Vale Dean is the kind of place with no McDonald’s, two card shops and four estate agents, three of them the big chains. I stop at the last and smallest, the local independent, and head in.
I recognise the man behind the desk from the ‘for sale’ signs: Graham Hescott, a generation older than the eager young men in the other agents’ offices. I tell him I am looking to downsize and keen to stay in the area. Yes, I’ll be living alone. I don’t need to say the word divorce. He’s been working long enough to work it out.
He talks me through a few options, mostly flats in new developments, and the pricier apartments they’ve made by carving up the old Victorian mansions.
In the end I just ask. ‘And what about that big one, on Park Road – Parklands? Aren’t they supposed to be turning that into flats?’
‘Oh yes,’ he says. ‘Although they’re taking long enough about it.’ We share a disapproving look. People aren’t supposed to let houses go to rot round here. It’s not good for property prices.
‘So would it be worth me getting in touch, putting my name on a list?’
‘If you buy in early you might be able to get a discounted price,’ he says, nodding. ‘We can put you in touch with the developers. Let me see …’ He clicks with his mouse.
I wait, the fan by his desk lifting the hair on the back of my neck. He must be boiling in that suit.
‘Hm,’ he says doubtfully. ‘I’m just looking at our notes. Might be a bit tricky … building work seems to have stopped for a while.’ I know that, of course.
‘Why’s that?’
He shrugs. ‘Could be anything, really. Money running out, the bank getting nervous. Although the market is really picking up now.’ He shoots me a covert look. Don’t scare a potential buyer. ‘Of course, inheritance tax can be very expensive.’
‘Inheritance tax?’
‘People can get caught out. They don’t always like to think of it.’
‘So – the owners died?’
He nods. ‘It went to their daughter, a few years ago now. Friend of mine was their solicitor, before he retired.’
‘Their daughter?’ It can’t be the Corrigans, Nancy’s family. Surely they sold it on well before then. They’ll have moved long ago.
‘I did my best to get in touch to see if she wanted to sell, but she was rather uncommunicative. But what a decision that turned out to be. The way the market’s gone up round here, even before they turn it into flats—’ He catches the look on my face, interpreting it as distaste for his professional enthusiasm. ‘But don’t worry, Mrs Harlow, there’ll be plenty in your price range. I really do think you should have a look at this Carr Road development, it will be ready much sooner.’
‘Why don’t I take a brochure.’ I give him my friendliest smile. It feels a little unnatural. ‘But you wouldn’t have a contact for the Parklands owners, would you? I live next door, actually, and it would be very handy to be able to get in touch directly, about a few things …’ I raise my eyebrows meaningfully.
‘Oh,’ he says, put out. ‘Oh, so you’re next door, that place with the bay windows.’ I can see him trying to place me in his local map, wondering why something about that family rings a bell … in a second he’ll remember. ‘You should have said. So are you planning on selling that house?’
‘Probably. Yes, very likely,’ I say, as I see him perk up, ‘once my husband and I— Once my ex …’ I trail off, mournfully. This is so hammy. But on the scent of a big sale, he’s now eager to help.
‘Just give me a second,’ he says, typing slowly, two-fingered. ‘Ah … yes. Just a phone number. American.’ He reels it off for me, carefully, as I scribble it onto the brochure. ‘Have you got that?’
‘Got it.’ I smile again, a genuine one this time. ‘Thanks. Oh, and what’s her name?’
‘Sorry, I should have said. It’s Corrigan. Olivia Corrigan.’
At home I google the number, before I dial it. It’s a Canadian dialling code, not American, but that’s all I find out: there’s no exact match in the search results. I search for ‘Olivia Corrigan’ instead, but I lose patience as I click through the Olivia Corrigans who are too old, or too young or just unlikely: a former cheerleader in Oregon, a biochemist in Ireland. She might not still go by her maiden name over there.
What am I looking for, anyway? So they never actually sold the house, big deal. Before I talk myself out of it, I go to the phone and ring the number.
I’ve decided to be honest: I’m a neighbour and I’m trying to get in touch, to discuss the house. That could cover a lot of things. And then well, I’ll see how it goes.
I just have to know what happened to Nancy. This way, her sister can tell me and I will then know, as of course will be the case, that there is nothing that connects Nancy’s disappearance – departure, I correct myself – with my daughter’s, and this nagging voice in my mind will shut up again.
But the number goes to voicemail, an automated machine message.
‘Hello, my name’s Kate Harlow.’ I put on my best, most amenable phone voice. ‘I live at Oakhurst, next door to Parklands in Vale Dean. I believe you’re the owner? I wonder if you could get in touch.’ I leave the house phone number, saying it carefully, twice. ‘Thanks very much.’
Well, that’s done. She might not even be there any more. Maybe’s she moved.
But I can’t settle, moving about the rooms downstairs, flicking through the news programmes for the reassuring drone of politicians. When they finish, I find they’re re-running Jaws on another channel and end up watching it again. I’ve always loved monster movies, it’s reality that I can’t stomach on the screen: gritty dramas about break-ups and babies and everyday sadness.
Afterwards, I finally switch off the TV and admit what I’ve been waiting up for: for Nancy’s sister to call me back. This is silly, I tell myself, go to bed.
The wind is picking up tonight, I can hear it streaming through the trees outside. A late summer storm must be on its way, soon.
Making my way up the stairs, I jump as I see movement out of the corner of my eye. My heart’s racing even as I register the ginger fur: it’s just Tom, making a mad dash to the landing. He freezes in front of me, his eyes fixed on mine. He still gets these kittenish bursts of energy, rocketing about the house when the mood takes him.
Annoyed at my fear, I go deliberately up the stairs and pause at the window to pick him up. I make a point not to rush. ‘What are you up to now?’ I ask him. ‘You came out of nowhere, didn’t you?’
I keep smoothing his soft fur and look out over the garden, all shades of violet and grey in the night. I don’t know if I’ll ever get used to how dark it gets out here. On the lawn, the light from the window forms a paler rectangle, my shadow framed within it, stretching out to where the rhododendron bushes blend together in one dark heavy mass. I need to get them cut back, they’re getting overgrown.
Another gust of wind comes now, swaying their boughs, the whole wall of leaves suddenly lifting and moving as one. And I notice, almost idly, that one patch of shadows doesn’t move in quite the same way, that one small corner of the mass isn’t ruffled by the wind.
It’s a shadow that, I see now, is not quite the right shape as the rest, a shape, pressed into the vegetation so you almost can’t see it, that is just about human-sized.
I keep very still. There’s nothing there. It’s a trick of the eye. It must be. Or just something the gardener left when he used to come, a piece of trellis leant against the bushes, a shape that’s just about to resolve itself into something entirely harmless, a bag of leaves propped on a dustbin.
And I keep telling myself that, that it’s all fine, even as my hand reaches towards the lamp on the side table and, with a click, the landing’s in darkness. There’s a second as my eyes adjust.
The movement’s quick – just a flicker, really. I almost miss it. It’s just a small white blur in the night, a pale upturned oval tilted towards the window. In fact, the moment’s almost over before I’ve time to catch up, to quite register what I’m looking at: what’s out there in my garden.
Then the face dips down and the figure slips further into the shadows. Whoever it was is gone.
I call 999 from the kitchen phone. I don’t care if it could wait till morning. Then I grab my mobile from where it’s been charging in a corner and retreat up the stairs, to my bedroom, where the curtains are safely shut. But it feels like a long fifteen minutes before I hear the slow crunch on wheels on the gravel.
They’re not officers I’ve seen before – both in their mid-twenties, the shorter one’s beard not masking the roundness of his face – but they’re confident and businesslike.
‘There was a dark figure, not really moving … no, I couldn’t describe him … no, I didn’t see what he looked like … I didn’t see where he went.’
They dutifully note it down, however scant the detail.
They have torches, and make a thorough show of looking all around the house and gardens, checking for unusual footprints in the flower beds.
‘Does that look strange to you?’ they keep asking me.
‘I can’t really tell,’ I say, examining yet another flattened patch of soil, trying to make out the tread of a shoe.
They’ve parked their patrol car in the drive. ‘There used to be a gate.’ I feel the need to acknowledge this. ‘But we didn’t bother to get one … it’s so safe round here.’
More nods, and we make another loop round the house, the warm wind still whipping round corners. I tuck my hair into the collar of my jacket and try not to shiver. It’s not the cold.
I’ve a sneaking feeling that I’m disappointing them, unable to proffer anything concrete.
Because we find nothing. There is nobody lurking in the undergrowth, no sinister rustles of foliage, no dark figure bursting out at us as their torches light up the pink flowers of the rhododendrons.
I feel faintly ridiculous as I make them tea back inside, their uniforms incongruous against my painted French grey chairs. They give me a leaflet about home security and tell me to lock my downstairs windows, even in this heat, people are opportunistic. I know all this, I have always been careful, but I nod.
Then a thought occurs to me: ‘My neighbour Lily, she’s on her own. I don’t think you should wake her up, but do you think you could check on her house, after? It’s just up the other fork of the drive, the little cottage.’
‘We can have a look around,’ says the older one. Under the spotlights, his scalp gleams pink through his sandy hair. ‘Ten to one, if it was anything, it was some chancer passing through, checking if anyone’s home. It’s that time of year, with people still on holiday. These big houses round here …’
‘There was a break-in not too far down the road about a month ago,’ says the one with a beard cheerily. I’ve forgotten their names almost immediately. ‘The owners were away, hadn’t cancelled their milk order, too, a dead giveaway. Might as well invite them in!’
He catches a slight warning look from his colleague. ‘And of course, it may have been nothing at all. It’d be easy in the dark to mistake …’ he looks at me, too polite to say outright that I probably imagined it. ‘I wouldn’t want my mum to be living in a big house like this all alone,’ he finishes.
I manage not to laugh. How old does he think I am? Then again, if he’s in his mid-twenties, as he looks, perhaps it’s not so preposterous after all.
‘Maybe you’re right,’ I say, wanting to be reassured. ‘I didn’t get a clear look. Perhaps it was just the wind in the shadows, a trick of the light.’
‘It’d be easy to mistake,’ says the younger one, with a sympathetic smile.
But even as they start moving to go, the scene flashes in my mind again, and stays there, a picture I can’t banish, as I wave them goodbye, and shut and lock the front door: that tall, still shape in the garden, tipped by a pale oval, against the dark.
A thought occurs to me now. When I switched the lamp off the shape moved, back into the bushes.
But until that moment, as I’d stared out of the window, the light framing me in my house as I looked out? Someone was looking right back at me.