“Bit early to be out walking,” she said. “But it looks like you never went back to bed.”
“Just thinking everything over,” Stevie answered honestly.
“I was doing the same,” Theo said.
Theo sat down on the stone step of the folly, and Stevie did as well. Nate lurked a bit, leaning against a pillar.
“It’s a very strange feeling,” Theo said, “a secret I’ve been holding all these years being out in the open at last. What you did last night was impressive. It’s . . . so strange. I feel like something’s missing. Of course, something—someone—is missing.”
“Do you have any idea where she might be?” Stevie asked.
“If I had the slightest clue where Angela was, I’d be there right now, not here.”
“Because you think she’s in trouble,” Stevie said.
Theo looked at the ground.
“I work in emergency medicine,” she finally said. “I see so many things, every day, from the most mundane to the utterly bizarre. Many things can happen. I don’t speculate. I treat the situation as it comes to me. In this case, all I know is that Angela left her house the other night, took the Tube to Waterloo, and hasn’t been seen since. None of that bodes well.”
“Do you work nights at the hospital? I mean, if someone had been brought in?”
“I work during the day. Benefit of seniority. But I checked, believe me. I checked every A and E in London, and I know the police have checked all over the country. Coming here—at least we could be together, support Izzy, not worry by ourselves.”
Theo rubbed her hands together against the morning chill.
“Whatever happened,” Stevie said, “it probably has something to do with what happened here, what she believes happened here. Was there anything she ever said about it to you? About investigating?”
“Not about investigating,” Theo replied. “The only thing she ever said . . . it was the day we found them. That afternoon. The police interviewed us all, one by one. Angela was cold—shock can do that—so she went upstairs to take a bath. I went up to bring her tea. She was very upset. We all were, obviously. She was having a strong physical reaction to the news, shaking all over. She told me Rosie had pulled her aside when we arrived and wanted to talk to her about something important, but she didn’t have the chance. Then Angela started talking about seeing the lock off the door of the woodshed during the game and something about a light inside.”
“You knew about that?” Stevie asked.
“You must understand, Stevie. We were all drunk during the night and in shock the next day. I’m not sure how reliable any of our memories or accounts are. I also don’t know what Angela’s story about the lock means, even if it’s true.”
“She mentioned a button in her texts to you all that night,” Stevie said. “Do you know what she meant?”
“No idea at all. I’m sure it was a typo. Anyway, there’ll be breakfast in an hour or so. Sebastian has enough food in there to feed an army.”
With that, she stood and made her way back to the house, with the focused stride of someone who walks the halls of a hospital all day and always has somewhere to be.
“Did you get the feeling she didn’t just come out here to bring us instant coffee?” Nate asked, holding his face over the hot steam coming off his mug. “I felt like she was trying to tell us something. I mean, there was the stuff about Angela coming to her, but it seemed like something more.”
Theo had made it to the low stone steps that rose to the terrace, then passed under the portico and out of sight.
“I think . . .” Stevie said slowly, running her gaze over Merryweather’s grand facade, “。 . . that Theo can’t sleep because she just realized things in 1995 didn’t go down the way she thought they did.”
“I guess that would be a bad surprise.”
“I think she’s more than surprised,” Stevie replied. “She’s a really smart woman. I think she’s terrified.”
25
WHEN STEVIE GOT BACK TO HER ROOM, SHE FOUND DAVID WAS gone. She put her hand on the side of the bed he’d been sleeping in and found that the sheets held a trace of warmth. In the hall, she heard voices and creaking footsteps—Merryweather was waking up.
She showered quickly under the luxurious rainfall shower, taking advantage of the fancy products that were stocked in the bathroom. She emerged smelling of gardenias and orange blossom, with her blond hair wet. She shook it out, pulled on her jeans and hoodie, and made her way back downstairs.
Julian was pacing the main hall, talking on the phone and running his hand through his hair.
“。 . . yes, I know, Fiona, but the vote is on Tuesday. Yes. Yes, I know . . .”
“Morning,” said a voice behind her. Sooz was coming down the stairs, her curly red hair a halo against the sober dark paneling of the staircase. She wore a petal-pink jumpsuit, rolled at the ankles, and white combat boots.
“I hope you got some more sleep last night after I woke you,” she said.
It may have been Stevie’s imagination, but she seemed to linger on the word sleep.
“There’s coffee and tea in the kitchen,” she said, continuing past Stevie and going in that direction. Yash and Peter were in the sitting room opposite each other, each with his laptop open and an intent look on his face. Peter had a slouchy way of sitting. He was dressed in jeans and an orange-and-red-striped sweater that made his own golden-red hair stand out. He had such a heavy-lidded expression that he looked like he might be falling asleep, but Stevie could see his eyes were intently focused on Yash. Yash was dressed in a hoodie and sweatpants and was making a gesture that was either a mime of playing trombone or something obscene.
“。 . . and then we say something about him being a prick,” he said.
“That’s too obvious,” Peter replied.
“What about something about letting the dogs out?” Yash countered.
“We made that joke three weeks ago.”
“It wasn’t that exact joke.”
“Close enough.”
“So it’s a callback,” Yash said.
“That’s not a callback. That’s just a repeated joke.”
Yash reached up and rubbed his curly hair in thought.
Someone else was coming down the steps now. Stevie turned to find Nate, dressed in a stretched-out black turtleneck and a worn pair of jeans. His hair was also wet, stuck across his forehead.
“Hey,” he said, tapping his fingers on the banister. “What are you doing?”
“Just watching,” she said. “I guess that’s what writing looks like.”
Yash noticed that he and Peter had a small audience and waved Stevie and Nate into the sitting room. It had a strange feel in the morning—the chairs were too low and soft, the drapes too thick, the glasses and trays of drinks not appropriate for the hour.
“This is how jokes get written,” Yash explained. “I make offerings and he insults them.”
“Edits them,” Peter replied.
Yash gestured as if to say, You see?
“In this case,” Peter said, “we’ve got a government minister who keeps cheating on his spouse and getting caught. This is the third time this year. And we’ve got to come up with new jokes about him.”