“They don’t like us,” Abby said evenly, reaching over to switch on the windscreen wipers. The street was long and deserted, little pastel houses closed down tight against the rain, dark blur of hills rising behind them. Nothing moved anywhere, only the old man’s slow mechanical shuffle and the flick of a lace curtain down the street. “Drive, hon.”
“That little fuck,” Rafe said. He was clutching his shoe like a weapon, knuckles white. “You should have floored it, Justin. You should have splattered whatever he’s got instead of a brain across this wretched street.” He started to roll down his window.
“Rafe,” Abby said sharply. “Roll that up. Now.”
“Why? Why should we let him get away with-”
“Because,” I said, in a small voice. “I want to go for my walk tonight.”
That stopped Rafe in his tracks, just like I had known it would; he stared at me, one hand still on the window handle. Justin stalled the car with a horrible grinding sound, managed to jam it into gear and hit the accelerator hard. “Charming,” he said. There was a brittle edge to his voice: any kind of nastiness always upset him. “That was really charming. I mean, I realize they don’t like us, but that was completely unnecessary. I didn’t do anything to that man. I braked to let him cross. What did he do that for?”
I was pretty sure I knew the answer to that one. Sam had been busy in Glenskehy, the last few days. A detective swanning down from Dublin in his city-boy suit, walking into their sitting rooms asking questions, patiently digging for their buried stories; and all because a girl from the Big House had got herself stabbed. Sam would have done his job gently and deftly, he always does; it wasn’t him they would hate.
“Nothing,” said Rafe. He and I were twisted around in our seats to watch the old man, who was standing on the pavement outside the newsagent’s, leaning on his stick and staring after us. “He did it because he’s a knuckle-dragging bog monster and he loathes anyone who isn’t actually his wife or his sister or both. It’s like living in the middle of bloody Deliverance.”
“You know something?” Abby said coldly, without turning around. “I’m getting really, really sick of your colonial attitude. Just because he didn’t go to some fancy English prep school, that doesn’t necessarily make him your inferior. And if Glenskehy isn’t good enough for you, you’re free to find somewhere that is.”
Rafe opened his mouth, then shrugged disgustedly and closed it again. He gave his shoelace a vicious jerk; it broke, and he swore under his breath.
If the man had been thirty or forty years younger, I would have been memorizing his description to pass on to Sam. The fact that he wasn’t a viable suspect-this guy had not outrun five students out for blood-sent a nasty little ripple across my shoulders. Abby turned up the volume; Rafe tossed his shoe on the floor and shoved up two fingers at the back windscreen. This, I thought, is going to be trouble.
“OK,” Frank said, that night. “I got my FBI friend to have his boys do some more digging. I told him we have reason to believe that our girl took off because she had a nervous breakdown, so we’re looking for signs and possible causes. Is that what we think, just out of interest?”
“I have no idea what you think, Frankie boy. Don’t ask me to climb into that black hole.” I was up my tree. I wriggled my back up against one half of the trunk and braced my feet against the other, so I could lean my notebook on my thigh. There was just enough moonlight, between the branches, that I could see the page. “Hang on a sec.” I clamped the phone under my jaw and hunted for my pen.
“You sound cheerful,” Frank said, suspiciously.
“I just had a gorgeous dinner and a laugh. What’s not to be cheerful about?” I managed to extract the pen from my jacket pocket without falling out of the tree. “OK, shoot.”
Frank made an exasperated noise. “Lovely for some. Just don’t get too chummy. There’s always a chance you may have to arrest one of these people.”
“I thought you were gunning for the mysterious stranger in the black cape.”
“I’m keeping an open mind. And the cape’s optional. OK, here’s everything we’ve got-you did say you wanted ordinary stuff, so don’t blame me. On the sixteenth of August 2000, Lexie-May-Ruth switched mobile-phone providers to get cheaper local minutes. On the twenty-second, she got a raise at the diner, seventy-five cents extra an hour. On the twenty-eighth, Chad proposed to her, and she said yes. The first weekend of September, the two of them drove to Virginia so she could meet Chad’s parents, who said she was a very sweet girl and brought them a potted plant.”
“The engagement ring,” I said, keeping my voice easy. This was setting ideas exploding in my head like popcorn, but I didn’t want Frank to know that. “Did she take it with her when she split?”
