“Did you meet anyone?”

“I don’t know. Maybe. I can’t think. I go every day, so things blur together.”

“And after your swim?”

“I went back home.”

“Did you leave again?”

“I think I did, but I don’t know for sure anymore. People have asked me so many questions that I can’t tell things apart.”

“What did you do in your house?”

“Not much. I can’t really remember.”

“Did you speak to anyone on the phone?”

“No.”

“Or send any texts, or use your computer—you have a computer?”

Tabitha nodded. “I didn’t do any of that.”

“Did you send emails?”

“I don’t think so. I might have done some work.” She knew she hadn’t worked. It had been one of those terrible days when she simply had to survive.

“So you have no clear memory of what you did during that day?”

“No.”

“But you remember Andrew Kane coming round?”

“Andy, yes.”

“Tell me about that. Be careful, take your time.”

Tabitha wondered why she kept saying that: “Take your time.” Anyway, it didn’t matter. She had so much time.

“He knocked on the door. I was in the main room and I opened the door. Or maybe he opened it himself. It was already dark and very cold. I remember the icy wind rushing in. He was all wet. He was dripping onto the floor.”

“Were you expecting him?”

“No. But he often just comes round.” She saw the questioning look on Mora Piozzi’s face. “He’s helping me with the house. It was a wreck when I moved in, back in November, and we’re doing it up together. I pay him by the hour and he fits me in between other jobs. We were going to lay some floorboards the next day and he just wanted to check on everything.”

She stopped and took a deep breath. This was where her memory became clear, like a shaft of light in the gloom.

“He went outside to the shed where the planks were stacked and I heard him call out. I don’t know what he said, maybe it wasn’t even words. I went out to him, and he was sprawled on the ground inside the shed, on top of something.” She swallowed hard. Her throat was tight. “I bent to help him and I felt something wet and sticky, it was everywhere, and I pulled him to his feet and he kept saying, ‘Oh God, oh God,’ over and over. I think he was crying.”

Tabitha stopped but Piozzi didn’t speak, just waited, her eyes narrowed.