‘So you don’t sit here in the evenings with a glass of wine, all looking at each other, wondering which of you is going to be the next to die?’

‘No!’ Sarah looked horrified and Fran wondered if she’d gone a bit too far. She could occasionally be flippant and felt liberated – and a little wicked – after a week of watching her words carefully. The chopping board was full and she pushed the sliced vegetables into a pan, before continuing with the neeps.

Sarah rolled the dough into a ball and lifted it into a bowl. She took a clean tea towel from a drawer and covered the dough. ‘Now I’ve just got to wait for it to rise.’ Fran thought she seemed very happy in this domestic role. Did she prefer it to her work with disturbed families? Had she made so little fuss about returning to the mainland because she was happy to escape her career for a while?

‘Obviously, you can’t help wondering,’ Sarah said. ‘I mean, I suppose some of us make more probable murderers than others . . .’

‘So who’s your preferred candidate?’

Sarah shot a sideways glance that was almost conspiratorial. Fran thought she’d probably missed the company of other women. Since Jane’s death and Poppy’s departure, Sarah had been stuck here surrounded by men, and although some men could gossip, none was as good at it as a woman.

‘Of course, I can’t imagine what the motive might be . . .’

‘But?’

‘Hugh,’ Sarah said. ‘He has that streak of cruelty. I can imagine any of the others killing Angela . . .’

‘Even your husband?’ Fran expected an immediate denial, but Sarah took the question seriously.

‘Perhaps even him,’ she said. ‘Angela had this knack of winding people up. For her own amusement. Or perhaps just because she had no social skills at all. She knew what she wanted and just went for it. But although I can imagine John, and any of the others, killing Angela in a fit of rage, I can’t see them stabbing Jane. She was lovely. Completely inoffensive.’

‘Even if she’d discovered who the murderer was and threatened to expose him?’

‘Even then,’ Sarah said. ‘Surely it would be a step too far.’

Fran leaned heavily on the knife to cut a particularly dense piece of turnip. Is this how much strength it would take to stab a person, to push through muscle, fat and bone?

‘But you think Hugh might have done it?’

‘I’m not saying that exactly, but of all of us I think he’s the most likely. He seems to have no morality, no qualms about using people. A bit like Angela herself, I suppose.’

‘But as you say, he has no motive.’

‘No,’ Sarah said. Fran thought the answer came too quickly. ‘No,’ Sarah repeated, then paused. ‘Look, we’re all done here for lunch and for dinner. There’s no need for you to stay.’