Page 136 of The Sleepwalker

There is a loud whirr as the mechanism starts to turn, but after just a few seconds the door shudders to a halt and starts closing.

Ida glances back at the door to the boiler room, presses the button again and reties the belt around her robe. As before, the garage door starts to open, grinds to a halt and closes again.

Something must be blocking the mechanism.

In the boiler room, the light comes on.

A thin chink of it spills into the garage like a crack in the floor.

Ida presses the button and runs over to the door. She gets onto her back and starts crawling through the gap as soon as it is wide enough for her head. The door shudders as it stops rising and begins lowering for the third time. Ida desperately tries to get out, but the door is too quick and pins her down by the waist.

The cold night air claws at her lungs.

Panting heavily, she tries to drag herself through, grazing theskin on her hips.

The mechanism starts turning again, and the door begins to lift. The pressure on her eases, and she scrambles to get out with a whimper.

Right then, she spots her neighbour, the former Chancellor of Justice. He is standing with his back to her as his old Labrador sniffs a lamppost a little further down the street.

‘Help!’ she shouts as she feels the woman grip her ankle and drag her back inside.

Ida’s head thuds against the concrete floor, and her robe rides up beneath her.

Yet again, the garage door closes with a whirr.

Ida is sobbing, and she lashes out with both feet, rolls over onto her stomach and scrambles onto her knees.

She has just started to get up when something hits her hard on the back, and her legs give way beneath her.

She attempts to break her fall as she crashes to the floor, but her forehead hits the rough concrete.

Ida tries to get up again, but she can no longer feel the lower half of her body.

As it dawns on her that her spine has been severed, she screams, and an excruciating wave of pain surges up through her torso.

The muscles in her upper body tense convulsively. Her heart is racing, and her breathing is laboured.

Ida hears herself roar in terror, breaking her nails as she frantically claws at the concrete.

She knows she needs to get out, but that isn’t a conscious thought; it is an animal urge to survive.

The woman is breathing heavily, and she kicks a stool angrily out of the way. Growling, she paces around Ida and nudges her twice on the cheek with her axe.

‘Please,’ Ida begs her.

Panicking, she tries to drag herself back towards the boiler room, but the woman lashes out with the axe and chops off half of her right hand.

Sparks fly as the sharp steel blade hits the concrete.

Ida is drifting in and out of consciousness, but she can see one of the sparks hovering in front of her like a small fairy with fluttering silver wings.

A pool of blood has begun to form beneath her.

She allows herself to relax, resting her cheek against the cold floor.

Ida registers the woman’s axe beginning to sever her limbs as nothing but a series of soft jolts, like the points on the railway taking her back to her mum and dad.

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