He stopped. Hal felt herself grow still and careful. This was it. This was the dangerous part. Because he was right.

She forced herself to stop pacing, and to sit, and her mother’s voice was in her head. When you’re tempted to answer in a hurry—slow down. Make them wait for you. Give yourself time to think. It’s when we hurry that we’re most prone to stumble.

“Well . . .” she said slowly. The sofa springs squeaked as she shifted her weight uncomfortably, and the wind howled in the chimney. “Well . . . there were things. Not at first—but later . . . but you have to understand . . . my name, it was there in the will. And Mum never spoke much about her childhood. She never mentioned any brothers, or a house in Cornwall, but then there was so much she never talked about. She didn’t talk about her parents either, or my father. I just took it for granted that this was another part of her I didn’t know. And I wanted so much . . .” Her voice faltered, no artifice here as she fought hard against the tremor in her voice, for this was the truth. “I wanted so much for it to be true. I wanted this—all of this—” She waved her hand at the room, at the fire and the house and the men sitting around her, looking at her with varying degrees of puzzled exasperation and bewilderment. “Family. Security. A home. I wanted it all so much, Mr. Treswick’s letter felt like—it felt like an answer to a prayer. I think—I think I shut my eyes to my doubts.”

“I can understand that,” Abel said heavily. He stood and rubbed his hands over his face, looking suddenly very old, much older than his fortysomething years. “Dear God, what a mess. At least you’ve told us now.”

“Well, I for one will be having stern words with Mr. Treswick tomorrow,” Harding said angrily. His face was a worrisome shade of purple. “This is damn close to some sort of—of professional negligence on his part! Lord knows how we’ll sort out this legal tangle. Thank God it came out before we obtained probate!”

“Jesus,” Ezra said under his breath. “Can we stop banging on about the bloody will? Presumably you’ll get the bloody money now, isn’t that enough?”

“I resent—” Harding began more hotly, but was interrupted by a tremendous resounding clanging that made everyone jump convulsively, and Harding slam down his whiskey glass as the noise died away.

“For God’s sake, Mrs. Warren!” he bellowed, opening the drawing room door. “We are all in here. Was there really any need for that?”

She came to the door, hands on hips.

“Dinner’s ready.”

“Thank you,” Harding said, rather ungraciously. He folded his arms, and then looked at Abel, seeming to ask him an unspoken question. Hal couldn’t quite read Harding’s face, but Abel evidently understood, for he shrugged and nodded, rather reluctantly.

“Mrs. Warren,” Harding said heavily. “Before we go into the dining room, there’s something we should explain, as it concerns you too. It’s come to light”—he shot a glance at Hal—“that Mr. Treswick made a rather unfortunate error in drawing up Mother’s will. Harriet is not Maud’s daughter, she is in fact Maggie’s child, something Harriet only discovered when she went through her mother’s papers. God knows how Mr. Treswick made such a regrettable error, but obviously in light of it the will is invalid. I’m not sure what will happen—I presume intestacy rules will have to be followed. But there it is.”

“I never thought she was,” Mrs. Warren said. She crossed her arms, her stick beneath her elbow. Harding blinked.

“I beg your pardon?”

“A-course she’s Maggie’s child. No one with any sense woulda thought otherwise.”

“What? But why didn’t you say something?”

Mrs. Warren smiled, and her eyes, in the dim light of the fire, seemed to Hal to glitter like stones.

“Well?” Harding demanded again. “Are you saying you knew this for certain and you said nothing?”

“Not for certain. But it was common sense. And none of my business, anyway.”

“Well!” This time it was an explosion of disbelief, but Mrs. Warren had already turned and was stumping down the long, tiled corridor, her cane click-clicking as she went.

“Did you hear that?” Harding asked the silent group in the room, but no one answered.

At last Ezra walked out, his shoulders hunched in mutinous silence. Abel shook his head and followed. Harding turned too, and Hal was left alone.

Her hands were still trembling, and she paused for a minute, warming them in front of the fire, trying to get the feeling back into her numb fingertips.

She was just about to leave when a piece of coal in the grate suddenly flared and spat, throwing out a flaming splinter onto the rug. Hal was about to stamp on it when she realized her feet were bare—she had taken off her soaked shoes at the door. Instead she took up the poker and flicked the coal back towards the stone-flagged hearth, scratching out the last sparks with the tip.

There was a smoking hole in the rug, and a scorch in the board beneath, but nothing to be done about either, and looking down, Hal saw that it was not the first. There were three or four holes even larger, one where the fire had eaten quite a little way into the board. With a sigh, she put the fireguard in place and turned to leave, only to find Mrs. Warren standing in the doorway, barring the way.

“Excuse me,” Hal said, but Mrs. Warren didn’t move, and for a brief moment Hal had a fantastic notion that she was going to have to call for help, or escape out of the window again. But when she took a step towards the doorway, Mrs. Warren pressed herself back against the frame, and allowed Hal to pass through, though she had to edge her way, to avoid tripping on Mrs. Warren’s cane.

It was only when she was past and starting up the corridor, the tiles chill beneath her feet, that the woman spoke, her voice so low that Hal had to turn back.

“What did you say?” Hal asked, but Mrs. Warren had disappeared inside the drawing room, and the heavy door slammed shut behind her, cutting Hal’s question off short.

But Hal was sure—at least, almost sure—that she had caught the words, hissed low as they were beneath the sound of the wind in the chimney.

“Get out—if you know what’s good for you. While you still can . . .”

CHAPTER 38

* * *

Hal went to bed early that night, and whether it was the strain of the day or the long walk to Cliff Cottages, she fell asleep almost at once.

She awoke stiff and with the sense of having slept a long time, but it was still not dawn, and when she got up and went to the window, shivering in the cold night air, the moon was still high. Her breath was white against the pane, and the sky had cleared, and in the moonlight she could make out the glitter of frost on the lawn.

Her mouth was dry and she reached for the glass beside her bed, but when she picked it up, it was empty. In her tiredness she must have forgotten to fill it the night before. The chilly walk through the dark landing down to the bathroom below was not enticing, and Hal decided to ignore the thirst. She got back into bed and shut her eyes, but the dryness in her mouth niggled at her, keeping sleep at bay, until at last she gave up, swung her legs out of bed, and picked up the glass. Wrapping her fleece around her, she went cautiously out into the corridor.

It was pitch-black outside, the lino freezing under her bare feet, and she tried the switch on the wall, but as she did, she remembered too late that she hadn’t told anyone about the missing bulb.

Sure enough, the switch clicked fruitlessly, and Hal sighed and went back to the attic room to pick up her phone. The thin tunnel of light from its torch made the corridor feel, if anything, even darker, but at least she could see the black, yawning opening to the stairs.

She was only one step down, when her foot caught on something.

Hal clutched, instinctively, for a banister—but there was none there. She felt her fingers scratch at the bare wall, and then the horrible stomach-wrenching lurch as the phone flew from her hand, and she realized she was falling, with nothing she could do to stop herself.

She landed with a crunch in the hallway below, thudding her head against the floor, and rolled to a stop against the wall, where she lay, gasping, winded, waiting for the sound of running footsteps, questions, solicitous inquiries. But none came.