'I think that's a no,' Harriet said. 'Perhaps we ought to give him a break and try again tomorrow?' She couldn't believe what she'd just said, but it seemed the simplest and kindest thing to do. His misery was too much for her.

But the young girl shook her head. 'It would be a terrible mistake to give in to him,' she said. Then lowering her voice to a confidential murmur, she added, 'It's usually better if the mother just walks away.'

Her voice equally low, and leaning over Joel, Harriet said, 'It's usually better if the mother isn't dead. My name's Miss Swift; I'm his aunt and legal guardian and I'd appreciate a little more thought on your part towards my nephew. Maybe you should acquaint yourself with his background.'

The girl looked fl.u.s.tered. Down on Joel's level once more, Harriet looked into his face. 'Joel,' she whispered, 'you've got to help me out here. I want you to be really brave and give today your best shot. I'll be back later this afternoon, and ... and I promise I'll bring Toby with me.'

Pressing her mouth close to his ear, she said, 'What's more, I promise to bring him right into the playground so all your new friends can see him. I'll even have your silky waiting for you in the car.' She leaned back. 'Do we have a deal?'

After a lengthy pause, he nodded. But only just.

'Shake on it?'

He put out his hand.

'Okay, and remember, a deal's a deal. You make it through the whole day, and I'll be here later with Toby.'

She straightened up again and though it seemed all wrong, she handed Joel into the care of this complete stranger. She walked away, not trusting herself to look back.

Pa.s.sing Carrie's cla.s.sroom on her way out, she took a moment to glance through the gla.s.s panes of the door. She spotted her niece straight away. She was the one chewing on the end of her plait and staring absently out of the window. It could have been Harriet sitting there at the same age. She had a feeling Carrie was going to need watching. She was a bright girl and if she wasn't stimulated sufficiently, she would quickly grow bored.

When Harriet got back to the car, Toby was standing on his hind legs in the driver's seat, his front paws resting on the steering wheel as he peered through the windscreen.

'Have you got a licence for that motor vehicle, sir?' she asked him, waiting for him to swap seats so that she could get in. As she switched on the engine and put the car into gear, he b.u.t.ted her elbow with his head, reminding her of Joel, the way he often made his presence felt. Poor little devil, she thought. Turning to the dog, she said, 'Now listen, you'd better do your part and cheer Joel up this afternoon. And when you've done that, you can book me into the nearest loony bin. Talking to a hairy mutt must make me cla.s.sic fruitcake material.'

He gave a polite little bark and turned away to look out of the window, his ears p.r.i.c.ked as if ready for any further instructions. It was difficult to understand how such a smart dog had come to be abandoned. The first night he'd spent in Maple Drive, when Harriet was on bedtime duty reading to the children, Carrie had interrupted her and said, 'I'm glad Toby's come to live with us. It must have been horrible in the orphanage for him.'

'It wasn't an orphanage,' Harriet corrected her. 'It was a dog pound.'

'A pound?' Joel repeated. 'Like money?'

'No. It's a place where animals abandoned by their cruel owners are looked after until someone very kind, like Granddad, comes along and takes them home. Can we get back to the story now?'

Her father was in the kitchen putting cereal packets away in the cupboard when Harriet got home. Toby went straight to his water bowl and lapped noisily.

'Where's Mum?' she asked, picking up her post from the table.

'Upstairs in bed. She didn't like to say anything at breakfast, what with the children's big day, but she's not feeling so good. She's got that weakness in her legs again and her back kept her awake in the night.'

'She's been overdoing it, hasn't she?'

'You know what she's like.'

'I'll go up and see her, make sure she's okay.'

'I wouldn't; she was fast asleep when I looked in on her ten minutes ago. Better to let her rest. Coffee?'

Surprised by her father's good mood - this was the chattiest he'd been in a long while - she said, 'Yes please. Shall I make it?'

'No, you sit down; I'll do it while you tell me how you got on with Carrie and Joel. Were they okay? Were there any tears?'

'No real tears, thank G.o.d, but I wasn't impressed with Joel's teacher. She didn't even know that I wasn't his mother. What qualifications do they need these days to be a teacher? A GCSE in nailbiting?' She sighed and sat back in the chair. 'Things will get easier, won't they, Dad?'

It was first break and Carrie searched the playground for Joel. She found him in the sandpit. There were other children with him, but he wasn't joining in with them; he was just sitting there fiddling with a toy car and watching the other boys as they pushed a blue plastic lorry along a track they'd made. He didn't look very happy, but when he saw her his face changed, then he threw down the car and ran to her. 'Is it time to go home now?' he asked. 'Is Harriet here? She said she would bring Toby. She promised.'

Holding his hand, Carrie walked him across the field where earlier she had easily won a running race in a PE lesson. When no one could hear them, she said, 'Joel, we haven't had lunch yet. Look at your watch.'

He pulled a face. 'You know I can't tell the time.'

'But it's easy. Look.' She pulled the cuff back on his sweatshirt. 'There, the big hand's on the six and the small one is between the ten and eleven.'

'Where will the hands be when it's time for Harriet to come for us?'

'The big hand will be on the six and the little one will be between three and four.'

'How long will it be before that happens?'

Exasperated, she said, 'Ages!' Then: 'You haven't cried this morning, have you?'

He shook his head solemnly. 'You said I wasn't to do that.'

'Good boy. And no thumb-sucking?'

He looked less sure. 'Um ... I might have.'

She sighed and put her hands on her hips. 'Joel, I told you, you mustn't do it. You'll get called names. You'll be called a baby.'

'But I'm not a baby!'

'Is he your brother?'

Carrie spun round. A group of girls from her cla.s.s had appeared from nowhere and were staring at her and Joel. The one she'd beaten in the running race earlier said again, 'Is he your brother?'

'Yes,' she said.

'He looks really sweet. What's his name?'

'Joel.'

They moved in closer. One of them said, 'Is it true your mum and dad are dead?'

Carrie reached for Joel's hand.

'And is it true they were killed in a car crash and had their heads chopped off?'

Joel gasped. Carrie suddenly wanted to pick him up and run, but she knew she mustn't. She had to be strong. 'Yes,' she said. 'It is true. And do you want to know something else?'

They nodded.

She leaned in towards them. 'Their heads rolled out of the car and onto the road. There was blood everywhere. Puddles of it. Great big enormous puddles of blood.' Enjoying the look of horror on the girls' faces, Carrie wondered what else to say. But the bell sounded for end of break time, and everyone started to run across the field.

It was lunchtime and Joel was doing his best to do everything Carrie had told him.

Not to cry.

Not to suck his thumb.

Not to be a baby.

But he couldn't help himself. He felt sick and he badly needed the loo, and all he could think of was Mummy and Daddy's heads rolling around in the road. Did the police find their heads or were they still there somewhere in the bushes?

He shifted in his seat but couldn't hold on any longer and suddenly he felt the wet warmth spreading down his legs. On and on it went. There was nothing he could do to stop it. He began to cry. Now Carrie would be cross with him. And Harriet too. Carrie had told him they mustn't ever make Harriet angry because then they'd end up in a place like Toby had been in. But surely Harriet wouldn't do that to them. Harriet was nice. Look how she'd promised to bring Toby in this afternoon.

Through his tears, he looked under the table and saw that there was a puddle on the floor. The sight of it made him cry even harder. Perhaps Harriet would be cross with him after all.

Harriet was in a good mood. Well, it was all relative, but the day was turning out better than she had hoped. And the source of her happiness? The morning's post had brought her a party invitation from Erin. Out of the small circle of friends she'd had in Oxford, Erin was the only one who had stayed in touch, albeit intermittently. This didn't surprise Harriet. Once you were no longer a part of something, everyone moved on without you. She was also to blame. She hadn't made an effort to write to or phone anyone either.

The prospect of going down to Oxford for one of Erin's parties shone like a beacon in the wasteland of Harriet's pitiful social life. Erin had an eclectic mix of friends - a lot of high-minded academics from the university, some arty types from the Ashmolean where she worked as a picture restorer and a variety of trendy types from London. Erin knew all about Spencer dumping Harriet - she had shown up that day when Spencer had done his amazing Houdini act - and had written on the invitation that Harriet was more than welcome to bring someone. Harriet wondered about asking Miles but decided against it. Some of Erin's friends could be a bit full on, not Miles's type really.

She turned away from the kitchen window where she'd been watching her father meticulously dead-heading the roses while Toby dozed in the shade of the cherry tree, and went upstairs to work on her laptop. She wanted to tweak her CV and start hawking it round. Now that she had the luxury of some free time, she could get down to the business of landing a job. The long-term plan was that her parents would always do the afternoon school run for her (she would drop the children off early in the morning before going to work) and that if either of the children were ill, they would be there to look after them. This, in theory, should mean that no potential employer would be put off because she had two children to care for and might be unreliable. It seemed a flawless plan, and one that would, before long, give her the wherewithal to buy a house of her own.

She pushed open her bedroom door - Felicity's old bedroom - and went in, shutting it quietly behind her. Her mother was still resting in the room next door and she didn't want to disturb her. Harriet had a.s.sumed that when she moved back home she would have her old bedroom, but Eileen had suggested it would be better for her to have her sister's. 'I don't think it's a good idea for either of the children to sleep in their mother's bedroom. Who knows what their vivid imaginations might dream up?' It had seemed a bit far-fetched to Harriet, but she had gone along with it. As she had with so many things.

She switched on her laptop, flexed her hands in front of her and sat up straight. 'Now then,' she said out loud.

'Here go the finishing touches to a perfect CV, which will reel in the perfect job.' Cheshire had so many software companies in its midst that it was often referred to in the industry as Silicone Valley. That, together with her level of expertise, made her confident that she would soon be taking her pick of the best of the jobs available.

Chapter Fifteen.

Outside Joel's cla.s.sroom, where she was waiting in the corridor to speak to Miss Rawlinson, Harriet was keeping an eye on the children through a large picture window. They were in the playground, where Toby was trying to stick his nose into Joel's crotch.

'I'm sorry to keep you waiting.'

Harriet whipped round to face Miss Rawlinson. Without preamble, she said, 'Why didn't you ring to say there was a problem with Joel?'

The girl looked confused. 'I'm not aware of there having been a problem, Mrs Knight, I mean Mrs Swift.'

'It's Miss Swift. And if Joel wet himself it sounds to me like there was a problem.'

'But they nearly all do that at this age. It's nerves.'

'Really? Well, the least you could have done was change his trousers for him. That would have been the humane thing to do, instead of leaving him in that degrading state. Have you any idea how humiliated he must have felt?'

'Unfortunately there wasn't much we could do. It's the start of term so there weren't any spare trousers lying around. The lost property box is empty, you see. Perhaps - ' She hesitated. 'Perhaps it might be helpful if you could send him in with a spare pair of his own trousers from now on. You know, just in case.'

I might even send him in with a spare grown-up teacher who can look after him properly, fumed Harriet as she banged the main school door after her and went outside to the children.

'Toby! Stop sniffing Joel like that! It's obscene.' She took the dog lead from Carrie. 'Come on you two, let's get out of here.'

n.o.body spoke until they were sitting in the car and Harriet was once again telling Toby off for shoving his snout in Joel's crotch. Just as she was pulling the dog away from him, Joel said, 'I'm sorry, Harriet. It just came out. I ... I couldn't stop it.'

She looked at him in the rear-view mirror. Oh, h.e.l.l, that face. That anxious little face. She lowered her gaze and turned the key in the ignition.

'Please don't be cross with him,' Carrie said. 'It was an accident. He didn't mean to do it. It's not fair if you're angry with him.'

Harriet yanked on the handbrake. She turned round to face them both. 'Whoa there! Who said anything about me being angry with Joel?'

The children exchanged glances. Carrie said, 'You looked cross when you were talking to Joel's teacher.'

'That's because I have a tendency to get cross when I'm talking to a numpty-head who doesn't know her a.r.s.e from her elbow.'

Carrie's eyes widened. 'You're not allowed to say bad words in front of us.'

'I'll say what the h.e.l.l I like in front of you. Watch out, because here I go again. a.r.s.e!'

Carrie began to laugh. Harriet laughed too. But looking in the rear-view mirror again, she noticed Joel wasn't joining in. If anything, he shrank lower into his seat. She saw him reach for his silky, which she'd only at the last minute remembered to put in the car for him as she'd promised.

'So did it go okay?' she asked, her question directed more to Carrie. 'Did you learn anything?' She'd decided she'd get more out of Joel when she'd got him home and he'd had a bath and a change of clothes.

But she was wrong. Joel remained as tight-lipped as ever. Even Eileen failed to get him to open up, and all during tea he just sat playing with his food, his eyes downcast, his legs swinging under the table. He was silent too during bedtime when Harriet read to them, and despite hovering by his bed for longer than usual, he still said nothing about his day at school.

Accepting there was nothing else she could do, she then got ready to go out. She was meeting Miles at his parents' house before going for a drink. For some reason his mother had expressed a desire to see her.

'I just wanted to say how desperately sorry I was that I was too ill to come to Felicity's funeral,' Freda McKendrick said. 'I was so disappointed not to make it.'

Harriet played along. She'd heard it all before; the list of mystery illnesses that had kept Freda away from every social engagement beyond her own doorstep was endless. 'These things happen,' she said lightly. Sitting next to his father on the sofa, Miles gave her a nod of grat.i.tude, which annoyed her. And her annoyance annoyed her further. Miles didn't deserve her animosity. Yet why did he pander to his mother? Why was he content to let her fritter away her life? Why not just bundle her through the front door and stick her out in the road for a dose of cold turkey treatment? What did he think would happen? That she'd have a heart attack and die on the spot?

Freda pushed a pale, elegant hand through the fine strands of her hair - honey-gold hair that was cut, dyed and styled by a hairdresser who came to the house. 'And how are you all coping? Dear me, it seems like yesterday when you four children used to play together. Miles, dear, pa.s.s me that photograph of Dominic. It must be quite a while since Harriet last saw your brother. Here. Doesn't he look handsome?'

Freda's overly refined but vague manner had Harriet wanting to grab her by the shoulders and shake her. She wanted to kick at the cabinets of china figurines, to run her hand along the spotless mantelpiece, knocking every ornament and dried-flower arrangement to the floor then grind them underfoot. The house was a mausoleum of perfection.

Freda had turned housework into a vocation. Because, at the end of the day, it was all she had to stop herself going completely gaga. And that husband of hers wasn't much better. Harvey McKendrick had always given Harriet the creeps. There was something weird about his manner: so upright and formal. Harriet had never seen him without a tie. He was cold-blooded too. When they were children, he ran over a neighbour's cat by accident and couldn't understand the fuss everyone had made about it.

Harriet gave the photograph a cursory glance. It was of Dominic, Dr Dominic McKendrick, and he was dressed up to the nines in his Cambridge finery; black gown and fancy fur trim. The picture had probably been taken to commemorate some highly important occasion in his world of academia, but she couldn't be bothered to ask what. Freda was right about one thing, though. He did look handsome. But then he always had.

She muttered a suitable response, pa.s.sed the photograph back to Freda and said, 'Well, Miles, shall we see what delights Kings Melford has to offer us?' She was on her feet before Freda could press them to stay any longer. She wanted to get out of the suffocating atmosphere this irritating woman was so reluctant to leave.

She had always been infuriated by the blatant favouritism that had gone on in the McKendrick household. Since for ever, Dominic had been considered the brightest son, the one destined for a stellar future. At the age of eleven he was sent away to boarding school where, apparently, his academic ability would be better nurtured. This might have left him isolated and excluded when he came home for the holidays, but there was no force on this earth that could hold, restrain or exclude Dominic McKendrick. From an early age he'd been convinced of his own brilliance and had believed the world revolved around him. The oldest within their gang of four - he was a year older than Felicity - he'd been their self-appointed leader. It had been him who'd got them all drunk for the first time, one night when both sets of parents had been out - this was in the days before Freda's problems had started. He'd decided it would be a laugh to concoct the mother of all c.o.c.ktails. They'd pooled their resources by pinching a selection of barely touched bottles from the back of their respective parents' drinks cabinets and had mixed them together. Net result, when Harvey and Freda came home, they found four teenagers in varying degrees of drunkenness. And undress - Dominic had also suggested a game of strip poker and they were all down to their underwear, with Felicity on the verge of removing her bra.

Harriet's face coloured at the memory. She wondered if Miles remembered that night, too.

'Seeing as it's such a nice evening, I thought we'd go to The Navigation,' he said. 'That okay with you?'