I hadn’t been there since the day I’d come in to clean it. I wondered if the Burgoynes might have disturbed anything on their pre-funeral visit, but nothing seemed to have changed since the last time I was there. Something glinted on the table, the light catching the edge of Nick’s spectacles, still lying next to the dusty bottles, where he had last placed them. I picked them up, folded them neatly and put them back where they were. I didn’t know what else to do with them.

Any delusion I might have had that Helena wanted a keepsake from her father’s possessions was dashed as soon as I walked into the bedroom. Nothing seemed to have been taken. His suits and coat still hung in the wardrobe, his folded shirts, vests and socks still occupied the chest of drawers. Despite her desperation, her search for the rings must have been a tidy one. Then I remembered that Mr Young had been present. If she’d been left on her own, she might have torn the place apart.

The only sign that she had been there at all was a small wooden jewellery box, upturned on Nick’s bed, its contents scattered across his pale-green eiderdown. I sat on the bed and picked up a pair of gold cufflinks, a watch and chain: not a bad watch, either − a decent half-hunter; of no interest to Helena, obviously. I picked up the box, lying open with its hinged lid, and lifted it out of the way. Beneath it I found photographs, tiny black and white prints of a young woman and two children, a girl with pigtails holding her little brother’s hand – clearly Helena and Richard. Memories of a happier past, surely − how could she bear to leave them? And one of Nick himself as a young man, hair neatly parted in the middle, but with the same bristling moustache, the same wicked eyes twinkling at the camera.

I took the photo of him and stood it up on the chest of drawers, leaning it up against a little clock. I would find a frame for it later. The other photos, together with the cufflinks and the watch, I would pack up, give to Mr Young, and ask him to send them to Richard. Perhaps one day, if not now, he might be glad to have some mementos of his father.

The only other thing I touched was Nick’s chess set, still set out on a table in the living room, ready for the next game. I packed the set away in its handsome box.

I would give it to Mr Singh.