Gideon listened. Yes – movement in the shapeshifting mist, large and very close. Primitive impulses fired in his brain, switching him from hunting mode to last-ditch defence – of home, hearth, offspring – he didn’t know, but it all stood represented by Lee Tyack and the child. He ran back upslope to them. “Christ, what is it? Not Joe...”
“No, not Joe.”
“Get the kid and stay behind me.”
“Not this time.”
No. It wouldn’t work. What the hell would, against the unseen vastness stirring so close to them? “Put her between us. Shelter her. Now!” Gideon twisted round to face them. He threw his arms around them both. He ducked his head, buried his face in Lee’s hair. “Hang on,” he whispered. “Don’t move. Don’t breathe.”
Again came the rattle of stones, faint and far off down the hill. The presence in the mist became immobile, and a listening silence so deep it could have swallowed all Cornwall came down.
The air moved. A breeze became a rush became a sudden roaring passage of unleashed energy, a buffet hard and close enough to knock Gideon down: he spared a hand to grab at the rocks, Lee and the child hanging on to him.
Then the presence was gone. Off in the mist, a man cried out once and was silent.
Chapter Twelve
They were a sorry procession, Gideon supposed. Not Lee, still tirelessly bearing Lorna along, his back straight and his head high with the joy and relief of bringing her home. He looked fine. What Gideon had to carry was a dog. Isolde had crawled out from under the gorse at the foot of the crag. She wasn’t much hurt, as far as a torchlight check could reveal, but she was done up, all her heroics spent, unwilling or unable to take another step. He’d picked her up. His mobile had come to life where he’d expected it to, and he’d summoned the forces of order and light now waiting at the bottom of the track – ambulance, police Rover, search-and-rescue truck, a pool of circlinglights casting dervish shadows from the standing stones nearby.
This was as far as road vehicles could get. The search team were unloading their quad bike and kit. Two officers with tracker dogs were already halfway up the southern cliff, the dogs this time barking and straining at the leash. Gideon was almost home. To his infinite relief, he saw Sarah Kemp sitting hunched in the police truck’s open rear door. She was wrapped in a blanket, a paramedic and a female officer looking after her. She jerked her head up as Gideon took the dog into one arm for long enough to open the last gate and usher Lee through it ahead of him. The blanket fell. She staggered upright and began to run. “Gideon! Gideon!”
“All right, love. We’re coming down to you.”
“He came for me – Joe did! He tried to take me away, but I...” She stumbled and went down on one knee, allowing the WPC to catch up with her. “I bashed him with a pan. I locked myself in the cellar. Oh, Gideon – have you got my girl? Have you got my girl?”
***
Gideon sat in the back of the ambulance, between the open doors. His arm was round Lee Tyack, who was also wrapped in a blanket now, leaning against him tiredly while a medic checked the rope marks on his wrists and shone a light into his eyes. “You should test his blood,” Gideon told the medic, who gave him the expected look for his advice. “He was given the same drug as the kid. And the only drugs Joe Kemp had access to, he got from the vet.”
“Don’t you worry, PC Frayne. Mr Tyack’s going in for a night’s observation. They’ll test him for everything then.”
Lee raised his head. “What? I don’t need – ”
“You’ll shut up,” Gideon informed him with muted ferocity, “and do as you’re damn well told.”
A new set of headlights approached unsteadily up the moorland track. The vehicle pulled to a stop, and Gideon’s inspector from Truro got out. He looked sleepy and dishevelled, but clearly could command the fancy car and driver at any hour he chose. For a moment Gideon considered the privileges of rank, and dismissed them. He couldn’t imagine wanting anything more in the world than he had right now.
Kinver made his way across to the ambulance. He gave a traditional Cornish policeman’s onceover to the tableauin front of him – one of his finest coppers, firmly hanging on to Lee Tyack, who was all very well in his way and certainly had been most helpful, but still was undeniably another man. Gideon felt not the least desire to move his arm. “Good evening, sir.”
“Good morning, I believe you mean.” Kinver peered into the ambulance, where the paramedics were tending the little girl as best they could around her mother, who had turned into an octopus and was clearly never letting go of her again. Sounds of laughter and crying spilled like music out into the night. “I gather you’ve done well, PC Frayne. Is that...?”
“Lorna Kemp,” Gideon said, with absolute exhausted satisfaction. “Yes. The missing child.”
Chapter Thirteen
“Would you like to own a dog?”
Lee Tyack lay back in his hospital bed. He looked up at Gideon in amusement. “This dog,” he said thoughtfully. “A bit on the plump side? A touch of a problem with gas?”
“That would be her.” Isolde had begun to howl the moment Gideon had handed her over to a neighbour for the night, and it hadn’t been for him. “You’re her all-time favourite human.”
“Well, I’d love to own a dog. Only my flat’s quite small, so it might be better...”
“If she lived with me, and you came to visit?”
“Something like that. But I’d only feel happy with living apart from my dog if they were pretty frequent visits, say...”
“A couple of times a week?”
