Millie watched transfixed as it came and moved the night light onto the floor. It made the goblin's shape cast a big shadow on the wall and ceiling behind it. And when it reared up and put its arms out and then arched over her bed, all the time staring at her with burning fierce yellow eyes, and when its shadow behind it did the same, Millie screwed her eyes tight shut and screamed and screamed and screamed.

  Suddenly the door of her room flew open and light flooded in from the landing.

  “What’s the matter Millie?” said her mum. “Have you got a pain or something?”

  “Mummy, mummy. There’s a goblin in my room. A big one. It’s all green and scary. Can I come and sleep in your bed?” Millie was crying.

  “Millie there’s nothing in here. Try to go back to sleep.”

  Millie started to scream again and her mother lifted her out of bed. She was carrying Millie out when she asked:

  “Who moved your night light down there?”

  “The goblin. He did it.”

  Millie’s mum sighed and continued carrying Millie back to their room where she went to sleep happily in between her parents. It was only the next day after Millie had gone off to school, the night time visitor completely forgotten, that Millie’s mum went into her daughter's bedroom. She found on the floor a sprinkling of real toadstools, green marks on the wall and chest of drawers and a small pair of green pointed toe boots made out of felt with a fringe round the tops. These items were on the other side of the bed to the door where she hadn't been able to see the night before.

  Quite bizarre she thought. Like Millie, she wondered if it was some trick played on their sister by Rich and Harry. She couldn't just `phone the police in case it was one of their pranks. Instead, she checked the exterior doors for signs of entry and found none, then called her husband. He said to leave it and they’d have a session with Rich and Harry that evening.

  Having settled what to do, Millie’s mum got on with the bed-making. After that, she was able to settle down to making up her Facebook page to keep in touch with all her friends which always took up half the morning. And she included an item about the goblin.

  DUNCAN LEFT NATALIE’S early as she had to get up to go to work. After a long, lingering goodbye kiss and arranging to meet up again that evening, since her flat was on the side of Colchester where he lived, he decided to walk home. Or rather float home. That’s what it felt like, though anyone observing him would have seen a serious twenty two year old plodding along with his head down and his hands in his pockets. They wouldn't have known that inside the head angels were singing or that the hands in the pockets were tingling deliciously along with the rest of him as he recalled every detail of his night with Natalie. Natalie, whom he had known since they were both eleven and whom he would never have dreamed could have touched him, mind and body, in the way she had last night.

  But as he passed Sarah’s house, he remembered. He still had the key. It was only eight thirty and he didn't want to wake her up unnecessarily but he had to check she was OK and he couldn't just use the key and barge in there. Therefore he stood and rang the bell repeatedly.

  Eventually she came to the door looking dishevelled and disoriented in last night’s clothes.

  “Sorry. I just wanted to make sure you were OK.”

  Sarah didn't appear to find it in the least odd he had turned up on her doorstep at eight thirty but he realised she was pretty out of it and he followed her into the sitting room where she fell back onto the settee and put her face in her hands.

  “God I feel dreadful,” she said.

  “You haven't been to bed have you? And what’s that?”

  “What’s what?”

  He walked over to a pile of items on the other side of the room. He didn't touch them with his hands but moved them about with one foot.

  “I’m not sure. A strange mask, what looks like some body paint, sort of verdigris in colour and some sort of mushrooms. Oh and there’s green marks on the sideboard here. What have….I mean how did this lot get here?”

  “God I feel awful,” she said again. “I think I’m going to have to go to bed. And I might have to throw up. Sorry but I can't talk now. I’m shattered. Oh. Thanks for bothering.”

  Duncan didn't know what to do. Whether to call the police maybe? After all he’d only gone round this morning in a neighbourly capacity, not professional. He wished he had someone he could ask. He decided to leave it until later when perhaps some story might have started to circulate about some odd night-time events.

  “Look I’ll just clear this lot up,” he said. “Have you got any rubber gloves? Oh never mind. I’ll go and look.”

  He found an unopened pair of kitchen gloves in the cabinet under the sink and tore a bag from a roll of freezer bags. Going back to the sitting room, he transferred the objects on the floor into the bag and sealed it with a tie. With his hands still in the gloves, he washed them in the sink, dried them and put them away.

  “Well I’d better be off then. Make sure you lock up behind me,” he said, feeling it was totally inadequate, but what could he do? And, taking the freezer bag with him, he left.

  LITTLE GIRLS, PRETTY LITTLE GIRLS, loved and cherished little girls deserve to be frightened. Why not? Why should their lives be perfect, full of perfect love. Why shouldn't they be made to suffer too? Ultimately, why should they be allowed to survive? Why shouldn't the black stuff envelope them too, crush the life out of them. One night one of them will scream too loudly, and she’ll have to pay. Whyever not? What good will she ever do anyway? Pretty and vapid and inconsequential. One of them will have to go the same way. No question.

  DUNCAN TRIED THE Prof's number a few more times listening to ever more exasperated greetings attempting to warn off callers, the last of which was:

  “Hello it’s me. Just leave a fucking message if you must and then piss off.”

  At that point he gave up.

  CHAPTER 25

  November

  THE REPORT BEFORE Alison related that the fire had been well under way by the time the neighbour, in his own garage working on his car, had noticed that it was getting pretty hot. He’d heard glass breaking and, looking out into the back garden, he’d seen the orange glow of the fire. He had walked outside from where the fire was clearly visible through the blown out garage window next door. Accordingly he’d ushered his own family out of their house as a precaution and had phoned for the fire service.

  Some of the report was rather technical but the general gist of it was that, although there were signs of accelerants having been in the garage which would have fed the fire, the fire was likely to have been started by an electrical fault in an old fridge. The report asserted that fluff and detritus often built up in the backs of fridges. Additionally where fridges were kept in outhouses to which wildlife had access, in this case a garage, mice may build nests in the cavities. A small amount of combustible material was enough to start a fire if a worn out relay emitted sparks, and the investigation showed that the fire had spread out from the back of what remained of the fridge.

  A factor in this fire had been the large amount of rubbish and other items stored or left in the garage some of which had been placed around and against the fridge. This included domestic refuse, items of furniture and other household contents and effects such as material, most likely curtains and bed linen. There were signs that refuse had also been left in the lobby leading into the house.

  Typical of Daniel, to not be bothered to put the refuse sacks out for collection so that they presumably just built up in the garage. As to the furniture, she wasn't sure. If Daniel was systematically selling it, then maybe he was keeping stuff in the garage either ready for collection or maybe for garage sales at weekends.

  They had inherited the fridge from the previous owner and they had only used it occasionally as an overflow. Most of the time it had been switched off. However it seemed likely that if Daniel had been disposing of the house contents, that he had fallen back on using the old fridge. Alison had already noticed, when she went round with Andrew on the night of the fire, that the gigantic expensive nearly new silver fridge-freezer which had formerly been in the kitchen was missing.

  As to accelerants, there was probably some petrol in the garage and Alison had bought quite a lot of shellac at one time when she had been into buying and polishing old furniture. She hadn't done it for ages but the shellac would still have been in there.

  It looked like Andrew could have his children to stay at the house after all. If they moved in that is. She knew he wasn't very keen and neither in fact was she but it would lighten their financial burden. All they would have to worry about was that Daniel wouldn't try to move back. If they did move in, she couldn't decide whether to tell Daniel or not in case it simply acted as a trigger to him to return himself just to cause trouble. She wasn't sure his actions, though irresponsible, would be enough to get an order excluding him from the house. She would have to try to find some cases on the subject and have words with professional colleagues to see if any had had similar situations. And of course discuss it all with Andrew.

  Meanwhile the garage could now be demolished. The insurance claim had been made and an assessor had been round. Thankfully, the insurance was in her sole name therefore Daniel’s negligence didn't affect the claim. A priority was to get a new back door fitted and to secure the entrance into the house from the garage. She would start pestering the assessor to allow that to go ahead immediately. She also wanted to get the front door lock changed but she was going to have to pay for that herself.

  CHAPTER 26

  December

  THE GARAGE HAD been demolished as a priority and the building of the new one was imminent. Alison drew her car into the drive and saw that of course Andrew’s was already there. She had to squeeze her car in behind Andrew's. She’d so wanted to be there at home to greet Andrew and his children the first time he brought Chloe and James with him to stay the weekend but she’d had to text him and say she’d be late.

  She had had to see a commercial client of Baz’s who’s wife had suddenly run off with a member of the gym she attended and had taken the couple’s children. The man was frantic and, as was often the case with a first interview with a traumatised client, very little law had been discussed. The man wanted to tell her everything, a lot of it irrelevant. He’d wanted to discuss the most outlandish, extreme and immediate Court applications to be taken that very night if he could have had his way. The outpouring and her attempts to persuade him to moderate his instant demands had lasted well past normal office closing time.

  While she wasn’t supposed to let the client lead the meeting, experience had taught her that you couldn't just verbally slap someone down at these times and insist they stuck to the essentials, or rigidly try to refer them to counselling or other services when they strayed into areas such as their feelings or psychological issues. The client had to start to trust you, see you as someone sympathetic and not perceive you to be a callous automaton. He knew her hourly rate and therefore if he wanted to rant and ramble on and go down dead ends, that was up to him. She even had a short note ready now and a basic instruction sheet for new clients to sign so that these people couldn't argue later that they had no idea that they were incurring a large bill while indulging themselves with a lot of irrelevancies, because that’s what they mostly were however hard-hearted it may seem to so regard them.

  As Baz was more than fond of pointing out, they weren't running a charity or a free counselling service which was true. On the other hand, with a view to maximising the fee income, Baz was all for encouraging as much litigation as possible whether in the client’s best interests or not, therefore he’d probably have happily seen her trotting off that evening to try to get a judge to make some sort of order relating to the children requiring, say, their urgent return. In most cases it simply wasn't on or remotely appropriate to do that and at least Alison had managed to calm the man down and get him to focus as far as he could in the state he was in on trying to form a reasonable relationship with his wife for, of course, the benefit of the children she repeatedly stressed.

  He knew where his wife and the children were and they’d try to sort out contact as soon as possible. As tactfully as she could, she tried to convey to this man that his wife would be far more likely to want to deal with him and make arrangements with him if he appeared reasonable, and that the children might not want to meet with an hysterical father.

  She would suggest mediation to the man at some later appointment, not something Baz was keen on since it meant the parties might resolve their difference with the minimum input from Solicitors, and hence far lower fees. On the other hand, Baz heartily welcomed the fees she brought into the partnership from acting as a mediator herself, although he personally had fought tooth and nail to keep for himself fees that he earned from sitting on the boards of companies and some charities. There had been an enormous to do about it all but Baz had won out in the end.

  Alison shook her head as she got out of the car. She often wondered why someone as difficult and aggressive as Baz had ever wanted to become a solicitor in the first place but he conducted his commercial cases with the same sort of belligerence towards the other side and his clients seemed to love him for it.

  It was seven in the evening already. They’d intended to take the kids out for a McDonald’s tonight as a treat, and frankly to get them out of the house for a time and avoid a rather claustrophobic first couple of hours. Now it would probably be much too late.

  She went in the back door and saw there were obvious signs of cooking and eating in the kitchen. There didn't appear to be anyone downstairs but she could hear voices upstairs. Without meaning to eavesdrop she stood for a moment to compose herself at the bottom of the stairs before going up. She heard James saying:

  “Yes. But it’s her house.”

  “Well never mind James. The bedrooms have been specially decorated. We hoped you’d like them.”

  “I like mine,” said Chloe.

  “Well I don't like mine!”

  “I tried to make it as similar as possible to your room at home,” said Andrew.

  “Yeah, well, it’s been redone since….recently.”

  “Well I’m sorry. I didn't know that. Look let's get your laptops etc set up and then you can both start doing what you want to. We’ve got wifi here and the broadband’s quite fast.”

  Oh dear, thought Alison. How weird it was that she’d anticipated that Andrew’s daughter would be the one to resent a new woman on the scene, not his son. But she found she got on really well with Chloe and was looking forward to digging out her old electric sewing machine tomorrow and teaching Chloe to use it, and to use a pattern to cut out a simple shift dress. They’d discussed it already. In town, she’d already bought several lots of different material and pattern styles hoping there would be one Chloe liked. Chloe was really keen.

  Girls these days didn’t seem to learn to sew any more. Shop bought clothes were so cheap and people didn't want to wear something that might look amateurish. In fact dressmaking as a girls’ past-time had largely died out by the time Alison herself was a few years old and able to start making dolls’ clothes, but her mother had been a very competent seamstress and had even made some very professional looking suits and coats. As a result Alison had always been interested, though she hadn't done much more than the odd cushion cover for years.

  Alison had surprised herself by apparently automatically feeling considerable affection for both of Andrew’s children simply because they were of him. She hadn't expected it. Even James’s stroppiness and fairly obvious animosity towards her didn't make any difference. She still felt it. She’d told Andrew and he’d been so pleased. She worked hard however not to show it to the children. She could imagine what a cringe factor it would probably have for them.

  More talking floated down the stairs. She heard James come back out onto the landing saying:

  “Yes but she’s not here is she.”

  “Well she will be soon so try to be a bit more pleasant!”

  Don't say that, thought Alison. He’ll hate me if he gets told off about me.

  “Bla bla bla,” said James and it sounded as though he’d gone into his bedroom and slammed his door. Alison decided against going upstairs and hurried off into the kitchen. Heaven forfend that she was found lurking in the hall listening. She was peering in the saucepans to see what was left to eat when Andrew came in rolling his eyes. He hadn't changed out of his suit yet. It looked as though he’d only just put it on. Nothing he wore seemed to get rumpled or creased. He was so handsome she had to look at him for a few seconds.

  He kissed her cheek. “Sorry love but we had to start without you. The kids were starving. God! James! What on earth’s he going to be like when he reaches his teens? Did you hear any of that?”

  “A bit,” she admitted. “I was going to come on up but then I thought perhaps I shouldn't. It sort of got to the point when I thought it might look as though I was spying on the conversation. I expect James’ll be less hostile after a time. I’m sorry I made you miss McDonald’s.”

  “Not to worry. We can go out somewhere with them tomorrow.”

  “Don't forget I need to spend some of the time tomorrow doing sewing with Chloe. That’s if she still wants to.”

  “`Course. Why don't you go up and see her now and show her what you’ve bought. I’ll get changed and then reheat something for you.”

  “Fine.”

  She gathered the patterns and fabric, zips and cotton together and knocked on Chloe’s door. Chloe said to come in and Alison found her sitting at the little desk peering into her laptop screen. She looked up and gave Alison a brilliant smile. It melted Alison’s heart and before she could say anything, Chloe wanted to know what she was holding and was it for the sewing they’d talked about. They spent half an hour going over the patterns together. Chloe was fascinated. And she loved all the material.

 

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