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you’ll remember your key one of these days—’ When she saw Harker and I sheltering on the step, she made a small gasping sound in the back of her throat.
    ‘Mrs Underwood?’ Harker said, cocking his eyebrow.
    ‘Yes,’ she said, pushing the door shut an inch. ‘Who are you?’
    ‘I’m Detective Inspector Harker and this is Constable Henson from Marsh Road Police Station.’ He held up his warrant card.
    ‘Yes?’ she asked, her face turning pale. It was like she somehow knew. It’s never going to be good news if you’re woken in the early hours of the morning by the police.
    ‘Can we come in please?’
    Slowly, and without taking her eyes off us, she opened the front door and ushered us into the hallway.
    ‘Who else is at home with you?’ Harker said.
    ‘My husband,’ she said. ‘Why? What is this all about?’
    ‘It might be best if you woke your husband,’ I said softly.
    With her hand on the banister for support, and a tremor in her voice, she shouted up the stairs. ‘David! David! It’s the police.’
    There was a noise from above, then the sound of footsteps.
    ‘What?’ a man’s voice called. ‘What did you say, love?’
    ‘The police are here.’ This time her voice nearly broke altogether. With a trembling hand held against her face, she looked back at us. ‘It’s Kerry, isn’t it? What’s happened to her? Please tell me.’
    Mr Underwood appeared in the gloom at the top of the stairs, raking his hands through wiry hair. A loose fitting dressing gown flapped around his legs.
    ‘What’s this all about?’ he asked, coming down the stairs. ‘What’s happened?’
    ‘Perhaps we should go and sit down?’ I said.
    ‘No,’ Mrs Underwood croaked, both hands held to her face now. She peeked at me through her fingers, as though if she couldn’t see me, then what I was about to tell her wouldn’t be true. ‘Tell me what’s happened to my baby! It is Kerry, isn’t it? That’s why you’re here?’
    ‘Kerry?’ Mr Underwood muttered, still looking half asleep, his hair sticking out in clumps from the side of his head. ‘What’s going on?’
    Knowing that I couldn’t keep the truth from them any longer, and feeling sick with nerves, I said, ‘I’m sorry to have to inform you that your daughter Kerry has been involved in an incident tonight …’
    ‘No!’ Mrs Underwood almost seemed to screech, coming forward and gripping my rain-soaked coat. She pushed me back along the hallway towards the front door. ‘Get out,’ she screeched. ‘Whatever you’re going to say, isn’t true. I don’t want to hear it. Get out!’
    ‘Please, Mrs Underwood …’ I knew breaking the news was never going to be easy, but this was horrendous. To see the look of fear in Mrs Underwood’s eyes was unbearable.
    ‘Carol,’ Mr Underwood whispered, coming forward and prising his wife’s hands from me.
    ‘No!’ she wailed, slapping her husband over and over again. ‘No, David! No! Tell them to get out!’
    Mr Underwood gripped his wife’s wrist and folded his arms around her. ‘Shhh,’ he whispered in her ear. After she had calmed down a bit, he looked at us over her shoulder. ‘What’s happened to my daughter, officer?’
    ‘She was struck by a train and I’m afraid she’s …’ I found it nearly impossible to look him in the eyes. I didn’t want to see his pain too.
    ‘No!’ Mrs Underwood sobbed, and then seemed to crumple even further.
    ‘A train?’ Mr Underwood asked, shaking his head in bewilderment. ‘How was she struck by a train?’
    I took a deep breath. ‘She was lying on the tracks and the train …’
    ‘Suicide?’ Mr Underwood asked, his face screwing up in disbelief. ‘Impossible! Kerry wouldn’t have killed herself. She was a happy girl. She wouldn’t have done this to us, not just before Christmas. No way.’
    ‘We believe that she was taking a shortcut home across the tracks,’ Harker said.
    ‘A shortcut?’ Mr Underwood asked, drawing his wife tighter