Sophie Hannah - A Game for All the Family

Picking up the phone on the bedside table, I dial my own mobile phone number.

George answers on the fourth ring. “Um, hello, Justine’s phone. George Donbavand speaking.”

“George, it’s me.”

“Hello! How fantastic to hear from my . . . phone benefactor!”

I start to cry. “George, you don’t have to say that. You don’t have to keep paying me compliments. I need to ask you—”

“I mean it most sincerely, Justine. You’re the first person who’s ever called me. This is the first phone call I have ever received in my own right—not just a general family phone call, I mean.”

“George, listen—do you know where we got our dog?”

“Figgy? Um . . . no. Don’t you know?”

“Yes. I’m asking if you do.”

“Right. No. Ellen said you turned up with him one day. London, I think she said. You went to London, and came back with a surprise dog.”

“She never told you the name of the person I got him from, or the address?”

“No. Oh, but I remember now: she said you were driving and saw a house that you got obsessed with—”

“Did she say where? Which house?”

“No. Just a house in London. Why?”

“I’m trying to work out if there’s any way your mother could have that information.”

“I don’t think so, no,” says George.

Olwen, despite living in London herself, is part of my offline, post-London life. She might be the only person that Anne doesn’t know I know. I’ve never followed her or communicated with her on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn. I remember asking my anonymous caller if she was Olwen, but I don’t think I mentioned “Brawn.”

There’s a good chance Anne Donbavand knows neither Olwen’s surname nor her address.

“Thanks, George.”

“You’re very welcome. Justine?”

“Yes?”

“Are you still in my house?”

“Yes.”

“I’m outside yours, just about to knock on the door. I emailed Ellen from Lionel’s boat. She didn’t answer straightaway, so I emailed Alex—I found a message from him in your inbox and I replied to it. He said I could come over. It’s weird and kind of symmetrical that we’re at each other’s houses, isn’t it?”

“Yes. George, I have to go. Tell Alex I’m going to call him in about five or ten minutes, okay? It’s important, so make sure he picks up the phone.”

“I will see to it. Don’t worry. Justine?”

“Yes?”

“There’s an enormous hole in your garden.”

“I know, George. I really need to go.”

“No problem,” he says cheerfully. “Maybe I’ll see you later when you get home?”

“Um . . . yes, maybe. Bye.”

I hang up, praying he used the word “home” because it’s where I live, not because he wants to live there too from now on. Even if he does, I can’t worry about it now—can’t worry about anything beyond the immediate danger of Anne Donbavand murdering me and interring my body beneath a terrible poem. I must focus on keeping myself and my loved ones alive.

I pick up the phone again, then realize I don’t know Olwen’s number. I had it stored on my mobile. I dial directory inquiries. “Can you put me through to Brawn—B-R-A-W-N—house name Germander, number 8 Panama Row, London?”

“Checking that for you now,” says the bored voice on the other end of the line. “I’ve got a Brawn at 8 Panama Row, initial O.”

“That’s the one. Put me through. Thanks.”

Please be in, Olwen. Please, please.

“Hello?”

“Olwen, is that you?”

“Justine? Are you okay? Are you crying?”

“No.” Yes. With relief.

“What’s the matter? Is it Figgy?”

“No. No, he’s fine. I can’t explain now, but . . . Olwen, I know this is too much to ask, but can I come and stay with you—me and my family? I’d go to a hotel but I don’t know how long it’d be for, and Alex and I are so stretched anyway with the mortgage—we’d run out of money in a few weeks.” I’m babbling, and probably not making much sense, but I have to try and explain a bit or she’ll think I’m unforgivably presumptuous. “I’d ask someone else—someone I haven’t only just met—but everyone I know better than you, I can’t go to because she’s got their addresses. Yours is the only one she doesn’t know. I need to be where she can’t find me or I’ll never be able to sleep again. You’re the only one who isn’t on the list.”

“No problem at all,” says Olwen. “You and Alex can have my bedroom and Ellen can have the spare. I’ll move in with my wife for a bit.”

“I . . . I didn’t know you were married.”

“Yes, to Maggie. It’s okay—she only lives down the road. Hopefully us sharing a roof won’t lead to divorce!”

Thank you, thank you. If I could only be there now, already . . .

“Justine? That was a joke about the divorce. It’s fine. Get your people—including Figgy—together and come as soon as you can.”

My people . . .

No. I’m crazy even thinking it. George can’t come with us. He can’t.

He’s not my son-in-law. He’s not my anything.

Chapter 13

Who, How, When and Why

Lisette knew her sister meant every word of the threat. She had failed to persuade Allisande. She would always fail. Allisande’s eyes were full of hatred for her—more hatred than Lisette had ever seen there for Perrine, a three-times murderess.

Oh, Lisette understood it. It made sense, in a twisted way. It still broke her heart, though.

That night, Lisette packed a bag and ran away from home. She took the key from the glass-fronted cabinet and escaped by the back door. She went to the police and told them all she knew, then took herself far away. How she fared after that, and how she made her way in the world, is another story, but I will tell you this: she made a huge success of it. She worked hard to create a stellar career for herself and, once that was taken care of, she married a lovely man and had two wonderful children.

There was only one problem: Lisette had built her new life, with a new name, in a place hundreds of miles from Speedwell House. She missed Kingswear and the River Dart dreadfully. Not her family, or the house itself, or even Mimsie Careless. Lisette realized after years away that that spot in Devon where she had lived was a special place—one she pined for desperately.

And so eventually, after many years had passed, Lisette Ingrey (who by now had changed her name to protect herself and her family) moved back to the place where she had grown up. She took the precaution of living on the other side of the river from where she had lived before, hoping that this would be enough to ensure that she and Allisande never bumped into one another—though she didn’t know if her sister and parents were still in the area. Did they still live at Speedwell House?

One thing Lisette did know: no one had ever been charged with the murder of Perrine. On local news, Lisette heard the occasional mention of how the killer of Perrine Ingrey was still at large.

Lisette was not surprised. Despite knowing for sure who had done it, she had been able to offer no absolute proof. The police, if they had interviewed Allisande, would have heard a very different story—no doubt Allisande would have pretended to see Lionel the boatman sneaking in and out of Speedwell House with his toolkit—and it would have been Lisette’s word against her sister’s.

And let’s face it, everyone in Kingswear and its environs believed deep down that the death of Perrine Ingrey was a jolly good thing, and that included all the police.

Lisette suspected that her family would have moved out of the area, wanting to leave the terrible memories behind. After all, Bascom, Sorrel and Allisande had each other to rely on—they didn’t need the River Dart and the sloping green hillsides on either side of it to nurture them emotionally and connect them to the bits of their past that were happy. (Don’t think there were none, even amid the catalog of tragedy and violence that I have recounted.)