Of course John was joking when he said he was meeting the Matricide in Prague. He read the papers, would have taken it for granted she did too, would have made his joke. Oh God, thought Matilda, he must think I’m mad. Perhaps I am. It’s high time I replanned my picnic or I shall end my days in a bin. Too boring for Louise, Mark, Anabel and Claud. I care for them enough not to inflict that on them. The car keys bit into her palm.

She made an effort towards calm and how to react to the police when they told her they had found Hugh. It would be best to be flustered, astonished, indignant. Then, remembering Hugh’s shoes were in her suitcase, she thought, how incriminating, I must throw them out of the window, and stood up to reach for her case on the rack, when she noticed the train slowing down. She had reached her destination.

23

THE CAR WAS where she had left it, exactly the same, just a bit more dusty. Somebody had written in the dirt on the back windows:

The driver of this car is a sex maniac.

Matilda put the key in the lock. The car was airless. She opened the windows, starting the engine, letting it idle. The palm of her hand felt sore from clutching the keys. As the engine livened she thought she would never know whether those hints dropped about Tom were true. As she drove out of the station yard she told herself she didn’t care whether he had been a part-time spy, slept around or been a bugger. It made no difference now.

Driving through the town she saw faces light up with laughter as people read the message on the back window. It’s great to look respectable, she thought. Then she thought it must even soften the hearts of the police who would be waiting for her. If Hugh has any gratitude he will have broken a window to make it look like a break-in, messed things up a bit, not too much, just enough.

She stopped to buy milk, then drove fast along the road bordered by bristly cornfields waiting for the plough, pheasants gleaming in the stubble. She felt hot and sticky after the train, looked forward to changing into old clothes. It felt warm enough to swim, make a trip to the sea. As soon as she had dealt with the police she would go.

In the three miles of lanes from the main road to her cottage, late holidaymakers were sticking firmly to the middle of the road, determined not to scratch their paint against the tall banks of this alien countryside. Their care was alarming to Matilda, used to judging the width by a whisker.