The Safe House by Nicci French Page A

to say to her that if there was anything I could do I would do it, and that I would find out her address from Baird and come to see her. She nodded at me but I wasn’t sure if she had taken it in and she released my hand and turned away.
    ‘How’s the cleaner?’ a voice said behind me. Michael Daley.
    ‘Aren’t you her doctor?’
    ‘She’s registered with me. I took her on as a favour to the Mackenzies.’ Daley turned and followed her progress out of the room with a frown, before turning back to me. ‘Does she know who you are?’
    ‘Baird introduced us; I don’t think she understands the connection between me and Finn,’ I said.
    ‘What did she want?’
    ‘Help, I should say, and urgent help at that. And she wants to give Finn some of her things. And to see her, before she goes back to Spain.’
    Daley sipped reflectively at his sherry.
    ‘Sounds good to me,’ he said. ‘I suppose it would be good for Finn to see someone she knows.’
    ‘I don’t know if it’s safe, but on the other hand she might be an unthreatening kind of presence,’ I said.
    ‘It’s fine,’ he said.
    There was a pause. He gave a half-smile. ‘There are one or two people I should make a pretence of talking to. I’ll pick you up on the way out.’
    Standing in a huddle in the corner of the room were the girls I’d noticed in the church. I made my way over to them and when I caught the eye of one, I moved into their circle.
    ‘You must be friends of Finn’s?’
    A tall girl with dark shoulder-length hair and freckles over the bridge of her pert nose held out her hand, looked suspiciously at me, and then back at her friends. Who was I?
    ‘Just from school,’ she said. ‘I’m Jenny.’
    I’d wanted to find out about Finn from people who knew her, but now I couldn’t think what to say.
    ‘I knew her father. Professionally.’
    They all nodded at me, incurious. They were waiting for me to move on.
    ‘What’s she like, Finn?’ I asked.
    ‘Like?’ This from a blonde girl with cropped hair and a sharp nose. ‘She’s nice.’ She looked around for confirmation. The girls nodded.
    ‘ Was nice,’ another girl said. ‘I went to visit her at the hospital. They wouldn’t let me anywhere near her. Seems pretty stupid.’
    ‘I suppose…’
    ‘Are you ready to go?’
    I turned with a start to see Michael’s face. He hooked an arm under my elbow and nodded at the girls. They smiled back at him in a way they hadn’t smiled at me.
    The car park of the little parish church at Monkeness was right by the sea wall, and we sat there for a few minutes. I nibbled at a walnut cake that I’d scooped up from a tray on the way out, and Michael lit a cigarette. It took several matches, and finally he had to crouch down in the shelter of the wall.
    ‘Did Finn get on with her parents?’
    He gave a shrug.
    ‘Were they close? Did they argue? Help me out here, Michael, I’m living with this girl.’
    He took a deep drag from his cigarette and gave a gesture of helplessness.
    ‘I think they were close enough.’
    ‘Michael, there must have been problems. She was hospitalized because of depression and anorexia. You were her doctor.’
    ‘Yes, I was,’ he said, looking away from me over at the indistinct sea. ‘She was a teenager, it’s a messy time for most of us, so…’ He gave a shrug and didn’t finish his sentence.
    ‘Was it difficult for you being a friend of her parents?’
    Daley turned to face me with his tired dark eyes.
    ‘It’s been very difficult for me being a friend of Leo and Liz. Did the police tell you what they did to them?’
    ‘A bit. I’m sorry.’
    We got into the car and drove off. The countryside seemed grey, scrubby, indistinct. I knew it was my own mood. I had been to a funeral and felt no grief. I had just been uselessly thinking. I looked out of the window. Reed city.
    ‘I’m not right for Finn,’ I said. ‘And I wasn’t particularly proud of myself today.’
    Michael looked round.
    ‘Why