Mo Hayder - Poppet

‘Game of tennis?’

She narrows her eyes at him. She loops a GPS unit around her neck, shoulders the bag and heads off towards the stile. She’s wearing black walking boots and she pushes through the brambles as if they’re not there. Caffery is dressed in office shoes and his suit, but he does have his Triclimate jacket on the back seat. He grabs it, and jumps out of the car – follows before he can lose sight of her.

IN THE ENTRANCE to the dead skeleton tree, AJ LeGrande sits on the ground staring at what is in his hands. Stewart stands next to him, attentive, uncertain. He keeps lifting his face to AJ’s as if asking to be reassured everything is OK.

‘I don’t know, do I?’ AJ says. ‘You’re the one who wanted to come here.’

Inside the tree trunk, behind the door, was a small hollow packed with feathers. In it were lying the two dolls he holds now. If Isaac Handel hasn’t made them, then someone is doing a good job of aping him, because they have his style stamped all over them. They even smell of him. AJ turns them over and over – studying them in the thin white light coming through the branches.

They have been constructed using scraps of fabric; twists of foil and bottle caps – they aren’t as ugly as some of the other things Isaac used to make. Isaac was never shy about depicting the gender of his dolls – he makes that part abundantly clear – one is a male and one is a female. They are depicted embracing. It’s not sex – it’s an affectionate embrace. AJ’s not sure how Isaac has achieved the sense of attachment and love between them. When he tries to untangle them it takes a while. He has to use his keys to snap the cotton that has been used to stitch them together.

He recognizes the male doll. It’s him. AJ.

‘OK,’ he says, shaken. He puts the doll down, takes off his jacket, in spite of the cold, lays it on the wet ground, kneels and lies the dolls carefully on the jacket. ‘OK.’

His hair is made of scraps of wool, and the front of the T-shirt is made from a scrap of the Hawaiian shirt that Patience says is a danger to all people of taste. The female doll means nothing to him. It has bright-red wool for hair and is dressed in a skirt covered in lilac-sprigged flowers. Tiny bangles made of twisted wire cover its arms.

‘Isaac, old mate,’ he whispers. ‘Isaac? What’s all this about?’

He raises his head to survey the clearing, wondering what Isaac wanted from this place. This place that has been in his dreams all these years – just a few miles from his home. With a jolt he sees he’s not alone. On the edge of the trees, about four metres away, a woman stands silently watching him.

‘Jesus.’ He gets up hurriedly. ‘Didn’t see you there.’

She smiles. She is petite and pretty – with a neat elfin helmet of vibrant red hair. She’s wearing wellingtons and a duffle coat – a floral skirt peeping out from under it. Stewart instantly trots over to her, as if he knows her, sits at her feet. She bends and scratches him behind the ears. ‘Are you Stewart?’ she says. ‘Are you? You’re lovely.’

‘Stewart,’ AJ says warningly. ‘Stewart …’ He wants to order the dog away, the way he’d warn him away from any stranger – but this woman doesn’t appear to be a threat. In fact she’s so gentle with Stewart that he actually rolls on to his back like a soppy puppy so she can rub his belly.

‘Hey, you like that!’ She crouches and scratches him hard. Stewart’s ears flop back and his head turns from side to side in doggie ecstasy. ‘You are an attention sponge,’ she laughs. ‘My old Suki would have fallen in love with you.’

AJ stands slowly. He is frowning. ‘Do you know my dog?’

She shakes her head, happily scratching away at Stewart, whose legs are twitching with pleasure.

‘I said, do you know my dog? You know his name.’

‘Yes, I know his name. He’s just as lovely as I expected.’

‘As you expected?’

She stops scratching and raises her eyes to him. She must be about his age, but her skin is as smooth and clear as cream. Her eyes are a muddy green. ‘That’s what I said.’

‘Are you going to explain?’

‘That’s why I’m here, AJ.’

He stares at her. ‘I beg your pardon? Say that again.’

She smiles. ‘That’s why I’m here, AJ .’

‘OK – stop now. This is too random.’

‘No. It’s not.’ She points to his jacket on the ground. ‘Look at the dolls.’

He glances down. Sees the red wool of the doll’s hair. The dress it is wearing is similar to the woman’s. A muted floral print.

‘I’m Penny, and you don’t know me. But I know who you are. You were Isaac’s friend in the hospital.’

‘Who are you?’

‘I told you – I’m Penny. And I’m a hippy.’

‘Yes – you look like one.’

‘You’re not exactly David Beckham. Has anyone ever told you that?’

‘Not in so many words. How do you know Isaac?’

She smiles. ‘I’m his mother. No – not his mother, of course I’m not really his mother. I’m his dream mother. I’m the one he wanted as his mother. Do you know some of the things his real mother did to him?’

‘Yes.’

‘Well – you probably don’t know them all. You don’t want to know. I didn’t know until last week – I didn’t understand him. I thought he hated me. That was Isaac’s problem. Everyone ran away from him.’

‘I didn’t run away. Or did I?’

‘No. You didn’t. And he loved you for that. He really loved you. If I was his mother in his dreams, then you were his father. Did you know that?’

AJ stares at her – speechless. He wants to argue, to tell her she’s insane, and that he should know about insanity, given his profession. But he glances down at the dolls and it crosses his mind that maybe he has been guided by an unseen hand. For a long time he’s thought he’d lost his way, but maybe that was all part of the path. His destiny.

THE WOODS ARE thick – still dripping with the earlier rain, soaking Caffery’s shoes and throwing mud and leaf litter over the hems of his trousers. Flea doesn’t check he’s following, she only stops every so often, to check her GPS unit. They go up and up and up, until they are on the edge of a hill – the land dropping away on their right. The density of the forest gives way to glimpses of sky between the branches. He can see snatches of surrounding farmland. But no hamlets or houses or electricity pylons. No sign of civilization at all.

She steps off the track, crashes through an impossible tangle of brambles and branches. His trousers are going to be shredded, but he follows. Ten metres in, she stops and turns to him. She drops the holdall and stoops, unzipping the side pocket. Pulls out two pairs of nitrile gloves and two pairs of bootees – the type the forensics team dole out to anyone visiting a crime scene.

‘Do you know where we are?’

‘You’re kidding,’ Caffery laughs sourly. ‘This is pin the tail on the donkey – you’ve been spinning me round blindfold for the last hour.’ He’d like to add she’s been doing it for months and months. Instead he says, ‘A clue?’

‘Farleigh Park Lake.’ She points to the north. ‘See?’

Sure enough, between the trees in the direction she’s indicating, there is a mirrored, grey coin of water nestling in the green. And suddenly he understands where they are. Hands on the trunks of two trees, he leans himself out over the drop, so he can survey the land. Familiar hills and sweeps of land are emerging out of the anonymous landscape.

‘Shit,’ he murmurs. He points his finger to the west. ‘The clinic must be over there … somewhere …’