Not that their new daily routine allowed much time for watching it. They would set out each morning at six-fifteen, leaving the front door wedged open to allow the dogs the run of both the house and the garden, and then drive along the narrow road to Auchnacerie, the headlights of the car beaming forth bravely into the soulless black void of the surrounding countryside. At first, Dan had felt his skin creep with uneasiness at the eerie desolation that enfolded him, having never before driven without a set of headlights blasting into his rearview mirror and the red taillights of the preceding car only yards in front of him. But now, he had come to find it exhilarating, as if every day he and Josh were setting out on a new voyage of discovery, “going where no man had gone before.” Josh would then drop him off at the end of the road leading up to the Trenchards’ house, where Dan would stand watching as the lights of the car twisted through the bends in the road, like the sweeping beams of a lighthouse, until they disappeared around the edge of the hill that dropped sharply down into the depths of Loch Eil.

After the first few weeks of this routine, Dan had tried his best to change it. At the outset, he had always found Patrick in the kitchen, sitting expectantly at the table and beginning his slow ascent to his feet as soon as Dan walked into the room. But soon, it was Dan who had to wait while he listened to the frustrated oaths that rang down the stairwell from the Trenchards’ bedroom above. Later still, both he and Katie would sit in the kitchen discussing how best they could persuade Patrick to take things easier while he slept on, undisturbed by the blast of his alarm radio. On such mornings, it was always Katie who bore the brunt of Patrick’s fury as he castigated her for not making sure that he was awakened when the alarm went off.

Yet Patrick was not for persuasion. Dan suggested that he could quite easily handle the buying at Mallaig by himself, but this was met with that steely glint of determination in Patrick’s eyes. “Nothing wrong with me, Dan,” he had said. “Body may be a bit tired, but the brain’s still active. Anyway, you’ve still got a lot to learn.”