There is an interminable silence, punctuated only by the faraway sound of her shoes on the tarmac, the sound of the wind,a car engine passing in the distance. A creeping sense of unease crawls up my arms, the hairs rising as if chilled by a cold wind. Was she walking into a trap?
“I see it,” she says finally. “No one else around.”
“Nobody watching?”
Her breathing grows a little heavier, the exertion of walking up the incline. “It’s open ground on one side here,” she says. “But there are trees, bushes, another building, the main house. Like, a hundred places to hide. Putting the backpack in now.”
Over the phone line I can make out the scratching creak of a hinge, a momentary pause before the heavy plastic lid is dropped back into place.
“OK, it’s done,” she says, a nervous smile in her voice. “Feel like I’ve just dropped off a bag of ransom cash in a movie.”
“Who can you see, Jess?”
“No one. I can’t see anyone.”
“Someoneis there,” I say. “Somebody must be watching you.”
“I’m going to loop around, take the long way back to the car. See what I can see.”
Dom says: “Be careful.”
She slips into silence again, only the intermittent sound of her breathing and the occasional dog barking in the distance to prove the line is still open. I’m struck with an overwhelming sense that I should have gone with her, that it should be me taking this risk. Instead, I’m blind, straining to hear what’s going on. Only a mile away but it might as well be a hundred.
“All right,” she says. “I’ve gone back up and around the visitors’ center. Going to hang here for a minute, see if anyone comes along to pick up the bag.”
“Listen, Jess, I’ve got a bad feeling about this.” A hard bubble of anxiety is painful in my throat. “Why don’t you head back to the car now? Better than being caught in the open.”
“I’m all right,” she says. “Don’t stress, there’s still a few other people around. They’re not going to try anything.”
I look out the window, the evening sky softening into dusk. It’s going to get harder for her to see what’s going on, and it’s not long before the gates will be shut for the night. Unless… the person we’re waiting for is an employee, right there at the park? A worker at the café, or the visitors’ center? In which case they could wait until all members of the public are gone before retrieving the backpack.
I discuss the idea with Jess while she watches, and waits, answering me in clipped tones.
“Could be,” she says quietly. “But it would be high risk, bringing us so close to their workplace.”
She spends another five minutes waiting, observing from the shadows. A couple of people emerge into the courtyard but only to go to their cars and drive away. Neither of them goes near the roller bin.
“OK,” Jess says. “Plan B.”
“Stay on the line.”
She goes back to the car, narrating for our benefit as she drives slowly and conspicuously down the drive to the main gate. Back on Wollaton Road, she pulls into a side street and does a U-turn, positioning herself with a good view of the exit.
It’s not long before the silence is broken by her loud exclamation of surprise.
“Bingo!”
I lean toward my phone. “What is it?”
“Volvo estate, dark color, leaving now. Pulling out left.” The soft cough of an engine coming to life. “I’m on him… oh.”
“Can you see the driver?”
“I’m not sure…” She tails off again. “Just got a glimpse as it turned through the gate. It might be…”
“What?”
“Itmighthave been a woman. But it was so quick, it’s hard to say. Can’t quite…”
