Home through the Dark by Anthea Fraser

fervently that the garages were at my own end of the building, I stumbled back past the west wing and along the front of the house, my footsteps sounding unnaturally loud on the gravel, and with a sigh of relief inserted the key in my own front door. As I did so, I happened to glance up and with a shock of alarm saw a tall figure motionless against the lighted window above. My shredded nerves disintegrated at once and I hurled myself inside and slammed and bolted the door. No doubt, I told myself sternly as I hurriedly drew the curtains in bedroom and bathroom, he had merely looked out to find the source of the footsteps. After all, why should Sarah’s Mystery Man care what time I arrived home?
    I washed and undressed in the same mindless haste, climbed into bed, pulled the blankets up to my ears and, thankfully, slept.

Chapter 4
    IT was nearly ten o’clock when I woke the next morning. For a while I lay luxuriously in the wide bed, going over the party of the night before: Suzanne’s outburst and her husband’s hurried exchange with Stephen Darby. She wouldn’t go away while she thought there was the remotest chance of – what? It could be a hundred things, but it was another small question mark, whether or not it had any bearing on the one that had been puzzling me during the last few days.
    I climbed out of bed at last and drew back the curtains from the side window. Barely six feet away the row of rustling beech trees edged the narrow path which led round to my own back door and the garden. Under the canopy of their branches the gravel was dark with heavy dew.
    I had a leisurely bath followed by a brunch of coffee and scrambled eggs to lay a necessary foundation for Sarah’s drinks. I had eaten little the night before, only a mouthful or so of the chop and a few biscuits at the theatre. At twelve o’clock, with a final appraising look in the long mirror, I picked up my bag and set out for the party. Sarah’s front door stood open and a notice was pinned to the newel post of the staircase just inside: “Come on up!”
    Typically Sarah, I thought with a smile as I complied. I could hear her voice as I reached the top of the stairs. There was a small hall similar to my own and through the open door of the drawing room I could see Sarah herself cheerfully dispensing some suspicious-looking liquid from a glass jug.
    â€œGinnie, hello! Come in. Meet Moira Francis from downstairs, and Roger and Michael.”
    I smiled across at the tall, fair-haired woman and the two boys and turned as Andrew Foss came into the room and was introduced in his turn.
    â€œI believe you have the flat corresponding to ours in the other wing,” Moira Francis said.
    â€œThat’s right, all to myself!”
    â€œI imagine it would be ideal for one or two, but it’s a bit of a squash for three, especially when two of them are great, clumsy boys!” She looked fondly at her sons. “We’ve divided the bedroom in two, of course. With the second window it adapts very well, and I have the front half.”
    â€œThere are just the three of you?”
    â€œYes, my husband died ten years ago, when the boys were small.”
    â€œI’m sorry,” I said inadequately. More people were coming into the room and Sarah brought them over in turn to meet me – Miss Cavendish, whom I had seen going into her flat when I’d called with Mr. Henry, a small, birdlike woman with grey hair and sharp eyes; the Lily-white Boys, to wit Robin Kershaw and Donald King, immaculate in dove-grey suits with large floppy ties and carefully waved hair; the Colonel and his lady straight from the pages of Somerset Maugham, he red-faced and silver-haired with a neat, military moustache, she clinging to a faded prettiness. I was marvelling at their closeness to prototype when, across Mrs. Bligh’s fragile bent shoulder I saw the last guest enter the room – Sarah’s Mystery Man. And as our