Roxy's Baby (15 page)

The thought was so horrific, so cruel, that Roxy began to cry again. She couldn't stop herself.

Mrs Dyce pulled a handkerchief from her pocket and wiped Roxy's eyes. ‘Try not to be upset, Roxy. You have
your own baby to think about. When I come back from town … we'll have a long talk.'

Roxy's nose was running, and she couldn't stop the tears. ‘I want my mum too, Mrs Dyce. I want to go home.'

Mrs Dyce held her at arm's length, looking into her tear-stained eyes. If only she could read minds, Roxy thought, and see what was behind the woman's blue-grey eyes. But then again … what if she could read Roxy's …?

‘I've thought about it all night. Thinking about Anne Marie, thinking about her alone, and now she hasn't even got her baby. You said it yourself, when a tragedy happens the first thing a girl wants is her mother. I want my mother, Mrs Dyce. I want to go home.'

Mrs Dyce looked off into the distance. She was biting the inside of her lip, thinking hard. Then she turned back to Roxy and smiled. ‘It will take a few days to organise. We have to be very discreet. You do know that, don't you?'

‘Of course.' Roxy could feel her heart beating like a drum at the thought of getting away from this place, these people. ‘And I'd never tell anyone about here, you know that, don't you?'

‘I know we can trust you, Roxy. None of the girls who have gone home have ever betrayed us.'

Roxy felt an urge to hug her, stupid though it was. This woman was planning to take her baby, sell it for adoption, pretend he had died during the birth, and yet she felt irrationally grateful because she was sending her home. Stupid or what?

‘I have to go now, Roxy, but I'll get it organised for you and we'll talk later. All right?'

Roxy could have leapt with joy as she watched the Morris Minor drive off. She would be home in a few days, and then she would blow the lid off this whole nightmarish little business.

She went back to her room though the sight of Anne Marie's empty bed made her cry again. ‘I'll get him back for you, Anne Marie. I promise.'

She lay on her bed and to her surprise, she slept. She dreamt of babies, as she always did these days, babies hiding in the house, Dragon House with dragons lurking in every dark corner ready to lick them up with their long tongues. Roxy was trying to find them, calling out to them, while somewhere in the distance Stevens was coming after her, because he wanted those babies to plant in his garden.

She woke covered in sweat. The oppressive heat was always worse in the afternoon. She pulled herself up and considered having a shower, just to cool herself down. Her baby kicked against her, reminding her he was there too, and he was hot.

One of the other girls was in the shower. Dietra, she was called. She was a surly Asian girl who seldom smiled. Roxy hadn't liked her but now she felt that maybe Dietra was as scared as she had been. Roxy decided for once to be friendly.

‘I'm Roxy,' she smiled, but Dietra didn't smile back. Roxy pointed to the girl's belly. ‘Baby good?' She gave the thumbs-up sign.

Dietra still didn't smile. She watched Roxy warily as if she was going to jump her, then she pushed past Roxy and strode out of the bathroom.

‘You'll be grateful to me one day, kid,' Roxy wanted to shout after her. ‘I'm going to save your baby.'

Roxy knew then she really was alone. The other girls could do nothing to help her.

She felt refreshed when she came out of the shower and ready for anything. Back in the room she towelled her hair dry. When she heard a car draw up outside, she went to the window and watched. Mrs Dyce got out and
opened the back door of the Morris Minor. One, two, three new girls stepped out. They looked bewildered, frightened, and pregnant.

More girls. More babies. More money for the Dyces.

‘Economically viable.'

Roxy stepped back from the window before anyone could look up and see her. She had to put an end to this.

Roxy had to put on a face, pretend she still believed everything the Dyces said. Lull them into the proverbial false sense of security. They had to send her home so she could tell the world what was happening here.

She went downstairs. Mr Dyce was in the kitchen unloading fruit and vegetables from a box on the table. He looked up at Roxy and smiled.

‘Hello, Roxy. You look very refreshed.'

Such a kindly voice, such gentle eyes. Santa Claus personified. Surely, she had to be wrong. This man wouldn't be a part of any plan to take babies from their mothers. Then she remembered Aidan and Anne Marie, and she knew she wouldn't trust him, for their sake. She smiled back.

‘I had a sleep and a shower. I'm sorry I made such a fuss. I was just that worried about Anne Marie.'

‘Of course you were. You've nothing to apologise for.'

Roxy began helping him with the vegetables. ‘Lots of supplies,' she said.

As if answering her unspoken question he said, ‘New girls. Asylum seekers thrown out by their families for bringing shame on them. Poor girls. How can parents be so cruel?'

Roxy wanted to ask, almost did, how did you find them? How did they find you? It was hard to keep her mouth shut and keep the smile fixed on her face. They had to believe she suspected nothing. Had to.

‘And none of them speak English?' she asked casually.

Mr Dyce shook his head. ‘Unfortunately not. Which makes it doubly hard for them.'

Doubly hard then to understand how these girls could find the Dyces. In that moment, Roxy realised that there must be many more people involved in this operation. This wasn't just the Dyces. It probably also involved the same kind of ruthless people who brought illegal immigrants into the country, locked in vans; desperate people willing to risk suffocation, even death, for the hope of a new life.

The idea made her shiver. This operation was perhaps even bigger than she could ever imagine.

Mr Dyce lifted the empty vegetable box from the table. He tapped her hand. ‘They might not be able to speak English, Roxy, but just remember, a smile is worth a thousand words and it only ever says one thing: I'm a friend.'

Roxy smiled back at him. That's what you think, Mr Dyce, she thought. This smile is saying, I don't believe anything you say.

The house was buzzing with activity. More beds crushed into more rooms, Mrs Dyce dashing about barking orders. There was hardly a moment to ask if she'd done anything about getting Roxy home. Roxy finally found the chance to speak to her as she was carrying sheets towards Roxy's room. Two new beds had been put there already. All change, thought Roxy. She was glad she was going. The idyllic picture of the house when she arrived, like a girls' summer boarding school, with midnight feasts in the dorm, was changing before her eyes. Now it was becoming a dark place, sinister and forbidding.

‘Roxy, my dear. These are your new room-mates.' She introduced the three girls, dark-skinned, who
looked frightened and wary of both Roxy and Mrs Dyce. Roxy took no notice of their names, she'd never remember them, and anyway she would be gone before it mattered. She wished she could tell them that she was going to help them, but all she managed was a smile.

‘Have you thought any more about me going home, Mrs Dyce?'

Mrs Dyce was putting fresh sheets on one of the new beds. For the first time she noticed (why had she never noticed it before?) that the sheets were worn and torn. Old sheets. And why is there never anyone to help her? Roxy asked herself, knowing Anne Marie would provide her with one of her logical answers. ‘The fewer people who know about this the better, Roxy. The safer it is for us …'

And the safer for the Organisation. She had already begun to think of it like that. The Organisation.

‘I'm so sorry, Roxy. I've been so busy today. But I promise tomorrow you will be my priority.'

I could phone home, Roxy wanted to say, phone Mum, tell her to meet me somewhere. In London perhaps. But she said nothing, and kept that smile fixed on her face. She began to help Mrs Dyce make the bed.

‘No, no, Roxy. I'll get this. Why don't you change your own sheets?'

When Roxy came back into the room carrying the fresh sheets, Mrs Dyce had gone. So had the new girls. The room was empty, and the hot afternoon had grown even hotter. The window was open and somewhere outside birds were calling to each other. It could have been an idyllic picture of a perfect summer day. Roxy was glad she was alone. She wanted to think and all she could think of was home. She had never wanted to see her mother as much as she did now. She wanted to talk to her, confide in her. Her mother would know how to get Aidan back for Anne Marie.

Anne Marie. The thought of her made Roxy's eyes well up with tears. How must she be feeling, believing her baby to be dead? She tugged the bottom sheet off the bed and saw something sticking out from under the mattress.

The newspaper. She'd forgotten all about that paper, stolen, so long ago it seemed, from the front seat of James Bond's car. She remembered with a smile how she and Anne Marie had lain across the bed and read all the showbiz gossip.

In fact, the showbiz gossip was all they had read
about. Roxy sat down on the bed and puffed a couple of pillows behind her head. There was a warm breeze drifting in through the window, but not enough to cool her down. She fanned herself with the paper for a moment, before opening it up and beginning to read.

There was that train crash again. Some politician had run off with a pop star. The plane that had been hijacked. So long ago, it seemed.

Had the politician returned by now? Was his wife standing by him? They usually did. Were they still negotiating the freedom for the hostages on the plane? Had it all been resolved peacefully? She was suddenly desperate to know all that was going on in the outside world. She decided then never to be cut off from everything like this again.

She began to scan the columns, reading all the other stories hungrily. The woman who had sailed the Atlantic single-handedly for charity. The fires that were springing up all over the country straining the fire service to breaking point. A family whose home had been built over an old mineshaft and one day it had simply sunk underground. In the photo they were all smiling, as if it was a wonderful joke.

The girl's body that had been found, and was
unidentified. She hadn't read that story either. It had made her think of her mother, being asked to identify that body in case it was her own daughter, Roxy. How cruel would that have been? But she read the story now. Remembering how she had also heard the same story on the car radio that day.

The girl's body, a foreign girl, probably mid-European, had been found floating in the Thames. Not a suicide. A murder. She had died with a stab wound to the heart. And the girl had just had a baby. There was no clue to her identity, except for one thing. A tattoo. A tattoo of a cobra wound around her upper arm.

In spite of the heat, Roxy's whole body was suddenly bathed in ice-cold sweat. She felt as if she was drowning in ice. Her head began to swim and she was terrified she was about to pass out.

A cobra wound around her upper arm.

Roxy had seen a tattoo just like that before.

On Sula's arm.

The body was Sula's.

Roxy felt as if she was going to faint. Black spots swam in front of her eyes. Her throat was dry as dust.

The body was Sula's.

No. It couldn't be. Sula had gone home to have her baby.

She read the story again, just to be sure. The unidentified woman had just had a baby.

Had they kept her alive just long enough to have the baby, so it could still be sold for adoption? And then when Sula was no longer necessary, no longer ‘economically viable', had they killed her?

A stab wound through the heart.

Roxy had to get some cool air, splash ice-cold water on her face. She needed something to cool her down. But when she stood up her legs wouldn't hold her. They buckled under her and she collapsed on to the bed again.

The body was Sula's.

It had to be. A young foreign woman who'd just had a baby. A girl with a tattoo on her arm. The tattoo of a cobra.

And a stab wound through the heart. That was the picture she couldn't keep from her mind, that horror image of Sula lying dead … a stab wound through the heart.

Who would have done it? Mrs Dyce? She didn't look like a murderess. Efficient, businesslike and sometimes so gentle. She would have to be heartless to kill Sula.

But she was heartless, Roxy reminded herself. Hadn't she taken Anne Marie's baby away from her? Told her he was dead? You couldn't get more heartless than that.

But murder?

Or could it have been Mr Dyce? No. Not with those soft eyes and that soothing voice of his. Not Santa Claus.

But she'd heard of Nazi doctors in the concentration camps who had seemed on the outside equally gentle and yet they had lured their victims, gullible, innocent victims, inside the gas chambers pretending they were only going for a shower.

Just as all the girls had been lured here, assured it was a place of safety.

Or could it have been Stevens? Yes. Him she could imagine plunging a knife into a young girl's heart.

Poor Sula. She had thought she was going home.

Roxy lay back on the bed, still bathed in sweat, and closed her eyes.

She knew now they had no intention of letting her go home. She knew too much. Just as Sula had known too much. Her fate was to be the same as Sula's. They would take her baby and then … She let out a cry. Couldn't bear to think of it. This baby inside her had no protection except for Roxy. She couldn't let him down.

She swung her legs on to the floor. Sat up. NO! She would not allow it. She cupped her hands around her belly and whispered softly, ‘They won't take you away from me, I promise. And they won't kill your mum either.'