“You’re never going to believe this,” Sophie said, the excitement in her voice travelling easily across ocean and continent.

“Mmm,” Lindsay grunted, forcing her eyebrows upwards in a vain attempt to get her eyes to stay open. It was quarter past seven in the morning, but it felt like the middle of the night. Seeing her plight, Kirsten thrust a mug of pitch-colored coffee in front of her. Lindsay took a scalding sip and felt synapses snap to attention all through her brain. “Believe what?” she asked, sounding like a reasonable approximation of a human being.

“Penny’s latest draft. Heart of Glass. The package arrived by courier today and Carolyn called me right away, at work. She knew you’d want to see it. Penny actually sent it the day she died. Three new chapters plus the very last revisions she ever made to the text.” There seemed to be an exclamation mark hanging in the air at the end of each of Sophie’s sentences.

“And?”

“I skimmed it. I knew you’d want chapter and verse on any substantial changes as soon as possible.”

“I didn’t realize you’d read the earlier drafts,” Lindsay muttered.

“I dipped in and out of it whenever I could get a spare moment,” Sophie said. “Darling, she’d made a lot of changes in this draft. The surgeon’s wife—the editor? She’s had a complete personality change. You know how she was passive and weak in the first drafts? Well, she’s not any more. She’s been turned into a strong, scheming bitch. A real sexual adventurer. Now it’s her who seduces the politician, not the other way round. And it’s clear she’s not a victim any more. In fact, it looks like Penny was shaping up to turning her into a killer—I think the twist she was aiming for is that the novelist isn’t really capable of causing death by remote control, but his editor goes out and makes his books come true, partly as a publicity stunt and partly because she enjoys it.”

By now thoroughly awake, Lindsay drew her breath in sharply. “Now that’s what I call a significant change. Tell me, Soph. Has Penny changed the physical description of the wife at all?”

“Funny you should say that,” Sophie said. “In the first draft, she’s described as slightly built with mousy blonde hair, pale skin.”

“Human wallpaper,” Lindsay interjected. The coffee was starting to do its stuff.