The Girl in the Rug (15 page)

His lungs were screaming in protest, every breath was agony,
and his shoulder was a constant burning pain as Turk ran for his life. He
stumbled his way along the narrow alley that ran behind a row of terraced
cottages, he was so close now…he could see the glinting of the lights on the
opposite side of the woods, if he could just make it into the cover of the
trees he was sure he could get to safety.

He heard the pounding footsteps behind him and urged his
broken body forward again…nearly there…nearly there. He crashed through into
the woods and was surrounded by darkness as the canopy of trees engulfed him.

Must keep going, must keep going was his mantra as he clawed
and slashed his way through the bracken and brambles…oblivious to the pain as
barbed tendrils ripped the skin on his hands and nettles attacked viciously,
leaving red welts all over his arms.

Like a hunted animal he kept running blindly, deeper and
deeper into the woods, the unmistakable sounds of his pursuer closing in on
him. Surely soon he would see the reassuring twinkle of lights coming from the
houses on Kenley Green, the police station on Kenley Green. He ran on, he must
be nearly there…an icy panic ran through his veins as it began to dawn on him that
there were no lights ahead. He swung round in a circle hunting desperately for
a sign…a landmark, something to aim for… nothing…just the huge shadows of trees
and brambles that surrounded him…he must have been running in the wrong
direction…oh god oh god…where to now…he was lost.

Turk flung himself behind a tree, landing with a grunt of
pain as his shoulder connected with the tree trunk. He flattened himself
against its solid structure, trying to make himself invisible while he figured
out which way to go.

The woods around him were as silent as the grave, apart from
the rustling of the trees and the call of a tawny owl. His heart was beating so
loudly in his ears that it was drowning out all other noises anyway. Turk
strained to hear any sounds of footsteps approaching, he could hear
nothing…maybe he’d lost him…after all these woods were as much a mystery for
him as for Turk. He let out a breath slowly…he’d just relax here for a while
and figure out what he was going to do.

How the fuck had Nellie found out about his phone call to
the police, he’d only told Paula…surely she wouldn’t…but then she had been
really pissed off with him about that little kid down the hall. Fucking hell
all he’d done was give the kid a little kiss and a squeeze, silly cunt she’d been
raving about it…shouting and screaming, no wonder he’d had to give her a bit of
a slap…what did she expect silly cow. But maybe she’d told Nellie about the
phone call… my god if he found out it was her, he would cut her up so bad
children would cross the street when they saw her coming, he would…

The air around him suddenly seemed to shift and his thoughts
of revenge were abruptly cut short, as he felt cold steel at his neck.

A huge shadow moved round from the other side of the tree,
and stood in front of him, striking terror into his heart.

‘Where the fuck do you think you’re going Turk?’ Nellie
whispered with barely restrained anger, pressing the knife harder against
Turk’s throat…it broke the skin and a trickle of blood ran down onto his shirt
collar.

‘Now look Nellie,’ began Turk trembling with fear, ‘I ain’t
done nuffin to you have I…you said to leave you alone and I ‘ave…so…’

‘A little bird told me that you’ve been talking to the filth
fella…have you Turk? Have you told them about me?’ Nellie pressed his face
close to Turk, he could see the blazing fury in his eyes…he began to struggle.

‘No you got it all wrong…I ain’t told no one…you know me
Nell, I don’t talk do I?’

‘Then why you running fella…what‘s got you so scared?’ Turk
started shaking violently, Nellie pushed the knife harder. ‘You’re a fucking
liar, you were going to dump me to the filth, you fucking slag.’

He brought his knee up hard between Turk’s legs…who
collapsed to the ground holding onto his privates and groaning. Nellie pulled
out a hammer from inside his jacket and slammed it into Turk’s arm, there was a
loud crack as a bone was shattered, Turk let out high pitched squeals as the
hammer came down again and again, connecting with bone and muscle. Nellie threw
the hammer to one side and started pounding into Turk’s face with his bare
fists, blood and teeth flew everywhere as he worked out his anger in a frenzied
attack.

Turk lay almost dead at Nellie’s feet a few minutes later,
his arms and legs were shattered and useless, his face looked like chopped
liver…he was gulping and gagging on his own blood. He watched Nellie as best he
could through swollen eyelids, as he stood over him looking him up and down as
if examining his work.

‘Who you gonna tell now fella?’ he taunted, ‘you should have
known better than to try and turn me in…you won’t be saying anything to anyone
any more.’ And with that he pulled apart Turk’s already broken jaw, grabbed
hold of his tongue and cut it from his mouth with one swipe of his knife, he
threw the severed tongue carelessly onto the floor next to where Turk lay.

Turk’s mouth filled with blood and he began to choke…Nellie
just laughed and walked away.

Life got much better for Andy now that he had a friend in
Daniel. In many ways, despite the age differences, the two boys were very
similar, both dealing with their own demons in their own way. They shied away
from the rest of the kids in the home, keeping themselves to themselves and
never joining in any of the group activities that were organised for their
entertainment.

Other than Daniel, Andy liked Lilly who worked in the
kitchen, she was a larger than life character always laughing and smiling. She
could be a hard taskmaster though, and expected those who had been assigned
chores, to do their jobs well or they would face her wrath…which was not to be
underestimated; an angry Lilly was a thing to be feared. Luckily for Andy she
seemed to have a soft spot for him and so he had only seen her nice side, he
liked to sit with her after dinner sometimes and listen to her stories; she
always seemed to have something to talk about.

Gwen the other carer, who usually did the night shift, was a
different kettle of fish. She was cold and unapproachable and seemed to try and
get through her eight hour shifts with as little effort as possible, and
usually with the help of a few stiff drinks. It wasn’t uncommon to find her
slumped in the armchair in the kitchen snoring her head off by about 8.30, with
an empty whisky tumbler by her side. Of course if Miss Taylor had ever found
out about her she would have been for the high jump…but who was going to tell,
the kids didn’t mind it meant they could raid the fridge and stay up late, and
the only other person that might have noticed was Clive Tutt, the caretaker,
and he had his own reasons for keeping quiet.

One day after dinner Lilly was sitting with Andy telling him
all about her youngest granddaughter’s latest escapade, laughing at her own
jokes as she told the tale, when the back door opened and Mr Tutt walked into
the kitchen.

‘Ain’t you got no tea on the go Lil?’ Tutt said as he went
over and looked into the huge teapot that sat on the side, ‘me mouth’s as dry
as a nun’s twat.’

Andy felt Lilly stiffen as she looked at Tutt with dislike.
‘I made you tea not an hour ago,’ she said shortly, ‘I’m not here to be your
slave, make your own tea…you know where the kettle is. Anyway I thought you
finished ages ago, what are you doing still here?’

‘I had a few things to take care of,’ he said vaguely. ‘Old
lady Taylor’s not ‘ere is she, gone to some convention or something, I thought
it was Gwen’s night tonight?’ he started rummaging around in the cupboards
noisily looking for teabags.

Lilly gave an irritated sigh and heaved her body out of the
chair next to Andy and went over to fill the kettle tutting as she did so. ‘Ok,
ok I’ll make you a cup of tea and then you get out…Gwen called in sick, so I’m
doing her shift and I have still got to clear up the dinner things so I don’t
want you in here under my feet,’ she grumbled.

‘Ooer “don’t want you under my feet”,’ mimicked Tutt trying
to make Andy laugh, ‘bloody hell Lil I wouldn’t want to be under your feet
believe me…I might never recover, you’d squash the life out of me, ha ha,’ he
laughed at his own joke again looking at Andy with a wink. Andy just looked at
him, he didn’t like the man, he was a bully pure and simple and just lately
he’d been picking on Andy and on Andy’s only other friend little Shauna
Mathews.

Shauna had bright red hair and a face full of freckles, her
pale blue eyes were magnified through the thick lenses in her glasses giving
her an owl like appearance and she was at present missing two of her front
teeth. That seemed to be enough to qualify her for special treatment from Mr
Tutt. He took every chance he could to tease her about her looks, or to
‘accidentally’ knock her glasses off her face and then laugh while she
scrabbled round to find them. Andy had seen him bullying a few of the younger
boys as well and he had noticed that a few of them were particularly nervous
when Tutt was around. But what bothered him the most was his inappropriate talk
and his fondling of Andy at every opportunity. He was always very careful never
to do anything when any of the adults were around, but if ever he caught Andy
on his own or even with Shauna he would inevitably find a way of getting his
hands into his trousers…even pulling his pants down on one occasion which had
left Andy with his cheeks flaming with embarrassment. Tutt would always laugh
in that mocking way of his as if he was only joking and Andy was a big baby to
be upset…but Andy had seen plenty of men like that when he had lived at home,
men that had come to do business with his mum, but had been more interested in
him or Lucy. Tutt was one of those men and Andy hated him.

He kept his thoughts to himself though, he was just
beginning to fit into this new life at Marshall Street so he didn’t intend to
rock the boat. He just made his mind up to try and always be around other
people when Tutt was around, no matter how hard the man tried to get him on his
own.

‘You on all night tonight then?’ Tutt was asking Lilly.

‘Yeh…I’m here till 8…not that it’s any of your business,’
snapped Lilly.

‘Ooer,’ mocked Tutt again, ‘ok don’t get you knickers in a
twist, I was only asking like…just trying to be friendly.’

With a blank face Lilly handed Tutt a steaming mug of tea,
but stopped him before he sat down at the table to drink it. ‘Um…outside I
think,’ she said opening the back door for him.

Tutt looked for a minute as if he was going to argue with
her, but Lilly just gave him a stern look, so with a short laugh and a
reluctant shake of the head he went back outside.

Lilly rolled her eyes and shook her head as she came back
and sat down next to Andy, ‘You steer clear of that man Andy, you hear me?’

Andy just nodded.

‘He’s always up to no good…I wouldn’t trust that man as far
as I could throw him,’ she muttered. ‘Any how sitting here talking to you isn’t
going to get these plates cleared is it, off you go now Andy and let me get on.’

By and large Andy’s days passed uneventfully enough, until one
day Miss Taylor asked to see him in her office, she told him that his mother had
been charged with Lucy’s murder. She felt, she told him, that he ought to hear
about it from her rather than find out from the newspapers. Andy reacted to the
news very badly, hysterically shouting and screaming that his mum hadn’t done
it, and that he wanted to see her…it had taken all Miss Taylor’s strength to
hold him long enough so that the nurse could give him something to calm him
down. He had slept then, but for days after he withdrew into himself again, not
even Daniel or Shauna could get through to him, it was like he had re-erected
the walls around himself that had been beginning to crumble.

A couple of nights later, Andy woke in the night needing to
pee. He stumbled out of his bed still half asleep and made his way to the
bathroom, it wasn’t until he was on his way back to bed that he realised that
Daniel’s bed was empty. He looked at the new little digital clock which sat
next to his bed, Miss Dronski had given it to him the last time she had visited
(now he had no excuse for being late for school she had said with a smile) it
said 2.56. Where on earth was Daniel at this time of night, maybe he was
hungry…yeh that could be it, Gwen was on duty tonight so he might have gone
down to sneak some food from the fridge. He was just about to get back into bed
when bright headlights shone through the curtains and filled the room with
light, and he heard a car’s wheels crunching over the gravel as it pulled into
the drive under his window, he peeped round the curtain to see who it was.

The white van that Mr Tutt used was in the drive with its
lights on and the engine still running. Tutt was there opening up the back
doors of the van and ushering a small group of children out of it and into the
house. The children were in their nightclothes and they looked half asleep,
stumbling all over the place, a couple of the little ones were grizzling. Andy
spotted Daniel bringing up the rear; he seemed to be in charge of the children
and was trying to quieten them down as they crept back indoors. Once the
children had disappeared back into the house Tutt went round to the back of the
van, he seemed to be looking around inside for something…suddenly the dark
figure of a man appeared out of the shadows, making Andy’s heart jump into his
mouth. The man came up behind Tutt saying something to him in a low growling
voice. Tutt swung round startled and then started backing away from the intruder
with a look of terror on his face. The stranger grabbed Tutt by the throat and
pushed him up against the van; Andy watched wide eyed as Tutt flapped his arms
around trying to get free from the man’s grip but his attacker was much bigger
than him. He seemed to be talking to Tutt growling and threatening…it sounded
like Tutt was whining back at him pleading with him…trying to appease him.
Suddenly he was released and he slumped back against the van. After brushing
himself down nervously, Tutt went into the back of the van again and produced a
large brown envelope from which he pulled out a thick wodge of banknotes. Andy
could hardly believe his eyes; he’d never seen so much money in his life
before. Tutt started counting out some notes, but his assailant wasn’t having
any of that, grabbing the whole lot and stuffing it into his jacket pocket.
Tutt let out an angry yell of protest which was quickly quashed by the man
forcing him back up against the van again. More threats were issued until at
last the man dropped Tutt and began to stride almost casually back down the
drive, he had almost got to the end when he turned and looked back at the
house, straight at Andy’s window. Andy couldn’t help letting out a squeal of
terror and he quickly pulled his head back from the window. He had seen the
man’s face clearly in the street light, the long scar that split one side of it
was quite distinctive. Andy started shaking with fear because Mr Tutt’s
attacker was the man that appeared in all of Andy’s worst nightmares…it was
Nellie.

So caught up in his fear was he, that he didn’t notice that
Daniel had crept into the room.

‘What the hell are you doing awake?’ hissed Daniel in Andy’s
ear making him jump out of his skin once more.

‘I had to pee,’ said Andy nervously, ‘where did you go? I
saw you get out of the van…what were all those children doing out?’

Daniel didn’t answer just started getting into his pyjamas.

‘There was a man outside,’ Andy went on regardless, ‘he was
arguing with the old Tutt.’ Daniel just raised his eyebrows. ‘He is the one
that said he would cut my mum’s eyes out…why is he here Daniel…why did he want
Tutt?’

‘Well I don’t bloody know do I?’ said Daniel irritably.
‘Look you just forget what you saw tonight ok…it’s none of your business and
you will just get yourself into trouble if you go around talking about it…’

‘Yes but what were all those kids doing out so late? And
you…why…’

‘Look Andy I said forget about it…it’s nothing ok…best you
don’t know about it. Now just shut the fuck up and go back to sleep.’

But Andy couldn’t sleep, why was Nellie coming to the
house…was he looking for him? What did he want? Andy had told no one about what
had really happened to Lucy, so why was he here? And what did he want with Mr
Tutt?