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She folded the paper again and dropped it back where she had found it. Laying her head back she lost herself in the music.
The concern at the back of her mind grew slowly. She put down her glass and picked up the post-it note. Pink with a daisy in the top right hand corner. The same as the ones she had kept on her desk in the house in The Dales.
Her throat threatened to close. She hadn’t put this paper here. Dolly had cleaned the room and there had been no bits and pieces left about. Both herself and the cottage owner were tidy and neat. She had used this table for her morning coffee cup and it was clean and empty.
She knew it was her paper and it was her writing – there was no doubt – but she certainly hadn’t put it in this room.
Where had she last had it? She had been so very careful to keep all her information on her Macbook, the one that George didn’t know she had, the one that stayed hidden in the old suitcase in the wardrobe.
She had written the address down just once. Sitting at her desk ready to leave and then thinking ahead to when she would arrive in Cornwall. She had scribbled it down at the last minute in case she needed to call.
She tried to calm herself. Just like the man in the garden this would have a simple explanation.
Closing her eyes she replayed her departure and remembered. She had slipped this into her jacket pocket and as she began the walk had pushed her jacket into the bag: the jacket that she no longer had because it was lying in a ditch at the side of the road.
Wasn’t it?
Chapter 17
She held the little square of paper in her hands, folding and unfolding it. It must be that she had brought it into this room and put it on the table. Or maybe, it had been on the floor and Dolly had picked it up and put it here for her to find. Yes, that’s what had happened.
But it wasn’t.
Pauline knew. This piece of paper had been in her jacket pocket. The ambulance people told her to keep the unconscious man in the ditch warm and sent her running for her bag and dragging out the jacket. She had wrapped it around his shoulders and chest and felt the shivering ease.
She had been so scared that he would die. It was frustrating that she didn’t know what else to do but to sit beside him and hold his hand and so then she had wrapped him in her coat.
So; had the paper fallen out into the road or in her bag? Maybe it had been in her bag and had become tangled in the other clothes. Yes, yes, and then she hadn’t noticed it when it fell out and Dolly had found it. That was it, that’s what had happened.
Why then did it have a water stain in the corner and a strange brown smear across one side?
She screwed the thing up and took it with her into the kitchen. She didn’t need it now and it wasn’t important and so it was dropped into the bin. The accident had been horrible. It wasn’t something she wanted to think about now or ever but it would have been nice to know how he had fared, the broken and unconscious rider.
Why was it that every time she moved forward something seemed to pop up to take her one step back and mar her pleasure? Damn it, the paper was nothing, just a strange little mystery and not worthy of a moment’s thought.
She poured another glass of wine and settled back on the settee to lose herself in the rich sounds of saxophone and piano.
Too much wine, too much emotion and it was time for bed. She checked the doors and dragged herself upstairs. Tomorrow was forecast to be bright and sunny and so she would go to the beach and remind herself that she was supposed to be on holiday. Time was running out and she must make the most of these last few days.
The waxing moon peeped through the tree tops and so she left the curtains open. The morning sun would waken her but that was fine as she wanted to fill her day with pleasure.
When the puzzles and memories tried to push in she cast them aside. She went on her mental journey to the desert island. Walking on white sand under swaying palms beside an azure ocean. The gentle rush of waves on the beach both real and virtual lulled her to sleep…
It was fear that woke her although it took a while to register. Music played somewhere softly in the darkness.
The moon washed the space with silver light. For a moment Pauline lay in the warm bed puzzled by the frizzle of nerves.
The smoky note of a saxophone drifted into the room.
As she slid her legs from under the duvet goose pimples prickled her bare arms. She realised that she was holding her breath and so gave herself a moment to breathe and to listen and assess.
Slowly she crossed the carpet and reached a hand to the half-closed door. The music swelled and faded waves of it wafting up the stairs enticing, puzzling and drawing her onwards in spite of herself.
She took the few steps across the landing and peered over the balustrade. The front door was closed, the living room door was open. There was the source of the sounds.
She gulped, her throat had dried and her stomach quivered with nerves. She looked back, it would be wisest to return to the safety of the bedroom, lock the door and ring the police on her mobile. Yet fear of embarrassment, a disinclination to cause a fuss, maybe even some curiosity; whatever it was something carried her quietly down the wooden staircase.
She crept along the hall and stood outside the lounge listening. The music still played, otherwise all was quiet save for the click of the hot water boiler which suddenly chimed in and caused her to gasp with shock.
She pushed open the door and stepped into the room. A figure sat in the easy chair by the window, backlit by the faint glow from the lamp in the farm gateway. A dark silhouette; his hands on the arms of the chair his feet planted flat on the floor. A shadow statue.
She took another step and his eyes opened and gleamed in the dimness. It wasn’t Jim and despite what she had come to assume this wasn’t George either.
Chapter 18
Shaking fingers clutched at her pyjama top, knuckles gleaming bone white. Tears of fear and panic swam in her eyes as Pauline hissed at the figure. Her voice hitched and caught as she struggled for control. “I’m not going back. I don’t care what he’s said, what he’s told you. I won’t go back. You can’t make me, he can’t make me.” She sobbed into the continuing silence.
For long moments the dark shape didn’t move, he simply sat four square in the armchair and then she saw his fingers stretch and flex. She backed away towards the door. She must run.
The voice stopped her. “Sit down. Sit down now.”
“I’ve called the police. They’ll be here any minute.” In response to her desperate lie the man simply raised his hand and turned her little phone in his fingers. He pressed the button causing the tiny screen to light up and shook his head. He had been into her bedroom while she slept. He had stepped beside her bed and taken the phone from her cabinet.
She couldn’t breathe.
“No, you didn’t. Sit down there.” He pointed to the settee. She wouldn’t sit, wouldn’t be ordered around. Never again, she had left all that behind.
“No. Get out. Tell him that I am not coming back no matter what and tell him to leave me alone.”
He moved too quickly. Out of the chair, across the room. He reached the corner where she was backing into the hall. He leaned behind her and slammed the heavy wooden door, and in the same move grabbed her arm and dragged her to the settee. He half threw, half pushed her into the soft cushions.
A deep pain in her upper arm begged for relief. She rubbed at it as she drew her legs up curling defensively in the corner of the seat. “Please, don’t hurt me. There’s no need for you to hurt me. I don’t know what he told you but he’s a brute and a bully. I had to get away. Whatever he paid you I’ll give you double. Just leave me alone and tell him you couldn’t find me. Please, please!” The begging faded to a whimper as the tall man stood looking down at her. It was too dark to see his expression but his stance, the clenched fists and bunched shoulders quieted her.