The terms could not have been clearer. She signed them when she paid for her booking. No pets. The last thing I need is slobbering great mutts chasing the squirrels and shitting on the footpaths.

When she and her tattooed husband pulled up outside my house to check in I was annoyed, though not entirely surprised, to see a great big golden retriever panting nauseously in the back seat.

“I’m afraid you won’t be able to stay with the dog,” I told her, hurrying over.

“Oh, Maxxie is as good as gold, isn’t he darling?” The husband grunted but didn’t look up from his phone.

“I’m sure he is, but the rules do say…”

She leaned out the window, snatched the keys from my hands and smiled smugly, closing her electric window. She drove her oversized car down the dirt track to the cabin in my woods, spattering mud as she went.

I trekked furiously after her. She’d already parked up and was happily unpacking a ring light and some camera gear when I arrived. The husband stared at his phone from the passenger seat.

“I’m afraid I’m going to have to ask you to leave. My rules clearly say…”

“Oh no, that’s not going to work,” she pouted. “It’s taken us so long to get here. There’s no need for us to leave just because of a silly old rule. Maxxie won’t be any trouble.”

She grabbed the dog and snapped a round of rapid-fire selfies.

“If you won’t leave, I’ll have to call the police,” I told her.

She just mugged for the camera.

The police did come, eventually. It was Sandra’s boy, Ralph, but when I took him to the cabin there was no sign of dog or husband.

“A dog? Oh no. It’s just little old me,” she told him, smiling sweetly. “I’m here on my own. There must have been some mix up.”

She leaned over to Ralph and stage whispered:

“I hear that can happen out here, when you live alone. It must be very hard sometimes. Very sad.”

Out in the woods a dog barked.

Ralph shrugged apologetically and made his way back to his bike. I loaded him up with some onions from the garden and a few bits of firewood for his mum and he was away.

So, in the end there really wasn’t much else I could do.

The banging on the door woke me. I go to bed early, so it couldn’t have been much past ten, but it was already very dark. We don’t have streetlights in these parts – a blessing and a curse.

“What do you want?”

“It’s John and Maxxie – they haven’t come home. You have to help me.”

“Who?”

“My husband John and our dog, you were the one kicking up all that fuss about Maxxie before – don’t be ridiculous.”

I saw her eye catch the bloody smear on the floor of my porch and the little hammer tucked away in a corner.

I smiled sweetly at her and picked it up.

“Oh no,” I told her. You’re here on your own. You must have had a little mix up. Your mind can play tricks when you’re out in the woods all by yourself. Very sad…”