Outside, I gasped.

A layer of snow had settled, cloaking Maple Hill in a soft white blanket and enhancing the twinkle of Christmas lights on the houses. A huge, round moon hung over the rooftops, casting a silvery light, and I wanted to lie in the garden and make a snow angel.

Instead, I followed the footprints through the gate, like Bridget Jones rushing after Mark Darcy – except I wasn’t wearing animal-print knickers and a cardigan. I’d stopped to pull on my boots and parka, which was just as well as it was freezing and my face already felt numb.

‘So, here we are in the festive season, hours before I switch on the Christmas tree lights in SHIPLEY.’ Ollie was in the middle of the road, camera aloft, giving a running commentary. ‘I’ll also be judging these houses, where the lighting rivals the NASA space station. Forget Blackpool Illuminations and come to SHIPLEY, where no Christmas cliché has been ignored, from whisky-nosed Santa’ – he focused on the Lamberts’ front garden – ‘to Creepy Elf’ – he swung the camera to a house a few doors down – ‘to Rudolph the wonky reindeer.’ As he panned to the roof of Number 10, Craig made a grab for the camera, but Ollie swung it up and out of his reach.

‘At least keep your voice down,’ Craig said, and even though quietly spoken his words carried on the frigid air.

As lights came on in a couple of bedroom windows, I tried to speed up, boots crunching the powdery snow. Hopefully, I could get Ollie back inside before someone reported him for breaching the peace… again.

‘Forget the new runway at Heathrow,’ he continued, clearly enjoying himself. ‘In future, aeroplanes will land on MARBLE HILL.’

‘Maple,’ I muttered. Why couldn’t he get it right? ‘Ollie, will you please stop shouting?’ My words seemed amplified and I lowered my voice to a hiss. ‘People are sleeping.’

‘We can sleep when we’re dead!’ he shouted. A glowing Rudolph nose from a nearby garden briefly bathed his face red, so he looked like the devil. ‘Lily, you’re adorable.’ He lowered the camera and gave me a playful grin. ‘Now, keep walking towards me but try to look as if you’re out for a late-night stroll.’

I kept moving forwards, while Craig closed in behind him.

‘Maybe don’t stare at the camera like that.’ Ollie clearly fancied himself as the next Woody Allen. ‘And perhaps soften your face a bit. You look like a serial killer.’

‘I want to kill you, right now.’

He gave a burst of laughter. ‘You’re hysterical, Lils. I’ve never met anyone like you.’

‘In that case, you need to get out more.’

He pulled the camera back. ‘I like this feisty you,’ he said, eyes dancing with mischief. ‘It’s very Scarlett Johansson.’

‘Ollie, give the camera to me,’ Craig said.

With a look of surprise, Ollie swung round and slipped, and as the camera fell from his grasp, Craig deftly caught it.

‘Hey, well done, my man.’ Recovering his balance, Ollie slapped Craig on the back. ‘Knew those baseball games would come in handy one day.’

‘It’s not even switched on,’ Craig said, checking for damage. His lips looked blue with cold – though it could have been a lighting effect – and his teeth were chattering. He hugged his camera like a much-loved puppy, and the sight of his shins, naked but for a soft coating of darkish hair, made me feel a bit tearful. Or it could have been the cold, stinging my eyes.

‘Let’s go in,’ I said to Ollie, holding my hand out as though trying to coax a deer, but he ducked down and scrunched some snow between his palms.

‘Ollie, no!’ I backed away as a snowball whizzed through the air and caught me on the shoulder.

‘Catch me if you can,’ he taunted, crouching like a rugby player waiting to be tackled – if rugby players wore loafers and gold velvet jackets with silky linings.

I brushed snow off my coat. ‘Not right now, thanks.’ I’d loved a gentle snowball fight with the children at Kingswood Primary and, years earlier, I’d given Chris a black eye with a badly aimed snowball that took him years to live down. But it was almost three o’clock in the morning and more windows were lighting up.

‘Coward,’ teased Ollie. He tossed another snowball, which I managed to dodge.

‘Ollie,’ Craig warned, but Ollie’s face was bright with daring and the urge to respond was irresistible.

I gathered a handful of snow, compacting it into a sizeable ball, and lobbed it at him before he had chance to react.

It hit him square in the face.

‘OUCH!’

He reeled back, one hand cupping his nose, and, to my horror, I saw blood dripping through his fingers.

‘Oh, Christ.’ Camera swinging in one hand, Craig clutched at his hair with the other. ‘He’s got sensitive sinuses.’

‘Well, how was I to know?’ Guilt made me snippy. ‘Here.’ I fished a tissue out of my pocket, not bothering to check it was clean, and shoved it into Ollie’s groping hand. ‘He started it,’ I said to Craig.

‘I know, I wasn’t blaming you, I—’

‘I can’t believe how much that hurt,’ said Ollie, tipping his head back and pressing the tissue to his nostrils. ‘More than the punch at the book-signing, actually.’

Brilliant. ‘I’m really sorry,’ I said, hands hovering uselessly. There were vivid red spots of blood in the snow and the sight of them made me feel sick.

I began to shiver as the cold penetrated my coat and nightclothes, and Craig looked on the verge of hypothermia. Only Ollie seemed untroubled by the sub-zero temperature, as if he had warmer blood than the rest of us. ‘There are a lot of stars in Shipley,’ he said, his head tipped right back as though on a hinge. ‘You never really notice them in London. Light pollution, you see.’

‘Why don’t we go inside and have a hot drink?’ I managed, through clattering teeth. I wasn’t in the mood for stargazing.

‘Now, that sounds like a marvellous idea.’

‘It really does,’ said Craig, hugging himself awkwardly as he swayed from foot to foot.

‘What on earth’s going on out here?’

I swung round to see Sheelagh approaching, in her emerald coat and a pair of fleecy ankle boots, looking suspiciously well-turned-out considering the hour – unless she always slept in full make-up.

‘Sorry if we disturbed you,’ I said, heart sinking when I saw the look of reproach on her face. ‘Ollie was just—’

‘Oh, my goodness, what’s happened to him?’ Her hands shot out as he staggered towards her, but it was only because his eyes were still skywards and he couldn’t see where he was going.

‘I think Lily broke my nose,’ he said, the tissue muffling his voice so it sounded like he was crying.

Sheelagh threw me a horrified stare. ‘Fighting in the street in the middle of the night is not what we expect from our neighbours,’ she said, in the manner of someone who’d been let down by a favourite niece. ‘We had such high hopes of you, Lily.’

Craig jumped in. ‘Hang on, it was an accident.’ He moved between us like a referee. ‘It’s not like she hit him or anything. Well, only with a snowball.’ His lips looked bloodless, and as she clapped eyes on him, Sheelagh’s mouth gaped.

‘You’re not dressed!’ she cried. For a moment I thought she was expressing concern that he might get frostbite but, instead, she covered her eyes with her hand. ‘Wandering about naked in the middle of the night is hardly socially acceptable behaviour,’ she said, though I had a feeling that if Ollie had been in his pants, or even capering about nude, she wouldn’t have minded one bit. ‘It was a big mistake you inviting them to stay.’ She removed her hand and, thanks to the snow, the Christmas lights, and the glaring moon, I couldn’t avoid the disappointment in her eyes. ‘It’s caused nothing but trouble.’

‘I agree,’ said a voice behind me.

‘Me too.’

I swivelled round, my mouth falling open. More neighbours had emerged, some in coats and bobble hats, others wrapped in blankets, and one in a duvet, as though attending some outdoor event.

‘This was a quiet, respectable street, until he came here.’

‘Until she came here.’

‘Who’s she going to invite to stay next? One of them idiots off The Only Way is Essex?’

‘Maybe it’ll be a murderer and we’ll all be killed in our beds.’ The woman who’d spoken poured steaming liquid from a Thermos into a mug, and I marvelled that she’d had the foresight to prepare refreshments. It was Annabel from the beach, glaring from under the peak of a knitted hat. ‘You need to keep your London boyfriend under control,’ she said.

London boyfriend? I wanted to say something, but my brain felt as frozen as my fingers.

‘We don’t want any trouble,’ Craig said, smoothing the air in front of us. There was a lot of steam from our combined breaths, and the unusual lighting lent the scene an air of unreality. ‘We were just going in, actually.’

‘Ooh, I’m not talking about you, my lovely.’ Annabel threw him a dimpled smile. ‘I’m talking about lover-boy here.’

‘Lover-boy?’ Ollie’s head resumed its normal position, his gaze sweeping over what was possibly his most unreceptive audience to date. ‘Lover-boy?’ There were scraps of bloody tissue stuck to his nose and his hair had flopped into an unflattering middle parting. It wasn’t his best look. ‘I’ll have you know, I haven’t laid a finger on this lovely lady.’ He pulled me to him, causing my heels to slip so I ended up clutching at him for support. ‘I can assure you her honour’s intact.’

I knew he was trying to defend me but wished he’d be quiet. They were imitating him now, in exaggerated vowels.

‘Oh, I saaaaaaaaaaay, he hasn’t laid a finger on her, milord.’

‘Would one like a cucumber sandwich, my lady?’

Gales of laughter followed.

‘Hey, come on, that’s a bit harsh.’ Ollie let go of me and spread his arms like a preacher. ‘How would you loike it if oi talked loike you lot?’ He lapsed into a hideous Dorset accent. ‘Oo-arr, where’s me combine ’arvester?’ He hooked his thumbs through a pair of imaginary braces and did a horrible jig. ‘I’ll ’ave me a pint of zider, please, sir.’

‘Ollie, don’t,’ I said, tugging his sleeve, while Craig laid a hand on his shoulder. ‘Let’s just go inside.’

‘Better listen to your girlfriend,’ said Annabel, eyes bulging. ‘And don’t think we’ll be turning up to watch you switch on the lights tomorrow – or should I say, later today –because we won’t.’

‘Yeah, you’ve ruined that for us, so thanks.’ It was a skinny youth in a beanie hat, who looked like he might be Annabel’s son.

‘But what about the competitors?’ I glanced round, hoping to see a friendly face or two, but Celia Appleton lived at the top of the hill, and Jane and Dennis – and Doris – near the bottom, and they were probably fast asleep. And I doubted they’d be feeling friendly, once word got around that Ollie Matheson and his ‘girlfriend’ had fought in the street in the middle of the night and woken half the neighbours. ‘They’ll have to be there for the prize-giving,’ I said.

‘Oh, I’m sure we will be,’ Sheelagh interjected, glancing towards her house. I was surprised that Barry hadn’t emerged to lend his weight to the argument, but guessed his dream of beating Mr Flannery (also notable by his absence) temporarily outweighed his dislike of my visitor, and he was keeping a low profile.

‘I’m surprised at you, Sheelagh.’ Annabel gave her a filthy look, and I had a horrid vision of a street forever divided into those who’d supported Ollie’s visit, because of the competition, and those who blamed him for disrupting their peaceful lives.

I’d probably have to leave, like Isabel Sinclair had, in order for peace to be restored.

‘Listen, now you’re here, why don’t we sing a few Christmas carols?’ Amazingly, Ollie was smiling again, seemingly unaware that his bloodstained chin and jacket gave him the look of a recently fed cannibal. ‘There’s nothing like a sing-song for creating a feeling of harmony.’

‘At this time of night?’ Disbelieving looks flew around.

‘Is he right in the head?’

‘He’s definitely takin’ the piss.’

‘’TIS THE SEASON TO BE JOLLY, TRA-LA-LA-LA-LAAAA,’ Ollie sang, in the style of Pavarotti, and the pin-drop silence that followed was broken by a long, piercing wail, closely followed by another, higher-pitched wail.

‘Now, look what you’ve done,’ hissed Annabel. ‘You’ve woken the Desmond twins.’

‘Are they Shipley’s answer to the Kray twins?’ Ollie queried, feigning a worried expression.

‘They’re babies, you idiot.’ Annabel looked like she might spit at him. ‘It probably took Bella and Mark hours to get them to sleep.’

We listened to the ghostly sounds emerging from the house where Craig had interviewed the parents just hours earlier.

‘Shall I sing a lullaby?’ Ollie said.

‘Sounds lovely,’ Sheelagh whispered, resting a mittened hand on Ollie’s arm. ‘But now might not be the right time.’

‘Ollie,’ Craig said tightly. ‘Let’s go. Now.’

Annabel drained her mug. ‘Take your friend’s advice,’ she said, a frothy moustache of milk on her upper lip. ‘Because if you sing so much as a single note I’ll set Brian on you, and he’ll go straight for your crown jewels.’

‘That sounds awfully like a threat.’ Ollie seemed genuinely disturbed at the level of resentment radiating towards him. ‘Fine,’ he said huffily, throwing off Craig’s hand. ‘I’ll let you get back to your beds and do whatever it is you do there.’

‘Sleep?’ The sarcastic voice came from a figure so thoroughly wrapped in a duvet that only a pair of baleful eyes and a thatch of dark hair were visible. ‘Dream?’

Ollie gave Annabel the first properly snooty look I’d seen from him. ‘Well, I doubt it’ll be anything sexual in your case. I actually feel sorry for Brian.’ Turning, he walked away, his exit somewhat spoilt by rapid, stumbling steps as his loafers slithered on the freezing snow.

Craig and I looked at each other, and I saw the same resignation on his bone-white face that he probably saw on mine. There was nothing we could do but follow Ollie and, as we did, I pretended not to hear Annabel’s parting words, despite them being loud enough to wake the dead.

‘Did you hear that? He just accused me of sleeping with my dog.’