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Ivy and Roy settled down in front of it. Ivy had taken off her shoes, and was toasting her feet in front of the stove’s open doors.
    “Nice little place, this,” Roy said.
    “It’s hideous,” said Gus. “If my poor father saw the depths to which I had sunk, he would turn in his grave.” His words were harsh, but he grinned. The cottage was a refuge from his former life, when his private and professional existence had become irretrievably muddled. Now in relative peace, he enjoyed the companionship of people who wished him well, and Enquire Within kept his brain active.
    “Yes, well, enough of that. Isn’t that the kettle boiling? Hot tea is required, and not too strong for me, please,” said Ivy.
    “So, the curious happening?” Gus said.
    “Right,” said Roy. “We escaped for a short while when the snow stopped and everywhere was dripping in the thaw. I had heard that Cemetery Lane was cleared and suggested we went up there, possibly to see the graves of my ancestors, God rest their souls.”
    “Don’t be so silly, Roy,” said Ivy. “You don’t think about your ancestors from one year’s end to the next. Shall I carry on? Yes? Well, you remember our latest client, Alfred Lowe?”
    “Of course I do, Ivy. I am the one who tackled him. He lives up there, doesn’t he.”
    “We were just coming up to his house, when his door opened and a woman came out. Tottered out, would be the best way of describing it. Heels four inches high, in this weather!”
    “So, Alf had a visitor. That’s not particularly curious, Ivy.”
    “Ah, but this visitor was screaming at him, and her parting words were that she would be back. Then I heard him say something like, ‘Stay away, Susan,’ and I reckon from the way they were at it, hammer and tongs, that she was his absent wife.”
    Gus nodded. “Right. That’s his wife’s name, all right. So not so absent. Did he say anything to you?”
    “Oh yes. I introduced myself and Ivy,” answered Roy, “and then he remembered me. Said we should get together sometime to talk about the old days. He was really very pleasant.”
    “Mm, seems he’s a bit of a Jekyll and Hyde character. You should have heard him when we first met! Anyway, now you’ve taken a very important step, and we can arrange to have an official consultation with him. What do you say, Ivy? Happy to take him on now?”
    “I thought we had already,” said Ivy with a sniff. “Now, we must be getting back, Roy. Our jailer will be sending out a search party.”

T welve

    HILL TOP, HOME of the Wrights, high up above the town of Thornwell, had had another flurry of snow, and Steven, already in a bad mood and feeling rotten from his disastrous meal last evening, was swearing bitter oaths at having to clear away a pathway for his car in order to visit his old uncle in Barrington.
    “Why didn’t you get me up earlier to deal with this?” he said crossly to his long-suffering wife.
    “You’ve made a good job of it now,” she said consolingly. But to herself she thought that one of these days she would booby-trap the garage door so that it would come down on top of him and silence his complaining voice forever.
    “I shall probably be late back,” he said. “This morning in the office, and then over to Barrington to see the blushing bridegroom. Boring old Roy. The whole thing is a complete embarrassment, and I shall do what I can to get him out of it. Probably in the clutches of a scheming old woman.”
    “Sometimes these late romances are very lovely. Old people can be very lonely, and if they have someone belonging to them to keep them company, it is a great blessing.”
    “Sentimental nonsense, Wendy. And don’t stand outside here in the cold. You’ll be going down with flu or something, and you know I have to steer clear of infections.”
    He drove off without saying good-bye or offering a backward wave.
    She returned to the house and decided to have another coffee and start the book she had