‘I think it looks beautiful.’
‘It’ll rain later. That’s a mackerel sky. Ask any fisherman, he’ll tell you.’
She reaches into the bucket, throwing grain for the chickens pecking about her feet.
We are silent for a moment. She is scrutinising me.
‘Saw you in the paper. Saw all of you, in fact. You didn’t look bad, you know. Hell, I’d have done the same at your age if the right man had asked me.’ She smiles slightly, drawing back her lips to reveal uneven, yellowing teeth. ‘Saw Marco arrived yesterday. Won’t be long now.’
Before I can ask her what she means she takes a step towards me, the bucket swinging at her hip. I back away a little, afraid.
‘He told you yet? About Ellie?’
I shake my head. ‘Who?’ I hear myself say. She laughs, dry and nasty, and turns away, walking back into the house.
When I get back to the cottage Jackie is walking in the garden with her hair wet, her phone lifted up towards the sky. She frowns at me as I walk past.
‘Can’t get a signal. I’ve only gone and brought Darren’s statins with me and left mine at home. His cholesterol will be through the roof by Sunday.’
She looks me up and down kindly and draws me to her in a bony hug I find surprisingly comforting.
‘Oh, darling. You’ve always been such a good girl. Your daddy used to say you were the apple of his pie. Do you remember how he always got it wrong?’
I nod.
‘He was so proud of you as Katie Marigold. He used to watch them all the time, although he never admitted it. Pretended it was junk.’
I nod. I remember that too. ‘Load of old rubbish,’ he’d say, ‘I don’t know why you put her through it, Marion.’ My mother, Marion, with her slantways smile, had only nodded and rubbed her fingers together – money – replying: ‘This is her university fund. Someone has to help her out, and we can’t rely on you.’
Of course by the time I’d got to university most of it had gone. The dogs and the horses and the slow spin of the fruit machines. My dad, with that line furrowed between his eyebrows.
Jackie follows me into the kitchen. I’d been to the deli and picked up fresh bread, bacon and freshly ground coffee. Jackie is still talking.
‘Marco suggested we go out for dinner tonight. We need to properly celebrate your engagement, for one thing. He’s done so much for you, been an absolute angel. And you need some food, you’re wasting away.’
‘I can’t, Jackie. Those pictures that got put in the paper. I’m so embarrassed.’
‘Nonsense. “Woman takes off clothes” is hardly news, is it? It’s your friend who should be embarrassed, the one who sold you out like that. She should hang her head in shame.’
‘Thank you, Jackie.’
‘It’s only a meal in town, love.’
‘For everything, I mean. Thank you for everything.’
I have to turn away from her because I am so close to tears, and I don’t want her to see me crying. I’m normal, remember? I need to act normal.
Inside, the knife has been washed and cleaned and put away, somewhere where I don’t have to look at it anymore. Marco is on his phone, reading the news.
‘I need you to look at these damp patches,’ I tell him, taking the milk out of the fridge. Marco doesn’t look up at me.
‘What are you talking about?’
‘In the hallway. You can’t miss them. They’re as big as I am.’
‘I haven’t noticed.’
‘Are you kidding?’
Now he looks up, blinking slowly. Shakes his head. I feel a throb of anxiety.
‘Marco, come and see. Put your phone down, come on!’
We walk through, and I look at the wall and back to Marco again. He is watching me levelly.
‘It was here. Frankie saw it too.’
‘It must have been a shadow, honey.’
He comes closer, placing the flat of his hands on the wall.
‘It’s cold, but not wet. Feel.’
I do, reluctantly. He’s right, of course. Cold but not wet. There is no musty smell of damp, no crumbling plaster. Even the spots about the doorframe which had appeared on my second night seem to have gone. I take him into the bedroom, but the walls are plain, unblemished. The lace curtain moves a little in the breeze.
‘I swear, Marco, I swear I’m not making this up.’
‘No one thinks you are, honey.’ He steps closer to me and touches my lips with his thumb. He speaks to me so quietly I am forced to lean in so I can hear what he says.
‘Do you know what happens when you’re under a lot of pressure? Something cracks. Inside you. Something cracks and sometimes what comes out is black and frightening and thick as molasses. But we’re fixing that, aren’t we?’
I think for a moment. Jackie is in the doorway, peering around the room with her blue doll’s eyes.
‘I think someone’s been coming in here when I haven’t been around,’ I tell them after an uncomfortable silence. He looks up at me.
Jackie pulls a face. ‘I had that with a plumber once. Going through my knickers and my personals while I wasn’t in the house. We only found out when he’d left. He took all my Marks and Spencers but left the Ann Summers. Darren said it proves he was a pervert.’
‘Who?’ Marco asks.
‘What?’
‘Who is coming in here when you’re not around?’
‘I don’t know. I mean, I thought it was Frankie at first—’
‘I thought you liked him.’
‘I trusted him. I do, I do like him. I don’t know.’
Marco laughs a good, solid laugh. I’m feeling stupid now, in the bright morning sunlight. I’m tired and headachy. My whole body throbs, my jaw tight.
‘Honey, I can’t accuse him without proof.’
‘Things have been—’
‘Things have been what?’
‘Moved around,’ I finish lamely, and even as I say it I feel ridiculous.
‘Well,’ Jackie says brightly, ‘maybe we can dust for fingerprints?’
‘Or, or it could be Joey Fraser. I know he’s in Cornwall. What about the other caretaker—’
‘Mr Kennecker? Come on, Stella, he’s nearly eighty.’
‘You know I met him. His story about the hospital doesn’t match with what Frankie told us.’
‘You’re paranoid,’ I hear Marco say. I catch him right at that moment, tapping his finger against his temple and looking over at Jackie. Suddenly I am angry – furious, in fact. The way they’re both talking to me: softly, softly, like I am cracked bone china recently glued together. Frankie is the same, and even Heidi, the careful way she’d looked at me.
‘Come with me,’ I snap, and lead them to the sitting room, striding with a purpose I haven’t felt in weeks. I hand Marco the note and the photograph and watch him carefully for signs of recognition – a flare in the eyes or a breath quickly drawn. There is nothing. He looks at the picture blandly, almost without interest, turning it over in his hands before handing it to Jackie.
‘I don’t know what to say, babes. I don’t know who this is, and I don’t recognise the writing. It’s creepy though.’