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Chapters (82)
  1. Cover
  2. Praise for The House of Whispers
  3. Title Page
  4. Note to Readers
  5. Transcript of interview with Mr Rohan Allerton, husband of Abigail Allerton: 20 December 2019
  6. One
  7. Two
  8. Three
  9. Four
  10. Five
  11. Six
  12. Transcript of interview with Mr Rohan Allerton, husband of Abigail Allerton: 20 December 2019
  13. Seven
  14. Eight
  15. Nine
  16. Ten
  17. Eleven
  18. Transcript of interview with Mr Rohan Allerton, husband of Abigail Allerton: 20 December 2019
  19. Twelve
  20. Transcript of interview with Mr Rohan Allerton, husband of Abigail Allerton: 20 December 2019
  21. Thirteen
  22. Fourteen
  23. Fifteen
  24. Transcript of interview with Mr Rohan Allerton, husband of Abigail Allerton: 20 December 2019
  25. Sixteen
  26. Seventeen
  27. Transcript of interview with Mr Rohan Allerton, husband of Abigail Allerton: 20 December 2019
  28. Eighteen
  29. Nineteen
  30. Twenty
  31. Transcript of interview with Mr Rohan Allerton, husband of Abigail Allerton: 20 December 2019
  32. Twenty-One
  33. Twenty-Two
  34. Twenty-Three
  35. Twenty-Four
  36. Transcript of interview with Mr Rohan Allerton, husband of Abigail Allerton: 20 December 2019
  37. Twenty-Five
  38. Transcript of interview with Mr Rohan Allerton, husband of Abigail Allerton: 20 December 2019
  39. Twenty-Six
  40. Twenty-Seven
  41. Twenty-Eight
  42. Twenty-Nine
  43. Thirty
  44. Thirty-One
  45. Thirty-Two
  46. Thirty-Three
  47. Transcript of interview with Mr Rohan Allerton, husband of Abigail Allerton: 20 December 2019
  48. Thirty-Four
  49. Thirty-Five
  50. Thirty-Six
  51. Thirty-Seven
  52. Thirty-Eight
  53. Transcript of interview with Mr Rohan Allerton, husband of Abigail Allerton: 20 December 2019
  54. Thirty-Nine
  55. Forty
  56. Forty-One
  57. Transcript of interview with Mr Rohan Allerton, husband of Abigail Allerton: 20 December 2019
  58. Forty-Two
  59. Transcript of interview with Mr Rohan Allerton, husband of Abigail Allerton: 20 December 2019
  60. Forty-Three
  61. Forty-Four
  62. Forty-Five
  63. Forty-Six
  64. Forty-Seven
  65. Transcript of interview with Mr Rohan Allerton, husband of Abigail Allerton: 20 December 2019
  66. Forty-Eight
  67. Transcript of interview with Mr Rohan Allerton, husband of Abigail Allerton: 20 December 2019
  68. Forty-Nine
  69. Fifty
  70. Fifty-One
  71. Fifty-Two
  72. Fifty-Three
  73. Fifty-Four
  74. Fifty-Five
  75. Fifty-Six
  76. Fifty-Seven
  77. Fifty-Eight
  78. Fifty-Nine
  79. Sixty
  80. Priory Hospital North London: 20 December 2019
  81. Acknowledgements
  82. About the Publisher

And I was thinking, just not of the good things but of the horrors of a city – a city I didn’t know, at that. Traffic, sirens, congestion, crowds, the subway and the sweaty, suffocating stench of a humid, New York summer. Terrorists. 9/11! Guns! Fear oozed through my guts; it slid around my organs and fired up my heart.

‘We can’t go. No way,’ I said, and my voice came from far away, but it was too late. The panic had already gathered, a burning ball in my abdomen, scorching my insides and making sweat break out on my forehead. It swelled inside me and ballooned up towards my throat, squeezing my chest until I struggled to breathe. I grasped the counter as the kitchen swayed.

‘No!’ I gasped. ‘Just say no.’

‘But Abs…’ Rohan said. He breathed slowly in and out with his eyes closed, then pinched the bridge of his nose and shook his head. ‘I already said…’

‘You said…?’ I slumped onto the counter, my head in my hands, my mouth gasping for air.

‘Abs,’ Rohan said carefully. He put a hand on my back. ‘Breathe for me. In and out. In and out. Nice and steady. Come on. Sit down.’ He led me to a chair and I fell hard into it as my knees buckled.

‘Let’s just calm you down. You’re having one of your “moments”,’ Rohan said and I didn’t have the breath to defend myself. All I could hear was the racing of my blood as it coursed through my body.

‘I have to go,’ Rohan said quietly. ‘With or without you.’

I pushed my hand against my chest, pressing, pressing, as my eyes beseeched him: don’t go. Don’t leave me.

We stared at each other and I saw the hesitation in his eyes; the question of whether he really could leave me. After a long moment, he changed the subject, but the issue had sizzled between us ever since, an unseen echo of the stifling heat of that interminable summer.

‘Yes, darling, what did you decide?’ I asked sweetly as Meena and Mili looked at Rohan. He rubbed his moustache and peered at me through a narrowed gaze I wasn’t sure I liked. I knew he was trying to gauge whether I was about to have a ‘moment’, and weighing up how bad that would look in front of his mum.

‘Well…’ he said slowly.

Meena cocked her head at him. ‘We’re waiting!’

‘Well,’ said Rohan again, and I took a sip of water. ‘We talked about it,’ he said carefully. ‘It’s obviously something they really want me to do, but Abi can’t get away from the hospice.’