Laura sighed. She had stopped questioning Joe’s methods, because he usually had a plan. So she walked towards the front door and rang the bell.

As they waited, she looked down at the lawn and rose bushes. They were untidy, but there was some sign of maintenance. The grass had been cut recently, although the branches on the rose bushes looked like they’d never been pruned.

No one came for a while, and they were about to turn around, when Laura saw a white shimmer behind the frosted glass in the porthole in the door. Someone was coming.

The door was opened on a chain, milky-blue eyes and pale mottled skin peering at them through the gap in the door. Laura pulled out her identification, and for a moment, the old woman’s eyes widened.

‘Is it Mrs Grix?’ Laura asked.

The woman on the other side of the door slammed it shut, but as Laura and Joe exchanged glances, Laura heard the jangle of the chain and realised that she was just taking it off its clasp.

‘Is it Amanda?’ the old woman asked as the door opened, panic in her eyes. ‘Is she all right?’

‘Amanda?’

‘My daughter, Amanda,’ she said. ‘Is that why you are here?’

‘Is it Mrs Grix?’ Joe repeated, stepping forward.

The woman nodded. ‘Call me Ida.’

‘Can we come in?’ Joe asked. ‘It’s about your son, Shane.’

The woman reacted like she had been punched in the stomach, her hand going across her midriff as she let out a yelp. Then she stepped to one side and asked Joe and Laura to go into the room at the front.

As Joe went into the living room, Ida shuffled along the hall. Laura followed and saw Ida rest her hands against the kitchen counter, her head down. Her fingers were trembling. Laura was about to go to her, but Ida straightened and clicked on the kettle, her hands going to a cupboard for some cups.

Laura backed along the hallway and into the living room. Joe was in front of a large photograph over the fireplace. It was two teenagers, the girl a few years older than the boy, both in identical school uniforms – bright white shirts and purple ties. The boy was staring at the camera, blond hair, his mouth pulled into a half-smile, but he looked more like he was sneering at the camera, not smiling at it. There were other photographs of the girl. More glamorous shots of her in her late teens, and then she was holding a baby, a young mother in her twenties. There were more pictures on the window sill, and Laura saw how the teenage girl blossomed into a woman as she looked around the room. There were no more pictures of the teenage boy.

‘Shane?’ Laura said, pointing at the photograph.

‘Probably,’ Joe said. ‘What is the old lady doing?’

‘Making a drink, but something isn’t right. She didn’t ask about Shane once she knew it wasn’t about Amanda.’

Laura stopped talking as Ida came in, holding a tray with three cups on it, along with a small sugar bowl and a plate of cakes. The cups jangled slightly as her hands shook.

‘I hope tea is all right for you both. And please help yourself to something to eat,’ Ida said, although she didn’t look at either Laura or Joe as she said it.

Joe reached over to take a cup and an almond slice, although from the way that he took a small bite and then put it onto his saucer, Laura guessed it was all about keeping Ida onside.

‘What can you tell us about Shane?’ Laura asked.

Ida took a deep breath, and then she smiled, before reaching for the handkerchief that had been tucked into the sleeve of her cardigan.

‘Just what you probably already know,’ she said. ‘He was a quiet boy, and we thought that it was just his way. He was secretive, and a bit of a loner. He could be sweet though, when he wanted to be.’ She gave a small laugh. ‘Usually when he wanted something.’

‘Why did you take him to Doctor Barker?’ Joe said.

Ida looked surprised. ‘How do you know that?’

‘We’ve just come from his surgery.’

Ida scratched at her cup with her fingernail, and then said, ‘He became too withdrawn and quiet. When he did say things, they were cruel and hurtful. We did what we could, but it seemed like he hated us both. Then we bought him a hamster for a pet. He seemed pleased at first, but then it disappeared. Shane said that he had left the cage open, so we got him another one.’ Ida took a deep breath and dabbed her nose with her handkerchief. ‘I was tidying Shane’s room one day and I found the first hamster under his bed. It was dead, but we knew that it hadn’t died naturally.’

‘Why?’

‘Its head was twisted, and it had dust from its cage in its mouth.’

Laura and Joe exchanged glances.

‘We were so worried,’ Ida continued. ‘He didn’t have any friends and spent all his time in his room. We didn’t know what he was doing, because he wasn’t playing music, and if we went in he was usually just sitting on his bed, looking ahead. That’s why we bought him the hamster, because we thought it would help to draw him out. But look what happened. Then a friend recommended Doctor Barker. We took him along for a few sessions, but it was hard to get anything out of Shane, so we gave up. We couldn’t afford the fees.’

Laura saw Joe’s interest, his fingers drumming hard on his knees.

‘How old was he when you adopted him?’ Joe asked.

Ida looked shocked for a second, and then her fingers toyed with her handkerchief before she spoke. When she said, ‘From birth,’ her voice seemed more hostile than before. ‘We’d tried for our own children, Ted and me, but we had just one. Amanda. We wanted more, and it was hard, knowing that she would grow up an only child. So we adopted.’ Ida wrung her hands and her voice trembled when she said, ‘But it didn’t work out, and I felt like I was to blame.’

‘Why do you say that?’ Joe asked.

Ida’s cheeks went red. ‘I turned his real mother away,’ she said. ‘I shouldn’t have done, but she wasn’t a mother to him. She had abandoned him, and we were the ones who’d brought him up.’

Laura sat forward and lowered her head so that she could catch Ida’s gaze. ‘Shane was always going to want to know about his birth mother,’ she said softly.

Ida flashed her a steely look that didn’t fit with her gentle appearance. ‘It was wrong, I know that, but she wasn’t good for him.’ She twisted her handkerchief between her fingers. ‘I know what you are thinking, that we were thinking just of ourselves. And maybe we were. Is there anything wrong with that? Have you got children?’

Laura toyed with her engagement ring and thought of Bobby for a moment, and how he was an only child.

‘I’ve got a child,’ Laura said. ‘A boy.’

Ida softened for a moment and smiled. ‘I can tell. I can see it in you. Contented but tired. If I see women your age without children, they usually look really relaxed because they’ve got easy lives, or else they look hungry somehow, as if they are chasing something to make up for not having children. But how would you feel if someone came along who wanted to take him away? You would fight for him, and that’s what I did with Shane. So I wouldn’t let her close.’

Laura reached out and took one of Ida’s hands in hers. It was cold, and her skin felt delicate. ‘You’re right, I would fight it, just like you,’ she said.

Ida squeezed Laura’s hand for a moment. ‘Being a mother isn’t just about giving birth, you know that,’ Ida said. ‘It’s everything else. The hugs, the teaching, the loving. Those midnight illnesses, holding the bowl as he was sick. His first day at school. Helping him with his homework. Reading to him at night. Just holding him and trying to make him feel safe. That’s what being a mother is all about, and then she came along, wanting to take over.’

‘But you could have let her have some access, because you knew that Shane would have wanted to know about her when he was older. It wouldn’t have meant he cared for you any less.’

‘You make me sound selfish,’ Ida said, dropping Laura’s hand. ‘It wasn’t like that. She was just a child really, and everything about her would have been bad for Shane.’