The Silent Ones: An absolutely gripping psychological thriller(14)

Neary starts with an introduction about the interview, and explains that it’s all going to be recorded. He’s talking about how they need to establish beforehand that the girls understand the difference between telling the truth and lying. It sounds like nonsense.

I try really hard to take it all in, to absorb his words, but I can’t drag my eyes away from my daughter’s washed-out face and the puffy dark circles under her eyes.

Last October, there was a Halloween disco held in Annesley Village Hall. Maddy dressed up as Wednesday Addams and I applied white face powder and dabbed slate-grey eyeshadow around her eyes to give her that authentic Addams Family look.

Today she has no need of any such makeover to look exhausted and drawn. I reach across and squeeze her hand, but she doesn’t respond.

‘Mrs Fletcher?’ Neary’s voice penetrates my thoughts.

I jump a little and bring my attention back to the room.

‘He’s asking if it’s OK to start,’ Tom prompts me.

‘Sorry, yes. Yes, that’s fine.’ I uncross my legs. Chloe would be annoyed at me for behaving so politely, saying all the right things… saying more than I need. But I can’t help it. We’re different like that.

DS March kicks off the interview.

‘So, Maddy. Like DI Neary says, it’s important we make sure that you fully understand the difference between a lie and the truth. For instance, if I was to say that you’re wearing a red top, would that be the truth or would it be a lie?’

Maddy glances down at the long navy-blue tunic they gave her when they took away her clothes for forensic examination. It’s a bit tight at the tops of her arms and it pulls a little across her belly.

She doesn’t answer the detective, but March is undeterred. ‘Let’s try another one. If I said that DI Neary isn’t sitting next to me right now, would that be the truth or a lie?’

Maddy shifts in her seat, squeezes her eyes shut as if she’s silently instructing herself to keep her words inside. I swear I can feel the tension rolling off her in waves as I watch her fingers grasp and pull at the bottom of the dull long-sleeved T-shirt.

Neary clears his throat.

‘Maddy, earlier today, officers were called to the house of Mrs Bessie Wilford on Conmore Street.’

Maddy looks up at him. Two dark pink spots begin to bloom on her pale cheeks.

I glance at Tom, but his eyes are fixed on our daughter.

‘Maddy, can you tell us what happened to Bessie Wilford?’

Her chest rises and falls faster now, but she looks away from the detective. Away from me and her father.

‘The officers found Bessie badly injured on the floor,’ Neary continues. ‘How did she get to be there, Maddy?’

Maddy twists the hem of the tunic into a small point. The pink spots on her cheeks are bigger now, and a faint sheen of perspiration has appeared on her upper lip.

‘How was Bessie when you first got to the house?’ DS March takes over. ‘Was she unhurt?’

‘Perhaps she did something to make you both angry,’ Neary adds.

‘I don’t think leading questions are the way to go here,’ Seetal warns.

Maddy slumps a little further down in her chair. She must be feeling overwhelmed. Confused. I feel like I ought to intervene, ask them to go a bit slower. But we’ve got to get to the bottom of this mess, sort it out so we can take her home.

That poor old lady is seriously ill in hospital, and someone put her there. Her family must be beside themselves too. But I would bet my life, without any hesitation at all, that my daughter was not the one responsible. She simply isn’t capable of doing something like that.

And my niece, Brianna? Of course I don’t think she’d do anything so terrible as to deliberately attack an old lady, but she has got Chloe’s temper. I’ve seen her shout back at Chloe, and even throw stuff around.

Last Christmas, when she and Maddy were playing a game of Operation in Mum’s front room, we all ran in, alarmed, at the sound of screeching.

‘She stabbed me with the tweezers when I won,’ Maddy howled, showing us the angry red snick on her hand.

‘I never!’ Brianna insisted.

Granted, it was nowhere as serious as attacking an old lady, but nevertheless, people can do some pretty bad things in anger.

‘Was Bessie OK when you first arrived at the house?’ Neary repeats.

Maddy slides her flat hands onto the chair under her thighs and stares at the floor in front of her feet. Her loose ponytail shifts slightly as she rocks gently on the seat, as if she’s trying to reassure herself. I want to prompt her to answer, to say something to fill the gaping hole that is swallowing us all up. But before the interview started, Seetal instructed Tom and me not to speak at all unless one of the detectives addressed us directly.

‘Maybe you had nothing to do with Bessie’s injuries at all,’ March continues, and Maddy looks up. ‘Did you help her, once you saw she was hurt?’

It’s far too warm in this room. You’d think they’d have a fan going or something. I’m starting to feel a bit queasy.

‘What did you do, Maddy? What did you do when you saw she was badly injured?’

Maddy’s bottom lips wobbles, and then the tears come. A trickle at first, but in no time at all she is gulping and gasping for breath, and her face is wet and completely scarlet.