‘Is there something you’ve come to tell me?’ she asked, handing back his dampened handkerchief. Tears: tears he’d caused. He told her to keep it, and she folded it neatly, then unfolded it and started the process again. She still hadn’t seemed to notice the damage to her knees. Her skirt was tucked between them as she sat.

‘No news,’ he said quietly. Then, seeing all hope drain from her: ‘There might be a lead down in the village.’

‘The village?’

‘Falls.’

‘What sort of lead?’

Suddenly he wished he’d never started. ‘I can’t really say just now.’ An old fallback and one that wouldn’t work here. All she had to do was say something to her husband, and he’d be on the phone, demanding to know. And even if he didn’t, or if he hid the news of the strange find from her, the media would hardly be so tactful …

‘Did Philippa collect dolls?’ Rebus asked now.

‘Dolls?’ She was playing with the cordless phone again, turning it in her hand.

‘It’s just that someone found one, down by the waterfall.’

She shook her head. ‘No dolls,’ she said quietly, as if feeling that somehow there should have been dolls in Philippa’s life, and that their absence reflected badly on her as a mother.

‘It’s probably nothing,’ Rebus said.

‘Probably,’ she agreed, filling the pause.

‘Is Mr Balfour at home?’

‘He’ll be back later. He’s in Edinburgh.’ She stared at the phone. ‘No one’s going to call, are they? John’s business friends, they’ve all been told to keep the line clear. Same thing with family. Keep the line clear in case they phone. But they won’t, I know they won’t.’

‘You don’t think she’s been kidnapped, Mrs Balfour?’

She shook her head.

‘What then?’

She stared at him, her eyes red-veined from crying, and shadowed underneath from lack of sleep. ‘She’s dead.’ It came out almost in a whisper. ‘You think so too, don’t you?’

‘It’s far too early to be thinking that. I’ve known MisPers turn up weeks or months later.’

‘Weeks or months? I can’t bear the thought. I’d rather know … one way or the other.’

‘When was the last time you saw her?’

‘About ten days ago. We went shopping in Edinburgh, just the usual places. Not really meaning to buy anything. We had a bite to eat.’

‘Did she come to the house often?’

Jacqueline Balfour shook her head. ‘He poisoned her.’

‘Sorry?’

‘David Costello. He poisoned her memories, made her think she could remember things, things which never happened. That last time we met … Flip kept asking about her childhood. She said it had been miserable for her, that we’d ignored her, hadn’t wanted her. Utter rubbish.’

‘And David Costello put these ideas in her head?’