After four repeats of this charade, Agnes realises the dog wants her to follow him.

‘For heaven’s sake.’

She pulls up her skirts. The snow is deeper at the edge of the gardens. She will struggle to wade out there, and for what? A rabbit hole? A half-eaten squirrel? But she can hardly return to Simon without his precious dog.

‘What is it, then?’

Morpheus is barking so hard that his feet seem to lift off the ground. She proffers the box of marchpane, hoping it will tempt him out to her. It doesn’t.

Morpheus never refuses food.

Ducking beneath a snow-laden branch, she toils towards the dog. He looks half-frantic. His eyes roll.

There is a sharp, fungal smell. She glimpses the frozen earth Morpheus has uncovered and the pale tree roots writhing up from the ground.

‘What—?’

She cannot finish her question.

The box of marchpane falls silently from her grip into the snow.

Erupting from the white hill in front of her are three grey-blue fingers of a human hand.

CHAPTER 12

Sergeant Redmayne has brought company to the house this time. His fellow officers are no more courteous than the man himself; their voices bray so loudly from the parlour that they carry up the stairs and through the open door of Agnes’s bedchamber.

Morpheus has flattened himself against the landing, cowering with ears back, while Cedric pets and tries to comfort him.

‘Fancy seeing you here, sir. Again,’ she hears Sergeant Redmayne say drily to Simon downstairs. ‘And you just happened to be in the park when the lady discovered the body, too?’

Chuckles from below. One of the other officers pipes up with: ‘Quite the old beau, ain’t you?’

Agnes is grateful they cannot see her angry blush. When Simon replies, his tone is dangerously polite. ‘Yes, I was escorting my sister-in-law on a constitutional walk. And thank goodness I was. She took ill at the sight of the dead man, as any lady might.’

The police stop laughing. ‘You didn’t mention your relationship last time I called,’ Redmayne points out. ‘Said you were her physician.’

‘I act in that capacity also. What does it signify?’

‘Everything matters, sir. And where might your lady wife be?’

‘Deceased. I am a widower.’

Snow drops down the chimney and makes the fire hiss.

Agnes lays her head carefully back on the pillow. She doesn’t want to listen to the discussion taking place downstairs, but nor does she want time alone to think. Sleep is no relief. Each time she closes her eyes she sees again the frozen rictus of horror.