She had met Alison’s widowed mother only once. But that had been enough. She had been staying with her daughter when Lindsay had popped in one afternoon to drop off a book she’d borrowed from Alison. Lindsay remembered a tall, ramrod-straight woman with iron gray hair carefully set like concrete who had peered disapprovingly at Lindsay’s jeans through gold-rimmed glasses. Alison had told her how strict her mother had been with her as a child, and Lindsay found it easy to believe, having heard Mrs. Maxwell pontificating about the appalling behavior of the unions, the need for Mrs. Thatcher’s firm hand at the helm, and the desirability of removing communism from the world. Remembering all that, Lindsay had taken time to change out of her jeans and sweatshirt and had borrowed a tweed suit and jade green silk shirt from Sophie. At least she now looked like the kind of woman Mrs. Maxwell might allow across her threshold.

It was just after two when Lindsay pulled up in the quiet street where Mrs. Maxwell lived. She’d found the address in the case papers Jim Carstairs had shown her, and had luckily taken a note of it at the time. The house was a large bungalow surrounded by a geometrically neat terraced garden, with dramatic views over the Firth of Tay to the Tentsmuir bird sanctuary in Fife. She climbed the steps leading to the bungalow’s front door and rang the bell. In the distance, she could hear chimes ringing out.

Almost before the echoes died away, the door opened to reveal Mrs. Maxwell. Grief had changed her outward appearance not one iota. She looked questioningly at Lindsay. “Yes?” she said.

“Hello, Mrs. Maxwell. I’m Lindsay Gordon. I don’t know if you remember me, but we met once at Alison’s flat.”

“I remember you perfectly well, Miss Gordon. I may be old, but I’m not senile yet,” she replied crisply. “What can I do for you?”

“Well, I was in the area visiting friends, and I thought I ought to call and say how sorry I was about Alison. I was out of the country when it happened, you see, so I missed the funeral and everything,” Lindsay said.

“I see. Well, thank you very much for taking the trouble,” Mrs. Maxwell said, showing no inclination to admit Lindsay.

“I also wondered . . . Well, Ruth Menzies told me you had all Alison’s papers and correspondence. Before I went off to Italy, Alison and I had discussed a joint project. We were going to write a book together about Scots who had made their mark in the 1980s. Alison said she would carry out the preliminary research while I was away, then we could finish it together.”

“She said nothing about it to me,” Mrs. Maxwell said. “You’d better come in, I suppose.”