With my hands wrapped around a cup of hot tea, warming them in the cool morning air, I leaned my arms against the railing and watched the passenger ferries come and go, carrying visitors up and down the River Dart to Totnes, Dittisham, Greenway and the Castle, reinforcing the fact that Dartmouth had always been a seafaring town.
With ten minutes to spare and excitement growing, I tossed my empty cup into a rubbish bin, then headed north along the Embankment to keep my date with Susan.
One might think that after watching Susan strike out completely with Alison’s dad, I’d not put much stock in my upcoming reading. Yet Susan had been the first to admit that she didn’t always get it right. And for me, it all came down to one word: refrigerator.
At one of the many blue and white ticket kiosks that lined the Embankment, just opposite the public restrooms, I was amused to see a border terrier snuffling at the crumbs remaining in a Walkers roast chicken crisps packet, pushing the distinctive gold packet along the pavement with his nose, dragging his leash behind him. When he lost interest in the packet and made a move to lift his leg against the side of the kiosk, the ticket agent shook off his lethargy, stepped out of the kiosk and brandished a fist. ‘Here, you! Get along, then!’
It was a busy summer day on the Embankment. Too many cars, buses and pedestrians made it a hazardous place for a little dog out on a stroll by itself. Even then, I was hearing honking horns and sirens. I knelt down, patted the ground in front of me. ‘Here, boy. C’mon.’
The terrier cocked his head, considered my offer, then decided that a Cadbury Dairy Milk wrapper had a lot more going for it.
‘That your dog?’ the ticket agent wanted to know.
‘I don’t know who he belongs to.’ I stood up and moved in. ‘Hey, fella. You off on a little holiday?’
The dog retreated a step, studying me suspiciously with liquid brown eyes. I took the opportunity to step on his leash, pinning the leather strap to the pavement. ‘OK, now. Let’s see who you belong to.’ I seized the leash and ran my hand cautiously along its length. When the animal didn’t seem of a mind to object, I grabbed his collar and turned it until I could reach the tags that hung around its neck. One tag certified that the dog had been vaccinated against rabies at a veterinary clinic in Hollywood, California. The other tag simply said ‘Bruce’, and listed a telephone with a 323 area code: Los Angeles.
Susan Parker’s dog.
‘I know his owner,’ I told the ticket agent. I tugged on Bruce’s leash. ‘Come on, you little rascal. I’m taking you home.’
With Bruce trotting along the Embankment beside me, tags jangling, I felt like a proper Brit, out for a morning stroll. I’d owned a cat once, but keeping a dog in downtown Annapolis, particularly when Paul and I were both working, always seemed like it would be too hard, particularly on the dog. But as the fresh air filled my lungs and Bruce’s little legs pumped to keep up, I thought maybe it was time to reconsider the No Dog Rule.
As Bruce and I drew near the first bus stop, the crowd grew denser. I was beginning to wonder why everyone was facing in the same direction, actually moving away from the bus stop, when I noticed the flashing blue lights. I’m as curious as the next person, so I followed the crowd as it surged forward. Bruce began straining at the leash, urging me onward. I had thought the fresh air was making my mind sharp, but it took me a while to put it together. Runaway dog, sirens, flashing blue lights. I broke into a run, elbowing my way through the crowd, dragging poor, frantic Bruce, toenails scrabbling on the pavement, behind me.
Through gaps in the crowd, I saw a man kneeling beside a bundle of lavender clothing that I had last seen Susan wearing. ‘Let me through!’ I screamed, shoving people out of my way. ‘She’s my friend!’
I rushed to Susan’s side and knelt down. I didn’t like the way Susan lay, her body twisted at an unnatural angle, like a question mark. But her eyes were open. That was a good sign, wasn’t it? I grabbed her hand and rubbed it briskly. ‘Susan, Susan, can you hear me?’ I looked up, pleaded with the sea of faces. ‘Oh, God! Somebody call 999.’
It took me a second to realize that that had already been done. I’d heard the sirens, saw the flashing blue lights. Even now, a PCSO wearing a bright green reflective vest over his uniform was running toward us on foot from the direction of the police station just a few hundred yards away.
The man kneeling opposite me said, ‘I’m a doctor. But I’m afraid there’s not a lot I can do for her.’ He was dressed in a T-shirt tucked into a pair of loose jogging shorts. Ear buds dangled loosely from an iPod strapped to his upper arm. A small white towel was draped limply around his neck. ‘I suspect her neck is broken. If it’s any comfort to you, I think she was killed instantly. I don’t think she suffered.’
I sat down, hard, on the cold stone pavement. How would he know whether or not Susan suffered? Nearby, flowers blazed red and orange and yellow in an immense stone planter; the fronds of a palm tree stirred in a gentle breeze against a clear, blue sky. Something was terribly wrong with this picture. Tears ran hotly down my cheeks. ‘What happened?’
A woman in a pink fleece warm-up suit materialized from the crowd. ‘A car came out of nowhere, like. Jumped the curb. Ran right into her, poor thing. Then drove off.’ She shook her head. ‘What sort of person would do that?’
‘What kind of car?’ the police officer asked as he waved the crowd aside, clearing a path for the paramedics who had just arrived with a gurney.
‘Dark blue,’ the woman said.
‘No, it was gray,’ someone else offered. ‘Black, maybe.’
‘Make?’
‘A Vauxhall?’
‘No, it was a Ford. Might have been one of those hybrid cars. Whatchacallum? Focus?’
‘No, you berk. It was a Fiat. My brother-in-law drives one just like it.’
Forty witnesses and forty stories. Why the police officer even bothered to ask the next question, I couldn’t imagine. ‘Anyone see the number plate?’
Blank looks and mumbling.
‘So, no one saw the registration number, then?’
‘Could have begun with a W, or maybe a V. It all happened so fast, you know.’
Darth Vader could have run down my friend, and no one would have been able to describe the fricking Death Star.
‘Ma’am? Ma’am?’ One of the paramedics knelt beside me, speaking softly into my ear. ‘We need you to move so we can help your friend.’ I felt his hand, cool and slightly damp, ease Susan’s lifeless hand out of mine. He escorted me to a park bench, and waited until I sat down. ‘Are you going to be all right?’
‘Shit, no,’ my brain screamed, but my vocal chords had shut down. I nodded dumbly.
What had my mother wanted to tell me? Had there been a message for my father, one of my sisters, or for me? With Susan gone, there was no way I’d ever know.
As the paramedics worked to revive Susan, I squeezed my eyelids tightly closed and prayed – please, oh please, oh please – even though I knew, deep down where despair was turning my gut into a roiling bag of snakes, that their efforts would be fruitless.
‘Make way, make way.’ I recognized the voice of the PCSO and my eyelids flew open in time to see the gurney carrying Susan’s motionless body being wheeled along the pavement toward a waiting ambulance whose doors yawned wide to receive it.