She was right. By the time we went into the restaurant it was after eleven o’clock and the tables had been cleared. Even so, we sat down next to a window with a view of the harbour and I managed to persuade a waitress to provide us with two pots of tea, some toast for me and a black coffee for Hawthorne.

‘I shouldn’t have come here.’ Anne was still distressed. She had the sort of face that folded itself easily into grief. The greying hair, the grey eyes, the grey scarf that surely wasn’t needed in this warm weather: she was like one of those figures you get in mythology who stand on the shore as the ship sails away carrying the bodies of the dead. ‘My agent advised against it and I’m actually far too busy right now to be away from home.’

‘So why did you come?’ Hawthorne asked.

She sighed. ‘Because I’m a soft touch. They sent me a letter saying the island only had one school – St Anne’s – and that it was in danger of closure because of the falling population. They were also raising money to support the library. I don’t know why my giving a talk there would be any help, although I suppose having a high-profile author is always a good thing. Actually, I had a very good session there in the end: the children were lovely and the teachers couldn’t have been nicer. I really shouldn’t complain. Alderney’s beautiful and I love this hotel. But after that business yesterday, I just wanted to leave.’

She was referring, of course, to Elizabeth Lovell’s session and the revelations that had been made about her son.

‘I don’t believe any of that nonsense,’ she went on. ‘Life after death and ghosts and mirrors and all the rest of it. I’m not even sure why I went to her session. I suppose I was being polite. Well, more fool me. She had obviously done her research. It would have been easy to find that story on the internet. There was a lot of press interest in the lack of pastoral care at Bristol University and although we did our best to keep him out of the newspapers, William’s name was mentioned. What I don’t understand is how anyone could use information like that as part of a performance to promote their own work. It seems so cruel.’

‘Maybe she believes what she says,’ Hawthorne said.

‘She believes in the money she makes.’ Anne was indignant. It seemed to me that real anger wasn’t in her nature.

‘You still went to the party,’ Hawthorne said. ‘You must have known she’d be there.’