minutes early and asking if my husband is in.
‘No, he’s not,’ I tell him, trying not to get distracted
by the flakes of dandruff on the shoulders of his dark
suit. ‘But if you run through the sort of system you think this house needs to make it secure, I’m sure I’ll be able to understand. As long as you speak slowly.’
The Breakdown
57
The sarcasm is lost on him. Without waiting to be
invited in he comes into the hall. ‘Are you often in the
house on your own?’ he asks.
‘No, not really.’ His question makes me uneasy. ‘My
husband will be home soon, actually,’ I add.
‘Well, looking at your house from the outside, I’d
say it’s a prime target for burglars, being stuck as it is at the end of the road. You need sensor alarms on your windows, on your doors, in the garage, in the garden.’
He looks around the hall. ‘On the stairs too – you don’t
want anyone creeping up on you in the middle of the
night, do you? I’ll just take a look over the house, shall I?’
Turning on his heels, he heads for the stairs, taking
them two at a time. I follow him up and see him making
a quick check of the window at the end of the landing.
He disappears into our bedroom and I hover on the
landing, uneasy about him being in there on his own.
It suddenly occurs to me that I never asked him for
proof of identity and I’m appalled that, in the light of
Jane’s murder, I wasn’t more careful about letting him
in. When I think about it, he hadn’t said he was from
the alarm company, I had just assumed he was, even
though he was early. He could be anybody.
The thought lodges itself so firmly in my brain that
the unease I’m already feeling at him being in the house
grows into something akin to panic. My heart misses
a beat and then speeds up furiously, playing catch up,
leaving me shaky. Keeping one eye fixed firmly on the
bedroom door, I creep into the spare room and call
58
b a paris
Matthew from my mobile, glad that I can at least get a
signal from here. He doesn’t pick up but a moment later,
I get a text from him.
‘Sorry, in meeting. Everything OK?’
‘Don’t like look of alarm man, ’ I text back, my fingers clumsy on the keys.
‘Then get rid of him.’
I leave the bedroom and go smack into the alarm man.
Jumping back with a cry of alarm, I open my mouth
to tell him that I’ve changed my mind about having an
alarm but he gets there first.
‘I just need to check this room and the bathroom and
then I’ll take a look downstairs,’ he says.
He squashes past me and instead of waiting for him I
hurry downstairs and stand near the front door, telling
myself that I’m being stupid, that I’m panicking for nothing.
But when he comes down I stay where I am, leaving him
to walk around the rest of the house by himself. It’s a long ten minutes before he appears in the hall again.
‘Right, shall we go and sit down?’ he asks.
‘I don’t think that’s necessary,’ I say. ‘I’m not sure we need an alarm after all.’
‘I don’t like to bring it up but after the murder of that young woman not far from here, I’d say you’re making a mistake. Don’t forget that the murderer is still out there somewhere.’
This virtual stranger mentioning Jane’s death unbal—
ances me and I desperately want him out of the house.
‘Have you got contact details? From your firm?’
The Breakdown
59
‘Sure.’ He reaches inside his jacket and I take a step
back, half expecting him to draw out a knife. But all he
brandishes is a card. I take it from him and study it for a moment. It says his name is Edward Garvey. Does he look like an Edward? My suspicion is addictive.
‘Thank you,’ I say. ‘But it might be an idea if you
come back when my husband is here.’
‘I could, I suppose. Not sure when it’ll be though. I
know I shouldn’t say it but murder is good for business,
you know what I mean? So if you just give me ten minutes
of your time, I’ll run through everything quickly and you can tell your husband all about it when he gets home.’
He walks towards the kitchen and stands in the
doorway, his hand outstretched, inviting me in. I want to remind him that it’s my house but I somehow find myself walking into the kitchen anyway. Is this how it works, is this how people let themselves be led into potentially dangerous situations, like lambs to the slaughter? My anxiety increases when, instead of sitting down opposite me, he sits down next to me, cornering me in. He opens
the brochure but I’m so on edge that I can’t concentrate
on anything he’s saying. I nod my head at appropriate
moments and try to look interested in the figures he’s
totting up but sweat is trickling down my back and the
only thing that stops me leaping to my feet and ordering
him out of the house is my middle-class upbringing. Was
it manners that prevented Jane from closing her window