there an attic? It seemed improbable that someone could have entered through my room, but I could hear the footsteps from above.
Shivering, I tiptoed back into my own room and flicked the switch on the lamp by my bed. It didn’t turn on.
I swore, Mr. Wrexham. I’m not too proud to admit it. I swore, long and loud. I had turned that light off by the switch, so why the fuck wouldn’t it turn back on by the switch? What kind of sense did this stupid lighting system make anyway?
Furiously, not caring about the music or the heating system or anything else, I mashed my hand against the featureless panel on the wall, bashing randomly at the squares and dials as they illuminated beneath my palm. Lights flickered on and off in closets, the bathroom fan came on, a brief burst of classical music filled the air and then fell silent as I jabbed at the panel again, and some unseen vent in the ceiling suddenly began to blow out cold air. But finally, the main overhead light came on.
I let my hand fall to my side, breathing heavily but triumphant. Then I set about trying to open the locked door.
First I tried the key to my bedroom door, which Sandra had shown me, tucked away on the doorframe above the door, like the others. It didn’t fit.
Then, I tried the key to the wardrobe on the other side. It didn’t fit either.
There was nothing above the doorframe except a little dust.
Finally, I resorted to kneeling down and peering through the keyhole, my heart like a drum in my breast, beating so hard I thought I might be sick.
I could see nothing at all—just unending blackness. But I could feel something. A cool breeze that made me blink and draw back from the keyhole, my eye watering.
It was not just a cupboard inside that space. Something else was there. An attic, perhaps. At the very least, a space big enough to have a draft and a source of air.
The footsteps had stopped, but I knew that I would not sleep again tonight, and at last I wrapped my duvet around myself and sat, my phone in my hand, the overhead light blazing down on me, watching the locked door.
I don’t know what I was expecting. To see the handle turn? For someone—something—to emerge?
Whatever it was, it didn’t happen. I just sat there, as the sky outside my window began to lighten and a thin lemon-yellow streak of dawn crept across the carpet, mixing with the artificial light from above.
I felt nauseous with a mix of fear and tiredness, and dread of the day ahead.
At last, when I heard a low fractious wail come from downstairs, I loosened my grip on my phone, flexed my stiff fingers, and saw that the display said 5:57 a.m.
It was morning. The children were waking up.
As I crawled from my bed, my hand went up involuntarily to touch my necklace—but my fingers grazed only my collarbone, and I remembered that I had taken it off that first night, spooling it on the bedside table, just as I had done before the interview.
Now, I turned to pick it up, and it wasn’t there. I frowned and looked down the back of the little nightstand. Nothing. Had Jean McKenzie tidied it away?
The wail from downstairs came again, louder this time, and I sighed and abandoned the hunt. I would look for it later.
But first I had to get through another day.
* * *
Coffeemaker—preloaded with beans and connected to mains water. Operated via the app, select “Appliances” from the menu, then “Baristo” and then choose from the preprogrammed selections or customize your own. If beans logo shows, the hopper needs to be refilled. If the ! error logo shows then there is either a Wi-Fi issue, or a problem with the water pressure. You can program it to dispense at a particular time every day, which is great for mornings, but of course you must not forget to put a cup underneath it the night before! The preprogrammed selections are as follows—
Jesus. I had confined myself mostly to tea since getting here, mainly because the coffeemaker was so extremely intimidating—a chrome beast of a thing covered with buttons and knobs and dials. Sandra had explained when I arrived that it was Wi-Fi enabled, and app-operated—but Happy was proving to be the least intuitive system I had ever encountered. However, after my sleepless night, I had decided that a