She chattered away about the cat while she made the tea. Camomile. Jamie tried not to grimace when she handed it to him.

‘You know the people who used to live in our flat?’

‘Letitia and David?’

‘Yes. I don’t suppose you have a forwarding address for them? Or a telephone number? It’s just that some mail has come for them and it looks quite important.’

Mary looked at him as if she were trying to see inside his mind, to ascertain if he was telling the truth. He blinked innocently.

‘Yes, I have got their address,’ she said. ‘Postal address, not an email unfortunately.’

His heart leapt.

‘I was forwarding their mail to them. I’ll forward the mail you’ve got as well, if you want.’

‘No! I mean, no, it’s OK. I’ll do it.’

She studied him for a long moment, then said, ‘Alright.’

She picked up her address book – decorated with a picture of a fat white cat – and copied the address onto a piece of card. She handed it to Jamie.

‘Scotland?’

‘Yes. Quite a remote village, as far as I’m aware. They told me they wanted to get as far away from London and people as possible.’

That sounded very much like evidence to Jamie. Wanting to get away from people. Isn’t that exactly what you’d want to do if you’d had a bad experience with your neighbours? He sometimes fantasised about it: living in the remote countryside, among sheep and chickens, no people nearby to cause you grief. Except he was determined not to be driven out of his home. He was not a quitter.

‘Thank you for this,’ he said, holding up the scrap of card.

Before he left, Mary gently caught hold of his arm. She looked into his eyes. ‘You’re not in any kind of trouble are you, Jamie?’

‘No. What makes you ask that?’

‘You just seem a bit stressed out.’

‘No. Everything’s fine. Just got married. Baby on the way. We couldn’t be happier.’

She clearly didn’t believe him, but she didn’t push it. Instead she said, ‘If you ever need any help, Jamie, you know where I am.’ She squeezed his arm.

He hurried down the stairs.

He dialled directory enquiries and tried to get a telephone number for the address Mary had given him. The operator told him the number was ex-directory. He wasn’t exactly surprised. He Googled Letitia Pica too, but despite it being an unusual name, nothing showed up.

Okay. If he couldn’t call or email them he would have to write them a letter. He found some writing paper – the same paper they had used to write to Lucy and Chris – and sat on the sofa with a cushion on his lap.

Dear Letitia and David