they’d hardly heard from Stephen in the months before he died. I spoke to the couple of close friends he had, but they didn’t know anything either. You were a mystery woman. Nobody had a clue who you were. This letter was the only proof that you existed. I puzzled over it for ages and then I made myself forget about it – I had to, in order to be able to get on with my life. But I always hoped that one day I might find this Kate, and that she’d be able to tell me what she was right about.’
Kate’s voice trembled. ‘I don’t know. I don’t remember.’
‘Can’t you try? Think back?’
‘You don’t understand.’
She explained to him about how patchy her memory was. ‘It’s so frustrating. I can remember some stuff incredibly clearly, but then there are these holes. I hardly remember anything about my second stay at the Centre, which was when it burned down.’
‘You stayed there twice?’
‘Yes. It’s . . . well, maybe I’ll explain why another time. This letter was written during my second stay. So whatever I was right about, it’s something that must have happened then.’
‘Could it just be something to do with your relationship? Maybe he’s saying you were right about, I don’t know, that you could make it work, while he was doubtful. Something like that?’
‘No. It can’t be. What about this stuff about secrets?’ She was quiet for a few seconds, though the bubble around them remained, sealing out the chatter of the other diners. ‘You’re going to think I’m crazy, but although I can’t remember the details, I do know that there was something, something we couldn’t agree on. Something to do with the CRU itself, or Stephen’s job. I can almost see it. Almost taste it. But it’s like . . .’ She paused.
‘What?’
She looked into his eyes. ‘I’m scared. Scared of whatever this truth is. I feel like the heroine in a horror movie, standing outside the door of the big creepy house, grasping the handle, knowing that when I pull open the door I’ll finally see what the monster looks like. But I don’t want to see.’
Paul leaned forward. ‘In the films, the girl always goes into the creepy house.’
‘I know. But my brain won’t let me.’
‘Why not? It just seems so odd that you can’t remember. Sixteen years isn’t all that long ago.’
She sipped her beer, wondering if he disbelieved her. Her heart was still pounding in her ears, but the initial shock had faded a little and the cool scientist inside her had stepped forward. Here was a problem. How was she going to solve it?
She shook her head and sighed. ‘I’m really jetlagged. I’ll be able to think about it more clearly tomorrow – not that I think I’ll have remembered anything else, but perhaps I can figure out why I can’t remember. Do you mind if we leave now?’
‘Where are you staying?’ he asked.
She told him the name of her hotel.
‘That’s on my way. Let’s take a taxi and I’ll drop you off there.’
The next few minutes – the walk to find a cab, the taxi ride – passed in a blur. When the taxi pulled up outside the hotel, Kate said, ‘I’m really sorry that I can’t answer your questions about the letter.’
‘Hmm.’ He appeared to have fallen into a slightly bad mood.
‘It’s not something I can control – I wish I could remember.’
He didn’t reply.
Kate pushed open the car door and climbed out, then walked quickly into the hotel, head down, through the revolving doors and towards the lift. She didn’t have the energy to talk about the holes in her memory again, to justify herself to this guy she’d just met. She felt emotionally drained. She didn’t want to have to think about anything else until tomorrow. All she wanted was to see Jack, to give him a cuddle before going to bed.
The taxi pulled away and headed around the hotel’s circular forecourt, back towards the main road. Paul sat back in his seat, trying to process everything.
He couldn’t believe that she had forgotten almost everything from that summer. God, it was frustrating. But then a stab of guilt hit him and he regretted the way he’d acted at the end of their encounter. He wouldn’t be surprised if she didn’t want to talk to him anymore. And that would be terrible – not only because it meant that this link to his brother was lost, but also because . . . well, he liked her.
‘Stop the car, I need to get out.’
The driver glared back at him. ‘You what?’
Paul thrust a ten pound note at him. ‘Sorry. Changed my mind.’
He needed to talk to Kate again, to apologise. And maybe he could help her recover her memories, find out what it was that had happened that summer. This fire – the official story was that it was an unfortunate accident, but what if that was a smokescreen? Bad choice of words, he thought to himself, grimacing. It had always seemed like a weird coincidence that Stephen had written this strange, emotional letter a few days before he died. Before, he had never had any way of going about finding out the truth. But now he’d found Kate, there was surely a chance. He would go after the truth, for his brother’s sake. To make amends for all the times he’d wronged him in the past. He cringed at the corny sentiment – but it was true.
The lift doors pinged open and Kate made her way towards her room. She glanced at her watch. Nine o’clock – Jack should be asleep by now. The babysitter would probably be watching TV and would be surprised to see Kate back so early. She might raise a questioning eyebrow, wonder what had gone wrong. Maybe this overprotective parent couldn’t bear to be away from her child for more than a couple of hours.
Kate took her keycard out of her wallet and swiped it in the lock. She pushed the door open.
The room was empty.
The babysitter, and Jack, were gone.
John Sampson glanced at the LED clock on the dashboard. 22:02. He’d been parked outside the McDonald-Taylor Research Institute, on the outskirts of Oxford, for hours now. This part of Oxford was industrial and grey – out of sight of the dreaming spires, but still connected to the university. Here, research was carried out in anonymous, flat buildings. Tourists didn’t wander round this part of town gaping with awe, buying postcards and photographing one another in front of places they’d looked up in their guidebooks and found their way to. Nobody looked twice at these buildings except for a few animal rights protestors. And it was those protestors who were responsible for making Sampson wait.
They were hanging around by the fence. A couple of middle-aged women; a younger woman, quite attractive in a sallow vegan way; and a bloke with a beard. Sampson had driven by earlier that day and seen the same group, plus a half-dozen others. Now only the hardcore remained. They carried placards that said STOP THE CRUELTY. Some featured grim pictures of monkeys with the word TORTURED above them. Sampson wondered what they’d think if they saw the things he’d seen a few days ago: the sick women imprisoned in tiny rooms; their blank despairing faces,
