Dexter shrugs and smiles. “Well, not for that long.”
“No, because she left, didn’t she? Early?”
“That’s right,” Dexter rejoins smoothly. “Just after lockdown. I never really saw her again after that. And we’re having a reunion, and someone asked if I could invite her. I couldn’t remember her address to send her an invitation, but I did remember what her house looked like. The man who lives there wasn’t very helpful, though.”
“Well, no. That doesn’t surprise me.”
“So, who exactly is that man? He said his name was Stuart?”
“Yes. Stuart. I feel that he might be some kind of carer? I know he took over looking after Daisy when she was about ten. Didn’t see so much of the mother after that. I never really see anyone coming and going anymore. And you know, that dog of theirs? It walks itself. You’ll see him, just there”—she gestures toward the far end of the Vale where Thornwood meets the crook of the Heath—“just snuffling around. He gets picked up sometimes by people who think he’s a stray, taken to that posh vet in the village, and they say: Oh, that’s just Hugo. And someone drops him home.”
Jane is taken aback. “So nobody walks him?”
“No. And I mean, he is getting a little old now, I suppose. But still. I do feel a little sorry for him.”
“Do you have any idea where I could find her?” asks Dexter. “Daisy, I mean? Or would you be able to pass on the invitation for me? If you have a number?”
She shakes her head. “I lost touch with Daisy a long time ago. I can’t even remember the last time I saw her. I assume she still lives here, but then again…”
“The boy around the corner,” says Dexter, “George. He said he thought she might have moved out.”
“Well.” The Other Jane shakes her head gently. “That doesn’t surprise me at all. I can’t imagine it was a heap of fun living in that house as an only child.”
“What was it like in there?”
“I never went in. The mother would come and collect Daisy from here. Or the grandmother.”
“The grandmother?”
“Yes, Daisy lived with her mother and her grandmother. There used to be a grandfather, and an uncle too, at one point, I vaguely recall. But they both seem to be out of the picture now.”
Jane blanches, thinking of the older man who picked her up in a bar when she was twenty-nine. “What was the grandfather like?”
“Oh, not terribly pleasant, very full of himself, thought he was a cut above. I think the wife, Daisy’s grandmother, I think she threw him out in the end, and I didn’t blame her.”
Jane nods. Of course, she thinks, good for her.
“There were au pair girls, too, from time to time. But I don’t know what happened to them.”
“Au pair girls?” Jane feels something cold creep down her spine.
“Yes, when Daisy’s mother was a young girl. There were often girls staying there. Some foreign, some British, all very young. They never stayed long.”
“Gosh, it sounds like the Bermuda Triangle in there!”
“Ha,” says the Other Jane, “I suppose it was, a little bit. But you know, an area like this, it’s strange. It’s a village, so everyone knows everyone, but also, it’s London, so people keep themselves and everyone else at arm’s length. You only have half the information you need about people to work out who they are, to work out what they’re up to. And if you’re nosy, like me, you just make things up to fill in the gaps. I have stories forallthe neighbors, believe me! But that family…” She pauses and sighs. “It’s hard to know where to start.”
“Spencer told us that the police visited there a few years ago?”
“That’s right,” says the Other Jane. “It was during lockdown, Covid time, I think. So many weird things happening back then. I just thought maybe they’d done something wrong, broken one of those stupid rules. But the police were there most of the day, some cars, blue lights spinning. I looked it up on the internet for days afterward trying to find a story, nosed around the few neighbors I was able to talk to, but nobody knew anything. Total mystery.”
“Well,” says Dexter, “I guess that’s a mystery I’ll have to solve if I want to find Daisy.”
“I suppose it is. But you know, Daisy used to tell me the strangest things. She told me her mother had told her there was a ghost that lived in their attic and it hated little girls, that she told her never to go up there. Daisy said she heard it sometimes, at night, banging on the ceiling to scare her. She also said her uncle had run away with the circus. I mean, come on, what strange things for a little girl to say!”
“What was her uncle’s name?” Dexter asks. “She never mentioned him.”
“Jasper, I think. Funny little chap. Gave me the creeps.” She shudders slightly. “Oh well. Sorry I haven’t been much help. Leave me your number, and if by any chance I ever see or hear anything from Daisy again, I’ll let her know you were looking for her, tell her there’s a party. When is it?”
