Gemma’s ghostly face, dying in front of me. Another face, smug with a legal victory that acquitted him of what Gemma and I both knew he had done. I had watched the law triumph over justice, and it tasted like ashes.

Or maybe it was my break-up with Daniel and leaving him behind that was niggling at me. He had texted last week. I hadn’t answered, then blocked his number to remove all temptation. Seeing his name on the screen made me feel physically sick. The loss of him, the hole he’d left in my life. The chasm of loneliness that opened in the wake of walking away from him, forever wondering: What have I done?

A shudder ran through me as I pushed the memories deep down. Steeled myself against them. I knew what I had done; I had left him for a good reason and I had to live with that.

I pulled the car up at the gate and opened it, drove forward, got out and closed it again. Then whistled. Out of the darkness, a huge black wolf-like creature bounded towards me. German shepherd, jet-black. Waffles.

‘Hey, boy,’ I said, ruffling his velvet ears. Waffles was a failed police dog—failed only in the sense that he hadn’t shown quite enough aggression for the job. In all other respects, he was a perfectly trained ball of energy. A mate in the Dog Squad had organised the purchase for me. ‘Car,’ I said, and Waffles leaped through the driver’s door and jumped over to the passenger seat, sitting up like a lord. In profile, his ears stood straight up, and his mane was like a lion’s.

I drove up the long driveway to the house, made invisible from the road by the grove of oaks my great-grandfather had planted after the war to mimic the gentle groves of honour springing up in towns all over the countryside. Several Pollards had fertilised French soil with their blood.

The electronic sensor spotlight did its job and light flooded the front of the house. The old cream weatherboard was showing her age, over a hundred years old now. It was a sprawling place with a wraparound verandah and weathered wooden boards that creaked underfoot. Waffles jumped out after me and stayed by my side as I walked up the four steps to the verandah. He sat politely as I unlocked the front door, then waited for me to step inside.

‘Good boy,’ I said.

The kitchen was at the rear of the house, reached via a hallway that ran from front to back. Ornately plastered Victorian arches and painted pressed-metal ceilings gave the house a grand look. Waffles’ toenails clicked on the wooden floor as he padded along at my side.