river. No sign of him. We can get her away from here without having to confront that. Get her away from him. Bring her home.
I let go of the river rope and pull myself up the bank on my own, clawing at roots and mud with my hands. Paul is close behind me, scrambling his way up the bank too, frantically, clumsily.
I make it to the top. I’m drenched and my hands are covered in mud, but I grab her – so hard that I’m in danger of leaving bruises. Twigs and leaves tumble down the bank from under my feet. Immediately, the river snatches them away and they’re gone.
‘You found me,’ she mumbles.
‘Of course we did! Chrissie, what the hell are you doing here?’
‘I didn’t mean to. I honestly didn’t mean it.’ Her face looks bloodless. What is it – horror? Fear?
‘We need to leave. Right now.’
‘Yes. Okay. Please. I’m coming.’
I’m confused. I didn’t expect her to be this compliant. We haven’t even set eyes on the camp.
Paul steps forwards, gaining the top of the bank too. ‘Is he here? Did he hurt you?’
She turns her gaze slowly towards him. ‘Is who here?’
‘Francis.’
There’s noise behind us. When I turn, I see a flash of bright yellow at the end of the track. A police vest. They’re here. I grab Chrissie’s arms again. I want to shake her, but I’m on the back foot again, because now there’s a figure coming up behind her. Brown hair, so familiar.
‘Oh my God. Reece.’ Chrissie’s best friend.
There’s a whole cluster of police on the opposite bank now; I see one of them set foot in the water. They are coming.
‘But Francis, Chrissie. What about Francis?’
Her face drains even further of colour. ‘No. Not really. He didn’t,’ she half whispers.
‘Didn’t what?’
Chrissie covers her face with her hands, her thin arms bending under my grasp. ‘Hurt me.’
Now Reece speaks, his voice low. Serious. ‘We just saw it on my phone. It’s on the news. Didn’t you see it too?’
‘See what? Listen, Chrissie. Francis is missing.’
‘He isn’t.’
I try to pull her hands from her face. ‘What are you talking about? Where is he?’
‘In Oxford! Where else?’
‘In Oxford? He never left?’
Reece repeats himself. ‘It’s on the news. They …’
His next words are lost on me: I simply can’t process them.
‘Hey!’ The police officer is shouting, waving, splashing through the river towards us. He’s a tall man, huge; the water barely comes up to his knees.
‘They what?’ Like me, Paul is staring at Reece.
DS Brayford’s words hammer in my brain. The last we know, he was seen with your daughter. Walking down towards one of the Cherwell towpaths. We picked them up on CCTV…
‘Don’t you understand?’ Chrissie says. She is crying now, tears flooding her cheeks.
‘No,’ I say. Because I don’t want to. I’m trying to hold myself up; the cold, the shock – I’m in danger of collapsing.
Reece says it again. ‘They pulled him out of the Cherwell river yesterday.’
I’ve never heard such misery in Chrissie’s voice. ‘Your boyfriend Francis isn’t missing, Mum. He’s dead.’
Chapter 47
Paul
‘We have to go,’ says Paul. ‘We have to get out of here.’ Although, this time, there’s no way they can avoid the police. He’s already pulling Chrissie back down the bank, tugging her by the sleeve of her unfamiliar clothes. He pulls at her, dragging her down the slope of the bank, even as she slithers and slips in his grasp.
‘It’s all right, Chrissie,’ he tells her, like a good father, even in the worst of circumstances sheltering her in the reassurance that everything is okay. He helps her down the bank and into the water. Julia follows them; her arm is bleeding, a bright red gash, but they haven’t time to stop. They have to get their daughter away from this place.
He steps back into the water and it feels almost colder than before. They meet the shouting police officer halfway across. The man grabs Chrissie, hustling her to the opposite bank. Paul glances behind; Reece is still standing on the far bank.
It’s so obvious to him now. Reece with his Save the Whales T-shirt; it makes sense he’d come to somewhere like this. And of course Chrissie would run to him, wherever he was. He catches Reece’s voice, shouting across to him. ‘I’m sorry! I’m sorry, Mr Goodlight. She didn’t mean to hurt anyone, she just wanted you to fix things! She ran away because she had to, but she always wanted to come back!’
Of course the police will need to ask a hundred questions. Paul has no idea how much they know. Are they under arrest? Is Chrissie?
‘We need to take you back to Kilgarry,’ the officers say. Paul nods, dumbly. He is soaked, frozen to the bone. Chrissie must be feeling the same. The police officers have silver foil blankets that they wrap round all three of them, and like that they have to walk back up the rutted track. It’s a blur; time expands and contracts. Paul’s mind feels frozen. He cannot seem to process what he’s learned.
Round the last bend, there are two police jeeps waiting for them. Unbelievably, Barbara’s sack of potatoes still sits slumped by the side of the road. A sense of horror begins to creep through him, a sense of reality cracking apart. It feels as though the last forty-eight hours is unravelling backwards, all the dot-to-dot connections coming apart. He thought he had this; he thought he knew what he was doing. He thought this was everything Celina had warned him about: Chrissie ending up in a sordid affair with some man. Now everything he’s assumed has been flipped on its head.
Paul pictures them dragging a body from a river. Francis’s body. Waterlogged. Cold. He thought he was rescuing Chrissie from this monster. But that was all wrong. That was never the story.
It can’t have been.
Because Francis is dead.
An officer sits him on the tailgate of a jeep, the foil blanket still around his shoulders. In response to the initial questions he’s asked, Paul tells this officer that he had no idea about Francis. Neither he nor Julia did. He explains about the Camp Dìon website they found on Julia’s old iPad, and how from there they tracked Chrissie to this place. They had no idea about any of it, even though he always tried to keep such a close eye. All this time, they thought Francis was with her. They feared he would hurt her – if he hadn’t already. They had no idea that he was dead.
They are interviewing Julia in a second vehicle. He can make out her head and shoulders in the back seat. Paul wonders whether she is telling them about her affair. She might as well. What’s left to lose?
They are gathering Chrissie’s initial statement too. She’s sitting on a fallen tree branch a little distance away, wrapped in foil too. An officer crouches next to her; he can just make out Chrissie’s voice.
‘I only pushed him a little bit,’ she says, ‘just to make him go away.’
He closes his ears to the rest of it after that. He isn’t sure he wants to know – not right now, maybe not ever.
