driveway. He raises a hand in apology and steps to one side. The car draws level and the driver window lowers.
‘Help you?’ The man behind the wheel is older than Joe, tall and thin, wearing a tweed jacket and green tie.
‘Sorry.’ Joe has nothing prepared.
‘You don’t look like you’re casing the joint, but we’ve had a spate of break-ins recently and we’re at the point of calling the police first, asking questions later. If we’re really worried, we activate neighbourhood watch. There’s a signal on the roof.’
Joe glances towards the roof of the house and can see nothing but a satellite dish. When he looks back, the driver’s face has the pleased-with-himself look of someone who has cracked a good joke.
Joe takes his hospital ID from an inner pocket. ‘My name’s Joe Grant,’ he says. ‘A patient of mine lived in number twenty-two some years ago and frankly, I’m not sure why I’m here. Sorry to have bothered you.’ He turns to walk back to his own car.
‘How many years?’ the man calls after him.
Joe hesitates.
‘Twenty-five, by any chance?’
Joe says nothing.
‘Come on up,’ the car driver invites. ‘I’m twiddling my thumbs right now and not about to turn down a chance to talk about the murder house.’
* * *
The car driver, whose name is Elwin Black, lives at number 24.
‘The houses are twins,’ he tells Joe, as they enter through a rear door. ‘I can show you round, if you like. You’ll get the idea of the layout. Coffee?’
‘Thanks,’ Joe says.
Black is an academic. His kitchen is piled high with books and files and papers. Maps and charts are pinned onto every available stretch of wall and Post-it notes are scattered across the room as though a paper machine has exploded. Joe steps closer to a series of photographs and starts back. The crime scenes depicted are lurid and explicit.
On the kitchen table is an old-fashioned manual typewriter. An ashtray overflows with cigarette stubs. There are sticky rings and two unwashed glass tumblers.
‘I have three rooms in this house that I’ve tried to use as studies,’ Black says. ‘And this is the only place I can work.’
As his new friend pours water and ground coffee into a machine, Joe sees a long narrow garden beyond the window. The door to the rest of the house is open and Joe can see a hallway with black and white square tiles, a wide staircase and a wood-panelled, under-stairs cupboard.
‘How long have you been here?’ he asks, when the coffee arrives.
‘Twelve years. Three different families have lived in number twenty-two in that time. No one ever stays long. Splash of bourbon in that?’
Joe declines. ‘I can’t talk about my patient,’ he says. ‘You do understand that, don’t you?’
‘’Course.’ Black invites him to sit and takes the stool opposite. ‘What do you want to know?’
‘Why do you call it the “murder house”?’
‘Bloke went mad and killed his family. Cut his wife to pieces and then did the same thing to his little girl. Then he killed himself.’
Joe feels his breakfast churning in his stomach. He thinks he might, actually, be about to throw up on a stranger’s kitchen floor.
‘Actually,’ he says. ‘I will have a splash of bourbon. Thanks.’
‘Thought you might.’ Grinning, Black sloshes some amber liquid into Joe’s cup. Joe drinks. The burning liquor has an instant, calming effect. ‘That’s quite a story,’ Joe says, when the immediate threat of vomiting has passed. ‘Is this common knowledge?’
‘Absolutely. There are ghost tours of old Salisbury. Tourist things, and they usually include a visit here. Nice little earner for me.’
‘Do you know the name of the family?’
‘Lloyd. Struck a chord with me because my mother’s maiden name was Lloyd. Her family came from the valleys.’
‘And they all died? No survivors?’
Black shakes his head, and the tiny smile doesn’t leave his face. ‘Bodies all found in the under-stairs cupboard.’
* * *
It is pouring with rain when Joe arrives back in Cambridge and he is soaked to the skin by the time he reaches Torquil’s boat. The cabin smells of the river and of fried onions.
‘Well, that can’t be right,’ Torquil says, when Joe has finished his story. ‘Felicity’s still alive. Was there a sibling?’
‘Who knows? To be honest, I suspect a combination of Chinese whispers, overactive imagination and love of an audience,’ Joe says. ‘The guy gets money from showing people around his house so it’s in his interests to make it as lurid as possible. But there must be some truth in it. Felicity has