An hour later, several police cars and an ambulance were parked in front of Clive Daniel’s new house. Ten minutes after that, a red German sedan pulled into the driveway. A blonde woman in a strict gray suit stepped out and immediately approached the group of police officers. She had a very pleasant face with regular features, and despite her serious expression, she looked quite approachable.

  Clive watched them from the yard. He saw one of the officers — a tall, well-built man — remove his dark glasses, slip them into the breast pocket of his jacket, and extend his hand to the woman. They exchanged a few words and then headed toward Clive together. Meanwhile, Dan and Stefan continued talking to a constable — a dark-haired woman with a curvy figure.

  “Mr. Clive Daniel?” the man asked, offering his hand. Clive nodded and rose from the bench.

  “I’m Detective Shane O’Halloran. And this,” he gestured toward the blonde woman, “is psychologist Orla Leary. You called the police?”

  “Uh… no. I found the girl. My friend Dan made the call.”

  “And the house and the entire property belong to you?”

  “Yes. I bought the plot with the cottage a couple of weeks ago and was planning to start renovations.”

  The detective nodded understandingly, made a few notes in his notebook, then glanced toward the area already cordoned off with yellow-and-black tape.

  “You’ll have to forget about construction work for a few days. Is the girl alive?”

  Clive swallowed. The image rose again in his mind — a small girl huddled in a corner like a frightened animal. She blinked, but didn’t respond to his voice, to his words. And when he tried to touch her thin hand, she began to crawl away…

  “Yes. She’s alive.”

  “Tell me in as much detail as possible how you discovered her.”

  The detective and Clive walked along the path toward the shed. Orla followed closely behind, listening attentively to the homeowner’s account.

  “When I bought the house, the realtor only briefly mentioned that there was a structure in the garden scheduled for demolition. I didn’t inspect it at the time. I figured if it was to be torn down, it wasn’t important. I liked the house and the garden. You can see how many trees there are. And if you go past that fence over there, you can reach the lake directly—”

  The detective cleared his throat, signaling that Clive had strayed from the point. Clive immediately caught himself.

  “Yes, right… So, Dan suggested tearing down the shed — or garage, or storage space, I’m not sure what to call it. He suggested building a rose garden for my wife in its place. But I’m not used to demolishing buildings blindly, so I decided to inspect it first.”

  “What struck you as strange first, Mr. Daniel?”

  “The noise. Like someone scratching at something. But Dan assured me it was probably rats.”

  O’Halloran and Orla Leary immediately noted this down.

  “And then we found the dresser. It was standing right in the middle of the room, and as it turned out later, it was blocking a hatch leading to the cellar.”

  “And the hatch itself — was it locked?”

  “Yes. There was a padlock on it.”

  Shane looked at the psychologist. They exchanged a silent conclusion. The woman nodded and wrote something down.

  “So the girl was locked in. Did you ask the realtor what happened to the previous owners?”

  “I didn’t, to be honest.”

  A solidly built man in a suit approached them. He introduced himself to Clive, then addressed the detective.

  “So, what’s the situation? Have you seen her?”

  “Not yet. We’re about to go down into the cellar. Evan, I’ve got a task for you — ask Fay to pull information on all the previous residents of this house.”

  “On it,” his partner replied and immediately walked away.

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  The detective continued questioning Clive. By then, they were standing next to the hatch.

  “Did you try calling her out?”

  “We did. Dan tried to grab her, but she hid under the stairs, and we decided we couldn’t handle this without the police.”

  Clive bent down, spread his legs wide, and opened the heavy hatch cover.

  “Is there any light down there?”

  “No, Detective. We checked. There used to be electricity, and there’s a bulb, but the wiring has long since deteriorated. We’ll need flashlights,” Clive replied, handing them construction helmets fitted with headlamps.

  Orla put hers on reluctantly, afraid of flattening the perfect curls she’d spent half an hour on. Shane went first. He had no idea what exactly he would do. Judging by the girl’s behavior alone, it was clear she had been in that place for a long time. How had she survived the winter?

  As soon as he reached the bottom, a thin stream of cold air brushed his face and neck, making him shiver. Moments later, an unpleasant chill — completely inconsistent with the warm April weather above — enveloped his body, seeping through his clothes and prickling his skin.

  “It’s so cold in here,” Orla said aloud.

  They stood shoulder to shoulder, turning their heads, but saw no sign of the girl.

  “The owner said she hid under the stairs,” Shane recalled and, without waiting for Orla to speak, moved around the staircase on the left and peered beneath the rotten steps. In the flashlight’s beam, it was hard to make out what lay there. Something like a barricade made of dirty sacks, boards, dislodged padded chair seats, and other debris. The protruding corners suggested the bedding was made of cardboard.

  Without attempting to touch any of it, Shane returned to Orla.

  “She’s built herself an entire house down there. What the hell is this?”

  “Easy, O’Halloran. Just because you haven’t encountered something like this in your practice doesn’t mean there’s no solution. What matters most is that the girl is alive.”

  “Yes,” Shane sighed. “But how do we get her out of here?”

  “Let me try,” Orla said gently. “We can’t scare her. She’s afraid because she was most likely abused by those who locked her in here. Our task at this stage is to prove that we’re friends.”

  Shane stepped aside, letting Orla approach the staircase. The psychologist crouched down and lightly tapped her knuckle against a wooden plank.

  “Hey? My name is Orla. I won’t hurt you. I really want to help you, do you understand?” She listened to the silence, trying to understand the source of the unease gripping her. Despite this, her voice remained calm and unhurried, as if she were persuading a small child to enter a dentist’s office. “We’ll take you somewhere clean and give you good food. I’m sure you miss fresh baked pastries.”

  Nothing. No movement. Orla tried to catch the girl’s breathing, but she had hidden herself expertly.

  “Maybe we should take a simpler approach?” Shane said impatiently. “Dismantle the barricade and pull the girl out?”

  Orla shot him a cold look that made him uneasy.

  “Are you out of your mind, Detective? No violence. She has to come out on her own.”

  “And how long do you think that will take?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “You do know,” Shane pressed.

  “Let’s go upstairs.”

  They spent a couple of minutes adjusting to the light. Orla immediately imagined what would happen to the girl if she were suddenly dragged into the sunlight.

  Clive Daniel approached them at once, accompanied by Dan. Constable Anita and Evan Gallagher, Shane O’Halloran’s partner, were examining the shed from the outside.

  “Well, Detective?” Clive asked impatiently.

  Shane looked at the man. His deeply lined face, with dark circles under his eyes, radiated anxiety. At sixty, Clive was solidly built, in good physical shape, with gray stubble along his cheekbones. He was crumpling a faded cap in his hands — clearly a favorite item, which looked out of place against his new, high-quality clothing.

  “All questions go to Orla Leary,” the detective said tiredly and stepped aside.

  Clive approached the blonde woman, who had already removed her helmet and was trying to fix her ruined curls, studying her reflection in the dusty shed window.

  “Ma’am?”

  “Oh, Mr. Daniel. This will be difficult work. First of all, I want the hatch to remain open. Detective O’Halloran will post officers here in case the girl comes out. Although…” Orla lowered her gaze. “I’m not sure she will. Judging by the conditions, that place is her home. It seems she was kept locked in for a very long time. If you’ve seen the film Mowgli, you can roughly imagine how difficult it is for a person who has lived in a certain environment and learned to survive in it to enter a different life.”

  “You think she’s been living in the cellar for months?”

  “It’s too early to make assumptions. I’m basing this on her behavior. We need to be extremely careful. She’s a fragile being whose life we must save — not break.”

  Clive gasped and shook his head, unable to believe what he was hearing.

  “How did she survive? Our winters are cold. It’s even colder in the cellar.”

  “If a person wants to live, they will survive, Mr. Daniel,” Orla replied with a gentle smile, touching his shoulder. “She built herself a cozy nest under the stairs from whatever she could find down there, shielding herself from the worst of the cold.”

  “So what does this mean?” Clive sighed heavily, his shoulders slumping. He thought of Molly, who was waiting to move in as soon as possible — and now this. “As long as that girl is in the cellar, I won’t be able to do anything here?”

  “Of course you will. Give the police a couple of days — they’ll examine the cottage, the garden, photograph everything — and you’ll be able to return to the renovations.”

  “And the girl?”

  Orla tucked a loose curl behind her ear and looked at the shed. A pause followed, during which Clive noticed the sadness flicker in the woman’s eyes.

  “We’ll start small. She needs to be fed. Is there a bakery or grocery store nearby?”

  “I have no idea, Dr. Leary. I’ve never been to Clorain before. As far as I know, there aren’t many locals here. Wealthy people buy country houses to rent them out to tourists or come for summer family holidays. That’s exactly why we chose this town. It’s quiet and cozy. For us old folks, that’s more than enough.”

  Orla nodded understandingly, then headed for her car, telling the detective she wanted to look for a shop or café.

  Meanwhile, Dan showed the jar with the unknown substance to Detective Evan Gallagher.