The Well (42 page)

“Oh, God,” said Becca, gasping for breath. She burst into tears. “I thought I was dead. Oh Hannah!”

“We have to get out,” said Hannah.

Becca barely had enough strength to stay afloat; she wrapped her arms around Hannah’s shoulders. “I can’t make it,” she said.

Hannah, a competent enough swimmer but nowhere near in Becca’s league, took them back to the bank – not by the shortest route, across the centre of the pool, but by the safest, around the edge, holding on to the side of the quarry as she went. She moved as quickly as she could, grimly aware of each passing second.

When Hannah could feel the bottom of the pool with her feet, she grabbed Becca and pulled her upright. Becca’s feet went through the motions – but she was unable to stand, let alone walk. Hannah dragged Becca out of the water and put her arm over her own shoulder. Then she half-carried Becca up to where Helen was standing, dropping her onto the ground as gently as she could.

Hannah knelt next to Becca, panting. Becca lay on her back, coughing.

Helen looked down at Becca. Her swimming costume was ripped in several places. She was wearing only one shoe and her bare foot – her left – was scratched deeply on both sides. Becca’s skin was cut, scratched, ripped and torn. One of the gashes – on her hip – looked so bad that Helen could swear she saw bone in the middle of the blood and pulp. Becca’s feet were puffy, swollen and covered with sores. The gaps between her toes and fingers were filled with deeply embedded filth. Her hair was a tangled mess. She looked like something wild.

With enormous effort, Becca lifted herself up and hugged Hannah. “Oh, Han,” she said. Both of the girls were crying.

In the distance, Helen could hear sirens. She knelt down next to the girls, her back protesting – and touched Hannah on the shoulder.

“The police and ambulance are coming,” she said. “What do you need to tell us?”

21

Sarah and Jim were both still sleeping when Jenny arrived. Jim answered the door in his dressing gown, his eyes red and tired. “I’m sorry,” he said. “We didn’t get to sleep until – I have no idea when. Not long ago. We’ve not slept for days. Mind you, you look a bit tired yourself.”

“Yes, I am a bit,” said Jenny, as casually as she could, trying not to blush.

Jim made coffee while Sarah showered. Even the hot water, shampoo and soap didn’t banish the tiredness from Sarah’s body; she went through the motions of washing her hair and body wearily, dreading the day ahead.
Is this it?
she thought.
Is every day from now on pointless? Just another tedious twenty-four hours on the treadmill, missing Becca a little more every day, and remembering her just a little less?

Fighting back the tears, Sarah was towelling herself dry when Jim tried to burst into the bathroom. He hammered on the door, frantically. “Sarah!”

Sarah’s heart skipped a beat; she unlocked the door and pulled it open.

“Jenny’s on the radio. The police have been called out to some old quarry.”

They both ran downstairs, Sarah almost tripping as she struggled to wrap a bath towel around herself as she went. Outside, in the garden, Jenny was talking into her radio. When she saw Jim and Sarah, she held up her hand to indicate that she needed to listen to her caller. Sarah and Jim remained at the door, catching only snatches of the conversation.

Jenny came running back to the house. “We’ve had a call-out,” she said. “To the quarry near Harper’s Lane, at the other side of the school. I haven’t got a clear picture – in fact, it’s a very confusing picture – but it looks like Becca’s been found.”

“Oh my God,” said Sarah, her hand covering her mouth. “Is she –?”

Jenny shook her head. “She’s alive, but she’s hurt and on her way to hospital.”

“Hurt? How badly? How?”

“I don’t know,” said Jenny, “I’m sorry. The ambulance and police have only just got there – it seems there’s more than one person hurt. I don’t know any details.”

Sarah fell backwards onto a kitchen chair, sobbing. Jim put his arm around her wet, bare shoulders.

“If you get dressed,” said Jenny, “I’ll drive you there.”

“Matt,” said Jim. “What about Matt?”

22

Stephen Carter took off his cap and wiped the sweat from his forehead. The quarry was alive with activity – dozens of police (both uniformed and non-uniformed) and paramedics swarmed around him. It was not an easy place to mobilise emergency services to. Harper’s Lane was backed up with police cars and ambulances, but at least they’d managed to close the lane off at both entrances to keep the press at bay for a while. The old well was even harder to get to – the air ambulance had flown over a few minutes ago, seeking a clearing deeper into the abandoned estate.

The paramedics had split into two teams, one group running up the hill to the old well while the other tended to Becca, Helen and Hannah. Becca had been the first to be taken away – not because she was most in need of help, but because Sammy’s injury meant that there was no way the paramedics could safely get her down the hill. Not that Becca looked good. Carter couldn’t get over just how much of her body was bruised and cut. He thought that she looked like she’d been in a fight with a lion and lost.

While the paramedics carried Helen down the field, Carter pulled his mobile phone from his pocket and dialled. At the other end, the phone was picked up on the first ring.

“Hello?” said Julia, fearful and anxious.

“Julia, it’s Steve.” He replaced his cap and looked over at Hannah who was sitting on the ground, wrapped in a blanket, waiting to be taken to hospital. “I’ve got someone here you might want to speak to.” He passed the phone to Hannah.

“Mum!”

Stephen paced around, close to Hannah, listening to one side of the conversation.

“No, I’m fine. Really.” There was a pause. “No, I’m out by the old quarry. Mum! No, it’s a long story. No, I’m fine.” Another pause, during which Hannah frowned. “I’ll tell you later Mum. But we found Becca, Mum! Me and this other girl, Sammy – Mum!”

Stephen gestured for Hannah to pass the phone back to him.

“Mum,” said Hannah, “I have to go, Mister Carter wants to speak to you. Mum! No, I’m not hurt – I love you too, Mum.”

She handed the phone to Stephen.

“Hi, Julia,” he said.

“Steve, what the hell is going on?”

“There’s too much to go into right now, and we don’t yet have a full picture of what’s happened. But Hannah is fine – she’s totally unharmed, I promise. She’s something of a hero: she helped to rescue Becca.”

“Can I come and get Hannah?”

“Not here. We’re just about to take her to hospital –”

“Hospital? I thought you said she was fine?” Julia’s voice was almost a shriek.

“Julia – she is fine. She just needs checking over. She swam out and rescued Becca from the quarry pool – and the water’s not too clean.”

“She did what? Becca can swim way better than Hannah.”

Not when she’s not eaten for a week and just crawled through a one-hundred-yard tunnel
, thought Stephen.

“As I said, it’s a long story and we don’t know it all yet. I’ll fill you in later. Get Lucy to run you to the hospital. You can meet Hannah there.”

“Lucy? If it wasn’t for her –”

“I know, Julia, I know. She’s very upset about it. She knows what she did –”

“Too damned right she knows. I’ll –”

Stephen interrupted. “Julia, can we talk about this later? Lucy screwed up, OK, but I’m up to my neck in it here. It may well be that Hannah sneaking out saved Becca’s life. If Lucy
had
stopped her, Becca might be dead now.”

Stephen finished the call as quickly as he could, then went back over to Hannah. “I think you’re going to get some earache from your Mum,” he said.

Hannah nodded, frowning. “I know. She’s going to be as mad as hell.” She paused, clearly worried. “Not as mad as Dad, though.” She put her hand to her mouth, shocked. “Oh God, Dad,” she said, flushing, realising that for most of the morning she’d not thought about her injured father at all.

“I wouldn’t worry about your Dad. He’s going to be too busy getting better to have much of a go at you. And he is going to be fine, Hannah.”

“Is he? Really?”

“I think so. He’s badly hurt, but he’s a strong bloke. Now, before you go, any chance of you running through what happened again – one more time?”

23

Abby kissed Sammy’s pale face on the forehead and watched her being wheeled into the operating suite. It had taken just under an hour from Abby’s call for them to arrive at the hospital. Abby supposed that, all things considered, this was good – although every second had been agony for her. The paramedics had arrived first, and immediately called for the air ambulance. Then they set about doing what they could – which wasn’t much. At least when the helicopter had landed at the hospital, the doctors and nurses had been waiting – Abby guessed that from wheels down to the theatre hadn’t been much more than five minutes. The paramedics had been able to give Sammy some blood in the air ambulance, which Abby hoped would buy a little more time for the surgeons to do their work – if anything could be done.

Abby sat down heavily on the uncomfortable plastic seat in the corridor, feeling sick and alone. Helen, she guessed, would be somewhere in the same hospital. She was quite possibly in another operating theatre close by – Abby had no idea whether Helen’s wounds would require surgery or just a lot of suturing. The latter seemed unlikely – some of the gashes had looked very deep.

It occurred to Abby that she wasn’t annoyed with Sammy – and that perhaps she should be. A man was dead, Helen was badly hurt – and Sammy herself might not see the next day. On top of that, Sammy could have signed the death warrant for another ten children in the town. But actually, Abby understood – and, to a certain extent, admired her daughter. Sammy had seen things clearly and simply: right and wrong. The girl in the well was innocent; she didn’t deserve to die. It was our family’s responsibility. Sammy knew – although almost certainly didn’t understand – the possible consequences of her actions. Yet she chose to do what was right, not what was easy. Abby wished she hadn’t been so weak.

The doctor had said that they’d be in surgery for several hours; Abby guessed that she had easily enough time to find Helen or at least check up on her progress – but she didn’t want to move. Although Helen would be lonely and perhaps afraid, Abby knew she would understand.
I left Sammy for Helen before,
she thought,
but not this time.

24

“You can see Rebecca now,” said the nurse. “I have to tell you that she’s sedated, so she may not react very much to you. And I’m sorry, but we can only let you have a few minutes, because we really need to tend to her injuries – and that’s going to take some time.”

The nurse led Sarah and Jim into the room. At the sight of Becca, Sarah gasped, but it was Jim who broke down – as he had earlier, when told about Matt. Jim, who was normally an anchor of reason and calm, had lost all of his usual composure and cried – wailed – openly when the news was broken. But still he’d opted to stay with Sarah so that they could see Becca together.

Although the nurses had begun to clean up Becca, she was still an horrific mess. Dirty, bruised, cut and swollen – she looked nothing like the girl who had set off to school on Friday morning, less than a week before. Sarah sat beside Becca and clasped her hand, avoiding pulling one of the two drips feeding into her arm.

“Re – Becca,” she corrected herself. “It’s Mum.”

As the nurse had said, Becca didn’t respond.

“I don’t know if you can hear me,” said Sarah, “but if you can, I want you to know that we’re here for you. Me and Jim. We love you.”

Sarah lifted Becca’s hand to her face and kissed it, then inhaled through her nose, expecting the familiar smell of her daughter. Perhaps it was there, but if it was it was masked by the stench of dirt and filth. She couldn’t imagine what Becca had lived through over the last few days.

The nurse came back into the room. “I’m sorry,” she said. “We really need to get working on Rebecca.”

“Can we stay?” asked Sarah.

“For most of it,” the nurse replied, “of course. But some of the treatment will have to be done in surgery.”

Sarah nodded, sniffing back her tears. “I understand. How bad is she?”

“The good news,” said the nurse reassuringly, “is that – as far as we can tell – there are no bones broken. We’ll be running a full set of X-rays later, though, to be sure. It could be that there are bones broken in her feet and even she doesn’t know – as you can see, her feet are very swollen. It’s the early stages of trench foot, which can be very serious, but we’re pumping her full of antibiotics. It’s the cuts that are the worst – some are days old and still open; quite a few of those are infected. The worst cut is more recent, on her hip, which we have dressed but will need surgery – she’s scraped her skin off to the bone.”

Sarah felt physically sick and swayed slightly in the chair; Jim squeezed her hand.

“And we’re testing for things like Hepatitis A,” said the nurse. “We’ll be very surprised if she hasn’t got some kind of blood-borne infection.”

Sarah brushed away a tear. “None of that sounds very – very hopeful.”

“I’m sorry,” said the nurse, smiling. “It doesn’t help when I reel it off like that. All of these can be serious, but we’re on top of things. I think she’s going to take a while to recover, probably several weeks, maybe more, but she’ll get there.”

Sarah nodded, numb.

“We have a lot to do,” said the nurse, as the room filled with doctors and nurses.

Dear God,
thought Sarah, as half a dozen people all began to work on Becca at the same time.

“You know,” said Sarah, “we’re just going to be in the way. We’ll sit back here.” She and Jim withdrew to the side of the room and watched from there, holding each other.

25

Helen lay on her side while a nurse and doctor worked to clean and suture her wounds. They’d been busy for nearly an hour – and had warned her at the start that some of the wounds might need to be closed in theatre. It was shallow of her, she knew, but she couldn’t stop thinking about how her back would look when it had healed. She had a good body and loved the way Abby watched her dress, sometimes pulling her back into bed immediately afterwards. Helen suspected that the days of her having a lean, smooth back had gone.