clasped between his knees, looking at Kath with concern.
‘In fact, more than fine. She was moving - really moving - on the bed, and making sounds. She’s continuing to be more intermittently responsive.’
Kath looked up hopefully at Sam, and Ellie leaned towards her and took one of her hands, putting her own worries aside for the moment.
‘She spoke, Kath. I could tell she was trying to speak, but it was just as she fell asleep that I was able to make out what she was trying to say. She was asking for you, Kath. She said “Mother”. I heard it distinctly.’
Ellie smiled at Kath, but was dismayed to see the colour drain from her face. Kath sat down heavily in a chair.
‘After all this time, all that love, and she still wants her mother.’
Ellie crouched down next to Kath and grasped her hands.
‘No - you’re her mother. It’s you she wanted. Why would you think anything else?’
‘Ellie, Abbie has never once in her life called me Mother. She has never referred to me as that, and it’s a word she never uses. It’s what she called her birth mother. I’ve always been Mum, but now, when she’s in trouble, she wants that awful woman. After everything she did to Abbie and Jessica.’
Ellie didn’t know what to say. She’d been convinced that Kath would be delighted, but she looked as if the exhaustion of the last few days had caught up with her as she leaned back on the chair and closed her eyes.
42
Tom stared at his computer screen. This wasn’t good. He didn’t know what he’d been expecting when he’d started the search for Leo’s father, but it wasn’t this. Ernie Collier from the Cheshire police had been doing a bit of asking around, and had called back to say that there had been talk that Ted Harris had ‘buggered off to East Anglia’. That piece of information had proved enormously helpful, and Tom had been working through all his sources by phone and email to see what he could dig up.
An appropriate term, he thought.
He’d made a brief trip into the village to see if he could pick up any gossip. The newsagent’s had been his first stop, and the only one that had revealed anything - although that wasn’t much.
‘Good morning, Mrs Talbot,’ he’d said, picking up his daily newspaper and placing it on the counter. ‘Haven’t you got any of the local newspapers left?’
‘They’ve all gone, I’m afraid Mr Douglas. A lot of interest, this week. Was there something particular that you were looking for, because I’ve got my own copy in the back if you’d like to borrow it? I need it back, though, because I do like to keep a copy for a week or so.’
‘That’s very kind - but I wanted to read more about the accident. You know, Abbie Campbell?’ He didn’t want to do any such thing, but he’d needed an opening.
As expected, Mrs Talbot had voiced a number of theories, all of which Tom had heard before and all of which he knew to be nonsense.
‘It must be a terrible shock for a village like this. I suppose it’s rare that anything happens to disrupt the peace,’ he said.
‘Well, you’d think so wouldn’t you. And on the whole you’d be right. But we’ve had our moments.’
Tom had noticed before that there was some kind of perverse pride in communities that have housed villains. It was the same with neighbours and acquaintances of the most evil criminals. Behind the expressions of shock and horror, there was always a gleam of suppressed excitement, as if somehow their familiarity with a monster made them, and their lives, infinitely more interesting.
‘Surely not recently?’ he responded, fishing in his pocket for change to pay for his paper.
‘No. That’s true. It’s been quiet for a good few years now.’ Mrs Talbot sounded vaguely disappointed. ‘But we’ve had our share of scoundrels. It’s interesting that all this seems to have happened to young Abbie in those woods, you know. It’s not the first time people have wondered what’s gone on there.’
Tom handed over his cash, and gave Mrs Talbot an encouraging smile.
‘It’s years ago now, but it was summer. I remember that, because it was hot and everybody had their windows open all the time. There weren’t so many houses on that side of the village then, but more than one person swore that one night they heard a terrible scream coming from the woods.’