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Christina was suddenly aware of a harsh ringing sound - a sound she took a little while to identify as the doorbell. The room seemed to have become suddenly darker. How long had she been sitting there? She went dreamily to the landing to see Bertha, the new maid, answering the door.

Christina looked down the stairs as Bertha, looking very serious, went to fetch Mrs Webster, leaving two dour-looking men standing on the doorstep.

Christina's mother went to the door and, after a good deal of talking, showed the men through to the morning room. Christina tiptoed downstairs. She wondered who the men were, but only for a moment. It did not matter. Nothing mattered.

She stood in the hall and edged towards the photograph in the gilt frame. She knew exactly what she would wish for. She stood in front of the girl and the girl smiled back.

'You do not look very happy,.' she said.

'I wish,.' said Christina, ignoring the girl. 'I wish that everything was as it was before my mother brought you back from the auction.' Christina closed her eyes as she made her wish, but opened them almost immediately when she heard the girl giggle.

'You look silly,.' she said.

'Why haven't you granted my wish?' said Christina with a frown.

'I have granted you three wishes, as I promised,. ' said the girl. Like a flash of lightning exploding in her head, Christina remembered her wish to have a room of her own and a scream rang out through the house, hanging in the air like gun smoke.

The morning-room door burst open and one of the men ran through, followed by Mrs Webster. They ran pell-mell up the stairs as Bertha appeared on the landing, screaming once again and pointing hysterically. The second man stood over Christina, an odd expression on his face, his hands clenched and the muscles of his jaw twitching.

Christina could hear footsteps and muffled voices coming from her and Agnes's bedroom. Why was that silly maid screaming so? She put her hands over her ears. Then she saw the photograph in its gilt frame. It became suddenly clear what she had to do if she was going to keep her promise to Agnes, if she really was to be a better person.

Christina lurched forward and grabbed the photograph, smashing it against the banister. The crash shocked the maid into silence. Christina's mother stood at the top of the staircase and gasped as she saw her daughter standing in the hallway, the gilt frame in her hands and shards of glass strewn about the floor.

'That will be enough of that, Miss Webster,.' said the man standing with Christina's mother. 'Please ensure that she does not hurt herself, Sergeant.'

'Sergeant?' said Christina, as the man next to her stepped forward, towering over her ominously. 'Mother? Who are these men?'

'They are policemen,.' said Mrs Webster, her body shaking, her face chalk white, her fingers clenching themselves repetitively into fists. 'Christina,.' she said, her voice dry and rasping. 'What have you done? What in heaven's name have you done? These men came to tell me such awful things and now . . . now your dear sister Agnes is . . .'

'Me?' said Christina. 'Nothing, Mama. It was the photograph. It was evil and I have destroyed it.'

'What photograph?' asked her mother, edging towards her down the stairs. 'What are you talking about?'

'The photograph!' said Christina, getting angry. Her mother could be so infuriating sometimes. 'The one you brought back from that stupid auction. In a way all this is your fault, Mother. If you had not been so . . .'

'But I never bought a photograph,.' she said. 'I bought a mirror.'

Christina looked at her mother in utter confusion and then down at the floor, at the dozens of jagged pieces of glass reflecting back at her. There was no photograph. There had never been a photograph.

She took this fact in just as the men came forward and grabbed her, holding her wrists and making her drop the gilt frame to the floor. As they led her away she began to remember.

It had been her that had sent the note to the police about Eva not having the correct papers to stay in the country. She