Aurora felt a squeeze in her stomach seeing him there with Topaz. He was no longer wearing a suit or sports kit. Instead he wore a pale-blue checked shirt that made him look all the more tanned. Jeans and hiking boots. Sunglasses perched in his hair. A midsize backpack over his shoulders. All of it outdoorsy and effortlessly handsome.
Topaz was smiling, her arms folded in front of her and a white beach bag slung on her shoulder. She had her weight on one hip, which let the other leg trail. There was something almost mocking about the pose.
Aurora grabbed on to an exposed root. She anchored herself on it against the tugging current, breathless and dizzy.
“We’re camping. We do it a lot. Want to see my tent?”
“That’s kind of you, Topaz. But I have my own tent.”
She wondered if she heard a light note of sarcasm in his voice, or if he was saying something more. Was it an invitation? She couldn’t see his face properly. She didn’t dare to move any closer or to let go of her grip. She felt she might be washed away.
“Where are you camping? Close by?”
He gave a small shrug. “A few miles farther on. I’ve got a few places in mind.”
“It’ll be dark soon,” Topaz said. “You might get lost.”
Aurora was sure he smiled at her when he said, “I know where I’m going. Don’t worry.”
He moved toward her, past her, and Topaz only half moved out of the way.
“You should come for a beer later,” she said. “Once you’re all set up. We’re only a little way from here.”
“I’ll bear it in mind.”
“Bye, Mr. Mackenzie!”
He raised a hand but didn’t turn round. He kept moving, and ducked under the beech tree. Aurora realized at that point which tree it was. It looked different from the river, and the low-hanging branches masked the trunk and the hollowed-out store completely. She held her breath for a moment, expecting him to stop and say something. For the stash to be discovered. But he emerged at the far side, and kept walking along the bank and under another overhanging tree.
Topaz moved only once he was gone. She unfolded her arms and took a brief look into her bag. She hitched it up her shoulder, and began to walk slowly back toward the camp.
Aurora watched her go, and trod water for a full minute before she began to swim onward, away from her clothes and the sand bar, toward the retreating figure in the checked shirt.
11
It was fully dark before they had followed the GPS the thirty-five miles from Bishop’s Waltham to Jojo’s small, brightly colored cottage outside Fritham. Jonah recalled a much younger version of Jojo Magos and a nineteen-year-old version of himself in uniform.
He remembered a pair of figures caught in the headlights of his squad car. The half-sprayed hammer and sickle and the bold writing on the side wall of a co-op. The way the two of them had looked round, startled, two short heads of hair illuminated and one hand flung up in front of a face.
His sergeant had pulled the car up sharply, and Jonah had been climbing out by the time the two of them had dropped everything and run.
“I’m after the big one!” his sergeant had shouted. Jonah had agreed with the choice. He relished the challenge of chasing down the nimbler, faster figure.
He had almost tripped on a discarded sweater as he started his pursuit. He faltered, recognizing the black-on-white Guevara silhouette. His sergeant was ahead of him as he ducked back to pick it up, and then fixed his eyes on that small figure and ran after it down the high street.
“Police!” the sergeant shouted. Woodman? Had that been his name? He was no longer quite sure. “Stop where you are!”
Neither of them stopped. The bigger one turned down the Romsey Road. His sergeant almost overshot. He wasn’t made for agility. Jonah carried on straight, following that swifter form. The figure ahead of him turned to glance at him.
About to make a turn, he thought, and smiled slightly as he watched her break suddenly right, down what he knew was a cul-de-sac.
Jonah turned after her, only twenty feet behind now. He wasn’t naïve enough to think that he’d have her cornered. She didn’t disappoint. She flung herself at the garden fence at the end of the road, hands going up to grab and feet pushing off the wood until she was over.
He couldn’t help being impressed by the ease of movement, by the speed with which the small form had vanished. He knew he would be slower, but jumped for it anyway. He had trained himself hard for pursuit, and rarely had a chance to use it. He couldn’t help smiling to himself as he slung the sweater over his shoulder and heaved himself up. He got one foot over the fence and then jumped down into a small, leafy garden.
He heard running steps retreating beyond the house and followed them at a headlong sprint down a small passage beside the house. He was provided some illumination as he emerged into the front garden by a light being turned on.
She had emerged onto a side street, one he vaguely recognized but could not have named. He was certain it joined up to another road farther up, though. He kept his pace up as he followed the retreating figure, which had opened up the lead a little.
They didn’t stay on the road for long. Within a hundred yards, she was off again, vaulting a gate with apparent ease and finding a gap down the side of another house. He began to lose track of how many fences they had jumped and gardens they had run through, and was no longer certain where they were. He suspected they had looped back on themselves at some point.
He began to grow tired, the constant sprint and climb murder on his lungs. He was sweating profusely into his uniform, uncomfortable and hot. But he was also a hound on a scent, and he wasn’t going to give it up.
The fleeing figure made a mistake in the end; she turned down the side of the renovated Stag Hotel and met a sheer wall with unforgiving brickwork to either side. He had to slow swiftly to avoid running straight into her.
He hadn’t really needed to see her face as she turned round, rebellious and sheened with sweat. He’d known it was her as soon as he’d seen the design on the abandoned pullover. It had been confirmed over and over by the way that she moved, and by her speed.
He pulled the sweater off his shoulder, and said, “You could have made it a bit easier.”
He threw it to her, while she stood, bristling. It fell in front of her feet, and she glanced down at it and then back up, suspicious and tensed to run. He nodded to her and, still heaving for air, began to back away. “Thanks for the exercise, Jojo,” he said. “I’ll see you soon.”
She didn’t say anything until he’d turned away and started to jog back. A slightly mocking, “You’re not too slow for a policeman, Copper Sheens!”