Page 17 of All Our Missing Pieces

At almost three in the morning, her hair full of cobwebs and her hands black with dust, tiredness drove her to give up and head upstairs to bed. On the landing she paused, checking that all the lights were switched off in the bedrooms and she could hear no sound other than the almost inaudible breathing of the sleeping occupants of the second floor.

Then she saw it. A frame that hadn’t been there before, hanging from the picture rail Luke had recently uncovered beneath layers of old dry-walling. He’d spent hours sanding and oiling the wood panelling, Beatrice remembered, and even she had had to admit that it looked beautiful, softly glowing and golden.

Clearly Orla had thought so too, and decided to grace it with a piece of art.

Beatrice shone her torch on it, peering intently. The narrow beam gave the wrong kind of light to appreciate the painting, glaring off the glass that covered it, but still Beatrice could see its quality. It was a watercolour landscape, showing a succession of hills bordering a valley, their slopes intersecting like the pleats of a dress. Above them stretched a twilit sky, the clouds painted in intense shades of pewter and violet. In the centre ground was the only warm colour: the glowing lights of windows.

Leaning in closer, Beatrice could just make out the fine lettering on the building’s wall, between two of the windows and above a door that stood half open, revealing a slit of light so inviting Beatrice almost imagined she could shrink herself like Alice and step straight in.

Riordan O’Connell’s.

It was the same name as the pub in Clonmara where she’d met the old men. Not only that – she’d have recognised it anywhere. It was the same pub.

THIRTEEN

I was woken by a noise. Probably not a very loud one but, as is always the way in the dark, small hours of the night, it felt that way – like a huge crash, as if a tile had fallen from the roof and shattered on the pavement outside my window or a door had slammed violently somewhere in the house.

I sat up, instantly fully alert, my heart pounding. And again – as is the way with sudden awakenings – I instantly forgot what exactly the noise had been. Perhaps it had only happened in a dream, because everything seemed silent now. I glanced at my watch and saw that it was half past three in the morning, and remembered that it was Friday. I needed to be up in a few hours – if I didn’t go back to sleep soon, I’d be kept awake by the persistent trilling of blackbirds.

Then I heard another sound – the scrape of footsteps on the landing outside my door.

I froze, imagining an intruder having broken into the house, creeping up to murder us all in our beds – what other motivation could they have? There was nothing here worth stealing.

Perhaps Luke would wake up and deal with it. But I knew Luke was a heavy sleeper – often, I was disturbed in the mornings by his alarm clock going off for ages before he finally got up.

And then I detected another noise – the almost inaudible squeak of a doorknob turning. Not mine.

It was nothing, I rationalised – just one of the others getting up to use the bathroom, perhaps dropping something while they were in there, then letting themself back into their room as quietly as they could, hoping they hadn’t disturbed the sleepers.

Except they had, and for me sleep wasn’t going to return until I knew everything was all right. I pushed my feet into my slippers – knowing from experience that going barefoot in the house meant the soles of my feet would be coated in dust and grit that would transfer to my bedsheets – and pulled my towelling dressing gown on over the T-shirt and pants I wore to sleep in.

Then I walked across the room and carefully opened the door. The landing was in darkness, but I could see a crack of light below the door of Beatrice’s room. I stepped across to it and knocked gently.

She didn’t answer, but seconds later she opened the door. Her eyes were wide and she was fully dressed in the jeans and lilac linen shirt she’d been wearing at dinner that evening. The shirt was no longer clean – I could see greyish-brown streaks on the front that I could have sworn hadn’t been there yesterday.

‘Are you okay?’ I whispered. ‘I heard something and I wondered…’

‘I… I heard something too. I went downstairs to see what it was but it… it was just the cat. And then when I was coming back up I tripped and fell over on the stairs.’

‘You poor thing. Did you hurt yourself?’

She smiled. ‘I’m okay. But I gave myself a fright. You know what it’s like.’

I nodded. ‘I do now.’

Beatrice giggled, then yawned hugely. ‘I’m so tired but I don’t think I’ll get back to sleep now.’

‘Me neither. Do you want tea?’

She shook her head. ‘But I’ve got chocolate. Come in?’

Conscious that by standing around on the landing we were more likely to disturb Orla, if not Luke, I nodded again. Beatrice opened the door fully and I stepped inside, then she closed it silently behind me and sat down on her bed. It was made, I noticed, puzzled. Why would she make the bed before going to investigate a mysterious sound downstairs?

I couldn’t think of a way to ask, so I joined her, kicking off my slippers and sitting cross-legged opposite her. She rummaged in the suitcase that stood open next to the bed, clothes spilling out of it, and produced a pack of Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups.

‘The crack of the candy world,’ she said, ripping open the pack and handing it to me.

‘Thanks.’ I took one and bit into it, the chocolate sweetening my sleep-soured mouth.