little hedge-lined country road into a gravel driveway, the tall black gates topped with a row of spearpoints and recessed into a high stone wall set back from the side of the road. A large marble panel tastefully engraved with two words: THE GRANGE. A black metal keypad is set into the wall and I buzz my window down to reach it, the steel call button cold and smooth beneath my fingertip. The intercom buzzes and I wait, looking into the square plastic eye of a camera set above it. The camera’s eye stares back, but there’s no response. I press the buzzer again, wishing that I could have phoned ahead rather than just turning up at the gate unannounced. I can see one corner of the house from where my car is pulled in, three storeys of white stone just visible through the trees. But it’s quite a way back from the road, too far away for me to make out any movement. I’m about to press the intercom buzzer one last time when there is a click and a female voice comes through the speaker, an older woman, a single word so quiet and reedy it sounds like it’s coming from a thousand miles away.
‘Yes?’
‘Mrs Clifton, my name’s Ellen Devlin, I’m so sorry to just drop in on you like this, but I was hoping I could have five minutes of your time. It’s important.’
A pause.
‘It’s . . . not a good time at the moment.’ Her voice is flat, toneless. ‘Sorry.’
‘Please, Mrs Clifton, I would have called but I don’t have your number. I really need to talk to you.’
‘I don’t have anything—’
‘It’s about Mia.’
Another pause. Longer this time, seconds stretching out.
‘What are you talking about?’ she says finally, a trace of worry lifting it above the monotone. ‘What do you mean?’
‘I looked after Mia for a short time on Tuesday. For a few hours.’ When there is no reply, I add, ‘I met your daughter Kathryn on a train, and she asked me to take care of her.’
The voice has fallen silent again. I’ve said too much, too quickly. Damn. I lean a little closer to the intercom.
‘Mrs Clifton?’
With a metallic click, the wrought iron gates part in the middle and swing slowly open on silent hinges. I put the car in gear and make my way up the curving gravel drive with wide green lawns on both sides, edged with tall trees along the boundary wall. The drive leads into a gravel turning circle in front of a house which is every bit as impressive as the satellite image suggested it would be, a Georgian manor house in creamy-white stone, neatly-clipped lawns and gravel paths on every side, low hedges giving onto a tennis court, a large patio, an orchard off to the far side. Two large fierce-looking dogs gallop up to my car as I pull in, staring and barking, teeth bared. At a signal I can’t see or hear, they run off towards the front door.
I park next to a Mercedes with a baby seat strapped into the back and make my way to the front door, gravel crunching beneath my shoes. A tall, dark-haired woman is already standing in the half-open doorway, arms crossed over her chest. She’s in her mid-sixties, expensively dressed in grey and black, the soft lines of her face shadowed with fatigue. A small silver crucifix hangs on a chain around her slender neck. The two dogs sit at her feet, staring at me with their tongues lolling.
‘Are you a reporter?’ she says as I approach.
‘No.’
‘He told us to expect reporters, sooner or later. The detective inspector.’ She has the faintest trace of a Liverpool accent, the vowels softened but still there. She sizes me up for a moment or two, before pulling the door open wider. Her eyes are puffy and red, a balled-up tissue clutched in one hand. ‘You’d better come in.’
She dispatches the dogs back out into the grounds with a single command and I follow her down a silent hallway, my feet sinking into the deep cream carpet, into a large L-shaped sitting room with views out onto the gardens at the back of the house. Framed paintings line the walls, broad canvas landscapes and a couple of abstracts, wide splashes of colour that contrast with the dark furniture. A grand piano stands alone in the corner, abandoned, its keyboard shut. A pair of shotguns are displayed in an ornate glass-fronted case. Despite the