Page 36 of The Fall

Sasha blinks. ‘She has a place in Portugal. A finca. She prefers to live there.’

‘Does she come back here often?’

‘No. She prefers Portugal.’

‘Why doesn’t she sell this place?’

Sasha shrugs. ‘You’d have to ask her.’

‘Do you and Olly act as house-sitters? Is that your role?’

She takes a moment before answering. ‘Yes. I suppose you could say that. Actually I’d say we act more as managers than house-sitters.’

‘It’s an unusual arrangement.’

‘We’re very lucky.’

‘I’d say so. Olly tells me you don’t pay rent to Anna Creed.’

‘That’s correct. We maintain the property for her in exchange for living here.’

‘And you run your yoga business from here?’

‘It’s the perfect location. My clients love it.’

‘I expect they do. And just to confirm, on the morning when Tom Booth’s body was found, how many people were here?’

‘Me, Olly, Kitty and my yoga student, who was here between ten and eleven.’

‘Kitty is your housekeeper?’

‘Yes,’ Sasha says. ‘She lives in the old Coach House, on the estate, as she’ll have told you.’

‘Can you talk me through how you learned about Tom Booth’s death?’

‘I was outside, on the front yawn, practising yoga. Olly had just joined me when Nicole came running up the drive, screaming for help. Olly left me with her while he ran to their house. He wanted to see if there was something he could do. Nicole was practically catatonic; she was in shock. I asked Kitty to take care of her and I ran to join Olly. But obviously, we were too late. It’s devastating. Tom was such a lovely man.’

Jen’s work phone buzzes and she sneaks a look at it. The text is from a colleague.

We’ve had a message from Kitty, housekeeper at the Manor, saying to tell you she needs to speak to you while you’re there.

Jen reads it twice and wonders why Kitty wouldn’t say so directly. She texts back:When did this message come in?And gets an immediate answer:Ten minutes ago.

While we’ve been interviewing, she thinks.

Did she say anything else?

No.

The obvious conclusion is that Kitty has something to hide from her employers.

When Hal winds things up with Sasha, Jen says, ‘We’d like to meet with your housekeeper, too. Could you call her for us?’

Intriguingly, Jen sees something in Sasha that makes her pulse quicken: it’s a more significant fracture in Sasha’s poise, a muscle twitching in her jaw, a lick of her lips. It only lasts a moment before Sasha’s on her feet. ‘I’ll get her for you,’ she says.

‘One thing before you do,’ Jen says. They’ve heard what Olly said about Kitty and now she wants to know what Sasha thinks. ‘Is Kitty a good employee? Reliable?’

She keeps her eyes on Sasha, though she feels Hal glance at her, wondering why she’s asking.

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