Kevin Brooks - Dance of Ghosts

‘Now all we’ve got to do is find her,’ Cal said.

It took us a long time, at least another three hours, and it was a painstakingly tedious task which gave both of us throbbing headaches and aching eyes, but eventually we reached the stage where we’d managed to track Anna — through a series of blurred and stuttered images — from the bottom of Miller’s Row all the way down to London Road. And now Cal had loaded the footage from a camera that was located about fifty metres south of the railway bridge, looking back at the lay-by, and we were both peering intently at the screen, our eyes fixed on the smallish grey blob of a figure that we knew to be Anna Gerrish. We’d seen her arrive at the lay-by at 01.31, and now — according to the read-out at the bottom of the screen — it was 01.47. So far, nothing had happened. Although the picture quality was poor, the view from the camera couldn’t have been better. It showed the whole of the lay-by, the tunnel entrance/exit, and the road leading towards it from the bridge. There was very little traffic around at that time of night, and none of the cars we’d seen so far had stopped at the lay-by.

We just had to wait.

‘What time did Tasha say she saw the Nissan?’ Cal asked me, without taking his eyes off the screen.

‘She thought it was around two-ish.’

Cal nodded.

I leaned closer to the screen as headlights appeared in the tunnel … but the car didn’t stop. I watched it drive past the lay-by, approach the camera, and then disappear.

I said to Cal, ‘Where does this road go anyway?’

‘South from here?’

‘Yeah.’

‘London Road ends at the entrance to the tunnel. After that it becomes Great Hey Road. It follows the railway tracks for a while, maybe half a mile, then there’s a right turn that takes you back into town, but if you stay on Great Hey Road and keep going … hold on, what’s that?’

Another pair of headlights had appeared in the tunnel, this time moving quite slowly. We both leaned in closer to the screen again. The headlights were on full, the glare making it impossible to see what kind of car it was. But as it approached the end of the tunnel, it definitely seemed to be slowing down.

‘This could be it,’ Cal said quietly.

The car was coming out of the tunnel now, its left-side indicator flashing. It pulled in at the lay-by, and as I watched the grey blob that was Anna walking towards it, I felt an irrational urge to shout out to her — Don’t do it, Anna! Don’t get in the car! But of course, after leaning in through the passenger window and talking to the driver for ten seconds or so, she got in.

‘Shit,’ Cal whispered.

The headlights were still on full beam as the car pulled away, and at that distance there was no chance of identifying the driver. But now the car was coming towards us, getting closer all the time … and we both had our faces almost pressed to the screen … and just as the car was about to pass the camera and disappear from view, another car appeared, travelling in the opposite direction, and our driver had to dip his lights. And just for a second, we had a relatively clear picture of our car. But it was, literally, only for a second, and then the car was gone.

‘Did you see him?’ I asked Cal.

‘No, it was too quick.’

‘Shit.’

He grinned at me. ‘It’s not live …’

‘What?’

‘It’s a recording, we can watch it as many times as we want.’ He started tapping the keyboard. ‘You didn’t really think it was live, did you?’

I leaned back in the chair, rubbing my eyes, trying to bring myself back to reality. I knew exactly where I was and what I’d been doing for the last few hours, but I was feeling that slightly odd sensation — a kind of gradually dawning awareness — that can come to you at the end of a really engrossing film. And that, in turn, was making me feel really uncomfortable. Because what I’d just witnessed wasn’t a film … it wasn’t a drama, played out by actors. It was real. A real girl, getting into a real car with a real man … a man who was quite possibly about to kill her.

There was nothing engrossing about that.

‘There,’ said Cal. ‘That’s as clear as I can get it.’

I looked at the screen. He’d re-run the CCTV footage and frozen it just before the car disappeared from view. The static image was still fairly blurred and grainy, but it clearly showed a man in the driving seat, and a girl in the passenger seat, and when I half closed my eyes and squinted at the faces, it was just possible to see — or, at least, to imagine — that the man matched Tasha’s description, and that the girl was Anna. But, of course, my imagination was probably swayed by the fact that I already knew it was Anna.

‘What do you think?’ Cal said.

‘Is that the best you can do?’

‘I could enlarge it, but all that’d do is make it even blurrier.’

‘You can’t get it any clearer?’

‘No … I know someone in the States who could maybe clean it up a bit. But he’s really expensive, and he’s got a really long waiting list. He probably couldn’t do it for at least a couple of weeks, probably a month.’

I leaned forward and squinted at the images again. ‘It could be Bishop …’

‘It could be anyone.’

‘What about the car?’

‘Well, it’s definitely a Nissan Almera — ’

‘Is it?’

‘Yeah, but I can’t make out the number plate.’

I leaned back, lit a cigarette, and looked at my watch. It was just gone four o’clock. Deep down inside me I could feel the faint stirrings of the black place again, and I knew that it wouldn’t be too long before it dragged me down into its void. But it wasn’t quite ready for me yet. And the black pills in my pocket would help to keep it at bay for a while.

‘What time does it get dark?’ I said to Cal.

He shrugged. ‘I don’t know. Six, half-past …? Why?’

‘Great Hey Road …’ I said, gazing at the frozen image on the laptop screen. ‘It carries on down to the coast, doesn’t it?’

‘Yeah,’ Cal said, frowning at me, not sure why I was asking. ‘It takes you out past the Ranges, through all those little villages … and it ends up at Hale Island.’

I nodded, remembering now. I hadn’t been to Hale Island for years, but when I was a kid we used to drive down there on Sunday afternoons for family strolls on the beach … my mother and father walking together, talking quietly to each other, while I went off on my own … scuffing along the strandline, kicking up junk, looking for jewels — tropical beans, cuttlefish bones, mermaid’s purses …

I was happy then.

‘John?’

I looked at Cal.

He said, ‘Are you all right? You look a bit — ’

‘Can you see if you can find some more footage of the Nissan?’ I said to him, getting to my feet. ‘Try and see where this guy went with Anna?’

Cal nodded. ‘I can try … there’s a few more Network Rail cameras that might have picked him up, but that’s before the turn-off back to town. After that … well, I’ll have to check, but I don’t think there’s too many cameras along Great Hey Road.’ He looked at me, frowning again. ‘Where are you going?’

‘I’m just going to take a drive out there, before it gets too dark.’

‘Out where?’

I looked at the image on the screen again. ‘I’ll start at the lay-by, and then … I don’t know. Just keep going, I suppose.’ I looked back at Cal. ‘I know it sounds stupid — ’

‘Yeah, it does. I mean, you’re not going to find anything, are you?’

‘I know. But I just need to do something, Cal. Even if it’s pointless … I need to feel like I’m doing something.’