Fear In The Sunlight Part 11

'You could always just turn your head slightly and look at the other actors on stage,' Josephine said, and for once she made no effort to keep the comment under her breath. Archie laughed, and even Alma threw an amused glance in her direction.

'But the craft of making movies is a subject for tomorrow. Tonight, I thought we'd get to know each other bettera and, to my mind, the best way to do that is to share our deepest fears.' He paused and looked round the room. 'What frightens a man is fundamental to who he is, to who he has always been: the things that frighten us now are the things that frightened us when we were children a and I must confess that I am easily frightened. When I was four, I woke with a start. The house was plunged into darkness and completely silent. I sat up and I began calling my mother. No one responded because no one was there. I trembled with fear. However, I was able to find enough courage to get up. I came to the kitchena which was illuminated in a sinister fas.h.i.+on. I trembled more and more. At the same time, I was hungry. I opened the kitchen buffet, in which I found some cold meat, and I began eating and crying. I couldn't calm down until my parents came back. The sense of isolation and abandonment that I felt that night has never left me. To this day, I avoid being alone wherever possible, and I fear the dark a or rather, what the dark may hold.'

'I don't know about you, but this is pretty close to one of my worst nightmares,' Ronnie whispered loudly, glaring at Josephine. 'I can't believe you've got us into this.'

'I don't remember being the one who broke my neck to get a seat,' she retorted, gesturing towards Lettice and Lydia. 'Right now, being alone would be my idea of heaven.'

'My wife will tell you that I'm frightened of authority.' Hitchc.o.c.k turned and spoke directly to Archie. 'Policemen terrify me. English policemena especiallya because you're always so polite. When I was five, I did something very bada' he continueda and Josephine suddenly had a terrible feeling that they were going to explore his fears year by year. Could any man have that many neurosesa she asked herselfa and decided that this one probably could; if that was the casea it was going to be the longest weekend of her life. 'I don't recall what it was, but my father wanted to punish me. He made me go to the police station with a letter and they locked me up a only for a few minutesa but the noise of the cell door is something that I'll never forget. It terrified me.'

As the director began to talk about a fear of embarra.s.sing himself in public a without any great sense of irony as far as Josephine could see a she looked out of the window and wondered what Marta was doing. The sky seemed at war with itself, and a ribbon of dark blue touched the hills on the other side of the water, threatening the gentle summer evening which had descended on Portmeirion; during a rare pause in Hitchc.o.c.k's monologue, she thought she detected the distant rumble of thunder. Outside on the terrace, the nun walked quickly past the window, rounding the corner in the general direction of the hotel's reception. Josephine waited to see if she would rejoin the party, but no one appeareda and she turned her attention reluctantly back to Hitchc.o.c.k's speech. 'But my greatest fear of all is to know the future. A movie director can predict the future, of course: in making a film, he takes an imitation slice of life in his hands and arranges it just the way he wants it. He knows, in the first scene, what is going to happen in the last. But the stuff the movie director is working with isn't real. In real life, we can plan and take precautions, but we can never be sure a and to know the future without any semblance of control would be a peculiar kind of h.e.l.l. To see the pain along with all the beautiful things ahead, the misery, the death a that would be terrible. The loss of those we love is something we should not be asked to know about too soon. When G.o.d keeps the future hidden, He is being merciful, and He is saying that life would be unbearable without suspense.' He sat down and smiled expectantly at his audience. 'Who'd like to start us off?'

'Have you left them anywhere to go, Hitch?' Alma's easy teasing of her husband made the atmosphere in the room instantly more relaxeda and everybody laughed, but Josephine noticed that she had distanced herself from the exercise, making it clear that she had no intention of taking part. 'You've probably spoken for most people here.'

'We'll see. How about you, Mr Lascelles? If I've touched a nerve, feel free to elaborate on it, or take us in a different direction altogether.'

He seemed to have picked on the shyest person in the room, and Josephine wondered if that was deliberate. The young man cleared his throat nervously and took a healthy swig of brandy before sayinga 'Injustice, I suppose. When I was a boy, I was accused of something I didn't do and I've never got over it.'

Hitchc.o.c.k nodded sympathetically. 'Shame is a terrible thing. How did it make you feel?'

'Devastated. It was just a childish prank, but it felt like the end of the world. I grew up that day, and there was no such thing as innocence any more a not because I felt guilty, but because I realised then that the truth doesn't always matter. It's what people think that determines how the world works. And that made me so angry.' Listening to him speak, Josephine was astonished that strangers were prepared to open themselves up to such public scrutiny, but the writer in her could only admire the skill with which Hitchc.o.c.k manipulated people, directing their private emotions as effortlessly as he presumably did their professional ones. Even she was caught up in the game now, aware of a certain shameful voyeurism in her att.i.tude but implicated nonetheless by her fascination with what was to come. 'No one believed me,' the actor continued, 'not even my parents, and it made me feel so helpless because there was absolutely nothing I could do about it. It was as if I were talking a completely different language. In the end, I almost began to doubt myself. That's what frightened me, really a not the idea of being punished for something I hadn't done.' He smiled, trying to make light of what he had said. 'I suppose I've always been too concerned about what people think of me. Bad choice of profession, I know.'

He looked round the room, made vulnerable by having been the first to speak and keen that someone else should join in. It was Astrid Lake who offered solidarity. 'For me, the greatest fear is rejection,' she admitted, unprompted. 'I'm adopted. My parents gave me up when I was too young to remember anything about them, and no matter how happy my childhood was in the end, or how often I tell myself that there must have been a good reason for it, I can't quite get over the fact that they gave me away.' She smiled at Lascelles. 'Like Danny, I seem to have chosen a profession which thrives on what I'm most afraid of.'

'You'd be surprised by how quickly you develop a thick skin.' The words were cynicala but they were delivered with a genuine kindness and offered as advice rather than criticism. Josephine looked round and saw Bella Hutton standing in the doorway. She walked over to the fireplace and put her brandy down on the mantelpiece. 'Don't let me interrupt,' she said, with the confidence of someone whose arrival in a room made normal conversation impossible. 'You were talking about rejection.'

The girl glanced at Hitchc.o.c.ka but he showed no sign of resentment at Bella's intrusion into the conversation; on the contrary, he seemed more interested than ever. 'Yes. I was going to say that I feel it to a certain extent whenever I finish a film,' she explained. 'For a while, it's like being in a family: there are roles and hierarchies, people you get on with and people you don't, but personalities don't matter because you're stuck with them and you make the best of things. What counts is that you have a place, no matter how small, and you know exactly what it is. You can rely on it. Then everyone moves on and you have to start again, doing whatever's necessary to fit in. I suppose that reminds me of things I'd rather forget.' She looked at Bella. 'I don't know if the idea that I might become too tough to care about that makes me feel better or worse.'

Hitchc.o.c.k waited to see if Bella intended to respond, but she said nothing so he continued his way round the room. 'You've been very quiet since dinner, Mr Turnbull. Is there anything you'd like to share with us?'

Leyton Turnbull seemed to have drunk himself sober. The erratic behaviour of earlier had vanisheda and, when he spoke, his voice was calm. 'I'm afraid you're right,' he said quietly, unable to meet Hitchc.o.c.k's eye.

'Sorry? I don't understand.'

'Everything you said at dinner, what you all think of me. I'm afraid it's true. I've seen him very clearly tonight a the man I've become.' He laughed, but there was no mirth in it. 'And I can see my future very clearly, too. You're right, Hitch. It's terrifying.' He pushed his chair back and stood up.

'Look, Turnbull, I'm sorry for what I said.' Daniel Lascelles caught his arm as he walked past, but he shook it off and walked out of the room with more dignity than he had managed all night. They watched him go. David Franks looked nervously at Hitchc.o.c.k, whose expression remained inscrutable. Astrid Lake seemed genuinely upset.

Archie leant forward and whispered in Josephine's ear. 'How much of this is genuine, do you think?'

She shrugged. 'I don't know, but I get the feeling that he's only just started. If this is going on all weekend, perhaps we should decamp to Bangor.'

Hitchc.o.c.k's manner suggested she was right. 'How about you, Mr Franks?' he asked, without any hint of awkwardness. 'What makes you tremble?'

'Fire,' Franks saida without a moment's hesitation. 'When I was fourteen, my father was burnt alive and I watched it happen. I wake to his screams every morning of my life.' The room was silenta and Josephine looked at Archie in horror. For the first time, Hitchc.o.c.k was thrown completely and stared half accusingly at his colleague, as if the game were the biggest victim in what had just been said. Alma seemed genuinely devastated. She reached across and covered Franks's hand with her own. 'I'm so sorry, David,' she said quietly. 'We had no idea. It must have been horrific for you.'

'Yes, it was.' He bowed his head, and no one spoke. When he looked up again, he was grinning. 'Only joking,' he said, squeezing Alma's hand apologetically and winking at her husband. 'My father's alive and well and living in a nursing home in Croydon.'

For a moment, Josephine thought Hitchc.o.c.k was going to hit him; instead, he walked over to Franks's chair and slapped him heartily on the back. 'Very good, David,' he said, but his expression changed. 'Let's just pray there are no fires in South London tonight. If one should break out now, think how you'll feel in the morning. Now, do you want to tell us what really frightens you, or shall we move on?'

Alma looked worried. 'Maybe we should leave it there, Hitch. I think we all know each other well enough by now, and some dancing might be a better idea.' Josephine glanced hopefully at her friends and saw her own discomfort reflected in their faces; even Lettice and Lydia seemed eager to get out of the room.

'It seems a shame to stop now, just when things are getting interesting.' Bella smiled at Alma, although she seemed as unsettled by Franks's joke as everyone else. 'And I've missed a lot of the fun. I don't even know if you've shared your darkest fears yet?'

Having shown no interest in taking part, Alma suddenly seemed intent on rising to the challenge, and Josephine wondered what issue existed between the two women to make Alma so reluctant to back down. 'Crowds,' she said simply. 'When I was a child, my parents took me to see the King's funeral.' She smiled wryly. 'I was very small and I lost hold of my father's hand. There was a sea of peoplea and it was impossible for me to stand my ground. I ended up being dragged through the crowds, and since then I've been very claustrophobic. The thought of not being able to breathe terrifies me.'

Bella nodded. 'Although there's more than one way to suffocate someone.'

The man whom Marta had pointed out to Josephine as. .h.i.tchc.o.c.k's cinematographer hadn't said a word since they arrived, but there was something in the way he stood up now which expressed his disgust with the evening as eloquently as any speech could have done. His movement distracted the director from whatever he had been about to say to Bella. 'Are you leaving us already, Mr Spence?'

'I've had enough of this, Hitch. I need some fresh air and I'm not in the mood for games.'

'I'm not sure I can allow you to leave without telling me what I want to know, Jack.'

'I'm not sure you can stop me.'

The two men stared defiantly at each other, and Josephine got the impression that their conversation was not simply about the evening. In the end, Spence sat down again, but it was far from an act of submission. 'All right. I'll tell you what frightens me. Gallipoli in 1915. They sent me out there to take photographs. Before the war, I'd never seen a dead body. I knew that was about to change, but I never knew how bad it would be.' He looked at Hitchc.o.c.k. 'People will tell you that reality is never as bad as your imagination, but they're wrong. The first thing we saw when we got off the boat was a big tent, like one of those marquees you get at a village fete. We went over to open it. I don't know what we thought we were going to find, and the smell as we began to unlace the sides should have told us something, but none of us was prepared for a pile of dead Englishmen, hundreds of corpses lying on top of each other, their eyes wide open, starting to rot.'

Hitchc.o.c.k pushed the decanter across to him but Spence ignored it. 'We started to bury them, but there were so many. You don't think about that, do you? Having to find somewhere for the dead. You cling on to decency and dignity for a bit, but it soon defeats you. We pushed them into the trenches, but it was impossible to keep them all covered. We lived with the dead. Their arms and legs taunted us, sticking out of the earth like they'd just rolled over in bed. The soil was soft and springy underfoot because of the bodies, like autumn in the woods, when you know you're walking on decay.' He paused, and changed his mind about the drink. As he poured brandy, Josephine looked at Archie, but he had bowed his heada and she wondered what fugitive images had found their way back to him thanks to Spence's words. 'So we buried them, but they kept coming, more each day. And we found ways to deal with it. If a hand came out of the soil, we'd shake it as we went past. It wasn't disrespect, it was a way to cope. We all did it. Then one day I grabbed a hand and it held on. We'd buried him alive, for Christ's sake. We were so tired and so used to death that we could no longer tell the difference.' He shook his head in disbelief. 'I scrambled in the dirt as if I were insane, sc.r.a.ping it off his face until I heard him moan and saw his eyelids flicker. When I was sure I'd found him in time, I started to cry with relief. I began to haul him out, but that wasn't what he wanted; he wanted me to finish it there and then. He clutched at my clothes, pleading with me to kill him. I didn't have a rifle with mea and I couldn't leave him on his own, so I put my hands round his throat and choked him, and this time I made sure. And do you know what? He looked grateful.'

There was a sudden division in the room between those who were too young to understand the wara and who were shocked by Spence's story, and those for whom his words were an extreme version of a familiar sadness. 'What you did was very brave and very merciful,' Hitchc.o.c.k said quietly.

'Perhaps, but I wonder how many weren't so lucky? He can't have been the only poor b.a.s.t.a.r.d we buried alive. You didn't serve in the war, did you, Hitch?'

'No. I was excused on medical grounds.'

'He enlisted in the volunteer corps of the Royal Engineers,' Alma added protectively.

Spence held up his hand. 'I'm not questioning your courage or your loyalty. I'm only saying that when you talk about fear, when you show death on screen, it's just a game a like the one you're playing now.'

'Would you be happier if we did it for real?' Franks asked.

Spence ignored him. 'But I'll go along with it, and those are my answers: I'm afraid of dying, and I'm afraid of killing. I have nightmares about both.' He stood up and looked at Franks. 'And I'm not joking.'

This time, he left the room without any opposition. 'Well, who's still to go?' Bella asked, unnerving Josephine by looking directly at her.

'We're just observers,' Archie said diplomatically. 'And it's time we were going.'

'Just a second, Chief Inspector,' Hitchc.o.c.k said, and his emphasis on the rank drew one or two surprised glances from his guests. 'Won't you stay until the game is over? I think Bella may be about to deliver the sort of exit line we all love her for.'

The actress didn't disappoint him. She stubbed out a half-smoked cigarette and walked to the door. 'I've always thought that there can be nothing worse than to know the manner of your own death,' she said, choosing her words with impeccable timing. 'And now I know that to be true.'

10.

'What the f.u.c.k was that all about?' Ronnie asked when they were safely back in the restaurant. 'Next time, remind me to stick with Marta. She's got more sense than the rest of us put together.'

'I wonder what Bella Hutton meant?' Lettice asked.

'Perhaps she's ill,' Lydia suggested. 'Although if that's a typical Hollywood evening, anything terminal would be a blessed relief.'

'Have you gone off the idea, then?'

Lydia looked at Josephinea and a guilty smile flickered across her lips. 'Let's just say I'll scuttle back to my dressing room at the Adelphi with a new-found humility. More drinks, everybody?'

Ronnie and Lettice followed her enthusiastically to the bara and Josephine lingered behind with Archie to watch the band, whose first set was just drawing to a close with a subtle rendering of an Ivor Novello song. 'Isn't that the waitress who was on duty this afternoon?' Josephine asked, pointing to the singer.

Archie looked more closely. 'Yes, I think so. Amazing what lipstick and a posh frock can do for a girl.'

'Posh-ish,' Josephine corrected him ungraciously. 'And not so much of the girl. She won't see twenty again.' She ignored a look which had the word forty in it, and was forced to admita 'Actually, she's very good.'

'Why do you say that so grudgingly?' Archie asked, laughing.

'Oh, you can just tell she's a little madam. I was watching her earlier, when she was serving tea to the table next to ours. It's all in the colour of her eyes: exactly the same as the girl who works in the shop for my father. I've never known that shade of blue to mean anything but trouble.'

The waitress-turned-singer took her applause and left the small stage. She made her way across the dance floor to where Hitchc.o.c.k and Alma were talking, and lingered by the director, waiting for a chance to introduce herself. Without looking at her, he held out his empty gla.s.s so that she had no choice but to take it. Mortified, the girl flushed and left the rooma and Archie noticed some of the waiting staff sn.i.g.g.e.r. 'Nothing like being brought down to earth with a b.u.mp, is there? Do you want another drink?'

'Only if you're having one.' She glanced round the room. Mercifully, there was no one she recognised; except for Alma and the director himself, Hitchc.o.c.k's party seemed to have other plans.

'Why don't you go and find her?'

She looked embarra.s.sed. 'Am I that transparent?'

'I'm afraid so, but probably only to me. I'm going to get changed and have that drink with Bridget. If we leave together now, they'll think we're going for a walk.'

'Are you offering me an alibi, Chief Inspector?'

'Yes, but only if you'll do the same. I can live without any more words of wisdom from Ronnie.' He looked across to where the Motleys and Lydia were already deep in conversation with another couple. 'I don't think we're going to be greatly missed. Is there anybody those three don't know?'

'I doubt it. Not in a place like this.' They went over to make their excuses and were just leaving when Lydia caught Josephine's arm. 'Do me a favour while you're out, darling. Pop in on Marta and make sure she's all right.'

PART FOUR.

Murder!.

25a26 July 1936, Portmeirion.

1.

There were many paths to the dog cemetery, but Bella chose the route that rose up from behind the old stable block, simply because it was the one she knew best. While Grace lived here, these woods had been more like a jungle a wild and impenetrable, so much so that the way had had to be cleared by woodcutters before the hea.r.s.e could pa.s.s through to collect her body. Even now, the land had an untamed and untameable quality about it: the maze of narrow pathways which ran back and forth across it were not man-made, it was said, but had been cut by a lone stag which appeared on the peninsula shortly after Grace's death. Bella had no idea if it were true or not, but the paths remained long after the stag had moved on, and the tale was one of the kinder myths that had been spun around her sister's isolation. It saddened her to hear Grace scorned by strangers: her privacy, her desire to honour the animals she had loved, her refusal to allow any living thing, beast or plant, to be destroyed on her land a these were codes that seemed oddly out of kilter to a generation that accepted cruelty and waste as natural and inevitable, although Bella could not help feeling that the eccentricity lay not with her sister but with the world.

The route she had chosen also had the advantage of being the most directa and, with the light dwindling and rain threatening, she was anxious to spend as little time in the woods as possible. Chaplin ran ahead of her, excited by the novelty of an evening walk, and Bella was glad of his company. A sharp right-hand bend in the path led her away from the village and deeper into thick woodland, and she realised that the open s.p.a.ces around the hotel had fooled her into underestimating how dark it would be among the trees. In a matter of seconds, the lamplight from the Piazza and the comforting silhouette of Portmeirion's skyline vanished as completely as if they had never existed. But daylight was no good for what she needed to do, and she couldn't risk being interrupted. Resisting the temptation to turn back, she fumbled in her bag for the torch she had brought with her and shone its beam determinedly onto the path ahead.

She longed for the release of the storm. The air was heavy and suffocating, closing in on her as she walked, and already her dress clung uncomfortably to her body. It was a relief when she reached a crossroads and the trees cleared, allowing the sky back in for a few precious moments. The cemetery lay a short distance ahead. She moved forward, but a rabbit shot out of the bushes, startling her, and Chaplin gave chase before she could stop him. She called the dog back but he ignored her, and Bella had to change direction to find him. A dark silhouette rose up ahead of hera and she stared at it in horror. For some reason, she had taken it for granted that the cottage was long gone, razed to the ground when the land was sold, but its sh.e.l.l was still there, a reminder of past obligations unfulfilled. She had turned away from so much of her family's grief and a sense of justice had never burned strongly inside her unless it was personal; now her home had pulled her back, and she was shocked by how strongly she felt an emotional bond with the people she had left behind and a physical connection to the earth which held them a a physical connection made more intense by the knowledge of her own mortality.

Unsettled, she clipped Chaplin's lead onto his collar and dragged him sharply away from the ruins, then retraced her footsteps to the crossroads. The luxury of the clearing was short-lived: when nature rea.s.serted itself, the shadow of the trees was worse than evera and, in the darkness, the woodland's age and lush profusion seemed menacing and other-worldly. The path narrowed again, forcing its way through old firs and rhododendron bushes, then climbing steeply as if daring Bella to reach her destination. She could only have been walking for ten minutes or so, but it felt much longer; the illness that she had refused to acknowledge was making itself known now with alarming regularitya and she paused to get her breath, leaning against a tree for support. Chaplin seemed to sense her anxiety; he stared into the blackness of the undergrowth, ears p.r.i.c.ked, tail taut and quivering, straining at his lead to go back the way they had come. Gently, she pulled him on, but they had not gone far before she stopped again and looked back over her shoulder. Had she heard footsteps? She coiled the leather round her hand a couple of times, instinctively wanting the dog closer, and listened carefully, but the woods were silent and she blamed her imagination.

As soon as she moved on, she heard them againa and this time they sounded very close, mirroring her movements, stopping and starting when she did. She longed to switch off her torch, knowing that it placed her firmly in the sights of whoever was behind her, but she needed the light to find her way, even if it made her vulnerable. Willing herself to stay calm, she quickened her pacea but the noise quickened tooa and, just as she was about to sink to the ground in despair, something in its rhythm told her how stupid she was being. The path was dry and hard from a long summer, and all she could hear was the echo of her own footsteps. It wasn't surprising that her mind was playing tricks, aided and abetted by the gloom of the woods and the knowledge of what she had come here to find. She walked on more confidently, but a now that it had been awakened a the instinct to fear could not be entirely dispelled. Ridiculously, because it was something she never did, she began to hum quietly to herself.

When she saw the old pheasant hide, she knew she was close to the cemeterya but she had forgotten quite how suddenly it appeared. Her torch picked out the wooden carving of a dog which stood at its entrance, as still and lifeless as the companions it guarded. Chaplin whimpered and stared at her reproachfully, sensing that this was a place of death, and Bella had a pang of guilt at having brought him here. 'Don't worry, honey,' she said, crouching down to rea.s.sure him. 'I wouldn't do it to you.' She looked around her and s.h.i.+vered. So much loss, so many friends.h.i.+ps cut short a and now, so much guilt. The cemetery had always spoken to her of desolation, not comfort or solace. It was the last place in the world that she would ever want to leave someone she loved; better that they should burn in h.e.l.l than lie cold and alone in such unforgiving soil.

The rich scent of pine and the melancholy sound of birds roosting served only to darken Bella's mood. Reluctantly, she hooked Chaplin's lead around the wooden dog, sparing him from any more distress, and walked alone into the circle of graves. She moved slowly, avoiding the tangle of twigs and branches which crawled at head height through the air. The summer growth had become so densely entwined that very little rain could find its way between the leaves, and the groundcover was dry and brittle underfoot. A branch snapped as she stepped on it, holly scratched at her face, and, in her mind, Bella imagined bones breaking, felt fingers touching her skin. She shone her torch round to identify the grave she had been told about, the tangible proof of her brother's guilty secret, but something in the cemetery's defiant peace made her hesitate. After all these years, what good would it do anyone to discover the truth behind Rhiannon Erley's disappearance? Then she saw the marker in front of her a a mound of rough stones, more like a cairn than a traditional memorial, and its poignancy gave Bella her answer. As she knelt down to examine its careful formation, the dank, fetid smell of earth rose up to greet her.

The second time she heard it, there was no mistaking the sound, no blaming her imagination. Footsteps circled the cemetery a slow and predatory, making no attempt at secrecy, and it was this very openness that frightened Bella most: it told her that any hope of escape was already lost to her. She stood up and swung her torch round defiantly, desperate to put a name to the evil that threatened her, but its beam was too weak to reach the edge of the burial placea and, without thinking, she threw it away from her in frustration. Deprived of any definite form, the footsteps became more sinister than ever, crawling insidiously into her mind and fas.h.i.+oning horror after horror. Behind her, Chaplin growled, then began to bark furiously, but the barking stopped as suddenly as it had started. Fearful that her dog had been hurt, she went to retrieve the torch to look for him but, before she could pick it up, the light from the beam went out.

And then she felt it. A presence, unbearably close. The terror that had so far failed to overwhelm her did so now with a dreadful, all-consuming force. Blindly, she turned to runa but the panic disoriented hera and she had no idea how to find the path out of the cemetery. Something moved to her lefta and she stumbled in the opposite direction, but it must have been a trick of the shadows because she realised immediately that she had in fact moved towards the danger. A hand reached out to her face. She ducked to avoid ita and the holly scratched her cheek again, deeper this time, its p.r.i.c.kles sharper than she would ever have imagined possible. She tripped and fell, and her exhausted body longed to stay where it was and submit to the earth, but the primeval instinct for survival was still strong enough in her to force her to her feet. She wiped the damp, rotting soil from her skin, sickened by the smell of death that clung to her so stubbornly, refusing to be brushed away, and a sharp pain shot down her cheek as she rubbed it. Her hand came away wet with blood. Only when she saw the knife flash towards her face again did she realise that what she had believed to be a holly tree was something far more deadly.

With a scream, she broke free for the final timea but she had lost all control now and crashed against the nearest gravestone. On her knees, she began to crawl like an animal through the undergrowth, but all the time she was aware of someone walking behind her, taunting her with the possibility of escape whilst waiting for the moment to strike. At last, the game was up and hands grabbed her ankles and dragged her roughly back to the middle of the graveyard. Her face sc.r.a.ped along the ground, rubbing dirt and leaves and pine needles into the open wound. The agony was almost enough to make her faint, but her body refused her the oblivion she craved. Out of nowhere, she heard a mournful, pathetic whimpering; just for a moment, she allowed herself to hope that Chaplin was alive after all, but the noise was too closea and it did not take her long to realise that it came from her own throat.

And then the knife was there again, driven with force through her hand so that she was pinned to the floor. Instinctively, Bella yanked her arm upwards, but the sight of the blade piercing her flesh made her gag, and the drag of the knife through her skin as it was pulled slowly out left her weak and defenceless long before the pain had time to register. The knife pa.s.sed back and forth across her body, cutting rather than stabbinga to prolong her agony, indiscriminate in where it landed and moving so swiftly that she barely felt it touch her skin. Sobbing, she rolled over onto her back, wanting the knife to strike where it mattered, offering herself to its deadly caress if only it would do its work swiftly. Still the torture continued, but there was a different, frenzied quality to it now, as if her submission were an incentive to even greater violence. The knife was thrust repeatedly into her stomach, deep enough for her to feel the hilt against her skin. Her body jerked in some terrible, violent dance, as if she were possessed, and she felt her life seeping away in the warm trails of blood which mapped the blade's path. As the knife worked its way systematically upwards, reaching her chest and neck, she heard a gurgling sound coming from her throat but it was the last thing she was aware of. She had closed her eyes for good long before the knife sought them out.

2.

Glad of some air and some peace, Josephine slipped away from the hotel and found Neptune in darkness. She knocked softly on the door, thinking that Marta might simply have fallen asleep after a long day, but all was silent. Perhaps they had missed each other and she was already back at the hotel with Lydia, but Josephine was reluctant to go and find out; tired of dancing around her own feelings and other people's, she wanted Marta on her own or not at all.

The strong scent of roses and lavender drew her further into the Piazza, and she sat down on one of the benches. This was her favourite part of Portmeirion, particularly during the evening. The glamour of the hotel was exciting in small doses, but there was something about the village itself that appealed more to her imagination. The visitors had gone, leaving the imprint of their day in the air and the promise of return in the neatly stacked chairs and clean cafe tables, and a few of the residents were taking a stroll after dinner. Their voices sounded deceptively clear across the peace of the square, making them seem closer than they really were, and it interested Josephine that Portmeirion played tricks with the ear as well as with the eye. The atmosphere reminded her of solitary walks at dusk through small French towns, when the character of a place seemed to reveal itself more honestly, freed from the confines of tour guides and history books. Or perhaps it was simply that she had felt free.

She smelt the cigarette smoke before she felt Marta's hand on her shoulder. 'Running away from your own party?'

Josephine smiled. 'Age must have some privileges.' She took Marta's hand and pulled her down onto the bench next to her. 'Anyway, I was looking for you. Where have you been?'

'Just for a walk. It was far too hot inside. Sorry.'

'Don't apologise. Sitting out here is exactly what I need after coffee with the Hitchc.o.c.ks.' She kissed Marta's cheek, noticing the faint scent of gardenia on her skin. 'And you're worth waiting for.'

'I'm glad to hear it.' The words were playful, but Josephine knew that they had each said exactly what the other wanted to hear. 'So was. .h.i.tch's cabaret as awful as you expected it to be?'

'Worse, if that's possible. He delivered some sort of definitive lecture on fear, then wound everyone up and watched them go. It was good to see him squirm when it turned nasty, though,' she admitted. 'I thought Archie was going to have to get his notebook out.'