‘We’re in luck,’ he says, putting the receiver down then looking up at me with a broad smile. ‘Mr Rivers is free to show you the property at 1.30. Does that work for you?’

‘Mr Rivers?’ I try to disguise my shock. ‘You mean –’

‘That’s right,’ says Ed. ‘The vendor.’

‘Geoffrey Rivers is going to show me round the house?’ I say slowly, still unable to grasp the sudden turn of events.

‘Er, yes,’ says Ed, his smile fading slightly. ‘At 1.30 this afternoon. Is that okay with you? I mean, I know it’s not usual but –’

‘It’s great,’ I say, fixing him with my widest smile. ‘1.30 is perfect.’

‘Wonderful,’ he says, the brightness returning to his face. ‘Now let’s just give you the details you need.’

I watch as Ed scribbles down directions on a piece of paper and hands it to me.

‘It’s very easy to find,’ he says. ‘From the high street head north, then take a right on to Flask Lane, then …’

His voice dissolves into a kind of aural soup as I sit there, staring into space.

This is it. I’m going to Holly Maze House.

Twenty minutes later I’m walking up the cobbled driveway. My heart lifts as I pass the rows of topiary animals that line the path. The cockerel, the squirrel, the frog and the rabbit; they are real after all.

I stand at the door, which is flanked by two stone griffins – when the dead walk the earth the griffins shall rise – and look up at the crest above, the year 1647 carved in stone.

This is it, I tell myself as I lift the brass knocker, there is no going back.

I wait a few moments, then hear footsteps behind the door. It swings open and an old man with thinning white hair, rheumy eyes and a stout belly stands in front of me. He looks startlingly different from the dapper figure with dark curls and piercing blue eyes who had been a regular on the chat-show circuit in the nineties, yet when he speaks there is no doubt that this is the person who enchanted a generation of children with his ghostly tales.

‘You must be Iris!’ he says, his voice low and honey rich. ‘I’m Geoffrey. Do come in, dear.’

I follow him inside and, as I step into the grand entrance hall, the years fall away and I’m ten years old again. Like the driveway, everything in this hallway is just as it had been described in the books. The heavy tapestries hanging on the stone walls with their carefully embroidered winged angels and lean deerhounds, the suit of armour, polished to perfection, standing guard in the centre of the room, the black iron candelabra chandelier on the ceiling with real candles wedged into its spikes. It is comforting and disconcerting in equal measure.