Maybe this really was the last place he had come. Someone had pushed him under, like that boy was doing on the far side to his friend, but not for fun. They had held his head down. The Mafia. Or a freak Pond Ness monster had put its mouth round his leg and it had been night-time and the lifeguard was looking the other way, and it had dragged him down. Or he’d had a secret meeting with a double agent from the KGB and it had gone wrong. Or. Or.

Holding onto a tyre with one hand, Matty went under, eyes open. The water was cold black tea, with patches of light that made it green. Full of secrets. What if he was still in here?

Above the water, the world was technicolour, and had the sun’s warmth. Another breath, and down again.

It was quiet. Jaws was keeping its fin down, a pale shadow about to loom up from the deep, mouth half-open and crosscut saw-teeth.

There was a slither of movement along one calf, chilled and furry. Matty immediately let go of the tyre, sank, kicked hard and came spluttering back up. Swam, quickly and very badly, to the steps and climbed out.

There had been something in there. Barracuda. Pike. A great white.

Matty sat on a wobbly, rotting bench in the changing area, staring at the scratchy wave of the concrete floor. Trying to get back to normal. It hadn’t really been like Jaws just then. It was as if Matty’s leg had been stroked, just once, by the wet finger of a corpse.

A man came in, small and skinny and dressed entirely in white. White trousers, white Dr Marten boots, white-framed sunglasses, T-shirt, blazer. He seemed to glance at Matty, though it was hard to tell with the sunglasses, before taking a white leather satchel from his shoulder and placing it on a hook.

He looked like Death.

A shiver. It was a proper sign this time, not like the sun flashing, or the man with the dog.

Dad had been here. He had drowned in here.

Chapter 2

Drowning.

Suffocation by immersion in a liquid, usually water.

Matty tried to picture someone drowning in milk or orange squash or cherry Coke.

Water closing over the victim’s mouth and nose cuts off the body’s supply of oxygen. Deprived of oxygen the victim stops struggling, loses consciousness, and gives up the remaining tidal air in his lungs.

Golders Green Library was an old building only a minute’s walk from the flat, on the other side of the road. Matty sat with a dictionary and a large encyclopaedia at one of the desks between two aisles. Edition 8, DICTA – EMBRY. There was a strong smell from the carpet, like it had just been cleaned after someone had been sick on it.

Lack of oxygen, anoxia, affects the brain within 30 seconds of the laryngospasms beginning to weaken with imminent brain failure.