Olga took her coat, placed it on a chair in the corner and disappeared into the kitchen to put on the kettle. Kate took a seat by the old gas fire. This room was like a step back into Soviet time, the curtains and chairs grey and dark red with an old-fashioned wireless in a Bakelite case. Kate glanced at the walls around her, still filled with pictures of the St Petersburg ice-hockey team, whose stadium Olga’s husband Pietr had managed, and photographs of Sergei, the couple’s only child.

Olga returned with two cups of black tea and a plate of homemade pryanik, a kind of flat honey bread that Kate had developed rather too much of a taste for in her time as a student. She smiled as Olga offered her the plate. ‘You remembered.’

‘Of course.’

Olga spooned sugar into Kate’s tea without question, then leant forward to take her hand again, eyes bright. ‘Tell me everything! Sergei says you are married.’

‘Was.’

‘Ah, I’m sorry. But these things happen.’ Olga and Pietr’s devotion to each other had been legendary. ‘Children?’

‘Two. Fiona is nearly sixteen and Gus – short for Angus – thirteen.’

‘You have pictures?’ Kate fumbled for her phone and flicked through it until she found a photograph of Gus and Fiona. It had been taken on the terrace of the hotel in Venice. Olga nodded approvingly. ‘Such a pretty girl. Like you.’

‘Ha, I’m not so sure.’

‘Do you work in Russia?’

‘No.’ Kate realized she had lied too quickly. ‘Very rarely.’

Olga’s beady eyes gazed at her steadily. A former teacher, she was a hard woman to fool. She could and did switch from Russian to English and back again, but Kate continued to speak to her in Russian. ‘If only he had won your heart,’ Olga said heavily.

Kate stared at the floor. ‘I’m not so sure he didn’t.’

‘I mean truly.’

‘Perhaps if I had not been already committed to someone else . . .’

‘And now, it seems, you are free.’

‘Yes, I suppose I am.’

‘Is that why you have come?’

The directness of the question had Kate suddenly lost for words. ‘No . . . I don’t think so. Not specifically, but in the hope of seeing him perhaps. He was always a great friend to me.’ Kate looked at the photograph of Olga’s husband on the dark dresser beside her. It was from his days as a soldier in the Soviet army. ‘How is Pietr?’

‘Only the dead can know.’

‘Oh . . . I’m so sorry.’ Kate could feel her face reddening. ‘When did . . .’

‘A few months ago.’

‘I’m sorry, Olga. I know how close you always were.’

‘Sergei is devastated. I think somehow it is even worse for him. He worshipped his father.’

Olga retreated into her thoughts. Kate turned to the window. It seemed indelicate to intrude further. ‘Is Sergei here in St Petersburg?’ she asked, as innocently as she could manage.