The Trials of Marjorie Crowe

Those who live alongside Marjorie Crowe in the village of Kilgoyne put her age at somewhere between 55 and 70. They think she's divorced or a lifelong spinster, that she used to be a librarian, a pharmacist or a witch. They think she's possibly lonely or ill or maybe just plain rude. She lives in a cottage on the edge of the village. The local kids call it the Hansel and Gretel house and make fun of her. With her few friends long gone, she's regressed into a quiet, almost mute, world of her own. Her daily strolls are the stuff of local legend. Twice a day, at the same time and the same pace each day, she walks. The locals can set their watches by her. She even goes in one door of the local pub and out the other, as if it isn't there. When Marjorie is seven minutes late walking through the back door of The Endrick Inn, it's noticed. That's the same day that 17-year-old Charlie McKee disappears. That's the day everyone wants to know what Marjorie knows.