had sounded almost like a cough, a harsh, crackling little cough—the kind a sick child would make—and it had been so close that it could have been inside the cottage.
But that was ridiculous. The cottage had a comprehensive security system. Her brother-in-law had fitted it after a vagrant had got in and made himself at home. It wouldn’t happen again, and any casual burglar would be put off too. And she was sure she hadn’t left a window open.
Almost sure.
She leaned forward over the stairs, listening for what seemed an age. But there was nothing, only a quiet so intense that the nervous thudding of her heart began to pound in her ears.
Had she imagined the sound? She took one step down. The cottage was miles from the nearest road, for heaven’s sake, it had been raining on and off all evening and no one in their right mind would have a child out so late, certainly not a sick one. She glanced at her watch, it was too dark to see but it had to be long past midnight.
She took another step. She’d noticed how oddly sound carried across the river. Perhaps, after all, it had been the cry of some small animal, the sound magnified in the deep silence of the night. Yet still she hesitated on the stairs.
Then a rumble of thunder, low and threatening, almost overhead as the storm bounced off the hills and swung back down the valley, drove everything else from her head and sent her racing down the stairs to seek the sanctuary of the living room. But even as she reached for the light switch she knew that thunder was the least of her problems, and her hand instead flew to her mouth as, momentarily illuminated by the moonlight streaming in through the windows, she saw a child, a little girl, her thin face gaunt with tiredness.
She was standing in the middle of the living room, and for one ghastly moment Dora was quite certain that she had seen a ghost. Then the child coughed again. Dora was no expert on the subject, but she was pretty sure that ghosts didn’t cough.
Yet, shivering beneath the thin blanket that she clutched about her, dark untidy hair clinging damply to her sallow skin, tiny feet quite bare, the child was quite the most miserable looking little creature that she had ever seen outside a refugee camp.
For a moment she was riveted to the spot, uncertain what to do—not scared, exactly, but unnerved by the sudden appearance of this strange child in the middle of her sister’s living room, her eyes enormous in her thin little face as she stared at Dora. There was something unsettling about the child’s wary stillness.
Then, as common sense reasserted itself, she told herself there was nothing to fear. No matter where the child had come from, she was in need of warmth and comfort, and she surged across the carpet, her own bare feet making no sound as she swept the child into her arms, holding her close to warm her with her own body.
For a moment the little girl’s eyes widened with silent fear, and she remained rigid against her, but Dora made soothing little noises, as she would have done to any small, frightened creature.
‘It’s all right, sweetheart,’ she murmured, her voice barely above a whisper. ‘There’s nothing to be afraid of.’ The child stared at her, flinching momentarily as Dora’s hand stroked her forehead, pushing back the damp tendrils of hair. Her skin was hot and dry, her complexion unhealthily flushed despite her sallow skin.
Whoever she was, one thing was certain: she should be in bed, not wandering about on a stormy night, straying into strange houses. And she needed a doctor.
‘What’s your name, kitten?’ she murmured, leaving the other questions that were crowding in on her to be answered in their own good time. Not least, how she had managed to get into the cottage.
The little girl stared at Dora for a moment, and then, with something between a sigh and a moan, she let her head fall against Dora’s shoulder. She weighed nothing, and most of that was blanket. Dora pushed the horrible thing away and enveloped the child in her silk wrap. Who was she? Where on earth—?
The question remained unasked as there was a sudden crash from beyond the living room door, a low curse in a man’s voice.
The child, it seemed, was not alone. And Dora, suddenly quite shockingly angry, decided that she wanted a few words with whatever kind of burglar dragged a sick child about with him on his nocturnal activities. Without considering the possibility that her second uninvited guest might, unlike the child, present a very real source of danger, she flung open the door and snapped on the light.
‘What the—?’ The intruder, swinging round from a cupboard, a torch in his hand, blinked blindly in the sudden light, throwing up the hand holding the torch to shade his eyes. Then he saw Dora. ‘Good God!’ he exclaimed. ‘Who the devil are you?’
Dora snapped. Ignoring the fact that he was the better part of a head taller than her, and could have picked her up as easily as she had lifted the infant in her arms, ignoring the fact that he looked as if he had been sleeping beneath a hedge for a week, she came right back at him.
‘Who the devil wants to know?’
The man stiffened at this attack. ‘I do.’ Then, quite unexpectedly, he dropped the arm shading his face and smiled. Dora’s sister was a model, Dora had seen professionals smile. This man was good. And he moved towards her, totally at ease with the situation. ‘I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to shout, but you startled me—’
‘I startled you?’ Dora gaped at him, momentarily stunned by his nerve. Then she gathered herself. ‘How did you get in here?’ she demanded.
‘I picked the lock,’ he said, with disarming candour. He was regarding her with open curiosity, not in the least embarrassed by such a confession. ‘I thought the cottage was empty.’
Picked the lock? He admitted it, and smiled as he said it, without an ounce of shame or remorse. Challenged like this, any ordinary burglar would have done the decent thing and taken to his heels. She hefted the child in her arms, fitting her more comfortably to her hip. But then ordinary burglars didn’t take sick children with them when they went about their nightly forays.
‘Well, as you can see, it’s not empty. I live here, mister,’ she declared, ignoring her own temporary status during her sister’s absence as a mere detail. When Poppy had offered her the use of the cottage while she and Richard were away she had been instructed to treat the place as if it were her own, but with privileges came responsibility. Right now, Dora decided it was time to take her responsibilities seriously. So she glared at the intruder, refusing to be charmed by an overgrown tramp with a practised smile, who was obviously looking for somewhere dry to bed down for the night ‘I live here,’ she repeated, ‘and I don’t take in lodgers, paying or otherwise, so you’d better get moving.’
The smile abruptly vanished. ‘I’ll move when I’m good and ready—’ he began.
‘Tell that to the police; they’ll be here any minute—’ As her voice rose the child in her arms began to wail, a thin, painful little cry that distracted Dora so that she turned to the child, hushing her gently as she stroked her hair. ‘What on earth are you doing out with a sick child at this time of night anyway?’ she demanded, as the little girl quietened under her touch. ‘She should be in bed.’
‘That’s exactly where I was planning to put her, just as soon as I’d warmed her some milk,’ he said tightly, confirming her suspicions. He made a slight gesture at a carton of milk on the table, as if it provided him with some sort of alibi. ‘I didn’t expect to find anyone here.’
‘So you said.’ Dora ignored
