I was also impressed by how perfectly preserved she was. No, that’s the wrong word, ‘preserved’ makes me think of gates and creosote. ‘Well-maintained’ doesn’t hack it, either. ‘Soigné’ is probably the best – or actually, in her case, remembering language lessons at school, soignée. The French do descriptions of women better than we do. Grace was in a pale blue cotton top and light grey linen trousers, dressed down for the country but still ready to face a photographer.

I got the feeling the kitchen had once been two or more separate rooms. Now it had a cooking area focused on the Aga, a sitting area focused on two deep sofas, and a dining area focused on a long pine table. There was a Belfast sink, a butcher’s block and a lot of tall vases full of grasses. No discordant modern elements like steel and glass, though I bet lots of that was on display in their London home. Again, the country kitchen was all ready for the moment the colour supplement camera clicked.

Slumped by the Aga was an endearingly tatty Golden Retriever (‘Is yours a Town Dog or a Country Dog?’). Grace introduced him to me as Trigorin. Of course.

‘Anyway, first things first,’ said Niall histrionically. ‘A drink! What is the weekend for if not for drinking?’ He turned to me. ‘So, Ellen … I may call you Ellen, I hope?’

‘Of course.’

‘What is your particular poison? I’m already on the red wine, as you see.’ He raised a glass as an unnecessary visual aid. ‘But we have champagne, white wine, beer, whisky, gin, vodka and probably a lot of obscure Balkan and Middle Eastern spirits. What it is to be?’

‘A glass of red wine would be nice, thank you.’

‘Red wine it is.’ He strode across to the surface beside the Aga, on which stood glasses and a half-empty bottle of Burgundy. As he poured my drink, he turned to Grace. ‘And what will it be for you, my child bride?’

‘I’ll get myself some white,’ she replied.

‘Topped up, no doubt, with sparkling water?’ Niall sneered.

‘Topped up, indeed, with sparkling water,’ Grace said evenly. She spoke as someone who was used to his sneers and didn’t rise to them.

‘Why didn’t the Lord God supply me with a wife who enjoyed a drink?’ He aimed the question at me, but I don’t think he was expecting a response. He certainly didn’t get one.

Handing my glass across, he said, ‘Slump on a sofa.’

He slumped beside me. ‘Ingrid enjoyed a drink. I think we should raise a glass to her. God knows there were enough times I wished her dead, but now I’ve got what I wanted … In the immortal words of Joni Mitchell, “You don’t know what you’ve got till it’s no longer there”.’

I couldn’t tell whether he knew he was misquoting or not. ‘Anyway, let’s raise a glass to Ingrid.’ He looked in the direction of the Aga. ‘You too, Grace.’