Bats swooped over the old barn opposite like flakes of black ash. Jo couldn’t believe it was still standing too. It belonged to Cherry Tree Cottage, a relic from when the place was still a farm. As a girl, it had always scared her a little, sitting out there alone and abandoned, with its tiny shuttered windows. Mrs Carruthers said it was dangerous, close to falling down, and one wall was bowed a little.
Jo was about to turn round and head back to the party when the barn door opened suddenly, and a figure came out, hunched and walking with a stick. An arc of torchlight flashed across the ground. It couldn’t be, could it?
‘Mrs Carruthers?’
The old woman stopped suddenly, and turned towards Jo with her whole upper body, as if her spine and hips were welded together.
‘Hello there? Who’s that?’
‘It’s me – Josephine,’ she called.
‘Oh my!’ said the old lady. She had something in her other hand that looked like a tin can. ‘Is that really you, Josie?’
Jo could have cried, so powerful was the wave of nostalgia that washed over her. How long had it been? Twenty years at least. She hadn’t seen Mrs Carruthers since the day she’d moved out to uni.
The old woman hobbled across to her, over the uneven ground, still clutching the can in one hand and the torch in the other.
‘No, stay there!’ said Jo. She hurried over herself, the dewy grass soaking her feet. She shielded her eyes as she got close, until the beam dropped. She saw a fork sticking out of the top of the can and smelt something that might have been cat food. She remembered a little tabby brushing against her ankles by the pedals during her lessons, but that was long ago.
‘Let me look at you,’ the older woman said, peering awkwardly from under a bowed back. She was wearing a blouse and baggy cardigan, and wellington boots. Her wrists were narrow, her fingers knotted. Under her thin white hair, her face was painfully gaunt; her once sparkly blue eyes looked silvery pale like a winter sky.
‘Goodness,’ she said. ‘All grown up.’
‘My brother’s having a birthday party,’ said Jo, and as she said it she realised it sounded a bit silly, like there’d be jelly and ice cream.
‘I see them from time to time,’ she said. ‘He’s got two bonnie children, hasn’t he?’
‘That’s right. Emma’s fifteen, William’s six.’ She frowned at the dish. ‘What are you doing out there, Mrs Carruthers?’
‘Oh, do call me Sally,’ said the old woman. ‘It’s my cat Timmy. He’s turned quite feral since Mr Carruthers passed away. Lives in the old barn, won’t come in the house.’
‘I’m sorry to hear about your husband,’ said Jo. In truth, she barely remembered Mr Carruthers. He’d been a large, taciturn presence at the best of times, drifting about, always doing indeterminate jobs. He’d used the barn as a workshop of some sort.
‘Don’t be,’ said Sally, with a toss of her head. ‘He was ready to go.’ She reached across and touched Jo’s arm. ‘Now how’s your practice coming along?’
The question threw Jo. ‘I’m sorry?’
‘Your piano!’ said Sally.
‘Oh, I’m afraid I don’t play any more,’ said Jo.
Mrs Carruthers wore a look of mock indignation. ‘But you were such a talent!’
‘I bet you say that to all your students.’
Sally Carruthers chuckled conspiratorially. ‘Quite the opposite actually. But really, you’ve given up completely?’
Jo felt like she was letting her old teacher down. She’d had lessons weekly from the age of six through to eleven with Mrs Carruthers, rising to grade seven just before her twelfth birthday. It had been her parents’ idea at first, though she’d quickly taken to it, playing for hours on the old hand-me-down her dad had found at a house sale. But after that, with secondary school and other distractions, the practice had started to slip. The piano had been passed on to cousins in Wiltshire. If she could talk to her teenage self now, she’d give her a firm telling-off.
‘I’m afraid so. I haven’t touched a keyboard for years.’
‘I’m much the same, though not through choice,’ said Sally Carruthers. She held up her twig-like fingers. The joints were swollen and misshaped. ‘I can barely manage my own buttons these days.’
Jo wondered exactly how old Mrs Carruthers was. Pushing eighty, in all likelihood.
‘Would you like to come and say hello to Paul?’ she said on the spur of the moment. ‘I’m sure he’d like to see you.’
As soon as she said it, she realised it would be next to impossible for the bent old woman to make it over the fence and back up the garden path.
‘Ha!’ said Sally. ‘I’m too old for parties now. But you must drop in and see me. I’m in most of the time. Just find me in the phone book.’
‘I will!’ said Jo, and she meant it. Though she’d have to locate a phone book first. There was probably one in a drawer somewhere at the station.
‘Right, I must go and dispose of this,’ said Sally, brandishing the can.
‘Okay – see you soon,’ said Jo.
She watched the old woman walk up the rutted path towards her house. Jo headed the other way, back through the garden, feeling lighter in her heart than she had for days. If she closed her eyes, she knew she’d be able to remember the exact lavender scent of the morning room in Cherry Tree Cottage as she played the piano under her tutor’s watchful eye.
She didn’t go back into the kitchen, but instead took the side gate again, climbing into her car. Perhaps leaving without saying goodbye was childish, but they wouldn’t miss her. The music inside was louder, and she really didn’t want to see Paul’s dancing. She was starting the engine when her phone rang. Bridges. She grinned, for some reason sure it was about the promotion. Maybe he felt bad about taking her off the Jones case earlier. There was no other reason for the late-night call and she wasn’t due on shift for another three days.
‘Are you still in Oxford?’ he said straight away.
‘Yes, just leaving actually.’
‘Well, don’t,’ he said. ‘I’ve just had a call about a possible kidnap.’
‘In Oxford?’
‘From a circus in Port Meadow. A kid’s been snatched.’
The mention of a circus gave her a moment’s pause, but she regained her composure quickly. ‘Okay, I’m close.’
‘Jo – you’re not going to believe this.’ Bridges sounded much more animated than normal. ‘It was a clown.’
Jo drove quickly, trying to stay focused on the task in hand. But memories kept rearing up unbidden – the same roads she’d cycled along as a girl, past the houses once occupied by her friends, the pubs she’d drunk in on fake IDs, the alleyway off Walton Street where she’d had a forgettable encounter with Dave Philips. Or was it Mark Philips? Not that it mattered now. In front of the University Press, she heard her first siren, and a car sped past going in the same direction. Then another. Drinkers gathered outside the bars watching the blue lights streak by.
There were signs for the circus too – in town for one night only. Jo knew where she was going without them, and took a left on the way out of Jericho, past the tall student townhouses, over the canal.