Harry’s voice was parched. He asked me again, “Are you all right?”

Why couldn’t he stop that? What was wrong with the man?

“I’m going to sleep,” I said. I rolled onto my side. I didn’t hear the click of a switch, so he must have stayed up. He had books of his own to read.

Harry would have thought I’d gone out.

The next morning, I woke before he did, dressed, and drank my coffee at the kitchen table.

There was the scrape and thud of a magazine being thrust through our mail slot. I wanted to catch Lawrence, our postman, to hand him a card I needed mailed. Today was Richard’s wedding, and I had yet to post it.

We have a cluster of bells attached to our front door. I made those bells shake.

But it wasn’t Lawrence at the door. Of course not. It being Richard’s wedding, it was Sunday. The magazine-person was someone who smelled of cosmetics. That, and finding myself standing on a pile of yesterday’s mail, disoriented me. “I’m sorry,” I said, stepping back and bending to retrieve the mail from the floor. Both Harry and I must have used only the side door yesterday.

The magazine-person’s voice confirmed her gender. “So sorry to have disturbed you,” she said. “I’m an estate agent. Rebecca Phillips-Koster. I’m selling the house across the road.” She crouched with me. “I was just delivering these informational brochures around the neighbourhood.”

I assumed she was proffering one, but my hands were full of yesterday’s mail. She twigged soon enough that I don’t see, and compensated with a flourish of attempted assistance. She pulled at the letters in my hands, to aggregate them with her magazine. I was shocked enough that I let go. She layered them all into a neat pyramid, smallest mail on top, and returned the stack to me. We stood. “Shall I tell you who they’re from?” she asked loudly.

The pipes in the wall rattled; Harry was showering. He would only have heard the shaken bells on the door, not the obtuse Ms. Phillips-Koster exaggerating her pronunciation for my sake.

“Oh dear,” she said. “This one’s been opened.”

“Which one?” I’d felt a tear in one envelope, but had assumed it to have been an accidental mangle from some post-sorting machine.

“It was mailed from this house. It’s being returned. ‘No such person at this address.’ Tsk. Laziness-ripping open an envelope before bothering to glance at the name. Oh, look-” She plucked another from me. “There’s another being returned. This one hasn’t been opened.” She told me who they’d been written to, and handed them back to me.

“Thank you,” I said, meaning ‘good-bye.’ She chattered about how good I was to have sent my holiday letters out with so much time to spare, and that the same happened to her every year: returned letters due to changed addresses. “Not everyone,” she commiserated, “can be so organised as we-”

I closed the door.

I carried the stack of mail into my study, and overturned it on my desk. The two returns were now on the bottom, thoroughly covered and held down. It was important to keep them under control.

Now I knew where she was. The letters had told me.

I’d written to the few Susan Maud Madisons I’d discovered, including author S. M. Madison. I’d contacted her through her publisher; no personal information about her had been available. A Susan M. Madison lived in Cambridgeshire, at Rose Cottage on Cantelupe Road. Both had returned my letters unaccepted. But one had been opened. And the estate agent had noticed that “return to sender” had been written on each in the same terse handwriting. I’d found her.

I’d wait. I didn’t want to explain it to Harry. I didn’t want to say the words out loud. Soon, he’d come downstairs, drink coffee, and go out. Eventually. By patience, I could earn the means to go upstairs to the computer, uninterrogated. I could print directions to Rose Cottage, and phone for a taxi. I’d see her today. If I could just keep still, I wouldn’t have to speak to anyone else before I spoke to her.

So it was my fault that Harry thought I was out. He’d heard the door; I was quiet here. What else would he assume?

My study is a small room. It had been added on by the previous owners as a large cupboard, had no windows, and had never been rigged for electricity. I had a desk in there, with a chair tucked under it, and a chaise along the wall, too full of books to sit on. Our computer was of necessity upstairs, in a room full of power outlets. I worked up there. I used my study to read, and to be alone. With the door closed, there was no tell-tale line of light from under the door or sound of typing to indicate occupancy. Harry wouldn’t have known I was in there.

So it’s my fault that he did what he did. He’s not a monster. He never would have made me listen.

The doorbell rang, followed by the bell cluster jingling. Harry’s feet on the stairs. The knob, and a click.

“Is Dr. Paul here?” a woman asked. She sounded too mature to be one of my students, thank goodness. I’ve had enough of students. They remind me of Gloria’s children.

“Oh,” this woman said, to what I assume was a shake of his head. “Well, I wanted to thank her. And you, of course. Mr. Paul?” That happened to him often.

“Call me Harry,” he said, not bothering to correct her.

“I don’t know what I would have done. I would have hired some solicitor, of course, but Mr. Tisch was a wonder.” Aha. Miranda Bailey. “I got out last night. He made them wake me up and let me out. He wouldn’t let them keep me till morning. There was a teenager. He’d seen Nick later that night. He’d mugged him. I hope Nick isn’t hurt.”

The voices shifted. Kitchen. Harry serves food as a reflex.

She blathered on. “You and your wife have been so kind. Mr. Tisch stood up for me. That policeman…” A pause. To shudder, to cringe? “I know he was just doing his job. But he wasn’t nice.” How fastidious of her to put it that way. How British. Polly told me that her mother was originally British.

“How is Polly?” Harry asked.

“I think Polly’s… depleted, you understand? I don’t think she has it in her to deal with me and my problems, which she shouldn’t have to anyway. She’s just a baby… I just want to pick her up in the middle of the night and hand her what she’s dropped over the side of the crib and make everything all right again…”

The kettle whistled. “It must have been hard on you, Mrs. Bailey,” Harry said. The tea drawer squeaked as it opened, spoons clinked.

“I didn’t care for it!” She forced a laugh. “But whatever Nick’s going through must be far worse. They were right to detain anyone who might have hurt him. I can’t blame them.” Pause. Sipping at the hot stuff, stirring it, blowing on it. Tea gives something to do with one’s hands. “You don’t have children, do you?” she asked him. He would shake his head. He doesn’t use words for that subject. “Well, I love my children, but sometimes it’s very hard. Will, my son, sometimes I think he’s been lost in all the fuss. He’s become peripheral. Isn’t that awful? Good grief, I’m a terrible mother…”

Here is where Harry would be embarrassed. He’s terrible with tears. When my mother died he cooked for me. He didn’t know what else to do. Miranda must be hemmed in by biscuits now. He would be thrusting them at her, making hills of them around her. “You’ve done well with Polly,” he said. “She’s a good girl.”

Miranda laughed, a sudden, horselike sound. “When I was a girl, ‘good girl’ meant something else entirely. It meant sexless. I like that ‘good girl’ means something else now. Strong. Determined. She’s a good girl. I try to tell her that, over and over I tell her, but it’s hard for words to compete with what her father did. I’m grateful that people like you tell her too. Maybe if we all keep telling her… Anyway, I’m glad there are people here who care. She must be very dear to you both, for you to have rescued me as you did. So thank you.”