“No!” But the idea of Louis Rosco seemed to trouble her, and she withdrew into a dispirited and unhelpful lethargy, answering the inspector’s questions with monosyllables, making it clear that she only wanted the interview to be over.

Jane was driven home by a uniformed policewoman she had never seen before, and the journey passed in silence. She was pleased. Sergeant Berry made her feel strangely and irrationally guilty, and she felt that in his presence there was a danger she would break down and confess to grave and unimagined sins. The constable dropped her outside Myrtle Cottage, then drove on down the valley to turn the car. Jane stood outside the house, breathing deeply, trying to compose herself before going inside. It was still not late, and she pictured them all there, as she had left them, sitting round the kitchen table waiting with a ghoulish excitement to find out what had happened, perhaps even to accuse her. She suspected that Roger’s offer to accompany her to the police station was caused by curiosity rather than a wish to give her support. It was a pleasant surprise when she lifted the latch on the kitchen door to find the room empty. The living room beyond was dark and quiet, too. They had been so exhausted that everyone, even Roger, must have given up waiting and gone to bed.

She sat in the dark on the rocking chair in the kitchen and began to cry.

The old woman must have been standing in the doorway for some time before Jane realised she was there. She stood, quite unembarrassed by the tears, and made no move to come into the room or retreat. When she saw Jane look up, she spoke.

“Was it quite dreadful!” she said.

“I suppose not,” she said. “ Just confusing.”

“Tell me,” Molly said.

Then the temptation to spill it all out was too much, and Jane explained about Greg and Rosco having been at the hostel, about the fire which had destroyed the records.

“I was there, too,” Jane said. “I was working in the hostel that summer. The warden was on maternity leave, and I took over. The inspector thinks it’s too much of a coincidence, and that I must in some way be implicated.”

Molly said nothing. She allowed Jane her righteous indignation. But she thought the inspector was probably right. The coincidence was incredible.

Molly went to her room then, but she could not sleep. She tried to piece together the overheard conversations, the whispered confessions, the suppressed antagonism, to make some pattern, but it was impossible. At some time after midnight there was a knock on her door, and Rose stood there, like the heroine of some Victorian bodice-ripper, in a long white nightgown and a white shawl. Her hair was tangled and untidy, and there was mud on the hem of her nightdress.

“Come in,” Molly said mildly. “ What’s the matter?”