his face so close to hers she could see the gleam of his eyes in the darkness. ‘Another sound and I shall have to take steps to silence you.’
She tried to wriggle sideways as she felt his knee forcing her legs apart, but he held her easily. Eventually realising that the more she fought him the more he was going to hurt her she made herself go limp, biting her lip in pain as he forced his way inside her. His mouth ground into hers and she opened her lips helplessly beneath his probing tongue and suddenly through her fear she felt a little surge of excitement. As if he sensed it Nick laughed softly, and she felt his grip on her wrists tighten. ‘So, my lady, you do enjoy violence,’ he whispered. ‘I think in a lot of ways you’ll find I can please you better than Richard de Clare,’ and his mouth left hers and travelled down her throat towards her breasts.
He fell asleep eventually, still spreadeagled over her numbed body, his head between her breasts, his hands, loosened at last, outstretched across the bedcover. Agonised, Jo tried to move. She was crying softly, afraid to wake him as she tried again to dislodge the dead weight which pinned her to the bed. In the end she gave up and lay still, staring towards the window where the heavy curtains cut out the first signs of a beautiful dawn.
Nick woke just before seven. For a long time he lay unmoving, feeling the woman’s body limp beneath his, then slowly he eased himself off her and sat up. He grabbed his trousers and staggered to the window, throwing back the curtains with a groan. It was full daylight. He looked at his watch in surprise, and then back at the bed as the stark daylight fell across Jo. She was lying naked on the bedcover, her hair spread across the pillow, her legs apart. There were vivid bruises on her wrists and breasts, and he could see bloodstains on the bedspread. There was a long jagged cut encrusted with dried blood on her forearm, more blood on the inside of her thighs –
He felt suddenly violently sick. She had not stirred. She did not even seem to be breathing. He threw himself towards the bed. ‘Jo? Jo! For God’s sake, are you all right?’
For a moment she did not move, then, slowly and painfully, she opened her eyes, dazzled by the light, and stared around the room. It was a few moments before she began to remember. He saw the fear flicker behind her eyes as she looked up at him and a wave of nausea shook him again. She still had not moved but he saw her lick her lips experimentally, trying to speak. Reaching for her bathrobe, thrown across a chair, he laid it gently over her.
‘I’ll make some tea,’ he said softly.
In the bathroom he tugged at the light pull and stared at himself in the cold, uncompromising electric light. His face looked the same as usual. Tired perhaps, and a little grey, but nothing strange. There was a scratch across his shoulder, otherwise nothing to show for Jo’s fight for her life.
He walked slowly to the kitchen and made the tea, comforting himself with the familiar sounds as he filled the kettle and fished in the jar for two teabags. Then he walked through to the living room. It was cold; the French doors had been open all night. The grass in the square was still silvered with dew. He pulled the doors closed then he turned and picked up his shirt. There were coffee stains on the sleeve. And blood. Pulling it on, he went back to the kitchen. He was numb.
Slowly he carried the two mugs back to the bedroom. Jo had not moved. Sitting on the bed beside her he proffered one of the mugs tentatively.
‘Jo –’
She turned her head away and closed her eyes.
‘Jo, please. Let me explain.’
‘There is nothing to explain.’ She did not look at him. ‘Please just go.’
He stood up. ‘All right.’ He leaned forward as if to touch her shoulder, but he changed his mind. ‘I’ll come back this evening, Jo. I’ll make it up to you somehow,’ he whispered.
Leaving the two cups of tea untouched beside the bed, he walked slowly to the door. Unbolting it, he let himself out onto the quiet landing.
As he tiptoed down the stairs towards the street he heard the distant sickly wailing of a baby.
For a long time after he had gone Jo did not move. She lay rigid, listening to Will crying. Her fists clenched, her eyes dry, she stared at the wall, feeling the ache of her body where Nick had bruised her. Suddenly she sat up. She threw herself out of bed and ran to the bathroom, turning both bath taps on full, then she went to find her address book. Fumbling in her canvas bag in her haste, she pulled the book out and began flipping through the pages with a shaking hand, trying not to notice the mess of blood and coffee stains which had soaked into the pale carpet in the middle of the room.
She stopped at Leigh Delamere service station on the M4, pulling into the crowded car park and resting her head for a moment on the rim of the wheel. She had thrown in her bags, typewriter and camera barely fifteen minutes after ringing Janet Pugh.
Pulling the rear-view mirror towards her she studied her face. Her lips were still swollen and her eyes were puffy from crying so much in the night. She had dabbed make-up over her white skin and used lipstick and eye-shadow. It made her feel better. The long sleeves and high neck of her Victorian blouse covered the worst of her bruises.
She pulled herself painfully out of the car and swung her bag over her shoulder. It was only another twenty miles, if that, to the Severn Bridge. Then she would be in Wales.
Tim stood for a long time outside the house in Church Road, staring up at the grey slate roof with its dentilation of wrought-iron decoration. The house was identical to its neighbours, save for the front door, which was cream with a brightly polished knocker. The windows were hung with fresh, plain net curtains, like old-fashioned muslin, he thought, as at last he raised his hand to the knocker.
Sylvia Walton opened the door at his second knock. She had plaited her hair and wound it round her head in a silvery braid. It made her look like an Austrian peasant. His fingers itched for his camera, but he had not brought it with him. He grinned at her. ‘It was very good of you and Bill to let me come back and talk to you.’
Sylvia smiled as she led him up the long flight of stairs. ‘He was pleased to hear from you again. Miss Clifford isn’t with you this time?’
Tim shook his head. He followed her into the room they had been in before, but this time the lines of chairs were missing. Instead a small wheeled table which had been laid for three was standing near the fireplace. Bill Walton was writing at his desk. He rose as his wife ushered Tim into the room and held out his hand. The prominent green eyes surveyed Tim shrewdly. ‘So, Mr Heacham, you want to try a little regression yourself,’ he said with a smile. ‘I’m glad you found your previous visit so interesting.’
Jo drew the car up in a narrow lane and stared ahead of her through a stone arch. Her stomach muscles knotted. Abergavenny Castle. Climbing out of the MG, she walked slowly through the arch and stared around her.
The sleepless night and the long drive from London were catching up with her fast now and she ached all over with exhaustion; her mind mercifully blank whenever she thought about Nick. All she knew was that she did not want to be in London and that if anyone could comfort her it would not be Nick but Richard – a Richard she might never see again, but for whom she longed with an almost physical ache. She drew a deep painful breath of air into her lungs, and walked on.
This castle too was a ruin but there was far more of it left than at Bramber. She stepped onto a grass lawn strewn with daisies and stared up at a mock-Gothic stone keep, somehow garishly out of place on the motte at the centre of the bailey where the Norman tower had stood. Around her rose high pinkish grey ruined walls, while below the hillside
