Peter Robinson: Watching the Dark

He looked around and sniffed the air like a wild animal. I felt fear prickle through me. I thought for certain he would see me or know instinctively that I was there. But he didn’t. He looked at the lake, as if contemplating something, then carried on, walking just a few more feet to a spot near where the woods started. There was a spade propped against one of the trees for gardening, and he started digging. The girl lay on the ground beside him. I could not tell whether she was alive or not, but she did not move.

I watched Joosep dig a shallow grave, drop her body into it, and shovel back the earth, tapping down the grass sods on top to make it appear undisturbed. It didn’t, but who would care? Who would notice? Soon the turf would knit together again and it would be hidden forever.

He went back into the outbuilding, and I lay down on my mattress again trying to decide what to do. I did not think he had seen me. If he had, I reasoned, he would probably have come and killed me, too. But I could not be certain. Joosep’s mind moved in strange ways. All day he kept catching my eye and smiling. He told us that the English girl had run away during the night, and everyone just laughed. Did nobody realise there was nowhere for her to run? When Sasha decided it was time to go back to Tallinn, I asked if he would take me along as I was working at The Club that night. I could not be certain that Joosep believed me, but he let me go.

When we got to Tallinn, I went immediately to my apartment. Larisa was not there. I packed a few clothes and personal things, just one suitcase, and made sure I had my passport. I did not have a car, so I had to hitch-hike. It is not difficult if you are a reasonably attractive young woman. I soon got to Riga, then Vilnius, then Minsk, then... But that is where my story ends.

Please do not try to find me. I am sorry for what I did, or did not do. That night has haunted me ever since. There was nothing I could have done to save the English girl, except perhaps run into the outbuilding and try to stop Joosep. But no one can make Joosep change his mind once it is made up, and he is much bigger and stronger than me. Perhaps I could have told my story sooner to spare her friends and family the agony of not knowing. I hope you will understand why I felt I could not do that until I read your story.

Banks folded the sheets, put them back in the envelope and massaged his temples. ‘The Wanderer’s Evening Song’ was playing now, and Banks let the strange choral harmonies flow over him for a few moments. As he did so, his mind went back to Rachel’s funeral in late May, the crowded crematorium, hordes of media outside with their hand-held cameras and boom microphones, oblivious to everyone’s pain and loss. As the coffin slipped away, Coldplay’s ‘Fix You’ had played over the music system. It had been Rachel’s favourite song around the time of the hen weekend, her best friend Pauline said.

Banks went with Annie to the funeral tea afterwards at the Hewitts’ house, where they sipped Harvey’s Bristol Cream and ate little triangular sandwiches with the crusts cut off. The media were consigned to the pavement beyond the garden gate, though occasionally an adventurous reporter managed to sneak closer and press his nose up against the window behind the lace curtains.

Banks managed to get Maureen Hewitt alone for a few moments, though her daughter Heather stuck close to her. The young girl made a ghostly presence, pale-skinned, dressed wholly in black, and Banks didn’t recollect her ever saying a word. Her expression remained unchanging, too, a sort of blank grief mixed with anxiety, as if she were always on the verge of tears, or of jumping up and running away.

Maureen Hewitt thanked Banks for getting to the bottom of the mystery of her daughter’s disappearance and assured him that, while she and her husband were devastated that they had not been right about Rachel still being alive, all their lives were much better for the sense of closure that knowing the truth brought. Banks assured Maureen, as best he could, that her daughter’s death had been quick and painless, that she had died of a drug overdose on the very night she had disappeared, probably without regaining consciousness. Maureen refused to accept that her daughter would take drugs willingly, and Banks told her that they were probably administered without her knowledge, though he had no real evidence of this at the time. It helped Maureen a little. She said that she and her husband would continue with the foundation and its work for the sake of all the other missing children out there.

Pauline, the would-be bride at the hen weekend, was the only one of Rachel’s old friends to turn up. She had clearly had too much to drink, even before she arrived. Her voice soon became too loud, and when she smashed a glass, Mr Hewitt had a quiet word with her. She left in tears. Banks and Annie made their excuses and left shortly afterwards.

Banks looked at the envelope one more time, then he got up, put it in his filing cabinet and walked over to the window again. Juliya’s letter and the questions it begged would still haunt him tomorrow, and the day after that. For the moment, though, it was a beautiful late afternoon, the best of the year so far. The tables were fast filling up outside the Queen’s Arms, reminding him of the Old Town in Tallinn, and he wanted nothing more than to sit by himself with a cold beer in the cobbled market square and watch the world go by.

Quite a lot of this book takes place in Tallinn, so first of all, my special thanks to Karen Root, who read the manuscript at an early stage and corrected my Estonian errors. If the Estonian sections ring more true now, it is because of Karen, and if they don’t, it is entirely my fault. I would also like to thank my Course Director Krista Mits for sharing her insights into Estonian history and culture, and my students Daniel Vaarik and Anna-Magdaleena Kangro for their wide-ranging conversation on matters Estonian. Also, a big thank you to my students, who all brought something to the experience of writing this book, and were an inspiration: Berit Kaschan, Gunilla Rosengren, Siret Kork, Tana Collins, Kaidi Laur, Adrienn Jankovich and Helen Kalpus. I would also like to thank the Canadian Ambassador to the Baltic States and his wife for the use of their beautiful apartment while I was teaching in Tallinn.

At Hodder & Stoughton, my thanks go to Carolyn Mays, Francesca Best and Katy Rouse in Editorial, and beyond them to Kerry Hood and Jaime Frost in Publicity, and to Lucy Hale and the formidable Hodder production and sales force. Thanks also to Justine Taylor for her thorough copy-editing. At William Morrow, I thank Carolyn Marino and Wendy Lee in Editorial and Laurie Connors in Publicity, along with the Morrow production team and sales reps. At McClelland and Stewart, thanks to Kendra Ward and Ellen Seligman for their editing, Ashley Dunn in Publicity (along with freelance Debby de Groot), and Doug Pepper for the oysters and stout and so much more. Thanks also to the McClelland & Stewart/Random House sales and productions teams. I would also like to thank my agents Dominick Abel and David Grossman for their continued support. Last but not least, I would like to thank Sheila Halladay for being my first reader, as always, and for making so many useful suggestions at a time when they were probably the last thing I wanted to hear.