Isobel blushed. ‘I am sorry, Miss, Mrs Black. I didn’t mean . . .’ She lowered her head and rubbed her hands dry on her apron.

‘We are both going to have to get used to this new situation.’ Heavens, but this is complicated, thought Ursula. ‘You worked for the late Mrs Black for some time. She selected and employed you and she will have had her own ways of doing things. I’m a stranger and this is different for both of us.’

‘I promise I’ll do my best. I’m a good maid and a hard worker. You’ll not be disappointed.’

‘Isobel, I have been visiting this house every week for more than six months. I have no concern whatsoever about your work. Anyone who can manage Mr Black as well as two children without it all going to pieces deserves a medal in my opinion.’ She smiled. ‘Not that Finlay is really a child any more. He is taller than any of us.’

Ursula picked up a parcel which was lying on the long table next to the flour and sugar, a brown paper-wrapped box about nine inches by six, tied securely with string. ‘Did this come today?’

‘Yes, miss. First post. The postman didn’t want to let it fall through the letterbox onto the floor in case it was something fragile, so he brought it round to the back.’

Ursula frowned. ‘He came to the scullery door? Did you not hear him knock at the front?’

‘I was taking in the kitchen cloths from the washing line. I thought I might as well take advantage of nature’s bleach.’ Isobel put her hands behind her back and crossed her fingers to protect herself against the lie. She and the postman had an arrangement, and he sometimes called in on his route and used the scullery lavatory in return for the occasional quarter-pound of cinnamon balls from the confectioners on the High Street. Or it might sometimes be Edinburgh Rock. Either way, it suited both of them.

Ursula put the parcel down again. ‘I suppose he’s a tradesman, of sorts, and it’s certainly better than taking packages back to the sorting office and causing delay.’

She looked around the room. It was not an inspiring place; the putty-coloured walls were serviceable but drab and seemed to suck the life out of the weak winter light outside. On a cloud-heavy day it was positively gloomy, and in the evening the gas lighting did a less than adequate job.

‘I should probably do an inventory,’ said Ursula, with no enthusiasm. Opposite the window was a large built-in dresser; she opened a drawer and saw neatly organised rows of knives and forks – the everyday sort, not the best silverware, which was kept in the sideboard in the dining room. The drawer beside it held kitchen tools: a potato masher, a grater and a rolling pin, among other things.