‘Found it where?’
‘I was at home one day on my own, ill. I had a temperature and had the day off school. No one else was there. Mum said she’d come back from work early and she left me a sandwich by my bed. I couldn’t read because my head hurt, but I couldn’t sleep either, and I just lay there listening to sounds in the street. Then there was a clatter and someone pushed something through the letterbox but I thought it would be junk mail or something. Then later, when I needed the bathroom, I saw it from the top of the stairs and I went down and picked it up and saw –’ She gave a small shudder and came to a halt, staring up at Karlsson.
‘You’re saying that someone pushed this through the letterbox?’
‘Yes.’
‘Cut up like this?’
‘Yes. It scared me. I don’t know why, but I just had to hide it.’
‘And it was done during the day, when normally no one would have been there?’
‘I had the flu,’ she said defensively.
Karlsson nodded. He was thinking that on any ordinary day it would have been Ruth Lennox who found the mutilated doll. A message. A warning.
This time Sadie had not put on any makeup or perfume. She had arrived early and ordered a tomato juice, and greeted Karlsson as if he was a business colleague. He bent down to kiss her cheek, which she turned away from him so he kissed her ear instead.
‘Get yourself a drink if you want. Then we can talk.’
He went and bought himself half a pint of beer, then took the chair opposite her. ‘I don’t know what there is to say,’ he began. ‘I behaved like an idiot. I’ve always liked you, Sadie, and I didn’t want to mess you around.’
‘But you did mess me around. If I’d known you just wanted one quick fuck on your night off, I wouldn’t have let you near me.’
‘I’m sorry.’ There was a silence and she regarded him coolly. He found himself talking, to fill it and to bring some warmth back into her unyielding face. ‘The thing is,’ he said, ‘I’ve been a bit wretched.’
‘Lots of us are a bit wretched.’
‘I know. It’s not an excuse. My children – Mikey and Bella, you met them when they were younger – they’ve gone away with their mother.’
‘Gone away – for a holiday, you mean?’
‘No. She’s got this new man – she’s going to marry him, I guess, so he’s really their step-father – and he got a job in Madrid and they’ve gone there. The four of them, the happy family.’ He heard and hated the bitterness in his voice. ‘So they’ve gone away for two years. I’ll see them, but it won’t be the same. Well, it hasn’t been the same since they moved out, of course. I kind of lost them then, but now I feel I’ve really lost them. And now that they’ve gone, I …’
He stopped dead. He suddenly found he couldn’t continue, couldn’t tell Sadie that he didn’t really know what his life was about any more. That he woke each morning and had to make an effort to face the world.
‘I thought I could fill the gap a bit,’ he said lamely. ‘Just to get through.’
‘Fill the gap with me?’
‘I suppose so. I feel detached from everything, as if everything is happening to someone else and I’m watching it, like in a film. So when I woke that morning and saw you lying next to me, I just – well, I knew I’d made a mistake and I wasn’t ready for you or anyone.’
‘So that’s it?’
‘Yes.’
‘You should have thought about it before.’
‘You’re right.’
‘I’m a person, me. Someone you used to call a friend.’
‘I know.’
‘I’m sorry about the way you’re feeling. It must be hard.’ She stood up, her tomato juice unfinished on the table.
‘Thank you for being honest with me, in the end. If you ever feel in need of comfort again, call someone else.’
Frieda arrived back at her house just before Sasha. She called Josef, who said he would go round to Olivia’s immediately, put bolts on the front and back door and change all the locks the next morning. Then she called Karlsson, but only got his voicemail. She didn’t leave a message – what would she say? ‘I think Dean Reeve was in my sister-in-law’s house last night’? He wouldn’t believe her. She didn’t even know if she believed herself, but dread washed through her.
Sasha arrived just after eight, bearing a takeaway, steam rising from the bag. She was wearing a loose orange dress and her hair was soft around her face. Frieda saw that her cheeks were slightly flushed and her eyes bright. She pulled naan bread out of a damp brown paper bag and laid it on a plate. Frieda lit candles and pulled a bottle of wine out of the fridge. She thought how strange it was that even in front of Sasha she could so successfully conceal her distress and fear. Her voice sounded steady; her hands as she poured wine were steady.
‘Is Chloë still here?’
‘Yes. But she’s seeing her father tonight so I have the house to myself for once.’
‘Do you mind?’
‘I don’t think I had a choice.’
‘That wasn’t the question.’
‘Sometimes I come in,’ Frieda said, ‘and she’s made herself completely at home. Mess everywhere. School stuff slung every which way. Dirty dishes in the sink. Sometimes her friends are here as well. Not to mention Josef. There’s noise and chaos and even the smell is different. And I feel like an intruder in my own home. Nothing belongs to me in the same way. It’s all I can do not to run away.’
‘At least it’ll soon be over. She’s only here for a week, isn’t she?’
‘That was the agreement. This looks good. Wine?’
‘Half a glass. So I can clink it against yours.’
They sat at the table facing each other and Frieda lifted her glass. ‘So, tell me.’
Sasha didn’t lift hers, just smiled radiantly. ‘Do you know, Frieda, the world seems sharper and brighter. I can feel energy pumping through me. Every morning I wake up and the spring outside is inside my body as well. I know you’re anxious that I’ll let myself get hurt again – but you’ve met Frank. He’s not like that. And, anyway, isn’t that partly what falling in love is? Opening yourself up to the possibility of feeling joy and being hurt? Letting yourself trust? I know I’ve made mistakes in the past. But this feels different. I’m stronger than I used to be, less pliable.’
‘I’m very glad,’ said Frieda. ‘Really.’
‘Good! I know you’ll like each other. He thinks you’re terrific. But I’m not just here to gush about Frank, like a teenager. I’ve got something else I need to say. I haven’t told anyone else but –’
The doorbell rang.
‘Who can that be? It’s too early for it to be Chloë and, anyway, she has a key.’
The bell rang once more, and then someone knocked. Frieda wiped her mouth on the paper napkin, took a gulp of wine and stood up. ‘Whoever it is, I’ll send them away,’ she said.
Judith Lennox was standing at the door. She was wearing an oversized man’s jacket and what looked to Frieda like jodhpurs. Dora was beside her, her long brown hair in a French plait, her face pinched and pale.
‘Hello,’ Judith said, in a small voice. ‘You said I could come.’
‘Judith.’
‘I didn’t want to leave Dora alone. I thought you wouldn’t mind.’
Frieda looked from one face to the other.
‘My dad’s gone out drinking,’ said Judith. ‘And I don’t know where Ted is. I can’t spend any more time in the house with Aunt Louise. There’ll be a second murder.’
Dora gave a strangled sob.
‘You’d better come in,’ said Frieda. She didn’t know which feeling was stronger – pity for the two girls on her doorstep or a stifling sense of anger that she had to look after them.
‘Sasha, this is Judith and Dora.’ Sasha looked up, startled. ‘They are friends of Chloë’s.’