It was market day in Skeffingham and the bus was crowded. She felt very safe among the country women with their big, motherly bodies and their talk of the farm, children and home. She did not mind the stares and the whispered explanations from one woman to another behind her, that she was the girlfriend of that birdwatcher from Rushy that “got himself killed.” Surely none of these women would send threatening letters in plain brown envelopes. The bus conductor had winked at her, and carried Barnaby’s pushchair on and off the bus. She felt very safe and at home.

In Skeffingham the stalls spilled out from the market hall into the wide streets. The houses were tall, red-bricked and stately. The town was crowded. Friends from different parts of the county met and talked, and the purchase of vegetables, cloth, a cake, was less important than the gossip. Some of the stalls had been taken over by incomers, young people who sold home-made things—jewellery, basketwork, leatherwork, clothes. At first Sally was suspicious of anyone who looked at her, or jostled into her, or bent to talk to Barnaby. But the market was full of pretty things. It was a kaleidoscope of colour, and her attention was caught by the bright things and she was cheered by the sense of celebration. She spoiled herself and bought an Indian silk scarf, and a pair of quilted dungarees for the baby. With a wonderful and wicked sense of extravagance, she decided to treat herself to coffee.

When Ella saw her she was sitting in the cramped tea shop in the High Street, feeding Barnaby illicit chocolate buttons to keep him quiet while she ate a toasted tea cake. So fortified, Sally felt able to face the older woman. Even through the window she could tell that Ella was preparing a performance. As she swept into the shop towards her, Sally prepared herself to be a good audience. Ella was genuinely upset by Tom’s death—before starting work at the White Lodge he had spent a lot of time in the Windmill, and had been one of her favourites—but she expressed her grief through a flamboyant mix of compassion and curiosity which in anyone else would have been offensive. She reminded Sally, loudly, of all Tom’s virtues, then wiped her eyes at the thought that Barnaby would be deprived of such a wonderful father figure. In this there was an element of question which Sally refused to answer. At last the performance was over and Ella felt able to sit with Sally, slip off her shoes, drink tea and pass on all the news and gossip relevant to Tom’s death.

Despite herself, Sally listened avidly. Apparently the police had interviewed the staff at the White Lodge hotel, even Mr. Yates, the manager, and they had talked to all the birdwatchers who lived locally. Ella paused, and in a confidential way, as if it were a gift and bound to provide reassurance, passed to Sally the information that George Palmer-Jones had been asked to find out if any of the birdwatchers were involved in Tom’s death.