‘That’s not funny.’ I let him in crossly. ‘You gave me a real fright.’

‘Sorry.’ He threw his bag onto the back seat and slid in beside me, looking dishevelled and not very sorry at all. ‘I thought I’d surprise you.’

‘Terrify me, you mean.’ I started the engine. ‘You look a bit hot and bothered yourself, I must say.’

He pulled his grey cashmere jumper over his tousled hair. ‘Yeah, well, it was a close thing. They suddenly announced the suspension of the whole bloody line at Paddington. I just managed to get on the last train out. It was a bloody bun-fight though.

‘So how was the big farewell?’ he asked, yawning widely as we eased onto the motorway. ‘God, sorry. I’m knackered.’

‘Don’t ask,’ I said, as we shuddered in the slipstream of a lumbering juggernaut. The motorway was quiet now, the frenzy of London’s Friday night exodus apparently over for another week.

‘That good? I’m sorry, babe.’ He offered me a piece of chewing gum, flexing his shoulders. ‘God, I’m sore. I can’t wait to get out of bloody London. A whole weekend of sea air and doing nothing.’ He shot me a mischievous look. ‘Well, nothing too strenuous anyway.’

I was searching for an appropriate response when my phone rang. Seb picked it up from the glove compartment. ‘Someone called Fox,’ he said, peering at the display. ‘Shall I answer it?’

‘Yes please. Would you say I’ll call back.’

At a service station somewhere in deepest Wiltshire, Seb went to buy coffee while I called Val to check she’d left the spare key under the geranium pot, as I’d never found mine. Cheery Val was my nearest neighbour in Cornwall, apart from the pub – though she was still a good mile down the road. She kept an eye on Pendarlin and did the occasional bit of cleaning for me. After I’d spoken to her, I lit a cigarette and, leaning against the car, rang DI Fox back. I told him about the anonymous texts, and he took a note of the phone number they had come from.

‘I’ll get it checked out, Maggie.’ He was calm and matter of fact. ‘It might help a lot if it’s linked, because so far the evidence is all circumstantial.’ I could sense the wariness in his explanation. ‘Until we actually catch someone in the act of vandalism, there’s very little I can do. Much as I’d love to put a plod outside your door –’