Pre-owned with no flaws. 188 pages. Those words, printed on a slip of paper in an old cookery book, were the first clue that Cordelia James, identity of the child in ruffled pink dress who makes brief appearances in the vicinity of the Cedars where she has rented a room. There are other clues the records of mid-nineteenth century case of a vanished governess and child, footsteps along the landing, a girl hanging washing in the back yard of suburban Liverpool house.