“You? What does he want to talk to you for? What have you done?”

“He just wants to find out a bit about Alicia.”

“He’s a journalist, you fucking idiot.” Her voice approached a shriek. “Get him out!”

“He’s not a journalist. I’ve seen his ID, all right? Now, come on, Mum, please. Let’s get you back to bed.”

Grumbling, she allowed herself to be guided back into her bedroom. Paul nodded at me to follow.

Lydia flopped back with a deep thud. The bed quivered as it absorbed her weight. Paul adjusted her pillows. An ancient cat lay asleep by her feet, the ugliest cat I’d ever seen—battle scarred, bald in places, one ear bitten off. It was growling in its sleep.

I glanced around the room. It was full of junk—stacks of old magazines and yellowing newspapers, piles of old clothes. An oxygen canister stood by the wall, and a cake tin full of medications was on the bedside table.

I could feel Lydia’s hostile eyes on me the whole time. There was madness in her gaze; I felt quite sure of that.

“What does he want?” Her eyes darted up and down feverishly as she sized me up. “Who is he?”

“I just told you, Mum. He wants to know some background on Alicia, to help him treat her. He’s her psychotherapist.”

Lydia left no doubt about her opinion of psychotherapists. She turned her head, cleared her throat—and spat onto the floor in front of me.

Paul groaned. “Mum, please—”

“Shut up.” Lydia glared at me. “Alicia doesn’t deserve to be in hospital.”

“No?” I said. “Where should she be?”

“Where do you think? Prison.” Lydia eyed me scornfully. “You want to hear about Alicia? I’ll tell you about her. She’s a little bitch. She always was, even as a child.”

I listened, my head throbbing, as Lydia went on, with mounting anger:

“My poor brother, Vernon. He never recovered from Eva’s death. I took care of him. I took care of Alicia. And was she grateful?”

Obviously, no response was no required. Not that Lydia waited for one.

“You know how Alicia repaid me? All my kindness? Do you know what she did to me?”

“Mum, please—”

“Shut up, Paul!’ Lydia turned to me. I was surprised how much anger was in her voice. “The bitch painted me. She painted me, without my knowledge or permission. I went to her exhibition—and there it was, hanging there. Vile, disgusting—an obscene mockery.”

Lydia was trembling with anger, and Paul looked concerned. He gave me an unhappy glance. “Maybe it’s better if you go now, mate. It’s not good for Mum to get upset.”

I nodded. Lydia Rose was not well, no doubt about that. I was more than happy to escape.

I left the house and made my way back to the train station, with a swollen head and a splitting headache. What a fucking waste of time. I’d found out nothing—except it was obvious why Alicia had gotten out of that house as soon as she could. It reminded me of my own escape from home at the age of eighteen, fleeing my father. It was all too obvious who Alicia was running away from—Lydia Rose.

I thought about the painting Alicia had done of Lydia. “An obscene mockery,” she called it. Well, time to pay a visit to Alicia’s gallery and find out why the picture had upset her aunt so much.

As I left Cambridge, my last thoughts were of Paul. I felt sorry for him, having to live with that monstrous woman—be her unpaid slave. It was a lonely life—I didn’t imagine he had many friends. Or a girlfriend. I wouldn’t be surprised if he was still a virgin. Something about him remained stunted, despite his size; something thwarted.

I had taken an instant and violent dislike to Lydia—probably because she reminded me of my father. I would have ended up like Paul if I had stayed in that house, if I had stayed with my parents in Surrey, at the beck and call of a madman.

I felt depressed all the way back to London. Sad, tired, close to tears. I couldn’t tell if I was feeling Paul’s sadness—or my own.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

KATHY WAS OUT WHEN I GOT HOME.

I opened her laptop and tried to access her email—but with no luck. She was logged out.

I had to accept that she might never repeat her mistake. Would I keep checking ad nauseam, give in to obsession, driving myself mad? I had enough self-awareness to appreciate the cliché I had become—the jealous husband—and the irony that Kathy was currently rehearsing Desdemona in Othello hadn’t escaped me.

I should have forwarded the emails to myself that first night, as soon as I’d read them. Then I’d have some actual physical evidence. That was my mistake. As it was, I had begun questioning what I had seen. Was my recollection to be trusted? I’d been stoned out of my mind, after all—had I misunderstood what I had read? I found myself concocting outlandish theories to prove Kathy’s innocence. Maybe it was just an acting exercise—she was writing in character, in preparation for Othello. She had spent six weeks speaking in an American accent when preparing for All My Sons. It was possible something similar was going on here. Except the emails were signed by Kathy—not Desdemona.

If only I had imagined it all, then I could forget it, the way you forget a dream—I could wake up and it would fade away. Instead I was trapped in this endless nightmare of mistrust, suspicion, paranoia. Although on the surface, little had changed. We still went for a walk together on Sunday. We looked like every other couple strolling in the park. Perhaps our silences were longer than usual, but they seemed comfortable enough. Under the silence, however, a fevered one-sided conversation was taking place in my mind. I rehearsed a million questions. Why did she do it? How could she? Why say she loved me and marry me, fuck me, and share my bed—then lie to my face, and keep lying, year after year? How long had it been going on? Did she love this man? Was she going to leave me for him?