SIXTEEN

There had been a constant stream of visitors to the hospital room all day, or maybe it just seemed that way to Daniel, still suffering with a throbbing headache that medication couldn’t entirely shift.

Not that the company hadn’t been welcome. For one thing, it helped keep him from dwelling on things he would rather not, such as the continuing lack of word from Drew. After the torment of thinking that he might die without having made up with his son, Daniel had sent him a text message that morning, just a short one to say, ‘Hello. How are you?’ but there had been no reply.

Daniel had had no visitors at all until this, the second day after the rescue, because he had slept solidly for the first twenty-four hours after admittance. When he awoke the first time, he had a crashing headache and neither the energy nor the inclination to move. His sluggish brain could make little sense of his unfamiliar surroundings, but he didn’t waste energy worrying about it. All that mattered, just then, was the complete and blissful absence of purpose.

Daniel closed his eyes and within moments was in a deep and dreamless sleep. When he finally returned to something approaching normal wakefulness, the first thing he saw was a dark-skinned nurse standing at the foot of his bed, apparently reading his notes. Her face split in a brilliant white smile when she saw that he was awake, and after asking him how he felt and discovering whether he knew his name, she checked his blood pressure and offered him a cup of tea.

Daniel’s mouth was dry, gritty and tasted unutterably foul, and he felt as though he’d swallowed a gallon or two of bog water. He thought the rather weak cup of tea that the nurse presently produced was the best thing he had tasted in the whole of his life, but after the first mouthful or two, another matter had taken possession of his mind.

‘What happened to Elena? Is she here? Is she OK?’

The nurse, whose badge named her as Leanne, frowned heavily. ‘Elena? I’m sorry . . . ?’

‘The girl who was brought in with me. Romanian, about twelve, long, dark hair.’

‘I’m sorry. I only just came on shift. I’ve been off for a couple of days.’

‘Can you find out? Please? It’s important.’

‘I see what I can do,’ she said with a flash of the thousand-watt smile. ‘But you should sleep now. Doctor will see you in the morning, OK?’

For a while after she had gone, Daniel battled leaden eyelids, hoping she would return with news of Katya’s sister, but eventually he lost the fight and slept.

The next time he woke up, daylight – albeit from a sky that was overcast and joyless – lit the small room. With the morning light came visitors, a bewildering procession of nurses and doctors of varying seniority, who read his notes, took his blood pressure and his temperature, listened to his chest and shone pencil lights in his eyes.

By the time Tom Bowden appeared in the middle of the morning, heralding his arrival with a brief rap on the door, Daniel was heartily fed up and desired nothing more than to be allowed to dress and go home. This, however, proved to be a pipe dream, for when – in a surge of rebellion – he had insisted on getting up to use the toilet, he found that he was as weak as a cat and the short journey left him trembling and exhausted.

‘You look a bit cleaner than when I last saw you,’ Tom observed, pulling a chair up to the bed and sitting down.

Daniel grimaced. ‘On the outside, perhaps, but I still feel as if there’s mud in every orifice. Tom, what happened to Elena? Is she all right? I keep asking, but they either don’t know or won’t tell me.’

‘She’s going to be fine,’ Tom said. ‘In fact, I’d say she’s in a better state than you, but then she didn’t get clobbered over the head by our friend Anghel Macek. At least, I presume that’s what happened to you.’

‘Macek,’ Daniel said, remembering. ‘Yes, it was. I thought I had him, but he blind-sided me.’

‘He certainly hasn’t improved your looks,’ Tom said, eyeing him judiciously.

‘I suppose there hasn’t been any sign of him?’

‘On the contrary, I’ve just spent the best part of the last twenty-four hours with him, and while I can’t say that it was a pleasure, it was immensely satisfying.’

‘Where did you find him?’

‘Ah, well, much as I’d like to be able to take the credit for that, I can’t. It was entirely down to that four-legged furry Exocet of yours.’

‘Taz caught him?’ Daniel exclaimed. He thought back and remembered asking the dog if he knew where Macek had gone. For a workaholic police-trained dog with a score to settle, that had obviously been enough to set him on the Romanian’s trail, and if Macek had resisted – as he almost certainly would have . . .

‘Did he bring him down?’

‘Certainly did,’ Tom told him. ‘The guy was well and truly immobilized. All we had to do was cuff him.’

‘That’s my boy!’ Daniel said proudly. ‘And what about the other girl, Molly? She was in a bad way.’

‘Yes, she was suffering from hypothermia, but the doctors say she should make a full recovery. A lot of what you saw was probably the effects of the drug Macek had given them to keep them quiet. Without meaning to, he actually did them a favour. They were so far out of it – especially the younger one – that some of the trauma seems to have passed them by.’

‘What I don’t understand is why Macek was in Tavistock in the first place,’ Daniel said. ‘I imagined he’d have been long gone.’

‘It appears that Patrescu had left a data stick in the bank’s safety deposit. Macek had it on him when we arrested him and it was a little goldmine. Names and addresses of contacts and clients, the lot. We’re assuming Macek needed the information to complete the deal for the two girls.’

‘And Naylor? Have you picked him up?’

Bowden made a resigned face. ‘We’ve certainly had words with him, but to be honest, we don’t have anything on him except confirmation that he spoke to Patrescu occasionally. He says it was in all innocence and we can’t prove otherwise. You know how it is, I’m sure.’

‘Only too well,’ Daniel agreed, disappointed. ‘So how did you manage to track me down?’ His recollection of the actual rescue was hazy, to say the least. ‘I have to tell you, never has the term “nick of time” been more appropriate.’

‘I fancied you were probably quite relieved to see us,’ Tom told him. ‘By the time we got the kid to safety and came back for you, you’d hooked your arm over the last rung of the ladder and were dead to the world. It was a bugger of a job getting you up on to the ladder, I can tell you.’

‘Sorry to be a nuisance, I’m sure.’

‘As for finding you, your friend Hilary told us where you’d gone, or at least, where you’d been heading for. She was quietly panicking. I think she was regretting having lent you the pony and was imagining all sorts of disasters.’

‘Instead of which, I was having a whale of a time, bog-snorkelling in subzero temperatures,’ Daniel responded dryly. ‘I don’t think I’ll ever get the stench of that place out of my nostrils.’

‘Yeah, it was a bit ripe. Anyway, when Hilary called, she was able to give me a pretty good idea of where we might find you, and added to that we picked up on a report from the local Search and Rescue helicopter on its way to another call-out. They couldn’t stop, but their description of the vehicle matched the one you’d been following. They also said there appeared to be some sort of fight going on, so they called it in for the ground crew and also contacted the police. They were able to give us coordinates and the good old sat nav did the rest. And then of course there was Taz. As soon as we’d relieved him of his charge, he was off like a bullet to find you. I expect you heard him barking to alert us. He did a good day’s work, your partner.’

‘So where is he now?’

‘Being spoiled rotten by my ma and pa, if I know anything about it,’ Tom said with a smile. ‘He’s fine. Don’t worry about him. By the way, you’ve made the papers again. Do you want to see?’

Daniel shook his head. ‘No, thanks.’

‘There were a couple from the local TV news team hanging around out in reception too. Shall I send them in?’

Daniel gave him a withering look. ‘What do you think?’

Tom laughed. ‘All right. I’ll get rid of them.’

When he departed, some twenty minutes later, moved on by a stern-faced nurse who said she’d come to take the patient for more tests, Daniel was left with the thought that whatever else the last few weeks had thrown up in the way of personal strife, at least he had made a new friend, and heaven knew he had few enough of those.

His first visitor of the afternoon was a surprise.

After a couple of knocks so quiet he wasn’t at all sure he’d heard them, the door opened a few inches and a blonde head peered hesitantly round.

‘Tamzin! Come in. It’s good to see you.’

She looked a little pale, but apart from the yellowing remnants of bruising, there was little physical sign of the ordeal she had suffered.

‘I can’t stop long – Mum’s outside,’ were her opening words as she came a few steps into the room. She seemed to be having difficulty meeting his eyes.

‘That’s OK. It’s nice of you to come.’

‘Mum drove me here. She’s been very good.’

‘Take a seat. How’re you doing?’

Tamzin walked over to the chair, but instead of sitting, she put her handbag on it and wandered away to look out of the window.

‘Oh, I’m OK,’ she said lightly, but Daniel wasn’t fooled.

‘Are you?’ She had dark circles under her eyes that spoke of sleepless nights.

She shrugged. ‘I don’t know. My counsellor says it’ll take time – you know, the bad dreams and stuff . . .’ Her voice trailed away uncertainly and she continued to gaze out of the window.

Daniel waited, pretty sure he knew what was coming, and eventually she turned to face him, her lip caught between her teeth.

‘I know it wasn’t your fault, only I don’t think I can do it any more,’ she said in a rush.

‘Meaning . . . ?’

‘This. Us. I’m thirty-one. I want security, a future, a family maybe. What happened the other day was so terrifying it’s made me see what I really want. Your life has been so different from mine – still is. I thought I could handle it, but I can’t.’

‘This thing with Katya was a one-off, a chance in a million. It’s not likely to happen again.’

‘Maybe not, but you’ve enjoyed it, haven’t you? It gives you a buzz – I could see it.’

Daniel didn’t answer. Although there were parts of the last few days that had gone well beyond a ‘buzz’, he knew she was right.

‘It’s all right,’ Tamzin went on. ‘I even understand, in a way, but I don’t want to be part of it. We’re just different people. I’m sorry, Daniel.’

‘That’s OK.’ Daniel had known it for a while and her realization gave him an easy way out. ‘And I’m sorry. I never dreamed you’d get hurt.’

‘I know. I don’t blame you, it’s just . . .’

‘We should be going now, Tammy.’ Nadine Ellis leaned round the door. ‘If you want to get to the garden centre before it shuts . . .’

‘Yes, I’m coming. We’re giving my garden a makeover,’ she said, turning back to Daniel.

‘Oh, right. That’ll be nice.’ Relegated to less important than a shopping trip – the interruption by Tamzin’s mother had been nicely calculated to show him where he stood.

There didn’t seem to be much more to say, so Daniel smiled.

‘You’d best be going, then. I expect I’ll see you around, when I’m back on my feet.’

Tamzin returned the smile, if a little uncertainly. ‘Yes, I expect so.’

She picked up her bag, shot him a wistful look, then turned and left.

In welcome contrast, his next visitors greeted him with unalloyed pleasure. He heard a light tapping and there were Fred and Meg Bowden peering round the door with wide smiles and asking if it was OK to come in.

‘Of course! Please do.’

‘Actually, there’s someone else here who’s rather keen to see you,’ Meg said.

The door opened wider, and with a scrabble of claws on the shiny floor, Taz launched himself at the bed in a blur of black and tan fur.

‘Oh my word!’ Meg exclaimed as Daniel strove to calm the ecstatic dog, whose sole aim seemed to be to lick as much bare flesh as he could find. ‘Are you OK?’

Finally catching hold of Taz’s collar, Daniel emerged, laughing, from under him.

‘I’m fine. How on earth did you smuggle him in? Or did you bribe one of the nurses?’

‘Sort of,’ she admitted, leaning forward to give him an exotic-scented hug, a multitude of bangles tinkling on her arms as she did so. ‘Actually, this room is quite close to one of the side entrances, so the nurse let us sneak him in. Though I doubt she would have if she’d known he’d do that!’

‘Taz, sit down, sir!’ Daniel said sternly, and the dog obeyed, though his excitement was still plain to see in his panting and the wild waving of his tail.

‘Daniel, how are you?’ Fred came to stand beside his wife.

‘I’m getting there, thanks.’

‘Well, I don’t think I’ve ever had an employee who found so many excuses to bunk off work,’ Fred said on a note of wonder. He sat in one of the chairs. ‘You’re never there. I’m going to reclassify you as a part-timer.’

‘Don’t listen to him, Daniel,’ his wife advised.

‘Well, he’d be quite entitled to give me my marching orders,’ Daniel said, rubbing the dog’s soft head. ‘Not only do I keep going AWOL but I trashed one of his lorries too. By the way, thanks for looking after Taz for me. I hope he’s been behaving himself.’

‘Of course he has. Actually, he’s struck up quite a friendship with old Mosely. Would you believe he was even trying to get him to play yesterday?’

Fred and Meg had brought a flask of real coffee and three mugs, and as they drank, they wanted to hear the story of the chase and rescue.

‘According to the paper, you “selflessly put” your “own life on the line to save that of a young girl”,’ Fred reported, quite clearly relishing Daniel’s discomfort. ‘Front-page coverage. You’re quite the local hero.’

‘That’s bollocks! I didn’t actually plan on falling into the bog,’ Daniel protested. ‘And if the cavalry hadn’t turned up on time, I wouldn’t have saved anyone.’

‘In fact, you only did what anyone would have done,’ his boss said dryly. ‘Come off it! We’ve had the truth of it from Tom, don’t forget.’

Much to his relief, Daniel was saved further embarrassment by a tentative knock at the door, and a voice that he had come to recognize as Leanne’s called out, ‘Can we come in?’

‘Sure,’ Daniel replied, wondering who ‘we’ were.

He wasn’t left in the dark for long. The door was pushed wide and Leanne came in pushing a hospital wheelchair in which sat Molly, wearing a pink towelling robe. She was pale and hollow-cheeked, but her hair had been washed and brushed into a shining curtain and in her beautiful eyes there lurked a shy smile.

‘Hi, Molly! How are you?’ Daniel exclaimed, delighted, but before the girl could answer, his attention was caught by a second wheelchair, this time pushed by Katya.

‘Elena!’ Emotion threatened to overwhelm him. They had striven so hard to save this child and here she was, at last, safe.

In a perfect world, Elena would have joyfully recognized Daniel as her saviour, but as it was, she merely looked up at her sister with anxious incomprehension writ large on her thin face.

Daniel smiled, back in control once more.

‘I don’t suppose she recognizes me clean. I must have looked like the Creature from the Black Lagoon when she last saw me. Katya, you’re looking well.’

It was true. Free at last of the worry for her lost sister, Katya had bloomed with a new beauty. Parking the wheelchair beside the bed, she moved towards Daniel.

‘She might not know what you’ve done for her, but I do,’ she said, going without hesitation into his outstretched arms. ‘I cannot thank you enough, and I’m so ashamed when I think of things I said to you.’

‘Don’t be so daft,’ Daniel murmured into her glossy brown bob. ‘You were under huge stress. And as for what I did, you were the driving force. Without you, none of it would have happened. By the way,’ he added, ‘I think you should meet and apologize to my boss, Fred Bowden. Fred, this is the young lady who’s responsible for messing up your schedules.’

With introductions all round and the easy warmth of Meg’s manner, the two youngest visitors soon began to relax and even become chatty, although Elena was handicapped by a limited grasp of the language, and a little overawed by the presence of Taz, who – growing bored with the human interaction – wandered across to the window and stood on his hind legs to look out.

Half an hour or so later, when Daniel had waved them all goodbye and again had the room to himself, he closed his eyes against the pain in his head and finally gave in to the depression that had been clouding his mind all day.

What had he done to turn Drew against him? Had it just been that one last rejection – as he saw it – that had tipped the scales, or had something or someone else influenced him? Given time, he felt the boy would eventually come round, but thanks to Amanda and her solicitor, time might well be something they weren’t to be granted – at least, not time together.

Surely no judge would separate a father and his child without a solid reason. Would they? In Daniel’s current mood, he felt anything was possible.

The nurse came in with a welcome dose of painkillers, and when she had gone, Daniel turned on his side and tried to doze, but as often when it’s most desired, sleep remained stubbornly elusive.

What did his future hold? He’d made good friends here in Devon, but the job driving for Fred had only ever been a short-term solution in Daniel’s mind. The same could be said of his relationship with Tamzin, however callous that sounded.

Tamzin had said he craved excitement, that he got a buzz from danger. Was that true? He certainly relished the challenge of pitting his wits against the criminally inclined – after all, wasn’t that why he’d gone into the police force in the first place?

Did it make him an unfit father, though? His mind came back obstinately to his greatest anxiety and he sat up and punched his pillow to make it more comfortable. The room felt stuffy, and the sounds of hospital life from beyond the door were irritating him. He threw off the thin sheet that covered him and shifted his position.

‘Daniel?’

At some point he must have slept because at the sound of his name he opened his eyes to find Hilary in the room, clad in a bright-green, frog-print sweater and bearing a Tupperware box and an armful of magazines. Someone had been in to draw the blinds over a darkening window, and a cup of cold tea stood on the bedside unit.

‘How are you feeling? I thought you might like some sausage rolls. What I remember of hospital food doesn’t fill me with longing to repeat the experience.’

‘My dear, you’re an angel in disguise,’ Daniel said, sitting up. ‘I’m fine, thanks, apart from a bit of a headache. If they can’t find any other reason to keep me here, I should be going home tomorrow – well, to Fred and Meg’s, anyway.’

‘You know you’re always welcome at the farm, don’t you?’ Hilary said, putting her offerings down on the cabinet by his bed before tipping the cold tea down the nearby sink. ‘I’m hoping the girls will be coming to stay for a while when social services get their act together.’

‘Thank you. That’s very kind. Have you had a busy day, or is the weather still bad?’

‘There’s been a bit more snow on the moor and I had several cancellations, so I decided to phone the others and take the day off.’

‘You? A day off? I don’t believe it,’ Daniel stated.

‘Well, I did. What’s more, I’ve had a brilliant afternoon making a new friend. I hope you don’t mind, but I’ve brought him along.’

Daniel pursed his lips, shrugged and shook his head, slightly mystified, as without waiting for his answer, Hilary went to the door and stepped outside.

‘Dad?’

Suddenly, impossibly, Hilary had gone and it was Drew who stood there.

For a long moment, Daniel just stared, wondering if something the nurse had given him was making him hallucinate.

But it was Drew. Thinner than he remembered and pale, with dark smudges under his eyes, giving his face an unhappy, strained look, he stood just inside the door waiting for Daniel to say something.

‘Drew! How . . . ? I mean, what are you doing here? No, scrap that,’ he said, finally pulling himself together. ‘Get over here and give me a hug – if you want to, that is . . .’

The boy needed no second invitation.

‘Oh, Dad,’ he muttered into Daniel’s shoulder. ‘I’ve been so unhappy. Then Hilary came with the paper. I knew you couldn’t have run away before. You weren’t afraid. Not you.’

Daniel frowned. ‘Who said I was afraid? What of?’

‘The boys at school. Chris Johnson mainly, but then the others all joined in. He said a girl got killed ’cos you were afraid to tackle a knifeman and then no one wanted to work with you. He said that was why you were thrown out of the police. I didn’t want to believe him, but he said he heard his mum and dad talking . . .’

Chris Johnson, Jono’s boy. Thanks for that, mate.

‘So then I asked Mum if it was true.’

‘And she said?’ Daniel noted that Drew had dropped the first-name habit.

‘She just said we’d talk about it when I was older and then changed the subject.’ Drew took a deep, shuddering breath. ‘Then when Hilary brought the newspaper saying how you saved that girl from the bog and that you were a hero, I knew there was no way the other stuff could’ve been true.’

‘It’s my fault. I should have told you what really happened at the time, but it’s complicated and I never dreamed you’d find out like this. I’m sorry, Drew.’

A few minutes later, Hilary looked in.

‘Is everything OK?’ Then, as she took in the scene, ‘Ah . . . right. I’ll go and fetch a cup of coffee, shall I? And a hot choco-late for Drew?’

‘Before you go,’ Daniel said over his son’s head, ‘tell me just how you managed to get Amanda to agree to this. Assuming you did. Or did you just kidnap him? And how, come to that, did you even know where to find him?’

‘I’d tell you, but I wouldn’t want to get Tom into trouble,’ Hilary said with a twinkle. ‘And as for Amanda, well, she came with us, didn’t she, Drew? She’s in the café along the corridor as we speak. In fact, why don’t you go and fetch her, Drew?’

After the boy left the room, Daniel said incredulously, ‘I don’t believe you! Amanda’s here? Not through any concern for my wellbeing, I know that much.’

‘Well, no, not exactly. I went to Taunton with the idea of having a chat with Drew – just to see if I couldn’t straighten things out. You see, I knew it must be a misunderstanding of some kind. Anyway, I found Drew on his own, so I showed him that picture of you and me together – you remember, the one Katya took – and he kindly invited me in.

‘We had a little chat – quite a long chat, actually – in fact, Drew and I even had time for some lunch before Amanda turned up. Rather a long time for an eight-year-old to be on his own – especially when there might be a custody case in the offing – wouldn’t you say?’ Hilary added with a wink. ‘At first Amanda wasn’t sure that Drew should come and see you, but after we discussed it, I found her surprisingly amenable.’

‘Mrs McEwen-Smith, you are wasted as a riding instructor!’ Daniel exclaimed. ‘The legal profession is crying out for people like you.’

‘And you, Mr Whelan, are wasted as a truck driver!’ she retorted.

After a moment, Drew returned, bearing a sticky cake in one hand.

‘Mum says she’ll come in a minute,’ he reported, then looked across at Hilary. ‘Can I please keep this hoodie? It’s cool.’

Daniel glanced down and was met with the spectacle of a Tyrannosaurus rex in full roar.

‘It was always a little bit small for me,’ Hilary said, a touch defensively. ‘I thought he might like it.’

Daniel groaned. ‘My God, woman! What have you started?’