He slipped out of bed, went up to his studio and checked the ceiling there. It was definitely no worse than earlier, either. He went on to check all the rest of the rooms in the house. Finally, satisfied there had been no further movement, and no cause for alarm, he went back to bed, relieved, closed his eyes and fell asleep a short while later.

When he woke again, his clock showed 7.42 a.m.

The bedroom was bathed in a weak glow. Emily was still asleep. He switched on his bedside lamp and looked at the ceiling.

And frowned.

The jagged crack had gone.

The ceiling looked fine.

He again climbed out of bed, slowly, pulled on his dressing gown and walked out of the room onto the landing. The mirrored walls either side of the staircase below were also no longer cracked.

Hurrying up the spiral stairs, he went into his studio. There was no longer a crack in the ceiling, nor in any of the windows.

Am I dreaming, he wondered? He went down and checked each of the spare rooms on the first floor and found that the cracks had gone from their ceilings and windows, also. It was the same downstairs.

Nothing.

He stood in the kitchen, staring up at the ceiling and then at the windows. Nothing. Nothing. He looked at the refectory table where, last night, flakes of plaster had fallen. There were none there now.

How could that be?

He switched on the Nespresso machine, waited for the green lights to stop blinking, then popped a capsule into it.

Am I going mad? he wondered, looking up at the ceiling again, and then at the windows. Everything looked completely normal. As the coffee machine rattled away, he walked over to the window, where there had been a massive, jagged crack last night. There was no trace of it.

‘Hi, darling!’

He turned, as Emily walked in sleepily, barefoot, swathed in a white towelling dressing gown.

He went over and kissed her. ‘How did you sleep?’

‘Like a lamb! Wow, I was just out for the count. Just as well, I’ve got a lot to do today. How did you sleep?’

He pointed at the window. ‘Notice anything odd?’

She walked to the sink and peered out. ‘There’s a whole bunch of ducks on the lake – have you seen? They must have flown in! We must buy a milk churn or some other container for feed. There’s Wishing Wells Farm at Hickstead, which sells all that stuff. We should go there when we’re not too busy.’

‘Sure. But what I mean is, the window.’

‘The window?’

He pointed upwards. ‘And the ceiling.’

She gave him a strange look. ‘I’m not with you.’

‘The cracks!’ he said. ‘They’ve gone!’

‘Cracks?’ She looked genuinely puzzled.

He waved a hand in front of her face. ‘The subsidence – we were discussing evacuating the house last night because of all the cracks. They – they’ve gone.’