Tamsyn had recently dispensed with her pushchair, and so whoever was escorting her to nursery had to set off earlier to allow for her journey time. Both her parents had encouraged the change. She’d been late to start walking, and the sight of her tramping sturdily along the little backstreets of Dark had put paid to any lingering fears about her development.
The other delaying factor was her obsession with plants. She’d lost her interest in wolfsbane, but now, in this third springtime of her life, every bud, leaf and blossom in the verges had become a source of wide-eyed fascination. Gideon crouched beside her. His thigh was stiff this morning, as if he’d done more running around last night than he could remember. “Cuckoo-flower, right?”
She looked at him in love and pity. “Dame’s violet, Dada. Hesperis matronalis.”
“Oh. My bad.” He took her hand and gently drew her back on the track, then turned to Lee, who was jogging up behind them with a forgotten lunchbox. “These ones are Hesperis matronalis, you know.”
“Well done, but I’m pretty sure you had help. What else is in the verges today, sweetheart?”
“Crikey, don’t ask that. We’re late already.”
“If you let her get it out of her system in one go, she’ll sometimes head straight for school. What’s that yellow one, Tamsie?”
She stumped across the lane to have a look. Sarah had dressed her in her orange dungarees and a pink T-shirt, and she looked like a small, exotic blossom herself, something you might find in the hothouse at Trengwainton. “Agrimonia eupatoria,” she declared. “Agrimony, Lee. Hello, sunlight-in-sorrow, clown’s-comforter. How are you?”
Gideon and Lee exchanged a glance, eyebrows on the rise. “This is bloody Zeke’s work,” Gideon said in an undertone. “He takes her out and teaches her all the Latin names.”
“Who teaches her the other ones, though? I’ve never heard those in my life.”
“Me neither. She talks to them as if they were old friends.”
“Great. Our kid’s a freak.”
“Like we didn’t already know that.” Gideon strode over and scooped her up, making her squeal with delight. “Come on, you aberration. You’ll miss the first round of orange juice at this rate, and Isolde wants her walk.”
They set off together towards the main street. Isolde, who clearly wanted no such thing, trudged along in the rear, only making any progress at all because her beloved mistress was being borne ahead like a carrot. Gideon looked around him in pleasure. This was a life he’d once never have dared dream could be his—a child in his arms, his husband at his side, a beautiful house behind him and a sunny day ahead, a Beltane brighter and more fruitful than any man could desire. “Glad I took Lawrence up on her offer. What do you reckon—drop this one off, and then put some picnic things together and head into the hills?”
“Sounds perfect to me. Did everything go all right at Lamorna last night? I was too sleepy to ask you when you got back.”
“You shouldn’t have sat up for me.” Gideon, well aware that Lee would never do anything else, dipped down to plant a kiss on his cheek. “Old man Pascoe was easily sorted out, and there weren’t any shells in his gun. The workmen did find a body on his land, but for once this one’s not urgent. Coroner thinks the remains are sixty years old at least, so whoever it was can hang on for a couple of days.” He leaned down to release Tamsyn, who was showing signs of restlessness, and watched as she scampered on ahead, Isolde at her heels. “Even DI Lawrence didn’t think I needed give up my day off to investigate. We can have a nice, normal morning, like any other couple. What are you looking around for?”
“Some wood to touch, other than your big, handsome, dorky head.”
“What? Things have been normal lately. I think the kid’s forgetting she could ever turn the house upside down without getting out of her chair. We even got through winter solstice without incident.”
“She was watching you do your Maypole dance last night. Described it perfectly.”
“I should think so, too. I was the belle of the ball.”
“No doubt of that, but... she did it with her eyes shut.”
“Oh.” Gideon took a quick read of his husband’s mood. Calm, determined to seize the day if possible, but prey to wing-shadows of anxiety, brushing back and forth in the air... He put an arm around his waist, drawing him close so that they matched stride for stride. “That is unusual, I’ll grant you. But look at her—she’s fine, and so are we. Let’s just have our picnic and our day off.”
“Better not use the P-word too often, or she’ll catch on.”
“Mm. I feel quite mean, leaving her behind. But...”
“But we’re still gonna do it,” Lee finished for him, laying a hand on his backside. “Please.”
They’d reached the end of Sarah’s street. From here there was a road to cross, and then a lane led to the village and the main traffic route through. The lane was a strange pilgrimage spot for Gideon: there, five years before, his feckless dog had gone running after Lee, almost bowling him down in her enthusiasm for this new friend. There he and Lee had exchanged their first real conversation, and Lee had sustained the first attack from his visions that Gideon had witnessed, a real and savage assault. Gideon had helped him to his feet, more than half convinced that this handsome clairvoyant’s madness was catching. And from there his whole life had begun. “Tamsyn, wait there, please.”
She had taken her road-safety lessons too deeply to heart to do anything else. She was waiting by the massive granite stile, peering through the bars of the gate into the road. Then, to Gideon’s dismay, she let out a wail, spun round and fled back towards him.
He caught her and hoisted her up. He couldn’t see anything that might have upset her: Dark was going about its usual morning business, Mrs Waite opening up the corner shop, a cluster of cars and parents gathering on the kerb outside the nursery. “What on earth’s the matter?” he asked, addressing the question to Lee, because his poor girl was speechless, face buried against his shoulder. “Is something wrong out there that I’m not seeing?”
Lee raised a hand to shield his eyes against the sun. He too scanned the busy, friendly scene beyond the gate. “No. But... I think something’s about to be. Stay here.”
“You stay.” Gideon dumped Tamsyn into his arms. If anything was about to go tits-up on the streets of Dark, no-one had a more urgent duty than he did to prevent it. He clambered over the stile, then stood still, listening. “Do you hear that?”
“Yeah, I do. There’s a car coming. Sounds like Jim Teague’s.”
“Right. Wait there.” Gideon strode across the lane. “Hoi,” he called, gesturing to the teachers and parents on the pavement. “Get all those kids inside the schoolyard and close the gates. Do as I say, please—right now!”
He seldom had to give an order twice. He was a low-key presence in the village, more friend and neighbour than copper to them now, but they knew when he had his sergeant’s voice on. He waited until all the pushchairs and toddlers were being swept to safety, picked up a couple of stragglers himself and handed them, squalling, over the fence and into Headmistress Prynne’s arms. Then he set off at a run towards the main road.
Now that poor Ross Jones was doing time in Bodmin jail, Gideon almost missed having someone local to bust. Jimmy Teague, a hot-headed teen who’d played one computer game too many and thought he was Vin Diesel, was well on his way to filling the gap. Someone had stupidly loaned him the money for a banger after he’d scraped through his driving test, and it was his greatest joy to put this beast through her paces along the narrow road from the A38 to Dark. That was bad enough, but he was oblivious to the speed bumps and zone signs intended to calm traffic down before it hit the main village street. Jobless and feckless, if Jim was blazing home at this hour in the morning, it could only mean a night ill-spent in Liskeard, making himself unfit to drive in every way he could afford.
Here he came. His pimped-out Escort gleamed and flashed in the sunlight through gaps in the hedgerows, almost splendid in her boy-racer trim, like a Celtic chariot with longer blades on the wheels than any other chieftain would dare. Her silencer had given out or been stripped in the interests of getting the deepest rumble and roar from her souped-up engine. A gigantic spoiler floated majestically over her boot. Gideon, who’d done his time in the laybys and on bridges of his county’s main roads, took an accurate guess at her speed: sixty at least, and no signs of slowing up.
Ridiculous. Gideon wasn’t in uniform, but could make himself obvious without it—obvious, unpleasant, unavoidable. Jimmy knew him well. Planting himself in the middle of the main road, he extended one arm and began to flag the car down. Peripherally he noticed Roger Quentin on the other side, taking his exquisitely beautiful Saluki hound for her morning walk.
A walk or a float. A drift perhaps described it best. Her silken coat rippled in the breeze. Poor Isolde had, in her dotage, conceived a tremendous fancy for this dreamlike creature and would rush her, yowling in unrequited love, whenever she got the chance, causing Roger to shudder and try to scoop his darling bodily into his arms. Jim Teague wasn’t slowing down. In his mind, Gid turned himself into a vast brick wall, a barricade from the pub on one corner to Mrs Waite’s shop on the other. But wouldn’t it be better, a gorse-breeze voice whispered in the back of his head—wouldn’t it be better to slip your own leash, Guardian Frayne...?
He shook himself. Where the hell had that come from? He’d lost crucial seconds. Jimmy hadn’t seen him: couldn’t, more like it, with the low morning sun and his idiotic aviator shades. The Escort was almost on top of him. Time to jump out of the way...
Something shot past his knees. Oh, Christ—bloody Isolde, heading like a heat-seeking missile for the object of her desire. Gid could save his own hide if he moved right now, but there was no way he could stop the Escort from hitting his dog. She was right in Teague’s path, oblivious, slobbering with joy, the useless mutt he’d come to love because Lee did. Because Tamsyn loved her best of all.
A shriek shot up like an arrow from the lane. No louder or more piercing than the cries from the other terrified kids, but every fibre of Gid’s being was primed to respond to that voice. He whipped round. Ah, and there was the other source of everything dear in the world to him—Lee, charging up the pavement, ready to rugby-tackle him out of harm’s reach. No need for that. Gideon had time—just—to leap back onto the kerb. He intercepted Lee, grabbing him hard to absorb his momentum. “Where’s Tamsie?”
“Back there with Miss Prynne. Look.”
Gideon obeyed. He couldn’t help it. Tamsyn’s next howl brought everyone else’s attention round to her, too. And so he and his husband, and all their gathered friends and neighbours, witnessed the little girl’s sudden gesture at the car. Headmistress Prynne was holding her tight. Her line of sight was clear. She pointed—flipped her hand palm-up and jerked it, as if tossing a pancake or throwing her plush model Earth ball into the air.
Isolde vanished under the car’s front tyres. The Escort leapt up, nose-first. She tilted impossibly, rear wheels leaving the ground—hovered for a moment, then smashed lid-down onto the verge.
After three paralysed seconds, Gideon let Lee go. “Keep people back,” he said unsteadily. “And call 999.”
Lee already had his phone out. Before he turned away, he seized Gideon’s wrist and squeezed it. The briefest touch, but Gid knew what it meant, and tears of gratitude stung to his eyes. No-one can take the poisoned cup of the next few minutes away from you. You’ve done it sad, sorry dozens of times on the roads of this overcrowded land, and it never gets easier: that first look into the cab of a ruined car.
Teague’s car was mostly intact. Crouching on the verge, Gideon peered inside. He drew a deep breath. There was Jim, who hadn’t been wearing his seatbelt, flat on his back on the upturned roof of the Escort. He seemed mostly intact as well. He did, however, look ready to die of shock. He met Gideon’s eyes in blank astonishment. “Lie still,” Gideon instructed him gruffly, reaching to switch off the engine. “Ambulance is on its way. And don’t even think about legging it, mate—you are nicked.”
Response time from Bodmin town was good. Already he could hear a faint wail of sirens. He pushed upright, listening distractedly to the creak of the Escort’s still-spinning wheels. Now he had work to do, a routine he’d grown to know all too well. The long straight stretch into the village tempted strangers and holidaymakers to put their foot down. The sharp last-minute curve would conceal this accident site, and the car’s rear end was still in the carriageway. He needed to station someone fifty yards or so up the road, to warn oncoming traffic to slow down. Roger Quentin would do. He was the kind of guy who loved such duties—helping the police, borrowing that cloak of authority. But Roger was out with his dog, wasn’t he—the silken pin-up pedigree who’d robbed poor Isolde of her last grain of sense.
Gideon braced up. If he’d learned to look undaunted into vehicles full of shattered human remains, he had to be able to check what had happened to his dog. Her vector—the point at which the car must surely have struck her—would probably have borne her into the ditch on the far side of the road. He had to set up his roadblock first, but then he would do it, if only to make sure the blow had been fatal and clean.
There was the Saluki. She had never shared Roger’s dislike of her new playmate and would, if allowed, have romped with Isolde all day. She was straining at the end of her leash now, plumy tail waving, while her master stared at the car wreck. Beside her—mouth agape in adoration and joy—was Isolde.
Gideon crossed the road to them. “Roger,” he said quietly. “I’ll take the dogs. I’ll get someone to take Farrah home. I need you to go up the road, just beyond the bend, and...”
Words failed him. Fortunately Roger was alive to the favour being asked. “And warn any oncoming traffic? Of course I will.” He tugged at the front of his Barbour. “Pity I don’t have a...”
Gideon glanced around. A cable engineer had popped up from his access hole a few yards down the street, and was also gawping at the scene. “Excuse me, sir,” Gideon said, going to lean on the red plastic barricade guarding the hole. “Police officer. I need to requisition your high-vis vest.”
The engineer blinked up at him. “You are kidding, aren’t you?”
“I am not, as you’ll discover when a dozen of my colleagues arrive along with those sirens.”
Hurriedly he took off the vest and handed it over. Gideon returned to Roger and helped him shrug into it. Clearly this was a crowning moment for him. Gid didn’t get it: the guy was an investment banker, and made a fortune every year by helping other people make theirs. “There you go, then,” he said gently, tugging the high-vis straight. People were strange, fragile cattle sometimes. “Stand on the right side of the road. Hold your left arm out straight and move it up and down. Do not put yourself in danger, but if people stop, explain to them that there’s been a crash in the village. The right-hand lane is passable with care, but they mustn’t stop or obstruct emergency vehicles. Is that clear?”
“Yes! Lovely.” Roger blushed. “I mean... yes, it’s clear. I’ll be glad to help out.”
“Good man.”
“Er, Gideon... did you see what, um... actually happened there?”
“Just some dangerous driving. Go on, please, Roger—we don’t want a pile-up.”
“Right! Of course not.”
He handed Gideon the Saluki’s lead and set off at a run. Gideon hooked the leash securely round his wrist. Then he turned to Isolde. He had to swallow hard before he could speak. “All right, then. Come here.”
Years had passed since she’d last scrambled wholesale into his arms. She was overweight, and starting to stiffen up with arthritis. She beamed at him, then managed a vertical launch of astonishing power. He grabbed her out of mid-air and held her fast. “Stupid bloody animal!” he sobbed into her coat. “Stupid dog!”
***
Lee had done a good job of crowd control. He’d only allowed through Jenny Salthouse, who had worked for decades as a nurse at Trelowarren before her retirement. Someone had given her a blanket, and she was squeezing backwards out of the cabin now to make room for the paramedics. Everyone in Gideon’s small, strange world was more or less where they should be—kids filtering in through the nursery doors, parents returning to their cars.
Tamsyn perched in Lee’s arms, calmly surveying the scene. The little world had changed irrevocably. The mums, dads and guardians edged back out of Gideon’s way as he brought the Saluki and Isolde through. Wide-eyed glances flew between the upturned Escort and the dark-haired little girl with her green-silver gaze, so like Lee’s now that he could have been her father in very truth. Two dozen witnesses at least, Gid reckoned, to what she could do.
Nothing. She’d done nothing. The Bodmin constabulary were out in force too, and Jim Teague’s situation wouldn’t save him from the tests for drugs and blood alcohol. Gideon had no doubt they’d find enough junk in his system to explain the crash. He handed the Saluki’s lead to Roger Quentin’s nearest neighbour in the parish-house lane, then carted his wriggling, tail-wagging armful through the schoolyard gates, where Lee, Tamsyn and Miss Prynne were waiting. “Here,” he said unsteadily. “Here she is, Tamsie. Everything’s all right.”
Tamsyn put out both hands to cup her friend’s big skull. Isolde responded with a burst of frenzied licking. “Dear me,” said Miss Prynne, without much conviction. “That’s not very hygienic, is it?”
“No, not very.” Gideon watched the reunion, his heart slowly climbing down from its fight-or-flight beat. “We’ll wash her off when we get her home. We, er... We should take her home, I guess.”
Tamsyn stopped the dog’s assault by the simple expedient of grabbing her tongue. “No, Dada,” she said seriously. “Want to go to school.”
“You do, do you?” With a grunt, Gideon let Isolde go. He found a tissue in his pocket and wiped a bit of dog-spit from his daughter’s fringe. “What do you think, Miss Prynne?”
“Well, we love a volunteer.” She tried for a watery, freaked-out smile. “You know, it’s often good to give a child an ordinary day, after... after an extraordinary event. Why not leave her with us? I’ll call you right away if she seems upset.”
Gideon looked at Lee, who hadn’t managed to add a word to the discussion so far, and whose colour suggested he might like to pass out cold on the tarmac. “Is that okay with you, love?” he asked, and waited till he got a small nod by way of assent. “Right. Off to school you go, then, monster.”
Lee set Tamsyn carefully on her feet. She promptly tucked a confiding hand into Miss Prynne’s, and the two set off towards the nursery doors. At the last moment, Miss Prynne turned round. “We’ll take care of her, you know.”
With our lives. Gideon heard the unspoken words like heraldic trumpet-notes in the air. Before he could ask, the double doors had closed, leaving him, his dog and his white-faced husband alone in the yard. “Come on,” he said, putting an arm around Lee’s shoulders. “Let’s get out of here.”
“Wait a second.” Lee pulled Isolde’s lead out of his jacket pocket. “I should’ve done this in the first place. She just... She went past me like a bullet. This is all my fault.”
Gideon steered him back up the road. He’d need to talk to the officers gathered round the car, but for now everything was in hand. Roger was probably diverting traffic via Truro, or Mars or Heathrow. Taking Lee’s elbow, Gideon half-lifted him over the granite stile and into the leaf-shadowed silence on the other side. No-one could see them here. “The only fault,” he growled, folding Lee into the biggest, most bone-melting hug he could produce, “is Jim bloody Teague’s. He must’ve been drunk or high, or both.”
For long seconds Lee hung on to him, taking the offered shelter in passionate silence. Then he got his head up. “You saw what I did,” he whispered. “So did everyone else.”
“That’s nonsense. Tamsie thought she was gonna lose her dog, and she let out a shriek like any kid would.”
“Gideon.”
“He was doing sixty at least. If he’d gone through the village like that, or God forbid taken the shortcut home past the school, Christ only knows what would’ve—”
“Gid!” Lee struggled back a little way, gave him an anguished shake. “Listen to me. This has got nothing to do with the village, or the school, or even... even the damn dog. She thought the car was going to hit you.”