Morris shook his head. “Nadia…”

“Shhh,” I said, as if to a small child. I was almost talking to myself now and I didn’t want my reverie interrupted. “When I went to the flat with Louise-that’s Zoe’s friend-it was amazing. It was almost as if she had already been my best friend, as if we recognized each other. It was so funny when she talked of going shopping with Zoe on that last afternoon; it was almost as if she had been talking of a shopping expedition that we had made together. She felt it too. I could tell.”

And at that moment, quite suddenly, the fog lifted and the landscape was there-there it was-cold and hard in the sunshine and I could see it. There was no doubt. I had been going over the forensic file in my mind ever since I had seen it.

“What is it?”

I started. I had almost forgotten Morris was there. “What?” I said.

“You don’t seem quite here,” he said. “What were you thinking?”

“I was thinking,” I said, “that when Zoe was killed she was wearing a shirt she had just bought with Louise. Funny, isn’t it?”

“I don’t know,” said Morris. “Tell me why it’s funny, Nadia. Tell me.”

“Pity to mess it up,” I said.

Morris gazed at me as if he was trying to see inside my mind. Did he think I was going a bit mad? Good. I leaned over the table and took his hand. It felt clammy. Mine felt cool and dry. I held his right hand between my two hands and squeezed it.

“Morris,” I said. “I’d love some tea.”

“Yes,” he said. “Yes, of course, Nadia.” He was smiling and smiling. He couldn’t stop.

He got up and walked out of the room. I looked across at the front door. There were several levers and knobs. Then fifty or sixty yards down the deserted road; no one about. I stood up and walked over to the cork notice board.

“Can I help?” I shouted.

“No,” he shouted from the kitchen.

I looked at the notice board. Below it was a writing desk with drawers. As quietly as I could I opened the first. Checkbooks, receipts. I opened the second. Postcards. The third. Catalogs. The fourth. A pile of photographs. I picked up a couple. I knew roughly what I was going to see, but still I gave a shiver of horror. Morris and someone and someone and Fred. Morris and Cath and Fred. Morris and someone and Fred. I put one of them in the back pocket of my jeans. Maybe it would be found on my body. I closed the drawer and went and sat down at the table. I looked around. It would have to do. I cleared my mind. No, that’s wrong. I didn’t clear my mind; I filled it. I made myself think of the photograph of Jenny dead. I made myself think of every detail. What would Jenny do if she were sitting where I was sitting?

Morris came in, somehow managing to hold a teapot, two mugs, a carton of milk, and a packet of digestive biscuits. He put them on the table and sat down.

“Hang on a second,” I said, before he could pour. “I want to show you something.” I stood up and walked round the table. “It’s a sort of magic trick.”

He smiled at me once again. Such a nice smile. He looked happy, excited. The excitement was like a light behind his eyes.

“I don’t know very much about magic,” I said, “but the first thing you learn is you never tell your audience in advance what you are going to do. If it goes wrong, then you can pretend you did it on purpose. Look.” I took the lid off the teapot and then lifted the pot and then very quickly threw it into his face. Some of it splashed on me as well. I didn’t even feel it. He let out a howl like an animal. In the same movement I reached for the iron. I took it in both hands. I had one chance and I had to do real damage. He was clutching his face. I lifted the iron up and then brought it down with all my weight on his right knee. There was a cracking crumbling sound and a further scream. He crumpled and slumped off the side of his chair. What else? I thought of the photograph. I felt white hot, glowing, like a poker. His left ankle was exposed. I brought the iron down again. More cracking. Another scream. I moved back but as I did so I felt a hand clutching my trousers. I raised the iron again but as I pulled back the grip fell away.

I moved back out of his reach. He was lying sprawled on the floor, twisted, whimpering. What I could see of his face was a livid blistering red.

“If you move one inch towards me,” I said, “I’ll break every fucking bone in your body. You know I’ll do it. I’ve seen the pictures. I’ve seen what you did to Jenny.”

But still I moved backward, never taking my eyes off him. I glanced around quickly and found the phone. Still with the iron in my hand, the cord trailing on the floorboards, I dialed.

TWENTY-TWO

I put the receiver down and stood there, as far away as it was possible to get from him in that room. He was still slumped on the floor groaning and wheezing. I wondered if he was gathering his strength, if he would raise himself to his feet and come at me. Should I go back to him and hit him again? Should I run to the front door and out? I couldn’t move my feet. There was nothing I could do. Suddenly I started to tremble in every bit of my body. I leaned back against the wall to try and steady myself.

I saw some traces of movement, tentative at first, then more purposeful. He was pulling himself up, groaning with the effort. I quickly saw that there was no prospect at all of his getting up. His legs were clearly useless. All he could do was drag himself, whimpering with the pain, so he was leaning against the bookshelf. He pushed himself up a bit farther and twisted so he could look at me. He was really badly burned on his face, blistered across his cheeks and forehead. One of his eyes was almost closed. Saliva was spilling out of his mouth, running down his chin. He coughed.

“What’ve you done?”

I didn’t speak.

“I don’t understand,” he said. “I didn’t do it.”

I took a firm grip on the iron.

“One move, and I’ll smash some other bit of you.”

He shifted slightly and cried out.

“Jesus.” He panted. “It hurts so fucking much.”

“Why did you do it?” I said. “She had children. What had she done?”

“You’re mad,” he said. “I didn’t do it, I swear, Nadia. They told you. I was a hundred miles away when Zoe was killed.”

“I know,” I said.

“What?”

“I know you didn’t kill Zoe. You were going to but you didn’t. You killed Jenny.”

“You’re wrong, I swear it,” he said. “Oh God, what have you done to my face? Why did you do that to me?”

He was crying now.

“You were going to kill me. Like you killed her.”

I was having difficulty in speaking. My breath was coming in uneven gasps, my heart beating hard.

“I swear, Nadia,” he said in little more than a whisper.

“Shut the fuck up. I’ve seen the pictures. In the drawer.”

“What?”

“Of you and Fred, the ones you took down before I arrived.”

He didn’t miss a beat. “I admit I hid the pictures. I got in a panic because it looked bad. But it doesn’t mean I killed anybody.”

“The way you panicked when we were due to meet Louise at the flat?”

“No, that was a real message. Nadia, you’re all confused here…”

I don’t know what I was expecting. Maybe I wanted him just to admit to what he’d done and to say something, however inadequate, that would make it comprehensible. Now I realized that he would never give up, and that I would never understand. He would lie and lie and maybe even he would grow to believe all his lies in the end. I stared at him, his peeling face, his writhing body, the one eye gazing up at me.

“I ought to kill you,” I said. “I should finish you off before the police get here.”

“Maybe you should,” he said. “Because I didn’t do it, Nadia, and there’s no evidence against me. And they’ll let me go and they’ll send you to prison. But could you do it? Could you, Nadia? Could you kill me?”