Next to Dorothy, Hannah and Indy had their arms linked together, Hannah leaning her head on her girlfriend’s shoulder. They were so striking together, Hannah’s pale features and long, black hair the opposite of Indy’s brown skin and blue bob. Jenny wondered what was going through her daughter’s mind as her grandpa’s remains went up in smoke. It still seemed crazy to Jenny that she had a grown-up daughter in a relationship.

The flames were higher now, black smoke stretching into the air. The smell of pine and spruce made Jenny think of Christmas. Dorothy had placed bunches of herbs on the corpse before they began, and now bay and sage came to Jenny’s nose, mingling with the smell of burnt flesh to remind her of Sunday roast dinners.

She looked to the far end of the pyre, beyond Jim’s melting feet, and exchanged a look with Archie. He was busying himself with the logistics of the process, peering underneath, checking that the grate was holding up to the weight and temperatures, using a long pair of tongs to replace a fallen log by Jim’s shin. Jenny saw an iron poker and rake on the grass behind him, for sifting through the ashes once the flames had died.

Archie was short and thick, a heavy brown beard and shaved head, the way he moved suggesting something of a Tolkien character. He was the same age as Jenny but seemed older. He’d been Jim and Dorothy’s right-hand man for ten years, but it felt like he’d always been here. Archie was one of Dorothy’s strays, she had a habit of taking in lost souls, becoming an anchor in their lives. He had appeared one day to arrange his mother’s funeral. Over the next month he was often seen at cemeteries and cremations, crashing the funerals of strangers, trying to feel connected. At one 3in Craigmillar Castle Park, Dorothy approached him with a proposition, and within two weeks he was driving the hearse in a suit, changing into overalls to hammer together coffins, eventually taking over the embalming under Jim’s training. And Dorothy stuck by him when the details about his condition came to light. She sought a second opinion, kept an eye on his medication and therapy sessions, and trusted him around the place, which went a long way to saving his life.