Suddenly, looking at the photograph again, she was struck by something. Curious, she pulled her phone out of her bag, opened WhatsApp and went to the photograph Laura had sent on Thursday. Then she compared it to the one on the kitchen table and, with a trembling hand, put her phone down.

They were different.

Both must have been taken at almost the same moment, but the one Laura had posted was face-on, with other tourists clearly visible in the background and trees beyond. The printed one was angled, high quality, and must have been taken from some distance away. The girls were clearly not aware of the photo being taken as they were so far away and not looking at the camera at all. Her heart sank as she realized it was most definitely not the same photo.

There was a creak from out in the hallway and she spun round. Shivers rippled through her. Someone had come in whilst she’d been at the races and put this on the table. Could that person still be in here?

Another creak. It was drowned out a moment later by the cat miaowing.

‘Hello?’ Meg called out, a dark unease coiling through her. ‘Is someone out there?’ She turned sharply, her eyes hunting in every direction.

Miaowwwww.

‘Shut it,’ she hissed. Then listened. The house was old, 1930s, it creaked all the time. She waited a full minute, the thudding of her heart echoing in her ears like drumbeats – boomf . . . boomf . . . boomf . . . A few feet away were a bunch of kitchen knives in a wooden block. She strode over, grabbed the largest then walked to the doorway to the hall. ‘Hello?’ she shouted and marched through, brandishing the knife.

There was nothing there.

She stood for some moments, wondering. Should she call the police? And say what? That someone had broken into her house and left a photo of her daughter in the kitchen?

The thought suddenly occurred to her that she hadn’t checked to see if anything had been taken. Still holding the knife and still scared, she went from room to room. Nothing seemed to have been touched. Laura’s menagerie was all fine. She was topping up the water for the gerbils when she heard a phone ringing downstairs.

Might it be Laura? She raced back down and into the kitchen, and realized it wasn’t her own phone as she saw another one on the sideboard that she didn’t recognize. A cheap-looking one. Whose was this phone – Vesma’s?

She answered it, tentatively. ‘Hello?’

‘Hello, Meg!’

A male voice. Confident. Pleasant, with the rasp of a heavy smoker. Almost like they were best buddies. Salesy. These kinds of calls really pissed her off. ‘Who am I speaking to?’ she asked, coldly.

‘A very good friend, Meg.’ He sounded so hurt that, for an instant, she thought she must know him, and the fault was with her for not recognizing who it was.