A Dirty Death (26 page)

‘But it isn’t working out, is it? Mum says she’s selling up.’

‘That’s because Sylvia hasn’t made her proposition yet. She’s biding her time. She doesn’t want Mum to make any uncomfortable connections. That would really wreck it.’

‘But how did she get the gun?’ 

‘Either she tricked Sam into giving it to her, or she nicked it the last time she was here. Easy, either way. Sam wouldn’t expect her to shoot him, would he?’

‘Rod, I don’t like this. It all fits too neatly.’ Lilah threw a bucketful of water over the floor and then brushed at a patch of resistant muck. ‘And there isn’t the slightest bit of proof.’

‘I bet you she hasn’t got alibis for any of the three mornings,’ he continued. ‘And I bet your Den hasn’t given her a thought. If the same person killed Dad, Sam and Isaac, then she’s the only one with a motive for all of them.’

‘Okay, I can just about go along with the idea of her drowning Dad, but whacking people’s heads with a crowbar? And Amos said it was definitely a man.’

‘Did he? I haven’t heard that.’

‘Den told me. Somebody wearing a balaclava, and rough clothes.’

‘Sounds as if it could be anybody,’ Roddy commented. ‘Including Sylvia.’

Lilah went to see Jonathan and Cappy that evening, curious about his interview with the police, and how they’d treated him.

Roxanne came to meet her at the curve of the lane, scenting her approach with the infallible nose of the gundog. But her greeting was subdued: a wag of the tail and a sniff of Lilah’s jeans. Together they went across the tidy back garden, where the barbecue had been held, and on to the patio. The house stood sideways to its driveway, making the rear as accessible as the front. In summer, the French doors stood permanently open and Lilah had long ago been invited to use them without formality. Now she stood for a moment, preparing to call out. Before 
she could draw breath, Cappy’s voice came from inside the room.

‘Honestly, darling, you are making a fuss.’

‘You haven’t any idea what it was like,’ came the reply, much harsher than Jonathan’s usual relaxed drawl. ‘Those men, like pigs, rummaging about in things they can’t begin to understand. You should have heard them. Asking all about the Beardons, how often we see them, whether we knew how Sam fitted in.’

‘And what did you tell them?’

‘That’s what’s so foul about it all. I turned into a complete jelly – told them everything. All that stuff about Guy’s first wife – finding the mucky clothes – everything. I feel sick at myself now. I thought I had more guts. I was scared. I just wanted them to think what a co-operative chap I was. Above suspicion. They seemed to be hung up on my driving round there so quickly the other morning, which I hadn’t expected. As if shots and screams were normal country sounds, not worth bothering with …’

Lilah knew she mustn’t eavesdrop any more. Deliberately she scuffed her sandal on the stone patio, and then clapped her hands foolishly at the dog. ‘Hello, Roxanne!’ she chirped. ‘Jonathan? Cappy? Anybody in?’

‘In here,’ Cappy called. ‘Is that you, Lil?’ As she entered the room, both the Mabberleys stood 
up to greet her, which felt oddly rebuffing. Ranged side by side, they presented a united front, which made her falter and pause only a few inches inside the threshold. But she spoke up boldly.

‘I came to see if Jonathan’s all right. Den phoned this afternoon and he told me you’d taken the clothes in.’ As in her conversation with Den, she bit off the urge to tell them more, to share everything that the policeman had told her.

She was looking brightly from one to the other, covering up the peculiar hot shudders that were surging through her at having heard them talking about her family. It struck her that every household in the village might be discussing, gossiping, surmising about every detail of their lives. She wished then that she had tiptoed away again, to think over what she’d heard before having to speak to them.

‘Den?’ said Cappy. ‘Who’s Den?’

‘One of the policemen. I knew him at school, sort of. I see him sometimes, since Daddy died.’ She shrugged awkwardly, wondering how she was sounding. The couple seemed to be looking at her with something like anger. Cappy had lines around her mouth which were new, and Jonathan was far from his normal self. It was as if the sheen had been wiped off them, revealing the pale flesh beneath. Something unhealthy hung in the air. Even the dog was subdued and glum. 

‘So?’ pursued Lilah, with a sense of having little left to lose. ‘Tell me about it.’

‘Oh, well—’ Jonathan flipped a hand, in one of his old gestures. ‘You know. You’ve seen it all on the telly. You sit one side of a table, and they sit the other, and they ask about a hundred daft questions, and make you sign something and then you can go. All a great waste of time and taxpayers’ money.’

‘I feel sort of responsible for you being hassled. If you didn’t live next door to a family that keeps getting itself murdered, none of this would have happened.’

‘True,’ said Jonathan, rapidly recovering his normal urbane composure. ‘We’d never have let you buy the place if we’d known what it would be like.’

‘
You
didn’t own it before us, did you? Nobody ever told me that.’

‘Well, it was no secret. You were just too young to be interested. It was all done through agents, and we’d never lived there. It was more of a technicality than anything. My dad bought it from an old chap in 1940, and never farmed it himself. There were tenants before you.’

‘But Daddy never once mentioned it. That’s really strange.’

‘Well, it isn’t important,’ Cappy interrupted. ‘Have they still got poor old Amos locked up?’

Lilah and Jonathan looked at each other, each 
expecting the other to answer. Then both shrugged. ‘Don’t know,’ said Lilah. She’d forgotten Amos since Den’s phonecall. The implication had been that he was no longer a prime suspect, but Den hadn’t actually said as much. She wanted to tell the Mabberleys that the clothes had belonged to a woman, that the police were now giving this most of their attention. But Cappy was a woman, and Cappy was deeply unknowable. Lilah hesitated, and tried to think.

It was more than possible that her neighbours already knew that they were female clothes. But if they’d been Cappy’s it made no sense whatsoever that she’d have allowed Jonathan to take them to the police. And it made even less sense to imagine the restrained and immaculate Cappy Mabberley wallowing in a slurry pit. Even so, Lilah kept the information to herself. She had come to glean, not to divulge.

The silence grew awkward, all three standing stiffly, tense with unspoken ideas and suspicions. Then Cappy swung her arms, as if limbering up for a race. ‘Tell you what,’ she said. ‘I’ve got something to show you.’

Jonathan darted a quick glance of warning at her. ‘Err,’ he said.

‘Oh, it’s all right,’ Cappy laughed, purpose shining from her. ‘There’s no reason to keep it secret from Lilah.’ 

‘What?’ The girl was intrigued, even excited.

‘Come with me,’ Cappy beckoned, heading past Lilah to the French windows. ‘It’s still light enough, but we can’t waste any time.’

‘Can I come?’ asked Jonathan.

Cappy looked back at him, considering. ‘No. You stay here.’

‘Well, be careful. If you see anyone, you’re to come right back. Especially if Lilah’s with you.’

‘Phooey,’ was all Cappy replied. ‘Come on, Lil.’

Nobody else called her ‘Lil’. It was strangely affectionate. She followed the woman past the bird sheds, down a deep, ancient lane, between high Devon hedges; the official entrance drive to the Mabberley farm. After a quarter of a mile, covered at a brisk walk, they turned through an open gateway into a field of lush grass, apparently destined for hay. ‘Are you making hay this year?’ Lilah queried. ‘That’s unusual.’

‘Jonathan’s getting someone in to do it, I think. There’s another couple of fields like this, over there.’ She waved a vague arm. ‘We’ll soon be there.’

The whole walk took fifteen minutes, and ended in the Mabberley woods, criss-crossed by paths and open to anyone in search of sylvan encounters. Off the paths it was dense with bracken, brambles, hawthorn and holly, as well as 
the larger, older trees, and thus almost impossible to traverse. ‘Nothing like the woods of my childhood,’ Cappy remarked, in a low voice. ‘It’s all bare between the trees where I grew up, and none of this endless stinging and scratching stuff.’ Nonetheless, she plunged off the path they’d taken, striding confidently over snaking brambles, and sidestepping horribly reminiscent clumps of nettles. ‘Tread where I do,’ she instructed Lilah.

‘Why are we whispering?’ asked Lilah.

‘We’re going to a secret place. In a minute we mustn’t talk at all, not even in whispers.’ They plunged on, making some noise in the evening quiet. Lilah wondered who there might be to hear them. She had never taken much interest in these woods, preferring open fields and hedgerows. The presence of holidaymakers had always been off-putting to her, with their loud laughter and silly picnics.

Without warning, Cappy stopped and pointed. ‘There,’ she sighed. ‘By the witch’s tree.’

Lilah could see nothing remarkable. A mountain ash grew straggly beside a broad, green sweep of bracken. It was a relatively light spot, with no large trees to blot out the sun, and it seemed to be clear of brambles. In fact, the ground underfoot was mossy and springy. She peered in the direction of Cappy’s pointing finger, but soon gave up. ‘Where?’ she said. ‘What witch’s tree?’ 

The woman indicated the rowan. ‘I’ll explain later,’ she mouthed, close to Lilah’s ear. ‘Now follow me carefully.’

She led Lilah straight towards the bracken, and then began to skirt round it to an area that had been out of sight to them. Lilah began to notice signs of human interference. A circular ring of stones contained a scattering of wood ash and singed ground. There was a visible path leading directly into the bracken. Following it, she realised that it ended in a shelter, formed from bracken and young ash and elder limbs. So cleverly was it made that it took her some time to recognise it for what it was. There was a smell about it, too, of sweat and smoke and something sweet.
Dope
, she thought suddenly.

Cappy watched her, and then spoke in a normal voice. ‘Clever, isn’t it. There are some things hidden away, too. Drinking cups, and a blanket.’

‘How on earth did you find it?’

‘Oh, well, I thought I saw someone coming down here one day, and being a nosy cow, I kept a lookout. And – well, I know Jonathan doesn’t care who uses the woods, but they are
ours
, after all. I do feel we should know what’s going on in here.’

‘Smoking dope, by the smell of it,’ said Lilah. ‘It’s lovely, though. Like a fairytale.’

‘Don’t you feel it’s a bit sinister?’ 

Lilah considered. ‘Not really. But perhaps I’m not very sensitive to atmospheres. They probably don’t use it much. Have you ever seen them properly? Who are they?’

Cappy shook her head. ‘I just saw a man, and then only from the back. Youngish.’

‘And you haven’t said anything to the police? After all—’

‘You think it’s got something to do with the murders? Well, yes, that’s why I showed it to you. But it isn’t much, really, is it? Probably just some local lad coming to get away from it all. I mean, that’s what these woods are for.’ She seemed defensive and somehow frustrated. Lilah wondered whether she had been expected to react differently.

‘But don’t you think they’d want to know about it?’ she persisted. The failure to tell the police struck her as quite seriously neglectful.

‘I have a good reason,’ Cappy replied evasively. ‘It’s growing about three hundred yards away, but I’m not telling you where.’

Lilah blinked, and then understood. ‘Oh, Cappy!’ she laughed. ‘How brave of you!’

‘Purely for personal use,’ the woman said primly. ‘But it wouldn’t be funny at all if I got caught, now would it. It’s well hidden, but even so, no sense in asking for trouble. Besides, I’ve never actually told Jonathan.’ 

‘Well, thanks for showing me the hideout, and trusting me with your secret. I’d never be able to find it again on my own. Hadn’t we better go before it gets really dark?’

Cappy nodded and turned to lead the way back. Lilah couldn’t even work out where they’d come from, or where the paths were: without her guide, she’d be completely lost. ‘How many acres are these woods?’ she asked.

‘Fifty or so, altogether. That’s quite a size, by English standards.’

‘You can say that again. I had no idea they were so big. Stupid, when I’ve lived next door for most of my life. It never occurred to me to wonder before.’

‘Hush!’ The sound came sharp, aggressive. Lilah stopped still, and caught the sounds of swishing that meant someone was ploughing through undergrowth, much as they were.
Too late
, she thought.
Our voices must have carried far enough to be heard
.

Cappy surprised her by suddenly crouching down behind a small, dense holly tree, flapping at Lilah to do the same. Feeling rather foolish, she squatted where she was, assuming she wouldn’t be noticed in the fading light.

The sounds came closer, obviously made by a single person, treading confidently along a known route.
Why are we hiding?
Lilah 
wondered.
What on earth is this all about
?

A woman came into view. Her face was a pale disc, framed with long, untidy black hair. Two distinct facts were immediately obvious to Lilah. Firstly, this was Elvira, the simple girl from the village, Phoebe Winnicombe’s daughter. Elvira, who had travelled the daily school bus with Lilah and Den and all the others of their generation.

Secondly, this was the female half of the copulating couple she had seen in the field after the Mabberleys’ barbecue. How this became such a certainty to Lilah was unclear. The swinging black hair, the broad, round hips, were the only physical pointers. But Lilah was sure. And it seemed suddenly very important to find the identity of the man who’d been with her.

She let Jonathan drive her home, without any argument. He dropped her at the farmyard gate, turning round and leaving her without saying more than a muted goodnight. Cappy’s revelation of the lair in the woods had only made Lilah more obsessed with her own preoccupations. ‘I must get home,’ was all Lilah had said, once they’d got safely back to the Mabberleys’ house.

As she let herself into the Redstone kitchen, she was greeted by a fevered Roddy. ‘Where have you
been
?’ he demanded, as soon as he saw her.

‘Why? What’s the matter?’

‘We left Particular out of the milking. She’s hurt her leg, and didn’t come in with the others. Now she’s bawling her head off because she needs 
to be milked. Her udder’s bursting. Mum was up in the orchard and heard her. We went to try and get her in, but she’s too lame to walk.’

‘We’ll have to milk her by hand.’

‘Can you do that?’

‘If I have to. Remember that little course I did when I was seventeen?’ Roddy looked blank. ‘Never mind,’ she said impatiently. ‘The point is, I was quite good at it, compared to some. She won’t like it, though. And it’s
dark
, Rod. What a bugger.’

‘Well, it’s your fault. If you hadn’t stayed out so long, we could have got it sorted by now. Where
were
you?’

‘At Jonathan’s. I told you.’

‘You didn’t.’

‘Roddy, I
did
. You can’t have been listening.’

‘Oh, it doesn’t matter. I just want to go to bed, but I suppose I’ll have to come with you, hold a torch or something.’

‘Why isn’t Mum doing something?’

‘She was going to phone somebody to come and help, when someone phoned her first. I don’t know who, but she must still be talking.’

‘If Particular’s leg’s that bad, we ought to get the vet out.’

‘I don’t think she’s too bothered about the leg – except when she tries to walk. Just the udder.’

‘Did she come in this morning?’ 

‘I don’t remember. The order did seem to go wrong near the end. No wonder she’s bawling if she’s missed
two
milkings.’

With a deep sigh, Lilah took charge. The cow was approached, soothed, milked by hand just enough to ease the worst of the pressure, and her leg deemed sufficiently non-urgent to wait until morning. Before this was accomplished, Miranda joined them, hovering and making suggestions until Lilah sent her back to the house. The rhythm of the hand milking would have been quite pleasant if it hadn’t been such a strain on the unaccustomed muscles. Soon both hands were aching unbearably, and one teat still hadn’t been touched. Milk spread across the ground in a widening pool, somehow horrible in the torchlight. As the torch battery faded, the silvery light of a half-moon made the milk shine weirdly against the dark grass.

At last, it was done. The two stumbled back across the fields, exhausted and resentful. Lilah felt giddy with the relentless succession of crises overwhelming her. But she was grateful to Roddy for staying with her and told him so.

‘That’s okay,’ he mumbled. ‘She’s stopped bawling, anyway, so we must have done something right.’

‘It’s funny I didn’t hear her from the Mabberleys’. I was outside most of the time – you’d think it would have carried.’ 

‘What were you doing there, anyway?’

‘I didn’t go for anything special, but Cappy showed me a secret camp, out in their woods. I’m not sure what to make of it.’

‘Why would she show it to you? Whose is it?’

‘Well – I probably shouldn’t tell you that part just yet. I need to have a think first. Okay?’

He slashed the stick he carried across the tops of some young nettles, and both were reminded of Sam.

Miranda was in her pyjamas when they got back, a pan of hot milk keeping warm on the Aga for them. ‘Pyjamas, Mum?’ smirked Roddy. ‘Aren’t they Dad’s?’

She hugged herself and wriggled into the brushed cotton. ‘They feel wonderful,’ she said. ‘I want to wear them all the time.’

Lilah was beyond speech. She took her mug and started up the stairs. ‘Oh—’ Miranda stopped her. ‘You’ll never guess who phoned.’ Neither of her children responded. ‘Barbara!’ she announced, with a dramatic flourish. ‘You know – Guy’s first wife. Barbara Beardon, that wrote the letter. She phoned. I told her I wanted to go and see her, and she said fine. So I am. She sounds nice.’

‘Great, Mum,’ said Lilah, wearily. ‘Can we talk about it tomorrow? I think I’ll die if I don’t go to bed this minute.’

When she woke, her hands still ached. They felt big and hot. When she rolled out of bed and started to pull on her jeans, her fingers worked stiffly. It was worrying to be so disabled and she envisaged a day of pain and incompetence. Particular’s troubles were not yet over, either: if she wasn’t properly milked out, the supply would dry up and they’d lose the yield of one of their best milkers, only a month into her lactation. Not until she was in the kitchen did she remember Miranda’s announcement about the first Mrs Beardon.

Initially her reaction was one of exasperation that her mother could seriously consider leaving the farm when they were so obviously under huge pressure. It was unthinkable that she and Roddy could be left to do everything on their own. Even if they abandoned everything except the cows and young stock, it would be too much for them. At the prospect ahead, she almost gave up and crawled back into bed to nurse her throbbing hands. Instead she poured two mugs of tea and went to the bottom of the stairs to call Roddy. A muffled response assured her that he had woken up.

Getting through the morning milking gave them no chance to talk to each other. Miranda came out when they’d started and intercepted some milk for the younger calves who were already calling for their breakfast across the yard. 
What semblance of routine there was had to be patched together as they were forced to put the tasks in order of priority. All three realised that the only way to manage was to begin early in the day, working all morning, and give themselves at least part of the afternoon to pause for rest and reflection. Lilah knew they were achieving the impossible, out of a sort of lucky ignorance, which couldn’t last. None of them knew how to maintain the milking machine, how to operate some of the implements or even keep the tractor in proper order. Lilah was fairly familiar with the basics, but there were serious limitations to her knowledge, in spite of her experience. Thinking about it now, she realised what poor use she had made of her opportunities, and how Guy had conspired to prevent her from genuinely sharing in any decision-making.

As she shut off the milking machine and went to put the equipment in to soak, her mind sought tirelessly for some escape, a way out of their intolerable position. It kept coming back to the cows. Everything else could be shelved or sold. Even the calves could go to market at a few days’ notice, distressing though it might be. But the cows were too important for that. Many of them were very dear to her. She had known them all their lives, knew how they were related, and which had been difficult to feed as new calves, or which 
had been slow to take to the rigours of
twice-daily
milking after nearly two years’ freedom out in the fields. She had seen markets – the callous men with their sticks and loud voices, and the great bulging eyes of the animals showing their panic. She knew how established herds behaved towards a newcomer – worse than children in a primary school playground.
Not the cows
, repeated a small voice inside her.
Please don’t let us have to sell the cows
. This fear, perhaps, was the single factor which kept her going through the hot June morning with its dust and flies and grass seeds. Miranda might make remarks like, ‘When this lot’s sold …’ or ‘Roll on market day’, but she wouldn’t do anything about it. There didn’t seem to be time to pick up the phone to summon the cattle truck or consult the auctioneer. There were too many aspects to selling which she didn’t understand. Somewhere, they all hoped there would be an expert on hand to help them. Perhaps if they waited long enough, this rescuer would turn up in the yard in a glossy white Land Rover.

Lilah continued to feel Guy’s presence at every turn. In the hot June sunshine, with heavy black shadows in the corners and the background buzz of insects, she regularly thought she saw him, heard his voice. He would be just out of sight, behind the barn door, or calling her from one of the fields. The cuckoo didn’t help. More than once 
she was convinced it was her father’s distant voice, calling ‘Li-lah!’ needing her for some urgent task.

Had the person who killed Guy and Sam understood what he was doing? That he was destroying Redstone, forcing the surviving family out into the unknown? Had that been the purpose, all along? If so, where was that person now, and how did he hope to gain from what he had done?

He or she
, Lilah corrected herself. It might have been a woman. A woman who had a score to settle with Guy. That much was just credible. But Sam? Who could possibly have any grudge against poor Sam? The theory about Sylvia hardly extended that far, surely? What difference would Sam’s existence have made to her plan? She wouldn’t inherit his share of the farm. Rather than being any sort of impediment, wasn’t he a vital element of the farm, his contribution ensuring that it remained viable?

The morning passed, with feeding and cleaning and automatic release of the cows back into the same field they’d occupied for weeks. Miranda phoned the vet for Particular’s bad leg, which looked worse in daylight, and then lent a brief hand, before disappearing into the house and eventually calling Lilah in to lunch at twelve. The girl fell on it voraciously.

‘Thank goodness it’s summer,’ said Miranda, 
as she watched her. ‘Otherwise you’d still have the mucking out to do.’

‘If it wasn’t summer, we’d have given up by now,’ said Lilah. ‘Or the RSPCA would have forcibly closed us down.’

‘We’ll have to get someone to help us. We should have done it before. There must be at least one person out of work in the village. Preferably a man who understands machinery. It’s stupid to struggle on like this. Something will blow up because we haven’t oiled it, or the milk will be rejected because it’s got something nasty in it. And if I go to Nottingham, there’ll obviously have to be someone.’

‘Yes, but who? Have sense, Mum. You can’t possibly be serious about going off now.’

‘I won’t just abandon you. I’ll ask Sylvia to come and do the things that I’ve been doing. Let’s face it, she’s far more competent than I am.’

Lilah sighed. Too many disjointed thoughts were whirling around in her head, and she felt exhausted with the strain of it all. ‘I forgot to tell you what Cappy showed me last night,’ she said. ‘It was all very peculiar.’ Having engaged her mother’s attention, she told her briefly about the hideaway in the woods. She also described seeing Elvira making her way back to it, although there was a strong feeling of anxiety attached to that part of her revelations. Her words sounded 
inconsequential in her own ears as she related the scene, and yet she knew it was important.

‘Elvira was always rather fey,’ said Miranda. ‘It’s the sort of thing she would do.’

‘I know. Cappy said there was a witch’s tree.’

‘A rowan? Fancy her knowing about that.’

‘Fancy
you
knowing,’ said Lilah. ‘I’ve never heard them called that.’

‘I thought everybody knew about rowan trees,’ said Miranda in surprise.

Lilah pressed on doggedly. ‘I do get the feeling that there’s something wrong about her being there, especially if she’s with a boy. Phoebe can’t be very happy about it.’

‘If she knows. It’s a wise mother that knows everything her daughter gets up to.’ She pulled a silly face. ‘Anyway, don’t get yourself in a state about it. You’re living on your nerves as it is, if I’m any judge. You’re all keyed up. Your imagination’s working overtime. It’s all beginning to look much clearer to me. Some stranger – it might even be Elvira’s boyfriend, I suppose – pushed Guy into the slurry, maybe because he shouted at him or abused him – you know what he was like with that sort of person. So, then he went off to try and burgle the Grimms, and laid about with a crowbar in the process. Then he came back here – don’t criminals always return to the scene, to check they didn’t leave any clues? Well, Sam must have seen 
him, and got himself shot. Awful. Horrific. But not a conspiracy, or anybody we know. Isn’t that the most likely explanation?’

Lilah folded her arms tightly around herself. ‘I’d really like to think so,’ she said, with a faint smile. ‘But somehow I can’t believe it’s as simple as that.’

‘Well, leave it for now. Maybe this will cheer you up. Look, I’ve found an advert in one of Guy’s magazines for a relief milking agency. I’ll get onto them. You two can’t go on like this. I’ll try to get someone to do the mornings, at least.’

‘Mum! Have you any idea how much these agencies
cost
? You can’t do that.’

‘I don’t care. We can always apply to the Council for a house, and the state for some money. Or live in a caravan. Or I could get work as a live-in housekeeper somewhere.’

Lilah guffawed unkindly. ‘You, Mother, are the last person in the world to find work as a housekeeper. Who’s going to provide you with references?’

Miranda gave her daughter a half-hearted slap. ‘I’ll fake them,’ she said.

‘We don’t know for sure we’re selling up. Wait before phoning the agency. Why don’t I try the college? There might be an agriculture student looking for work. I should have thought of that ages ago. We just need another pair of hands.’ 

‘That’s not a bad idea. But I’ll phone, not you.’

Lilah was suspicious of her mother’s helpfulness. ‘Is this all because you’re so keen to get to meet that woman?’

‘Lilah! What a nasty thing to say. It’s not true at all – just that last night’s phone call was the spur I needed. It sort of brought me to my senses, I suppose.’

‘I still don’t see what the attraction is.’

Miranda pouted and said nothing. Lilah knew she’d have to let it go at that.

Sylvia came back that afternoon, when Miranda and Lilah were sitting outside with cups of tea, barely awake in the warm sunshine.