She has left the rear door of the car open, the engine purring but the driver invisible behind dark windows and hidden by the partition that keeps his section of the car separate. We both know it is no accident that she has crossed my path. Nothing is ever an accident with Maxine.

‘Why are you here?’ I channel her flat indifference, though I am pretty sure I can guess. As repellent as she is to me, it is looking as though I am going to need her help.

‘Have you done anything to give yourself away?’

The question is a confirmation more than a surprise, but the air still puffs out of my stomach. ‘My grandmother . . .’ My voice trails off. ‘It’s possible, yes.’

She starts towards the car, parked where the road ends and the tunnel opens. ‘Come with me.’ It is as if I’d seen her yesterday, to hear her boss me around.

‘Are you having me watched? Is that how you found me this morning?’

‘Not necessary. You seem to have forgotten that I already knew where you were.’ Do I imagine that there is a flash of something behind her eyes? Maxine opens the car door. ‘There’s something I need you to see. It’s for your protection.’

‘Excuse me if my confidence in your ability to protect me isn’t great.’

‘It’s not as if you have anywhere important to go. Or anyone to go to.’

I say nothing. I keep my face indifferent, channelling Maxine herself. But she is right. Other than my grandmother, there is nobody.

‘Trust me,’ Maxine says.

‘I’ve tried that before. It didn’t work out great.’

‘As far as I can tell, it still hasn’t.’

‘Do you have children, Maxine?’

She pretends not to hear.

‘I asked you a question.’

‘If I answer, will you come?’

‘Yes.’

‘I have children.’

‘How many?’

‘I agreed to answer your first question, not a series of them.’

‘How many?’ I say again.

‘Two.’ She looks so sorry for me. ‘I have two.’

Then
The Plague Pit

Two years and five months earlier

Cornwall, 13 November 2016

Since Maxine’s failed attempt to recruit me four weeks ago, I’d plugged Jane’s name, and her mother’s and father’s and brother’s, into every Internet search engine I could think of. There was no social media for any of them, though I found a record of Jane’s birth in London on 4 August 1980 and her marriage to Zac in September 2006.

I also found her father’s obituary, which confirmed what Maxine said about his wife pre-deceasing him and his son Frederick surviving him. Two other things struck me when I read it. First, that Philip Veliko had been a property developer, and second, that the obituary didn’t mention Jane at all.