33

After an exhausting day clearing out her husband’s clothes, Charlotte decided to have an early night. She had spent hours packing shoes, trousers and shirts into bin liners, ready for donation to a charity shop. The task was not only tiring, but she had found it upsetting, throwing out all his familiar clothes. First she had emptied his drawers, carting things out by the armful. The most difficult part was when she came to empty out his laundry bin and recognised the smell of his sweat on a jumper he used to wear for gardening. The knowledge that she was inhaling deposits left by his living body made her break down in tears. At last she pulled herself together and, holding her breath, bundled his dirty washing into a black bin liner and tied it firmly closed. Still the smell seemed to linger. In a fury of emotion, she dragged the bag along the landing, bumped it down the stairs, and hauled it outside to the bins. After that, she felt too unsettled to continue, so she closed the door on the clothes still hanging in his wardrobe and took a shower.

Too wretched to do any more she had something to eat and went to bed early, only to be disturbed by a gale rattling around outside. As she came to, she thought it sounded odd, more like a door creaking than a storm. Peering out of her bedroom window, she saw the trees in her back garden were hardly moving. What she had heard couldn’t have been the wind. Still, something had woken her up. She lay in bed listening, but couldn’t hear anything. She supposed she must have dreamt it. Slightly unnerved, she decided to check all the windows upstairs were shut before going downstairs to check the doors were locked. Before going downstairs she turned off the burglar alarm but when it should have given two long beeps in response to the code she entered, there was only silence. She must have forgotten to set it when she went to bed. Since Mark’s death, her own life had been falling apart.

Cautiously she crept downstairs and found all the doors and windows closed. Reassured that everything was secure, she set the alarm and returned to bed, leaving several lights on around the house. But she was wide awake now so she turned the alarm off and went back downstairs to put the kettle on. The noise of the water coming to the boil drowned out the silence. Sipping a mug of tea a few moments later, she told herself she must have been dreaming she had heard noises in the night. There was no other explanation for it, unless the wind had picked up and then dropped again before she looked out of the window. In her confused state of mind, anything seemed possible. Abandoning her tea, she poured herself a large slug of whisky.

If she hadn’t been downstairs, she probably wouldn’t have heard the faint sound of her front door opening and closing. On the instant her pulse began racing so fast, she thought she was going to have a heart attack. Someone had just entered or left the house. There could be an intruder prowling around as she stood in the kitchen clutching her mug of whisky. The only other person who had a key was Eddy, and he was hardly likely to be visiting her at two o’clock in the morning. Trembling, she hesitated over what to do. It was possible Eddy had walked out on Luciana after a massive row. Never a patient man, he’d always had a short temper. Not only did he have a key to Charlotte’s house, but he would have nowhere else to go at that time of night. If that was what had happened, as seemed likely, then Charlotte would look pretty stupid calling the police. Moving as quietly as she could, she raced upstairs and grabbed her phone before locking herself in the bathroom. Leaning back against the door, she began to shake. If it wasn’t Eddy downstairs, her life could be in danger.

There might be a violent criminal prowling around in her house while she sat on the side of her bath, procrastinating. Her hand trembled as she phoned Eddy, praying that he would answer and tell her that he had just popped in to collect something. He didn’t answer; no doubt because he was fast asleep at home. There was nothing else to do but call 999. She couldn’t risk waiting any longer to find out who was downstairs. Having summoned the police, she sat staring at the flimsy bolt on the bathroom door, waiting. It seemed to take hours for them to arrive, although in reality it was only about five minutes until she heard banging on her door. Cautiously she opened the window and saw a police car parked outside.

‘I’m just coming down,’ she called out.

Her legs were still shaking as she crept down the stairs. A police presence on the doorstep was no guarantee she was safe indoors. A drug-crazed maniac might pounce on her at the bottom of the stairs and take her hostage, or stab her to death, before anyone outside had a clue what was happening to her. Reaching the hall, she cast a rapid glance all around before making a frantic dash for the front door and flinging it open. Two young policemen were standing outside.

‘Mrs Abbott?’ one of them stepped forward. ‘We received a phone call from you just now –’

‘Yes, yes,’ she interrupted him, ‘that was me.’ She lowered her voice and spoke slowly, aware that her speech was sounding slurred. She needed to be careful or they would never believe her. ‘There’s someone here.’

The policeman nodded. ‘Yes, ma’am, we received your message. Did you get a look at the intruder?’

‘No, I didn’t see anyone. I just heard the front door open and close.’

The policeman nodded again and gave her a sombre smile. ‘The fingerprint officers will be here shortly, so please don’t touch the external doors or windows unless you have to before they get here.’

She trailed helplessly behind the two officers as they went around the house checking all the doors and windows. There was no sign of a break-in. The police officers didn’t seem surprised when they didn’t find anyone else in the house. Charlotte didn’t think they believed she had heard anyone, but it made sense that the intruder would have fled as soon as the police began banging on the door. When she followed them into the living room, she frowned. The cupboard doors were open. She always kept them closed. She never left doors open. Mark used to complain about her compulsion for closing doors around the house.

‘Someone’s been in here,’ she stammered.

Her alarm must have shown on her face because the officer gave her a sympathetic smile. ‘We’ll soon be finished here,’ he said gently.

Drawing in a deep breath, Charlotte told him she always closed all the doors in the house.

‘It’s a habit of mine,’ she explained with an embarrassed grin. ‘I can’t help myself. So you see, I’d never have left those doors open.’

‘What about your burglar alarm?’

She bit her lip. ‘I must have forgotten to turn it on.’

The policeman took a step away from her. ‘We’ve looked around and there’s no sign of a break-in, so I don’t think you need to worry, but we’re sending a fingerprint officer along. Does anyone else have a key to the house?’

‘No, only my son.’

The policeman asked for Eddy’s address and telephone number.

‘There’s no need for you to speak to my son. I can do that myself. If I find out he was here during the night, I’ll let you know.’

With no sign of a break-in, and nothing missing, there wasn’t much more the police could do but the officer assured her a report would be filed and an incident number issued. They departed soon after, leaving Charlotte feeling tired and disturbed. The police believed that she had imagined hearing an intruder during the night. The evidence certainly seemed to confirm that they were right. But she knew she hadn’t left the cupboard doors open. Although she had already checked the doors and windows were closed, she went around the house checking them all again before she went upstairs to bed. She didn’t go back to sleep. She was afraid she was losing her mind.