Jayne looks at her and feels contempt. Emily is so selfish, she thinks. If she hadn’t run away from the barn last night, none of this would have happened.
“In a minute,” she says. “I need to help Ruth out.”
“What’s wrong with you? Don’t you want to find out if Mark is okay?”
“Mark’s fine. All the men are fine.”
“I need to make some calls,” William Elliott says. “Come into the farmhouse if you need to before you go.”
It sounds as if he’s emphasizing the word “go.” Jayne gets the message.
“Of course,” she says. “Thank you.”
They watch him walk away across the yard. Emily wants to ask him to use his phone, but she’ll have the same problem she had last night: she won’t be able to recall Paul’s number.
Emily opens the car door and squints down the lane, into the fog, willing a vehicle to come into view. She maneuvers her legs to the side so that she can get out and pauses. It will hurt her ankle, but she’s going to lower herself down and drag herself around to the back of the car so she can wrestle a phone from Jayne or Ruth if they won’t give her one.
She takes a deep breath in. As she starts to move, the fog in the lane brightens and headlamps emerge slowly, belonging to a black car. It crawls toward them. “Oh my God,” Emily says. She drops too hard down from the Land Rover and her ankle screams in protest.
She hobbles toward the car in the lane. It looks large, and sleek. A town car. The type Paul likes to use.
“Paul!” she cries out. The fog dampens her shout.
Jayne, watching, helps Ruth out of the back of the Land Rover. Ruth collapses against the side of the vehicle, doubles over and retches.
“Paul!” Emily calls again. She can only inch down the lane. It feels as if it’s taking forever. The car is parked about a hundred yards away. The headlamps extinguish.
Emily’s heart lifts as two men get out of the car. It’s Paul. She knows it because he’s wearing his overcoat, the cashmere one they bought together and beside him, it’s hard to say who it is.
Emily accelerates her pace, pushing through the stabbing pain and wonders why Paul isn’t throwing his arms wide open, the way he usually does, why he isn’t jogging to greet her.
She hears footsteps behind her. Jayne catches up with her, passes her and stops dead a few feet ahead.
Ruth shivers as she leans against the Land Rover. She can’t move but is transfixed, though it’s hard to see what’s happening through the fog. She thinks there are two men approaching Jayne and Emily. She doesn’t know if she wants one of them to be Toby, or not, but she’s desperate to know if Alfie is okay. She reaches into her pocket for her phone.
Maggie Elliott’s little terrier scampers past Ruth and appears on the path beside Jayne. She yaps at the men before sidling up to greet them.
The thicker-set man in the big coat leans down to pet her. He makes a fuss of her.
“Paul?” Emily says. Paul never pets dogs. He doesn’t like them. She feels as if her heart might stop.
“No, it’s me,” the other man calls.
“Toby?” Jayne says.
“Hello.” Toby emerges from the fog. He’s dressed for the weekend, in jeans and walking boots, an old, waxed jacket, a messengerbag slung across his torso. “This is quite the welcome party. What’s happening?”
The first man stops petting the dog and steps forward, too.
“Who are you?” Jayne asks.
“I’m the driver. You all right if I head off now, mate?” He looks at Toby.
“Absolutely. Of course. Thanks a lot. Drive safe on the way home. And good luck to your nephew!”
The driver salutes him with two fingers and turns away.
Emily has caught up.
