‘Dan’s almost there,’ said Jake. Tom looked across the roof. Jake’s brother, Dan, was just a few paces away from the north-eastern tower. The middle brother was just behind him. There was no sign of Ebba.
‘He’s here!’ shouted Dan, who had reached the opposite tower and was bending inside it. ‘I’ve got him.’ The second brother had arrived at the tower too now. Tom could see two denim-clad bottoms sticking up towards the night sky as both boys leaned inside. Then first one and then the other began to straighten up.
‘Will’s got him,’ said Jake. ‘He’s pulling him out, look.’
Jake’s other brother had both arms around Joe’s middle and was tugging him out of the tower. The patchwork quilt got left behind and Joe’s pale naked body gleamed like a shell in the moonlight as he and Will Knowles tumbled on to the roof. Then Dan Knowles bent and lifted Joe. Carrying the small boy in his arms like a baby, he began to walk back along the guttering towards Tom, Jake and Billy. As he neared, they could hear him shouting something that sounded like, ‘Well, mell, ding-dong bell, ring the ruddy bell, you wazzocks.’ Jake understood a second before Tom did and then both boys were tumbling down the staircase, fighting each other in their effort to be the first to unleash the bell rope and give the first tug.
Clang. The old bell shuddered in protest at being roused from sleep so late at night. Clang. Louder now, getting its confidence back. Clang. Tom half wanted to let go of the rope and put his hands over his ears, but he didn’t because tugging on that rope and ringing that bell felt so good. Clang. Get out here, everyone, get out and see Joe being carried across the rooftop. Joe, OK after all, Joe, coming home. He couldn’t wait to see his mum’s face.
‘Jenny, you can’t go in that room.’
‘And I’m going to be stopped by a cripple? I don’t think so.’ Jenny stretched up on tiptoe, looking over Evi’s shoulder. ‘Stone floors in the hall,’ she said. ‘Do you know what it sounds like, when a child’s skull breaks on stone? A bit like an eggshell cracking, only amplified a thousand times. You’ll hear it – maybe.’
‘Where is Joe?’ demanded Evi.
Jenny was walking backwards along the landing, her hand reaching out for the handle on Millie’s door.
‘Does Heather know where he is?’ asked Evi.
For the first time, Jenny looked uncertain. ‘No,’ she said.
‘Are you sure?’ said Evi. ‘Because I think she knows all about you. I think she’s been trying to warn people, in her own way. She’s been trying to make friends with Joe, Tom and Millie, to talk to Harry. She’s even been trying to tell Gillian what happened to her daughter.’
‘She’s a brainless idiot.’ The handle was turned, the door pushed two inches open.
‘She came for Tom tonight,’ said Evi. ‘Why would she do that, so late in the evening, unless she knew where you’d put Joe?’
Jenny thought for a moment, then she shrugged. ‘It makes no difference,’ she said. ‘He’ll be dead by now.’
Evi took a step forward. ‘You know what really pisses me off, Jenny?’ she said. ‘You’re a complete fake. You’re pretending you’re doing all this because Millie is your grandfather’s next victim. Well, bullshit. He’s probably barely been near her. He almost certainly didn’t touch Hayley either, or Megan. You said yourself he was never allowed near Lucy. You’re killing these girls because you like it.’
‘Shut up.’
‘I saw the look on your face when you told me about Lucy’s death. You enjoyed it.’
‘I don’t have to listen to this.’ Jenny was turning away.
She had to stop her, had to give her something to focus on other than Millie. ‘Your grandfather, everything that happened to you in the past, it’s just the excuse now. You’re doing it for fun.’
‘You have no idea.’ Jenny was in the bedroom, making her way across the carpet.
‘I’m a psychiatrist,’ called Evi. ‘I’ve been dealing with twisted bitches like you for years. Now get away from that cot.’
Jenny was coming towards her. She was out of the room in moments; a second more and her hands were around Evi’s throat and the two were staggering backwards, past the stairs.
‘Ever wondered what it would be like to fly, Evi?’ Jenny hissed in her ear. ‘You’re about to find out. They’ll think you slipped with little Millie in your arms and fell down the stairs. Only old Tobias will know the truth.’
Evi’s windpipe was being crushed. The pathologist would know she’d been strangled. Small comfort. The banister was digging into her back, it hurt like hell but it was supporting her weight. She brought her good leg up and kneed the other woman hard in the crotch. Jenny grunted and her hold slackened, but she was a woman after all and it hadn’t done too much damage. Evi twisted round and tried to get a grip on the banister but found herself being lifted off her feet, forced over the top of it.
Before she could brace herself, her hips had gone over the edge and she was close to falling. She grabbed out, one hand caught hold of the banister but her legs were lifted high, she was being pushed and something was banging at her hand, stamping on it, and she had no choice but to let go.
It seemed to take a long time to reach the slate floor.
They’d stopped ringing the bell. The three boys climbed inside the tower. Did they still have Joe? Yes, there he was, wrapped up in the patchwork quilt again, his face pressed against Dan Knowles’s chest, still bound tight with thin, nylon rope, still shaking, still alive.
Dan Knowles, who seemed to have grown during his brief time on the roof, looking more like the young man he’d be in a year or so than a teenage bully, was at the bottom of the steps, climbing into the gallery. His brother Will followed, then Billy, just as the sound of a heavy door being opened echoed around the church.
‘Hello!’ shouted a loud Geordie voice.
‘He’s up here! We’ve got him!’ called back Dan Knowles.
‘Joe!’ yelled Tom’s dad.
‘Dad!’ screamed Tom.
‘Police! Everybody keep still!’
The two groups met on the balcony stairs, Gareth Fletcher and Dan Knowles almost colliding. The small, shivering parcel was passed from one to the other and Joe gave a quiet moan as his father’s arms closed around him. Higher on the steps, over his father’s head, Tom’s eyes met Harry’s. Then the vicar turned, pushed his way past the bewildered-looking police constable, and ran from the church.
Evi was barely conscious. She was very cold. An icy wind was blowing all around her. Snow was falling softly on her face and the world was growing dark. Was she back on the mountain? No, in the Fletchers’ house. That was Millie she could hear, howling like a banshee. The front door was open and a man was standing not three feet away from her. Brown leather shoes, damp patches around them on the stone. Something in his left hand, long and thin, fashioned from metal, something she thought she recognized, but it seemed so out of place that she really couldn’t be certain.
‘Put her down,’ said a voice. Too late, thought Evi, I already fell.
‘Oh, I will,’ replied a woman’s voice from high above them.
‘Don’t take another step,’ said the man. ‘And put that child down.’
‘You’re not serious,’ replied the woman.
The thing the man was carrying was lifted up until Evi could no longer see it.
‘It’s over,’ he said. ‘Put her down.’
A silence, when the world seemed to pause; then a footstep and an explosion of sound. Evi didn’t hear the second gunshot, but she felt its vibration flutter through her body and she saw the blinding flash of light. Then nothing more.