Given the waiting lists ahead of us, that was not likely to happen any time soon, but that was Mark all over. He liked to kid himself he was in control… but actually, he just had a habit of avoiding anything that reminded him he wasn’t.

I made sure the house was spotless before the teacher arrived; at least that made me feel that I’d done as much as I could to prepare. I couldn’t help but feel that everything about Daisy was now under the microscope, including me and Mark, our relationship, our parenting, and the home we had provided for her.

Mary Greengage turned out to be a pleasant, grey-haired woman with a calm, authoritative manner, dressed in the kind of clothes that teachers wear to appear smart but approachable – cardigan, floral blouse, skirt, sensible shoes. I showed her a couple of Daisy’s favourite toys – most of them lit up, or made sounds that drove Mark crazy – and she watched Daisy play and made a few notes, and then I offered her a cup of tea and she said yes.

It was soon after four, and already dark outside. Daisy was in the dining room, rolling out playdough worms on the table, and Mary stood next to me in the galley kitchen in front of the blind-covered window as we waited for the kettle to boil.

I said, ‘Did you meet Amy? At pre-school?’

‘I did have a chat with her, yes.’

‘I don’t know if she would have told you this, but Daisy loves playing with gluesticks. I don’t mean with glue on them – clean ones. She likes to twiddle them round between her hands. Amy keeps a little tub of them on a shelf by the door specially for Daisy, so she always knows where to find them.’

‘Mm,’ Mary said non-committally.

The kettle boiled and clicked off. I poured the water onto teabags in two mugs and was hit by a sudden and intense spasm of doubt.

I said, ‘Do you have any idea why Daisy does it?’

‘Does what?’

‘Twiddling things, or twirling them between her hands. She’s always done it. I mean, she’s done it for as long as she’s had the physical ability to do it. She used to sit in the middle of the living-room carpet surrounded by toys, playing with an old sock – flipping it up and down as if that was the most interesting thing in the world.’

Mary cleared her throat.

‘It could be what is sometimes described as repetitive behaviour,’ she said.

‘Repetitive behaviour? What does that mean?’

Suddenly she was as stiff and expressionless as a piece of paper, and I knew straight away that it did mean something, something big, and that Mary Greengage was worried about how I might react to it.

‘It could suggest a diagnosis of autism spectrum disorder,’ she said.

I very carefully poured a little bit of milk into both our mugs, fished out the teabags and dropped them in the pot with all the other used teabags and put on the lid.