Desperate for news, I waited for the phone to ring all afternoon. I sat in the warm kitchen drinking endless cups of coffee and watching Jenny cooking a lumpy cauliflower cheese, biting my lip when she didn’t sieve the flour or get the butter to the right heat. Eventually I stood silently at the cooker and whisked up a white sauce that I could do in my sleep, and she gave me a quick squeeze. I couldn’t even bear to look at the latest bunch of flowers; I asked Jenny to chuck them away and she took one look at my face and didn’t argue.

Over dinner we managed to make small talk about the end of term and our plans for Christmas. I didn’t tell my father about work and I didn’t call Sebastian. After struggling through Jenny’s valiant attempt at rice pudding, I shivered outside the back door, staring alternately at my father’s perfectly regimented but dying garden and my mobile phone – until I took a deep breath and sent Seb a pretty bald text with lots of question marks at the end. Then I poured myself a big glass of red wine and took it up to wallow in the bath. This time I locked the door.

A while later my father tapped on it gently. ‘There’s someone called Sebastian on the phone. He’s pretty keen to talk to you.’

‘Well, I don’t want to talk to him, Dad. Thanks.’

I ducked my head under the water. I’d just stay here all night. It was warm and safe and kind of womb-like – and I’d felt so incredibly cold recently, as if my very bones were made of ice.

Sometime later, there was a commotion downstairs. Digby! I jumped out of the bath and rushed dripping wet onto the landing.

‘Please, Mr Warren. I only need five minutes.’

He was so beguiling I could sense my father hesitating. I sighed. It just wasn’t fair to keep dragging my poor dad into my mess.

‘It’s okay, Dad.’ I stuck my head over the banisters. ‘I’ll come down.’

I pulled on my pyjamas and drained the rest of my wine before I went to find Seb by the fire in the sitting room, the fake coals glowing red and warm, the carriage clock gently chiming on the mantelpiece. My dad and Jenny had retreated tactfully into the kitchen.

‘Maggie,’ Seb turned as I came in, his tone urgent. ‘I got your message.’ He looked a bit like a small boy with his hand stuck in the cookie jar. ‘I’m sorry. I’m really sorry – but you got the wrong end of the stick.’

‘Did I?’ I went to the window in case Digby was outside. ‘And which wrong end would that be?’