‘Not today. Tomorrow maybe. And the boat will certainly go in the morning. I meant getting away from the centre. I wondered if you’d like to spend the day with Mary and me.’

There was a hesitation. It took Poppy a moment to work through the disappointment that she wouldn’t be leaving Fair Isle immediately. ‘Sure,’ she said at last. ‘Why not?’

‘I’ll give you a minute to grab a shower, shall I?’ The girl could certainly do with a good scrub. ‘I’ll wait in the kitchen with Jane.’

When Poppy emerged she was wearing jeans one size too small and a long grey sweater. Her hair was still wet from the shower but she didn’t look very much cleaner. She hadn’t bothered with make-up and looked very young – an overweight child with an unhealthy pallor and poor skin. But we all looked like that when we were growing up, Fran thought. Or we believed we did.

She found herself thinking of Poppy as a slightly older version of Cassie. She needs some fresh air, a bit of exercise. ‘We’ll walk, shall we?’ she said. ‘We can meet up with Mary at Springfield for lunch. I need to stop off in the post office to buy some stamps.’ And perhaps Poppy was too tired to object or perhaps she was glad for someone else to take decisions for her, because she followed Fran out of the lighthouse without speaking.

They walked for a while in silence. Poppy was hunched in her jacket, her hands in her pockets.

‘What’s it like going out with the filth?’ The question came out of nowhere just as they were approaching the turn in the road by the North Haven, Poppy’s attempt to reassert herself or to provoke a reaction.

‘I don’t think of him as the filth. He’s a good man doing a hard job.’ Fran kept her voice easy. After all, some of her London friends had asked her the question in almost the same words. They lapsed again into silence.