‘Tell me about the Grey Lady,’ she says. ‘She seems to have come up a lot in conversation recently.’
Janet laughs. ‘She’s not very popular with David either. I think he thinks I’m obsessed with her. But it’s such a strange and awful story.’ She pauses. Ruth finishes her last falafel and thinks about her next course.
‘She haunts Augustine Steward’s House,’ says Janet. ‘You know, that crooked, timbered building opposite the cathedral? Next to Tombland Alley? I’ll show you on our way out. Well, in the sixteenth-century plague, the one supposedly caused by Elizabeth’s entourage, the house was boarded up. That’s what they did in those days. Sealed the house with the occupants still inside. They’d draw a cross on the door and sometimes the words “Lord have mercy” and they’d leave the household to die. I suppose it was a way of containing the outbreak. When they opened the house again, they found the bodies of a man, a woman and a young girl.’
‘How sad,’ says Ruth. It seems rather callous to eat her brownie now.
‘Very sad,’ says Janet. ‘But that’s not the worst thing. The man and the woman had teeth marks on their bodies. Human teeth marks. It was thought that they’d died first and the girl had kept herself alive by eating their flesh. Maybe she died by choking on it rather than of the plague.’
‘Oh my God.’ Ruth pushes her plate even further away.
‘The daughter is the Grey Lady,’ says Janet. ‘She’s often seen in the alley, walking through walls, opening doors that aren’t there. Sometimes you just see the light of her candle reflected in the window panes. She’s a sad spirit. Maybe she’s exiled from heaven because she consumed her parents’ flesh.’
‘That seems very unfair,’ says Ruth.
‘There’s nothing fair about this life or the next,’ says Janet. She’s another lapsed Catholic, Ruth remembers. Like Nelson. And Cathbad too, come to think of it.
‘There have been lots of sightings of the Grey Lady,’ Janet continues. ‘Even by a former vicar of St George’s.’
‘Have you ever seen her?’ asks Ruth.
‘I’ve often sensed something,’ says Janet. ‘A shadow, a presence, sometimes just a feeling of intense sadness. The tourist information centre is in Steward’s House, you know. People don’t like to work there after dark.’
Ruth is not surprised. She doesn’t like to hear this story in the daylight, in a brightly lit café, with a school party jostling in through the doors, carrying activity books and Disney lunch boxes.
‘Cathbad’s seen her,’ says Janet, with a slight smile.
That doesn’t surprise Ruth either.
Avril Flowers lived in a neat bungalow on the edge of Hunstanton. Tanya immediately awards it a score out of ten. She and Petra are house hunting.
‘Seven,’ she says as Judy parks by the gate. It’s usually the junior officer who drives but Tanya’s car is in for a service. Judy never minds driving though. Tanya is always surprised by how much of a petrol head she is.
‘So high?’ says Judy.
‘Two points for the garden,’ says Tanya, ‘and I like the veranda.’
The house has a wrap-around porch that reminds Tanya of American films. There are plants in pots and one of those swing seats. The garden is well kept with a large pond and a willow tree. It looks like a place where someone once enjoyed spending time. The scene-of-crime team have finished, and the only sign of their presence is some plastic sheeting leading to the front door.
Avril’s daughter Bethany is meeting them at the house. There’s a smart hatchback on the drive which looks to Tanya as if it’s owned by someone called Bethany.
The door is opened by a blonde woman who is probably in her mid-thirties. She introduces herself as Bethany McGarrigle. She shows them into a sitting room that has a distant view, thanks to the elevated site, of the sea.
‘What a lovely house,’ says Tanya. She wonders if she can ask how much it costs.
‘Mum loved it,’ says Bethany, her eyes filling with tears. ‘I wanted her to come back to Scotland to be near me, but she said she had her life here. She worked at the library and volunteered at the school, listening to children read. And she was really involved with the local church.’
‘How did your mum seem when you spoke to her last?’ asks Judy. Tanya notes that she’s swapped ‘mother’ for ‘mum’, the sort of detail Tanya always forgets.
‘She seemed fine,’ says Bethany. ‘I spoke to her on Sunday. That was our ritual. We’d chat when Mum got back from church.’
‘And her health was good? No worries?’
‘Her health was better than mine,’ says Bethany. ‘Sixty’s young these days and Mum took care of herself.’
‘I’m sorry,’ says Judy. ‘I know this must be a terrible shock for you, but can you bear to tell me what happened when you got the call about your mum?’
Bethany takes a few deep breaths but, when she speaks, her voice is quite controlled. ‘Tina, the cleaning lady, called me at midday yesterday. She’d arrived to clean at her usual time. At first she thought Mum wasn’t in but that wasn’t unusual. Like I say, she was a busy lady. Tina had her own key and she started work as normal. But, when she went to Mum’s bedroom, it was locked.’
