While Nan, the maid, was dusting the stairs, Felicity slipped out to look for the motorcar, and saw it was still in its shed. The horse that drew the dogcart had been fed, the stable mucked out, chores Matthew always dealt with before breakfast. The cart was there where it always was. Nothing had changed.

He couldn’t have returned from his walk. If there’d been someone at the door, she’d have heard it.

Matthew wasn’t in the gardens. He wasn’t in the house. A mist still concealed the Mole from view but she thought it was beginning to lift.

And no one had come to tell her that something had happened to him.

He couldn’t simply disappear-could he? She remembered those frightful landslips that occurred from time to time along the coast just west of here, when an entire cliff face could vanish into the sea. She shivered at the thought of never knowing what had become of him. Then scolded herself for letting her imagination exaggerate her fear.

By eleven, she was verging on real anxiety, pacing the floor, listening for the sound of the latch lifting or a familiar footfall in the hall. Listening for the knocker to sound.

Where was Matthew?

She had just gone up to her room for her coat and hat when she heard the knocker clanging hard against the plate on the door.

Felicity stood still for a moment, her heart thudding. And then, calling to Nan that she’d see to it, she flew down the stairs, almost flinging herself at the door, pulling it open with such force it startled the constable standing there.

“Mrs. Hamilton?” he said, as if he didn’t know her at all.

“Yes, Constable Jordan, what is it? I was just on the point of going out-”

He cut across her words. “It’s your husband, Mrs. Hamilton.”