Derek Pierce

Florence barely slept. Her old room under the eaves had become Mum's sewing room: where posters had once hung, there was now a Singer machine and a basket of fabric scraps. Lying there was like sleeping in a museum of her own childhood after the main exhibit had already been taken away.

At three in the morning she opened her voicemails. The last one from Mum — the twenty-ninth of April. Florence knew every pause in it.

"Flo, sweetheart, it's Mum. Nothing urgent. Just… when you come in the summer, I'd like to talk to you. About Dad. And about me. There are things I should have told you all a long time ago, and I've never found the words. Don't worry. Love you."

She hadn't rung back that week. An exhibition in Glasgow, a wedding shoot in Inverness, something else. She hadn't come in the summer. And in August Mum had died in the garden among the roses, secateurs in her hand, without ever finding the words.

Florence hadn't told anyone about the message. She carried those thirty-eight seconds like a stone in her pocket — and felt its weight every time someone said the word "sell."

At nine o'clock sharp a silver Lexus pulled up at the gate.

Derek Pierce turned out to be exactly as she'd pictured him, which made it worse. Nearly sixty, tanned, grey hair combed back with the kind of careless care that costs money. His smile switched on at the doorstep and didn't switch off until he left.

"Margaret's children," he said, taking Katherine's hand in both of his. "Florence, you were this high when I used to come round for mulled wine at Christmas. Your mother was so proud of you."

Florence couldn't remember a single Christmas with Derek Pierce.

He walked into the sitting room without being asked and sat down in Mum's floral armchair. Katherine stiffened but said nothing.

"I won't take up much of your time. In the spring your mother came to me about a possible sale. We discussed terms with Ashford Homes. She was interested."

"Interested isn't the same as agreed," Katherine said.

"Quite right." The smile grew even warmer. "Which is why the offer still stands. Four hundred and twenty, payment within thirty days, no repairs, no viewings. You can even leave the boxes — the buyer isn't interested in the contents."

"He isn't interested," Florence said, "because he's going to knock the house down."

Derek looked at her a little longer than at the others.

"The foundations are settling, the roof needs replacing, the wiring's from the sixties. Any other buyer will want a discount. Your mother understood that."

"You told Nigel you had documents," Katherine said. "May we see them?"

"Of course." He didn't reach for his folder. "I'll bring copies next time. It's only correspondence, preliminary figures."

Florence saw Nigel glance at Katherine, and Katherine glance at the closed folder.

Derek stood up.

"Mind if I use the loo? I know the way."

He knew the way. Florence, without quite knowing why, followed him out, as though she'd left something in the kitchen. The loo was on the right. Derek turned left.

He stopped at the door of Dad's study — it stood ajar, because Katherine had been measuring the desk that morning. He stood there for a second, two, looking through the gap. Florence could see his profile: the smile was gone. In its place was the cold, focused face of a man checking whether something was still where he'd left it.

Then he turned and saw her.

"Oh," the smile was back in an instant. "Old age. I always mix up these doors. Margaret used to laugh at me."

When he'd shut himself in the loo, Florence pushed open the study door. Everything was just as it had been in Dad's day: the heavy oak desk, the shelves of books about bridges — Dad had been a civil engineer all his life — the chessboard with the unfinished game that Mum hadn't been able to bring herself to clear away for seven years. And in the corner by the window, a grey metal filing cabinet with three drawers, old, army issue, with a small keyhole at the top.

That, Florence was sure, was exactly where Derek Pierce had just been looking.

When the Lexus had gone, Katherine stood at the window with her arms folded.

"He never showed us the documents."

"He knew where Dad's study was," Florence said. "And he was looking at the filing cabinet. Like he was checking on something."

"Flo, don't start," Nigel snorted. "The man got the doors mixed up."

"A man who 'always mixes up the doors' walked straight to them like he owned the place."

She could have left it there. But the stone in her pocket suddenly became too heavy.

"Mum rang me in April," Florence said, and her voice failed her on the third word. "She left a message. She said she wanted to tell me something. About Dad. And about herself. That she should have told us a long time ago."

Katherine slowly turned from the window. Nigel froze with a box in his hands.

"And you said nothing?" Katherine whispered.

"I thought I'd have time to ask."

No one answered. Above their heads, in the loft, an old floorboard creaked softly — just the wind in a gap under the roof. But all three of them looked up at the same moment, as if the house had finally decided to answer in Mum's place.