I stood watching the ice for two or three minutes hoping she might come back. I knew I hadn’t imagined her: I could still make out her signature scratched on the ice’s glittering page. Only when I turned away and felt the movement of air on my face did I realise the effect her display had worked on me. There were cold tear tracks down both my cheeks.
I walked on, and once the ice had been swallowed up by the darkness behind me I began to wonder if I’d hallucinated the whole episode.
In the darkness on both sides of the track I became aware that things were starting to change. Where there had been only trees and grass there now stood sturdier shapes. It was too dark to see what they were but soon I noticed the irregular echo of my footsteps which told me the track was edged intermittently by buildings. In the distance I saw light and in a few minutes I was walking under streetlamps that shed a diluted milky light over the disused workshops and factories lining my route. Soon, I hoped, I would find a phone.
But even after passing the openings to several side roads I still hadn’t seen a kiosk. I passed one or two beaten-up vehicles, trucks that appeared to have been abandoned. Apart from these dubious clues I saw no signs of life and so just kept on walking.
I appeared to be heading into town. God knew what town: some grim Midlands industrial community. The frequency of side streets increased and my track had widened to two lanes with a white line down the middle — a road, then. I saw a few old cars dotted about and the factories were soon replaced by four-storey blocks of flats. There were occasional shops all shuttered and padlocked. The street had that strange, alienating feel common to all dark streets. In the full light of morning — if I hadn’t managed to find a garage or a phone by then — it would all look quite different.
The streets changed again and now looked like the area around Annie’s flat. I could have been wandering about lost in Moss Side. Long low rows of terraces and back entries, whatever they called them around here. I was surprised to find myself in such a heavily built-up area when there had been no sign of it from the motorway.
But still there were no phones. I turned off my straight route once I formed the impression I was heading away from the centre of whatever town this was. I wasn’t even sure I would be able to find my way back to the motorway.
I felt a tickly sensation at the back of my skull even before I heard the muted rumble of the engines and then the sensation spread to the base of my spine. My mouth went dry. I looked about for a hiding place then stopped myself: what was I scared of? If there were vehicles approaching could I not stop them and ask for help? On a rational level there should have been nothing to fear, so why did I seem to have three small rats chasing one another’s tails in my stomach? The rumble got louder; I heard a gear change. I thought they were still several streets away, whoever they were, but my mistake became clear as two police cars turned the corner at the far end of the street and headed slowly in my direction. They were perhaps a hundred yards away. I flattened myself against the wall but they would still be able to see me.
I should have been able to ask them for help but I was frightened. There was no one else about, the air seemed unnaturally still, and the police cars proceeded so slowly it could only mean they were on the lookout for something or someone. My head was buzzing now and beads of sweat had sprung up along my hairline. I didn’t know which way to turn, where I could hide. The cars rolled closer.
Another movement caught my attention. Out of the corner of my eye I noticed a man beckoning to me from a car parked in a side street. The engine was running. To get to him meant crossing the road in full view of the police cars. If they happened to be looking to the front their beams would probably just pick me out and I sensed that might mean trouble. I didn’t think it was a brilliant idea, to get into a car with a complete stranger, but if I stayed put I’d almost certainly get picked up by the police and I had no idea what trouble that might lead to.
I crouched low and ran across the road, ducked into the side street and jumped into the waiting car, which took off immediately, throwing me back in my seat.
‘What you doing out?’ the driver asked, his tone incredulous. He was short and dark, wearing a woollen hat pulled down over his forehead and a black bomber jacket. His gloved hands gripped the wheel. I was too shocked to know what to say to him. ‘What you doing out on the streets at night? You want to get shot? You must be mad.’
‘My car broke down,’ I said.
‘What do you mean, your car broke down? You shouldn’t have been out in it. Asking for trouble. Where did it break down?’ As he fired these questions at me he steered the black car around the most unlikely bends and corners at speeds that seemed out of all proportion, but he drove with such confidence that I trusted him. Even when we appeared to be heading straight for a lamppost it always side-stepped the car neatly at the last second.
‘On the motorway,’ I said.
‘On the motorway?’ he exclaimed. ‘What motorway?’
Fear spread through my insides like smoke. ‘Where are you taking me?’
‘To a safe house,’ he said, leaning into another ninety-degree corner and tearing out of it like a bishop out of a brothel. I decided to shut up and let the man drive. Watching the side streets flash past I got the impression we were skirting the city centre. If any police cars came into view at the end of any street my driver quickly re-routed us down some unlikely alley, hurtling into the darkness without headlamps. There were no other cars or pedestrians about though I did glimpse dark blurs of movement around the base of buildings, which could have been dogs. At major intersections there were statues mounted on plinths. As far as I could make out in the dark they were all the same man: a tall, broad-shouldered figure wearing either a trench coat or a double-breasted suit with a trilby-style hat. Something about his deep-set eyes and square jaw unsettled me. This was no ordinary Midlands town. Frightened and confused, I began to find myself short of breath.
In a street of anonymous uniform terraced houses the driver emergency-stopped outside a derelict-looking building.