Foxplot Manor had stood vacant on the outskirts of the village for most of living memory - most that is, save for Granny Minnow, although it was common knowledge you had to take what she “remembered” these days with a whole shaker of salt.

She had always been prone to exaggeration, but now age had long since begun to cloud the edges of her memory, so you really had no idea if what she was telling you resembled any form of the truth.

“Barely older than yourself,” she had croned, the old porches worn boards creaking as she settled into her chair, pausing to sip at her lemonade.

Paula looked out at the street, the summer sun hung low in the sky refusing to end the day, and waited for Granny to resume her story.

“13 or 14 maybe” eyes fogged as she gazed into her past “but I still remember it, clear as if it happened yesterday”

Despite doubting this, Paula hung on Granny’s every word regardless, as was she drip fed the story.

Granny, who just went by Lucy in those days, slowly told of the skinny pale girl, whose hair clung flat to her scalp, who would sit at the back of class a phantom.

Eventually even the teachers began to realise it was fruitless trying to draw participation from her and, since she wasn’t disrupting anyone, found it best to just leave her to diligently get on with her work.

So Granny couldn’t say how long that girl, Alice or April or “something like that” she was sure, had been absent from school before anyone, including the staff, took note. Due to this the three bodies were quite cold when the front door of Foxplot Manor was broken down by the local police.