Finally she seemed to locate the right internal frequency and her deep eyes widened. Mummy. It was Mummy calling her name. Oh, she sounded upset, so upset, not like Mummy at all. Her brow furrowed, and she glanced

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  around as if expecting her mother to appear from one of the doors on each side of her. Expecting and wanting her to appear. Her mummy sounded so sad, and it was all her fault. Her mummy missed her. She missed her.

  The music inside started to play louder and louder, and Tabby frowned, pushing the sound away.

  Come on, Tabby. Let’s play. Let’s play hide and seek, and she’ll go away. Just ignore it and it’ll go away. Let’s play Tabby, let’s play.

  Her face furrowed in annoyance as she pushed the notes away. Why would she want to ignore Mummy? She looked at the doors, which came off from each side of the corridor that seemed to go on forever, trying to figure out where the sound was coming from. Could Mummy be in one of those rooms? How could she have gotten there? They’d played in and out of them all afternoon. Surely she’d have seen Mummy if she’d been in them. She’d explored every inch of their fairy-tale contents. Those rooms were the most beautiful and magical places she’d ever been, full of toys and sweets and princesses’ beds and clothes, each unique but equally wonderful. She couldn’t ever imagine being afraid of the night if she had to sleep in those rooms. Anyway, that didn’t really matter, because it never seemed to get dark here. It was always daytime, and it was always sunny.

  Her mother’s voice cut through her thoughts, and something in it made her insides feel funny. The music was getting louder and more insistent inside her, and she screamed at it to SHUT UP. Suddenly she wanted her mummy more than anything. More than the sunshine, more even than Mr. Pickles. She didn’t like hearing her screaming like that as if she were crying, when everyone knew that mummies didn’t cry. Mummies made everything better.

  This time when Tabby heard the echo of her name, she shouted back, shouted back with all the strength her small lungs could manage. She shouted so loudly that her throat

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  ached with the effort. The music inside was discordant and angry, sending sharp pains across her forehead, but she ignored it. Her mummy was in the room just up a bit from her, she was sure of it. Why hadn’t she answered? Grabbing the handle with both hands, she twisted it and pushed the door open. She’d been expecting to see the cool blue of the walls and the enormous toy chest open by the four-poster bed, and the shock of the change left her staring in silence for a moment at the terrible blackness across the threshold. The air that hit her was cold and stale, but it was only when she heard the wet sound of something big slithering toward her across the floor that she screamed and screamed, pulling the door towards her, desperate to shut it before whatever thing was in there reached her and sucked her in. Her eyes squeezed shut, and she held the door shut tight, tugging against the handle for a few moments until she was convinced that nothing was trying to open it from the other side.

  Small tears were running down her face—her mummy had been in there, her mummy had been in there, she’d been sure of it—and she stood frozen with fear until somewhere under the awful noise inside her, she heard the faint sound of her mother’s cries. Opening her eyes, she turned around, screaming in frustration.

  What she saw made her yell cut off midway. Things in the house had changed, just like the music that was hurting her head. The corridor was crumbling now in the new gloom, its walls and ceiling covered with cobwebs, their silky threads thick and weighed down with dead insects. It hadn’t been like this a minute ago; it hadn’t been like this at all. Her body shook as she cried, confused and terrified and just wanting to go home—please Mummy, please take me home, I’ll be good I promise—and she shrieked as a large black spider scuttled across her bare feet, pausing for a moment, its front legs waving in the air as it sensed her presence, sniffing her out.

  She pushed the wisps dangling from above that

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  threatened to trap her, out of her face, and she ran to the window that was now covered in grime, shouting and screaming for her mummy, for anyone, to see that she was in here. The garden was a dull haze, but if she looked hard enough she was sure she could see ghost-like figures moving out there. Banging on the window, jumping up and down in anxiety, she shouted again and again, her words nonsense, her small vocabulary unable to convey what she felt, just wanting someone to hear her, to look up and see her. Behind her, she was sure she could hear the spider coming back. Not just one, lots of them, and they were coming for her.

  Little Miss Muffet sat on her tuffet, eating her curds and whey. Along came a spider and GOBBLED HER UP!

  We can play hide and seek like this if you like, Tabby. You’d be amazed at what can live behind some of those doors. I can make it like this forever, you know. Now be a good girl and behave. I love you. You’re home now.

  Trying to shut the voice out, Tabby banged on the window frantically, and something fell from the ceiling into her hair. Hysterical now, she beat it out and glanced upwards. The ceiling was covered in slugs and they were dripping onto her, their small thick bodies, heavy and damp as they landed on her head, arms and shoulders. It was too much for her system to take and she slid down beneath the window frame curling into a tiny ball, her hands over her hair. Make it stop now make it stop now I want to go home I want to go home I want to go home. And she did. More than anything.

  The music was gentler now.

  You are home, Tabby. Look. You’re in your beautiful house. The one you wanted so badly.

  Tabby slowly opened her eyes, her nightdress sticking to her with sweat despite the chill. For a moment she seemed unable to breathe. The corridor was back to the golden yellow, no spiders now, no cobwebs, no slithering creatures coming to catch her. Pulling herself up on her

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  knees, she peered through the clear glass of the window. The sun was shining on the perfect lawn, and the surface of the pond twinkled back up at her. She stared for a few moments, and for a second she almost believed it, but if she stared hard enough, she could almost see the blackness under there. The blackness and the bugs. ?It’s not real,?she whispered, the loneliness eating her up from the inside. ?It’s not real.?A small mewl seeped out of her. ?I want my mummy.?A pane of glass cracked in front of her, but she didn’t flinch, just kept on staring out at the garden now empty of moving shadows. ?I want my mummy.?

  Go to sleep.

  The tiredness washed outward from somewhere deep inside her, her muscles aching as they relaxed. The tears were still silently flowing as she buried her face in Mr. Pickles’s familiar, homely smell, and waited for her eyes to start to drift shut.

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  It had been two hours since Jack had finally persuaded Kelly to leave Syracousse, and the bath and brandy he’d poured her had done little to calm her. He hadn’t really expected them to. Nothing would calm her apart from the return of her little girl. And despite his own veneer of calm and strength, it was only Kelly’s need for him that was stopping him falling apart. It seemed as if even the house ached with the lack of Tabitha. Nothing seemed right without her. Nothing.

  Kelly was staring into the flames, one hand playing with a loose strand of hair, twisting it into knots. Her voice was quiet. ?She was crying. It’s crazy, but I was sure I could hear her. So sure. I thought I could hear her really faintly calling for me, answering me. She sounded terrified.? She paused, lost in the memory, and Jack knew that even in the midst of this terrible loss, her clever mind would be analyzing it, needing to know whether it was truth or whether her own brain was deceiving her, answering her need.

  ?How could I have heard her if she wasn’t there? And what about her slipper? She’s there, I know it.?She

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  paused. ?I know it, but I just don’t understand it.?For the first time, she turned to gaze at Jack. ?Why did they make me leave? Why??

  ?They’re ripping the house apart up there. If they find anything, they’ll call. It’s better that we’re here. They need space to get on with their jobs. You know that better than most, love. Trust them.? Looking down into the golden pool of brandy, Jack’s stomach turned a little knowing that what he was saying was only a half-truth. Keery had asked him to take Kelly home because they needed the daylight to dredge the large pond, and that was something neither of them wanted Kelly knowing. If he were honest, it was something he could have done without knowing himself. The thought of those men looking for Tabby in all that murky water would keep him awake tonight. That thought, and so many others.

  He finished his drink and poured himself another from the bottle on the floor by his chair. One more wouldn’t hurt him. Kelly hadn’t really touched hers, and that was probably a good thing. He’d try to get her to take one of his sleeping pills later, and too much alcohol beforehand wouldn’t be too clever. But he’d resigned himself to a sleepless night, and he needed the calming warmth to help him think properly. To think without guilt and confusion and fear.

  Why the hell hadn’t he recognized the house in Tabby’s painting? He should have; God knows, he knew it well enough. And today, going up there, seeing it standing so defiantly after everything that had happened, had brought all the memories flooding back. There were some good ones, yes, and some great ones; there was no point in trying to deny that. But some were painful, too painful to want to revisit. And then there were the ones that were … well, were downright strange. God, he was too old for this, too old to have to go traipsing around in the past again. It was done. Done and dusted, damned or otherwise. He let out a long sigh, but Kelly didn’t notice.

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  What would she think of him if she knew? What would she and Tabby do if the whole mess were opened up?

  Do you have a secret, Granddad? A guilty secret.

  The confusion inside was making him want to scream, and he got up and went into the dark kitchen, gazing out the small window without turning the light on. The dark was the place for thinking about secrets. It was a great leveler, making distractions invisible, objects old and new, loved and unloved reduced to shadows unintrusive and unimportant. In the dark, he could forget about age and aching hips and just exist for the moment as if nothing before or after was of any consequence. When he’d been on the force, he’d done some of his best thinking late in the evening when everyone else had gone home. He’d turn the lights in his office out, put his feet up on his desk—back in the days when he could do that without thinking something was going to snap at the base of his spine—and let his brain take over. Staring out at the night sky it felt a little like that now, and the chill away from the fire seemed to make his mind sharper, more focused.

  How could Tabby have known? How could she have even known what the house looked like? Kelly and he had never taken her down there. No one ever went down there. It was a forgotten place. No one even thought about it, mentioned it. It was like a dirty secret that the town was no longer interested in. Not until that rape. What would have made Tabby go there? What would have made her paint Syracousse? It didn’t make sense.

  The only link between Tabby and Syracousse was himself. Whatever was going on, it had to be down to him in some way, and it wasn’t only Tabby who was affected. What about Jason Milburn? Someone or something had hurt him pretty badly last night, and he didn’t hold with Keery’s theory that Jason had anything to do with Tabby’s disappearance. Jason may have strayed off the straight and narrow in the past, but he’d never been like that,

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  never bad. But just what the hell had he been doing down there?

  The dark provided no answers. He turned and stared through the doorway at Kelly, and his heart felt heavy and for the first time in his life, old. Its beat was tired, an unwilling accomplice in his life. She was his baby girl. His daughter. His youngest daughter.

  Standing there watching her, seeing her so pale and upset, he felt a sudden overwhelming urge to sit down and tell Kelly everything. To bare his soul and be damned. He’d lose her; he’d lose her for good, of that he was sure. But maybe if he told her, then Tabby would come back. Crazy as it sounded, he believed that more than he believed in anything. If he told Kelly, if he sacrificed himself on the altar of the truth, then Tabby would come back. All this would stop. It would be worth it. Losing that love to see her joy when her baby came back. And in his heart he’d know that his punishment would be deserved. Would that knowledge make the loss easier?

  He felt like a man standing on the edge of a precipice, giddy eyes drawn to the tiny reflections of rocks below, wondering how large they would grow, what sharp shape they would become were he to take just one tiny forward step more, leaving land behind him and heading into the abyss. Mentally moving in a dream, he raised a foot. ?Kelly, there’s something I need to tell you.? His words sounded as if they were coming from somewhere else, somewhere outside himself, and as his daughter slowly turned her head to face him, it almost felt like he was leaving the safety of firm ground and heading into the freefall that beckoned so invitingly.

  The doorbell rang like an alarm clock going off in the middle of a deep sleep, and Kelly’s head swung round away from him, breaking the moment.

  ?That’ll be Rob.?Scrambling to her feet, she was blind to the reeling step backwards Jack took, his hand reaching

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  for the doorframe, clutching at something to steady himself mentally and physically. What was I thinking? What was I thinking to tell her today? Today of all days? Despite the heat from the fire, his hands felt cold and he poured himself another large brandy under the guise of fetching one for Rob.

  Coming into the small lounge, the writer looked tired. There were large, dark circles clinging to his eyes, and his clothes hung lethargically from his frame, disheveled and forgotten. Kelly ushered Rob to the sofa, where she sat down close to him, her face full of concern. ?How is he??

  Jack passed the young man a glass, and Rob took a long sip before answering. ?Not good.?His voice was hollow, another reminder to Jack of how the world had changed for them all with only the passing of one day. Each with their own burden of grief locked away inside.

  He slowly eased his aching, treacherous body into the chair by the fire to hear what Rob was quietly telling them.

  ?They say he’s lucky to be alive. I don’t think I’d call it lucky. He’s broken his back and fractured his skull.?He took in a long, shaky breath. ?He’s in a coma in intensive care. If he does make it, and it seems like a big if, then he’s never going to walk again.?

  Jack’s trained eye noted the tortured way Rob’s jaw twitched, and the anger hiding just below the surface of his handsome, sad face. The policeman inside, the one his body had forced into retirement, stirred. ?Do they know how it happened??

  Rob’s face twisted into a smile before his muscles lost their energy and his expression slackened into nothingness. ?The doctors said that if they didn’t know better, they’d say he’d fallen or jumped out of a third-floor window. They haven’t got a clue how it happened. I’m going back up there tomorrow morning, so maybe they’ll know a bit more then.?

  ?I’ll come with you.?Kelly’s face was determined. ?Just

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  in case he comes around. He might know something about Tabby. Maybe he saw something.?

  Rob stroked her hand. ?Don’t expect too much. Like I said, he’s in a coma.?

  ?Anything’s better than just sitting here going crazy. I’ve got to do something.?

  Jack took his moment. Kelly needed to rest, and this seemed like a good opportunity to get her to bed. ?I think you’d better go upstairs and take one of my sleeping pills. I’m not letting you go anywhere tomorrow unless you get some sleep tonight. You need it. You need to be fit and well for both yourself and Tabby.?

  Kelly frowned. ?I hate pills, and the last thing I feel like doing now is going to bed. What if someone rings??

  ?If someone rings, I’ll wake you up. They’re not going to knock you out; they’ll just help you drift off. Trust me.?

  Kelly looked at Rob, who stroked her hair. ?Your dad’s right. You need to rest if you’re going to be fit for anything tomorrow. Now go and do as you’re told, young lady.?

  Kelly didn’t smile, but acquiesced, pulling herself to her feet.

  Kelly leaned down and kissed Rob before going and kissing Jack. ?Goodnight, Dad.?

  ?Goodnight, sweetheart. Let’s hope this whole nightmare is over tomorrow. Keery will find her. I’m sure of that.?

  Kelly didn’t reply, but headed slowly up the stairs, leaving both men staring into space as if hypnotized by the fire. Neither spoke until they heard the dull sound of Kelly’s bedroom door shutting. Jack waited a few moments before sipping his brandy and leaning back in his chair. He spoke quietly, the age in his voice like gravel.

  ?So what do you think Jason was doing up at the house last night??Rob sent him a sharp, suspicious look from the sofa, and Jack shook his head quickly, a sad smile on his face.

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  ?You’re getting me wrong. I don’t think he had anything to do with Tabby going missing, don’t you worry about that. I had plenty of dealings with him back before I retired, but it was never anything serious. He did himself more damage than he ever did anyone else. I think he is just a very angry young man, not a bad man. He’s been out of trouble for a while now.?He watched Rob carefully as the writer rolled his glass in his hands, avoiding eye contact.

  ?I just wondered if you knew what he’d be doing up there. You boys were pretty friendly when you were kids, and you chatted for a while at the funeral. Did he say anything??