We remained standing to accept the vicar’s parting blessing, before shuffling from our pews, filtering out into the aisle, queueing for the arched doorway to the rear. There was a murmur of polite conversation as neighbour greeted neighbour, but I chose to fix my eyes on the uneven flags beneath my feet.

When at last we reached the vicar, I hung back while Mother stepped forward to proffer her thanks and my father made some intelligent observations on the sermon. I skirted round them and ducked out into the porch, pressing through the mingling crowd, until I managed to free myself from the throng. I sidled down the path, averting my eyes from the freshly domed grave of Private Tom Whittaker, who had clung onto life long enough to make it home. A wreath of white roses had been laid upon the heaped earth and the tips of their petals were now beginning to brown and curl. I fought to quash a sense of envy that at least his family would be able to set fresh flowers down whenever they wished. A strip of ocean kept me from Gerald’s graveside. It grieved me to think of his resting place languishing unadorned.

I hurried on, eager to leave the post-service conviviality behind me. Chippings crunched beneath my feet as I moved through the silent congregation of lichen-covered headstones, their platitudes faded, their inhabitants forgotten. I was not the only one to have disengaged from the churchgoers: Annie was crouched before a modest headstone lying in the shadow of the cemetery wall. I knew whose it was, for I had stood beside it myself a decade ago, paying my respects to her father.

Jim Burrows had died saving my little sister Lydia from the devastating fire that had engulfed Haverton Hall all those years ago. It had been deemed miraculous that he had succeeded in finding her when all other attempts had failed, lowering her to safety from an upstairs window before succumbing to the flames. In the end though, his sacrifice proved to be in vain: her smoke-charred lungs were so badly damaged she died a few weeks later, but we were always grateful for the precious extra time that his bravery had granted us. However devastating those days had been, as we watched her suffer each painful breath, they had afforded us the opportunity to hold her, kiss her, cherish her – to say our final goodbyes. Annie’s father had been there one minute and gone the next, with barely a body left to bury. How much more difficult it must have been for Annie and her mother to come to terms with such abrupt loss. I often wondered about their regrets, the things they might have said, if they had had but a chance. Instead, all they had was a gravestone. I looked away as I passed by, affording Annie her privacy. It seemed we both sought comfort from the dead.