Half the World Away - страница 44

He touches my arm.

‘Don’t,’ I say, rearing back.

He glares at me, then turns away.

‘The leaflets?’ I break the silence.

‘I’ll sort it out,’ he says. ‘I’ve got all the details.’

‘OK. I’ll email Nick and Missing Overseas – get them to change that date.’

An enormous coach, full of tourists, pulls up in front of the hotel. I go in to beat the rush. The lobby is hushed and cool, a balm.

I amend the dates in my head: Missing since 6 April 2014. Today is 3 May, a Saturday. Lori has been missing for twenty-seven days. Four weeks tomorrow. So very long.

Anthony, the interpreter with whom Missing Overseas has put us in touch, meets us in the lobby after lunch. He’s young, I estimate late twenties, and attractive, with the sort of sculpted cheekbones and even smile that you see on male models. He speaks excellent English with an American tinge. He looks as if he is dressed for business, in a crisp shirt and black trousers. We go over what we want him to do and he seems perfectly at ease, though I imagine it must be very different from most of the work he gets.

He has engaged a driver who, he explains, will want a tip as well as his fee. I give Anthony Lori’s address. Dawn is going to show us round the apartment.

The car is a Lexus, slick and white. The driver uses satnav. We wait at lights where workers are erecting hoardings along the edge of the pavement. They wear yellow hard hats and blue boiler suits. The two closest to me are women.

‘It’s always busy,’ I say, as we queue in heavy traffic.

‘Yes.’ Anthony turns back to us to reply. ‘One day a week, each car is banned from driving to help with pollution.’ The lights change and we creep forward. At the side, a parade of scooters streams past us.

‘See the coats,’ I say to Tom. Several of the riders wear their jackets back to front. It must afford them some protection from dust and draughts and the fumes. They remind me of Finn and Isaac dressing up as superheroes.

I see Dawn as we pull in to park. She looks much like her photos – about the same height as Lori but plump with frizzy red-brown hair, her face sprinkled with freckles, a broad nose and large round eyes.

She looks anxious as we meet. I feel the same: nerves grip my stomach. We shake hands, which feels formal, a little awkward. Hers is warm and moist.

We introduce Anthony to her.

‘You’ve still not heard from Lori?’ Dawn says.

‘Nothing. We’ve been talking to the police this morning. They didn’t give us much idea of where they’re looking,’ I say.

‘Playing their cards close to their chests,’ Tom says. ‘Not exactly big on sharing. You kept your keys?’

‘I never got a chance to give them back.’ Dawn reddens, plays with her lip, pulling at it, a nervous tic, I think.

‘You know Shona?’ I ask her.

‘Yes.’

I explain about the text. ‘And on the Sunday Lori was teaching, so that’s officially the last contact.’ A couple carrying shopping bags approach and we shuffle aside to let them pass.

‘Do you want to go in?’ Dawn says.

There are two blocks, seven storeys high, with a courtyard in between. One building is tiled in cornflower blue, with white bands every other storey and a splurge of foliage on the roof – green shrubs and some climber frothy with purple blossoms. The other block is tiled jade green, almost turquoise. The buildings are remnants from older times, gaudy and shabby now, the grout stained. Rust marks streak down from all the metal balconies. The blocks provide splashes of colour in contrast to the skyscrapers towering round, which are dun and black, grey and brown and silver, a monochrome palette for the new century.

Around the outside at ground level there are shops. Halfway along the roadside, where we are standing, there is a gateway with an automatic barrier for cars and a small security booth.

We file after Dawn through the entryway, past the security box where the guard is eating his lunch, to the blue building. He watches us pass, expressionless.

The lift is an old-fashioned design with an outer door and an inner one like a cage that concertinas. Apprehension makes my jaw and hands tense. I flex my fingers. Every day Lori would be here, in this exact space, travelling out to work, to see her friends, coming back to rest, to sleep.