You progressed rapidly after that, moving first out of intensive care and soon, in a matter of days, there was talk of your coming home. All the tests came back clear. The bleed dispersed, the swelling subsided and your brain function was normal. The doctors spoke, some more robustly than others, of a full recovery.

I agreed, at last, to leave you for a few hours each day and for much of the night to go home to shower and change my clothes and sleep. It was during one of those brief returns to the house that a pair of police officers turned up and began asking questions about the accident.

‘So the driver, Ella Hicks, I understand she’s your ex-husband’s partner? Did she often have sole charge of your daughter?’

The police officer speaking was middle-aged, her torso further thickened by body armour and an arsenal of equipment. Something in her manner made me anxious.

‘Not often.’ I shook my head, vehement. ‘If I’d known she’d take Gracie out on her own, I wouldn’t have agreed. I thought she’d be with her father all weekend.’

The police officer narrowed her eyes. ‘Why wouldn’t you have agreed?’

‘Well, she has no business. I mean, Gracie’s not hers.’

They both scrutinised me. A young Asian policeman sitting beside me, his hat on the carpet at our feet and his leather gloves inside it, made a note. He kept quiet, the more junior of the two.

‘I understand that.’ The policewoman leaned forward, probing. ‘But why would you have objected to her looking after your daughter? Was there anything about her driving specifically that gave rise to concern?’

I searched my mind, trying to think of something.

‘Not really.’ I thought of Ella, confident behind the wheel, risking your life. ‘But I don’t trust her.’

‘You don’t trust her?’

‘No. And I’m right not to. She nearly killed Gracie.’

The policewoman’s eyes bore into me, appraising.

‘You seem to blame Ms Hicks for the collision. I wonder why?’

I felt myself flush. Because I don’t like Ms Hicks. Because she broke up my marriage and stole my husband. Because she’d do anything she could to hurt me.

I shrugged. ‘She was the one driving.’

Her eyes stayed on my face. Beside her, the Asian police officer was alert, his pen poised.

I reached for the mug of tea on the coffee table in front of me and drank a little. My hands shook and the china juddered against my teeth. I used both hands to put it down again.

‘There’ll be a coroner’s inquest, of course. But it should be straightforward.’

‘An inquest?’ I shook my head. ‘Does that mean she’ll face charges?’

‘It’s standard procedure, ma’am. When there’s a fatality. We need to establish the cause of the accident.’

The young Asian flipped his notebook closed and reached for his gloves, his hat.

‘I’m sorry. I know it’s a difficult time.’ The senior officer put a business card on the table beside my mug as she heaved herself to her feet.

‘Who was she?’ I asked. ‘The other driver.’

‘Vanessa Parkes. Twenty years old.’

‘Twenty?’ It shocked me. She was so young. ‘A student?’

‘An estate agent.’

I couldn’t answer. I thought of her mother. Of the call from the police, breaking the news.

‘We’ll see ourselves out.’

I sat very still, following the creak of the floorboards in the hall, the heavy sound of their footsteps, the squeeze of the latch as they closed the door behind them and went down the path to merge with the early evening darkness gathering there.

At once, the house was too silent. I sat on the settee, my legs trembling, unable to move. Neither of them had touched their tea and I wondered why they’d asked for it, if there were some hidden trickery in keeping me busy in the kitchen while they lingered, unobserved, in here.

Finally, I forced my legs to take me upstairs to wash and change before I headed back to the hospital. Your room was hollow with emptiness. I sat for a while in the battered old armchair in the corner and simply looked. Then I made up your bed with clean sheets and arranged the mess of soft toys at the bottom of your bed – kitty cat, puppy, rabbit, bear – all waiting for you to bring them back to life.