She opened the casement window in the lounge a crack so she could hear better. There was nothing to be seen in the river itself. She thought about opening the front door to look out on the path but felt a cord of fear in her gut. The dead body on the shoreline just three days ago had overshadowed her dreams ever since. She was just about to close the window when she heard more footsteps – and something else. It sounded like the low whirr of a bicycle being wheeled. She crossed to the other side of the room, switched on the porch light and looked out of the tiny leadlight window next to her front door. Yes, there was a man, with a bike and a head-torch. This was a private island, and he shouldn’t be there, especially at night. Elvira tried to pluck up courage to open the front door, to chastise this person for scaring her. But as the seconds rolled by she found she didn’t dare.

Things had changed in the last three days. She had told the two policemen who had come to interview her that she never worried about her safety. It was true, when she herself had walked or run in parks alone at night, that there had never been any frightening incidents. She had always projected self-confidence and capability. But things were different now. Suddenly she realised that the discovery of that poor man’s body had robbed her of a freedom. A freedom from worry and anxiety. She just hoped and prayed that this didn’t cast her back to the dark days, to the terror that had almost destroyed her. She was eighty-one, but she could fight.

She took a deep breath, pulled open the door, and went out to confront her fear.

Chapter Twelve

Tuesday

It had been a quiet night at Staines police station, that’s what the duty log showed when Sergeant Vince Babbage arrived at Kingston Road to start his shift on the desk at seven a.m. For once there was no one in the cells. He was just thinking about going to get a coffee when a call was passed through from the control room. A report of a suspicious intruder on private land.

‘Righto,’ Babbage said when the call was patched through.

‘Hello. My name is Elvira Hart, and I’d like to report an incident from last night.’ In cultured tones she went on to describe the noises she had heard and then how she had opened the door to confront the intruder.

‘Madam, I really don’t think that was a good idea,’ Babbage said, scratching at his ginger beard. ‘You shouldn’t put yourself at risk. You should call 999.’