She hesitated, and then she said, ‘No – no – it’s all too ridiculous. It’s like some fairy story. Are you absolutely sure that’s what you saw? It wasn’t some trick of the light, something like that?’
‘Katharine, she disappeared into the wall,’ said Rob. ‘We’re going to search the house again. I was wondering if there might be some cavities behind the walls, and she’s trapped in there. It could be that Timmy’s trapped in there, too. I know it all sounds like madness, but they have to be somewhere, even if Timmy’s still stuck in Wednesday and Ada’s stuck in – well, five minutes ago.’
Katharine looked at her mug of tea, and then she stood up, walked over to the sink, and tipped it down the drain.
‘I’ll help you look. We need to find out what’s going on in this house for good and all. And I need to find out where Martin’s disappeared to, just like you need to find Timmy.’
*
They searched the house again, room by room, as thoroughly as they had searched it twice already. They looked in the wardrobes and under the beds and tapped on the walls. Rob climbed back up into the attic and Francis went back into the witching room.
‘Nothing there?’ Rob asked him.
‘Nothing visible. But there’s no question that feeling’s still there. That tension. That frisson. Otherwise – no.’
They went back down to the drawing room. The fire had burned right down to the grate, so Rob jabbed the glowing ashes with the poker and stacked three fresh logs on top.
Vicky said, ‘You’re right, Rob, we’ll have to call the police, even if they do think we’ve all gone barmy.’
She turned to Francis, who was still ruefully massaging his elbow. ‘I know you’re going to try and find out how that witching room works, Francis, but three people have disappeared now and how are we going to explain it? If we don’t tell the police, they’re going to start suspecting that we’ve got something to hide, aren’t they – that we made them disappear. You remember that case of those two young girls who were murdered in Soham, what were their names? And before the police realised it was him who had killed them, that Ian Huntley went out and helped to look for them.’
‘I don’t think that the police have a better chance of finding them than we do,’ said Francis. ‘In fact, I don’t think they’ve got a hope in hell, to be honest with you. My bicycle was stolen last month and they never caught the fellow who took it, even though I had him on CCTV. But I’m inclined to agree with you. It would look suspicious if we didn’t report them missing. The difference between us and Ian Huntley is that we didn’t have anything to do with their disappearance, so we don’t have anything to worry about. Hopefully, anyway.’
21
They were still talking when there was a loud postman’s knock at the front door.
‘Grace and Portia,’ said Rob. ‘I’ll get it.’
When he opened the door, he found Grace and Portia standing in the porch in their muddy wellingtons, looking exhausted, but standing close behind them was DI Holley, as well as another detective in a raincoat, and two uniformed officers.
‘Mr Russell?’ said DI Holley. ‘All right if we come in?’
‘What’s wrong? You haven’t found Timmy, have you?’
‘Still no sign of him yet, Mr Russell, I’m sorry to say. But we need to ask you a few questions about another matter.’
‘Really? What other matter?’
‘If we can come inside and you can find us somewhere to talk in private.’
‘Yes, of course. Come on in. Are you all right, Grace? You look knackered.’
Grace was wiping her nose on a crumpled tissue. ‘Oh, God. I don’t know how many hills we’ve climbed up and down. And it’s freezing out there. I’m just about ready to drop.’
‘Thanks, anyway. You too, Portia. Thanks. Why don’t you two go into the drawing room and get yourselves warm?’
‘We will, yes. Just let us pull these boots off.’
Rob said, ‘Come into the library, detective inspector. We won’t be disturbed in there.’
He led the way into the library and DI Holley and the other detective followed him, while the two uniformed officers remained in the hallway.
‘This is Detective Constable Cutland, by the way,’ said DI Holley. Rob gave him a nod. He thought he looked more like a local farmhand than a detective. He had jet-black short-cropped hair, bulging eyes and a chin as deeply cleft as a stag’s hoof. He also smelled faintly of stale sweat.
Rob closed the door and the three of them sat down around the library table.
‘Is your brother here?’ asked DI Holley. ‘You might want him to sit in while we talk to you.’
‘Martin? No, he’s not here just at the moment. But what’s this all about?’
‘I need the answer to one or two questions, Mr Russell, but if you lead me to believe that you’re being evasive or non-cooperative then I may be forced to give you a formal caution.’
‘Why? What am I supposed to have done?’
‘Can you account for your whereabouts between the twenty-eighth and the twenty-ninth of last month?’
‘The twenty-ninth? That was the day my father was found dead, wasn’t it?’
‘Yes. And I’m asking you if you can tell me where you were on that day, as well as the day before it.’
‘Where do you think I was? At home, in Hersham. Number fifteen, Larkwood Close. I’m an animator and I work
