She goes a bit pink in the cheeks, and I’m sorry I said it. Not her fault if the master’s funny about letting folk know what he’s up to. ‘Nobody would want you to put yourself in danger, Grim. I understand my brother can call in the farm workers to help, and of course Gormán and Conn . . .’

‘Best way to go ahead, if you ask me, is to have the same team here every day. Five or six workers all day, every day, until it’s finished. Or at least until we start thatching; I can do that with just a couple of helpers.’ I glance at Bardán. ‘Two lads to pass things up and hold things in place and so on, and Bardán to tell me the tricks of the job.’

‘It’s . . .’ she starts, then look at Bardán again and stops. ‘May I speak to you in confidence?’

I want to tell her anything she says to me can be said to him too, but that would be stupid when she might tell me something useful. I get up and follow her down the path a bit, out of Bardán’s earshot.

‘My brother wants no more outsiders here,’ Mistress Della says. ‘Only you, Grim. He . . . He has always set a great deal of faith in . . . in luck charms and the like. A heartwood house is an idea from an old rhyme. It is said to confer every blessing a person could possibly want for himself and his kin. He was devastated when . . . when the building could not be completed, the first time. Suanach – his wife – died soon after the work was abandoned. He believes that if the house had been finished, her life would have been saved. When the builder came back,’ she gives Bardán another glance, ‘my brother saw it as a second chance. A chance to do things properly. There can be no mending the past, of course. But he can secure the future.’

I try to think what question to ask. Cara is the future. It doesn’t take a scholar to understand that. But Cara hasn’t got a mention, though this lady’s been more or less a mother to her, from what I’ve heard. ‘Doing it properly, doing it right, I understand that,’ I say. ‘But not the bit about no outsiders. Especially when getting in a crew would mean doing things quicker and safer. And I don’t understand why Master Tóla can’t treat his master builder more kindly.’ Hope that’s not too direct for her.

‘My brother loathes gossip. He is a very private man. As for the builder . . . there is a sad story attached to him. A story that would bring the strongest man to tears. It justifies my brother’s caution a hundredfold. His rules are made with good reason.’

‘What story, Mistress Della?’