So it was Alice that Hazel felt close to, and yet, standing here on the other side of the world underneath the tree which William Gale had planted, she felt almost overcome. The emotion took her by surprise, her eyes suddenly stinging. She wasn’t a tree hugger – that sort of thing was more Karen’s department – but she couldn’t help putting her hand out and cupping it around the cedar’s trunk. It struck her very forcibly that this was a living thing, like an elephant’s leg. There was a touch of pink about the bark. Its branches stretched out high above her, vertical, into the greyish light. She felt as if this tree would shelter her, if she needed shelter; protect her from rain or fierce sun. It was like being a small child, coming to stand under the outstretched arms of a long-lost grandfather. She couldn’t help being moved by the thought of William – young, ardent William – coming home from war, planting this tree. A tree was a symbol of hope, wasn’t it? The hope that things would last, would continue unbroken into an unseeable future. Endure. Maybe he had needed to plant trees, after seeing all that death. Maybe the trees stood in for some of the men who had fallen in that war.

‘Cedars always remind me of waiters, don’t they you? As if the boughs were great, flat serving dishes being borne aloft into some grand dining room,’ said Penelope.

Her husband, who had come across to the tree, laughed in response. As crazy as it seemed, Hazel wished she could be alone with the cedar, sit under it by herself for a while and reflect. It was with an effort of will that she reminded herself that these people were showing her hospitality. The tree was theirs now.

‘Come and see the walled garden. The structure is still as it would have been in Gale’s day. Even the water-butts are original, I think.’

They trooped after Penelope, along gravel paths through low box hedges which gave off a fresh, slightly bitter smell as their leaves were brushed by the legs of the passers-by. Hazel tried to picture Alice here, but was unable to. It seemed too formal for Alice’s temperament, too stiff.

‘We live in dread of box-blight of course,’ said Penelope in a low, confiding voice, as if she thought the blight, whatever it was, might hear her.

‘Let’s go in and have tea,’ said Ian. ‘I’m sure our visitors haven’t got all day.’