The Grass Widow's Tale: Ellis Peters

Bunty's husband George is called away on urgent police business. Left alone in the house, Bunty begins to feel low; she will be forty one tomorrow and since their son has grown up she feels there's nothing left for her to do except grow older. So, to shake off the black mood, she goes out to the local pub where a chance meeting with a distraught stranger sweeps her into a terrifying situation, desperately trying to hang on to the life which earlier stretched out endlessly before her.