Stranger on the Train

Struggling single mother Emma loses her son on the London Underground, when the police are reluctant to help her and everyone else doubts her story she resolves to find her son herself.

“A roller-coaster thriller and a great read.”

Auteur

Abbie Taylor is a doctor, married, with two children. She lives in Dublin, Ireland. Emma’s Baby is her first novel.

Texte du rabat

A mother’s worst nightmare: the subway doors close with her baby son still on the train. In this suspenseful debut novel, a woman goes to unimaginable lengths to get her child back.

A struggling, single mother, Emma sometimes wishes that her thirteen-month-old son Ritchie would just disappear. Then, one quiet Sunday evening, after a sinister encounter on the London Underground—Ritchie does just that.

Emma immediately reports his abduction to the police but there she faces a much worse situation than she ever imagined. Why do the police seem so reluctant to help her? And why do they think she would want hurt her own child?

If Emma wants Ritchie back, she’ll have to find him herself. With the help of a stranger named Rafe, the one person who seems to believe her, Emma sets off in search of her son. She is determined to find Ritchie no matter what it takes…but who exactly is the real enemy here?

"A heart-stopper” (Publishers Weekly, starred review) with dark twists and intertwining narratives, The Stranger on the Train is an unforgettable, “first-rate debut thriller” (Washington Post) that you will keep you guessing until the shattering finale.

Échantillon de lecture
The Stranger on the Train

Chapter One

Sunday, September 17th

Day One

At the top of the stairs, a group of teenage boys slumped against the walls with their feet out, taking up most of the passageway. They wore black puffy jackets and had the same expressions on their faces: blank, hard, bored. Emma heard their voices from around the corner, echoing off the tiles. As soon as they saw her, their conversation stopped.

“Excuse me,” Emma said politely.

Very slowly, they moved their feet back. There was just enough room for her to pass. She had to walk straight through the middle of the group, feeling their eyes on her. They watched in silence as she struggled down the steps with the buggy and Ritchie and all the bags.

She was glad when she got to the bottom of the steps and around the corner. The tube platform was deserted and starkly lit. Emma checked behind her. The boys had not followed.

“All right, Rich?” Relieved, she crouched down beside the buggy. She was not normally a nervous person, but with Ritchie there she found herself hoping the train would come soon.

Ritchie, a solid, chubby thirteen-month-old, had begun to grizzle, sticking his tummy out and rubbing his eyes with his fist.

“Tired, eh?” Emma jiggled the buggy. “Soon be home.”

She was tired herself. It had been a long day: a trip all the way across London to the East End. She’d been desperate to get out of the flat and couldn’t face yet another walk to Hammersmith Broadway or the North End Road. They’d made a day of it; wandered around the stalls in Spitalfields Market, bought some trousers and vests for Ritchie, and gone to a busy little café for scones and coffee, and a jar of Banana Surprise. Then they’d got a bus to Mile End and gone for a walk by Regent’s Canal, watching the swans and the long boats with their painted flowerpots. But when it turned chilly it was time to go home. In the dusk, the canal had a layer of green scum and a rusting shopping trolley poking out of the water. It took quite a while to find a tube station, and the shopping bags doubled in weight, knocking against Emma’s legs as she walked. She was relieved to finally spot the familiar blue and red London Underground circle ahead of her on the pavement.

“Muh.” Ritchie leaned out of his buggy to thrust his orange lollipop at her. Sticky liquid trickled down his sleeve.

“Oh, for God’s sake.” Emma felt a headache starting. “Why did you ask for it, then?”

Roughly, she took the lolly from him and wiped his face and hands. She looked around for a bin. None anywhere, of course. It was a quarter to eight on Sunday evening. Everyone seemed to have finished their traveling for the day and gone home. There wasn’t a soul about. She could just chuck the lolly on the tracks. In the end, however, she wrapped it in a tissue and stuffed it into her bag. On the wall of the platform opposite, an ad for bottled water showed a picture of the countryside. Trees, and water, and peace.

Ritchie whined again, straining at the straps.

“Come on, then.” What harm could there be in letting him out?

As she knelt to undo the straps, a faint scratching noise sounded from deep in the tunnel.

There was something sinister, Emma had always thought, about the sound of a train approaching through a tunnel. The way you could hear but not see it; only the rattle of the tracks ahead of whatever monstrous thing was about to loom from the darkness. Quickly, she lifted Ritchie onto the platform. He’d heard the noise as well and turned to stare, a breeze lifting the blond down on his head. Emma held on to his harness, stooping to fold the buggy with her free hand. The noise grew louder. Ritchie pressed himself against her leg, gripping her jeans in his fist. Distracted though she was, she remembered afterwards the way he had looked. Round little face, eyes wide, mouth in an O as he gaped at the tunnel and waited for the monster to come.

“Der,” he said, thrilled, as the headlights lit up the tunnel. He let go of Emma’s jeans to point. The grimy red, white and blue carriages roared into the station. Squeals and screeches filled the platform; the train slowed, then stopped. The roar of the engine died abruptly, like a turned-off fan.

Silence.

A second later, the doors whoomped open.

“On you go,” Emma said.

Ritchie didn’t need to be told twice. Emma steered him to an empty carriage, keeping his harness taut, lifting it a little to help him climb on board. He struggled in on his hands and knees, the top of his nappy sticking out from his cargo pants. Then he stood up again in the doorway, delighted with himself.

“Muh,” he said, turning to wave her aboard with a fat hand.

That was how she saw him, mostly, in the weeks that followed. Standing there in the doorway with his toothy little grin, his crooked fringe, his blue fleece with the smiley elephant on the front. There was nothing different about him, nothing she hadn’t seen a thousand times before. No whisper in her head warning her to snatch him back from the carriage and never let him go. He was still waving as she loaded the buggy on beside him and turned to pick up the bags. Reaching down, Emma thought she felt something with her other hand: a slight, sideways jerk on the harness she was gripping. Just a small thing, but looking back there must have been something odd about it, because she remembered frowning to herself. Even before she had a chance to straighten, to look, she knew that something was wrong.

Whoomp.

She spun around. For a second, she found it hard to take in what she was seeing. Her thoughts zigzagged. What is missing from this picture? She still held Ritchie’s harness in her hand, but the door of the carriage was closed.

Closed in her face, and Ritchie was on the other side.

“Jesus!”

Dropping the bags, Emma sprang at the door and tried to get her fingers around the edges. Through the window, she saw the top of Ritchie’s head.

“Hang on,” she …