Moments later, an older man appeared and gestured for them to come through to a small room behind the velvet curtain and then asked them to take a seat at the table in the centre of the room. Grace glanced at Ellis to gauge his reaction, and on seeing that he appeared quite relaxed, she went along with it too.

‘Thank you for coming to visit us,’ the man said in heavily accented English after they had all introduced themselves, Marco being the son of the original jeweller who had opened the shop back in 1923. ‘Your colleague explained in the telephone call from America that you wish to talk about a number of commissions from a long time ago.’

‘Yes, that’s right,’ Ellis confirmed, and pulled out his phone with all the pictures of Connie’s jewellery on. ‘Fortunately, Grace found the collection in an abandoned storage unit in London.’ Marco shook his head and sighed before taking the phone and swiping through the pictures.

‘It is very sad to see these pieces hidden away like this. Such beauty and craftsmanship. I remember my father making this ring, here. I was just a child when it was made, it would have been in the Fifties some time,’ and he tapped the screen and turned it to show Grace and then Ellis, ‘with the finest diamonds sourced from a dealer in Naples. Giovanni was very discerning and it was our honour to serve him right up until he died.’

Grace’s heart was crushed on having this news confirmed. She knew it was the most likely outcome, but still … it felt like a blow. An avenue closed.

‘May I ask when he died?’ Ellis said solemnly, glancing in her direction.

‘Ah, it was a long time ago. Some time in the Nineties. Sorry, I don’t remember exactly when. But his wife, Connie, she very sad when they took his body away.’

‘Took him away?’

‘Yes, he go back to America on an aeroplane. But she say he love Italia. His family, his brothers they no listen to her and bury him there.’

‘Oh no, that’s so sad,’ Grace said, thinking how awful it must have been for Connie to have her husband taken away from her and buried thousands of miles away. Her heart must have been broken all over again to not even have his grave to visit. It would have been the same with Jimmy. Nowhere for Connie to go to talk to her trueloves, to mourn their loss.

‘It very sad,’ Marco said quietly. ‘This brooch here was the last piece we made for him.’ And he tapped the screen.