Ronnie was pacing around even more than Pax had at her restless height, hands raking her thick blonde bob as she thought hard. ‘If you really are serious about separating, I think you should move in here.’

‘Why ever would I do that?’

‘Because it will look better as a home for Kes. You live in a damp caravan, this is a fine Cotswold house. You have support here. We’ll help you through recovery.’

‘This house is damper than the mobile home – which has three bedrooms, superfast Wi-Fi and decent insulation by the way – and I have plenty of support: I have friends; I have Alice. I have stopped drinking.’

She wasn’t listening. ‘You need a jolly good lawyer. Mine was hopeless. Bunny will know somebody.’

‘No, Mummy.’ Pax held up her hands, but her voice remained smooth, in control. ‘I’m not getting some friend of a friend who hunts with a silk from Lincoln’s Inn involved in this.’

Ronnie’s protests were cut off by a heavy knock at the front door, which nobody used except salesmen and tourists. At the same time, there was a sharp rap at the back door.

‘You take the Jehovah’s Witnesses.’ Ronnie headed through the back corridor to the vestibule, trailed by her dogs.

Pax made her way to the enormous hallway, hauling aside locks and bolts and cranking the stiff key around.

Carly and her buggy were waiting. ‘I’m sorry to bother you, only the new manager has fallen asleep in the tack room. Poor bugger’s fit to drop, says he’s not slept since Toronto.’

‘He’s lying,’ Pax muttered, remembering him asleep on the hotel chair, her hillbilly guard with no gun.

‘That little puppy’s with him.’

‘Thanks. I’ll wake him in a bit.’

‘Am I needed tomorrow?’

‘For what?’

‘Yard work. Only I can change my cleaning shifts if I am.’

‘Someone will call you. Does Mummy have your number?’

She nodded, shifting from foot to foot. ‘I need minimum wage if it’s regular work. Just saying.’

Pax rubbed her forehead tiredly, irritated by her fresh-faced ballsiness. ‘I’ll pass that on. Anything else? Pension scheme? Private healthcare? Dress-down Fridays?’

‘That’s all.’ She forced a smile, but her jaw was set, the eyes unfriendly. ‘See you tomorrow, maybe.’

‘I won’t be here.’

Pax trailed back through the hall and the breakfast room, dropping down the steps into the kitchen, then freezing on the spot as Penhaligon’s Quercus filled her nostrils.

Bay Austen was standing by the Aga, resplendent in red coat, blue eyes dark with concern. ‘Darling Pax, I’m afraid there’s been an accident.’

‘It’s Lester…’ Ronnie was already pulling on her coat.

7

A pair of hunt supporters had brought Lester’s cob back in a muddy trailer being towed by an Isuzu Trooper with a boot full of spaniels. They’d given Bay a lift.

‘I didn’t see it happen,’ he explained to Pax, lounging against the wheel arch in offensively good humour whilst she lowered the ramp. His own horse was standing alongside in the second partition, both fully tacked, steam still rising from their backs.