On any quietish Sunday when they were at home, after they had been to Mass and enjoyed a family lunch, the stocky and dapper figure of Erik Palmstierna would materialise outside in his car. If the day were fine, he and Adila would go for a drive – Erik loved driving, the faster the better; she would trot out to meet him in a flurry of hat, fur and bead necklaces, as eager as a young girl on a first date. Later they would have a session with the glass, for which Alec might or might not join them. Jelly was always relieved when Adila’s musical commitments interfered with the baron’s plans, for her sister’s career as violinist remained almost as busy as her own.

Adila refused to accept Jelly’s resistance to their ‘psychical research’, eager to point out that concern with the esoteric was part and parcel of artistic life, whether in the form of spiritualism, Theosophy or both. Jelly knew by heart the decades-long list of Theosophically inclined artists: Alexander Scriabin, Paul Gauguin, Charles Rennie Mackintosh, D.H. Lawrence, Khalil Gibran, Gustav Holst, for a start. ‘And I need hardly mention the Yeatses,’ Adila added. ‘But it’s so simple. It’s the heart of religion, without the mumbo-jumbo.’

Jelly did not see why, just because it was fashionable, just because Willy Yeats was involved along with his wife ‘George’ – one of her dearest friends – that meant she should be too. She had read, many times, pamphlets declaring that Theosophy, or Ageless Wisdom, represented the unifying thread behind all the world’s religions: the same truth illuminating the various beliefs, rituals, symbols and myths. That was already quite enough mumbo-jumbo for her. She hated arguments, and she knew Adila would never budge. Therefore she would kiss her sister and let her win.

Feeling mortified, she began a hunt in her room: somewhere she was sure she had a photograph of herself and George in their twenties, glowing with joy at the top of Garsington’s sloping lawn, Jelly with hair plaited and coiled around her ears, George with a long dress and a cascade of loosened tresses. Together, post war, they had made up their minds: in art alone one finds salvation. Her cupboards held box upon box of old letters, postcards, concert programmes and photos, but the one she wanted now was eluding her.