“Because Lily looked down on you?” It wasn’t my idea of humour.

“No. I liked the idea of Madeleine playing servant for the first time in her life.”

I’m sure it was at that point that I gave up trying to understand Jess. There were innumerable questions I wanted to ask, not least why she’d remained close to Lily, but instead I resorted to banality. “You’re well out of it.”

“I know,” she said, staring critically at Nathaniel’s painting, “but he isn’t. I feel quite sorry for him sometimes. He comes to the farm every so often, wanting to put the clock back, but I haven’t seen him since I told him I’d shoot his dick off if he tried it on again.” There was a glint of humour in her eye.

She really did have the capacity to surprise. “Does Madeleine know?”

Jess gave an indifferent shrug. “I shouldn’t think so. They hardly speak any more, which is why she wants this house. It’s her best chance to get rid of him…and she’d have done it by now if Lily hadn’t stymied her. Lily didn’t approve of divorce.”

“Why did Madeleine tell her?”

“She didn’t. I did.”

I might have guessed that, I thought. “Not a bad revenge, then?”

“Except I didn’t do it for revenge. I did it to protect Lily. Madeleine would have killed her, or stuck her in the cheapest home she could find, if Lily hadn’t reassigned the power of attorney. The only thing that stops her shoving a cushion over Lily’s face is that a solicitor’s involved. She’ll be worth a fortune when she inherits this place…as long as she gets shot of Nathaniel and the son first.”

THERE’S NO QUESTION Jess was my protector when she roared up the drive within ten minutes of my phone call. It was a little like having a knight on a white charger come to the rescue, except there was no chivalry and very little TLC. When I unlocked the back door her dogs came bounding in behind her, and she snapped at me angrily as I shrank against the wall. “I’m not facing an intruder on my own,” she hissed, following the mastiffs into the kitchen. “Wait there.” I heard her unlock the door to the corridor and then the swish of the green baize as she and the dogs disappeared into the body of the house.

It was only when she came back alone five minutes later that I saw she was carrying a gun. She broke it across her knee and put it on the table. “You’re OK. No signs of a break-in, and I’ve left the dogs in the hall. So what happened?”

I can’t remember what explanation I gave, other than to repeat that I thought I’d seen someone in the garden the evening before. The truth was too complicated, and I was too tired to pick my way through the minefield of revelation. Jess was unimpressed. “Why didn’t you call the police? That’s what they’re there for.”

“I don’t know,” I said, sinking miserably to my haunches in the corner. “I didn’t think of it.”

She reached down impatiently and hauled me to my feet. “Stop being so bloody pathetic and show some guts,” she growled, pushing me on to a chair. “I know you’ve got them.”

I wondered if this was how she’d treated Nathaniel. If so, it was hardly surprising he’d preferred Madeleine’s flattery. I don’t know what I’d expected from her-sympathy and a little affection, perhaps-but it never occurred to me that she might be frightened. It should have done. I should have guessed that my mention of an intruder would take her straight to MacKenzie’s photo.

At the time she’d worked on the headshot, I’d expected her to bombard me with questions. She hadn’t, although I do remember her asking what the man’s name was and why I was doing it. She used the computer at the farm, with me sitting beside her, and she seemed content with the answers I gave-that it was someone I knew by sight, who was wanted in Africa for passport offences. The only comment she made was that it was surprising I was ignorant of his name when I remembered his face so well.

“Was it that man?” she demanded now.

I stared at my hands.

“Who is he? Why would he come looking for you?” When I didn’t answer, she reached for the cordless phone and held it out to me. “Call the police…I’ll give you the number of the local station. The person you should ask for is Steve Banks. He’s our community bobby, and this is his area. He’s a good bloke.” She put the receiver on the table in front of me. “You’ve got one minute to make up your mind, then I’ll do it myself.”

I pulled the phone towards me and cradled it against my chest. “There’s no point. I didn’t see anyone.”

“Then why tell me you did? Why lock yourself in here?”

“You wouldn’t have come if I’d said I’d locked myself in for no reason.”

She turned on the tap and ran some water into the kettle. “You look like shit,” she said severely. “Do you want to go upstairs and sort yourself out while I make some coffee? I’ll shut the dogs in the back room so you don’t throw a panic attack when you see them.” She flicked me one of her penetrating gazes as she switched on the kettle before heading for the door to the corridor. “And don’t start feeling sorry for yourself. If you take longer than half an hour, I’ll be gone…and I won’t come back. I really hate weepy women.”

DENIAL’S A WONDERFUL THING. You can survive forever if you say “no.” It’s “yes” that puts you at risk. Yes, I’d like a job. Yes, I’ll go to Baghdad. Yes, I know who abducted me. Yes, I can identify MacKenzie. I had a great-aunt who said “no” to everything. She died a virgin at ninety-eight and her death was the most interesting thing about her. She said: “What was I thinking of?” just before she died, and we’ve been wondering ever since.

Jess was right about my appearance. I did look like shit. Red-eyed and haggard, and easily as old and desiccated as a ninety-eight-year-old virgin. As I washed my face and tugged a brush through my hair, I asked myself what I was thinking of. I’d hardly written anything since I’d arrived-except emails to Alan and Dan-and the only people I spoke to on a regular basis were my parents, Jess and Peter. My days were spent surfing the net, researching information on psychopaths and deviants. My nights were spent dreaming about them.

“Stalker types: The delusional stalker often has a history of mental illness which leads him to fantasize that his victim is in love with him. The vengeful stalker-the most dangerous-seeks revenge…”

“Sadist Rapist: One who seeks to punish a woman by the use of violence and cruelty. The victim is typically only a symbol of the source of his anger. He is usually very deliberate in his rapes and plans each one carefully. The victims are often traumatized, suffer extreme physical injuries and, in many cases, are murdered…”

“Torturer: One who inflicts extreme physical and mental pain for the purpose of punishment or obtaining information. Abuse may include: blindfolding; enforced constant standing or crouching; near drowning through submersion in water; near suffocation by plastic bags being tied round the head; rape…”

When John Donne wrote “no man is an island, entire of itself” he can’t have known about genuine introverts like Jess or sociopaths like MacKenzie. Such people might live within communities-albeit on the fringes-but their reclusiveness, their reticence, even their indifference to what others think, means, at best, that they’re only semi-attached to the “continent” of mankind. If they engage with the rest of us at all, it’s on their own terms and not on ours.

MacKenzie’s isolation had turned him into a predator, although it’s arguable which came first-his sadism or his alienation. It’s unlikely he was born with sadistic fantasies-what baby is?-but a harsh childhood might have led to them. By contrast, Jess’s introversion seems to have been inherited from her father, although the tragedies in her life may have exacerbated it. Sometimes, particularly when she refused to speak, I felt there was an autistic element to her personality. She was certainly a gifted artist and gave the same obsessive commitment to her work that savants show.