‘Merry Christmas to you. And don’t thank me until you’ve tried spending a night in that death trap. Don’t come knocking back on my door, either. I clean, that’s it. Any other problems you speak to that owner crook.’

With that, she slammed the door shut so hard my teeth rattled.

Henry, who had retreated firmly back into robot mode, resolutely plodded back through the snow to the car and fetched our bags. This time, Polina had left the key in the door. It was with some trepidation that we ventured inside.

‘At least it’s clean,’ was the best I could manage, after an initial glance around.

‘It’s not difficult to keep a virtually empty room clean, though, is it?’

Henry wasn’t exaggerating. There were in fact three rooms – the main living space and bathroom on the ground floor, and a tiny bedroom wedged into the attic. The living room included a sofa, a lopsided bookcase containing no books, and a kitchen area similar to Polina’s. The bathroom had a basic sink, toilet, and bath, no shower. The bedroom had a bed.

To her credit, Polina had added a vase of pine branches similar to the one in her home, so at least that helped mask the smell of must and rot. It wasn’t quite enough, however, to detract from the bare beige walls, mud-coloured carpet and dismal not-a-lot-else.

‘It’s even worse than the photos.’ I marvelled.

‘Oh, it gets even worse than that,’ Henry said, coming out of the bathroom. ‘There’s no running water.’

‘What?’ I hurried over to the kitchen only to discover there was no sink. Trying the taps in the bathroom failed to produce anything other than a horrible squeak.

‘Maybe the pipes have frozen,’ I worried, while Henry flicked through the information folder on the kitchen table.

‘Oh no, it’s fine.’ He looked at me, and to my relief there was a hint of humour in his eyes. ‘We can use the well.’

My relief evaporated. ‘The well?’

‘It’s behind the house. Perfectly safe to drink if we boil it first, and deep enough in the ground that it might not even be frozen.’

While I was still processing the well, Henry carried on.

‘Speaking of freezing, rather than having to endure boring old central heating, I get to build my second fire of the day.’

I had a look at the fireplace. ‘There’s no wood. Or kindling. Even if we can get a fire going, it’s hardly going to keep us warm overnight.’