Harper waited while Patrick spoke to the psychiatrist. She’d offered to watch the boys but was secretly glad when he said he’d take them in with him—the way they stared was beginning to unnerve her. She was on the verge of asking if they’d always done that or if it was a new thing, but the question seemed inappropriate, under the circumstances.

After a few minutes, a buzzer sounded somewhere further down the corridor and a nurse, a woman in her forties with lots of thick dark hair piled above a pleasing face, emerged from behind a heavy door. Big eyes and high cheekbones, she could have been a model in her youth. She marched smartly past where Harper sat and knocked on the door of the counselling room into which the doctor had taken Patrick and the twins.

“I’ll take you down,” she said, holding the door open for Patrick to come out with the stroller. He got its wide wheels stuck a few times before succeeding.

Doctor Summer followed Patrick into the corridor. As the door to the therapy room was closed and locked behind them by the nurse, the doctor peered at each boy in turn, giving them a little squeeze.

“They’re so chilled, aren’t they?” she said. “Such good boys.”

Then she smiled and started to walk away.

“Aren’t you coming, too?” said Patrick to the doctor.

“No, but I’ll be watching.” She nodded towards the CCTV camera mounted next to the smoke alarm in the ceiling, “and there will be two nurses there with you, for support if it’s needed.”

Patrick watched her walk away, his wide-eyed expression that of a lost little boy.

“Do you want me there?” asked Harper, and he nodded.

As she followed the nurse, the father and the stroller down the long, wide corridor Harper noticed the art—huge canvases, each of them covered with rectangles of primary colours in different formations. The white walls and the large paintings made it feel a bit like a gallery. There was a stillness here, too, a sense that etiquette required a certain kind of reverence, and that all behaviour was being judged and examined, and found wanting.

A little further on something in one of the rooms hit the wall with a force that made the frames of the screwed-on art rattle.

“Jesus,” said Patrick, “is that …” He looked in desperation at Harper, seeming to ask, it’s not Lauren, is it?

“No, no, nothing to worry about,” said the nurse, lifting her radio handset from her belt and holding it to her lips. “Room seven, assistance please,” she said brightly, and smiled at Harper as she caught her eye. Something slammed against the wall again, harder this time, and two nurses appeared, running up the corridor, keys jangling, shouldering their way into the cell.

“What was that?” asked Patrick.