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gardener we can employ.’ Zoë’s hand hesitated as she turned the key in the lock. ‘God knows what it’s like in here. Maggie was a scatty cow, clutter everywhere.’
    Libby held her breath. Someone died in this house. ‘There won’t be any, you know... evidence , will there?’
    ‘Lib, she fell down the stairs and broke her neck. She wasn’t bludgeoned to death.’
    But Libby wasn’t fooled by her friend’s overly chipper smile. Sure enough, when the door opened into a long hallway, they stood on the threshold, staring at the foot of the stairs, neither of them admiring the black and white Victorian tiles.
    ‘So is that where…’ Libby wrapped her arms around herself.
    The stairs were wooden, the floor ceramic. She winced imagining poor Great-aunt Maggie’s final moments. How long had the little old lady lain there, dying? Minutes, hours? Hopefully, less than a second.
    Zoë looked up to where the staircase turned to the right, disappearing from view. ‘She had this big, fat old cat and he used to sleep at the top of the stairs. Mum said she probably tripped over him. The amount of times I’d nagged her about him. I nearly broke my neck last time I was here.’
    ‘What happened to the cat?’
    Zoë shrugged. ‘A neighbour, Sheila, I think, came to feed him after they’d found Maggie, but he’d gone.’ With a little shake of her head, Zoë flashed a real smile. ‘Okay, maudlin over. Want a tour?’ Without waiting for an answer, she opened the door to their left. ‘Welcome to the Eighties.’
    ‘Wow.’ Libby stared at the flowery sofa, matching curtains and coordinating striped wallpaper, a riot of burgundy and cream. ‘I’ve never seen so much chintz in one place.’
    Knick-knacks covered every occasional table, books were stacked against the walls, but Libby just discerned an upright piano from the CDs stacked around it. She squeaked in delight.
    ‘Please, please, please, can we keep the piano?’
    ‘If we must.’ Zoë peered at the label on a tassel-cornered scatter cushion. ‘Back in the day, Maggie liked quality. This is a Laura Ashley vomitorium.’
    Libby cleared the CDs and lifted the lid to stroke the keys. Without hesitation, she pressed middle C. When had she last played? A pub in Cornwall?
    ‘It needs tuning,’ she said, closing her eyes, feeling the note as much as hearing it. She hit G-sharp, adoring the melodic ring.
    ‘Don’t get started on your Lady Gaga repertoire,’ Zoë replied. ‘We’ve got to unpack.’
    Through the door on the opposite side of the hallway they found the dining room. It featured no less chintz but at least its blue and white theme was a little less jarring on the eye.
    Zoë ducked down, inspecting the underside of the ornate table. ‘I reckon that’s real mahogany and so going on eBay tonight.’
    The kitchen sat at the back of the house. Its magnolia walls were oddly muted compared to the other rooms, though the mustard yellow splash-back tiles featuring the occasional vegetable display made up for it. A gift bag sat on the side, with a card addressed to Maggie.
    ‘ Don’t drink it all at once ,’ Zoë read before peering inside the bag.
    ‘Wine?’
    ‘Homemade crap.’ Zoë plonked a swing-top bottle of elderflower wine on the worktop and took out a pair of tall, beeswax candles. ‘Well, they’ve got Regift Me written all over them.’
    Libby peered through the window in the kitchen door. At the end of the long garden, edged with tall privet hedges, she could see nothing but fields stretching into the distance.
    ‘Ace, there’s a proper herb garden,’ Libby said. The multitude of planters dotted around the crazy-paved patio put the window box she’d nurtured back in Manchester to shame. ‘I spy… thyme, parsley, mint, rosemary and marjoram, but god knows what the rest are.’
    Zoë pointed to the tall, bushy plants growing in a sun-trapped corner. ‘It’s not all for eating.’
    ‘You’re joking. Your great-aunt grew