The Pure in Heart by Susan Hill Page B

If he had money or if he found someone with it, he could start a proper market-gardening business, supply the best shops and hotels, good stuff, what they wanted now, organic, and not just cabbages and spuds. He had the training, he had the sense, he could do it. ‘Start-up capital’ it was called.
    He stared down at the newsprint. ‘Media Sales Executive.’ ‘Marketing Consultant.’ ‘Group analyst.’ All the proper jobs seemed to have vanished. ‘Youth outreach coordinator.’ He folded the page over.
    ‘You put a foot wrong, Pete’ll have you out that door.’
    ‘He wants me out of it any road.’
    ‘Yeah, well, if I say you stay, you stay, only you want to watch it.’
    The missing Lafferton boy had madeSky News. There was a picture. A mousy little kid with a small snub nose and a serious expression. School blazer. Tie. All neat.
    Andy looked into the soft nine-year-old face. He remembered men inside. What they would do to a kid like that. What they had done to plenty, and if they were behind lock and key, enough others weren’t.
    He sat down.
    Lee Carter. He saw the house. The car. The fountainstarting up. The thick pile carpet. The gilded bar in the corner of the room.
    Only he’d gone past that when he was a kid, wanting, wanting, doing anything to get, not bothered how. He could go and work for Lee Carter, but then what? Besides, he wasn’t interested in horse racing or the people who were.
    There had to be another way.
    A posse of men in Stetsons galloped across the screen kickingup a dust storm. Andy got up. Westerns were just one of the things he couldn’t stand.
    There was still bedlam. From the kitchen came the crash of a dish into the sink.
    ‘See you,’ he shouted. No one answered.
    He pulled his donkey jacket off the peg and went down the cold, ugly street towards the lights of the Ox.
    It was full and they were all talking about the boy. Andy got a pint and ordereda plate of pie, peas and chips.
    ‘Poor little sod.’
    ‘They’ll find him.’
    ‘You reckon?’
    ‘I didn’t say they’d find him alive.’
    ‘Right.’
    ‘Poor bloody parents. Anyway, what’s Lafferton done? After all that stuff last year it don’t deserve another lot.’
    ‘It won’t be local.’
    ‘Why not? Who says?’
    On and on. The boy’s face was in his head now, he couldn’t get rid of it. He wanted to do somethingand there was nothing he could do, unless they asked for people to start searching Starly or Hylam Peak or the Hill … He’d be up there with them if so. What it was, he realised suddenly, he was restless. He was in prison at Michelle’s almost as bad as before and in a way it was worse because he hadn’t anything to do. There, he’d been outside in the market garden eight till five. He’d had a purposeto his day. He had to do something. Starting tomorrow.
    His plate of food came steaming hot, mounds of it, the pie oozing thick brown gravy. A yell went up from the darts board. When he’d finished, he’d take his drink over there, have a game. Michelle wouldn’t want to see him before eleven.
    He cut the pie and watched the pastry sink softly down into itself.

Fifteen
    ‘Darling?’
    ‘Hello, Ma. Yes, I’m still here.’
    ‘Oh, isn’t it infuriating when people ask you the entire time? How do you feel?’
    ‘You know how I feel.’ Cat shifted her weight from one leg to the other and back again but the knife-blade pain in her groin did not lessen. ‘The baby’s lying on a nerve and it won’t budge. Sorry, I didn’t mean to snap.’
    ‘Darling, I don’t suppose you feel likegiving me a hand on Saturday morning, do you? Only Audrey has let me down and I really don’t think we have enough people …’
    ‘Remind me what’s happening on Saturday morning.’
    ‘The hospice exhibition in the Blackfriars Hall … ten till four, and of course I wouldn’t ask you, and needless to say you’ll just sit in a chair and talk to people and hand out leaflets and so on, I wouldn’t