Silent Children (35 page)

"Hold everything while I get this written down. Matter of fact, why don't you tell me again to make sure." While Terence repeated the number Hector finished transcribing it and thought of a name for himself. "Tell him Mr. Dadd was asking for him."

"Dadd."

"That's the tag, sure enough. Hush her up now, boy. Give her a hand if hers ain't enough."

"I didn't catch that."

"Be glad you didn't, Teerence. Just tell Jack Woollie Mr. Dadd that he's been speaking to is gonna be in touch. Tell him it's a proposition we gotta keep between ourselves."

"Is it about his book?"

"Mebbe so. Hey, Teerence, didn't I just get through saying it's between me and him? Tell you what, you give him the message if you see him and we won't stop you thinking you helped with the book. Mebbe you'll see your name in print if you do like I say."

"I've been in the paper," Terence said, with some pride but also a hint of unease that showed Hector it was time to end the conversation. He put an end to Terence without moving his gaze from the pair on the stairs. Ian hadn't helped Charlotte cover up her mouth, but if Jack should hear her, surely that would impress on him the importance of obeying his father. Hector dialled the digits that masked his number and then rang the one Terence had given him. "That ole magic coach is gonna be here 'fore you know it to carry you away," he told Charlotte in the voice he seemed unable for the moment to abandon. He stared at her to warn her not to laugh so loudly she would be audible outside the house, but she took her hands away from her mouth without releasing a sound. Perhaps his words had silenced her. Only the ringing of Adele's phone was to be heard: no voice, neither the one he wanted nor the one he was glad not to hear.

"Guess that ole coachman jest stepped out. Guess mebbe he's watering them hosses." He saw Charlotte's face writhe, trying to fix on the reaction she thought he wanted, and above it the boy gazing so blankly at him that Hector came close to fearing he'd lost the power to make anyone laugh. The boy was attempting to undermine his confidence, that was all.

Everything had been going right for Hector until the children had turned up. He'd been watching for John from the alley behind the houses when he'd heard the woman calling from her window that she and her husband would be away for weeks. Hector's keys had still fitted the locks at Woollie's yard, and better yet, he'd found a pane of glass already cut to the size the woman's kitchen door took, standard as it was. He'd had to hide just twice from nocturnal strollers on his way with the pane from the yard to the house, but it seemed he'd hardly secured his refuge when he'd heard Charlotte crying out for peace.

He leaned against the wall beside the phone, wishing he'd thought to bring a chair while it had been dark enough for him to risk fetching it. He would have if the boy's presence hadn't given him too much to be aware of. He stared at the children until the boy's expressionlessness spread to the girl's face, and then he picked up the receiver and poked the redial key. The bell was waiting all by itself.

He let it ring until a robot woman cut it off and told him to try later. She was there next time he rang too. He was giving John a chance to return from wherever he'd gone and get rid of her when he saw Charlotte's mouth begin to work. "You itching to whisper something to me, babe?" he said.

Her mouth wavered open, and the tip of her tongue risked venturing around it as though seeking the shape of a word. Perhaps it was remembering a taste, because she admitted "I'm hungry."

"No remedy for that right now, babe. Gonna have to wait just like the rest of us."

"There's stuff in the fridge," Ian said, not nearly quietly enough.

"You already told me that once, boy. Guess you better make sure I hear less of you. I saw in there, babe, and it ain't much. Anyway, you should have asked when we were there."

"But I'm hungry
now."

"Can't do anything about that now it's light. Reckon you'll survive. I've gone longer without rations, and look at me," Hector told her, cocking his head and giving her a wide-eyed smile. Despite his efforts she seemed determined not to cheer up—he thought the boy wasn't letting her—and so he said "Wait till the coach comes to take you out of the woods. You won't be hungry once you get where you're going."

In fact he had no idea where he would have John take them—time enough to decide that once he made sure John would come when he was called. He watched Charlotte's face sink into a resignation unsteadier than he would have preferred, and then he redialled. The bell... the robot woman. He slammed the receiver down and saw Charlotte think better of pleading. Maybe it was the toilet this time, but could she really want to go again or was the boy causing her to think she did? She'd become far more trouble since the boy had intruded—Hector had been on the very edge of singing her to sleep when the boy had disturbed her, and because of the boy he'd had no sleep himself. Could the boy have devised a means of communicating silently with her? Was that why she was threatening to grow restless? Maybe his legs were exerting pressure on her sides, conveying a coded message to her or just ensuring she didn't nod off. Hector took hold of the receiver and jabbed the button, pretending to be intent on the phone while he watched for the slightest secret movement of the boy's legs. The intolerably familiar bell rang twice, twice more, and Hector's prickly eyes had just glimpsed a minute shifting of the boy's left leg when John's voice said "Hello?"

"John Woollie."

"Excuse me, who is this?"

Hector had failed to relinquish his American accent, to his own amusement now. "You mean you or me, boy? Who you figure you're talking to?"

"That's what I asked."

"Try Mr. Dadd. Know me now?"

"Mr—"

"Your dad," Hector would have said through his teeth if he'd had any, his lack of all the sleep Charlotte's playmate had stolen from him leaving him very little patience. "What's wrong, boy? Forget I was alive?"

"I was wondering where you'd got to. Are you going to want to speak to my mother?"

"No way. You and me, that's the whole team."

"Are you saying you don't want her to know about you?"

"She ain't gonna be no help to us. Got her hands full with folks that are mad enough to need her."

"Then you'd better give me your number. She could be back any minute and I'll have to ring off."

"Cute, boy. Very cute. Don't try to be no cuter," Hector said, glaring at the children. "If you have to cut me off you wait there till I call back."

"Suppose she answers?"

"Then she ain't got no reason to think she's stopped being a widow, right? Nobody knows except you, ain't that the truth?"

"Sure."

The word was heavy with resignation, and at once Hector knew why. "You been trying to tell folks about me, ain't you, boy."

"After you said I hadn't to?"

"Guess you figured you didn't have to do what your dad says since you left home and tried to kid everyone you weren't my son. Only you found out nobody believed you, right? Nobody believes I ain't dead, and I reckon if you tried to tell anyone they thought it was one of your stories. Thought you'd run out of bogeymen to make up."

"You're your own invention, sure enough."

"Didn't I just say not to be cute?" Hector found himself as unable to stop glaring at the children as he was to abandon the accent, but they deserved to feel he was warning them—the boy especially did. "Best keep me to yourself from now on in," Hector said. "You've a good reason, better believe it."

John wasn't so quick with an answer this time. After quite a pause he said "What's that?"

"You'll see when you get here."

"You want me to come to you."

"Sounded like I said that to me."

"Sure I will. Just tell me where."

"Not right now, boy. Not till I need you to pick me up and a couple of babes."

"Babes," John said, and even more incredulously "Women, you mean."

"Ain't none of them things here, no. Not that kind of babe."

John was silent long enough for his voice to fill with dread. "What in Christ do you mean, then?"

"Hey, boy, no need for that talk. Never raised you to make free with the Lord's name. Mebbe writing them books of yours got you too fond of the devil. I'll let you hear what kind of babe," Hector said, and pointed at Charlotte. "Seeing as how you're itching to talk, say a word for John. Just one word."

Her teeth squashed her lips together, and he thought she was so confused she would only cry, which would do fine as long as she stopped when she was told. This time there was no doubt, however, that he saw the boy send her a message, pressing his legs against her sides as if to squeeze out the word she released. "We—"

"That's perfect. Hush now," Hector said, covering the mouthpiece and scowling at the boy to ensure he helped to quieten her. Only when she pinched her mouth shut with a finger and thumb did he speak into the receiver. "Hear that, did you, boy? Hear the little pig going wee? She'd like to go wee, wee, wee all the way home."

"I don't know if I heard anyone. Let me again."

"Not so cute as you think you are. You heard sure enough. Don't want her upset, do you? You know how that upsets me."

"Don't harm her. Give me your word you won't and I'll do whatever you ask."

"Just remind me, boy. You ever give me your word when you were younger you wouldn't leave me and your momma?"

"I never said that. I know I never did."

Hector didn't think he had, but was simply guaranteeing that John would be desperate to please him, a prospect so appealing it bared his gums. "How you gonna make me believe that?" he said.

"Any way I can. By doing what you want. How couldn't I? Who is she?"

"Nobody that means anything to you, boy."

"She does. That's why you've got my word."

"You sure you ain't trying to be cute again?"

"Christ no. Sorry, but I mean, how can you think that? Do I sound as if I am?"

Hector had to trust him: there was nobody else. "Mebbe not. You got a coach there, right?"

"A what?"

"A coach. A car." Sleeplessness, aggravated by his difficulty in choosing his words or his voice, was crawling beneath Hector's scalp. "You got one of those to bring."

"As soon as you like. You said you want to take her home."

"You hear me say that, boy? Better listen closer. Wouldn't want you getting your instructions wrong. That wouldn't do her no good at all."

"I'm listening, but wait. You said a couple, not just one. Who—"

"You'll see soon enough. Keep that on your mind while you're waiting for me to call. You got no reason to go out till I do, that a fact? Somebody's hoping you ain't."

"I'll wait here for you, that's a promise, but how long—"

"You'll find out when it happens, and where to come too. Just be ready. When I want you I'll want you fast."

"You've got me. Only I could use some idea how far—"

Hector burst out laughing. Not only could he hear John attempting yet another ruse, he could see Charlotte's playmate opening his mouth. "Jack," the boy called, his voice so high it must have embarrassed him, as Hector slammed the receiver down and Charlotte shrank into the refuge of the boy's legs. "Don't bother trying, son," Hector whispered, his false accent deserting him at last. "He'll know where we are when I want him to know."

"Where's he going to take us?"

"Where he's told."

"Where?"

"That's enough row, son. You're upsetting your playmate."

"No he isn't," Charlotte said.

It was the boy's fault, Hector thought in a rage that made his scalp feel as raw as his gums. The boy was encouraging her to rebel. When Hector took a step toward him the boy crouched protectively over her, more like the babes in the wood than Hector welcomed. "You don't know, do you?" Charlotte said.

"I know everything worth knowing, love. Grown-ups do."

"You don't know where you want him to take us."

She wasn't far from laughing at him. She wouldn't laugh or even smile when he wanted her to, only when it would confuse him. Didn't she and her accomplice realise they were simply enraging him? "You'll find out I do when John does," Hector muttered, and wiped his chin with the hand that wasn't reminding him of the knife. "Go on now. Back up to the woods to wait for the coach."

Her face dared to turn pitying. "There aren't any woods and there isn't a coach."

"A car, then. Settle down. Better get used to waiting till I say it's time. Let her up, son. She knows where to go."

Neither child moved. Hector planted a foot on the bottom stair with more of a thud than made sense, another indication of how they were blurring his concentration. He was clutching the knife in his pocket when Charlotte blurted "I will if you promise he'll take me home like you said."

John had accused him of saying that too. For a moment Hector thought the children were somehow managing to conspire with his son, and then he grasped that the girl's assumption should help him quieten her. "I'll do what you heard me say."

"And you have to let Ian go too."

"Don't worry, I'll have no use for him once you're gone."

She rested her hands on Ian's knees and rose unsteadily, and was sidling past him when she halted and peered over her shoulder at Hector. "You haven't promised."

"Thought you said you heard me. All right, don't start creating. I promise."

"You have to say what."

Beside her the boy was staring as if he had the right to judge someone of Hector's age, and Hector had to restrain himself: it was best to keep them as calm as he could while he thought how to deal with them. "I promise you'll be going home," he muttered.

"Why can't we now?"

"Not till I'm going somewhere too."

That appeared to satisfy her. She turned and had climbed three stairs not too intolerably slowly when the boy, who'd remained seated, said "Where?"

"Never you mind. You've got what you wanted. You've got my promise."

The boy gripped the stair he was sitting on, rendering himself more of a barrier between Hector and the girl. His face was dull with stubbornness and incredulity, though Hector wasn't sure what he disbelieved—the promise or that Hector had a plan. Hector saw him opening his mouth to make even more of a nuisance of himself, and interrupted before the boy could speak. "Let's have a bit of quiet now. Your playmate wants you to follow her so she can have a rest."