Peter James - A Twist of the Knife

Susan agreed that they should see the house. She had to see it to satisfy herself that it was not the one in the dream, but she did not tell Tom that; he had little sympathy for her dreams.

The estate agent drove them himself. He wore a sharp suit, white socks and smelled of hair gel. ‘Great position,’ he said. ‘One of the most sought-after residential areas in Hove. Five minutes’ walk to the beach. Hove Lagoon close by — great for kids. And it’s a bargain for this area. A bit of work and you could increase the value a lot.’ He turned into Bolingbroke Avenue, and pointed with his finger. ‘There we are.’

Susan bit her lip as they pulled up outside number 12. Her mouth was dry and she was shaking badly. Terror was gripping her like a claw; the same terror she had previously experienced only in her dreams.

The one thing that was different was the ‘For Sale’ board outside. She could see the cherry tree, the stone birdbath. She could hear the sea. There was no doubt in her mind, absolutely no doubt at all.

She climbed out of the car as if she were back in her dream, and led the way up the path. Exactly as she always did in her dream, she reached out her hand and rang the bell.

After a few moments the door was opened by a woman in her forties with long red hair. She had a pleasant, open-natured smile at first, but when she saw Susan, all the colour drained from her face. She looked as if she had been struck with a sledgehammer.

Susan was staring back at her in amazement. There was no mistaking, it was definitely her. ‘Oh my God,’ Susan said, the words blurting out. ‘You’re the woman I keep seeing in my dreams.’

‘And you,’ she replied, barely able to get the words out, ‘you are the ghost that’s been haunting our bedroom for the past ten years.’

Susan stood, helpless, waves of fear rippling across her skin. ‘Ghost?’ she said finally.

‘You look like our ghost; you just look so incredibly like her.’ She hesitated. ‘Who are you? How can I help you?’

‘We’ve come to see around the house.’

‘See around the house?’ She sounded astonished.

‘The estate agent made an appointment.’ Susan turned to look at him for confirmation, but could not see him or Tom — or the car.

‘There must be a mistake,’ the woman said. ‘This house is not on the market.’

Susan looked round again, disoriented. Where were they? Where the hell had they gone? ‘Please,’ she said. ‘This ghost I resemble — who... who is... was she?’

‘I don’t know; neither of us do. But about ten years ago some building society manager bought this house when it was a wreck, murdered his wife on Christmas Eve and moved his mistress in. He renovated the house, and cemented his wife into the basement. The mistress finally cracked after a couple of years and went to the police. That’s all I know.’

‘What... what happened to them?’

The woman was staring oddly at her, as if she was trying to see her but no longer could. Susan felt swirling cold air engulf her. She turned, bewildered. Where the hell was Tom? The estate agent? Then she saw that the ‘For Sale’ board had gone from the garden.

She was alone, on the step, facing the closed front door.

Number 12. She stared at the white letters, the brass knocker. Then, as if drawn by that same damned magnet, she felt herself being pulled forward, felt herself gliding in through the solid oak of the door.

I’ll wake up in a moment , she thought. I’ll wake up. I always do. Except she knew, this time, something had changed.

For 353 days a year — and 354 in a leap year — N.N. Kettering put the fear of God into restaurants around the world. On those dozen remaining days, something put the fear of God into him.

A number.

Just a simple, two-digit number.

Thirteen.

Just the sight of it was enough to make beads of sweat appear along his brow. And he had a vast expanse of brow, providing ample accommodation for whole colonies of sweat beads.

Nigel Norbert Kettering hated both his first names. When he had first started out as a restaurant critic, for a small English provincial newspaper, he decided a degree of anonymity was a good thing — and it gave him the opportunity to lose those two bloody names. For the past two decades, N.N. Kettering had been, undisputedly, the most influential restaurant critic in England, and in more recent years, his eagle eye and sharp palate, and even sharper writing, had made him a global scourge.

Kettering analysed everything. Every single aspect of any meal he ate. From the table at which he sat, to the quality of the paper on which the menu was printed, to the glasses, the tablecloth, the plates, the balance of the menu, the quality and speed of the service, and, far above all else, the food.

This attention to every detail, even to the quality of the toothpicks, had taken him to the top of his profession — and the top of the list of people many of the world’s most renowned chefs would have liked to see dead.

His daily online postings, the Kettering Report, could make or break a new restaurant within days, or dramatically enhance the reputation of an established one. No amount of Michelin stars or Gault Millau points came close to the rosette rankings of the Kettering Report . Of course, he had his favourites. Before it closed, El Bulli in Spain regularly received a maximum score of ten. So did The French Laundry in Yountville, California, and The Fat Duck in Bray, Vue du Monde in Melbourne, and Rosemary in Sardinia, and the Luk Yu Tea House in Hong Kong for its dim sum.

But there were legions of other establishments, hailed as temples of gastronomy by some of the greatest newspaper critics, which received from Kettering a scornful three, or a withering two. One of the greatest French chefs committed suicide after Kettering downgraded his rating from a nine to a devastating one in the space of a single year.

In the current harsh economic climes, few people would risk the expense and disappointment of a mediocre night out without first checking the latest opinion online at Kettering’s site.

N.N.’s appearance at a restaurant was enough to render the most seasoned maître d’ and the most assured sommelier quivering jellies, and when whispered word of his presence reached the kitchen, even the most prima donna of chefs turned into a babbling, begging wreck.

Some years ago, his identity had been revealed by a tabloid newspaper. Now, he no longer bothered to book his tables under an assumed name. Every restaurateur in the world had N.N. Kettering’s photograph pinned discreetly to an office wall. Besides, the man was hard to miss. He was tall and lean, despite all the food and wine he packed away, with an elongated neck, on top of which perched his egg-shaped head, his eyes distorted behind round, bottle-lens glasses and his short black hair brushed forward, rather like a modern take on a monk’s tonsure, the fringe barely reaching the start of his high, sloping brow.

He was always dressed the same — in a dark, immaculately tailored suit, white shirt and red or crimson tie — and sat ramrod straight, with perfect posture, as if he had a ruler jammed down the back of his jacket. One great London restaurant owner had described the sight of his head rising above the menu he was reading, accompanied by his beady glare, as being like staring into the periscope of a submarine. Fortunately for this man’s establishment, N.N. Kettering never got to hear the remark.

Of course, Kettering’s tastes became more and more esoteric. One year, the appearance of snail porridge on the menu of The Fat Duck caused him to devote two whole pages of lyrical praise to Heston Blumenthal’s skills as a chef. The following year, he devoted an unprecedented three-page review to a single dish at El Bulli — chef Ferran Adrià’s creation of oysters with raw marinated rabbit brains.