The House on the Shore (22 page)

Her legs shook as she followed the dogs into the kitchen.
Her trembling fingers felt for the light switch.
She flicked
it on
, but nothing happened.
She
clamped her lips together and
choked back a cry,
and wondered
why the emergency generator hadn’t kicked
in,
as it should.
Fumbling in the darkness, she edged her way to the dresser,
yanked open
a
drawer, and felt for her torch.

In the weak, narrow beam,
everything appeared normal.
Yet her instincts told her somet
hing was wrong
.
T
he dogs
howling in the near darkness,
knew it too
.
She crossed the hallway and swept the torch around the small sitting room.
Nothing seemed out of
place.
Too scared to open the curtains to peer outside, she retraced her steps.

“What is it, girls?” she w
hispered.
“What can you hear?”

The dogs stood on
either
side of her, the warmth of their bodies seeping through the thin fabric of her
oversized
T-shirt to her ice-cold skin beneath.
T
eeth bared
and
snarling
, they stared at the door
.
The silence was suddenly broken by an explosive bang.
Anna shrieked and dropped the torch.
Ensay and Rhona barked and jumped at the door.
She pick
ed up the torch and spun around as another
loud crash
came
from the rear of the croft.
Icy fear twisted in her stomach.
She
co
llapsed on to the bottom stair, and kept
her eyes fixed on the firmly bolted door.
She weighed the
walking stick in her right hand
and the torch in her left.
Neither offered her comfort.
She needed something more substantial.

The
re was a
metal
poker next the Aga.

Carefully, she
edged her way into the kitchen,
and grabbed the poker along with the largest of her kitchen knives.
She crept back into the hallway a
nd took up her vigil once more.

Suddenly, the front door handle turned.
The door rattled, pushed back and forth by an insistent hand.
She swallowed a scream, dashed into the kitchen, grabbed a chair, and wedged it under the handle.
The dogs went berserk.
The sound of their barking echoed off the walls,
and filled
t
he tiny house with a cacophony.

The knob rattled.

Anna couldn’t breathe.

I
t
turned
again then
stopped.

Cold and
too scared to move,
she
listen
ed
for the slightest sound or movement
.
All she
could hear
was
the rapid beat of her heart and her own ragged breathing.
S
he rubbed her arms and legs vigorously, trying to bring some warmth into her frozen limbs
.

Ensay and Rhona grew quiet, but still darted from room to room as if chasing some spectre.
Anna leaned her head against the wall
and willed her body to relax.

She
sat
on the stairs.
When
no longer able to bear the cold,
she
staggered into the sitting room.
The embers in the grate were almost gone
, but s
he threw on some kindling
,
crying
in relief when it began to
crackle and
burn.
She added a little coal and the driest log from the
basket and sat back on the rug.

A vague scratching sound came from the window.
Her head whipped round
and she stared
at it, hardly daring to breath.

Silence.
Then mo
re scratching.

Someone was trying to force the catch
.

Her heart pounded.
Spasmodic shivers prickled her skin.
Mesmeriz
ed, she
watched.
Would the old lock hold?
She wasn’t sure.
She wanted to run from the house, but there was no one to run to for help
.

She stood in the dark and
screamed.

Bright sunlight flooded in through the cabin’s tiny porthole, carrying with it the ‘gah-gah-gah’ cry of the herring
gull that
had
taken up residence on top of
Sandpiper’s mast.
Luke groaned and pulled the pillow over his head.
Four mornings in a row the bird had wakened him.
If he had a shotgun, he’d have blasted it into a million feathers, but knowing
the way his luck was going, he woul
d just as easily have missed and punched a hole in a sail.
He opened one eye, looked at his watch, and groaned again.
Six-thirty!
Not only
was the gull consistent,
it was
also
as accurate as his Rolex.

He climbed out of his bunk and shuffled his way across the cold, unyielding deck to the small galley.
After taking two painkillers, and drinking a cup of coffee, he felt able to face the day.
He peered through the galley window—not a ripple s
howed on the surface of the loch. E
ven the rigging was silent.
There was no sign of movement over at the croft either, making i
t a perfect morning for a swim.

With a towel slung over his shoulder, he opened the hatch.
Safe in the knowledge that there was no o
ne to see him, he emerged naked. He
crossed the deck
and dived in.
The icy water enveloped him, shooting agony through every muscle.
He came to the surface gasping for breath.
Anna was
right about the temperature—
it was so cold he felt as if ten thou
sand needles were stabbing him.

He whipped his head round to clear the hair out of his eyes and set off in a fast crawl.
Ten laps later, breathing fast and hard, he heaved himself up on to the swim step, wrapped the towel around his waist, and headed for the shower.

By ten-thirty the thermometer had climbed into the mid-seventies.
The weather forecast predicted even higher temperatures by midday.
Stripped to the waist and wearing a pair of cut-off jeans, he sat
sketching
on deck.
His yacht had been anchored in the loch for nearly a week, but every day he saw something different in the landscape.
Today it was serene, with the water dark and still beneath a cloudless sky
.
T
he mountains, with their snow filled crevices, reflected perfectly on its glassy surface.
The door of the croft
remained closed.
H
e hadn’t heard the dogs,
or Anna’s cranky old Land Rover, and
wonde
red if she’d taken the day off.

Dismissing her whereabouts as none of his business, he concentrated on his drawing.
Noon came and went with no sign of Anna or the dogs.
By one-thirty, he started to feel uneasy about not seeing her.
It wasn’t right.
He clambered into the dinghy and rowed acros
s the loch.

Her curtains were still closed.
Puzzled, he tried the door, but it was firmly locked.
He circled round to the rear of the croft.
The Land Rover was parked in its usual place adjacent to the
cowshed
, but when he felt the hood, the engine was cold.
He was about to walk away when he noticed the left front tyre was flat.
He squatted d
own to examine it more closely.

It wasn’t sim
ply flat.
The tyre
was
slashed.

This was no accident.
It was deliberate.
Swallowing a curse, he ran
back to the front of the croft
and pounded on the door.

“Anna!
Anna
, if you’re in there, open up.”

On the far edge of her nightmare, Anna heard someone calling her name.
The voice sounded familiar, but she couldn’t tell whose it was.
Disorientated, she fought her way through the
cobwebs
of sle
ep and opened her eyes.

“Luke?
Luke, is that you?
Oh, thank God!”
Shaking and gas
ping, she staggered to the door. She
dragged t
he chair from under the handle
and
drew
back the bolts
.

He gathered into his arms and held her while she sobbed.
“Hey, sweetheart.
Shush.
It’s o
kay
.”
He waited until she
finished crying
then held her at arm’s length and studied her face.
Her green eyes, wide with fear, were ringed by dark shadows.
Her skin
felt
clammy, but that didn’t surprise him, since the T-shirt she wore barely reach
ed to the middle of her thighs.

“Come into the kitchen,” he said, slipping an arm around her waist and gently steering her towards the old rocking chair.
“I’ll make you a hot drink.”
He added a log to the firebox of
the stove and opened the vent.

“That would be nice, but I must see to the dogs.”
She struggled to stand, but Luke pushed her back into the chair.

“The dogs are fine.
They’re outside.
Stop worrying about them and concentrate on yoursel
f.
Now tell me what happened.”

Too tired to argue, she nodded and
bit her lips to control her sobs.
She sat huddled in the chair, her hands twisting in her lap while he filled the kettle and placed it on the hotplate to boil.
He found two mugs in a cupboard, a jar of instant coffee and
a packet of teabags in another.

He turned to
check on Anna.
She was shaking violently
.
Without hesitating
,
he dashed up the narrow stairs
and
flung open
the first door he came to
.
He
pulled the quilt off the bed and carried it back down to the kitchen.
When he wrapped it around her shoulders, she flinched and shrank from his touch before snuggli
ng into its soft, downy warmth.

Luke leaned against the kitchen table and watched her from under hooded eyes as she nursed the mug of sweet tea.
Her hands were trembling so much that some of the hot liquid spilt into her lap.
He’d never seen anyone
so
scared.
Her eyes darted to the door, as if she expected someone to appear at any moment.
She looked so fragile, so vulnerable, that he wanted to hold her in his ar
ms until her fears melted away.

Despite his need to comfort her, he was
annoyed
with her too.
She was a grown woman and didn’t need reminding of the risk she took living in such an isolated place.
He fought his temper.

“Feeling better?” he asked.

Anna nodde
d with a taut jerk of her head.

“
In that case,
care to tell me what happened
?”

“Last night…the dogs,” she hesitated, her voice barely more than a whisper.
“I woke up because they were growling and barking, as if…as if someone was in the house.
I couldn’t hear anyone moving around, so
I
came down to investigate.
When I switched on the lights nothing happened.”

Luke crossed the room and flicked the switch.
The overhead fitti
ng bathed the kitchen in light.