The island had been laid out in lines, and from Kadetzskaya down to the fifth line, it maintained a fairly well-bred air. From there to the fourteenth had been the middle class and commercial district, and beyond, the tenement houses of the poor – and each part of the island still bore the mark of its history, in spite of, or perhaps because of, the brutal decades of Soviet rule. Kate skirted St Andrew’s Cathedral and browsed through the rudimentary food on offer in a morning market, killing time.

She slipped into a café that had existed since Tsarist times and ordered coffee. On the walls, there were pictures of the last of the Romanovs at Livadia, their estate in Crimea. Alongside them, in pride of place close to the door, hung a framed portrait of the current Russian president, as if his connection to the former royal family was perfectly obvious.

When she could contain her patience no longer, Kate walked on to eigth line and the still grubby tenement building that housed the apartment that had once belonged to Sergei’s grandfather, an important Communist Party official and officer in the city’s maritime section, who’d somehow managed to keep his head and position throughout Stalin’s reign of terror.

She climbed to the top floor and knocked. She could see her breath on the air. She pushed her hands deep into her pockets.

The door opened just a fraction.

Either Kate’s memory wildly deceived her or Sergei’s mother, Olga, had shrunk dramatically. If never exactly overweight, she had been a well-built, handsome woman far removed from the bent, shuffling figure that peered at Kate now through the mists of time. ‘Yes?’ she asked, with the strong Kiev accent that betrayed her familial origins. ‘Can I help you?’

‘Olga, it’s Kate.’ She spoke in Russian, and stepped backwards into the light from the landing window. ‘Sergei’s student friend from England.’

The old woman’s face lit up. She opened the door wide. ‘Kate?’ The smile had all of its old welcoming warmth. ‘Can it really be you? After all this time? Come in, come in.’ Kate stepped into the gloom. Olga gripped her arms. ‘Let me look at you.’ There was light in those old eyes now. ‘How well you are,’ Olga said. ‘What are you doing here?’

‘Just passing through . . . on business.’

‘But after so long!’ Olga shook her head in confusion. ‘Come in,’ she said again, beckoning her further into the flat.

Kate followed her down the hallway to the living room. ‘What can I get you?’ Olga asked.

‘Whatever you have.’