Page 128 of The Love Letter

‘Yes.’

‘All got to be kept hush-hush for now, apparently. Them up high don’t want his disappearance getting to the newspapers, because of his mum and her . . . boyfriend.’

‘Quite. Well, I’ve checked the house and he’s not here. Are you going to stay, just in case he should make an appearance?’

‘No, I’ve been asked to check the place over, that’s all. I can organise someone here, if your lot request it.’

‘I think it would be advisable. It’s likely, if he’s free to do so, that the young man in question will head for home,’ Simon said. ‘I have to leave now, but make sure someone is stationed outside, will you?’

‘Righto, sir, I will.’

A little more than two hours later, Simon pulled his car to a halt in front of Haycroft House. He checked his watch and saw it was just after ten o’clock. He retrieved his torch from the glove box, climbed out of the car and set off in search of the water barrel and its hidden key. He found it with a shiver of disappointment; Jamie had obviously not got there before him. He trudged round to the front of the house and opened the heavy front door.

Switching on the lights, Simon went from room to room, seeing the pans still on the drainer from the supper he’d cooked Zoe, her bed upstairs still unmade from the morning they’d left so early.

Nothing. The house was empty.

He returned downstairs and called the sergeant now stationed at Welbeck Street to find out if Jamie had returned. He hadn’t. Informing him that there was no sign of Jamie here either, Simon went into the kitchen to make himself a cup of black coffee, before he contemplated the drive back to London. He sat down at the table and rubbed his hands harshly through his hair, trying to think. If Jamie hadn’t made an appearance by tomorrow morning, then the palace be damned. They’d have to go public on this. He stood up and spooned some instant coffee into a mug and added boiling water, playing over and over in his head the last conversation he’d had with the boy.

After his third mug of coffee, which made him feel liverish and sick, Simon stood up and prowled round the house one last time. He turned on the floodlights outside and opened the kitchen door to the back garden. The garden was large and obviously well stocked, although its current seasonal condition was that of a sketch waiting to be painted. Simon shone his torch into the hedge that fringed the garden. In one corner of the garden, presumably positioned to catch the best of the sun, was a small pergola. Beneath it, a bench made of stone. Simon walked over to it and sat down. The pergola was covered in some kind of creeping plant – Simon put a hand up to touch it and gave an ‘ouch!’ when a vicious thorn pricked his finger.

Roses, he thought.How beautiful this would look in the height of summer.

Roses . . .

Great-James loved roses.He has them on his grave now . . .

Simon jumped up immediately and ran to the back door to make a phone call.

The cemetery was only a quarter of a mile down the road from the house, behind the church. Simon parked his car outside the iron gate. Discovering it was padlocked, he swung himself over the top of it and began to walk through the graves, shining a light on each name. Despite himself, Simon shuddered. A half-moon appeared from behind a cloud, bathing the cemetery in a ghostly light. The church clock struck midnight, the bell clanging slowly and mournfully, as if in remembrance of the dead souls that lay at his feet.

Finally, Simon reached the 1970s and then the 1980s. Right at the back of the cemetery, Simon espied a gravestone that had 1991 chiselled into it. Slowly, as he walked past, the dates on the headstones became more and more recent. He was almost at the edge of the cemetery now, with one last grave remaining, set alone, with a small bush planted below the headstone.

SIR JAMES HARRISON

ACTOR

1900–1995

‘Goodnight, sweet prince, and flights of angels sing thee to thy rest.’

And there, lying huddled on top of the grave, was Jamie.

Simon approached the boy silently. He could tell from the way Jamie was breathing that he was fast asleep. He knelt down next to him and angled the torch so he could see the boy’s face, yet at the same time not disturb him. Simon felt for his pulse, which was steady, then his hand. It was cold, but not dangerously so. Simon breathed a sigh of relief and stroked his blond hair gently.

‘Mumma?’ Jamie stirred.

‘No, it’s Simon, and you’re perfectly safe, old chap.’

Jamie shot up from his prone position, his eyes wide and terrified.

‘What . . . ? Where am I?’ He looked around him, then began to shiver.

‘Jamie, you’re fine. Simon’s here.’ Instinctively Simon pulled the boy to him. ‘Now, I’m going to pick you up, put you in my car and drive you down the road to home. We’re going to make a big fire in the sitting room and, over a hot cup of tea, you can tell me what happened. Okay?’

Jamie looked up at him, his eyes, at first fearful, were now trusting. ‘Okay.’

When they reached the house, Simon took the eiderdown from Zoe’s bed and tucked it around the shivering boy on the sofa. He lit a fire as Jamie stared silently into the distance. Having made a cup of tea for both of them and alerted the London sergeant and Zoe’s mobile to Jamie’s safe return, Simon sat down at the other end of the sofa.