Mrs Lydia Shaw complained that someone walked across her ceiling at half past midnight.

Cryer climbed into the roof space.

There was nowhere for anyone to stand.

At the appointed time the footsteps began: slow, deliberate, crossing from one end of the cottage to the other.

Dust fell from the beams.

Cryer heard every step.

He searched the roof at dawn and found only an old child's shoe trapped between the rafters.

The following night the footsteps stopped.

They began again one year later, after the cottage had been sold.