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      She had emptied her pockets of change by the time she reached the front door.

     

      Anne-Marie was in today, though there was no welcoming smile. She simply stared at her visitor as if mesmerised.

     

     

      'I hope you don't mind me calling...'

     

     

      Anne-Marie made no reply.

     

     

      'I just wanted a word.'

     

     

      'I'm busy,' the woman finally announced. There was no invitation inside, no offer of tea.

     

     

      'Oh. Well... it won't take more than a moment.'

     

      The back door was open and the draught blew through the house. Papers were flying about in the back yard. Helen could see them lifting into the air like vast white moths.

     

     

      'What do you want?' Anne-Marie asked.

     

     

      'just to ask you about the old man.'

     

      The woman frowned minutely. She looked as if she was sickening, Helen thought: her face had the colour and texture of stale dough, her hair was lank and greasy.

     

     

      'What old man?'

     

     

      'Last time I was here, you told me about an old man who'd been murdered, do you remember?'

     

      'No.'

     

     

      'You said he lived in the next court.'

     

     

      'I don't remember,' Anne-Marie said.

     

     

      'But you distinctly told me - '

     

      Something fell to the floor in the kitchen, and smashed. Anne-Marie flinched, but did not move from the doorstep, her arm barring Helen's way into the house. The hallway was littered with the child's toys, gnawed and battered.

     

     

      'Are you all right?'

     

     

      Anne-Marie nodded. 'I've got work to do,' she said.

     

     

      'And you don't remember telling me about the old man?'

     

      'You must have misunderstood,' Anne-Marie replied, and then, her voice hushed: 'You shouldn't have come. Everybody knows.'

     

     

      'Knows what?'

     

     

      The girl had begun to tremble. 'You don't understand, do you? You think people aren't watching?'

     

     

      'What does it matter? All I asked was - 'I don't know anything,' Anne-Marie reiterated. 'Whatever I

    said to you, I lied about it.'

     

      'Well, thank you anyway,' Helen said, too perplexed by the confusion of signals from Anne-Marie to press the point any further.

     

     

      Almost as soon as she had turned from the door she heard the lock snap closed behind her.

     

     

     

     

      That conversation was only one of several disappointments that morning brought. She went back to the row of shops, and visited the supermarket that Josie had spoken of. There she inquired about the lavatories, and their recent history. The supermarket had only changed hands in the last month, and the new owner, a taciturn Pakistani, insisted that he knew nothing of when or why the lavatories had been closed. She was aware, as she made her enquiries, of being scrutinized by the other customers in the shop; she felt like a pariah. That feeling deepened when, after leaving the supermarket, she saw Josie emerging from the launderette, and called after her only to have the woman pick up her pace and duck away into the maze of corridors. Helen followed, but rapidly lost both her quarry and her way.

     

      Frustrated to the verge of tears, she stood amongst the overturned rubbish bags, and felt a surge of contempt for her foolishness. She didn't belong here, did she? How many times had she criticized others for their presumption in claiming to understand societies they had merely viewed from afar? And here was she, committing the same crime, coming here with her camera and her questions, using the lives (and deaths) of these people as fodder for party conversation. She didn't blame Anne-Marie for turning her back; had she deserved better?

     

      Tired and chilled, she decided it was time to concede Purcell's point. It was all fiction she had been told. They had played with her - sensing her desire to be fed some horrors - and she, the perfect fool,