“I knew her.”
“Knew? Is she… where is Lucy?” Bea’s hand on his arm, holding him down even as his voice began to rise. He bit his lip, stared down at the floor, let out a breath, tried again. “Please. It’s very important that I find her.”
The girl thought for a moment, then nodded once, uncrossed her legs, rose to her feet and scampered past them, a light run, habit dictating speed. Theo uncurled and scampered after her. Corn jumped as they belted past him, but didn’t leave his post at the door. The girl ran, knowing every twist and turn of the shattered prison, her domain, broken windows and broken doors, smoke stains up the walls from the kitchen, furniture overturned and cupboards stripped bare. She ran until she reached another dormitory, the door open and undamaged, and pointed, triumphant, proud of her success.
Theo followed the direction of her finger inside. Bunk beds, less damaged than those where the children huddled.
Sheets in disarray, thin and torn.
An explosion of polystyrene beads across the floor, from packaging ripped recklessly apart, he wasn’t sure how long ago.
A photo on one wall.
The photo was new, stuck in place with masking tape.
Lucy glowered at the camera, daring it to make anything of her blotchy face, acne-pocked and starved of sun. Theo peeled the photo carefully away, turned it over.
On the back someone had written in neat biro.
MARKSE
Theo marches from the prison as the children look on and
Corn is all what the hell what
And Bea silences him and
Theo strides past the gate past the bicycles makes it to the road outside
And the children are clustered outside now, five of them, what’s happening why is the man sad why is he angry there is
Neila has a compass on her boat, it points north. Somewhere in the north there is her soul, there is the centre to which all things return, there is the fall there is the sky there is
“I did my best,” she whispers as the world spins and the cards tell only lies. “I did my best. I did my best. I did my best.”
Mala Choudhary’s kids are taken out of school now that Mummy is gone we can’t pay for these nice things you see we can’t afford to have music but it’ll be all right it’ll be
The real Theo Miller lies in an unmarked grave and laughs and laughs and laughs at the funny old way of things and
Theo made it fifty yards before falling down.
It wasn’t a sideways tumble or a face-down flop.
He was standing, and then he was sitting cross-legged in the middle of the street, a sack of potatoes dumped from tired hands. Corn followed, still trying to understand. Bea shushed him with a hard slice of her hands, then shuffled up to Theo, sat down by his side.
Held his hands in hers.
Whispered, “Theo? Theo? What does it mean? What does it mean?”
The picture of Lucy, crunched to a broken tube in his fist.
“Theo? Talk to me. Tell me what it means?”
He looked up at her, and cried, and didn’t say a word.
Theo didn’t speak for two days.
He obeyed commands, and they cycled, and he did not speak.
And one night Bea lay down next to Corn on the frozen ground, and Corn held her tight, and that was good, and they didn’t talk about it, and kept on cycling.
And then
When one of the TV stations was broadcasting again, its crew paid in vegetables, beer and promises, and the pundits were beginning to pundit and there was sometimes cabbage in the shops again, Simon Fardell held a press conference, and announced that the Company was going to commence a major restructuring programme resulting in the dissolving of several major assets and that all things considered he was grateful for the opportunity to reassess the corporate structure of
and there was Lucy.
There was Lucy.
There was Lucy.
There was
Lucy.
They watched it on the one working TV in Newton Bridge.
Theo hadn’t spoken, and did not speak when he saw his daughter’s face, and Bea thought she recognised it from the photo but couldn’t be sure, and everyone else cheered and said it was great, it was the beginning of something amazing, and there was a party that night complete with bad singing and home-distilled alcohol that bypassed the digestive tract and went straight to the retina.
And there was Lucy.
She was
Lucy.
For a while Theo thought it wasn’t her, but knew it was, and knew her face and there was
Lucy
Glaring at the camera, dressed in a silly duck-blue dress with a white collar
Heidi Fardell’s hand resting on her shoulder
Lucy
Lucy who is my
SHE’S YOUR DAUGHTER
who is my
Lucy who is
who is
obviously there are the usual words there are
love heart soul burning fire ice pain guilt grief there is
And Theo sees his daughter’s face and walks into the bathroom and locks the door and kneels and prays to a god who isn’t there he prays and prays as the tears flow
Blessed is her name, blessed are her hands upon the water, blessed is the shadow at the door forgive me forgive me forgive me forgive me
After
He went to find Bea, who lived in an attic above what had once been the undertaker’s. And he sat on the end of her bed as she huddles, knees hugged to her chin, wrapped in wool and dirty cotton, and he says:
“I’ve got to go to London.”
Bea’s head tilted a little to the side, waiting.
“They have my daughter, they… I have to… I’m sorry. I’m very sorry. I thought maybe I could be a hero and then they… so I’m not. It turns out I’m not after all.”
“Do you need anything?”
He shook his head. “I’ll cut across to the railway line. If they don’t arrest me on the train, they’ll get me in the city. Bess will try to stop me.”
She shrugged.
“I think… when I’m gone, this place won’t be safe. Tell Bess. Tell her it won’t be safe.”
“Bess won’t leave here.”
“She might have to.”
“She won’t.”
“Please, I…”
Stopped.
Stared at the ceiling.
Stared at the floor.
Stood up.
“When I get to London,” he said, “they will tell me how they’ll hurt my daughter. And I’ll do anything to keep her safe. Anything.”
Walked away, without another word.
Chapter 74
Theo sneaked out of Newton Bridge in the middle of the night, and no one stopped him.
He crawled through bracken, and when no one came shouting, he walked down the side of the road, and when no vehicles passed, he walked down the middle, following white broken lines. Once a drone passed overhead, scouring the countryside for runners, screamers, ragers, ready to shoot, or maybe just flying because it still had power and it pleased its owner to fly, and Theo just kept on walking, reasoning that there was no hiding from this eye in the sky, and so he may as well not bother. And if they saw him, he wasn’t interesting enough, not a runner, not a screamer, so it buzzed on by.
In the morning he came to a motorway fenced off on either side to guard against the world. Two or three cars passed in ten minutes, and he followed it until he found a smaller road bending off to the west, towards a town with an empty market square and a hotel that offered Thai massage and Sunday roast. Two cars were pulled up outside, bare concrete between the door and the empty square where once there had been stalls selling bruised bananas and replacement phone screens. Theo looked for any sign of other life, and couldn’t see any, save for a single woman, hair wrapped in a white towel, body swathed in dressing gown and flannel slippers, who stood on the balcony of the hotel and looked out and seemed astonished to see him.