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MILLIE WAS IN THE DOORWAY, WATCHING SOME CHICKENS strut up and down in the lane. Across the drive, her mother was unloading shopping from the car. She straightened up and headed for the door.

‘Will you go back inside?’ she said to the toddler, bending down towards her. ‘It’s freezing.’ She squeezed past the child and disappeared. A moment later her hands caught hold of Millie round the waist. ‘I mean it,’ she said, as she lifted her daughter up and took her out of sight. ‘You’ll fall down those steps.’

For a moment the doorway was empty and then the mother appeared again. She crossed quickly to her car and found the last of the bags. As she straightened up and pressed the button on the thing in her hand that would lock the car, the child appeared in the doorway again. She stole a brief, sly look at her mother before turning to the chickens that had wandered into their garden. Then she climbed down the steps to the drive.

The car hadn’t locked itself. The mother pressed the button twice, three times and then gave up, using the key to lock the car instead, just as Millie set off across the lawn. The mother crossed the drive and went inside. The front door closed. Silence.

Nothing to see, nothing to hear for a minute, maybe two. Then the front door was pulled open and the woman, her face white and her hands clutching her upper arms, appeared in the doorway. ‘Millie!’ she called, as though afraid to shout too loudly. ‘Millie!’ she called again, a bit louder this time. ‘Millie!’