‘Mm.’ He shakes his head and put his plate to the side, takes out one of his millions of hankies and dabs at his mouth before picking up his tea and gulping some down. ‘Fore that, when your grandmother was a girl workin out at Eidsvold Station.’

He isn’t deliberately teasing me – he has to see and I have to prove that I’m worth it. Knowledge for us isn’t like rocking up to school or opening a book and it’s all there laid out for you. You have to prove yourself, that you deserve the old people’s trust, and even then there are some things they will never tell. I’ve had those yarns with Nan, but I’m almost an adult now, the rules have changed. I’d never had this kind of talk with Pop. I should be honoured that he was willing at all, especially about Nan. He hasn’t said a word about her since the funeral.

I might be ready to jump out of my seat and throw a full-on tanty till he told me what I want, but I won’t. It would get me nothing and Mum would pitch a fit if I did something that disrespectful. Worse, Pop wouldn’t tell me anything ever again.

‘But you would’nt’ve been ere then, ay?’

He waves his hand in a northerly direction. ‘I was up round Rocky then, happened while I was out there. Young woman snatched was all I heard. There was nuthin in the newspapers, not till the end and not about what happened to er.’

It’s said to his mug, not me, and I can see he’s getting jittery talking about it. Still, this is for Laney. I so desperately want to push, to know.

‘Do you remember what year, Pop?’

I watch him pull back and look at me, the ends of his eyebrows falling over his dark brown eyes, creating a screen that he watches me from under. There’s a second I think for sure he’ll clam up.

‘Mighta been ’47. No, had to be ’48, a few years fore I met your nan.’