Checking her watch - heavens, five to two already - Estelle told herself not to be such a wimp and braced herself for an assault on the wardrobe in the spare room. This entailed pulling a chair over to the front of the wardrobe, carefully balancing a foot on each of the rolled arms, then reaching up until she was juuuust able to grasp the dusty handle of the large blue suitcase stored on top of it.

It was the most ridiculous place to keep them. Estelle couldn’t imagine whose bright idea it had been in the first place. Now, maintaining her balance on the padded arms of the chair, she had to ease the cobalt-blue case slowly forward then tip it at just the right angle, so that it slid gracefully into her arms rather than crashed unceremoniously down onto her head.

Panting a bit with the effort, Estelle managed this. She was doing fine, absolutely fine, all she had to concentrate on now was— ohhh .. .

Falling backwards, falling backwards .. .

‘ Fuck,’ gasped Estelle, finding herself flat on her back on the floor with the suitcase over her face.

Pushing it off, she clutched the side of her head and felt the sticky warmth of blood where the metal-edged corner of the case had gouged a hole in her scalp. Oh well, at least the damage wouldn’t be visible, it was only in her hair.

At least, it wouldn’t be visible once the bleeding stopped.

Gingerly levering herself into a sitting position, Estelle brushed dust from her shirt and felt her head begin to throb. Actually, it hurt quite a lot. Having righted the chair and returned it to its original position, she was about to lug the case through to the master bedroom when the sound of the front door opening downstairs reached her ears.

Damn, damn. It was too soon for Kate to be back from the Angel, which meant it had to be Oliver.

Far too humiliated to face him, Estelle prayed it was only a flying visit home and that in a matter of minutes he’d be off again. Gazing wildly around, she realised that hiding under the bed wasn’t an option -

the gap between the base and floor was less than six inches, which was completely hopeless with a bottom like hers. Plus she’d drip blood all over the carpet.

Hearing movement downstairs and panicking, Estelle pulled open the door of the wardrobe and plunged in. The door wouldn’t close completely, thanks to the absence of a handle on the inside. But that was OK, she didn’t want to be trapped in total darkness. Breathing heavily, squashed like a sardine between a musty overcoat and one of her own ancient taffeta ballgowns, Estelle listened to the sound of footsteps on the stairs and prayed she wouldn’t sneeze.

Bloody dog, bloody animal, Oliver raged as he squelched up the staircase. How was he supposed to have known that Norris could swim? They’d been walking alongside the River Ash when Norris had suddenly spotted a mallard and taken a flying leap into the water. Oliver had experienced no more than a mild jolt of alarm but the next moment, struggling to free himself from a tangle of underwater reeds, Norris had started yelping and scrabbling in a genuinely help-I’m-drowning kind of way. In a complete panic, Oliver had promptly slithered down the steep river bank into the water. Revolting – and disgustingly cold, compared with his own heated pool – but at least he was only in up to his thighs.

That was until he had waded across to heroically rescue Norris, whereupon the bloody animal, wriggling and splashing, had freed his legs from the weeds and launched himself at Oliver, knocking him off his feet.

Spluttering, gasping and spitting out fronds of weed, Oliver had come up for air just in time to see Norris, sleek as a seal, swimming effortlessly past him with something that looked suspiciously like a smirk on his face.

Trudging back up Gypsy Lane, trailing the contents of the River Ash in his wake, hadn’t been Oliver’s finest hour. Norris, trotting along ahead of him, had begun wagging his stumpy tail as they reached the house and Oliver had lost patience with him. Shooing Norris through the side gate into the back garden, he had let himself in through the front door and made his way upstairs.

With the shower running, Oliver had already stripped off his wet muddy clothes when the doorbell began to ring. Heaving a sigh of annoyance but incapable of not answering the door – what if the bell carried on ringing? – he wrapped himself in a towelling robe and padded downstairs.

‘Yes?’ Oliver brusquely demanded of the man on the doorstep. On the driveway behind him stood a taxi with the engine still running.

Uh ... I’m back.’

‘ What?’

‘OK,’ said the man, clearly discomfited. ‘Could you just tell your wife I’m back?’

Oliver frowned. ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’

‘I’m here to pick up your wife.’

‘My wife isn’t here. There’s no one else in this house. I’m sorry, but there’s been some kind of mistake. You’ve got the wrong address.’

Oliver waited for the taxi driver to turn and leave, but the man was giving him a decidedly odd look.

‘I dropped your wife at this house half an hour ago,’ he told Oliver. ‘She said she was here to pick up a load of her stuff and that she’d need a hand carrying it out to the cab. This is where I left her.’ His eyes narrowing, he said, ‘She’s definitely expecting me.’

It was Oliver’s turn to be taken aback. Why was the man sounding so suspicious?

‘ My wife?’ He double-checked. ‘Blonde-ish? Plump-ish? About this tall?’

‘That’s the one. Disappeared into thin air, has she?’

Could Estelle be here and he hadn’t even realised? Bemused, Oliver said, ‘Hang on, I’ll see if she’s around,’ and closed the front door.

There was no sign of Estelle downstairs. Upstairs, it wasn’t until he rounded the corner of the L-shaped master bedroom and spotted the bulging black bin bags that Oliver realised the taxi driver hadn’t been hallucinating. Calling out Estelle’s name a few times and getting no response, it occurred to him that if she had come back to Ashcombe she may well have popped over to visit Marcella.

Downstairs once more, he yanked open the front door.

‘You’re right, my wife was here,’ said Oliver, ‘but she’s gone now. Look, she might not be back for a while, so I wouldn’t bother waiting if I were you. When she needs one, we’ll call another cab.’

The man didn’t leave. He backed away a couple of steps, his gaze flickering over Oliver’s towelling robe, bare feet and wet hair.

‘What’s going on here, mate? Your wife asked me to come back for her. Look, is everything all right?’

All right? For crying out loud, his life was in pieces; how could everything possibly be all right?

But Oliver knew he wanted the man to go, so he shook his head and said wearily, ‘Don’t worry, everything’s just fine.’

Clearly unconvinced, the taxi driver said, ‘Look, mate. Has something ... happened?’

Upstairs, Estelle could bear it no longer. The taxi driver, it was blindingly obvious, thought that Oliver had murdered her in a fit of rage and was taking a shower in order to wash away the evidence. If she didn’t show herself, the man would be on the phone to the police in a flash.

Creeping along the landing, cupping the side of her head so as not to leave a trail of blood, Estelle reached the top of the staircase. Her heart lurched at the sight of Oliver, standing in the front doorway with his back to her. Clearing her throat, she called out, ‘It’s OK, I’m not dead,’ and saw Oliver spin round in disbelief.

Chapter 51

Astounded, Oliver said, ‘Estelle?’

The taxi driver looked pretty taken aback too. Squinting up at Estelle through the gloom, he said,

‘Jesus, what happened to you?’

Pulling her shirt collar to one side, Estelle saw that while she’d been squashed away in the wardrobe, a fair amount of blood had trickled down her neck and soaked into the shoulder of her white shirt. No wonder the taxi driver sounded so horrified, she must look like something out of a Hammer horror film.

Unable to bring herself to look at Oliver, Estelle said, ‘I fell and hit my head. It’s really not that bad.

Look, if you could come up and give me a hand with my stuff, that’d be great. As soon as everything’s loaded into the taxi, we can be off.’

Did he do that to you?’ demanded the taxi driver.

‘Of course I didn’t bloody do it to her.’ Oliver spoke through clenched teeth. ‘I didn’t even know she was here. You heard me calling her name—’

‘Sshh,’ said Estelle, because Oliver was raising his voice. ‘He didn’t do it, I promise,’ she told the taxi driver. ‘Now, can we get my things into the cab?’

‘No,’ said Oliver.

‘Please, I just want to go.’ Estelle wondered why she couldn’t get anything right, not even leaving her husband.

‘We need to talk,’ Oliver told her.

‘She doesn’t want to talk, mate.’ The taxi driver wasn’t taking his eyes off Oliver for a second, he was on his guard should Oliver suddenly produce a machete from the pocket of his dressing gown.

‘Talk about what?’ Estelle’s eyes filled with tears, something she’d dreaded happening. ‘What a complete and utter idiot I’ve been? Thanks, but I already know that.’

Oliver shook his head. ‘Please. We need to do this properly, without an audience. Just tell him to leave, will you?’ Estelle hesitated at the top of the stairs.

‘Go on,’ said Oliver.

‘Look, love, shouldn’t you be getting that head of yours seen to? Needs a few stitches, if you ask me.’