Camille, to her credit, refused throughout to be photographed with Seb. She made this clear from the beginning and, in Eva’s opinion, Seb only had himself to blame for presuming that a beautiful, independent-minded woman who happened to be in love with him would eventually bend to his will. Lesser women might have been swayed but Camille was very sure in her sense of her rights as a person. And all the time that Seb was trying to browbeat Camille into appearing with him in public, he was careful never to talk about his family – neither the island summers of his childhood, nor their antique island house, nor his father’s time as a minister under Thatcher, nor his daughter Zoe. The only aspect of himself which Seb discussed was his rise within the party, from parliamentary researcher, secretary, backbench MP, to minister. That and a coy but pointed mention of his wife in repeated press interviews. Eva dreaded the impact on Seb’s family of his political career. Especially the impact on Camille.

During the late 1980s, when Sebastian’s father was heading up the Ministry of Defence, it was a young reporter who had hinted at Harry’s fondness for working late into the night with only his parliamentary secretary for company, and also that he had been accompanied by his parliamentary secretary on an official visit to the Royal Ordnance Factory in Lancashire, and furthermore that the minister and his parliamentary secretary took the unusual decision to delay a return to London by staying overnight in Manchester, in order, his office clarified, to pay a personal visit to factory workers in their homes on Saturday morning. These were bitter things to read about one’s husband on Sunday morning, alone in the islands – even if what was being implied was no revelation. This same husband had once spoken often of a young, sweet-mouthed breath of fresh air in his office (hair in Eva-imitation curls); until suddenly she was no longer mentioned; except by their pre-pubescent sons, who returned home from a visit to Westminster talking of a nice pretty lady who had bought them each a Sherbet Dip and allowed them to push each other around the office on a wheelie desk chair.

But it wasn’t just that. It was also that they had tried, and failed – Jen and she – to make their mark on national politics. Currently, all of the islands’ politicians – one from the Scottish constituency, one from the English, and one MSP – were men.

Eva also knew that it was partly cowardice, as well as pragmatism, which had made her efface herself as leader of her own political movement. All the scrutiny, when it came, would fall on Inga. Inga was the one they would shout at, when everything came out in the end, as it certainly would. At least Inga knew this, and understood the risks.