‘Sorry I screamed. But I wasn’t expecting to find you prone in the scullery. I mean, it’s not the normal way my visitors arrive.’

‘I’m not visiting. I’m mending your boiler.’

Maddy tried to remember. Had she told him about the boiler last night? Had she issued him an invitation to sort out the vagaries of her heating system? Had she told him where the back door key was hidden for him to gain access? ‘I don’t understand …’

‘Your sister came across to Peapods this morning.’ Drew was piling workmanlike tools into a box. ‘She introduced herself. A very friendly girl. Is that her own hair colour, by the way?’

‘I don’t know. What colour was it?’

‘Sort of apricot.’

‘No, then. So Suzy asked you to fix our boiler?’ Maddy was horrified. ‘I really am so sorry. She shouldn’t have –’

‘Will you stop apologising? I offered. When she arrived to introduce herself I was checking out those peculiar steam bath things the health studio had, and wondering whether I could use the sauna pool for my horses. She, er, Suzy said the horses were luckier than some humans – at least they got warm baths. It went on from there.’ He snapped shut the tool box. ‘I said I hadn’t really got much on. My furniture won’t be arriving for days, my horses aren’t due for at least two weeks, I can’t interview any staff until I know just who I’ve got coming over from the island. I was at a bit of a loose end, so I said I’d have a look at your boiler. She told me the key lived in the wisteria. So,’ he shrugged, ‘here I am – and it’s fixed, by the way.’

‘Really?’ Maddy beamed. ‘You mean we can have heating when we want it and baths at any time? God, that’s luxury. It’s never worked since I moved in five years ago.’

‘Your landlord should have fixed it for you.’

‘Diana’s my landlord, and I pay such a piddling bit of rent it seemed like a cheek. And then when I asked heating engineers for quotes they were far more than I could afford …’

Drew smiled for the first time. A slow, devastating smile. ‘I assume you had this cottage when you and Mr Knightley were together, so why couldn’t he have fixed it for you?’

‘Oh, Peter never lived here – and he didn’t do practical things. He just dreamed up schemes, had meetings, made money. He didn’t like getting dirty.’

‘Somehow I’d guessed that. No one who likes getting dirty would wear designer cream trousers in a horsy village. He probably won’t again anyway – not if we’re going to be in the same social circles.’

‘You disliked him, didn’t you?’

‘That’s a bit unfair.’ Drew leaned against the tumble dryer. ‘I hardly know him. I’d heard of him, naturally, as he’d once owned Peapods. He seemed very proprietorial towards you. I’d already decided that you were a nice lady. I thought you might need rescuing.’