‘Oh that,’ she says, playing down her swimming incident. As she feared, it’s become the talk of the village: the incomer who forgets how to swim and has to be rescued by the lifeboat. At least he hasn’t heard about her being nearly run over by a car today. No doubt news of that incident will soon be percolating through the village. ‘I’m fine now,’ she adds. ‘And Stretch is good. My friend Bex – she took him out earlier. Thanks, though.’

‘No problem,’ Mark says, turning to go. He pauses. ‘Did I see Rob just now?’

Kate’s heart misses a beat.

‘Rob? I don’t think so,’ she says, managing a thin smile. ‘He had to go back to London yesterday.’

‘That’s what I thought.’

She’d told Mark as much when she dropped Stretch off at the gallery before her ill-fated swim.

‘Where did you see him?’ she asks, failing to sound casual.

‘I must have mistaken him for someone else. I just thought I saw him driving past, out the top of the village. Gave him a friendly wave.’

‘In a Tesla? Like that one?’ she asks, nodding at the car parked on the drive.

‘Yeah, a Model S, just like that one.’

Mark knows his electric cars. He was one of the first in the village to get one. It wasn’t a Tesla though. There aren’t any other Teslas in the village, even during the holiday period. Kate’s has been sitting on the drive all day – at least she thinks it has. She was out for a few hours with Hart and Strover, but the car is where she left it when she returned from Truro yesterday. What worries her is that Rob said recently that he was planning at some point to buy a second Tesla, identical in every respect, for his use in London. He’s like that. When he finds something that’s right for him, he sticks with it. Cars, trainers, tennis racquets, Italian coffee. If he had a wine cellar, it would be full of identical wines.

‘When was this again?’ she asks.

‘About an hour ago,’ Mark says. ‘Hey, listen, I must have got it wrong. Rob normally waves back anyway. This guy sped past, so I made a note of the number plate, in case it had been stolen. You know me.’

Kate tells herself to calm down as she takes the scrap of paper that Mark gives her and closes the door. Rob is in London. She spoke to him earlier. Mark is right. It’s just a mistake. He’s a member of Neighbourhood Watch, inclined to be over-cautious. But then she remembers the woman who approached Rob at Truro station.

‘Everything alright?’ Bex says, coming back down the corridor from her room.

‘I need another drink.’

37

Jake