I take a long sip of my tea and start with my detour to Wyddial Lane last Saturday.
As simply and clearly as I can, I tell her everything. By the time I’ve finished, she’s drunk all her tea. My cup’s still full, and cold.
‘And … you told all that to the police, everything you’ve just told me?’
I nod.
‘Weren’t you embarrassed?’
‘Why would I be?’
‘It’s such a crazy-sounding story. It’s … I mean it’s outrageous.’ She stresses the word. ‘I’m not saying I don’t believe you, but I couldn’t sit there and say all that to the police.’
‘It’s not the first time I’ve been outrageous,’ I tell her. ‘Sometimes you have to do the things no one else would do to get a result. My husband only got his first job because I applied for it on his behalf. Without telling him.’
‘As his wife?’
‘No. Pretending to be him.’
‘Wow.’
I can’t tell if she’s impressed or repelled. ‘I’d shown him the advert and he’d said, “There’s no way I’d get that. I’m too inexperienced.” And he was right, he wouldn’t have got it, because he’s not the sort of person who’d really sell himself in the bold way I could tell that particular company wanted. It was obvious from their ad. So I wrote an application letter basically saying “I’m brilliant and you won’t find better” – more subtly than that. It was a great letter, if I say so myself – witty, charming, but it made the point: “I’m the best you’ll get”. And he got the job!’
‘You’re very different from me,’ says Lou. ‘I feel terrible for being here.’
‘Then why are you?’
She stares into her empty teacup. I’m starting to feel the first prickle of impatience when she says, ‘If I talk to you about the Caters, will you swear never to tell anyone that the information came from me?’
‘I can’t promise to tell nobody,’ I say. ‘If the police do end up looking into it and they come back to me with—’
‘I don’t mean the police. If there’s an official investigation, that’s different.’
‘I promise that whatever you tell me won’t lead to you losing your job. You can trust me. I’m not going to land you in any trouble.’
She nods. ‘Yesterday, you asked me about Jeanette Cater’s accent, or your daughter did.’
I wait.
‘Jeanette Cater – the woman I know by that name – has an English accent. Like yours.’
I show her the photo I took in the car park of the other woman. ‘Then who’s this?’
‘Yanina. She’s the Caters’ nanny. I don’t know her last name. I think she’s Ukrainian.’
‘And the woman you know as Jeanette – does she look a lot like Thomas, facially?’
‘Yes. Oh! I might have a photo, from sports day.’ Lou rummages in her bag. ‘I’m terrified I’ll lose my phone and then all my pictures’ll be gone. I’ve got hundreds on there. Should back them up, really.’ When she pulls out her phone, a crumpled tissue and a hair clip fall out with it. She picks them up and stuffs them back in.
I sip my cold tea while she scrolls through her photos. ‘Here we are,’ she says eventually. ‘This is Jeanette.’ She passes the phone across the table to me.
It’s Flora. Her face is flushed and she’s wearing grey and blue trainers, grey jogging trousers and a red T-shirt. There are two women standing to her right, also wearing running gear. All three of them are smiling. Two of the smiles look natural and convincing. Flora’s is the odd one out: stiff and uncomfortable, as if it’s hurting her lips to make that shape.
‘That was after the mums’ race.’
‘This is Flora Braid,’ I say.
‘Are you sure?’
‘Positive.’
‘That’s so odd,’ says Lou. ‘I wonder why she changed her name.’
Another peculiar aspect of this whole bizarre business has just struck me: many of the strangest details involve names. The Ukrainian nanny, Yanina, pretended her name was Jeanette. Either Flora’s doing the same in her dealings with her son’s school and her next-door neighbour, or else she really has changed her name to Jeanette Cater. And, since Thomas and Emily Braid can’t possibly have been frozen at the ages of five and three, then the Thomas and Emily I saw last Saturday in Hemingford Abbots must have been two different children – but their names are the same.
‘It doesn’t surprise me that Mr Cater and Yanina presented themselves to you as a married couple,’ Lou says. ‘I’ve often thought they seem like more of a unit than Mr and Mrs Cater do. I’m not saying there’s anything going on between them. They’ve never shown signs of being romantically involved, but they seem to be … together, somehow. Like, a pair.’
‘A pair but not a couple?’
‘Yes. There have been a few times when all three of them have been in school together – Mr and Mrs Cater and Yanina – and it’s as if Mr Cater and Yanina are the grown-ups and Mrs Cater’s a child, trailing along behind them. More in the same category as Thomas and Emily – like their older sister or something. And those three sort of cling together in a way that’s always struck me as a bit off.’
‘Which three? The Caters and Yanina?’
‘No. Mrs Cater and the two children.’
‘They cling together?’
‘Yes, it’s strange. Like she’s determined to protect them. She wraps her arms round them as if she’s terrified of the world on their behalf.’
‘My mind is reeling.’ Flora, terrified of the world? Terrified for her children? She never used to be. She was always very relaxed about …
About the other Thomas and Emily?
I can remember her taking the mickey out of the way her mum used to say, ‘Aren’t you worried about Thomas crawling upstairs?’ and ‘Aren’t you worried about Thomas sitting so near to where you’re cooking?’ Flora was a far less neurotic new mother than I was.
‘Have you ever heard any of them use the name Chimp, or Chimpy?’ I ask. ‘Flora, Kevin or the nanny? It might be a person’s nickname, or the name of a pet.’
Lou looks blank. She shakes her head.
‘What about Peterborough? Does that ring any bells?’
‘Not in connection with the people we’re talking about, no.’
‘Have you ever heard Flora … I’m going to call her Flora, since that’s who she is to me. Have you ever heard her say she’s very lucky?’ I’m not sure why I’m asking this, except that I’ve heard her say it twice: once on the phone outside Newnham House and once in the background, the first time Lewis rang.
‘No,’ says Lou. ‘She doesn’t look as if she thinks she’s lucky at all, though it’s clear they’ve got pots of money.’
‘That’s why you contacted me, isn’t it? You have a sense that something’s wrong in the Cater family?’
‘Yes, but … I kept telling myself that I must be wrong to think that. Since I’ve known Mrs Cater, she’s been clingy with her children, and reluctant to have conversations and interactions with anyone who isn’t her child.’